Happy New Year!

As I sit here with my laptop in my, uh, lap, watching "That's Entertainment" (we're nearing the end, the American in Paris ballet with Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron is playing), Miller, Bailey and Fred snoozing and occasionally snoring in the background, I have been checking out the polls over at Andrew Sullivan's The Daily Dish. I highly recommend viewing some of the finalists in the Mental Health Break of the Year. "My Dogs Greeting Me" is way ahead in the voting, and I do love that one, but I voted for "Our Wonderful Nature". It is hilarious. Also, "Hey Jude" is pretty great, too.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/mentalhealthbreak.html

Enjoy and have a wonderful New Year!

Denise and the crew

Pizza stone good

We christened the pizza stone last night with two delicious 14 inch pizzas. Darryl did most of the work as he made the dough and was a one-man assembly line. I sauteed the mushrooms and sliced up the onions and red peppers. The first one wasn't the most beautiful pizza ever made: we had, how shall I say, technical difficulties getting the loaded down dough onto the stone. We figured out what we had to do for the second one, though. They were delicious, and as you can see, the second one really was pretty, too!

Bring it on!

Well, I am ready for the new year. It's not that I didn't have a good 2008 or anything. I made the big move up to the Adirondack Mountains and I am enjoying being up here so, so much. But with the coming inauguration of Barack Obama as president of the United States I feel renewed hope that we as a country can get back to the job of helping ourselves as well as the rest of the world. I hope that means an end to the war that has bled us dry of the funds that we so desperately need to fund research into disease and crippling medical conditions so that the future looks more like the future that we saw ahead before these last eight years of George Bush took away so much of the hope and promise of our country. It is like we are eight years behind in medical, other sciences and technological research. I like that we have a president-elect who is a self-professed geek. I think that bodes so well for all of us.

On the home front, Christmas was nice and we're celebrating the New Year a little early tonight with homemade pizza...and champagne, of course. We have had a significant snowmelt over the last few days. It was flurrying a few minutes ago, and now the sun is shining brilliantly. I've got to run Miller over to the vet for a check-up, so I've got to sign-off for now.

I hope everyone's Christmas was great, and Hannukah, too. Kwanzaa if that's what you celebrate. And have a great 2009! Cheers. Denise

The Holiday Meal

We're right close to the big Christmas holiday. I have just made the cranberry relish (an absolutely wonderful recipe with whole fresh cranberries, tangerines and their zest, onions, garlic, ginger and brown sugar that I got from the Food Network). I served this at Thanksgiving as well and it was a big hit...with everyone but Dana! Onions and cranberries together? The horror. After a break I will be making the stuffing. I don't actually stuff the turkey anymore since it just seems too mushy coming out of the bird. I like a little crunch with my stuffing, so I'm putting it in the oven early this time.

I do turkey for both the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. I'm not sure why. We used to do ham sometimes at Christmas, but I do like the turkey. Plus, I make ham and cabbage with potatoes several times through the year, so ham doesn't seem all that special, at least not to me.

Happy Christmas eve, everyone!

Denise

Snowshoeing!

Today Darryl and I headed out back again to do some snowshoeing. This was just my second time - my first time snowshoeing was yesterday! It's a wonderful, peaceful and beautiful way to get some exercise. Yesterday we met my neighbors Bob and Pam and their daughter Morgan along with their two Great Danes, Sapphire and Nitro. Great dogs! Our walks to the quarry in the summer and fall were nice - and in the wrong direction. Darryl found a shortcut when he explored with his snowshoes on his own when he first arrived to ride out this last snowstorm (he was able to drive down his driveway without a plow, just not back up!).

So here are a few shots of today's adventure.

First, the quarrry. That's me, waaaaaaay in the distance:

It's so cool out in the forest. Virgin snow, save for the occasional deer, fox, rabbit or other tracks of the creatures with which we share this land. The trees all have their unique footprint as well, especially after they've been doused with several inches of snow:

As we walked through the woods we came along some things that were now only vaguely familiar from when we'd passed them in the summertime. This shortcut that Darryl found to the quarry allows us to bypass one of my least favorite things about the other way to get there: the other shortcut, a steep, rocky way to get back to the path down at the bottom of the quarry (Darryl's new way gets us to the top of the quarry without all the harder climbing). That steep path is still steep, but you'd never know there were rocks there, too, with the blanket of snow now covering them.

This is the sky through the trees today after two days of snow:

And then we finished our snowshoeing and got back to the house. We took a stroll to the front to get another look at how pretty my house looks in the snow (I did spend time this afternoon shoveling snow off of the porch. It really wouldn't do for the front porch to crash under the weight of snow and ice!):






And then Darryl found my mailbox on the ground. This seemed to always happen in South Jersey whenever we had infrequent snowfalls. I attributed that to the fact that they got so little snow there that they would forget how to run the snowplows. I guess that wasn't the issue. I noticed that my neighbor down the street whose mailbox was even farther out to the street than mine didn't get hit. Dana and I are probably going to get a bunch of bungie cords and wrap them around the post in an inexpensive attempt to get the mailbox to last through the winter. What we'll do in the spring is the question.


