Papa's memorial get-together in Ohio

Garage update!

Awhile back CD wired, insulated and drywalled the garage. His latest project has been mudding and taping, although I think it originally was supposed to be my job. He loves doing it and I think it relaxes him to spend time in his future "manroom".

The Mud:



The first wall aka the dartboard wall, primed:



After a couple of layers of paint:



Mudding and taping, moving around the garage:

Visitors

MidMay brought along some visitors. Jason came during Mother's day weekend and the following weekend it was Dave's turn. They were both very lucky with the weather: sunny and mostly warm.

Jason has visited a few times before, so we spent a lot of time cooking and hanging out in the house. Jason enjoying a refreshment on the deck:

Dave's arrival coincided with the last day of finals, so he accompanied us out for beers with the students followed by a lovely walk down the jetty:

On Saturday, we headed to that hippie fest known as the Arcata Farmers' Market. There were lots of people since it was commencement weekend and it always helps when the sun is out.

After a stop to enjoy lunch with the physics department graduates, CD had to attend the commencement ceremonies, so Dave and I headed to the beach.

We went to Moonstone beach which is one of my favorite spots. We climbed up on the rocks and watched the water rising as the tide came in, we saw some crazy people swimming, and we loved watching the surfers and the climbers. We spent a good while just chilling on the beach talking and surprisingly getting sunburned (yikes!)

The next day, we drove down Avenue of the Giants to see the big redwoods. It was pretty warm, but it felt cool in their shade. While there, Dave picked up a live burl to take home to Wisconsin. I'm excited to follow it's progress because the saleswoman assured us that redwood trees can grow anywhere... we'll see!

Mother's Day

Happy mother's day to all the wonderful mothers I know.

Sometimes mother's day is hard for me to think about without getting a bit sad and I really miss my mom. (Other times, I feel liberated because even if I forgot to send a card or flowers, it's not the end of the world.) 2009 marks the 10th year anniversary of her passing, I'm currently taking ideas about how to honor her, so feel free to send your suggestions.

My aunt (who's always been like a mother to me) and my mom, way back in the day:

Wristwarmers: part two

I made these for my friend Molly and she loves them. I'm glad!

Today is Stephie's birthday as well. Happy Birthday!!!

CD's birthday cake: a success story

Growing up in Chile, my favorite cake was Torta de Mil hojas, which translates to Thousand layer cake. It had been a long time since I'd eaten it and my idealized version sorta contained flaky pastry interlayered with "manjar" (dulce de leche to the rest of South America?) On my most recent visit there, I made a point of getting some cake (as much as I could eat really) and I even got some to-go after an inport, so that for a couple of days after going out to sea, we were still eating cake. It was awesome, but quite different than my idealized version. The bready/cake layers were not flaky, in fact they were more like thin flat bread or cracker layers. The layers are not sweet in themselves which makes sense since the manjar is so rich.

When I asked CD what kind of cake he wanted for his birthday, he mentioned repeating the coconut cake that I had made earlier this month for Easter or his wording might have been more along the lines of "whatever". He likes most of the cakes that I've made for him and his long-time favorite (usually made for his birthday) is carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. This year, I wanted to try something new and I had the manjar already made (bought in Chile- thanks Sis!) which CD loves, just loves.

I found a recipe online and went to work. This recipe is somewhat labor intensive, but so worth it! It tasted just like I remembered. Delicioso!!

To start, make dough and divide into 10 balls which you roll out into 9" discs to be baked

Baked layers (not quite round)

Manjar!! (to make it at home, just boil a can of sweetened condensed milk (in the can!) for 3 hours making sure that the water in your pot doesn't boil away)

Moisten the layers with a bit of brandy (I used some lucuma liqueur since I didn't have brandy on hand) before covering with manjar and beginning the layering.

I adorned the finished product with some walnuts:

CD loved his cake. Happy Birthday!

I know you're wondering what happened to the other half of the cake... we couldn't wait until dinner. We had been invited to Craig and Stephanie's for a lovely dinner in CD's honor, but earlier in the afternoon, we dove into the cake (ha!)

Minnesota Spring time

It was great to spend a long weekend visiting with Paige and Dave.
The guys did all the log chopping while Paige and I moved the logs into the shed for next winter. The weather was pleasant and mostly dry.

Paige drives the haul!


Tandem chops!


I became mesmerized by the maple tree, I'd never seen these flowers before:

We got organized (for a change) and had the opportunity to see Guy and Kelly. Guy and CD rocked out in The Itch back in those high school days. So fun to see them!

Kelly and Guy sample Dave's home brews:

Additionally, our friend Dave was driving through town that same weekend. We got to visit with him and his two daughters, Laura and Emma. The girls enjoyed playing with the bouncy balls and eating tiny cupcakes: