Tag: mom

Fun in Minneapolis (the tl, dr edition)

I’ve been busy having fun & frolic with my family this weekend. This is the main reason I haven’t been updating my journal.

When I last left off, it was still Wednesday and we’d only just had naps. We had a few chores yet to do before Thanksgiving, including a booze run and the search for “real” cranberry sauce (the Ocean Spray variety in a can). Amy showed the folks the cottage they’ll be staying at most of the them they are here (they’re here for another week after I go). We also picked up Rachel at her apartment and got to see her little kitty, Charlotte.

We had Wine Time in lieu of supper where I had a pear hard cider (Fox barrel, so far my favorite pear cider). The cheese assortment was excellent, except for the sheep’s cheese that Amy had gotten from her cheese CSA. Ah well, they can’t all be winners. Amy, Rachel, and mom worked on baking the pies (sweet potato, apple, and pumpkin respectively) and I made my thanksgiving cheeseball. When everyone was back to their respective locations, Amy and I cleaned the turkey & let it soak in brine overnight.

Thursday was Thanksgiving and Amy and I got up at a reasonable hour in order to get things going. The cheeseball was finished, the turkey was prepped & stuffed into the oven, and the stuffings were prepared. Amy picked up mom and Rachel biked over while we were doing all of the rest of the work. Mom got the table set and it looked ecclectic and interesting.

Dad called later, looking for a thanksgiving dinner to be paternal over, so mom picked him up. And by 2pm, Amy’s friends, Jim & Carrie, arrived. Time to EAT!

The food was wonderful, the company excellent. I am very thankful for my family and our friends. And I’m really glad we got to come & visit Amy for the holiday.

The evening was closed with a game of Apples to Apples, which, frankly, is a little boring after playing Cards Against Humanity. Amy won the game. I had only 1 card at the end. Alas!

Rachel spent the night with us that night, and Charlotte was picked up because she’s still very young and hasn’t been alone all night yet. Curtis, my sister’s cat, tolerated his little cousin. He’s probably glad when she finally goes home. 🙂

The girls and I had decided there was one Black Friday sale that we had to attend. A local business had donuts and coffee, 10% off, and a free gift for $20 purchase (a $50 value). So we took advantage of their sale. I had two of their donuts (they kept insisting) and we each bought enough merchandise for the free gift. Rock on! Here’s to small businesses that take care of their customers!

We picked up the folks and then headed to Brit’s Pub for lunch. I had half a BLT and cock-a-leekie soup along with a Strongbow (on tap). We had a great time at the pub and I picked up the tab. It seems appropriate to eat there since it was Doctor Who‘s 49th anniversary.

Our only big box store visited that day was Target for a couple of things that we needed. It wasn’t overly crowded, whih was nice. Then we went to Depth of Field, the futon store that Amy got her futon from. She was determining what fabrics to get her bolsters and pillows in. Dad, meanwhile, investigated what on him kept setting off anti-theft devices in stores. To everyone’s annoyance (and my amusement), he kept removing stuff until he finally discovered it was something in his wallet. He eventually discovered a little RF antenna in it.

Our final shopping spot of the day was Midwest Mountaineering. This allowed us to have our parking ticket validated and both of the girls found useful purchases. Looking at the price of the Smartwool socks, I realized that my $9 Fox River socks weren’t too expensive after all. Heh.

We returned to Amy’s for pie and coffee. We finished off the apple pie (now with ice cream). Then we headed to mom & dad’s cottage in order to watch Brave on the nice TV there. Turkey sammiches were the snack of the night. Then Amy and I dropped Rachel off at her place (Charlotte had been dropped off earlier) and returned home for bed.

Yesterday (Saturday), we had several things planned in advance. To start with, Amy and I made breakfast. She made “refrigerator clean out” eggs in a tortilla wrap and I fried potato cakes from leftover mashed potatos. The breakfast was a success, if we do say so.

