Catch Up Post

 

Hi Guys – Just wanted to post a catch-up post….

 

We definitely had some fun with the snow, and were able to get out there and make a snow man with Matt before it started to really melt. The first picture really got me going, cause he looks so big! Time is going by so fast!

 

Meanwhile, Ger and I also got to sneak away to Vegas for a couple days. It was such a blast! We stayed at the Aria hotel – they were all set to celebrate the Year of the Snake as you can see from the lobby photo below. The Aria is pretty new and was a great place to stay, and we had so much fun walking the strip. In addition to all the sites, I was completely bowled over to run across an Oldenburg sculpture right next to the hotel! This is actually probably the third time I’ve run across an installation of this particular sculpture and it was like seeing an old friend.

You can see from the last photo, which was a view from some of the rooms at the Cosmopolitan where some of the conference participants stayed. Our view was very nice too, but this one at night was particularly fun- you can see the Bellagio fountains. It’s time’s like this that I wish I had remembered my other camera (these are all iPhone pictures). Some highlights of eating was tapas at Julian Serrano and our dinner at the Eiffel Tower Restaurant. I was surprised to learn that the lights of the real Eiffel Tower were dimmed the day that the Vegas Eiffel Tower was lit; I thought that was very sweet and just makes me want to visit Paris all the more!

 

 

 

Especially since I just finished reading Jennifer L. Scott’s “Lessons from Madame Chic – 20 Stylish Secrets I learned while living in Paris”. The latest American attempt to deconstruct the French myth is by far the best. For light reading, it was fun and entertaining and a good reminder of common sense advice. The author is very observant and points out things like the modern American suburban house plan of an open main floor basically means the kitchen is never closed, so you eat all the time. This I thought was a very clever observation. I enjoyed the book so much I started following her blog, which is chock full of good advice and tidbits.

I also finished Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. Margaret Atwood brings us another creepy, weird and wonderful dystopian tale – the first in a trilogy. Atwood takes us through a fictional end of the world scenario, which while probably not very plausible still had a heavy cautionary tale. The Handmaid’s Tale is still Atwood’s best work, I think, but I was moved by the story even though it was a very heavy handed lesson she is trying to push to her readers.

Finally I also finished Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. This was a beautifully written book, and I am so sorry I am not a movie producer or I would fight to buy the rights to this. It follows characters living in current day south east Nigeria through the 60’s – during the attempt to form a new country – Biafra. The resulting suffering from the war and blockades is what spurred the formation of Doctors Without Borders. This book however, follows mostly African middle class characters through the war. There are good reads and there is literature and this one is literature. It was definitely a bit heavy at times (anything less would have been trite considering the subject matter) but I loved it and was glad I read it.

I still plan on doing some book reviews from time to time, especially with the non-fiction as it helps me digest and remember the main points, but I am so behind I just wanted to jot down some thoughts on those books before too much more time passed….

I’m going to end with some kitchen going-ons. I had so many pictures I’ll spare you. SO I have just two updates. Apparently, my muffin tin does not make the cut. I tend to use things till they die, but I was given a new one and told to relegate the old one to back-up status. I bake a lot, as you know but I never thought about pan maintenance. To say goodbye to my old muffin pan I baked a goodbye batch of orange cranberry muffins, which were the muffins that originally got me really baking. It was a pretty sentimental moment. New pan, you have some pretty big shoes to fill!

 

 

Also, as you know Matt can be a super picky eater. In all the cookies I made last year he never showed any interest in eating any of it, despite helping me mix and measure ingredients even – until just recently. Imagine my surprise when he crawled into my lap and took a cookie and starting eating it! It was all I could do to look nonchalant while he ate. Ger of course could not hide his excitement, as this means a lot more cookies in our household from now on!