Thursday, September 21, 2017

A Birthday and Best Laid Plans

Jay and I are in the throes of moving into our new place, and we are having so much fun.

Our first day back in Orange County was my birthday, so we postponed all unpacking and devoted the day to celebration.

I've recovered from my flare-up, so Jay brought me my very favorite breakfast — in bed: pastries filled with real whipped cream!


In a victorious attempt to reenact our honeymoon, we ate all seven of these bad boys by ourselves, after which we promptly took a nap. Now that I am the ripe ol' age of 33, my idea of a good party is eating food while horizontal so as to transition to napping with minimal effort. Who knew 33 would be so glorious.



(Pastries are from Cream Pan, a Japanese and French bakery in Tustin).

After our nap Jay took me on a mystery outing. "Get dressed up and make sure you're hungry when we leave!" he said.


Our first stop was my favorite restaurant in Orange County, Gabbi's Mexican Kitchen. We ordered plates piled with homemade tortillas, pork, mole chicken, and fresh salsa; and we spent most of the time discussing the fabulous nuances of the food.

I'm so glad I'm married to someone who likes talking about food. I've missed food confab all these years (it is very hard to get excited about daily servings of squash, my friends) and I'm making up for lost time. Also: it's still hard to believe I can eat real, live dessert on my birthday.

When our bellies were full, Jay took me to the symphony to see Rachmaninoff. It was his first time at the symphony, and he loved it! I did, too. Whenever I go to a concert, I feel like the sound waves rush toward me and wrap around me in a big hug, as if to say: "You're here! We've been waiting for you! We want to invite you into our beauty!" It is one of life's best feelings.



And of course, we closed the night with a trip to Stars Hollow — we watched Gilmore Girls. It was the perfect end to a delightful day.

The next day we began moving stuff into our new place.

I wish I could report that we have been strategic and efficient movers, but we have been the absolute spaciest movers I have ever known. We've tried to be strategic and thorough; but we are worn out from the summer's fast pace, and our attempts at efficiency quickly morphed into a comedy of errors.

First, we headed to the storage unit in one city so we could bring some of its contents to my old place in another city. Then, we realized the keys to the storage unit were at my old place. So we turned around and headed to my old place to move my piano, before realizing the blankets to drape over the piano were in my storage unit. After successfully moving the piano (sans blankets) to a third city, we finally made it up to my storage unit, only to find it had closed. So we headed to a fourth city to pick up a desk, and determined to make it to our storage unit the next morning before heading back to the third city to drop some stuff off, before heading to the second city to drop other stuff off.


We traveled 70 more miles than we intended, but our spirits are still high, baby!

Now our little abode is piled rather high with boxes and is rather void of furniture, so we've been using box furniture:


A box dining room table! It's just the right size for two and doubles as a gift and mail holder between meals.

I love our box table dinners. I think I will miss them when we have a dining room table. This is probably a good thing, because Jay and I are shooting for the stars with our dining room table dreams. (I will tell you about them later!). Our grand plans mean we will have either have a beautiful dining room table soon, or we will not have any dining room table for quite awhile. Our track record this week makes me think I may be getting my box table dinners for awhile longer...

What a beautiful life it is.

Happy Thursday, friends.

-Sarah

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Thursday, September 14, 2017

Horses

The townhouse Jay and I have been staying in the last few weeks backs up against horse pasture. Some evenings, just as we are sitting down for dinner, the horses are released from their stalls to graze. We love watching them search for sweet clover. 



We often wish there was clover against the fence nearest our back patio so the horses would draw near enough for us to pet. Sometimes we try to convince them that the feeding opportunities near our house are tremendous. I may stand on the fence and wave a giant carrot in the air, or I may do my best horse call — which is, incidentally, a Mariachi shout — but despite my best efforts, the horses stay put. Until two mornings ago, when I pulled open the shades and saw one of the horses eating brekkie, right next to the fence nearest us. 



Excited at the prospect of hand feeding the horse (I have named her Stella), I ran outside and over to the fence where I was able to pet her. A few moments into petting Stella, I realized that, in my excitement, I had forgotten to put pants on. This is not the first time I have forgotten to put pants on before leaving the house; and I am beginning to wonder what old age will be like for me — and, more importantly, for the people who have to look at me, if this pant trend continues. (Have mercy!).

So I ran back inside to put pants on and grab some carrots for Stella. She was ready and waiting when I returned, as were a number of hungry horses.




This here horse is Jay's twin, with its tan hide and blond hair:

I have named him Barney. Jay is not sure if he is a Barney. (And neither of is sure if he is a "he.")

Do you see the resemblance?!


Once the horses learned we were the sole neighborhood carrot distributors that morning, they were eager for more.



So we kept more carrots comin'.



It was my favorite breakfast of the trip!


I hope you are all having a lovely Thursday!

-Sarah

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© by scj

Friday, September 8, 2017

Peck of Pickled Zucchini

My husband is a non-profit ministry founder. A skier. A volleyball player. A brat-and-summer-squash griller. He is a wash-the-dishes-right-after-dinner kind of dish washer, and a "sure, I'd love to run to Michael's Craft store with you" kind of pal. And, he is a Panther-who-pickles-pecks-of-peppers. Or slices of zucchini and yellow squash, as the case may be.

I was not familiar with his pickling ways when I married him, but boy am I delighted with them.

Today, I came down to the kitchen where he was prepping dinner and noticed this in the fridge:


Pickled squash!

Jay was preparing to grill some brats when he thought, "I sure do wish we had some more of that cheesy bread from the other day. That would be great with these brats"

But we had eaten all the cheesy bread, so he thought, "I wonder if I could hollow out a zucchini and stuff the brat in it..." He ixnayed that plan, along with a number of other potential plans, before landing on the mother of all plans: PICKLING! He would pickle some vegetables and cover his brat with them!

So he diced up some squash, covered them with pepperoncini juice, and stuck a teacup on top to keep all of the squash pieces fully submerged in pepper juice.

Don't I have an innovative husband?


It's just one of the may things I love about him.

Happy weekend, folks!

-Sarah

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© by scj