Halloween Part 1

We have been in desperate need of a decluttering/reorganizing of our apartment. I think I have mentioned it several times. So, I called in emergency backup last week. My mom and her husband came and helped me rip through the apartment. In about a day we were able to reorganize all of the closets, the entire kitchen, and the entire bedroom. This leaves only the dining/kitchen area left for me and Ten to work on. Finally, we have some order in the madness.

We also were able to have a bit of fun while they were here.

We celebrated a birthday.

The gorgeous cheesecake that Ten picked up on his way home. I would say it was enough for 12 people. We had cheesecake for days.

On Saturday, we went over to the Pumpkin Fest at Central Park. A pumpkin patch in the middle of the city. We got there right when the event began, so we barely had any wait time at all. 

Our little bumble bee deciding which pumpkins would be going home with us.

Family photo with one of our pumpkins.

Heading over to the other stations. They had lots of games and even a haunted house....all for free I might add...even the pumpkins....really nice event.

Making the pumpkin all pretty to take home.

Mini area for fall photos.

 After looking around at some of the booths, we decided it was time to go grab lunch. Also, it was getting so crowded at the park that we wanted to escape before it just got too tiring. We decided to pop over to a restaurant called Dallas BBQ. The serving sizes were absolutely huge and the BBQ itself was pretty good, but some things were below average....I doubt (or pretty much can guarantee) that we won't be coming here again.

Mia and her pipe cleaner spider checking out the decor.

An onion loaf....which was pretty much tasteless!! I had to dump tons of salt on mine to make it edible. That is saying a lot from people that don't salt anything.

Honey roasted chicken (really good), baby back ribs, corn bread, and very, very tasteless fries.

Free Halloween cupcakes to end the meal...I think Mia was pretty excited to get to eat the icing off of it without anyone stopping her. Such a pretty smile.

When we got home it was around 2:00, and so we were all pretty tired. Ten and Mia napped while the rest of us watched a bit of TV. Around 4:00 we headed back out to a Halloween party for kids at a nearby church. They had lots of little activities for little ones.

Playing with chalk.

This was the first time Mia got to play with hula hoops, and I'm pretty sure she thought they were the coolest things.

She also got to play in her very first bouncy house. We usually have to skip these because there are just too many big kids, but the church did a great job of grouping kids by age.

On Sunday, my mom headed back home. We also got a phone call saying our swimming class was cancelled because the teacher was sick. I was secretly doing back flips in my mind because that meant we had a whole day to ourselves to just hang out at home.

Roseola does not make for a carefree weekend.

Kudos to those people that have their weekend blog posts ready to go first thing in the morning. Seriously, how do you find the time? I am genuinely impressed my friends.

So, there was once a nice family who lived on the Upper West Side. They did fun things like go to the park together, attend play groups, and watch the occasional Disney movie while eating ice cream. They were such a happy family. One day, the youngest of the clan got a fever. A fever that was to last 4 days long. This fever would then be followed by a rash, and the great medicine woman diagnosed said illness as Roseola.

Yes, my friends....that little intro is what we have been dealing with for the past week....and let me tell you...it is not fun. Not one bit. This made Mia's ear infection seem like a trip to Hawaii. She has been miserable to the tenth degree, but we have been assured that it will all end soon....here is to hoping!

Anyway, while battling her virus....we did decide to get out and do a few things over the weekend. The doctor said that she was no longer contagious, and I seriously had to escape the nightmare that we had been living...even if it was just for a little bit.

Proof of said nightmare: Cream stew for dinner on Friday night....none of us like it much....but it was the fastest thing that could be made so I could get back to nurse duties.....sad night.

Anyway, on Saturday morning we woke up and headed to the Rutgers Presbyterian Church to attend a performance of Stomp, Clap, and Make Bangs. It was a puppet/musical show put on by Theatre Arts Japan, so we decided to take advantage.

Ten and I are still debating what this animal was supposed to be. In the end, I think it was part mouse, part bear, part raccoon. Yes, that must be it. 

Mia stayed entertained for most of it though, so winner.

Off she goes to check out what is behind the scenes.

After a really confusing show about Boo and her forest friends, we decided to stop at a diner for lunch. After our cream stew dinner....we were wanting something with a bit more substance I guess you could say....so we had gigantic burgers.

Mia enjoyed some tots. Can't you tell how thrilled she was to be out after the show. Notice the spots on her face?

