Happy Halloween

Princess Rudy would like to wish you all a happy Halloween.  May you get to eat lost of candy.  May you get to be silly.  And may you not look this miserable and uncomfortable in your costume. 

Footnote: Princess Rudy is a creation of the lovely little ladies who live next door.  They love him.

Candied Ginger

Cliff and I took a little trip to a local farm yesterday to buy some fall goodies.  An hour after arriving we left with green beans, ginger, one hubbard squash, three pie pumpkins (we already had three more at home so we didn't want to go crazy), a half a gallon of cider, beets, rutabagas, and lots of mud on our shoes.   Oh and an apple cider donut on our bellies!  (Side note: most people out here have never heard of apple cider donuts.  They aren't that popular.  That is crazy to me as they are perhaps one of the best things about fall!  Nuts.)  As we checked out the cashier asked us what in the world we were planning on doing with 2 lbs. of ginger.  Cliff calmly replied "make some candied ginger!".  Oh course.

When we got home Cliff pulled up this recipe online from one of his favorite folks, David Lebovitz.  We went to town and a few hours later we had lots and lots of delicious candied ginger.

First you peel the ginger...

Then you boil it in fresh water (twice)...

Then you boil it in a sugar solution until it comes up to 225 degrees...

Then you let it sit for a few hours to cool.  After you heat it back up so it is warm so that you can begin the really fun part...dunking everything in sugar.  Chopsticks were our preferred method of picking and dunking.

Lay them out so that they can set.  We left them out overnight. 

Enjoy!

There is so much candied ginger in our house right now.  I don't know how long it will last as Cliff loves it.  See the hole of missing ginger in the right hand sheet....Cliff did that in like ten minutes.  We also made some really wicked strong ginger tea (oh it burns!) and quite a bit of ginger syrup (see the mason jars).  We are planning on making our own ginger ale.  I'm excited!

Happy Sunday!

400 Pumpkins

We all know that I love the fall and that pumpkins make me giddy.  Seriously.  I love this time of year.  So imagine my excitement when I found out that my work has a three night hayride to celebrate Halloween and that in preparation I would need to recruit as many volunteers as I could get to carve over 400 pumpkins.  I get to do these things for my job.  Score. 

The great carving party took place on Friday and it was awesome.  Best day of work ever.  Our awesome Parks guys had already cut all the tops off and all we needed to do with scoop (gut) and carve.  I was thrilled as 106 volunteers and about 20 staff members came out to help.  We had several tables set up for the scooping and carving as I took it as my duty to move the pumpkins from our little patch area to the carving tent.  Parks left a sweet gas powered wheel barrow type thing so I deemed myself the moving master.  My at-work-other-half thought it was comical so she documented my process.  Enjoy....

Pumpkin two hundred and three...

Time to pull up my pants...

Let's get this started...

Whoops!  Got away from me a little...

"No worries.  I'm good!"...

Off into the mist I go...

The volunteers did an amazing job.  We had zombie pumpkins, scary pumpkins, happy pumpkins, and even several pumpkins with mustaches.  It was a fantastic day.  I didn't care that I was wet, covered in pumpkin guts, and starting to get really sore from lifting and scooping (don't laugh at me).  Look at all of them!

Ok, that the end of the real part of the blog. BUT if you are bored and want to see me geek out a little please scroll down to see some photos that document my love for the wonderful orange vegetable.

Pumpkin Fest 2003 in the Boston Common

Kappa Pumpkin

Apple Picking 2004

Kappa Retreat at the Hamptons 2005

Pumpkin Patch in Oregon 2006

Apple/Pumpkin Picking 2007 at Detering Orchard

Corn Maze and Pumpkin Patch in Surry, Virginia 2009

 About an hour ago for dinner

Happy Fall!!!!!

Life Is Beautiful

From September 28th - October 9th Cliff and I were lucky to be on the east coast to celebrate the weddings of two great couples and spend time with family and friends.  It was amazing.  Lots of smiles.   Plus, I got to dance.  Sometimes I even got to dance with Cliff.  It was a pretty epic week.

Part I: Sam and Steve's Wedding

We took the redeye out of Portland on Thursday night so that we could get into Pittsburgh with enough time to join into some pre-wedding activities.  We didn't sleep at all.  Maybe two hours of bad napping at the most.  We did get quite a few Biscoff cookies so that helped.  Kathy and Jill lovingly picked us up at the airport. What did we do first?  Cracker Barrel of course!  We don't have them around here and I miss then dearly.  We ate biscuits, hash browns, gravy.  You know all the essentials.  We stocked up with cheap candy and went to go get our nails done.

Cliff went with the boys to run errands and Sam and the bridesmaids got manicures and pedicures.  How girly!  It's been a really long time since I've had a pedicure and I was really ticklish.  Also, it was pretty funny as in college Kathy, Jill, Sam, and I were together all the time and never once was getting our nails done a considered activity.  Was not on our radar.  I think it was more fun because it was such a foreign group activity.  Also, BIG thank you to Jill who is letting me steal some of her photos to post as I only took one Sam and Steve wedding photo the whole time we were in Pennsylvania.

The wedding was at this beautiful farm (pond, donkeys, rolling hills, geese, silos, awesome barn).  The best part is that the bridal party got to sleep onsite in one big house. Slumber party!  Sam and Steve grilled out for all of us at the rehearsal dinner.  It was really nice to be able to hang out with everyone.  With very limited sleep, Cliff and I still managed to stay up until 10:00pm.  When we woke up the next morning we felt like new people.  Seriously.  It was like Cliff and I had finally arrived at the party.

