It's March already?!

My apologies for the lapse in blog updates.  I have no excuse.  But I certainly will try to make up for it with a flurry of wonderful blogs!

Most importantly and most recently, Mario has received a bona fide offer from a really great Intellectual Property firm in Austin, TX.  He also interviewed last week in Houston at a really great litigation firm that also does some IP work.  We are thrilled at the prospect of finally knowing what the heck we’re doing for the next few months and years.  While he has not accepted the Austin offer yet, we are hoping to make a decision this week.  Thank you all for your prayers and well-wishes!  We’ll let you know where we’ll be this summer as soon as we find out!

So, back to catching up on the last three months.  We celebrated the arrival of the new year with a tribute to our upcoming year in Fairbanks, Alaska.  We made beer-battered fish, pub fries, and sourdough bread.  The fish batter was from a mix we got at our favorite pub in Anchorage during our trip, and the sourdough starter was from Denali.  It was delightful!  We discovered the trick to real pub fries – you fry the potatoes twice!  You can see the difference in the picture.  Other than great food, our New Year’s Eve was quite uneventful. 

Let’s move a little more quickly.

The best crème brulee EVER.  And a $5 blowtorch (a real one, not one of those little kitchen ones) to brulee it with. 

Julia Child’s coq au vin and ratatouille for Valentine’s Day dinner.  Complete success!

Had to cut Josh’s hair again.  It went a lot better this time once we strapped him into his highchair and turned on the Backyardigans.

We’ve had some epic snowstorms and had to break out the candles due to extensive power outages.  Some cool shots Mario got, huh?  The snow was especially deep this year.  The piles between cars on our street were higher than my head until just a few weeks ago.

Mario took a morning off to go to the Boston Children’s Museum with me and Josh.  What a fun place!  Josh had a blast.  

Mario also turned 29 in March.  We went out to a good (but not worth the price) dinner at Boston's most famous fish house - Legal Seafoods.  

Josh and I usually have 3 play groups a week.  One is a Toddler Time group that we take turns hosting.  Josh and I hosted for Chinese New Year in February and had a great time with all his friends!  

Mario and I also kept our tradition of celebrating Chinese New Year with a feast of dishes learned during our year in Qingzhou, Shandong Province, China.  La zi ji shown here – chicken braised in caramelized sugar and soy sauce with star anise, leek, peppers and mushrooms.  

And here’s some pictures from the weekend when we learned to make that very dish at Lindy’s family home in a very small rural village.  We ate the very rooster that woke us up that morning at 4 a.m.  And boy was he delicious!

We also made it to the Aquarium with a few friends.  Josh didn’t like it very much – I think it was too dark for him.  We tried with Mario a second time with the same results, unfortunately.  It’s a really cool aquarium, though.  There’s a 4-storey, circular tank that runs up the middle of the building with a walkway winding around the outside all the way to the top.  It is filled with sharks, turtles, tuna, and a whole lot of other very large fish, which I think also scared the little guy.  Josh did enjoy the penguins, though.  

We checked out the Museum of Science.  While it wasn't very kid-friendly, Josh did really enjoy this Archimedian motion machine.  Here he is showing Daddy how it works.

 

Mario’s been pretty darn busy lately.  He’s taken on a fairly ambitious class load as well as working part-time at a Cambridge-based robotics engineering firm called Vecna.  He’s working with their in-house lawyer doing patent prosecution.  It has been a great experience, but we sure have missed him! 

We discovered a restaurant in Chinatown that not only has AMAZING, authentic food, but it has AMAZING, authentic food from our province in China!  What a wonderful evening that was!  Can’t wait to go back!!

In other food news, we made some epic pad thai and a really wonderful coconut shrimp soup with apricot and cilantro basmati rice.  Yummm!  I’m happy to share the recipes if anyone’s interested. 

Josh and I are headed to Moab, UT and Las Vegas to spend some time with my family.  Hopefully we’ll have some fun pics to share in a few weeks!  Poor Mario will be here all by his lonesome for almost 2 weeks. 

Christmas and Stuff!

