Easter 2008

I am completely behind on putting photos and stories on the blog so I am trying to catch up!

Matt's mom came to Dallas for Easter. We made some yummy brown sugar cookies from Cooks Illustrated for the "break the Fast" reception at the church. We then went to the Easter vigil which is such a beautiful service.

Matt made a wonderful brunch the next day. I was pretty spent an very tired from the girl in my belly. He grilled some salmon on cedar planks and made a mustard sauce. He also grilled some asparagus. Then we had some decadent potatoes au gratin. Of course, we needed dessert so we had some lemon bundt cake. It was all wonderful!

Here are some photos from the brunch: share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AaN27dq2ZNGEx

What I did over the holidays

I wish I could personally wish everyone a Happy New Year! Since I can't, I thought I'd summarize what "we did over Christmas Break".

We had mom's family here for brunch on the 23rd. We have had a couple of dinner parties since we bought the house in April but we decided it would be fun to have all of Mom's family (14 people) sitting down at brunch. It was a lot of fun! We pulled the breakfast table into the living room and all of us were together. We had spinach & gruyere strata, cinnamon rolls (gosh they were good), breakfast potatoes, bacon and fruit salad.

We had dinner that night with friends that I grew up with. We had a wonderful beef tenderloin and we exchanged funny gifts. I ended up with a cow puppet that mooes - it appeared at several other events.

I had the 24th off so I baked cookies most of the day. I baked cookies a couple of weeks ago in Wichita but I wanted the experience of making them in my own kitchen. I had a wonderful time. I was getting laughed at because I had "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" cartoon playing on TV - but it was a great way to enjoy the holidays.

We went to the church to set up some food that mom made for the priests and choir. The last few years she and a friend have fed the priests between the 4 Christmas Eve services. Then we went to Mom's house for the annual Christmas Eve Shrimp Curry feast. Why shrimp curry you might ask? Well, my mom has a bunch of friends from the church to her house for Christmas Eve and then we go to church afterward. One year she made Sprimp Curry which was my Great-Aunt Myrtle's specialty. My dad and I love it. The next year, my mom said that she was getting a Honey Baked Ham for Christmas Eve and we told her the Baby Jesus wouldn't come if there was no Shrimp Curry. So now it is Christmas Curry and we all look forward to it every year.

We slept in on Christmas morning and had a nice, lazy breakfast. Then we exchanged gifts and he made some lasagna for dinner. My parents came over and we ate some goodies while we opened some more gifts. Then we had some wonderful lasagna, some salad and Christmas cookies. A great day!

We had lots of friends in town for the holiday and it was a lot of fun to have them over or meet them out for meals. It's been a wonderful time but I do not think it's possible to eat another morsel of food!

I have some photos from our holiday here:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AaN27dq2ZNHzg&emid=sharview&linkid=link4

Celery Stalkers

We joined a Produce Co-Op with some friends that is called Celery Stalkers. In essence, there are 12 members and every other week, we pay $10 and get a box of fruits and vegetables from a wholesaler. Each member has to pick out the produce twice a year. The quality is good and it's fun to see what other people have picked.

We only know 2 of the other members. So a couple of weeks ago, I found myself going up to a random house in the dark, knocking on the door and whispering, "I'm here for Celery Stalkers."

I am not a person who deals with ellicit substances but I felt like I was doing something very, very dirty.