Thankful Thoughts
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Thanksgiving Recipes
Likely no one needs another Thanksgiving recipe, but here is my menu and my recipes nonetheless. We are hosting this year, there will be 6 of us, 2 vegetarians (well, pescatarians, they eat fish). I will do as much as I can tomorrow afternoon, assuming I get off of work early. Appetizers Wine I have 3 bottles of wine this year, which is too much for 6 people I suspect, but at least we’re prepared. I have a Cabernet Franc, a Cabernet Sauvignon, and a Chardonnay. Main Course Dessert Do you celebrate Thanksgiving? Any mashed potato tricks for me? I have some sour cream I might add…
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My Great Aunt Flo
Grandma on the left, my Great Aunt Flo on the right. Aunt Flo’s husband died in 1961, and she spent the rest of her life caring for family. For a cousin, for her parents, and then for my Grandma. When my Grandma died in November of 2016, Aunt Flo asked me, “Who am I going to take care of now?” I told her that those days were behind her, she needed to take care of herself. She spent her final years collecting recipes and going through family treasures. Then in late 2021, she went to a care facility, where she got excellent care and lived near her granddaughter, Debbie, and…
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Proof of Life
My poor avocado tree, which I grew from a seed and have had for many years, is not doing well. You may remember that its leaves fried in a 2 week heat wave this summer, though I watered my plants and tried to save them. I trimmed back the leaves, and have been watching to see if it might come back. There is new growth near the bottom of the trunk, but nothing higher up. What to do? It just so happens that one of my cousins knows a lot about plants, and is a Master Gardener. When I’m worried that I may have killed a plant, I consult her.…
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Staycation, Part II
The second half of our Staycation began on Wednesday, when we drove to wine country on our new tires. Ted’s uncle, aunt, and cousin live in Sonoma County, so we started the day having lunch with them. Long-time readers may remember the wedding we attended in 2019, with two ceremonies, beautiful horses, and a big family reunion. That was Ted’s cousin. She now has a 2 1/2 year old daughter, and is on the beginning of her maternity leave with a new baby, due in early October. We had lunch with Ted’s uncle, aunt, cousin, and the pre-schooler. That is one smart kid, and she’s so sweet. It was fun…
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Staycation, Part I
As mentioned in my last post, Ted and I took this week off from work for a staycation. We live in the San Francisco Bay Area, and people come from around the world to visit, so sometimes it is fun to play tourist in our own area. We decided we wanted to do a variety of things…some days chilling and maybe getting things done, some days out and about. Here’s a recap of the first half of our staycation. Saturday, we went to Ted’s parents’ house to celebrate his step-dad’s birthday. It was a low key party, just us, them, and Ted’s brother. Instead of cooking, we brought in take-out,…
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Friday Randomness
What’s new pussycat? Around here, it’s gotten hot again, though thankfully only for a few days, and never over 100 degrees. Today is the beginning of a cool down. One nice thing about September heat waves as opposed to July or early August heat waves, is that the sun goes down a little earlier, so the full heat of the sun isn’t beating on our house for as long. It’s the little things in life, right? I kept seeing this ad on Facebook. It’s for a t-shirt company. My thought? Hannah’s an actor! (Hannah is Engie’s dog) Do you see a resemblance? Here are some gross things. We recently had…
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Happy Independence Day
Happy Independence Day to my American friends! Our plans today include a small family BBQ with Ted’s parents and maybe his brother. I am looking forward to a good hot dog, as that is something I do not eat very often. Ted and I had a lovely anniversary together yesterday. We started the day slowly, went for a walk early before it got too hot, went to the grocery store for things for today’s bbq, and lazed around a bit. Then we hopped on our local transit (BART) and went in to San Francisco for the day. We took a cable car from the Embarcadero to the end of that…
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Catching Up
