The Gray Family

Happy Fourth Birthday, Sawyer!

2011-12-03T15:05:00.000-08:00

Sawyer’s birthday fell during our Thanksgiving vacation this year, and we had plans to be in southern Utah with the Bates family. So we started the celebration off the night before we left with Sawyer’s request birthday dinner. He asked for pizza with sausage and mushrooms, with broccoli and green beans on the side.

Here is our homemade pizza before going in the oven.

It was a big hit with both kids, but Fielding gives much more jovial faces while eating than Sawyer.

Since Sawyer is such a pizza fan, I thought it would be fun to do a fruit pizza for dessert. I added almond flour to the crust and it was excellent.

And then we let him open a few small gifts.

The weekend after we got home from our trip we had his birthday party proper, with friends and games and cake. My friend Meredith had given me a Wilton Lightning McQueen pan, so I gave that a go for his cake. Man, this took forever, and was way harder than I thought it would be. I skipped the star tip, cause I’m not into the shag carpet look for cakes, and I’m not sure if that slowed me down or sped me up—either way, it was a labor of love, like all of my special cooking projects for family are, I guess.

We woke up the day of the party to one hell of a snow storm.

But despite the weather, most of the guests still managed to make it. We had several activity stations set up for the kids. The first was an art table where they painted ceramic cars to take home as their favors.

Another was where they made their own pizzas for lunch. I had made whole wheat dough, then had a variety of sauces and toppings for them to choose from. They were so adorable with their mini-rolling pins!

Lunch!!

And when we called them for cake, they came tearing down the stairs like a band of rabid cake zombies.

A few shots of gift opening.

One of Sawyer’s gifts was something that Chris had been saving for years for his own kids: a Playmobil Polar Expedition set. He took Sawyer outside in the snow to set up an arctic play land with the little dudes and their vast collection of equipment.

And then there was some snowy horseplay. Chris shows Sawyer that there’s nothing scary about the tunnel.

Stella is very fond of the mini-sledding hill we built in the back yard.

Happy birthday, sweet little man. You are AWESOME, and we LOVE YOU.

Random pics from early summer

2011-08-17T12:54:00.001-07:00

Fielding is a miraculous eater. I don’t know if it’s possible to express the extent of my gratitude for his willingness to glom on whatever I put on his tray. He had his 1 year check-up recently and, of course, as seems to be the pattern for the Gray boys, he’s pretty petite. But at least I know he’s getting lots of good stuff every day, because he’s the kid that cries when the tofu and veggies on his plate run out.

I gave Sawyer this really awesome haircut at the beginning of the summer. Eventually the front go so long that he started to complain about his hair being in his eyes—but it was so cute! Chris finally took the clippers to it about a week ago :-(

This was a naughty behavior that I took a picture of, and then promptly nipped in the bud. No more dishwasher-escalade!

Oh yeah, Chris’ father’s day dinner! This was YUMMY. Argentine beef with chimichurri sauce (the greenish-red stuff next to the meat), Israeli couscous, and fennel-apple salad.

For dessert: ginger stout cake and stout ice cream. And man was that ice cream stout-y.

Proud papa and his offspring.

I had the camera with me early one morning when I was out on a walk with Stella. I thought, “Man, do I live in a beautiful place,” and snapped this pic of our neighborhood and the snowcapped Rockies behind it.

The garden got a late start this year, but did manage to bear some fruit. These are the raspberry bushes that we planted last year, and boy have they paid off! The first harvest last about three weeks and was amazing! There is supposed to be another one in September, but we’ll see.

The main reason for the late start with the garden is that we added two new small plots. This one has three kinds of tomato plants, two kinds of eggplant, and yellow squash.

The other one has pumpkin, lettuce, oregano, basil, carrots, and butternut squash. Yup, all of that crammed into that tiny space. My idea was that the vining plants like pumpkin would root there, but would wander off an occupy other parts of the yard eventually.

And here’s the main plot—in late May, at least. Now it’s a jungle. Have had amazing spinach, lettuce, beets, chard, loads of basil, as well as zucchini and cucumbers.

Giving up, in a manner of speaking, or maybe settling.

2011-08-17T12:26:00.001-07:00

I’ve been insanely neglectful of our family blog this year. And I think one of my new years resolutions was actually to be better about keeping it up to date. But I swear that it’s not entirely my fault. Blame it on technology. And logistics. And a small dose of perfectionism. By that I mean that I hate to make a blog post of recent happenings when there are previous events that I still haven’t recorded. And so what happens is that I keep putting off catching up because I have an intimidating backlog, which of course continues to grow because I’m procrastinating taking care of it. It’s a vicious cycle which is actually only vicious to me, because I feel guilty for not doing a better job recording the touching day-to-day happenings of our growing family. So my conclusion is that I have to just stop fretting about the past and hunker down in the present: I’m just going to start posting from now, and not worry about what is past. Maybe I’ll catch up eventually, but I’m not going to hold myself to it, or I’ll never get started. The first order of business will be to at least post what's currently on the camera's memory card--brace yourself for a bunch of randoms.

