Are you guys related? No...YES!!!! part 2

Oh how I love food. Another place that Chris fell in love with on his last visit was the Barbeque Joint. It is a crazy kind of little place. From what I understand it has the best Carolina BBQ around. Even better than the famed Allen Bros. Knowing this, one would expect that they would have little to offer a veggie like me. Nothing could be further from the truth. Along with their amazing traditional southern foods and BBQ they have a gourmet selection of vegetarian dishes. Weird, right? I usually get their eggplant but they were closing for renevations for a couple of weeks so they were running down the kitchen. I had to make due with their homemade rosemary mac and cheese. It was fantastic. Another night, another set of wonderfully, over full bellies.

Matt and I had decided long before they arrived that we wanted to take them to one of our favorite local eateries, Buns. I'm pretty sure I've posted about Buns before. They use all local ingrediants, bake their buns fresh daily, and have really delicious dipping sauces for their fries. I'm a creature of habit and I always end up getting the veggie burger with goat's cheese and a balsamic reduction. Pretty fancy for a burger joint, huh? I think Matt tried the chicken breast this time which we've heard was really good. It didn't disappoint. Do I need to addthat we went home with happily full tummies? I think its a theme for their visit.

I don't want you all thinking that we only ate out during their visit. Michelle and I are very good cooks and we managed to turn out a couple of good meals. We had a large Christmas Eve dinner, consisting of turkey breast, mashed potatoes, candied yams, gravy, and stuffing. It turned out pretty darn awesome, if I do say so myself. Michelle offer to make one of her's and Chris's favorite dinners, tomato and red pepper soup with grilled chesse sandwiches and a carrot salad. I helped by making a rosemary olive oil bread for the sandwiches. The salad was really good. So good that even Matt liked it despite the fact that it was made with ranch dressing and baby carrots. Moe is definitly an excellent cook. For Christmas day Moe and I prepared a buffet for everyone to graze on throughout the day, a tradition stared by my mom, Debbie. There were several kinds of dip and cream cheese spreads, two sweet cream cheese spreads, some cold cuts, a veggie platter, and of course, a cheese array consisting of no less than six kinds of cheese. It was a good day. And in case any of the moms are still unsure, our rag tag group still made it to midnight mass, full tummies or no.

We were sad to see them go. I love having my family around, even my crazy brother ;) teehee. We had a ton of fun while they were here. Even though Chris tried to pretend that he didn't like going shopping with Moe and I. Matt and Chris played a couple of games of Heroscape which Chris, or really the Hulk, won. We watched a couple of movies and took a lot of naps. It was a lovely weekand I wished that it could have been longer.

Are you guys related? No...YES!

It has been brought to our attenion by several parties that Matt and I have been somewhat lax in our blogging. So let me regale you with tales of our Christmas.

In an attempt to save money and because it's getting harder and harder for Matt to take time off of work we did not travel this Christmas. Fear not! My brother and Moe came to stay with us for a week. Although I suspect that their real reason for visiting was to meet our little Zelda-girl. She was very happy to meet her ninos. In fact, she played nearly nonstop with Chris the entire time he was here. Needless to say she slept very well while they were here. They very nearly didn't get here. Their plane was late leaving California and they came close to missing their connecting flight.

I could regale you all with heartwarming stories of our family moments lovingly shared in front of the fire. However we all know the most important part of any trip my family is involved in is the food. Chris, having visited once before, had a small but unchangable list of places he wanted to dine at while he was here. On the very top of the list was Mama Dip's. If you've never been there, on your next (or first) trip to NC, you should make it a priority. Both sets of my parnts love it. Matt and I love it too but, as Steph says, it's the kinda place you should only have once or twice a year. So waitig until people come to visit is pefect. Every single thing I've had there has been delicious and all the meat eaters hav also been in love with their dishes as well. The main reason we really wanted to go was the fried pickles. I am a firm believer that frying foods can only make them taste better. Things that are already tasty come out heavenly. The fried pickle is one of those heavenly items. The pickles at Mama Dip's are fried to a golden brown perfection, they come out warm and have a bit of a spicy bite to them. We got two orders and at first Chris was worried that we wouldn't be able to finish them. They all disappeared, within a matter of moments. The rest of the night we all just kind of laid around the living room. We were too full and extremely happy about it. To be cont.