Moving on to Sunday. Ten went to Trader Joe's and picked up this lovely cinnamon whisk. At the same time, I bought this Yankee Candle in cinnamon stick.....hahaha. I guess we both thought cinnamon would be the perfect scent for the apartment. So, random.

We decided to brave the world again and see if Mia would like to go to her swim lesson. She was doing a great job for about 90% of it, but she got cranky at the end.

shot of the whole class

On the way home, Mia did have quite the meltdown. We put her straight to bed, and then Ten decided to use her nap time to go to the pumpkin patch (aka Trader Joe's) and he picked some beauties I might say.

Mia deciding that the pumpkins needed to be stacked.

....and then that 4 pumpkins was totally too many for a family of 3. She promptly put one pumpkin in the bottom of her stroller to dispose of at a later time.

On the agenda this week: decorate lovely pumpkins, slay the evil dragon of Roseola for good, and welcome out of town family (the only kind we have) here for a busy 4 days. Have a great week all!

Norovirus. I Loathe Thee.

We have been out of commission here since Saturday. Oh it has been such a long, long week. Mia woke up with a weird look on her face Saturday afternoon and then got sick all over the bed. Repeat later on the couch. Repeat later on the play mats, and repeat again on the couch. Yes, it wasn't a fun day.

However, she got over it in less than 24 hours, so I didn't think much about it until I woke up not feeling well on Monday. Oh, it was a long Monday....and a long Tuesday. 6 pounds lost by Wednesday and I was ready to brave the world. My first stop was Walgreens.

Cleaning supplies and new toothbrushes. Toothbrushes are a must after getting sick.

What is driving me most crazy about this though is that this is the second time in two months that I have caught this thing! How is this possible? We are the hand washingest people you ever did meet. I just can't wrap my mind around it. However, I have gotten invites to hang out with people who have sick kids this week. Crazies. I am blaming it all on you. For the love of humankind, keep your sick kids at home.

So, I am trying to avoid the urge to become hermits for the fall/winter. It is so, so tempting. I'm totally over puking my brains out every day.

Anyway, so that is life here lately.

On the agenda today, trying to find a yukata for Mia with 24 hours notice....thanks a lot play group who knew a week ago!

The Weekend That Wasn't

Our Labor Day weekend was what you would call unremarkable. Gloomy rain clouds were hanging over the city all weekend long, so we weren't really sure if we should venture out or not. We were so indecisive about it that it ended up being not. 

We did normal things this weekend. We went grocery shopping.
We watched the Lion King. Mia forced us to dance to the Disney station on Pandora. I whipped up some s'mores in the microwave... using marshmallows that could have possibly been from Thanksgiving last year. We played with sidewalk chalk. We got Mia her first real pair of tennis shoes. You know all of those kinds of things. We did none of the spectacular things that we thought we should have been doing, but it was all okay. 

I guess one down side of living here is that there is always something going on, so you feel like you should be out having life experiences....whatever that means.

In other news, I guess it is unofficially fall now. Ten had to wear a tie to work today, so that means summer is over. I'm looking forward to less humid days and holidays. I can't wait for lots of pumpkin and apple and then snowflakes.

Tonight, I am throwing a little end of summer/beginning of fall dinner. We will do summery foods followed by a nice fall dessert. It only seems right to say goodbye and hello at the same time.

Now, I leave you with an unrelated picture. I didn't snap a picture of this weekend, so this will have to do. Mia has officially figured out how to open her finger paints. This makes for interesting mornings.

Thanksgiving Weekend

Friends, we really did have a great first Thanksgiving here in NYC. I took quite a few pictures, but they really don't even cover the half of it. 

Everyone of course wonders if we went to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade...and we decided not too. 3 million people up at 6 a.m. to line up to watch the balloons just didn't seem like a good idea this year. So, we decided to do the next best thing. We headed down to the Museum of Natural History on Wed. afternoon to watch all of the balloons being inflated, and it was such a great idea.

Here are the Macy's staff blowing up Santa. I'll admit we didn't watch them do the entire thing because it takes forever!

Mia had just woken up so wasn't really sure what was going on...hahaha

Buzz Lightyear all ready for his big flight!

Mia yawning in front of the Macy's balloon...you could tell she was very impressed.

After walking around and seeing all of the classics like the Pillsbury Dough Boy and Ronald McDonald, we headed back to the apartment, and I started cooking for the next day. In all honesty, I found Thanksgiving cooking actually quite easy. Lots of just throwing things together in a pan and then baking...so no stress at all really. Here are a few photos of our family dinner.