Can’t stand the cuteness

2011-01-14T14:31:00.001-08:00

A recent photo shoot of our boys in the midst of some major horseplay. Well, as major as it can be when one of the members of the team can’t sit up or really move much at all. These two guys are starting to form a really sweet little relationship—it mostly consists of Sawyer putting on Vaudevillian displays of physical prowess (or lack thereof), which include, dancing, jumping, somersaulting, falling, and launching, while Fielding watches from his command center, mouth agape, in a fever of torso shaking laughter.

I like this one. Fielding kind of looks like he farted for the first time and doesn’t know what to make of it.

Zerbers!

Fielding TOTALLY has Chris’ smile.

Quel petit gourmand!

2010-12-31T09:48:00.001-08:00

Well, Fielding is eating human food kind of out of nowhere, and he FREAKING LOVES IT! He was fussing at the dinner table on Christmas Eve, and to quiet him, Chris let him suck on a piece of ham, and then on a chunk of butternut squash. He went completely crazy for them! So the next day I mashed some banana and avocado together, and, same thing—he couldn’t get enough!

We started Sawyer on solids at 7 months, and I remember that it took him, like, 6 or 8 weeks to even catch the vision of what we were trying to do. He would just let the food spill down his face, stare at me, then smear it all over his tray. I remember the day when I saw something click behind his eyes—“Oh! this goes in my belly and keeps me full! and it’s not bad eats either!” At that moment he leaned forward like a baby bird and opened his mouth. WELL, the minute Fielding saw the banana-covered spoon, he grabbed it with his hand and shoved it in his mouth. Since then he’s had carrots and sweet potatoes and rice cereal, and the freezer is starting to fill up with little portioned purees that I’ve made for him. He is a total, total gourmand.

Farewell, sweet buttermilky poops of the breastfeeding baby. Hello, total stinkers.

Sawyer was really excited that he and Fielding were eating carrots at the same time.

I did it all by self.

2010-12-31T09:39:00.001-08:00

Bummer. The pics are a little too dark to see the extent of the silliness. Sawyer, now that he has his own bathroom stool and cup (who knew that that would be what pushed him over the edge into independence?) is now all about going to the potty and doing EVERYTHING by himself. He emerged the other day with his pants on backwards. We both thought it was so funny that we turned Fielding’s pants around backwards too and took some pics.

The successful maiden voyage of a cool xmas gift

2010-12-29T14:18:00.001-08:00

In part because my food blog is now pretty much definitively defunct, and in part just because we got this awesome pancake pan for xmas, I’m going to bore everyone with the tale of Sawyer’s breakfast this morning.

Behold, the zoo animal pancake pan! Thanks Matt, Rach and kids, it’s awesome!

Sawyer helped me prepare the “healthy” pancake batter (silken tofu, banana, egg, almond milk, barley flour, rice flour).

We filled the wee indentations.

And when we flipped them? Animal cakes!

Clockwise from top left: monkey, lion, giraffe, elephant. Sawyer ate SIX of these little cakes this morning.

Christmas discovery

2010-12-28T15:33:00.001-08:00

Sawyer was amazingly uncurious Christmas morning. He wandered past this bizarre, hulking thing several times, and Chris finally had to tell him, "I think Santa left this for you; why don't you take a look!" As you can see, it's a totally awesome and shallow gift, good for cheap thrills and not much else. Bring your kids over if they want to try it!

Happy Little Boy

2010-12-23T09:51:00.000-08:00

A glimpse into Fielding's winning disposition:

Christmas Train!

2010-12-18T21:21:00.001-08:00

Tonight’s holiday activity: Christmas train at the orchard town center!We’d tried to do this two weeks before, but got there after the train had stopped running. But this time: success! The little thing chugs around the mall for about 15 minutes, sending toddlers into a wish-fulfillment swoon.

Afterwords we had promised Sawyer that we would drive around a little to see Christmas lights, because he’s a little obsessed with them. We found this insane Christmas house in the neighborhood south of ours. When we stopped to take this pic there were three other cars circling to admire. I have really mixed feelings about this kind of thing (energy use being the foremost concern), and yet somehow I am as thrilled as Sawyer when I see such a bombastic holiday display.

Holiday Baking is done!

