Coffee Emergency!

Greetings!  As you know from this post, I make my coffee each morning in my trusty French press.  When I come back up to our room after breakfast and sending Steve off to work, two things help me be successful to not go back to sleep:

1) I make the bed. (Since we're in a studio, if I don't it mocks me and calls me to jump in and warm myself and just "rest my eyes."  Evil. So I make it to avoid getting IN it.  Yes, we have maid service, but they don't come until the afternoon!)

2) I make my coffee! 

I keep thinking that since I'm getting puh-lenty of sleep each night (which I know you'll be happy to hear, Mom) that I'll be a morning person one of these days...  After all, Steve's already off to work and earning the big bucks, so I should be able to stay awake, too!  But, so far, my body (or mind?) is not cooperating.  So the coffee and bed-making ritual help me fake it.  (Now I just have to figure out how to avoid falling asleep on the couch...)

But anyway, the other day, there was a kink in my caffeinating plans!  I noticed a crack in the spout of my trusty French press, and when I put the plunger in, the spout fell right off in one piece.  So I made the coffee in there and then quickly poured it back into the hotel coffee maker carafe over the sink.  But I knew this would not do...  (and confirmed this after a minor scratch that came while cleaning the pot the next day!)

In this case, I did not want to buy another press (it was $20 and this one was only a few months old!).  And sadly, I did not see duct tape as a viable solution for this problem (shocking, I know!).  So, I found me some Elmer's non-toxic glass glue and picked some up a few days later and did some minor surgery on my beloved caffeine-delivery-device. (Does anyone else think it needs a nickname?)

Good as new!  (Although not as pretty...) Yay for not having to buy a new one! And yay for that awesome handy-woman feeling from fixing something yourself! :)

Cooking Up a Storm!

Okay, maybe just a light rain shower...

Anyway, I was trying to think of something else I could share with you all besides photos from recent adventures (of which I am currently all out... but Steve's off this weekend so there will be more to come soon!) and I thought of all of the cooking I've been doing!  Well, I only have to make dinner 3 times per week and never breakfast, so that means I can't possibly be doing all that much cooking... but for me, this is a lot!

I signed up for got addicted to Pinterest recently thanks to my sis-in-law (it's a website where people share things they like from the internet...if you have never heard of it, stay away if you value your time!) and have found a few really good recipes on there and a few using my iPad AllRecipes app.  So I thought I'd share.  I only have one photo to share (of a dessert), though, because I accidentally deleted the others that I remembered to take... (insert game show "sorry, you lose" music here)

I'm also including the links to the recipes so you can check them out... because if I can successfully make it, anyone can!  (I've included a little rating system for your benefit... all categories are out of 5.  The "number of ingredients" category is a rating, not the number of ingredients required.  Higher scores going to recipes requiring fewer ingredients, thus making them easier!)

So without further ado, here are the highlights of what I've made in January:

Spaghetti Aglio, Olio, e Peperoncino: (translated spaghetti with garlic, olive oil, and red pepper flakes, but doesn't the Italian sound so much better?)  This was a super easy dish that I whipped up one day for lunch after we ran out of deli meat and I didn't feel like going to the store.  I added chicken breast and it was a good meal.  It would also be really good and make a full meal with a nice green salad and bread.

Ease: 5 (Super easy)
Number of ingredients: 5 (few needed)
Time required: 15 minutes
Taste: 4 (great flavors, but very simple -- that's part of the charm, really.  But bottom line is that there's not too much to it... the appeal of this dish is definitely the ease!)

Meatball and Spaghetti Soup: yummm... Steve loves soup and I love pasta!  I spied this recipe from a Facebook friend and whipped it up one night for dinner.  We had 2 days worth of left overs if I remember correctly.  I followed the recipe just as described and found the meatballs to be difficult to handle (they were really wet before I plopped them into the broth) but turned out good (albeit deformed). 

Ease: 4 (Fairly easy)
Number of ingredients: 4 (quite a few ingredients, but most commonly found in the pantry)
Time required: 30 minutes or so?
Taste: 5 (this had great flavor... Steve loves his spices and he thought this was one of the less bland dishes I made.  But wasn't too much for me, who likes my bland food)
Notes: I subbed star-shaped pasta instead of the short spaghetti because that's what I had (and let's face it, stars are so much more fun!).  Bonus: this is a low-cal dish :)

Better-Than-Olive-Garden Zuppa Toscana: I told you Steve loved soup... and his favorite is Zuppa Toscana from Olive Garden.  He told me he'd love me forever if I could make it for him... so onto the internet I went and dug up this recipe!  (Turns out he tricked me and said I had to continue making it for him to keep loving me... but the joke's really on him because he's stuck with me....hahaha!)  Anyway, he liked it a lot although I couldn't get him to say it was better than OG's. 

