I thought of you because I planted impatiens this weekend.
And impatiens always make me think of you.
I bought a flat of impatiens at a local nursery
and pulled out all my wintering pots from the garage.
Reuben ate a burrito, then dug in the dirt looking for worms.
Your front porches and yards have been so beautiful wherever you have
lived because of the flowers (including lots of impatiens) you have planted. For the next five months
I get a lovely reminder of you as I open my curtains in the morning and
as I come and go from our house.
They're small right now, but I love that they will grow and grow
and add so much color to our porch.
The green plants in the ground, in front of the porch,
Do you know how Paul and I met? It was August 1997.
We met at an Irish pub on St. Patrick's Day. No, that was someone else I know.
We met at a bowling alley that no longer exists because an earthquake has since destroyed it. No, that was my parents.
He was my Sunday school teacher and I was his 100th date. No, Paul's parents.
We met online. No, I was barely aware of what 'online' meant in 1997.
We met on a service trip to Mexico to build houses. It was sweet. Except that wasn't us.
We met in the cafeteria at our college. Oh, yeah.
He was an incoming freshman and I (being a senior) was on the Welcoming Committee during new student orientation. A friend and I sat down at his table to cordially welcome him, of course, and he proposed right then. He was so sweet, but I told him "I never accept a man's first proposal" and he could try again in two years and 3 months. Which he did.
And here we are now. Two kids, six countries, four moves, and ten anniversary celebrations later. So happy together. Most of time. We're not perfect, you know. But we love each other, and even when we don't love each other, we still do. Have you met Paul? He's the greatest to be married to. He is persistent in loving me. He won't stop.
On our date last night.
We dressed up, ordered dessert, and sat across the way from...
Peter's teacher,
which was odd because we were out of town.
It was a lovely date,
with an evening stroll and sips of Martinelli's.
Did you know you were (or weren't) at our wedding ten years ago today? It's true. If I had any digital pics from the big day I'd insert them here. You can imagine the white dress and a black suit filled by excited young newlyweds. I held a gerbera daisy bouquet from the Encinitas farmer's market and the stain glass windows of the church were an outdated orange and green. Paul had a gotee due to a gash on his chin he earned crashing jumping his bike off a planter at Cal State Fullerton the week before. It was great. Paul and I chose to hang out before the ceremony to make it more relaxed, and I'm glad we did. It was fun. I remember smiling a lot.
Oh look. I found myself with my bouquet when I searched for 'gerbera daisy pictures' ...
I was so beautiful.
Ha.
My Hunk-of-Burning-Love brought me these today.
Sweet, sweet man.
So have some Martinelli's in celebration with us today!
We have shared a bottle each anniversary.
Where will we be in another ten years?
How many more children will have joined our family?
How many more countries will we get to travel to?
How many more people will know God more?
So I'm using it in recipes. You should try this one. For dinner tonight. So good.
Cottage Cheese Pancakes. It uses 3 eggs and just a dab of flour, so these come out kind of omelety. I sauted mushrooms and onions to go with them, with the ultimate topping of fresh avocado slices. We ate them all and ooed and ahhed and forgot to take a picture. But here's the recipe...
Combine cottage cheese, flour, oil, and eggs in a
large bowl.
Heat a large skillet over medium heat, and coat with
cooking spray. Pour 1/3 cupfuls of batter onto the skillet, and cook
until bubbles appear on the surface. Flip with a spatula, and cook until
browned on the other side.
A lot of the comments at All Recipes, where I got this, said they added vanilla and topped them with syrup. So you could try that too.
We had those for lunch today. And for dinner I'm making Spaghetti Pie, which also uses cottage cheese. I got the recipe from MoneySavingMom, who got it from Cooks.com.
6 oz. spaghetti
2 tbsp.
butter
1 well beaten egg
1/3 c. grated Parmesan cheese
FILLING:
1 c. cottage cheese
1 c. Mozzarella cheese,
shredded
SAUCE:
1 lb. ground beef
1/2 - 3/4
c. chopped onion
1/2 diced green pepper (optional)
1 (15 oz.) jar
spaghetti sauce
Cook
spaghetti according to package directions. Stir in butter, Parmesan
cheese and eggs into hot spaghetti. Form spaghetti into a "crust" into
10" pie plate. Brown onions and green pepper in small amount of oil
until soft. Add meat and brown. Add spaghetti sauce and simmer 25 to 30
minutes. Spread cottage cheese over spaghetti crust. Top with meat
sauce. Bake 30 minutes at 350 degrees. Top with Mozzarella cheese and
let cheese melt. Let stand before cutting.
And the remaining cottage cheese with be enjoyed smothered in crushed pineapple. Except by Paul. He doesn't care for it with pineapple, if you can believe that.
Must give him credit. He's here now. Scared me as he popped up on his ladder outside my kitchen window. Perhaps he just wanted a blog post written about him. I bet it's his first. Should have baked the cookies. Think he'd fall off his ladder if I took his picture to post it here? He might. Cute (as in older gentleman cute), nice guy if you ever need any windows. You'll never guess his name. I'll give you thirty thousand guesses.
The view out my kitchen window has never been so clear. It's pretty great. It catches me by surprise every time I look out. Because... We got 3 new windows.
Bye bye 1800s windows.
(Maybe. I don't know. But it does sound dramatic.)
Every year the church replaces two or three windows
and a few of them have been the old wavy/warped glass that distorts your view.
A friend of mine loves that glass.
The window man said he'd come back to finish on the outside, but I think he forgot.
As he was working on our bathroom window outside,
he looked up and saw Peter's bedroom window and said,
"Huh. I never finished that window."
That was 3 years ago.
So I shan't be making him any cookies as I await his return.
I guess I could and them eat them as I wait.
With some tea.
On the front porch swing.
While Reuben torments a slug Paul found on our front porch this morning.
Not purposeful tormentation.
Just 3-year-old curiosity.
He thought the slug would like a tortilla chip for breakfast
so he got one out of the kitchen and laid it on top of the slug.
Do you think that's enough salt to do what salt does to slugs?
Doesn't matter.
He moved the slug to the sidewalk
for further examination in natural light.
Then came in and told me he moved it to Roxy's yard
and smashed it.
"Why did you smash it?"
"Because I like to."
"Oh, well it hurts the slug. Do you want me to smash you?"
After the museum we met up with several families for a picnic at a park.
All were families who have adopted from Korea.
Reuben did his customary greeting of
"I'm from Korea"
to everyone who looked like they might be Korean too.
The kids had fun playing together
and the adults got to chat and share experiences.
We met three other families who live
about 30 minutes from us.
Yahoo!
Then, onto the international market
to look at the live crabs and get pan dulces, of course.
And Paul decided he needed some oysters.
Not sure what he's going to do with those.
Oh man, do you think they're alive in my fridge?
Do they sell live oysters?
They were right next to the live crabs.
I'll ask Paul to check.
With all our edible international treasures,
(I got some 68 cent avocados - yum)
we scooted 60 minutes to get home,