2010-12-17T16:18:00.001-08:00

Ooo, look at these rows and rows of sugar-dusted and chocolate drizzled puffs of holiday light and cheer!

Here’s an example of the plates that Sawyer and I put together with all the goodies that we made. See recipes below, if you’re interested.

On the top left are Pfeffernusse: http://www.vistawide.com/german/christmas/pfeffernuesse_recipe.htm

To the right of that, Peanut Butter MnM cookies: http://www.familycircle.com/recipe/cookies/holiday-peanut-butter-cookies/

Next is the chocolate gingerbread cookie that was previously posted.

Below that are pecan crescents (supposed to be hazelnuts, but I couldn’t get them!): http://www.familycircle.com/recipe/cookies/hazelnut-crescents/

To the left are my favorite dark chocolate fudgy cookies, which you can find on my now mostly defunct cooking blog )-: http://pregnantladycooks.blogspot.com/2010/02/dark-chocolate-valentine-cookies.html

And in the middle are peppermint meltaways: http://www.landolakes.com/recipe/2720/peppermint-meltaways

Wrapping paper project

2010-12-17T16:05:00.001-08:00

One of our Christmas craft activities this week was to make homemade wrapping paper, and then do a little gift wrapping. So I got rolls of poster paper at the Hobby Lobby and Sawyer helped me pick out a bunch of holiday stamps. Toddlers detest well-ordered art, preferring randomness to predictability, which you can see from this small sample of our stamping project. But he loved it, and we made just enough to get all of Chris’ presents wrapped.

And how cute does this look under the tree?? Brown paper packages tied up with string…

Here is our tree, btw.

Chocolate Gingerbread Men Recipe

2010-12-14T19:18:00.001-08:00

As requested:

3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2/3 cup cocoa powder, sifted (preferably natural cocoa powder)

1 tablespoon ground ginger (not more than 2 months from purchase)

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

2/3 cup vegetable shortening

1/2 cup dark brown sugar, packed

1 large egg, room temperature

3/4 cup unsulphured molasses

1 Position racks in the top & bottom thirds of the oven, then preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

2 With shortening (not on ingredient list) to grease several large baking sheets, then set aside.

3 In a large mixing bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, ginger, cinnamon, baking soda, salt, baking powder & cloves until spices & coca are evenly distributed, then set aside.

4 In a 2nd large bowl, & using an electric mixer on medium speed, cream shortening & brown sugar until smooth & airy, about 1 minute.

5 Beat in egg & then the molasses.

6 Turn off mixer & add prepared flour mixture, then AT VERY LOW SPEED beat just until crumbly bits of dough form, but not until the mass begins to cohere into a ball.

7 With flour lightly dust a clean, dry work surface as well as your hands.

8 Turn dough out & knead just until it forms a smooth mass, about 30 seconds.

9 Divide into thirds & cover them with a clean kitchen towel.

10 With flour lightly dust the work surface again & roll one of the thirds to a rectangle about 1/4 inch thick. Flour the dough & a rolling pin only as necessary.

11 Use a large gingerbread-man cookie cutter to cut the dough into the desired shapes, then use a metal spatula to transfer them carefully to the prepared baking sheet(s). Gather any scraps, lightly dust again with flour & roll out a 2nd time, creating additional gingerbread men.

12 Decorate the cookies with the raisins & red hots, using one for the eyes & the other for the mouths. Additional red hots can be used as buttons on their coats.

13 Bake for 4 minutes, then rotate sheets top to bottom & front to back.

14 Bake another 4 minutes, or until cookies feel dry but still are a little soft.

15 Remove from oven & cool on the baking sheets for 2 minutes before transferring the cookies to wire racks to cool completely.

16 Cool the baking sheets for 5 more minutes, then regrease them before baking additional batches, as necessary, OR work with 2 additional baking sheets, preparing them while the others are in the oven.

For royal icing with meringue powder: beat 4 cups powdered sugar, 2 tbs meringue powder, 1 tsp vanilla and 6-8 tbs water on medium high for 7-10 minutes until soft peaks form. Add food coloring and thin with water if necessary. If using pasteurized egg whites, sub 3 oz. egg whites for powder and water. Beat whites and vanilla until frothy before adding sugar, then beat 7-10 minutes.

Making Gingerbread Men

2010-12-14T18:45:00.001-08:00

Today’s activity advent adventure was to make and decorate gingerbread men—sounds a lot like gingerbread houses, but we chose to do chocolate gingerbread, for one, and then opted to decorate exclusively with frosting, no candy this time. I’ve actually spent a lot of time expressing how much I loathe rolling out dough and cutting cookies, going to the extremes of hyperbole to express what I’d rather do than make cut-out cookies, but, in truth, IT WASN’T THAT BAD. So I take back everything I’ve ever said about it. It was even kind of fun (she says sheepishly), though maybe only because the cookies got thicker and thicker with every batch, which means I probably unconsciously cut my labor by a third.

