Category: Misc

I got to meet Tre Wilcox, from Season 3 of Bravo TV’s “Top Chef”! He was in town doing a cooking class as a part of the Texas Hill Country Wine and Food Festival. It was a great class! He made a beautiful baby watercress salad topped with lobster and champagne caviar sauce, beef two ways (Braised Short Ribs with Golden Beets and Grilled New York Strip Steak with Celery Root Puree) and the masterpiece was Pan Seared Black Cod Fillet served over vegetables in a spicy-sweet Asian broth. I actually made that recipe for a dinner party this Saturday and it was a HUGE hit. I will try to type up and post a modified recipe soon, but here are some photos:

Cod with Spicy Thai Lemongrass Broth

Baby Watercress Salad with Lobster and Champagne Caviar Sauce

Beef, Two Ways

Aren’t these cute? I made them!

Just drill a small hole into the corks (don’t go all the way through). Cut some lengths of cording and wrap some transparent tape around the ends to keep it from fraying. Put a bit of hot glue inside the holes of the corks and insert the cord ends. They can be any color you like, with the cord as long or short as you like. Some of you may see these under the Christmas tree, so act surprised!

Hubby’s subtle protest.

VERY sorry for the delayed absence (again!). Spring just always seems to be a SUPER busy time for me. For some reason, every extracurricular event, elective class, or sports activity that the children are involved in seems to require some end-of-year culminating event, performance or open house. It’s a fun time of year, but yikes…musicals and field trips and recitals, oh my!

So here’s what we’ve been up to:

We had a recent health scare with Girl. She was having persistent pain just below her left knee. When it didn’t go away after a couple of weeks, we took her into the pediatrician, who said it would likely go away in a couple more weeks and to let her know if it didn’t. Well, it didn’t, so the pediatrician ordered an X-ray. When she called back with the results, she said that the radiologist saw something called Slipped Capital Femoral Epiphysis (SCFE). I had no idea what that was, but I knew that the pediatrician wanted us to see an orthopedic surgeon (RIGHT AWAY). When I called the orthopedist (the same office that fixed Boy’s broken arm last year) and told them the diagnosis, they told me to bring Girl over right away and don’t give her anything to eat, in case she ended up having surgery that afternoon. When I heard that, I almost passed out. And then I googled. That was a big mistake, because when you read things like this….

“Almost all children with the condition have surgical treatment, and most do well. Some, however, develop problems due to the disease. One foot might point outward more than the other, or one leg may be slightly longer than the other. Blood may stop flowing to the top part of the thighbone. Children’s hips may be stiff, and they may be more likely to develop arthritis at an early age.”

…you tend to panic, but we got her to the orthopedist, who said that the radiologist had been overly cautious, not wanting to miss anything (SCFE can be a side effect of a medication that Girl takes, so the radiologist knew to look for it, or the pediatrician had told him to look for it, I guess). It turns out that she did NOT have SCFE, thank goodness, but just has a specific type of tendinitis (Osgood-Schlatter) in her knee that will require rest, ice, Motrin and physical therapy for a few weeks. She is already doing much better, so we are VERY relieved. Something that can be cured with Motrin and ice doesn’t scare me. MUCH better than surgery. She has two roles (Napthali and Judah) in her school’s upcoming production of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat”. I’m in charge of costumes. She also recently helped me paint the laundry room:

(She has gotten contact lenses since this photo was taken.)

More news:

Boy has BRACES! He’s had just these front brackets on for a couple of weeks and will get a “palatal expander” tomorrow. He’ll have that for about 3 months. I’ve heard it’s painful and has to be tightened with a little key every day, but I haven’t told Boy that yet. If any of you parents have had experience with one these things and have any food suggestions (seems like EVERYTHING would get caught in there!) or pain relief tips, please let me know. After the expander, he’ll have full braces for about 2 years. Poor kid. He actually likes them, though, and his buddies are now calling him “Bling Man”. He also recently competed in a “Math Pentathlon” and has started playing the guitar. He can already do a VERY basic version of the Rolling Stones’ “Paint It Black”. His grandfather is so proud (and so are we).