The picture above is from my favorite local church. In 2020, in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, they put up a sign that said “Created in God’s Image, Black Lives Matter, To God and To Us.” That sign was up for almost 4 years, and now has been replaced with the sign above, which has rainbow ribbons over the cross, and says “Nothing can ever separate you from the love of God. <3” Again, I had to pull over and take a picture, it made me so happy. If I were a believer, I would definitely go to this church. Well, a few things have happened since I was…
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Friday Thoughts
Sometimes I have all of the ideas, I know what I’m going to write about, and it comes really easily. Sometimes this happens while I am in the shower, and I forget by the time I’m near my computer. This is one of those times. So I’ll try to come up with something for you, but it’s not the good shower content. Sorry for that. The other day I was taking my morning walk along one of my regular routes. This route crosses our local waterway, which is quite deep and is intended to prevent flooding by rushing the water out of our local tributaries and down to the bay…
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Miscellaneous Monday
Many of you know Elisabeth’s blog, Optimistic Musings of a Pessimist. Elisabeth is such a thoughtful writer, I love her blog and am ever thankful to San for her organized NaBloPoMo for introducing so many of us to each other. Elisabeth sometimes has guest posts, and when she asked me if I would be interested, of course I said, Yes! So pop on over. Speaking of Elisabeth, she recently wrote about ice cream, and mentioned how much she loved the pistachio gelato she had in Spain. I decided I wanted to try some pistachio gelato with whole pistachios included, so I bought the Talanti brand, and it’s delicious! Is it…
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Miscellaneous Monday
First off, look at my beautiful Mother’s Day breakfast. We usually get danish for Mother’s Day, a tradition born when Maya was little and Ted worked early (before the sun came up) on Sundays, so this was something that he could put together before he left. She’s old enough to make me anything I might want now, and he works normal hours, but the tradition remains because I love danish, and the only time I eat them is Mother’s Day. Now look at this picture and tell me whether you think I have a skin cream addiction. I love skin cream, and I think I collect it now like I…
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Blood Orange, Fennel, Avocado, and Arugula Salad
Maya took me out for a lovely lunch on Saturday to celebrate Mother’s Day. We ordered a few items and shared them. We had a salad, some calamari, and tuna tartare. Maya doesn’t eat meat, but she does occasionally have seafood, and tuna tartare and calamari are definitely favorites. The salad was blood oranges, fennel, arugula, and feta cheese. Everything was delicious, but the salad was our favorite item. To drink, I had a lovely crisp Sauvignon Blanc, and she had her drink of choice, gin and tonic. I liked the salad enough that I decided to make it at home last night, and because everything is better with avocados,…
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Friday Five
It’s been a busy week around here! Here are a few things that are going on. Look at this Big Dumb Cup. My friend Neva gave it to me for Galentine’s Day. It holds 32oz, so I will not be dehydrated. I like having it at my desk. One of my bloggy friends (I forget whom) recently read Land of Milk and Honey, by C Pam Zhang. Based on your recommendation, I listened to it this week while out taking walks, cooking dinner, that kind of thing. I liked it a lot. The writing was lyrical in many places, which is interesting in a dystopian novel. Here’s the blurb from…
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Happy New Year
Ex-blogger extraordinaire (V-Grrl) Veronica is a Facebook friend, and she posted these wise words on New Year’s Eve. The sun sets on 2023, and my resolutions remain the same—savor small pleasures and ordinary moments, take care of my health, cherish time with those I love, be a good friend. I liked that a lot, a lot more than the idea of always trying to change who we are. So I’m taking her resolution and making it my own. I hope the holidays have been good to you. I had a lovely Christmas, and then the week before New Year’s was very busy at work, and now it is New Year’s…
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Merry Christmas!
Sending you all warm wishes for a very Merry Christmas! I haven’t been around much, this is a very busy time of year at work, and then on weekends there are parties and visits and so on. So I’m behind. I’ve read and enjoyed some of your posts, but have been too lazy to comment. I’m hoping that this upcoming week will slow down a bit and I can catch up. In the meantime, look at our ridiculous Christmas tree (which I love, btw). Our living room is TINY and there is no other place for it, so we bought the thinnest entryway type tree we could find. You can…