So that is today's post. Stay warm - it seems the whole country has been hit with some of this cold. I don't mind it, but I've had complaints from a lot of people who are not enjoying their winter weather. I don't have much sympathy, but then again, I like all this snow! Ciao.

Winter Wonderland

What a day. See?

I cannot express how pleased I am to see all of this snow. I love it. I truly do live in a winter wonderland. I spent about an hour shoveling and clearing my driveway and making paths for the dogs to get out into the yard to do their business. Fred felt it was his special job for the day to make sure that all the paths were passable - at light speed! He was adorable running around and trying out each way to go. Once he zoomed past a new way to go and I swear I heard the "screech" sound in the air, and I think I may have seen smoke when he stopped, and then made his way as fast as he could down a new path. He is such a cutie-pie. And Bailey and Miller had fun in the snow, too.

Joyful times in Willsboro.

Also today, I made beef stew in my slow cooker. I used an Ina Garten (of Barefoot Contessa fame) recipe from her chef at her restaurant. Her recipe isn't for use in a slow cooker, but I made it that way anyway. It starts with placing the beef in wine, garlic and bay leaves and marinating overnight. It has other wonderful things as well - sundried tomatoes, rosemary, Worcestershire sauce. Very savory, rich beef stew. We didn't eat it today - I made it for tomorrow. Well, okay, I taste-tested it. It's excellent. You can find the recipe on the Food Network listed as Parker's Beef Stew/Ina Garten. Yum.

Good cheer

I took a ride down to see my sister Deb's elite choir perform a holiday concert. What a lovely evening and a wonderfully talented group they are. I always marvel at how excellent these kids are and have to forever remind myself that these young people are still only in high school. Deb manages to get a beautiful sound from these young voices, excellent singing with great passion and emotion. I really never tire of listening to her choirs (my beat up old CDs are proof positive of this), and even drove all the way back to southern New Jersey just to hear them. I picked up my friends Tom and Dolores on the way down and we delivered four dozen decorated Christmas cookies for the refreshments part of the evening. They were a big hit. If you want to impress, check out the internet for Martha Stewart's Royal Icing recipe and its accompanying cookie recipe. Delicious. Of course, including some Collies, Dachshunds, Scotties and Westies decorated with their Christmas colored collars along with the trees, bells and other holiday-themed cookies goes a long way in spreading Christmas cheer. I also got to drive through that crazy ice wonderland through the Saratoga Springs area. Wow. Just beautiful, in spite of the danger the ice was to the trees and the power outages left in the ice storm's wake. And the stay overnight at Tom and Dolores' - their million dollar view of Manhattan from Guttenberg - was thrilling, as it always is. It's truly breathtaking walking into their place, every time. Thanks for the hospitality, friends.

Let it snow

The bad news is that it's kind of a dark day. It started out relatively warm, but it's gotten colder as the morning has gone on. The good news is that turning the lights on on the Christmas tree and watching the pretty snowfall behind it outside the picture window makes you totally not care that it's overcast. It doesn't feel dark or dreary but bright and cheery. I love the snow. I just brought the dogs in from a walk and it had rained steadily earlier, wiping out all evidence of yesterday's snow. I suspect this snow could make the roads messy, but I'm in for the day. I have two things I must do today: 1) prepare the dough for the cookies Dana and I are making for Deb's concert on Saturday (it needs to chill before it can be spread out for the cookie cutters tonight), and 2) bake an apple cake for my Christmas gathering Friday morning with the Master Gardeners group. Seems like a good day for baking.

Well, I know it's been a while since I've posted anything. Had family for the Thanksgiving holiday, then Christmas decorations that HAD to get up ASAP as I like to enjoy a nice, long Christmas season.

Today Darryl came over to replace two ugly wall sconces with the two new ones that I purchased a while back. There is a wonderful lighting store up in Plattsburgh. I'm not allowed to go there anymore, as I am always tempted by their great variety of nice sconces and, therefore, I don't buy the cheaper stuff at Lowe's. I have two more sconces to replace, and I assure you, they will be from Lowe's or Home Depot.

So, in exchange for Darryl replacing these sconces, I made him lunch: cous-cous with olive oil infused with garlic topped by sauteed vegetables. I used what I had in the fridge: leeks, carrots, celery, heirloom cherry tomatoes sauteed in garlic, some onion and olive oil, finished with fresh thyme. Oh, baby. It was a very nice lunch.

Darryl hung out and we worked out a way to keep the guest room from getting too hot (it's heat zones, shared thermostats, too much baseboard heat, blah, blah, blah), and also checked out a few other things in the basement. When Dana got home from work we all headed over to the Turtle Island Cafe for dinner. It was 5 degrees out. At 6:30 in the evening. In early December. Brrrrrr.

Dinner, by the way and as always, was superb. It is just crazy that one of the best restaurants in the Adirondacks happens to be in my little town of Willsboro.

That's it for now. Stay warm!