Jake's Baby Claire Rose

What a wonderful Christmas we’ve had!  It was the very best of both worlds – Josh and I got to visit family in Oregon during Mario’s finals, and the three of us got to spend a quiet Christmas together. 

I packed the refrigerator full of food for my studying sweetheart and Josh and I took off for Oregon.  The little man did great and we got there with no problems.  We spent a wonderful 9 days visiting family.  Josh absolutely loved the time with grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles.  We got to meet Jake and Heather’s new little darling, Claire Rose, and catch up with lots of loved ones.  We missed Suzie and little Max and Scotita, though!  Josh had a riot of a time chasing around his cousins as well as all the dogs and cats he met at the grandparents’ houses!  When we got to Oregon, he was fascinated and terrified of dogs.  By the time we left Oregon, his favorite thing to do was to chase down the nearest furry creature, stick his hand in its mouth, and squeal in delight.  In fact, this comfort with dogs has held up after coming home – just the other day he was sitting on a lap that was also occupied by our friends’ little poodle, Gigi.  He proceeded to grip Gigi on both sides of her cute little head, pull her in close, and the two shared a kiss.  With tongue. 

Anyway, Oregon was great!  Josh had his first real experience with Christmas presents.  He got some great gifts, although he doesn’t seem to enjoy opening presents very much.  He made the same disgusted face every time he ripped the paper, including Christmas morning here in Boston.  He sure does like the presents, though! 

Our flight home was not terribly pleasant.  On the second leg, Josh fell asleep (miraculously) as we took off.  About an hour into the 3 hour flight, one of the flight attendants told me I needed to move him since his head was resting on the arm rest and hung out about an inch into the aisle.  So I tried very carefully to move him.  He woke up and cried so hard he made himself vomit.  After that he was okay, though!  Fun stuff!

Mario was studying for and taking finals while we were gone.  He thought he had finals Monday and Thursday.  He found out on Sunday that his Thursday final had been moved to Tuesday morning.  Although that was pretty unpleasant, he thinks he did okay and is glad the term is over. 

The day after I got home was our 6^th anniversary.  Mario got me a beautiful, huge, hardwood cutting board and a delightful box of Belgian truffles.  What a dear!  We went out to dinner at a little restaurant (little as in it only had seating for about 20 people) in East Boston called Rino’s Place.  It was absolutely amazing.  Mario had chicken saltimbocca and I got the lobster ravioli.  That’s right, I said lobster ravioli.  And it was every bit as lovely as it sounds.  It was a wonderful anniversary and it’s been an even more wonderful 6 years! 

Josh and I have been relishing all the time we’ve been able to spend with Mario this past week.  Usually all his time off is spent traveling to visit family and trying to make sure we spend time with everyone.  This holiday, though, we’ve been taking walks, going shopping, reading, and spending lots and lots of time playing with Josh.  It’s been so relaxing and fulfilling and, although we do miss parts of being with our families at Christmas, this has been a most excellent vacation!  We had the chance to do a bunch of things we haven’t been able to the last few Christmases, like put up a Christmas tree!  We also decorated sugar cookies, which the monkey really enjoyed.  

Yum!

We spent Christmas Eve with some friends who host an annual Christmas Eve dinner for those few families in our church group who don’t go “home” for Christmas.  This is the first year we’ve attended and it was a really fun evening.  The Gentrys had a delicious Italian dinner prepared.  It just so happened that their guest list included vegans, vegetarians, and celiacs (allergic to gluten).  Lots of credit to Laci and Christian for putting together a feast for such a challenging group of eaters!  Mario and I turned out to be the only omnivore couple in attendance.  After dinner we had a rousing game of Christmas Pictionary (the boys won by 4 points), we sang Christmas carols, and finished by decorating sugar cookies for Santa.

