Joshua and Bevin

You’ll never guess what I’m doing.  Okay, maybe you can.  I’m making cookies.  Woo!

They’re cinnamon-oatmeal-white (and milk) chocolate chip-walnut-cranberry cookies.  I know, that’s a lot of ingredients.  Originally I was going to make them with just the walnuts and the cranberries, but I was reading the recipe pretty loosely and just ended up adding chocolate chips, not realizing that I hadn’t planned to add them after all.  On top of that is the fact that I didn’t have as many white chocolate ones as I would have needed, so I just topped it off with whatever I had left of the milk chocolate chips.

Either way, they’re baking now and hopefully my dad’ll give me a call back later so I can give him a couple.

Josh doesn’t yet know that I’m making them, so that’ll be a nice surprise.

In other news, I’ve reached a new low.  I usually put on a show from TV-Links while I’m baking or doing the dishes or something, but lately I’ve been running out of things to watch there.  For one, many shows don’t have complete seasons available, so I tend to skip over them.  For two, the rest of the shows that are readily available, Josh wants to watch too.  What am I left with?  The equivalent of TV’s garbage.  Case and point: right now I’m watching The Ghost Whisperer with Jennifer Love Hewitt.   Sigh.

I picked this show because my mom watches it (even if guiltily), so at the moment I’m keeping a tally of all the outfits she wears on the show that do not reveal massive amounts of cleavage.  So far I’ve counted one.

Later tonight after Josh gets home I’m going to make another pear/blackberry/goat cheese tart, and this time I promise that I’ll take a picture.  I have a bit of trouble calling it a tart though, despite the fact that it probably is due to the ingredients.  When I was eating it last night all I could think about was how danish-y it tasted, and how great it would be with just a little bit of frosting drizzled on top.  Who knows.

I’m off to go eat (oops, I meant bake) more cookies before my dad calls me.  And hey, maybe I’ll get to mark off another check on my list and bring us up to two.

This spiffy keyboard certainly makes it easy to update the blog.

I don’t really like calling it a “blog”, because I don’t actually do what’s normally considered “blogging”.  I “journal”, I think.  I don’t think that I’m really passing any kind of useful go-out-into-the-world-and-succeed kind of information… it’s just stuff about my life and what I’m doing at any time.  Maybe I should refer to it as journaling?

Either way, I met with my mom this morning for coffee.  Actually, she called me at 7:50am and told me she’d be in Bellevue in 10mins, and did want to get picked up and go to Specialty’s Bakery with her for coffee?  After a harried 10mins of rushing around trying to get ready in the morning we went over to the mall and spent a few minutes there.  I got a grande vanilla latte, and afterwards a day-old peach scone.  Yum.

It was only then that it occurred to me to hang out at the mall until Josh was on lunch and go somewhere with him.  Luckily I had a book and my knitting with me (along with my iPod) to keep me going.

We went to the little Greek place at the mall and I got my usual lamb gyro, which had much more lamb in it than expected (yum!).   After that we went to Jamba Juice to get Josh a smoothie and he tried his best to convince me to walk over to Hilltop and ask them what happened.  Obviously I ended up going, but before I did I went to Aveda.

I did get something there, heh.  I got a $10 bottle of hairspray.  Woo!  Now when I style my hair with my new HAI ceramic straightening iron, I can actually keep it that way for awhile.  I did make a good attempt to put the purchase on Allison’s account so that she could accrue points towards cool stuff, but they didn’t seem to be able to find her in the database.  Sad.

Guess who works there though?  Katya.  Old friend from elementary school.  Never expected to see her there!  She told me to look for her on MySpace and add her there.  I have to remember to do that.

Okay.  Today there are things to do, like tidy up the apartment, do dishes, and fold laundry.  I’m going to make something yummy tonight though: Goat Cheese, Pear and Blackberry Tart.  Yum!  I hope I don’t screw it up too badly.  *crosses fingers*

Oh, and the other day I made cookies.  They had white chocolate chips in them, and on top was a sour cream dark chocolate-raspberry frosting.  Best thing ever.  Now all I need is a metal bowl with handles so I can temper chocolate without scaring my hand into thinking we’ve moved to the equator.