Ease: 3.5 (lots of chopping)
Number of ingredients: 3 (quite a few ingredients that I had to go buy)
Time required: > 30 minutes
Taste: 4 (this one was pretty spicy thanks to the spicy sausage... not too much for Steve but a little much for me.  A bit salty for me, too.)
Notes: I ended up adding another potato and probably another cup of kale after the first time we ate it because I didn't think it was enough in proportion to all that sausage.  Also subbed 1% milk for the heavy cream to no detriment.

Creamy Chicken and Wild Rice Soup: Another "stolen" recipe... this time from Panera.  If you like their cream of chicken and wild rice soup, you'll enjoy this!

Ease: 4
Number of ingredients: 3.5
Time required: 30 minutes (roughly... by now you've noticed that everything takes me a half hour.  It probably doesn't, I'm just bad at guessing how long something takes and how much time has passed.  Which explains my poor time management skills!)
Taste: 5 (mmm, comfort food!)
Notes: I used half-and-half instead of heavy cream and found it to be almost too creamy.  Next time I'll probably use half half-and-half (whoa, that's a lotta halves!) and half milk.  I also added carrots and a healthy dose of celery to it, which I thought improved it.

Pork with Mushroom Dijon Sauce: Really easy and delicious twist on a classic.  I still haven't figured out how to properly prepare pork chops so that they're not dry, but at least this had the yummy sauce to improve it!  If anyone has any pork-cooking tips, please send them my way!

Ease: 3
Number of ingredients: 4
Time required: I'm not going to guess this time.  The recipes says 25 minutes for prep and 25 for cooking :)
Taste: 4 (nothing amazing or spectacular, but yummy nonetheless)
Notes: I skipped the wine and it was still delish!

Cheddar Baked Chicken: Also known as the reason I had to find more recipes using Rice Krispies!  This was really good and pretty easy... and I imagine that it's very kid-friendly, too.  Can't go wrong with cheese :)

Ease: 4
Number of ingredients: 4 (mostly common pantry items)
Time required: < 1 hour
Taste: 4 (yum but not I-will-lick-my-plate)
Notes: I believe I skipped the step of drizzling even more butter on top and it was still rich and delicious.

Okay... this is longer than I thought it would be (see, told you I've been cooking!) so I'll post desserts and snacks next time.  I've got some yummy treats that go well with coffee :)  So come back later, okay?

Wine Country (Again!)

If you recall, the last weekend Steve had off, we drove up to Napa Valley and visited Sterling Vineyards and the Calistoga Hot Springs.  Well, lucky me!  I had another chance to visit wine country this past Thursday with some girls from BSF and I took it!  I met up with three girls, one of whom was a visitor from Taiwan, and we drove up and enjoyed a beautiful, sunny day, good food, and great fellowship!

Our first stop was at a winery called V. Sattui, where they have a great little market with lots of yummy foods.  We enjoyed a picnic feast of fresh bread, cured meats (coppa and salame), eggplant/red pepper spread, and cheeses (brie, fontina, and artichoke cream cheese).

Oh... and a couple of tangerines I snatched up from church one night that someone had brought from their tree at home :)

Then we visited a 13th century Tuscan castle!

It is, naturally (since we were in Napa), a winery and vineyard called Castello di Amorosa.  And, naturally, not built in the 13th century!  The owner of V. Sattui (where we had lunch) built this as his retirement project and it was a fun place to visit.  And it is just as damp and cool as a 13th century Tuscan castle and even has a great room with frescoes, a chapel where they hold Roman Catholic mass in Latin, and a "torture chamber!" 

Oh yeah, and they have peacocks!

After our taste of 13th century Italian architecture, we traveled down the road to a modern hillside winery called Artesa.  And when I say "hillside," I mean it in the most literal way possible...

The door pictured above is the entrance into the winery.  Outside on this level of the hill there were also some great water features and fantastic sunset-bathed views of the valley!