We also had a visit over Spring Break from our very best friends. They have a daughter Girl’s age (12 – they’ve been buddies since preschool), a son Boy’s age (10 – they’ve known each other since they were in diapers) and their youngest daughter (also one of Girl’s very best friends) is 9. We took them here:

and here:

Also:
My grandparents have moved to town! We have been asking/inviting/pleading/begging them to come to Austin for a while now, and they finally found the right place and jumped on it. They are about 15 minutes from where we live now (they were previously about 4 hours away) and 5 minutes from where my parents live, so we have been helping them get settled: setting up bed frames and assembling computer desks (a new computer, too!) and getting them established with new doctors, etc. Their new home is lovely and has wonderful amenities. We are THRILLED to have them so close by and we are really enjoying our frequent visits.

So, that’s a “catch-up”. I have been cooking and taking photos this whole time and will be uploading new photos and posts soon.

1. Girl’s cat has very long hair. Long hair that gets tangled. And matted. And greasy. Cat grooming costs $150. And involves a 20-minute car ride with a cat that HATES car rides.

2. THIS is our current “entertainment center”.

No, really!

3. I had something more like THIS in mind. But something like that costs as much as my first car. No, really!

So, since every penny that crosses my palm for the foreseeable future is already spoken for, I decided that I could bear to wash a cat to enable myself to get rid of all of those ugly cords (or at least hide them). It really wasn’t THAT bad. She quit making the “I am in fear for my mortal soul” noises after the first couple of minutes and I only have a couple of scratches on one wrist. I did worry that the checker at Costco thought I was a “cutter” when she saw them today, but, of course not! I’m perfectly normal: I’m not a cutter, I’m just a cat bather! Oh, wait…

The great thing is that we got this photo:

This is what she normally looks like:

The regional spelling bee was tonight for Girl (next level up after winning the bee at her school). She ended up placing 3rd (out of about 35 kids from 3 counties). The competition was pretty stiff, but we are VERY proud of her performance. She was confident and composed, but the word “croustade” just got the better of her (yes, ironic, I know, given my recent fondness for French pastry – suffice to say you will not see me making any “croustades” any time soon). She can spell tchotchke and waterzooi and azimuth and witloof and cynosure and hemerocallis all day long, though. 🙂 In the final rounds, any word in the dictionary is fair game and there’s just not really any (practical) way to study for that. The young lady that ended up winning was absolutely deserving. She was obviously quite prepared.

The bee itself was very interesting: a varied selection of Americana. Pretty much any culture that you can imagine was represented, from a super-cute little boy in Chuck Taylors and a shirt with electric guitars on it to a young girl in a Muslim hijab and everything in between (Girl was in Chuck Taylors, a hoodie and a cool Threadless tee). The children were amazingly supportive of one another. There was one girl that was giving a “thumbs up” to her competitors when they got their words right and was consoling children as they were eliminated. Very inspiring. She was very sweet; I regret not finding out her name or getting her contact info. She seems like the kind of girl that would make a great friend/playmate for Girl. The fact that this event was happening on “Super Tuesday” wasn’t lost on me. I hope that this positive atmosphere of encouragement and peaceful co-existence will be something that the adults in charge of our country can also accomplish. Whatever your leanings, (Conservative or Liberal, Republican or Democrat), you’ve got to be proud of the fact that we have a man of color and a female as viable candidates…just to know that we are open-minded enough to support things that would have been impossible just a few generations ago…it gives me hope.

We didn’t watch the Super Bowl today. Not a second of it. We went for a bike ride 5 minutes before kick-off (the neighborhood was DEAD – no traffic at ALL – it was eerie) and then went home to watch an episode of Star Trek: Enterprise that we had on our DVR. Yes, we are officially the geekiest family in America.

This is a HORRIBLE photo (Hubby excitedly took it with his phone this morning), but…..it is a photo of a cat, successfully and without assistance, properly using the toilet!!!
Note the correct (“All 4 feet on the seat” stance). We are now using something called “Citykitty” and it’s what turned the corner for us. I will try to take some video of him later, for anyone that is interested (I’m surprised by how many of you are, actually!)