You’ll never guess what I’m typing on.

That’s right, the new Apple keyboard.  Woohoo!

Josh got it on refresh for $30 at work and it’s pretty great.  He has his spiffy FingerWorks multi-touch keyboard that he uses with the iMac, and now I have the new version of Apple’s keyboard to use on the iMac.

For one, I don’t yet type in Dvorak, so I don’t really like using the FingerWorks, and for two I’m not used to the whole touch typing thing yet.  Our old keyboard that originally came with the iMac is certainly a bit more clunky, and wouldn’t really be a problem if it weren’t for the fact that I can’t get the damn space bar to work!

Every time I type on the thing I hit the space bar and nothing happens because it didn’t want to press down (or maybe it just hates me), so as a result I don’t use the iMac much.  *gasp*  I know, I know, it’s really bad, especially since that’s where all of my photos are that need to be uploaded into my Gallery page so that I can blog about them.  Don’t worry… all will be righted now that I have regained my typing efficiency.

I love this keyboard.  Typetypetype.

Yes yes, I know how long it’s been since I posted.

So California was a blast.  Josh and I left Sunday evening and arrived late-ish.  The hotel was surprisingly nice for $129 a night.  We had quite the large room, and the bed had four (4!) down pillows, not to mention a down comforter.  There was a loveseat, desk with two armchairs, and all the wood was a dark mahogany.  Mmm.

They also had a pool/hot tub, which was equally nice.  Josh and I went to Target on the way to the airport to get him some swim trunks and found a pair for $20.  Josh claims that guys “never try things on”, and despite the fact that I urged him to he didn’t.  You can guess what happened when we got to Cali and tried them on, right?

Luckily there was a Target in the area and they were happy to refund us the money, at which point we went and got him another pair (in a better color).  The pool was used twice, once on Tuesday night (yay for pools being open until 10pm) and again on Thursday night.  By then all the weekenders had arrived at the hotel though, so there were many people in the pool and hot tub.  Not as exciting.

Most of the time for lunch Josh and I just ate in the food court at the mall (great chicken sandwiches!) but on Thursday we went to a burger place that was just a 15min walk from the mall.  It was great!  You got a piece of paper and filled out all the stuff you wanted on your burger, like what kind of meat you wanted, any toppings, and what kind of cheese you felt like today.  They had many, many options which made it exciting.  Brie on a burger?  Yum!  Although I had feta cheese on mine.

While Josh was at work (which was approx. 8am-5pm every day) I wandered around the mall, shopped, read, and knit up a storm.  There was a Starbucks there, so that’s usually where I spent my mornings since that’s where Josh and I got our coffee.  I ended up getting two pairs of armwarmers knit during the week, and managed to start on another project.  Woo!  Then I’d meet Josh for lunch, and in the afternoon I’d either shop or spend my time at this wonderful bakery that had the best crossiants.  Mmm!

Valley Fair mall is even more ritzy than Bellevue Square Mall, if you can believe it.  Although it only gets that #1 position because it’s so much bigger than Bellevue Square!  Easily twice its size.

Ooh, and they had a Teavana!  We all know how much I like to go there here in Bellevue, so it was wonderful to see it at Valley Fair.  They were a bit on the small side though because they barely had room to stand, let alone put chairs and tables.  The best part was another tea shop that was also at the mall (much like Teavana) called Lupicia.  I guess they hail from Japan, because most of their stuff is in Japanese and all the tea is pre-packaged there.  I got a booklet from them and when I took a look at their brick & mortar stores I discovered that they had at least 100 in Japan, and about 6 in the US.  Ha!

Either way, I got the most delicious tea while I was there.  It’s an apple green tea, and oh boy is it good.  So far I’ve only had it iced being as it’s so warm these days, but come winter I bet it will still be excellent.  Apparently flavored green tea has more potential for the flavorings to come through compared to black, and it’s certainly true with this tea.  They have an online website, but no way to order the tea (not even by mail!) other than by calling a toll free number.  At least there’s a way for me to restock my supply.