Next, we walked to the library so she could return some videos and get her books that were on order. Sadly, we were too late for her to avoid the late fee on the DVDs, but the fee is pretty reasonable.

Then we picked up the parental units and headed to the chicken coop. It was Amy’s day to feed & water the chickens. I helped! Sadly, the outdoor water faucet was frozen, but Amy discovered that after she dumped the water (whoops). So a short trip to Rainbow to buy 2 gallons of drinking water, and she was done with the coop chores.

I have a number of people I’ve known online for years and yesterday had the chance to finally meet one of them. He’s a member of the Greater Midwest Lego Train Club and they had an open house in the Brickmania Toyworks display room. So we went there and were awed by the train displays, and I got to meet Michael. I took lots of photos.

We had hopped to also visit an antique store in that area, but the frozen tap had other ideas. So we just hopped on the 35W and headed south to Bloomington to meet a friend of dad’s at Sawatdee for lunch. The lunch was good (I, of course, had tofu pad thai), and it was nice to see Bill again.

Since we were down in Bloomington, we decided to visit Ikea. I love shopping at Ikea. I think I need to visit my “local” next weekend. Heh. But I managed to refrain from putting stuff in the basket. Amy, meanwhile, scored a number of nice things. A Poang chair, stuff for her soon-to-be remodeled bathroom, and a few other odds and ends.

We dropped the folks off at their cottage, then put Amy’s purchases into her house and got snack foods, and finally picked up Rachel. Then it was Game Time at mom & dad’s cottage. Mom popped popcorn and we munched on that and cheese ball and crackers. We started with Euchre, where Rachel and I won after a slow start. Then we played Rumikub, where I won after a slow start. Heh.

So now Amy and I are relaxing on a fine (but chilly) Sunday morning. NPR is on the radio. We had a cinnamon roll (from Ikea, dad’s purchase) and steel cut oats (I doctored mine with brown sugar, almond slivers, butter, and banana). Tasty tasty. Dunno what we’re doing today other than eventually taking me to the airport. Gonna miss hanging out with the family, but will be glad to see the kitties again.

Long Day is Long

I got up this morning at 3:45am EST. It’s now 11:42pm EST, so I’ve been up for a long time. Why, you ask? Well, this morning the folks and I flew to Minnesota to visit my sister – woohoo!

Our flight took off at 6:45am and we got in early – 7:30am CST. Turns out Amy was mistaken on the arrival time (we were supposed to arrive at 8am, she was thinking 8:40) but she met up with us at the car rental place shortly after we had loaded it up.

We headed to her place of work for K-Day where they were celebrating with kalua, koffee, and kookies. Apparently this is a tradition on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. We got to meet several co-workers (current and former) of hers and it was always fun being introduced as “Amy’s sister” or “Amy’s parents” etc. 🙂

As I’m rather tired, I’m sure I’ll get some of this wrong, but I think we next went to pick up the turkey & last minute items from the co-op. Sadly, the “fresh” turkey was frozen, but we think we’ll be good for tomorrow.

Once back at Amy’s, we figured out where to head for lunch. We went to Herkimer Brewery as mom would get bonus points for her air miles card (or something). I thought the beer battered fish was very good, as was the tartar sauce. Sadly, some of the other things there weren’t quite as good. The fries were no better than ones you’d find in your grocer’s freezer. Ah well, the Strongbow cider was a plus.

We had a couple more things to pick up while out, then we returned home for naps. I didn’t nap, but got caught up on e-mail and twitter. But not LJ, sadly. Or else I wouldn’t be doing this now when I’m too tired to type. I think I’ll finish this for now and continue tomorrow (or whenever I next get to updating. Heh.)

Thanksgiving is tomorrow (minutes away in Ohio!) so y’all have a great day!

WoW claims another victim – NaNoWriMo

First, I should updated my WoW icon. I don’t play the two Horde characters in the list, and I don’t have my Worgen or Pandarian showing.

