2012, Or the Year in Which We Flew 1 Billion Times

2012 was a year of lots of flying and while we enjoyed everything we went to, we have no intent of doing this much flying ever again.  Everyone needs to stop having life events that we want to attend.

January: I flew to North Carolina for a baby shower; Taylor flew to North Carolina the following week for a conference

February: Austin, Texas (the only trip we took the entire year in our car)

May: North Carolina for a cousin’s wedding; the following weekend we went to Rochester, NY for our sister’s graduation (yay!)

June: San Francisco (for no reason except vacation)

July: The beach for the Annual Nichols / Jones/ Gibson vacation

September: Park City, Utah for an amazing wedding; the following weekend we went to another wedding in Connecticut

October: Atlanta to attend a football game and to meet a baby

November: Connecticut for Thanksgiving

December: North Carolina for Christmas

Whew!  And you think with that many flights we would be experts by now but I still went through the metal detector with my watch on in November.

-Sara

Cheese Classes Until the End of Time

Taylor and I have now been to a ridiculous amount of cheese classes at Scardello and we have no intent of stopping.

1. Cheese 101 – 16 cheeses (16 cheese?) paired with 2 glasses of wine
2. Beer versus Wine – 5 cheeses, each paired with a glass of wine and beer (by the end it was a wasted-fest for the people who didn’t have dinner beforehand)
3. Charcuterie and Cheese – 10 cheeses paired with 10 charcuterie and several glasses of wine
4. Jester King and Cheese pairing – 10 cheeses paired with 5 glasses of Jester King, an Austin brewery
5. Cider and Cheese – 10 cheeses paired with 4 glasses of cider
6. Cheesmonger’s Choice – the cheesemonger’s favorite 10 cheeses paired with 4 wines

We keep thinking they’ll stop coming up with classes we haven’t attended.  Up next is all types of blue cheese paired with wine.  I had my annual physical last week and nothing came back in the blood work.  So I’m assuming I can continue to consume the same amount of cheese.

-Sara

Sweet Potato Burritos

Our CSA has been overloaded with sweet potatoes for the past two months.  I’ve found a lot of different recipes to use them up and this one is currently our favorite.

Sweet Potato Burritos with Avocado Salsa Verde
adapted from Cookie and Kate

• 1 medium sweet potato, cut into small cubes
• 1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne
• sea salt and black pepper
• several sweet peppers, sliced into thin rings
• 8 flour tortillas
• 1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
• 1/2 cup shredded Pepper Jack cheese

• 1 avocado
• 1/2 cup of salsa verde (we like hot tomatillo White Girl Salsa)
• 1 garlic clove, chopped
• 1/2 lime, juiced
• 1/4 cup cilantro, chopped

1. Heat the oven to 450 degrees.  Toss the sweet potatoes with 1 Tbsp olive oil and the spices.  Place into a pan and put in the oven for 25 minutes, or until tender.
2. Sauté the peppers over medium heat in some olive oil until soft.
3. Assemble the burritos by placing sweet potatoes, peppers, beans, and cheese in the tortillas and rolling them up.  Place them all into a pan and put back in the oven for 5 minutes.
4. While the burritos are cooking place the avocado, salsa, garlic, lime juice, and cilantro in a food processor and pulse until smooth.  Add a Tbsp of water at a time until it is a spreadable consistency (it usually only takes me one Tbsp).
5. Place the burritos on your plates and cover with the avocado salsa verde.

-Sara

Too Cute!

There is a show on Animal Planet called “Too Cute!” which essentially follows around three sets of puppies or kittens from birth to eight weeks.  The combination of the music they select, the narration, and the adorable animals make it pretty funny:

The other day I had it on when they were following around puppies.  Luna hopped up in my lap and literally watched the TV for the full hour.

Whenever a commercial break came on, she would look away at other things.  The second the show would come back on she would start watching again.  Someone wants a puppy!

-Sara

Ikea Monkey

A couple weeks ago at an IKEA in Toronto, people realized there was a monkey in a coat wandering around the store.  Someone snapped this photo:

It turns out some lady owns him – illegally – and he got out of the car while she was shopping.  Luckily he is now enjoying his time at an animal sanctuary.  But the oddity of a monkey in a coat at an IKEA spurred some great variations of the photo.  My favorite:

-Sara

Art is Art

Last week, I came home to Luna’s newest art installation.

She explained to me that it was a commentary on the depravity of our nation, as illustrated by the parallel lines of the two benches and the overturned food bowl.  Still open for bidding.

-Sara

Merry Christmas!

-Sara