We're moving

To the Biltmore Estate.  I think with that many rooms they won't even notice us there.  Well, maybe they'll notice Zelda, but I can be real quiet when I need to.  Matt gave me my Christmas present early this year and took me to see the Biltmore Estate all done up for Christmas.  It was a lovely little trip.  We had lunch at Sheetz and then we got to Asheville a little too early to check into our hotel so we browsed a local pet store.  They had this nylabone rib toy that I was thinking of getting Zelda.  I didn't end up getting it but I still want to, I'm pretty sure she would have loved it.  We stayed at the cutest little hotel and the lady who checked us in was nice as could be.  We didn't have time to stay and admire our spacious room though, our reservations for the Biltmore were at 5:30pm.  A couple of years ago Chris and I were watching a program on the Travel Channel about "The most" McDonalds.  The one that they showed at the fanciest McDonalds was located in Asheville.  I promised Chris ahead of time that we would go and take pictures.  The place is pretty ridiculous.  It has a two sided fireplace, a vaulted ceiling, player piano, and wrought iron dividers.  Even the employees were fancier than normal.  It was pretty amazing.  Did I mention how cold it was?  It was freezing outside, literally.  It was snowing when we got into Milo to drive down to Biltmore Village, nothing major, just a few flurries.  Still, it was super cold and windy.  Luckily Matt and I had planned ahead and packed lots of warm accessories to help us through.  I can't possibly describe the Biltmore Estate so I'm not even going to try.  But it is beautiful and if you ever get a chance to, I would go.

Thanksgiving is gone but the leftovers are not

I wouldn't say our Thanksgiving went off without a hitch but I think it was a pretty smooth ride.  It took a little while longer to get the turkey in the oven than we had anticipated which turned out ok because Steph and Linda were also running a little behind too.  The group agreed that Catarina's candied yam recipe was amazing.  Linda stuffing was delicious, really delicious.  And I can't say enough about Steph's filling.  I could have just eaten that.  Matt's turkey got rave reviews.  There was so much food.  S&L also made a veggie platter, brussel sprouts, and green beans.  We all ate way too much and then lazed on the couches and watch Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, ordered special from netflix since Matt had never seen it.  Before we got to taste the apple pie, which was pretty beautiful, Zelda managed to pull the pie off the table.  Luckily the pie tin landed on the bottom corner so the pie wasn't ruined, just smooshed.  So it became more of a apple crumble than a pie.  I guess she figured that since we had allowed her some turkey with her dinner she would just serve her own pie.  The pie was delicious, crumbled or not, and the ice cream was fantastic.  The pumpkin pie was also wonderful and so was the cheesecake that Linda made.  At one point, Linda fell alseep on the futon and Zelda mirrored her position and fell asleep too.  As you would expect, we had a lot of leftovers.  I love Thanksgiving leftovers, I could eat them for weeks if I could.  As it is we had them at least one meal every day since Thursday.  I wish there were more, but we're slowly running out of them, dish by dish.  Now we're starting to gear up for Christmas.

The night before Thanksgiving and no one was stirring not even the puppy

Its the night before and we have things a rollin.  I baked up the pumpkin this morning but I haven't gotten around to the seeds yet.  I baked the pumpkin pie already and it looks delicious.  I still have to make the apple pie in a little while.  The cheddar cheese ice cream is getting frozen right now.  I tasted teh base though and its amazing.  I love cheese.  I think its going to go wonderfully with the apple pie.  I also already baked the yams so that I only have to mix them up tomorrow when its their time.  Zelda has been lending me her support all day by sleeping for most of it.  When we took the turkey out of the fridge it was still frozen so we are doing what Alton Brown suggested and it seems to be working.  I still don't fully trust him but he's on a trial period now.  I'm not really in charge of the turkey though, thats all Matt's work.  I'm just here for moral support.  I think it'll work out just fine.  Its going to be a low stress day tomorrow.  At least thats what we're hoping for.  Hope you all have a great day tomorrow!!!

The bird is in the fridge

Our Thanksgiving shopping is officially done, except for two things that I want to wait on.  I got the yams for 25¢ a pound.  Steph and Linda joined us last Saturday night for some chocolate peanut butter bread pudding and Thanksgiving planning.  3/4s of us are very in to cooking so it was an excited session.  Thankfully Steph usually has a level head and was realistic about how much food four people can actually eat.  I believe it narrowed down to four appetizers, a turkey, a tofurkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, filling, yams, a vegetable dish, cranberry sauce, gravy, cheesecake, pumpkin pie, and apple pie with cheddar cheese ice cream.  There will also be drinks for merry making; Steph is bringing a warm cider type drink and there will be wine.  Matt did such an amazing job with last year's turkey that he is in charge of this year's as well.  Luckily this year its a much more manageable eleven pounds.  This is the first year I'll be using Catarina's candied yams recipe.  It was so delicious last year that I got the recipe from her.  We're going to be having dinner at about one in the afternoon.  That way we can eat, lounge around and go in for round two.  It promises to be a wonderful day with our surrogate family since we can't be with our actual families this year.