On an unrelated note: I LOVE MY MIXER. Few things (by ‘things’ I really do mean inanimate objects) are bringing me as much joy this month as my beloved Kitchen-Aid. What a breeze it is to whip up several batches of cookies and finicky frosting like royal icing. Thank you, Ebay, for helping to make my mixing dream come true. SO, here we are making the dough, which was, I confess, entirely TOO snackable.

And….the requisite shot of the chocolate-faced kid. Chris is all: “when are you going to stop doing that? oh, here’s his face covered in chocolate! and here’s his face covered in spaghetti sauce! and here’s his face covered in XX…!” When it stops being funny to me, I guess. Or when Sawyer becomes self-aware enough to notice that he has chocolate all over his face and therefore becomes less messy, which will be kind of a tragic hallmark of adulthood.

While S napped I did the aforementioned rolling and cutting…

…and baking.

Now we’re all suited up with our bags of colored royal icing. Sawyer was making a hell of a mess of my icing bags until I had the idea to put a rubber band around each one at the top of the icing bulb.

He started with minimalist technique—monochromatic, simple squiggles.

And then he became possessed by the sheer joy of squirting colorful sugar-ooze over everything in sight, and adopted a more expressionistic tactic.

Things went downhill from expressionism to what I’m calling “wide-scale botched autopsy.”

Here are all my little guys, dressed in technicolor duds. See if you can find the one in the leisure suit and the one with the hippy shawl.

GUUUUUUTS.

Candy Cane Festival at Hammond Candy Factory

2010-12-11T21:45:00.001-08:00

Today’s activity (the blog is almost all caught up!) was the candy cane festival. The line was looooong, and it was cold—we were surprised to see that most of the festivities were outside. While Fielding and I held our place in line, Sawyer met the local celebrities.

Once inside the hard candy flowed. Hammond specializes in handmade shaped candies, like ribbons, candy canes, sugar sticks, etc.

After visiting the area where they make the candy, the kids have a chance to write a letter to Santa on the wall—there were a few that made me laugh:

And here’s Sawyer’s:

Gift shop = more sugarplum dreams than any kid can handle.

Last stop, xmas train:

Thornton Winterfest

2010-12-11T21:26:00.001-08:00

One great thing about our activity advent idea is that we’ve been discovering and exploring events in the area that we weren’t aware of before—the Thornton Winterfest has been the biggest surprise so far. We went on Friday night, and will definitely be including it in future years.

It’s in the Thornton City Park, which was filled with hundreds and hundreds of small Christmas trees, as well as a Santa’s village of miniature houses.

The elves’ workshop:

In the center of the area is a HUGE tree and an ice skating rink.

Around the periphery are various stages and tents, including an ice sculpture exhibit.

Sawyer’s really obsessed with Frosty right now.

Gingerbread House Decorating Party

2010-12-11T21:07:00.001-08:00

On Wednesday our advent activity was to make a gingerbread house. I had convinced a few other ladies to pitch in some money and bring their kids, so we could stretch our decorating dollars. Here’s the spread I laid out on the dining room table for the wee guests.

The first masterpiece!

Jen and Peter drew on Jen’s engineering expertise to build something extraordinary.

I built Sawyer’s house kind of hastily right as everyone was arriving, and then got busy with Fielding.

He piled all sorts of madness on top before it was very stable, and the unfortunately result was total, total collapse.

Tara and Josh get the roof on.

Becky and Sophia get ready to decorate.

Little fingers laying roof tiles.

Little kids that were too young to decorate a house spent the morning grubbin’ on the decorating candies. Some ate so many, they had to loosen the belt a little.

April and Ryan turned out a perfect specimen.

And here’s Peter’s opus.

Natalie and Chelsea also made a fine example of the genre.

Because of the sad collapse of Sawyer’s house, I built him another one—an uncollapsable one—while he was napping, which he was able to decorate to his heart’s content with fearing a cave-in.

Turns out these things are pretty delicious.

Best Birthday Dinner Ever

2010-12-11T20:45:00.001-08:00

When I came home on Sunday Chris had been slaving away on a most impressive dinner. The first course was roasted red peppers stuffed with scallops and pesto.

And then we enjoyed fusili with sausage, apples, sage and gorgonzola. MMMM.

For dessert there was a ginger cake with warm vanilla sauce, but I was too busy smothering myself with it to take a picture. Thanks for an awesome birthday, honey.

