Wuv, tru wuv

Mawage. Mawage is wot bwings us togeder tooday. Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam… And wuv, tru wuv, will fowow you foweva… So tweasure your wuv - one of the best movies of all time, The Princess Bride. Below was our Valentines Day.

We started the Day with Pink Biscuits and Pink Gravy.  So totally unappetizing to look at, but so much fun, the kids loved it.  

My School got in on the romantic spirit of the day and we had a day devoted to chocolate.  I made Orange and cinnamon infused dark chocolate ganach with milk chocolate coating. Tasty.

Whilst I made dinner, Annie set up a Valentines party in our front room, and wouldn't let anyone in until the party began.  Boy were we in for a treat.

She had taken pillows and blankets from all over the house and set up activity stations, 9 of them, around the room.

This station was pick  picture and act out the animal you see on the card.

This was the refreshment station, with the chocolates that I dipped today, and water.  She also played D.J., making sure there weren't any lulls in the party atmosphere.

One game station was "Sit in a suitcase and have Mom pull you around." Not related, I am wearing some cozy P.J's a friend found for me at a thrift shop.  They even have feet!

Playing spoons at the glass table.  FYI: Ryan is wearing heart pajama bottoms that he bought me for Valentines Day 5 years ago when I was big pregnant with Owen.  After delivery, they didn't fit and I gave them to him.

A game of Ratuki, our new favorite card game.

Guess the animal on the card.

Right near the game "Toss the Crayons into the basket"

The party finished with Annie and Owen doing a choreographed dance that looked a lot like an iceskating routine.  We "loved" tonight.

Sharing an Ipod

The camera on my UK phone is rubbish, and my Ipod is locked and the phone only works in the states, so it is now Simon's, except when I need it for class. Calvin now owns Ryan's and loves it as well. So any pictures taken at my cookery school are the result of one of my boy's being a share bear.  Tonight when I downloaded my pics, I found this little gem of Simon, with his head cut and pasted into a female 80's rocker.  What the what!?! The joys that technology can bring.

Simon, age 9, very strange.

Blinis with salmon and caper horseradish sauce.

Great tasting, weird looking bread.

Roasted peanut ice cream and a praline parfait teardrop.  

Shrove Tuesday

It all started with one of my friends sweetly asking an instructor if she could make pancakes for us today. (As a side note, every grocery store here has packaged pancakes in the bread isle... becasue pancakes have so many different ingredients... and take such a long time to make...) Anyway, several other classmates joined in on the request.  So I asked, why pancakes?  Apparently today is known as "Pancake Day" or Shrove (shrove = shrive = confess) Tuesday.  Today marks the day before Ash Wednesday, where many people start a fast, of sorts, for Lent, which starts 40 days before Easter.  The 40 days represents when Jesus Christ fasted.  Apparently, Shrove Tuesday or Pancake Day is very well known, just as anyone (Mormon or not)  living in Salt Lake City would know about General Conference, when we get to hear from the Prophet of the world, Thomas S. Monson.  Long story short (too late!) we got our pancakes, and because we are at a cookery school, we got chocolate sauce and fresh ice cream to go with them.

Pancakes, Chocolate Sauce, and Ice Cream.  Happy Pancake Day.

Moroccan Fish Tagine

Chargrilled Sea Bass with turned potatoes.

Looking Busy

I think one of the best ways to appear busy at school is to just load a bunch of stuff on my table.  Today we did recipe testing, in preparation for a food photography project where our dishes will each be photographed by a pro.  We (the students) each turned in a list of a few options of things that we might like to make for the challenge, and the principal instructor then selected which one she thought would photograph best.  From my list, she chose the stacked mango salad with mint dressing. It needs some tweaking, but the finished product is destined to be lovely.  Ryan is still hanging out with the politicians in D.C., and the kids partied like it was 1999 with Owen's nanny at a bounce house. 

My cluttered table. My scale is in the background with my business card on it.  I love my business card.

A little looksie of my Stacked Mango Salad with Mint Dressing, and Mango Coulis dribbled in the corners. Triangle plates are cool.

A side view.  It needs some help.

This is a picture of spun sugar on top of burnt caramel (accidental) cream puffs, in a pate sucre shell.  Kind of a weird looking dish, but the spun sugar is pretty cool, and made me think of some fun Halloween themed dishes.

Chocolate Chip Sunday

As many of you know, my calling (church assignment) is to make sure our church building gets cleaned weekly (not weakly as many mistakingly suppose.) Anywhoo, I promised each organization that if they completed their assignments this week, I would deliver fresh cookies to them on Sunday. I reviewed the checklists yesterday night, around 5:00pm, and it looked like I needed to make about 70 cookies.  I felt inspired to check again this morning, and my new cookie total came to around 160.  Yikes! Chocolate chip cookie party at the Smith's this morning.  I also gave my husband's lesson in Sunday School and  prepared my son's talk for Primary. And was called as the 1st Councillor in the Young Women's program. I am still also the facilities manager, and haven't been released as a Relief Society Teacher.   My sweet kids have the week off from school, and for the first time in my mom life, I am busy (with school) and won't be around to entertain, snuggle, party hard with them during their break.  Only 6 weeks left.  I will be so glad (and sad) when it ends.  I miss hanging out with my children.  When I am done, I can hang out once again, and we can dine on gourmet food.

Annie drew this tonight whilst I made dinner.  She wanted to know if there were boy angels also.  We talked about the Angel Moroni, who is seen on many Ladder Day Saint temples, just to help her understand that there are boy angels.  I am glad that her heart told her that naturally girl angels existed. How lovely that Jesus is saying "I love you people."

Saturday, in the park...

What a day.  We started with pancakes for breakfast, cleaned the house, went for a walk to a park along Gorgy Road, ate some chips (french fries) at the Golden Arches, and finished the night with some chili.  My better half is in D.C. and we miss him terribly already. Can't wait for Weds. to come!  The one upside to having Ryan out of town is my one and only daughter usually sleeps with me.  I love my Smith Sleepovers with Annie Joy.

A random picture of my darling daughter, taken about 6 months ago. 

Taken from a book Preston and I wrote to Annie:

Annie Joy is not a boy,  instead she is a girl 

(but she used to say "doggy" instead of "girl", and we would both laugh till it hurt... oh the memories!)

Sushi Rockstar!

What crazy fun in the kitchen we had today! On our "to make list" was peanut ice cream, praline parfait,  jam doughnuts, and a plethora of sushi.  It was a really great day, spent with really great people, in a really great kitchen.  Best part of all?  Many people kindly sent me away with their leftovers, so I was able to share the sushi love. We ended this fantastic Friday with dinner at our kid's favorite Italian restaurant here, Bar Italia.  The prices are reasonable, the service is great, the food is delicious, and it's loud enough that we fit right in, very family friendly. And not related, but incredibly exciting: 15 year's ago yesterday, my husband asked me to marry him for all time and eternity.  I said yes.

Sushi. Tuna. Salmon. Japanese Omelet, made in a square omelet pan. 

Dinner out.  Yes, Owen is open-mouthed, totally asleep on my lap.  He checked out about 10 minutes after we sat down, and woke up half way through our walk home.

Another sticky toffe pudding for the week, just to make sure that I truly am madly in love with the stuff.   I am.

Yesterday at school my sweet Simon was running around a corner.  He collided with a girl who had her mouth open and his cheek looks like a bite mark, but with only the top set of teeth.  Weird injury. lovely boy.  I took this picture after he fell asleep in bed.  I guess that means I am a weird mom.