This was, of course, immediately followed with “Good boy, Jack, good potty, good kitty” and 2 Feline Greenies treats (his favorite).

Jack is, at this point, essentially trained. Ace, his brother, is following VERY closely behind in the process. The girl (Queenie), however, is still stubborn and will complain pretty vocally about having to use this piece of unfamiliar equipment for her, um, “ablutions.” If we are not around, she will still pace around the bathroom, looking for somewhere, anywhere else to go and we have to keep reassuring her that, indeed, there IS no other acceptable option before she will actually consent to use the toilet. The “Citykitty” set-up, at the “almost at the end” stage where we are, still requires a small sprinkling of cat litter. When we open up the (gigantic, plastic, Costco-sized bucket) litter container, she always stands up on her hind legs, peeking in, thinking that she’d much rather go IN the litter bucket (she has actually done this before – now we have to put the bathroom trash can on TOP of the bucket to keep her out – brat.).

The Hannah Montana concert last night was AWESOME! Girl, Friend C and Cousin A had a great time. I knew that I was only along for the ride (or, rather, to provide the ride), but I actually enjoyed it, myself. I was familiar with some of Hannah/Miley’s songs, because I’ve watched the show a few times with Girl and we frequently listen to the Disney music channel on the XM radio in the mornings on the way to school (Hannah/Miley gets LOTS of rotation there – natch). I was less familiar with Aly and AJ’s music, but was totally bowled over. Those girls ROCK! They were slamming on their guitars and really belting out the lyrics. Obviously, a lot of concerts are beefed up by background “lip synch” tracks, but if Aly and AJ were using one, it was much less obvious than during the Hannah/Miley part of the show. She was wonderful, too, though. I have to admit that I was watching for the “body double in the wig” portion of the show (not that I hold it against her – it’s a show, after all – they have to use whatever tricks they can find), but I didn’t see it. There was another part of the show where Aly (the curly-haired one) and AJ (the straight-haired one) came out to sing another song – maybe that was added in and wasn’t part of the original show – maybe that was to give Miley time for her costume change.

The concert was a TOTAL estrogen fest. You’ve never SEEN so many little girls all in one place. There was LOTS of screaming. LOTS. Thankfully, the concert arena had re-purposed some of the men’s room (covered the “MEN” signs up to change them to “WOMEN”), so the lines weren’t unbearable. This was confusing to a couple of dads that happened to be there, though, and I did hear a couple of tiny girls ask what the weird-looking sinks were in the bathroom (as the moms hurried them past, saying, “NO! That’s NOT where you wash your hands!”).

Anyway, here are some photos:
(I’m not the greatest photographer, under the best of circumstances, but add in lots of noise, flashing lights, a dark arena and LOTS of screaming and well….I did the best I could.)

In case you’re not familiar with the whole Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus/Aly & AJ genre:
Miley Cyrus is Billy Ray Cyrus’ 15-year old daughter. She has a wildly popular TV show on the Disney Channel. If you haven’t heard of it, you either have been living under a rock or have no females in your life under the age of 14. She is currently on a concert tour, singing songs as both Miley Cyrus and as Hannah Montana, the character that she plays on the show. Aly & AJ are older, but still Disney-affiliated, I believe. No show, but a couple of albums under their belt. They were the warm-up band for Miley/Hannah for the last few stops of the tours, but last night”s concert was their last show with her. The concerts have sparked all kinds of controversy because they’ve been sold out in every city, commanding prices online and through scalpers above $1000 per ticket (I didn’t – and wouldn’t – pay that, by the way). People resorted to all sorts of desperate measures to get their hands on tickets. I am fortunate to have a connection with the concert venue and was able to procure tix with minimal effort, but also have lots of friends here in Austin that were able to secure them through the legit online box office – I think that they must have found a way to weed out the mass online ticket brokers and make the tix more available to fans at a reasonable price.