First Holiday Activities

2010-12-11T20:35:00.001-08:00

We decided to try an activity advent this year: an activity for every day from Dec. 1 to the 24, to savor the days until Christmas. So far we had done crafts and put up our decorations, but Saturday was the kick-off of December, the day we planned to get our tree. But first, mom slept in and the boys fooled around.

Off to the tree lot! This year we decided to get a native Colorado Balsam.

And she’s up! Sawyer did a great job encumbering the bottom two branches with ornaments.

That night we went to the ward Christmas party, and Sawyer sat on his first Santa lap of the season.

Gopher 2.0

2010-12-11T20:16:00.001-08:00

Cousin Julie sent this adorable onesie and hat when Sawyer was born, and now Fielding is enjoying it.

Here’s Sawyer in the wonderful getup, back in the day.

But Sawyer’s pretty thrilled that it doesn’t fit him anymore—he’s three now, after all.

Boys eating noodles!

Sawyer Francis turns 3!

2010-12-10T20:24:00.001-08:00

Start the day off right, birthday boy—green animal-shaped pancakes.

That night grandma and grandpa Gray took him to dinner at Gunther Toody’s.

The servers made a special hat for him and sang, but he was exceedingly shy.

Grandpa taught him how to do the Twist.

And grandma helped him with his birthday hat.

The next day was the big birthday party at the house. Mom made a Toy Story cake.

Fielding watched from afar and got a lot of great ideas for his birthday party next year.

Whoops, the party’s about to start and Sawyer is still in his Thomas PJs…

Keep the little fingers out of the cake---had to put it up on the counter.

Rousing games of duck, duck, goose, Hullabaloo and Pin the Belt Buckle on Woody followed lunch.

And then we lit the candles!

And everyone got ready to sing!

The kids sidled up to the table, ready for cake!

The birthday boy waited patiently!

Lick the candles!

That night Sawyer tried out one of his gifts—wicked cool bath paints.

Random fall moments

2010-12-10T13:22:00.001-08:00

My boys, all together…

Our nephew Cael turned 4, and I made him this scary Halloween birthday cake.

The Gray-the-elder’s apple tree did very well this year, so in addition to more Mama Gunther’s Apple Cake than you could shake a stick at, Sawyer and I made some homemade cider one day.

We froze some of it for tantalizing heart-shaped glaces a la pomme.

Our other nephew Jack also celebrated a birthday, and I made him this 1up mushroom cake for his Mario Bros party.

Fielding, in the meantime, entered the phase where he poops every five days or so, and it looks something like this. “Apres moi le deluge,” hehehe.

Sawyer got this balloon at CB Potts and insisted on sleeping with it.

“I can’t put my arms down!”

Halloween

2010-12-09T19:39:00.001-08:00

After much deliberation, Sawyer was Woody this year, and Stella was Bulls-eye…for about 10 seconds.

Fielding, in the meantime, was a little monkey.

Chris and I had been invited to a scary Halloween party, however, so we had to put in a little thought and work: Chris is one of Joker’s henchmen, and I am an escaped mental patient.

I made my straitjacket out of a thrift store bathrobe.

Denver Puppet Theater--Rumpelstiltskin

2010-12-09T14:55:00.001-08:00

Thursday is typically the day when Sawyer and I do a special, fun activity—in mid-October, we went to the puppet theater. It was so magical, I could tell he was enthralled. Since then we’ve had lots of fun making little puppets at home.

Here is the stage:

Before starting the show, the puppeteer explained to everyone how a spinning wheel works.

the miller’s daughter, her little rat friend, and the wicked jester.

After the show there were loads of puppets to play with and several stages where the kids could put together their own little shows.

The shadow theater:

And an art room where they got to decorate their own puppets.

And a gift shop with every kind of puppet imaginable.

Outside was a delightful little garden where we had a snack…

…and where Sawyer got suddenly serious.

Trip to Chicago

2010-12-09T14:40:00.001-08:00

One year ago I made a lightning speed trip to Nauvoo for Bryn’s wedding. And this October I was finally able to get to Chicago to visit her in her new menage.

Fielding was very good on the journey, just a little shagged out the next morning.

Luckily Bryn loves holding wee babies, cause she carted this no-core-muscules sucker around for me a lot during my visit.

Ahh! I miss those curls so much!

Most of what Bryn and I do when we get together is seek out and consume extreme deliciousness. To be more specific, we put together an itinerary that will allow us to enjoy the maximum of strange foreign foodstuffs possible. Here we are at a highly recommended dim sum joint. It’s so popular that we had to go at 10am to avoid waiting in line for an hour.