Second, I have now paused on my NaNoWriMo novel. I got past 6100 words, but then Parent/Teacher Conferences came. When I got home late from the first night, I realized I would rather play World of Warcrack than work further on my novel. (And I really don’t know what happened the day before – what was my excuse for Wednesday?)

Friday night we had a dinner party at a friend’s place. An Oktoberfest in November. What’s funny is what occured BEFORE the party…

See, thanks to my gaming addiction, I’ve been having issues getting to my parents’ house at the times I say I’ll be there. Dad now just expects me to be late ‘cuz it happens so often. (He is a scientist, you know, and is good with interpreting evidence.) So I was going to be on time, dammnit!

I actually set the stove timer to remind me when I should bug out Friday evening. I played WoW until the timer went off. And then headed outside. I scolded myself as I exited that I hadn’t parked in front like I’d told myself I would do in the morning. (I actually drove to work that morning since I was running late. I don’t game before work, but Twitter sometimes distracts me in a similar fashion.)

I walked into the garage and noticed the absence of car. Um, the reason I hadn’t remembered to park in front of the house? I hadn’t remembered to drive home! LOL. I stood there laughing at myself, then called dad on my cell as I started walking (quickly) to the school to get my car.

I wasn’t much later to the folks than I had intended, and we wound up being the first there to our friends’ place. The evening was fun and I had two hard ciders during the course of the evening. (Was fine when it was time to drive the folks home.)

And when I got home, I wasn’t in the mood to write. So the poor thing is languishing. I haven’t decided yet if I want to give it up or try to jump start it. We have another round of parent/teacher conferences on Tuesday. Then when Thanksgiving comes, I’ll be busy with family family family.

Hmmm, I have Christmas music playing now. Perhaps if I turned the novel to a Christmas story I’d be more likely to write it…

Wow, October’s nearly over!

Alas, one of my worst months ever as far as updating LJ. And it’s not as if I’m doing nothing. (Sadly, I suspect it’s the doing World of Warcrack which is preventing me from doing things like this, grading papers, cleaning house, etc… MMORPGs are bad, mmm’kay?)

Anyhoo, one of the most recent things that I’ve done (other than play video games) is attend a Halloween party. Friends invited my folks (and I crashed, which was actually OK with the hosts) to this party, with the invitation itself being a blank mask with instructions to decorate. I didn’t know what I was going to make mine into until the day of the party and opted for making it into a puppy dog, with a pair of socks for doggy ears.

doggytreen

I wound up winning the prize for most creative mask. Dad, meanwhile, had cut out his mask and had me print “Generic Mask” on it neatly. He glued it to a stick (ala Renaissance masks) and wound up winning the Funniest mask. Heh. Mom then topped us during the pumpkin carving competition by getting a special award for her puking pumpkin. A family of winners – woo! Tomorrow I’ll post punkin pix.

Oh, and this year will be my first year attempting National Novel Writing Month (AKA NaNoWriMo). Hoping it might jumpstart my blogging and possibly curb my gaming. Guess we’ll just have to wait and see!

Anyone have a novel plot idea????

Quicky end of month post

Can I get this posted before midnight? Let’s try!

Today the parental units and I went to the Tipp City Mum Festival. Lots of stalls selling things, mostly autumn-themed items. Several stalls with mums and pumpkins too. And of course, the most important stalls, the food vendors!

Dad and I each got gyros (mine lamb, his chicken), mom got a corn dog, and we split an order of spiral fried potatoes (basically, home made potato chips). Good eats. Then for dessert, the folks got a peach cobbler a la mode which was tasty, and I got the deep fried sampler: cheesecake bites, Nutterbutters, and Oreos. Almost too sweet for me (almost). Thankfully, the folks ate almost half of the sampler.