We did go to some yummy places for dinner.  One of them was By Th’ Bucket.  We had a good laugh whenever we drove by the sign (which was a lot), so one night when Josh asked me what kind of food I was in the mood for, I said “Italian and/or Seafood” so he went right there.  Apparently that was on the sign.

As it turned out the restaurant was nicer than we both expected, and we had the best appetizer one could ask for.  It was diced apple pieces with what seemed to be brown sugar, butter, and cinnamon, along with black cherries and walnuts.  On top of that was a bunch of brie.  That mix was then baked until the sugar carmelized and the cheese melted, and served with slices of sourdough bread to eat/spread it on.  So very yummy.  I want to reproduce it myself.  I had some lobster tortellini which was delicious, and Josh had halibut covered in asiago cheese.

One of the evenings we went to drive around 1 Infinite Loop, and another evening we went yarn store hopping, which was a lot of fun.  That’s where I got the lace yarn for the scarf project I started Friday.  It’s made my a local yarn company called (I think) The Yarn Place.  It’s black and burgandy mixed together… a very dark yarn.  It should look great.

I think it was Thursday night when Josh and I went to dinner at a place recommended by a coworker of his.  I forget what it was called, but they make pretty delicious steak & cheese sandwiches.  The half size is 12″ long, can you believe it?  Very delicious though.

Friday before we left I got us a yummy pastry/mini cake from the same pastry shop.  It was a mango/passion fruit mousse.  Best thing ever.

We dropped off the rental car at Hertz and went into the airport.  Nothing really exciting happened there I have to say.  Once we were in the airport and seated, we noticed that there was a much older man and his apparent grandson sitting diagonally from us, and at one point he came over.  He asked Josh if he was German and proceeded to talk about the kilt a bit, then suddenly he says that Josh and I are very cute together, and that I’m very beautiful and Josh exceedingly handsome.  The guy was quite cute.  Very appreciated.

I was amused while we were waiting in line to get on the plane, because Josh turned to me and said, “since we’re in boarding group A and will get to pick our seats, make sure you sit on the left side as we go in.  And make sure you’re in the front half of the plane in front of the wings.  That way we’ll be able to see out the window without the wing in the way, and the sun will be on the other side of the plane so you won’t have that in your eyes.”  That was totally not something I would have thought to consider as I was picking a seat, you know?  Of course it was quite the good suggestion, because it meant that we got to see out the window most of the trip without worrying about the sun in our eyes.

Other stuff might have happened, but I don’t remember it now and there are other things to talk about in the blog.

Where am I? At Christ the King of course. Josh is practicing the organ and I’m playing with the iPhone.

There’s kind of a lot going on this week as it turns out. Yesterday Josh and I went to the DMV to get the license tabs renewed on the Honda, but as it turns out they no longer tell you on your renewal form that it’s time fir you to get your emissions test, so when we got there yesterday right before they closed we were told that we were out of luck. Unfortunately since Josh works until 4pm every day and the DMV closes at 5pm, it’ll take us one day to take the test and another to get the tabs renewed.

Oh well. We got the test done today so we should be all set for tomorrow.

Today I tried to call my dad at lunch to take him out for his birthday , but he never called me back so I’m going to try again tomorrow. Friday is another one of those exciting days… I’m off to do two things: get my hair cut and go to dinner. Allison and I have been meaning to cut our hair for awhile now, so we figured on doing it together. We ended up making appointments for Friday so that we could show up to dinner with new hair. The only caveat is that our hair appointment is at 9am, while dinner is at, well, dinner time.

Josh, Allison, Lisa, her boyfriend Greg and I will all be going to The Melting Pot here in Bellevue. None of us has been so this should be a lot of fun.

That’s all for now. Gotta go!

As you probably know by now, I’m back in WA. Cali was a lot of fun, even though I didn’t get to hang out with my Aunt Mae, just my Aunt Diny and Uncle Gary.

When they got back to Seattle from their Alaskan cruise I snagged a ride down with them, but instead of staying ovenight somewhere on the way down as planned, we jiao made a go of it and got back at around 2:30am. Oof!