43 days till Christmas, not that I'm counting

SoI went ahead and decorated the whole spare room for Christmas. Yes, I know that its not even Thanksgiving yet but Christmas decorations are so beautiful. I think its a shame that we only get to see them for a month. Plus, they are helping to encourage me as I dig my heels in and make my Christmas presents. The tight budget this year means everyone is getting lovingly hand made presents. My poor little sewing machine is ready to give up. I've also been playing with paint and yarn and pretty soon I'm going to be drilling holes. Sorry to be cryptic but since my readers are most likely those people who would get a present from me, I don't want to ruin it for y'all. Zelda isn't too happy about my crafting. She wants me to pay more attention to her. When she realizes that I'll be at the machine a while she lays down in her little bed and naps. Like many adolescents, Zelda does a whole lot of sleeping these days.
On the cooking front, Matt and I are working on cutting our budget. This means that we must have less fancy dinners. Not that many extravagant ingredients. I feel like beans are going to become a oft seen dinner companion. Speaking of which, I made beans today. They not only have the benefit of being cheap to make but making them from scratch makes them taste so much better than getting them out of the can. Because we had fresh made beans I made Mexican food for dinner. It has been years and years since I made chile rellenos but I think they came out pretty darn good. Oh! I almost forgot. I made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies this weekend. They were super tasty. I made the pumpkin puree myself with a cute little pumpkin that Matt bought me. I still have more left and he has requested some pumpkin bread.
After a long day of crafting, cooking, and cleaning I need to relax. Thanks to my mother, I cannot sit and watch tv without feeling antsy so I generally have something to do in the evenings. I am currently spending my evening tv moments doing this pattern. I don't know what it is yet but its fun to see it take shape, bit by bit.

Quick holiday wrap-up

We've been home for a while now but I'm only now getting around to blogging about it.  I have a headache and its snowing so I'm still sitting here in my pjs watching the Inauguration coverage.  Matt and I split for the holiday for probably the last time. Its too rough for us to have to separate for that long and at a time when you are supposed to be with your family.  I spent my Christmas in Temple City this year with my mom, Tom, Chris, Moe and Thumper.  Thumper isn't as warm as Matt is but he is almost as cuddly, so it wasn't too hard to sleep at night.  My brother took me shopping at Company D, which is the store that is exclusive for Disney castmemebers and their families.  Being a Disney fan, I was in heaven looking at all the Disney things that I didn't need.  To top is off everything was on sale between 50-75% off and then Chris's 20% on top of that.  It was awesome.  I got a new hoodie that is a castmemeber only item, so Chris had to buy it for me.  We had a really nice Christmas day.  Mom got tamales, Tom made pozole, and Moe and I made too many desserts.  Oh! I also made pimento cheese, a southern favorite, for the first time.  It was kinda awesome.  The family streamed in and I got to see a lot of my cousins that I only get to email or text or chat with here and there.  There was way too much food, tons of fun and an auction where I won lots of stuff including a wine bottle that I had no time to drink. 

--hot chocolate break--

Sorry, but I have a perfect view of our snow covered wooded area in front of our apartment and one of the parking lot.  Both covered in snow!  Real snow!!!  I took a moment to step outside to see it all with the wind blowing snow in my face.  Its so beautiful, and cold.  I was confused when I first walked out because there are all these little blue-ish, green pebbles everywhere.  It took me a minute but I figured out that they must be salt to keep the walkways safe for walkin'.  Teehee, I've never seen that before.  I have this delicious dark chocolate hot cocoa that we got from Target and I put little marshmallows in it so now I feel ready to continue.

Matt spent his Christmas In Michigan with his lovely family.  Luckily we both have video cams in our laptops so we still got to see each other.  We then met up in Florida for a family trip to Disney World!! w00t!  I was super excited when we got to the airport because my dad and Debbie revealed that they had got me a first class ticket!!  It was awesome, it was one of those planes that has a tv in every seat.  I watched movies, had a few drinks and a lovely vegetarian breakfast.  The only thing that sucked was that this was not too long after the big snowstorm in Vegas and it was still very cold.  There was ice on the wings and no de-icing vehicles, so in order to melt the ice the pilot decided to wait for the dawn and then sit in the shade.  Long story short, we missed our connecting flight and then had to run, literally, across the Atlanta Airport.  We made it to Orlando safe and sound eventually.  The first class ticket wasn't the last of the day's surprises.  We didn't depart the Magical Express at the  Beach Club Villas like normal, which confused me.  Instead we got off at the Animal Kingdom Lodge, where I found out that my parents had bought a new time share there when they opened up recently.  Its a beautiful hotel.  Our rooms were savanna view, which meant that no more than ten feet from our room were wild african animals grazing.  It was lovely to look out each morning to see a giraffe munching on a tree just outside. 
Well, I've taken up a lot of time/room, so I'll finish my tales of Disneyworld and beyond.

Merry Christmas from the Fort!

Since Matt and I aren't spending Christmas together we decided to have Christmas come to the Fort a little early. So yesterday we cleaned up the downstairs, got a little dressed up and had a wonderful Christmas dinner. I made the most delicious penne a la vodka with garlic bread and Matt chose a fantastic bottle of wine and made us a fire. We had such a lovely evening that culminated in our little present exchange. I got Matt Spore and the first expansion pack that I didn't even know existed until Saturday. I didn't give him both right away though, I gave him the game and then later when he had begun to install it the box gave birth to the second all of a sudden. Matt did such a great job of presents, he's really good at it. He gave me the most beautiful pair of silver dangle-y earrings that are in the shape of pine cones which I have worn today and make me feel all winter like. He also got me THE cutest bag. It looks like a mini bowling ball bag, its even made by Brunswick, and it holds my ds. Or rather it would if I had a dslite. I can still get my older ds in there if I try but I just love it soooo much. Finally he got me one of the greatest games ever made! Dragon Quest IV has been on the top of my list of favorite games since my childhood. Now I have something to play on the very long plane rides to LA on Friday. Thank you Sweetie!

I am trying to keep up with last year and so I have dubbed this week Christmas baking week. The lab simultaneously loves and curses it. This morning I made dark chocolate peppermint brownies. mmmmmmm, I love peppermint! I'm really excited too because Matt and I are having Dan and Caroline over for dessert on Wednesday. I haven't completely decided what I'm making but it will include Mexican hot chocolate.

I'm not dead yet

I know so many of you have been wondering, and the answer is: I'm not dead yet.  I have been in bed for the better part of a week.  The doctor says that I have a very bad cold with a sinus infection.  Luckily, my voice has returned, which I'm sure Matt is go grateful for.  He has been the most wonderful nurse a girl could ask for.  I'm all better yet but I'm getting there.  We're starting to count down the days until Thanksgiving.  Matt has wisely vetoed some of the things that I wanted to do for the holiday.  I get a little ambitious and with the cold I have gotten behind in the planning.  He's right though, as long as the food is good and the house is clean, the rest doesn't really matter.  I'll post our menu later this week.  I think we're going to go to Walmart on Friday to do the grocery shopping.  Ugh, stupid sinus infection is making me dizzy.  Later!

VOTE ALREADY!!!

Matt and I voted last Tuesday and we have a little two person election party planned for this evening. I'm just so excited about everything! For those of you who haven't yet, GO VOTE ALREADY!!!

I promised a Halloween post. We spent the first part of the evening at Matt's boss's party. Matt went as a judge and, after looking through my closet, I decided to go as a 1940's pin-up girl. I'm not sure how great of an idea that was but oh well. We spent the rest of the night at Jess and Jacob's playing heroscape. It was boys vs. girls and while the boys technically won I think it was a moral victory for the ladies. Jess and Jacob went with a super-nerdy set of matching costumes, they went as their Rock Band characters. lol