Lotus-stuffed bean curd skin. Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it.

Bryn’s lucky life partner, Zack.

The lovely Nana, formerly of th CU complit dept.

One time when we weren’t hungry, we went to an old grist mill that was part of the underground railroad.

Grist mill-era artifacts.

The great wheel that makes it all happen.

On my last night we made the most extraordinary raclette ever, skipping the potatoes for slabs of roasted butternut squash and kohlrabi. Can we still call it raclette? Yes, just don’t tell the Swiss.

Ew, what’s that smell?

Visit to Sunflower Farms

2010-12-09T14:22:00.001-08:00

THis is a place that we’d been meaning to get to for ages. It rules! It’s part farm, part park, part zoo, all rolled into one adorable, kid-size playland. Here is Sawyer exploring the tree house.

Scary suspension bridge!

The intrepid adventurer

A tiny henhouse has been filled with corn and fun tools—the kids shovel and rake and scoop…

And when they’re bored, they fill a cup and go feed the animals.

The animals are enclosed in whimsical little habitats with colorful fences

Adjacent to the animal pens is a giant hay bale maze, with planks placed here and there in case you want to traverse from above.

Tunnel!

Cute farm structures. This place even has a zip line—too cool.

Goats on the roof took me back to l’Afrique…

Awesome tire swings in the shape of animals

And cool tractors to play on.

Spending time with baby Liam

2010-12-09T12:24:00.001-08:00

Six weeks after Fielding was born, along came baby Liam. We spent the evening with the Doughertys when he was a few weeks old, and got some great shots of the cousins all together.

I love how sleeping Liam is propped in the corner like the drunken uncle who couldn’t sit up in his own.

These guys will be buds.

Fielding’s sunday best!

And later that night: helping Sawyer feel safe and happy in his bed. “Dad, all my fwends is wit me!”

Family date and MORE FIELDING!

2010-12-09T12:08:00.001-08:00

We had big plans on this one Saturday—the art museum was free, and we were going to see it! We’d been meaning to do this for years, ever since the new (and funkarific) Denver museum had been built. So we arranged everything just right with naps and food, and off we went at 4pm. Oh, turns out the museum closed at 5. So much for our great planning.

So we walked the grounds, admired the strange installations…

…and ended up at a restaurant for some of the best Indian food EVER!

And then there were more adorable photo sessions of Fielding! About two and half months here, you can see he’s starting to lose his sweet curls, but is gaining in plump adorableness and smiles galore.

More Fielding: 2 months, sitting in his bumbo, looking wicked-adorable.

2010-12-09T11:40:00.001-08:00

He will eat anything with chopsticks

2010-12-09T11:33:00.001-08:00

A recent discovery that maybe will work with your toddler too? He’ll even eat broccoli if he can pick it up with little sticks. And now he has his own pint-size pair that I got him in Chinatown in Chicago…

I know what you’re thinking: you only see him eating noodles in all these pictures…

Enter little Fielding

2010-12-09T11:22:00.001-08:00

His birth was long since announced, but now I have to catch up on all the cute photo sessions since Aug. 1. He’s a few weeks old in the following pics.

In his second favorite place (the first being the womb).

Summer trip to OBX

2010-12-09T11:00:00.001-08:00

It’s time to start catching up the blog from the long-lost summer, and the months since having Fielding, which have been delightful, but which have flown by and remained unrecorded. SO: our major summer trip this year was to Outer Banks, NC, a beautiful and out of the way vacation destination chosen by Chris’ extended family for their reunion. They rented two amazing houses near the beach. We divvied up the meals, and whoever was in charge of cooking had the honor of wearing the coveted zebra print aprons. This was the ladies night—we made gourmet hamburgers and the usual accoutrements and sides.

Somehow I thought that the waters of the Atlantic would be warm, but no… So I didn’t get in the water much, but people who are impervious to cold water, like boys, enjoyed many a dip. This was Sawyer’s second trip to the ocean—the first being Mexico in Sept of last year—but he still needed time to acclimate to the idea of open water, waves, salt, sand, etc.

We did some serious digging and sand castle building.

Two pregnant vixens, enjoying the ocean breeze.

One of the houses had a pool in the backyard, and many happy hours were spent there.

Opposite the ocean side is the Currituck Sound, the water between the Outer Banks and the rest of NC. It was a good place to do some canoeing.

The larger house, seen from the back.

Boys out in the canoe. I think it’s Chris and Sean…

And boys cooking dinner in the saucy aprons—I believe it was bruschetta and gnocchi that night.

The three grandsons (soon to be five) posing in their matching shirts.

Lots of games were played each night.

And one day we took an excursion to the sand dunes near Kittyhawk.