Disgusted present-opening face

Christmas Camping

One aspect of being by ourselves at Christmas has been the opportunity to establish some of our own family traditions.  Mario thought a fun tradition would be to sleep under the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve, so we did!  I think we’ll call it Christmas Camping.  We decided after a particularly rough night with Josh (the day before Christmas Eve he woke up at midnight and didn’t go back to sleep until 3am.  What am I going to do when I eventually have a

Breaking in the new truck

newborn again?!  One sleepless night and I was thrown all out of whack!) that only kids who are capable of falling asleep and staying asleep outside of their cribs are allowed to participate in Christmas Camping, so it was just the two of us.  When Josh woke up, he opened his presents (Mario and I both got our presents early – Photoshop Elements for me and a nice overcoat for him . . . and sushi, but that’s later!), which included a train, a dump truck, and a Leapfrog book.  Anyway, after exploring those options for a while, he found his snow boots and brought them to us, indicating he would like to play in the snow for a while and freeze his little paws off.  He had a great time filling up his new dump truck with snow using one of my kitchen spoons. 

Maki rolls

Tuna sashimi

Mario and I spent the rest of the day (and parts of the previous days) working on Christmas dinner.  Our friends, Sophie and Jose, bought a beautiful prime rib roast for dinner which we prepared, and Mario loves sushi, so we had prime rib and sushi for Christmas dinner.  It was epic.  I dried the rib, uncovered in the refrigerator, for two days.  Then I dry rubbed it and roasted it.  The sushi was lots of fun – a throwback from my days as a ski bum working at the Seafood Buffet at Deer Valley Ski Resort in Park City, Utah.  I made bluefin tuna, salmon, and shrimp nigiri as well as crispy shrimp and spicy tuna maki rolls.  We even had flying fish roe (those are the shiny little orange balls on top – fish eggs!) for garnish.  They were beautiful and delicious.

But the prime rib defied description.  Hands down the best piece of meat I’ve ever eaten, although Dave and Aurica’s steak and tri-tip sure could give it a run for its money!  It had a beautiful dark, salty, crispy crust but the inside was a perfectly seasoned and tender masterpiece.  It was like eating delicious little bites of prime-rib-flavored butter.  It was unbelievable.  I can’t wait for our next big occasion so I can make another one!  For dessert, we had homemade dark chocolate truffles, triple chocolate coconut cookies, and pumpkin spice cake.  As one who often measures a celebration by its food, this Christmas was out of this world!  And it was definitely better because it was shared with our good friends Josh & Whitney (and their little Gigi, with whom our Josh shared a passionate kiss on Christmas night as discussed above) and Jose & Sophie and their little Mirabel.   

From left - Jose, Mirabel, Sophie, Whitney, Gigi, and Josh

In all, it was a lovely Christmas that was spent quietly with our little family and with wonderful friends.  We missed our families, but this was exactly what we needed!

You may have heard about the big snow storm currently blowing through the East Coast.  Snow storms are lovely when you don’t need to leave the house unless you want to, and this one has been fun!  Josh has finally learned that if he lets me put his mittens on right (i.e. lets me get his thumbs in their place), he can play and put his hands in the snow and they won’t even get cold!  He and Mario have been having fun playing in snow drifts when the wind isn’t going like mad. 

Today we braved the elements and the un-shoveled sidewalks to go to the library for a little while.  Our library is seriously the best library ever.  The entire top floor is just for kids, and it’s separated from the rest of the library so the little tykes don’t have to be quiet or anything.  It’s huge and awesome and we spend a lot of time there.  

The Cambridge Public Library

Eating bubbles

When we got home, Josh found the bubbles and politely asked us to blow some for him.  He was content for a while just to watch and pop them, and then he got this idea! 

 Some great shots Mario took, huh?

Josh is a great little guy still, and learning a lot.  Just this week he learned how to spin in circles (while watching the Backyardigans, his most favorite show EVER) and spit mouthfuls of water in the bathtub, both of which he is very impressed with.  He also thinks he can jump, but he really just bends down and then stands up really fast, which is hilarious and adorable.  He still hasn’t used any new words besides his three (hi, daddy, eye), but you can see him figuring out stuff.  He’s a whole lot of fun these days!

You can see more photos on my Facebook account.  If you're not on Facebook and would like to see them, let me know and I'll send you a link!