Mia on Thanksgiving Day...supervising all of the last bits of cooking to be done.

Getting ready to eat all of this yummy goodness.

Butchering...I mean carving...the turkey.

You may notice a few things in these pictures. 1) Our table runner was a collection of gym towels and 2) Our serving dishes were all disposable or made of plastic...hahaha...yeah we actually didn't figure in the whole serving of the meal thing...we kind of completely forgot about what we would need to eat it after it was cooked....haha. So, next year we have vowed to do better.

After our Thanksgiving lunch, we lounged around and watched Netflix and waited for meal two! Yes, we actually went to someone's house and ate Thanksgiving dinner with a bunch of new (to me) people...which was pretty fun...but didn't want to bust out my camera with a group of strangers and put them on the blog....haha.

Anyway, we had a really relaxing four days...and we even made a Starbucks run and drank a peppermint mocha (well I did at least)..OMG...can't wait to go get another one! Completely random side note...I know...anywho... hope everyone also had a great holiday weekend.

Halloween 2012

We had such grand plans for Halloween. We were going to go to the Pumpkin Festival in Central Park, the pumpkin patch in Queens, and then the parade in Riverside Park...well we all know that none of that was possible... so we had to go to Plan B.

First, Mia actually didn't wear this on Halloween...but here she is in her first costume... picked by Ten. He said it would be cruel to dress her up in the pig costume I liked...agreed...and he didn't want to choose the lamb costume because he doesn't like the taste of lamb really...so that is how this bunny was chosen...odd...I know.

On Halloween we lit our Jack-O-Lantern...

...we also read quite a few books. Here were some of our favorites...

Also once we realized that we would be stuck in the building on Halloween, we signed up to accept Trick or Treaters. We had a grand total of 16...not terrible but definitely not like  a small town where you get a bunch of kids I'm guessing...but that just meant more candy for me :)

Anyway, so that is how we spent our Halloween this year.... hopefully next year we will be able to do a little more...weather permitting.

Hurricane Sandy

Our view of the Hudson River on Monday morning. This was the only picture that I could take before we got to about zero visibility.

I really hate to disappoint those looking for a dramatic tale...well actually maybe not...but for us Sandy was a huge wind and rain storm. Unfortunately I can't say the same for those in lower Manhattan and other areas of New York...but hopefully things will be up and running again soon.

Before Sandy got here...we did our absolute best to prepare (lessons learned from the March 11 earthquake). Ten was out getting some canned goods, stocking up on our normal groceries, getting water, buying matches, and doing all of the laundry... great guy yes I know!

The subway was closed, so he was forced to work from home while me and Mia did our usual activities. Things were pretty calm during the day...and after Ten was finished with work...we decided to try to make the atmosphere as light as possible.

We had a simple lunch of taco rice... yes... even though we aren't in Japan we still eat this. If you can't guess what it is...it is taco seasoned chicken, lettuce, tomatoes, onion, black beans, salsa, and shredded cheesed served on rice...yumm.

Later in the day...we decided it was pumpkin carving time! It was so much fun with our little helper....but pics of Jack later.

After carving, we of course roasted the seeds...and Ten loved them. I coated them in olive oil, seasoning salt, and cayenne pepper before popping them into the oven for 45 minutes....yummmm.

Anyway, we aren't sure when the city will be fully up and running yet...and once again I want to emphasize how lucky we really are...I mean so many people are without power and some are stranded in flooded areas... but until we are off of house arrest here...we are going to carry on as usual.

Fall and Apple Dumplings

Even though it is still terribly hot outside, September always makes me feel like fall has arrived.


To kick the season off right, we had homemade apple dumplings for dessert. They weren't the prettiest, but they were sooo good.

There are so many recipes for this online, but this is the one I used:


Crust:
1 cup of flour
1/3 cup of shortening
a dash of salt
1/4 cup of water
cinnamon
vanilla extract


Mix all of the ingredients in a bowl until you get a nice dough. Next divide the dough and flatten into circles.


Next peel and slice up an apple.  Add the apple slices to the dough, sprinkle on some sugar and cinnamon, and add a small amount of butter. Fold up the mixture in the dough and place them in a greased baking pan.


Now, you want to make a sauce to cook the apples in.


In a pan bring 2 cups of water, 3/4 cup of sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and margarine to a boil. Cook until it thickens a bit and then pour it over the dumplings.


I like to sprinkle with more cinnamon and throw in some apples slices around the dumplings.


Put in the oven on 200 C or 400 F for about 50 minutes.


Enjoy!!