The rest of the week was nice though. I got to see baby Evan! He was adorable, as expected. He seemed to like me enough which was encouraging. It was a lot of fun to see Kristen and Karley although I fear that I have little in common with either of them. For one I don’t hve a newborn, and for two I’m not much of a “party girl” so going out to bars with Karley is pretty much out.

Regardless, it’s nice to see them again. Karley didn’t seem much interested in hanging out with me, as evidenced by the fact that she wasn’t busy Tues-Thurs and yet she stayed in Davis (an hour away) instead of at her parents. Dunno, seemed odd is all.

Either way they took me to this great place in downtown Placerville called Sweetie Pie’s for breakfast one day. Mmm. I had crepes stuffed with ricotta and cottage cheese, topped off with berries of all sorts and cream cheese type stuff. Right afterwards my Aunt and I walked over to the knitting shop downtown so I could get some sock yarn and needles… I didn’t have the needles I needed to start on my armwarmers.

So I started out this post on Josh’s iPhone but Safari was crashing a lot that day so I didn’t really get much of it done.  It’s a few days later, and I’ll try to finish up this post if I can.

While in Cali my Aunt and Uncle did have things that they had to do… like my Aunt had to go back to work at the middle school, and my Uncle volunteers now that he’s retired.  So most of Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday I just stayed at the house while they went off and did random things.  One or two of the days I went to Starbucks with my Uncle once he got home, which was fun considering the hot weather.  Apparently he’s addicted to raspberry mochas.

I did make two batches of cookies during the course of the week though.  Josh was kind enough to relate to me the recipes I’m used to using, so that was a big help.  The first time ’round I made peanut butter cookies, but didn’t realize that the sticks of butter my Aunt had were only 4oz. sticks, not the normal 8oz.  You can guess what happened.

They turned out okay though.  I also made some Cinnamon Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Walnut cookies… those turned out really well.  We only baked some of them; I left the rest of them in the freezer for her to bake some other time.

One morning we had “dutch babies” or something similar for breakfast.  We cut up some peaches and microwaved them with cinnamon, butter, and brown sugar for a bit.  Then we put them on some popover looking things that my Aunt baked in the oven.  No idea what the recipe was for that, but boy was it yummy.

Friday was Karley’s birthday, so Kristen and Karley were scheduled to come over.  My Uncle had a farewell party to attend in the morning, so my Aunt and I went with him and met Karley at the outlet mall while we were waiting for him (I didn’t buy anything).  Before we’d left, Kristen arrived but didn’t know we’d be going out of the house, so she didn’t have anything like a stroller for Evan.  She ended up staying at the house.

Once we got back Kristen handed Evan off to her dad and the four of us girls went off to see Harry Potter (again for me).  That was fun!

Uhh, I can’t really think of anything else that went on.  At one point during the week for dinner we had In-N-Out burger, which I just absolutely have to have every time I’m in Cali.

That’s all I have for this post.

Josh and I are out driving around doing a few errands like getting fish a heater and Josh a passport. Can you guess how I’m posting this?

Mwahahaha.

I’m off to California.  Well, technically I’m off to Whidbey Island, and when my Aunt and Uncle leave for Cali on Sunday I’m going to ride down with them, then next Sunday I’ll fly back.  That’s the plan at least… so I won’t really be communicating during the next week, unless it’s on my cell phone.  Feel free to call me on my cell.

Woo!

So last night Lisa, Allison and I went off to eat at Il Bistro in downtown Seattle.  It was really fun!  They were nice enough to pick me up and since there were 3 of us in the van we were able to use the carpool lane on 520.

The only disappointing part was that I’d made us a reservation for 8pm, but when we got there (after wandering around Pike Place Market because were early) we were told that they were about 45mins behind!  And on a Thursday night!  At first we were worried that we’d have to slip him a $20 or something, but he was so apologetic that we tended to believe him.

The service certainly wasn’t slow despite the fact that they were running late in any case.

I can’t talk much more about it now, but I will after next week.  Allison took some pictures while we were there, so I’ll post those later.