Afterward we went to a French-inspired restaurant called "The Girl and the Fig" before heading home.  It was a 12-hour day full of fresh air and lots of walking around and sight-seeing... not to mention good food and getting to know new friends!  You can be sure I slept well that night! :)

Well, thanks for stopping by and catching up on the latest buzz! 

Experience Tesla

So I thought you'd like a glimpse of where Steve works and what he's working on!  Steve's project has him working on the assembly line that will build the Tesla Model S frame.  Tesla bought a 5 million square foot plant that used to be owned by Toyota.  It's so big that you can see it from the top of the neighboring mountain, Mission Peak, which you can see behind it (as seen in the last photo of this post).  I've also included a photo of Mission Peak as seen from the ground (we hiked to the point near the left set of antennas sticking out of the peak).  You can't miss it as you drive on I-880 with "TESLA" emblazoned on the side easily viewable from both North-bound and South-bound lanes:

Last week, I went to an outdoor mall called Santana Row in San Jose.  It's several blocks of very high-end stores, including many I've never heard of.  One of them is a Tesla store!  So I took a few shots of the Model S for you all in between lunch with two girls from church, window shopping, and frozen yogurt at Pinkberry :)

Pretty slick, right?  Like how they filled the front trunk (where you'd expect to see them showing off an engine) with luggage?  Now check out the rear trunk (huge!) and peek through to the giant TV--er, touch screen console!

I asked one of the employees where you plug it in, and they hid the plug outlet port thingamajig (yes, that's the technical term) in the side of the tail light -- see it? (It looks like it's glowing, but I don't think it really is.)

I got a cheesy shot of myself with it as well :)  I'm sure they'll be calling me up anytime now to see if I will model for them on the auto show circuit! Ha!

And now I'll leave you with the best photo of my day: mango frozen yogurt with blood oranges, kiwi, and mochi topped with almond slices.  Ahhhhh!

Napa Valley: Winery Tour + Hot Springs

The last weekend Steve had off of work, on Saturday we headed up to Napa Valley to the northern end to a city called Calistoga.  They are known for the natural hot springs, so I found a place for us to do a winery tour and then a hot springs-fed pool to soak our sore muscles from our Missions Peak hike.

Napa Valley is about an hour and a half North of us, but we decided to take a detour through San Francisco and over the Golden Gate Bridge.  Not far from the route to the bridge is the famous Lombard Street -- the crookedest street in America.  So we took another mini-detour and drove down just for fun. 

 

It was hard to take a good photo from the car, so I grabbed this one below from a website so you could see the whole street.  It's really beautiful, especially in the spring/summer when the flowers are in bloom and you can really appreciate the gorgeous landscaping.

 Some of the streets in the city are so steep we were nervous about the transmission holding on!  I cannot even begin to imagine driving a manual transmission up those, especially with the frequent stop signs mid-hill.

After our windy little drive, we headed over the bridge. This city is so beautiful!

It was cloudy, so hard to see the city from the other side of the bridge, but it was a great vantage point to take in the whole city. 

A few hours later (after a stop at this quaint little Italian restaurant called Olive Garden), we arrived at Sterling Vineyards.  The winery is situated at the top of a hill, so after entering, you have to take a tram up to it (can you see it in the second photo below?), giving a great view of the vineyards as well as the whole surrounding area.

 

As we sampled a few of the wines, we wandered around the winery, learning about the wine making process on the self-guided tour from a series of plaques and videos.  Since it's winter, there isn't a lot to see since the wine is in the vats and barrels in the aging process.  There were lots and lots and lots of barrels...

 

At the end of the tour, we ended up on the roof where we took in more great views of the valley and the Sterling vineyards.

We hope to come back during a different season.  We hear that spring is nice because the whole valley is blooming, but they have a lot to see in the fall at harvest time, too.  They also have wine-stomping festivals then and the valley, we were told, smells wonderful!  I'll take you if you come visit! :)

Afterward, we drove five minutes to Calistoga Spa Hot Springs.  It's a spa and hotel with public pools heated by the natural hot springs.  

They have three pools -- one was 104, the next was 100, and the last one is 80 degrees.  It was so perfect for our achy muscles, so we stayed in the two hot pools (the 80-degree pool was too cold for us after being in the hot ones!) until we were good and pruny before we drove home.  The drive back through the valley was probably beautiful, but we couldn't tell because it was pitch black!  Another good reason to come back when the days are longer...