This evening was cards at Aunt Becky’s – probably the last time we’ll play cards at her house as she’ll be moving to a two bedroom apartment in two weeks. And we’ll probably play cards there (as she’s moving into the same complex as another of our regular card players). I came in second during the first game, and came in first during the second – woo!

Oh, and I think Sophie Aldred spoiled tonight’s Doctor Who episode for me. Reading Twitter before you’ve watched the episode can be a bad idea…

Oooh – I think I made the time – woo!

It’s Autumn!

Ah, the Autumnal Equinox! And the promise of autumnal weather (which we’ve been having) and autumnal sights (trees are looking like the trees in model train sets) and autumnal smells (love the smell of decaying leaves). 🙂

Our Grand Adventure today was for the folks and I to go to the Aullwood Apple Festival. Unlike the Troy Strawberry Festival, the featured fruit wasn’t present in most of the booths, which was a bit of a surprise. But the various booths had interesting items and lots of food choices.

Dad and I decided to try the “fish boats” that one tent was selling. And while we waited for our food, mom held up the tent for the folks making our lunch – it was so blustery the tent kept threatening to fall over. The fish was excellent. Mom opted to try the lamb chili that another place was selling – that was tasty too. I also had a lemon shake-up, which was mighty tasty. And just because I could, I had the “hot waffle ice cream sandwich” which is just as described. Interesting.

As we were finishing our lunch, big black storm clouds crept over the festival, so we (and half of the folks there) headed to the inside bits. Thankfully, the clouds blew over without raining, so we returned outside to share an apple dumpling a la mode before heading back.

The rest of my day was spent cleaning house and listening to the latest Big Finish Sylv audio, Gods and Monsters. And halfway through that story, I got to watch the latest TV episode, “The Power of Three.” Quite enjoyable. I’m gonna miss the Ponds!

Tomorrow is laundry day. And hopefully I get a nice walk in to enjoy our lovely weather.

What has Trina been up to?

My summer has been a nice and lazy one. I find myself in my library reading, sometimes with a cat, sometimes without (like right now – come on Lucy, get in here!) and that’s been lovely. I must remember how nice that is when things get crazy during the school year. 🙂

In between the reading (and the gaming), I have done some other things too. Like last Monday when mom and I went to a cooking class to learn some summer fruit desserts. Best $5 I’ve spent in a long time, I told mom. We learned how to make galettes (which are very easy with prefab pie dough), peach ice cream, chocolate mousse (made with ricotta cheese), and crepes (filled with lemon curd) with blueberry sauce. Everything was easy and delicious.

The next day, mom and I ventured out again, this time to watch my young cousin Sydney perform in a juvenile production of Annie. She was playing Miss Hannigan (alternating with another girl – the bigger parts were played by multiple people). It was a cute production – the kids did a nice job, though it was often hard to hear them, speaking or singing. Syd did a very nice job, IMHO.

Then on Wednesday, I had surprise guests – the parental units! They had popped in since mom had just had her hair done (her stylist is in my town, not hers) and wanted to see my ceiling fans. I gave them a tour and they liked ’em. They were going off to Trophy Nuts in Tipp to buy nuts (fancy that!) and I finagled my way to the Grand Adventure.

I bought a nice assortment of nuts from Trophy Nuts and my favorite preserves, too (hot pepper & peach preserves, if you want to know). Then we went to Harrison’s for lunch (and $.99 margaritas). I had finagled my way by offering my services as the DD. Heh. So I drove the folks home (to my place) and we chatted awhile until dad felt he was able to drive them home.

Friday evening was a meeting of our “Supper Club” at mom & dad’s. Normally, we go out with some friends (all now retired, except me) once or twice a month to a local restaurant. This time, however, mom suggested their hosting it. Dad has perfected pork chops with their new grill, so mom wanted to have that, cooler corn, and dad’s world famous slaw. The day of, 1 of the couples called to cancel – she had bronchitis, alas, and he was going to stay home & look after her. But the other two showed. Mom and I made a peach galette (since the missing couple was going to bring dessert) which turned out very yummy.