The wedding was so beautiful.  I cried a whole lot.  Sam and Steve are wonderful together and we had all been waiting for the day when they finally got married. Sam was glowing and Steve was a dressed up version of his amazing self.  The setting was unbelievably beautiful and the food was super tasty.  They did a family style dinner with brisket, chicken, grilled veggies from the family farm, mac and cheese, pumpkin tortellini, mashed squash, and roasted potatoes.  I ate like a pig but who's really surprised.  We also got to see a real life cookie table in action!  We heard about this PA/HH tradition at our fake wedding back in 2008 as our co-couple was from that area.  Well, let me tell you.  I'm totally sold on cookies tables as they are amazing.  Sam's aunts baked thousands of cookies in preparation for the big day.  Thousands!  I sadly didn't get to eat any (so many of them hand nuts/touched nuts) but Cliff said it was the most consistently delicious array of cookies he had ever had.  And that's a compliment.  As if the day wasn't already good enough, THERE WAS SO MUCH DANCING!  I love to dance.  I'm kinda bad at it but that night I didn't care.  I danced like I was back at Emerson as a freshman at Hand Me Down Night.  I was a dancing machine.  Dancing. Machine.  I was sore the next day.  I had so much fun.  The best part, Cliff danced with me for two and a half songs!  We didn't dance that much together at our own wedding.  We hadn't danced together that much since junior year of high school (after which Cliff knew I liked him so he stopped wooing with dancing as he really hates it).  The whole night was magical.

Oh, there was also a photo booth.  That was pretty fun too.

Part II: Time with the Family

The next day we dropped Kathy and Jill off at the airport, rented another car (a Ford Focus), and drove the five and a half hours back to Maryland.  We ate our take home caramel apples at a rest stop someplace about an hour north of the PA/MD border.

The following day Cliff flew back to Oregon as he had work and I got to spend time with Mom and Pam.  It was really wonderful to spend quality time with them.  Over the next four days we played slots at the new casino at Anne Arundel Mills, installed a new front gate on Nanny's fence, drove to Virginia to eat lunch with Dad and Grandma, visited Arlington, shopped, ate Sweet Frog frozen yogurt, and celebrated Pam's birthday at the Gaylord Hotel.  I didn't take nearly enough photos but look these happy faces!

I also got to meet Mom's new dog, Sam.  He is a big guy (about 150lbs) but is really sweet.  He just wants to lay on the cold bathroom floor and be pet.  Weanie and Wibble are falling in line and you can tell that they like him too.

I wish there had been more time but it was really wonderful just to hang out and talk.  Next time we will need to go on an adventure.  I'm trying to talk them into coming out to Oregon.  My fingers are crossed.

I also need to mention that Mom and Pam saved the day quite a few times by lovingly taking three trips to the airport.  Thank you!

Part III: Andrea and Joe's Wedding

As if the trip wasn't already awesome enough we got to celebrate another fantastic couple.  Andrea and Joe got hitched and we got to be a part of it.  Sweet.

Nicole and I got to see Andrea and Joe's new apartment (nice work guys), get our nails done, and help put together the wedding flowers.  Cliff took his second redeye in eight days and got back into town just in time to put up directional signage and be apart of the rehearsal dinner.  Cliff did a reading and I was lucky enough to be a bridesmaid along with Nicole and Andrea's fun friend Cat.  I sadly didn't take any photos leading up to the wedding but Cliff took a few shots from the front row during the ceremony and then various folks used our camera to document the day.  Score.

Andrea looked beautiful.  Joe was so handsome.  It was a little cold (in the low 50's after being in the 80's and 70's all week) but that didn't matter.  We are all really happy to have Joe officially apart of the Lyddane clan.  The day was so much fun.  We got to see family that we haven't seen in years.  Plus, there was more dancing.  The Wileys and the Minters really know how to break it down.  Even the Lyddane men got into the action.  And I got to dance with Cliff yet again (thank you Stephen for documenting!).  Dancing makes me so happy.  Oh, we all also got to hear how Stephen has the most amazing, beautiful hair ever.  Seriously, both women and men were jealous.  I heard several conversations.  It was awesome.

Once again, the food was delicious.  We seriously lucked out.  For the rehearsal we got Beefalo Bob's BBQ (I miss BBQ soooooo much!).   For the wedding, there were tons of appetizers (crab drip, artichoke dip, various bruschetta, zucchini fritters, and something with tuna).  I sampled them all except for the tuna as I was never able to corner a waiter while they still had them on their tray. That was just the beginning as we also had salad, chilean sea bass on grits, and filet with mashed potatoes.  Best filet ever in my opinion. And the cake was chocolate and raspberry (very Andrea).  I ate two pieces plus several chocolate covered strawberries. Also, I got two shirley temples.  Always a good day when you have a shirley temple.  Apparently I like to eat like a pig at all weddings.

I was really sad to leave as the trip had been amazing.  I had a smile on my face almost the entire time (hey...a girl has got to eat and sleep).

It is hard to believe that four years ago yesterday Cliff and I got hitched.  Weddings make me happy.  Being married rocks.  Seeing friends and family also rocks.  Life is beautiful.