The Game and Thanksgiving!

November has been a fun month.  The weather has been mild until the last week or so and we’ve really been enjoying the company of great friends and a mostly-happy baby!

Josh is a big fan of cooking.  When I’m busy in the kitchen, I always have to clear a spot on the countertop so he can hang out and give me a hand.  He needs to have his own utensil to poke and stir things with and full access to whatever happens to be in the bowls I’m using.  Here he is helping me finish up a pizza, one of his current favorite foods.

 

Two weeks ago we went with some friends to The Game.  For those of you not familiar with this term, The Game is the annual, thunderous clash of the Ivy League football titans: Harvard vs. Yale.  It’s the longest-running rivalry in college football and is actually broadcast every year.  In reality, The Game is not really about football at all.  It’s really just an excuse for Ivy League namby-pambies, such as ourselves, to shamelessly flaunt our Harvard affiliation.  We got all yuppied up in our school sweatshirts and virtually pranced through Harvard Square on our way to the football field.  I don’t think many people actually noticed when the game began as they were busy networking with their fellow namby-pambies.  It wasn’t like any football game I’ve been to.  Sure, people wanted their team to beat the other guys, but I don’t think many of them actually knew how that was to occur, nor did they care.  It was like a high school game but without the heart.  I really like watching football, and I wasn’t even following the game very closely.  And with all those white-sweatshirt-around-the-neck yacht club-goers around (does it get any more yuppie than Harvard vs. Yale?), it was really difficult not to make remarks like “That’s a great marching band.  I wonder if they’re actually the football team too and are going to rip off their band uniforms and start playing football.  Or maybe they’re just going to play band music at each other violently and see who wins.”  We wondered whether being members of the marching band at Harvard was actually a status symbol (no offense to anyone reading this who was in their high school marching band).  Anyway, we had a great time with our friends and headed home at half-time to let Josh have a nap and enjoy the rest of the game in the warmth of our own home.  Strangely, the game looked much more exciting on ESPN than it did in person, which has definitely not been my experience with college sporting events.  Every time I watch the Beavers play (Josh is a big sports-watcher, as you can see here - OSU v. Cal a few weeks ago), I remember how awesome it was to sit in that stadium and enjoy the rush of excitement or disappointment along with tens of thousands of avid fans.  In person, the Harvard game was somewhat sparsely populated by people who really didn’t care.  On TV, the announcers kept saying how exciting the game was and how electrifying the atmosphere was.  Those announcers obviously have never been to a “real” college rivalry football game if that was an electrifying atmosphere.  Anyway, we had a great time with the wonderful friends we’ve made here over the past two years.  Here’s Josh and his little buddy Katelyn, only two months and one block apart.  And here’s Josh with his two favorite people (and that’s including us), Josh and Whitney.

We have been blessed with friends who were willing to let us into their lives here while we are far from family.  The past two years we have been invited to share Thanksgiving with good friends, so we decided it was our turn to spread the friendship.  We ended up hosting 20 adults and 5 children (including ourselves) in our 800-sq foot apartment.  I was a little worried about fitting that many people in our little place, but it turned out great.  We wish we could have invited more people, but we were truly at capacity as you can see!  We were quite cozy, and once everybody sat down there was really no getting up again, but everyone had a great time.  We had fabulous food and great company and it was wonderful!  Tiring (even little Nikhil was worn out and he didn’t even cook anything! :) ), but wonderful! 

 

Here’s a flourless chocolate cake I made for Thanksgiving dessert.  My friend Paige, an outstanding baker, inspired the stenciled leaves and acorn detailed in powdered sugar and cocoa.  Mario spent about an hour cutting out the pattern for me.  Turned out great, and it was wonderfully delicious! 

We bought one of our Christmas presents early this year – a portable DVD player.  Josh and I are flying to Oregon for a short visit while Mario studies for finals, and we’ll be driving across the country at least twice in the next 18 months, so we figured it would be an excellent purchase for everyone’s benefit.  Here’s Josh giving it a go.  Hope he’s this interested in it during our flight home!