The evening was a success. The pork chops were perfect. The corn was wonderfully sweet. The slaw, popular. And the galette was also a hit. And the evening culminated with searches through annuals looking at photos of other former co-workers from way back when. (One of our guests couldn’t remember when she had started working at Newton, so we searched through the 80s to find her.) Those were a lot of fun for reminiscing.

Then, on Saturday morning, mom and I tried out our crepe-making skills for breakfast. Well, mom made the crepes, and I made the blueberry sauce. We also used lemon curd (mom got it from Trophy Nut) as the filling. We did a fab job, IMO. Dad agreed – it was a good second breakfast for him. (He gets up earlier than we do on Saturdays!)

Anyhoo, this week will be another lazy one, I suspect. I’m going to enjoy the hell out of these lazy days while I’m allowed them!

A Grand Adventure (in Cheese)

My family has a tradition of going on a Grand Adventure from time to time. Basically, we have a vague goal in mind and a vague destination, and there ya go: A Grand Adventure! So yesterday, the folks and I went on a Grand Adventure to Bellefontaine.

It all started with a Groupon coupon that my mother had bought for Blue Jacket Dairy (BJD). BJD shows up regularly at one of the Farmer’s Markets we frequent, so we were familiar with their cheese. The Groupon, OTOH, is only valid at their store, which is in Bellefontaine. The Groupon was going to expire soon, so we finally planned our Grand Adventure.

We packed a cooler w/ ice pack and headed north and east. We found the Dairy with only one turn-around (we do tend to travel by limits – think calculus) and entered the tiny storefront. It had to be the noisiest room I’d ever been in. Poor dad couldn’t hear a word that anyone was saying. Turns out they had sold out of a lot of their cheese just the day before, but they had my favorite (houtz – a hard goat cheese) and quite a few things that I wanted to try. The folks found some stuff they wanted as well.

Our next stage of the Grand Adventure was lunch. We drove around Bellefontaine looking for a nice lunch place and were disappointed. Their downtown was lacking shops and restaurants. We then looked for the ice cream shop associated with BJD, but there was no place to park and only outdoor seating. So we headed south to West Liberty.

There were some nifty shops to peruse here in the downtown area and one of the shopkeepers recommended Liberty Gathering Place for lunch. (West Liberty > Bellefontaine, even though it’s much smaller.) So we ate lunch there (I had a nice turkey club with fries & slaw, followed by a very yummy peach crumble pie a la mode) and then backtracked a little to Marie’s Candies for some chocolate.

As soon as we entered the store, they gave us all a sample. Then when we were perusing their various choices, the attendant asked what sorts of candies we liked, so she gave us samples of their equivalent. (Well, I’d started off by saying that we were from Winans country and here for the first time and I think she wanted to show us Marie’s was just as good, if not better, than Winans.) So I got $9 worth of chocolate candies (most with nuts but a couple of mints too).

The cooler, it turned out, was great for holding not only the cheese, but also the chocolate. Our Grand Adventure now over, we headed back south & west to home where mom & I went out to be Swimmin’ Wimmin. 🙂

Puny Poultry Days

After the lovely flowers of the Lost Creek show and the enormity of the Yellow Springs Street Fair, the Versailles Poultry Days was a bit of a wash. 🙂

It was hotter’n hell today (and summer’s not even here yet!) so that might have reflected a little on our attitude. We were mostly there for the food (like you do).

They really have the food lines down pat. We purchased a ticket for the chicken meal at one booth, then stood in line for the chicken meal. It was a very short wait. You get 1/2 a chicken barbecued with the Miss Chick marinade, a small bag of Mike-sells Potato Chips, a single serve apple sauce, and orange drink (so-named for the color, not the fruit, I suspect. Contained 0% fruit juice. It said so on the label!)

After the yummy lunch, I bought a lemonade shake-up that was inexpensive, large, but not sweet enough. It was refreshing, however, and did contain actual lemon! We cruised the craft tents, but nothing really appealed (except the booth selling kettle corn – mom and I each bought a large bag). I think we were probably there just over an hour. Quite a contrast from the other festivals of the weekend. Dad figures we need to get to at least 2 more festivals to make up for the non-event that this one was. Still, the chicken was very tasty.

Before the fun and excitement of the Poultry Days, I took my bike for a ride this morning to buy donuts for the folks and I. It was only about 10 minutes there and 10 minutes back and I didn’t squish the donuts – woo!

I was riding my new Cannondale Adventure 4. My original plan was to buy one of Trek’s women specific design comfort bikes, but while at the Family Bike Shop of Troy, I tried out a nifty green bike by Cannondale. I did some research and read good stuff about Cannondale and the Adventure 4 (a 2010 model), returned to the shop for another test ride, and wound up buying the bike. They had it built for me the next day (Friday) and I’ve been riding it ever since. Did I mention it was GREEN? 🙂

This bike will remain at my folks’ place since they are near the bike trails that go all over the place. I’ll keep my old bike at my place for P. Hill rides. My first big ride will be on Wednesday with friends – woo!

Festivals & Fairs: Summer has begun!

Last weekend was the Troy Strawberry Festival. To me, it signifies the beginning of festival season (with Oktoberfest in Minster signalling the end). Since the Adams Street bridge is out (they started construction right after last year’s festival), they couldn’t really hold the festival on the levy like usual, so they held it in downtown Troy.

It was nice, although a bit smaller than usual. My favorite vendors were there, however. I got my strawberry lemon shake-up from the usual lot, and lunch wound up being, for the third year running, a pork chop sandwich (bone-in). Damn good pork chops. I also sampled a strawberry pizza (not a good one, alas), strawberry empanada (tasty and not too sweet), strawberry smoothie (yummy), and strawberries on cheesecake (very nice).

Yesterday was the start of the Lost Creek Garden & Antique Show and mom wanted to get there early to have a good selection of flowers to choose from. Went to her favorite vendor first and she picked out 4 things (which the deer will probably eat, alas!) At another vendor, I bought a hypertufa filled with hardy succulents, which I shall endeavor to not kill. We also had supper there (chicken salad sammich, doritos, cookie, water) and sat on logs to eat.

Today’s Grand Adventure (TM) was visiting the Yellow Springs Street Fair. Usually when we attend it, we can park in Yellow Springs. This year, I think just under 4 billion people were there, and they brought their 3 billion cars with them. Thankfully, there was a shuttle service from Young’s Dairy, so, after going through town & back again, we parked at the shuttle lot & took a blue school bus to the Street Fair.

Despite the crowd, we were able to see most of the booths at the festival. We wound up having lunch from Jeet India‘s booth at the festival. Jeet is where I get my Indian Fud when I go to Fairborn for my Doctor Who Magazines at the Bookery Fantasy. Mom and I had saag paneer, dad had chicken tikka masala, and we all had vegetable samosas and naan with our meals. Very yummy. Once again, we sat on (or near) the ground. (We did this at the Strawberry Festival too – we’re getting good at getting up off of the ground.)

After we returned home, mom and I spent some time at the pool. (We were also there yesterday, before we went to the Garden show.) I used my snorkel and snorkel goggles – woo! I bought them as a birthday gift for me this year, but today was my first time to use ’em. It took awhile of breathing through the mouthpiece to get over my initial panic, but I spent several minutes swimming underwater – twice! I shall have fun practicing this over the summer.

Tomorrow’s Grand Adventure (TM) is the Poultry Days Festival in Versailles (pronounced ver-sales). So I suspect we’ll be having fun and food again tomorrow. Oh, and maybe tomorrow I’ll post about my new bicycle!