Weekend Getaway

Chris and I just came back from a long weekend away.
It was beautiful.
And peaceful.
And fun!

We took long walks on the beach, played in the waves like a couple of teenagers, stayed up late every night and slept in as long as we wanted to.

It was a perfect weekend. Perfect. I'll remember this forever (and not just because we barely escaped a shark attack. It's true. I think. But that's a story for another day.)

We are home now, and it was so wonderful to see the girls tumbling out of the house to see us! I missed them so much! But, wow! They are noisy.

It is great to be back home, but it was great to get away.

Jasper

Jasper.

I love this dog. Despite the fact that about half of what I've ever said about him has been in complaint, still....I love him. He is a sweet, sweet, sweetheart of a dog. He loved the kids. He loved them, even though he was constantly, accidentally, knocking them over.


He was especially good with Abbie. I ultimately have no explanation for why, but among Jasper's virtues, gentleness was not one of them. He was gentle with Abbie, though, laying beside her all the time, barely moving, his eyes on her and his tail happily thumping.

It was time to admit defeat, though.
We failed.
There's no way to whitewash it.
Jasper needed space to run in, but he couldn't do it here. Here, he could jump over the fence at will and run off chasing cars. We couldn't take him outside unless he was on leash, which meant that he couldn't run at all.

There are other things, too: there were too many toys, and he couldn't learn to leave them alone. He destroyed everything he touched, and so as time went on he spent more and more time in the kitchen, because that was the only way we could keep him from breaking the toys.

The truth is, he just wasn't a good fit for us right now. We tried to make it work, because we did love him, but nobody was happy.

So yesterday, Chris drove Jasper back to the farm he was born on and the breeder assured us that she has a family already waiting to take him. They've always had two dogs, and last year both of their dogs (both Chessies) died. They have a puppy now, but wanted an older dog as well, one who was already house-trained. They have three kids. The kids are all older, their youngest is the same age as our oldest.

I am so glad they have kids. Jasper really loves kids.




So here we are. We had our cry out yesterday, and now the house feels weird and quiet.

We love you, Jasper. I'm so glad we were able to find a good situation for you, but I am so, so sorry that it wasn't here.

Request from the kids (reason #2 I didn't mind turning 33)

Katie, who now makes a point of reading the blog over my shoulder as I write posts, has asked me why I put up a post about Chris' birthday gift to me and did not put up a post talking about the girls' gifts.

She has a point. So here it is! (Shh! Quick while Katie isn't looking)

My eldest daughter, showing her true colors as well as her maturity, disappeared the Sunday afternoon before my birthday, emerging about an hour later with a mysterious request that I meet her upstairs. I finished whatever it was I was doing and went up the stairs.....to see a sparklingly clean top floor! Katie had straighted and cleaned the entire floor all by herself. I was so touched, both that she put so much effort into it and that she would have even have the idea in the first place. She's some kid. I seriously can't believe someone like her managed to be born to someone like me.

The second big birthday gift was an original song by Beth and Claire. I loved it, and immediately made them sing it again for the camera so that I could post it. Enjoy!

The reason I didn't mind turning 33

This is going back a few weeks now, but I have to talk about it. I can't not talk about it, and I can't not share these fuzzy, grainy photos.
Be glad if you don't live near us, because we are forcing everyone we encounter to scroll through the 30 or so pictures Chris has on his phone. We know it's obnoxious, but we can't stop ourselves.

The above picture is a covert shot of the guy who set the stage for the single most amazing meal we have ever had in our lives. For my birthday this year, Chris reserved two seats at the best table in this up and coming Frederick restaurant. It's called Table 21, and it is set right in the kitchen so that you can see all the action. Did I mention that it is called Table 21? Do you wanna guess why? They serve you 21 courses.

Heaven, man. Heaven has got to be at least a little something like this.

The food was amazing. Amazing! I have been very snobbish about the whole molecular gastronomy movement, but at Volt we were served some truly unique, inventive and delicious courses that rocked my preconceptions.

The couple sitting beside us (Table 21 serves four per night) were vegetarians, so it was especially interesting to see what they were getting as opposed to what we were getting. I'll tell you what, becoming a vegetarian never looked so good.

Carrot sphere with cardamom and ginger

But when this came, oh I thanked God for the wonder that is pig:
Iberico cross pork belly with cranberry beans, mostarda

If I were going to be executed tomorrow, this is what I would order for my last meal. I'd never had pork belly before, although I had heard about it, and let me tell you this: pork belly lives up to the hype.