Not far from the sand dunes is the Wright Brothers memorial and museum, commemorating the first flight that took place there.

The adorable aunts had put together dueling baby showers for me and Carrie.

On one of the last mornings uncle Steve took us crabbing. Turns out you need a big net and a turkey neck. I never would have guessed this.

Lazy days on the dock, waiting for the crabs to bite.

Got one! Mmm, fresh turkey neck!

And some family pics taken on the porch of the main house.

A wonderful and relaxing trip, and another state to check off the list! Maybe next time it will be SC?

Fielding is one month

2010-09-06T19:28:00.001-07:00

Our little guy is one month old already—it’s happening very fast. Although there are parts of me that want to race through this period as quickly as possible, in order to sleep better at night, have more freedom, a more predictable schedule, and to not have to lug this nugget around everywhere (ok, that’s a long way off…), he’s just so precious and sweet, I’m trying not to take him for granted or accidentally miss out on all of the precious little traits of the newborn, from inadvertently living in an imaginary and much easier future.

One month into this adventure, Sawyer remains as enthusiastic about his little brother as before. You can get a sense of his very sincere love in this vid.

Number two!

2010-08-03T13:45:00.001-07:00

At long last, I’ve been delivered of my pelvic burden, in the form of the handsomest, sweetest little 8lb wonder ever. Fielding Christopher Gray left the oven a few days ahead of schedule, on Sunday Aug. 1. What a great birthday that is. Here are a few shots of his first few days.

Daddy setting him down for the big weigh-in (8lbs 1.5oz):

That’s one proud papa.

I think everyone has gotten a glimpse of this curly mop by now. That was right after his bath—I don’t think it will look like that all the time. Right now he’s got sort of a 1940’s film star wave going on.

Relaxing evening at the hospital after making his big debut.

We came home yesterday and Stella was so eager to make his acquaintance; they’re pals already.

Thanks to everyone for the emails, calls, well wishes, etc.

Anniversary trip in the Springs

2010-07-12T14:47:00.001-07:00

Happy six years to us. To celebrate I had reserved a secret BnB stay in Manitou Springs, about 2 hours south of us. It’s just west of Colorado Springs, but neither of us had been before, and we were surprised and delighted to discover an adorable historic town at the foot of Pike’s Peak with great restaurants, shops, beautiful architecture and lovely scenery.

First stop: pinball arcade! This is a classic Gray activity when we’re out on our own. Before we were married we used to go to a bowling alley in Lafayette to play some Michael Jordan pinball game. And then in Boulder we used to ride to the Hill to hit the arcade in that weird indoor mall near College Optical. Lately we’ve been playing play station pinball, but it just can’t measure up, especially not to Star Trek pinball. Although I have to admit that despite Patrick Stewart’s participation, this was a particularly lame game of PB.

Taking a break on the streets of Manitou. I took a lot of these. I’m definitely slowing down in the face of impending childbirth.

We started Saturday morning off with a hike through Williams Canyon. There was supposed to be a waterfall, but we never saw more than a few puddles.

I liked the look of this suspended highway over the mountain greenery.

Here’s our BnB: the Avenue Hotel—can’t recommend it highly enough. Delicious breakfasts, beautiful rooms, hot tub, etc.

And then we went to Greek Festival in Colorado Springs, where we ate lamb, lamb and more lamb…

…and saw some bored but gaily festooned adolescent dancers.

Chris likes to photograph dancer’s’ feet.

And then we toured the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, where, as you can see, I picked up some serious speed.

And then I won.

The center can house up to 150 permanent residents. Once they’re chosen to train there, it’s completely free to them, and most stay for 4-6 years. Here are some male gymnasts training.

And here is the weight training gym. Athletes spend up to six hours/day here. There’s now a ceiling-high fence to keep them out when it’s closed—apparently people were sneaking in at night to get in extra training hours, and were injuring themselves.

This is the closest I will ever get to the Olympics no doubt.

Though Chris has aspirations as a pugilist.

The flags of every country line the walkway from the visitors center to the training facilities and dorms.

“Nah, I don’t want to fight you. Show me a real threat.”

We have Chris to thank for this shot.

Chris faces the Karate Kid and loses.

That night we had a fancy dinner and caught a dollar-movie—that’s right, the Grays know how to splurge for their anniversary! Sunday morning we walked around Old Colorado City, and then ended up at a bar to watch the World Cup. Espaaaaaaaaaana! Golasso! Golasso!! I think Chris was bummed that I got my book out after half time. That game is just too demoralizing and theatrical for me, but I appreciated seeing someone get karate kicked in the chest; that was cool.