Its been too long

I'm sorry its been so long.  I get to work with the plan of taking ten minutes to post and then start looking at what I need to do and forget about the blog.  Some of you may have noticed the new gadget on the left sidebar.  I've added twitter so that I can send mini-updates to the blog.  I know it is quite popular with the kids these days and this past weekend I've heard that NPR is now tweeting too.  Speaking of which they are doing their seasonal pledge drive right now.  I'm not sure how much longer I'll be able to hold out before I send them money.  My immunity is running out plus, as Dave points out, we listen to it about ten hours a day.  I probably should send them something, they're wearing me down. 
Matt and I are (very) slowly finishing up the unpacking and organizing.  Pretty soon we will be able to start the decorating.  w00t!  Last year, at the after Halloween sale, I bought some cute little hand towels for the bathroom.  They are quite adorable in the downstairs bathroom.  We recently purchased a couple of Halloween themed kitchen towels at Target in their bargain area.  I keep teasing Matt that in a couple of years we will have a complete set of decorations for every holiday. 
We've unpacked nearly everything in the spare room now.  It has left us with a slightly disturbing discovery.  There is a 1.5' by 1.5' square on the floor that reeks of old lady perfume.  It is so gross!  We think that because we have always had boxes covering it up before we never noticed it.  Now that things in that room are almost done the smell is overwhelming.  I can only work in there for small bits of time because the odor gives me a headache.  Last night we poured baking soda all over it and I'm going to try and see it the smell is gone when I vacuum it up tonight, everybody cross your fingers.
Last but not least, since we have taken time off for weddings and whatnot this year and we'd like to be able to take time off for Christmas, neither Matt nor I are going home for Thanksgiving.  Instead we are going to be hosting a nice, quiet dinner at our new place this year.  Any family or friends who want to come are invited although being so far away I don't think we'll have many takers.  We are inviting a few local friends and judging by their responses so far we are having an international Thanksgiving.  So far those who have said they will come: Catarina and Nunu (Portugal), Mira (Germany), Kuo-Chen (Taiwan), Kim (Alabama) and Dan (England).  Two of the guests, Mira and Kuo-Chen, have never been to a Thanksgiving dinner.  Even better they have never eaten turkey.   So no pressure right?

The marathon is over, at last!

The moving part of moving is officially over.  Matt and I finished getting everything out of my apartment Sunday.  We spent several hours Saturday and Sunday scrubbing the place down.  We dropped the keys off at the office Sunday night with only a few reminiscing tears.  It is wonderful to be done with it.  Now we are concentrating most of our free time on unpacking.  Although at the this point it is literally just unpacking.  It mostly consists of Matt and I opening boxes and then walking and dropping them into the room where they should live.  As soon as we can get the living room rid of boxes then we can start to organize the rest of the house.  It is just too much to try and do the whole apartment at the same time.   So, for the time being, the place looks a little chaotic.  We even left work "early" yesterday at 5pm and spent the night unpacking after we cooked dinner together.  Not much of a holiday but time well spent I think.
Its going to be a short week for us anyway since this weekend Matt's best friend is getting married.  We are flying out to Chicago on Thursday but the wedding is in Indiana.  We're both really sad because we have to cut our trip short.  We had originally intended to spend a few days in Michigan with Matt's family.  Due to my aforementioned new grueling work schedule and Matt's new project for Sushmita's paper we really just can't afford to take the time off.  Just thinking about it makes me want to cry.  I was really looking forward to seeing where Matt grew up and all the places he's told me about.  He's consoled me by pointing out that we have the rest of our lives to get there and that now is just not the right time.  I'm lucky that he's so practical. 

Lovely weekend

Our super exciting Fourth went as follows: We slept in, went to work, went to Michaels/Target, played Maple Story, and then met Steph and Linda at He's Not for a holiday blue cup. I had a blast talking with her family and then Steph's brother Chris correctly predicted a rainstorm. So we went into the newly painted downstairs and I helped my team win two games of darts. The party started breaking up from there and Nathan, Matt and I ended up discussing the pros and cons of life, grad school, and MMORPGs. No matter what Nathan says, we are not joining WoW.
It turns out that the lovely storm took out some nearby power lines and along with them my power for nearly 24hours. So we spent a lot of yesterday bumming around enjoying Matt's air conditioning. We drove by later on and since we didn't have a camera here is an artist's rendering of what the power lines look/ed like:

Before:
After:Thats pretty much it for our weekend escapades. I think I'm going to take a day off this week to handle car stuff. Oh yeah, I've been approved by UNC as a official NC resident. I don't know who was happier, Mark or me. Probably him since I just saved him $20,000

No plans for the Fourth

Last year we had a lovely Fourth of July. Trent hosted a BBBQ at the cottage and then the whole group went down to Kenan for a surprisingly good fireworks show. It wasn't Disney caliber but it was still very good. This year both Matt and I have to work. Stupid adorable flies. Hopefully we won't be in for too long, maybe only a half day? Steph's brother, sister, and soon to be brother-in-law are in town as of 2am this morning and we were going to do wine tasting at Southern Season tomorrow night. They're still having their awesome storewide sale right now so it'll give me a chance to make sure I buy everything I really "need".

Matt and I watched this adorable movie last night called Quinceañera. Its about a girl who finds out she's pregnant just before her fifteenth birthday. I love that she had ninos for the dress, dj, cake.