So, when do you want to come visit? :)

Mission Peak Hike/Climb

Last weekend Saturday and Sunday, we were walking a little funny.  That's because on Friday, we decided to drive over to Mission Peak (about 10 minutes from us) to climb the "hill."  Now, I use quotation marks around hill because to anyone from the midwest, it's hard to see why this isn't considered a mountain.  I guess there's some height requirement to be classified as a mountain, but sheesh!  I've hiked in Rocky Mountain National Park up a 13,000-something foot mountain and it was less steep than this "hike."

Okay, I just googled it and here's what I found on Wikipedia:

Definitions of "mountain" include:

• Height over base of at least 2,500 m (8,202 ft);
• Height over base of 1,500 m (4,921 ft).–2,500 m (8,202 ft). with a slope greater than 2 degrees
• Height over base of 1,000 m (3,281 ft).–1,500 m (4,921 ft). with a slope greater than 5 degrees
• Local (radius 7,000 m (22,966 ft). elevation greater than 300 m (984 ft)., or 300 m (984 ft)–1,000 m (3,281 ft). if local (radius 7,000 m (22,966 ft). elevation is greater than 300 m (984 ft).

According to the park website, Mission Peak's summit is 2,517 ft above sea level.  And let me tell you, I didn't have my protractor, but that slope was pretty steep!  According to what I found, the rise is almost 2200 feet in less than 3 miles.  Someone get your calculator out!

Okay, that's not the point.  The point is, we climbed it.  It took about 2.5 hours because I was not letting poor Steve have frequent or extended breaks (I was told to expect it to take 3 hours... I'm such a slave driver!).

It was a pretty warm day (upper 60s) and very sunny.  The path doesn't have much in the way of shade (as you'll see from the photos below).  So we drained our two water bottles!  The hike begins pretty steeply right off the bat, and what keeps you going is that you can't tell how much further you have to go, thanks to the winding switchbacks seen here.

 So we climbed and climbed, and it doesn't take long before the views start getting pretty amazing.  Unfortunately, there was a layer of haze covering the lower elevations, so you can't see all that far.

We kept climbing and took a few breaks here and there.  We were among some interesting wildlife... we saw wild turkeys, some squirrel-esque critters, predatory birds (hawks, golden eagles?) and many a cow.  Cows were all over the hills and although some were pretty docile, others did not seem to like our company and started making what I interpreted to be some warning bellows.  We kept moving except for a quick photo here and there!

Check it out -- Steve's carrying a Michigan cup!  Caught him!

Then we got to what we thought was the top.  Notice Steve's smile of relief...

But it wasn't...

We could only now finally see the actual peak!  Ugh!  But we made it after another half hour of pretty strenuous climbing.  Hooray!  And here's proof!

In the last photo, Steve is pointing out the Tesla plant that he is working in.  It's 5 million square feet and a pretty obvious landmark!  Do you see the series of little squares to the right of where Steve is pointing?  Like I said, it was pretty hazy, but you can barely see it.  Beyond that, approximately right under the clouds, is the San Francisco Bay.

And if you noticed that the hills are looking a little dry, it's because the region has gotten an unusually low amount of rain.  Normally winter is the rainy season, but not so thus far!  These are what they call the "golden" hills of California :)  We are finally getting a little bit now for the past few days.

Good thing we got our hiking done before the rain came!

Praise Report

Hey everyone!  It's update time...

I was informed earlier this week that I did not get the job I interviewed for recently.  While this is disappointing, I am trying to trust God to bring the right opportunity my way at the right time.  I've been looking around and am unfortunately not finding much.  I have also started looking for home-based jobs (and discovering that I should have gone into computer programming if I really wanted to do this!) and/or jobs based out of the Detroit area that might allow me to work remotely.  I even checked at my old employer to see if they had anything posted in a different department that might work... Anyway, still looking...

The fantastic news I wanted to share is that we were also just informed that the short sale of my condo was approved by the lender!  I'm not really sure what the next steps are, but I hope to hear what happens next very soon.  My hope is that I will not have to be physically present for the closing... (as much as I'd like to be back in MI!)

So thank you to all of you who prayed for both of these things!  God is faithful and sovereign and trustworthy and all praise and glory go to Him!  As you continue to pray, please pray that I will use my time wisely.  It is easy to entertain myself, but not easy to be productive!