This next one actually made Chris clap his hands and bounce in his seat:
Foie gras torchon, bing cherries, vanilla brioche, pistachio soil

I say the vegetarian dishes were awesome, and they were, but I can only put five pictures in this post and I couldn't resist throwing this one in:
Pineland farm beef strip loin, creamed corn, soy beans, garlic

Do you see that thin, papery sheet laying against the beef? That's the garlic. I don't know how they did it, I don't know why they thought of it, but it was delicious. It literally melted into the tenderly cooked, luscious beef as you took a bite and added a fun little kick of garlic, the perfect amount.

We had heard really good things about Volt since it opened last year, but we hadn't had the chance to get there yet. When we read that the chef was going to be a contestant on Top Chef, though, we started to worry. The chef seemed like the real deal, and we wanted a chance to get into his restaurant while the plebes still could...

I can't tell you how glad I am that we did. Top Chef has started now, and let me tell you.....this guy will knock your socks off. I think there is a really, really good chance that he will win. I think there is a really, really good chance that by this time next year you will need divine assistance to score a seat at Table 21.

There is an almost undefinable focus and humility that all the best chefs seem to have in common, and this guy has it in spades. The night we went to Volt was the night after the premiere of the TC season, and there was a steady stream of giggly women asking to talk to him He would smile and nod....and then go about his thing. At one point, there was a slight hitch in the rhythm of the kitchen and the chef brought our next course to us before our last plates had been cleared. This guy owns the restaurant, he is a burgeoning foodie rock-star; you'd think he'd call the bus-boy over to clear the plates. No. He set the hot plates down, came and cleared our dishes away himself, and then went back and got the next course.
That is humility, and dedication, and service. I was hooked. I loved the food, I liked the atmosphere, but I really respected the chef.

Watch Brian Voltaggio on Top Chef. Root for him! Meanwhile, I can't thank my husband enough. It was the best birthday gift ever. It's a rare and precious thing to have the opportunity to glimpse something really and truly special.

Back to School (or How Anne of Green Gables deceived me)

Sorry for the long silence. It has been a busy few weeks, but here I am to report that the first week back was a resounding success! The girls all seem to enjoy their respective teachers and classes, and we're off to a smooth start.

Yesterday, though....

Yesterday was a different story. It was the official Back-To-School Night, where the parents get to sit for hours listening to things that could be communicated in the span of three minutes, and the teachers get to learn where all the annoying habits of their students come from. I joined the "hospitality committee" this year, which is a fancy way of saying I bring food. Since all baking these days must be used as preparation for my sister's wedding cake in November, I decided to make cupcakes decorated in the school colors, with tiny roses on top.

This is where Anne of Green Gables let me down.

I grew up loving the series. Loving it. I loved the way Anne did things just like me, forgetting things and having crazy things happen to her....I was never responsible for having a mouse drown in cream, but I did once leave the garage door open, leaving me an easy scapegoat for the mouse that appeared a few days later. I also never fell through a roof, but I routinely ran out of gas while driving my grandparents' boat around Deep Creek, leaving me (and my passengers: Kelli, Julie, Shannon, Ange - I'm sorry) stranded at the mercy of strangers. The awesome thing about Anne, though, was that as she grew older she grew out of her ditsy ways. By the time she was a mother she was gracious, relaxed and serene. I felt confident that my future would be the same.

Fast forward to yesterday. I began decorating the cupcakes around noon, thinking that I could drop them off at the school right before classes let out and surprise the girls with a car-ride home. It wasn't to be, however, because I am incapable of gauging time correctly. By four o'clock I was frantic and the kitchen was covered in frosting, and I was still not done. To make things worse, Chris came into the kitchen and immediately burst into laughter. He was laughing so hard he couldn't tell me why, he just directed me to the bathroom mirror. I went in and looked at myself. I looked at my lips, then my teeth, then my tongue. They were all a deep, violent shade of blue. I should not have licked that spoon.

I brushed my teeth like mad, to no avail, then realized that I was just going to have to accept the fact that I was about to face an entire school full of judgemental parents...with a blue mouth.

I packed up the cupcakes and asked Katie to help me load them into the car. Despite my blue mouth (and, actually, green fingers -- the cupcakes were blue with yellow flowers), I felt proud of the cupcakes. They looked cute, and I congratulated myself on cleverly decorating them in the school colors. I said as much to Katie as she helped me out, and she looked at me with a puzzled expression.

"Um, Mom, " she said, "The school colors are blue and red."

Oh. So, as it turns out, I decorated the cupcakes in visually unappealing colors and covered myself in bizarre stains for no reason at all. I was all set to really impress the PTA crowd.

Anne Shirley would never have done that. Where did I go wrong? Is this my fault, or is it the fault of Mrs. Montgomery, who should have known that flighty little girls grow into flighty little adults? I'm going to blame Anne. And hope that the parents of my kids' friends don't hold it against them when their mother can't pull herself together.