'twas a good christmas

Things are getting back to normal around here (i.e., the cat has reclaimed her home and is no longer hiding), but AJ and I had a great Christmas with a number of parties, events, dinners and a visit from my family for the New Year.  It was great to celebrate the season with those close to us - we missed many of you this holiday, but we look forward to connecting with you ALL in the New Year!

A brisk walk to Candy Cane Lane

 Santa and Mrs Claus showed up in their phat ride!

  Christmas Eve Nutcracker performance - all sets designed my Maurice Sendak of Where the Wild Things Are!

AJ and JJ at the theater

Christmas morning bloody marys - the only way to do it

AJ and JJ gazing on in merry wonderment

Engaged in lively Christmas dinner conversation

Christmas dessert: carrot cake and pecan pie!

A dark and stormy sunset

A visit to the snowy mountain town of Leavenworth

AJ and JJ under the Christmas lights in Leavenworth

AJ going after the famous Bavarian Pretzel Tree

Mar and Jer lookin sharp while experiencing two completely foreign entities: snow and cold

Leavenworth's festive Christmas lights

Seattle Conservancy's pointsettia collection

A fantastic New Year's Eve sunset over the Olympics

New Year's Eve dinner with the Parents, Uncle Money, and the Blondes

good eats and good vino!

baby Hala scoping her mini-sized veggie burger

A dessert for the ages: homemade layered ice cream cake and rum cake

2013's first day

AJ and I spent a low-key New Year's day in Seattle, enjoying the sun and the views, exchanging well-wishes with neighbors, and strolling through the 'hood - perfect for the first day of the year.  We hope you all had a pretty-perfect day too, and that the coming 364+ days bring nothing but good stuff for you and yours.

frozen lupine leaves this morning

migrating ducks hanging out in Greenlake

late day light on the mountain

our little kitty cat keeping warm

 finishing the day with a sip of Patron, compliments of the grandparents

memories of sunny days...

The above picture is what we've seen around here for...oh, I don't know...what seems like forever now.  I realized that since Tahiti, the only sun we've seen was in New Jersey at Thanksgiving.  And that made me think of those fun south Jersey memories - so I figured I'd share a few pics of good times from a great visit back east.

Philly lookin good on a crisp, fall day

The peanut gallery in the backseat, going to the Barnes Foundation downtown

The Barnes Foundation standing tall on beautiful night

Abby, AJ, and Ron-meister

After some good eats - at the Belgian Cafe

The East Coast family looking sharp

Finishing out the evening at The Corner

the scene around the neighborhood

Woodstown Lake

christmas at the muttons

AJ and I are excited for Christmas.  And, its a chance for the Centenarian to get all dudded up and lookin excellent.  We were the first on the block to get the outside lights up, and now its time for a tree - so this weekend we walked down to the corner fruit stand and carried home a 7-footer.  It's lookin like the holidays up in here.

 "This one?"

"No, this one!"

Deckin the halls with a Syrah taste test - a good way to welcome Christmas.

friendsgiving (portlandia style)

I can't believe it - Adrienne and I just celebrated our 4th Thanksgiving in our little house!  Yes, I'm aware - we have a few days before the real holiday, which we will happily celebrate in Jersey.  But its fun to carve out our own Seattle traditions too, so we had a Portlandia-style Friendsgiving yesterday.  Uncle Mark made the annual pilgrimage down here from the Valley of the Rain, and our bestest of friends Simon and Faith came over with baby Hala to join in the festivities.

But we all know the REAL reason everyone made the trek was to nosh on AJ's food creations and imbibe perfectly paired alcoholic beverages.  See below for the menu, the drinks, and a few shots from the day.  BTW, most of the ingredients were garden-grown or homemade. 

I know...its disgusting.

a set table with things we've never used before - chargers (who knew there were plates-placeholders for plates?) and extra leaves for our table

a kitchen prepping for a feast

AJ needed me outta her hair, so she deployed me to the Seattle Car Show for 1/2 the day - unfortunately, I was a few $ shy of driving something like this home...

this is what I came home to - a menu board outlining the gastronomical day with snacks ready to go

for starters, AJ made a Jerusalem Artichoke soup with crispy-fried sage leave

wine pairing for the 1st course: 2009 v 2011 Mirth Chardonnay

light reflection off the dinner plate - art on my table!

good people - AJ, JJ, and MW

more good people, Simon and Faith and cranberry-sauce-lovin Hala

spicy lentil tarte, pureed parsnips and sauerkraut, chanterelles, cipollini, and horseradish, molasses fennel rye bread

wine pairing for 2nd course: 2009 Pinot Noirs, Cambria v Benton Lane

dessert time - pumpkin pie with tahitian vanilla ice cream

food forests, con't

I have to laugh when I look at the previous post about our mushroom outing - what amateurs!  Only found enough mushrooms to top veggie burgers?  Pathetic!

Those were the old days (yes, the old days were ONLY two weeks ago).  We are now stalking our mushroom prey with such immense success that we are making entire meals out of the stuff!  Last week, we took some friends to a couple places and had pretty good luck.  And today, we rolled out of bed and into the soggy foothills to test our skillz again - we were home by noon with $60 worth of 'shrooms.  That's about 3 lbs.

One of the coolest things about mushroom hunting is seeing all the varieties out there.  Even though we're searching almost exclusively for chanterelles, the forest is teeming with other funky mushrooms.  Below are a few of my favorite images from the past two weekends.

This one will actually kill you - 20 mins, dead.