Birthday Weekend

We celebrated Katie's birthday in Boston this weekend - she's 25 now!

First, here's an interesting thing I saw when I was driving down my road on my way (eventually) to the birthday party. Don't worry - I stopped the car to take the picture. The fire department was doing a controlled burn in the middle of town and you could see this plume of black smoke from the top of our ridge. This is part of the beautiful view I get to see every day - usually without the smoke though.
We had dinner Saturday night at Zocalo Cocina Mexicana on Comm Ave in Brighton. It's right near where I used to live back in the 70's but back then it was El Phoenix Room. It's still Mexican but nicer now. We passed the camera around the table so everyone could take a picture of their plate.

Katie had enchiladas with delicious fried plantains on the side.

Raf had tacos. He got lots of dishes.
Nathan had chili rellenos, I think with steak inside.

Sarah had this beautiful avacado salad.

And I had a different kind of chili rellenos with spinach, pine nuts and raisins. It was delicious!

Katie really liked this lamp.

This is all the pictures I had. I hope someone got a picture of the cakes. Happy Birthday Katie!!

Crazy gas prices

Isn't this the craziest thing you've ever seen? I just filled my tank for about $14. Less than 6 months ago I paid $4.29 a gallon up in Maine. I'm not complaining, but this just doesn't make sense to me. I wonder what will happen next. Will it go below $1? Over $5?

Thanksgiving's coming!

I don't know how time has gone by so fast, but all of a sudden Thanksgiving is next week. I looked for some pictures from last year to help me get in the mood.

Susie and Max love Thanksgiving dinner - don't they look happy? The pies haven't even come out yet.Cranberry bread - will we make it again this year?Katie and Nathan - either they ate too much or they're wondering when dinner is going to be ready. I can't really tell but it must be one or the other.Emily's wondering when she'll get a chance to see Bruno. He snuck downstairs eventually while everyone was eating. Emily saw him and chased him into the living room. They knocked over two lamps and Bruno ran back upstairs - what a wild house! The people get a little wild too. :)

OK - here's the list. It's pretty much the same every year. It seems like a lot of dishes but I don't know what we could eliminate.

• cranberry sauce
• garlic mashed potatoes
• gravy
• stuffing
• sauteed mushrooms
• hot lulu !!!
• Moroccan vegetables
• acorn squash
• green bean casserole
• pumpkin bread
• cranberry bread
• dinner rolls
• apple pie
• pumpkin pie
• custard pie
• wine / beer / cider

Haha - no turkey. This is a vegetarian Thanksgiving. It's a harvest feast, right?

I don't know exactly who's coming yet, but I'm getting ready!

Another Craft Day

Sarah and I had a day off today so we got to work on lots of projects. Here's the startup. The table got a lot messier later in the day. I got a bunch done but they're not ready for viewing yet. I did finish this little Christmas tree ornament. It's needle-felted inside of a cookie cutter, then I sewed on some red beads. I don't know who it's for, but it's pretty cute.Here's Sarah star-belly!After a day of hard work we needed a treat so we made some crepes. It sort of looks like something from another planet. They're really good though.

Nathan put blueberry syrup on one of his crepes. This was a tame one - another version was the "suicide crepe" with all the toppings at once. Wild! Sarah said it tasted like an ice cream sundae. (I didn't try it.)

Here are the toppings.
And here's what Bruno thinks of craft day. That's a yawn in case you're wondering. :)

Birthday Brunch

We had a birthday brunch for Nathan. We made a feast! Here's Nathan opening his presents. He got two new discs for disc golf (his latest favorite hobby), a bag for all his discs and two new shirts.Pumpkin bread The beginning of "impossible pie" with poblano peppers, jalepenos, onions, potatoes, mushrooms and cheddar

It was good!

Baked apple pancake Happy but full
Two sleepies

Bruno likes to play Monopoly.

We had to go try out the new discs and get some fresh air after that meal. This is us smiling at Sarah's camera which is sitting on the bleachers.

Colorful projects

I'm excited about this cute pin cushion - it's just a needle-felted ball with some yarn decorations. I think it looks sort of like a sunset. Some miscellaneous (mysterious) projects and supplies.... I love all these colors!

An array of hand-spun yarn - maybe a felt bowl someday?

This is going to be a scarf - believe it or not!

Election Day

Early morning voting in Deerfield - this is the longest line I've ever seen there.
Cold campaigners in their corral Durham's getting ready.

Busy Crafters

Sarah and I have been working on lots of projects. Most of them are going to be presents so they're secret for now. One we can talk about, though, is this experiment with felting. I don't know what they'll turn into yet, but here's the start of a couple of projects.

Sarah bought some wool sweaters at a thrift store. I think they were something like 50 cents apiece. We zipped them into a pillowcase and washed them in the washing machine with hot water. One of them really smelled like moth balls when it got wet.
I don't know if you can see the difference, but they're a lot smaller now and really dense - they've turned into felt. We're going to cut them up and transform them into something else. They're still drying for now - it's taking a long time. (The hat had a label saying it was wool but it didn't felt, so I guess it wasn't.) We'll show you when the next step gets done.
Here's another felt project. You start by knitting something that looks like a hat.I guess it wouldn't keep your ears very warm.

Then you give it the hot water treatment and dry it over a rounded container. It's going to be a felt bowl. It's almost dry. Now I'll have to figure out how to decorate it. I'll put up a picture if it comes out ok. I think it's pretty cute so far. :-)

The Halloween Crew

People in my office dressed up for Halloween... Aren't they amazing? Some cute, some scary - lots of imagnination. What a great job! (I was wearing my pumpkin socks but they didn't count as a costume - what a wimp.)