And on the way home on Sunday evening we saw the most stunning rainbow ever.

The great cake making exercise

2010-07-06T08:44:00.001-07:00

The fruits of my week-long labors were finally harvested last night at my friend Katina’s wedding where, after a beautiful and moving ceremony, we rocked out at the Space Gallery in Denver and feasted on my first attempt at a wedding cake—a wobbly, 4-tiered flavor sensation that was 18 months on the drawing board before last night. A few thoughts about the experience: the learning curve was steep. If I ever do this again (it’s too early to say either way, but I’m definitely over licking the beaters for awhile), I will enlist an assistant, will experiment with cake recipes until I find one that is a little sturdier without compromising its moist deliciousness, will buy ready-made fondant instead of making it myself, and will have the air-conditioning in my car fixed. Beyond some of the challenges and the sheer amount of time that this project took (most of which was happy and meditative, and only a few hours of which were stressful and worrisome), it’s bordering on one of the most surreal undertakings of my life: there’s just something so hilariously Dada about cracking 30 eggs into a bowl, or melting 10 cubes of butter in a pan, or manipulating a cake that’s 16 inches in diameter.

Here’s a brief walk-through of how the week unfolded.

First we need some supplies: cake boards to put the tiers on and dowels to support their weight.

Oh, just one more acquisition to make: Kitchen Aid Pro! I’ve been wanting a proper mixer forever, especially since I burned out the motor on my hand mixer trying to make 6 batches of cookies at once, and a wedding cake on the horizon seemed to be just the excuse to finally get one. Serendipitously, it arrived on Tuesday, the day I started baking.

In addition to the cakes, the filling needed to be made. Here’s part one of the raspberry filling. In my prototype cake that I made for Katina ages ago the raspberry was more of an ooze than a filling, so this time I stabilized it with some gelatin. Otherwise it’s nothing but raspberries, sugar and a little lemon juice.

The other filling was lemon curd (I have a slightly unhealthy obsession with lemon curd). Here’s the pile (5lbs) of lemons that I reamed to make this curdy dream come true:

And here are the rest of the curd fixins in the pan: lemon juice, sugar, 10 CUBES OF BUTTER, and eventually 30 eggs.

Here’s a 12-in tier cooled, trimmed, and waiting on its cake board for further instructions. I have SO many cake scraps in my freezer from the trimming process—two HUGE freezer bags. Last time I made the luscious Lemon Coconut Cake Top Bread Pudding—what will these bits become?

Here are the ingredients for one 16-in layer—practically bursting out of the bowl.

And here is the 16-in layer about to go in the oven—my hand in front is showing you just how absurdly large it is. I laughed every time I even saw this pan.

Time to whip up some butter cream frosting—for this cake we decided to go with rosewater butter cream.

Time to start filling and frosting the cakes. Each layer is split horizontally for a filling—raspberry came first.

In between the two layers is butter cream, then the second layer is split in order to accommodate a smear of lemon curd. This is the 4-in tier, which the couple planned to freeze for their one-year anniversary.

Using my dough scraper to spread the raspberry filling on the 16-in layer.

This one was a huge challenge, and what made me realize that I needed sturdier cake next time if I was going to be making such a large tier. It all turned out fine in the end, but there were some scary moments of oozing, cracking and general auto-destruction of the 16-in tier.

And now to make enough frosting to cover this beast. I think this is five batches of butter cream. Hah! At this stage the frosting is kind of like glue—whatever is falling apart can hopefully be cemented back together by a sturdy butter cream prison.

All done! Get this thing in the fridge asap!

Here are all four tiers, frosted and chilling in the refrigerator. Last step is the fondant, and then the on-site assembly with the final decorations.

We had decided to do gum paste calla lilies decorations on the top of the cake and on the vegan cupcakes that Katina had requested for some of the guests. I watched a few tutorials in preparation for this and I think calla lilies are about the easiest flowers to make out of gum paste. All you need is a heart-shaped cookie cutter, some cones to dry them on, and a little patience. I tinted the gum paste a peach color, then used red Luster Dust in the centers for contrast and to match the red/pink of the bridesmaid dresses.

Chocolate cupcakes with almond custard and chocolate butter cream frosting, all vegan.

Here are the frosting decorations—little tiered swirls—calla lilies will follow.

All ready to go. Thankfully my friend Liz agreed to transport these in her air conditioned car so I didn’t end up with cupcakes swimming in a pool of butter cream.

Here’s the fondant going on the 12-in layer. So I’ve made this marshmallow fondant recipe scores of times with no problems whatsoever, but of course, the only time I would have any trouble would be the one time that I’m doing a cake that actually matters to someone, only on, like, the most important day of her life. (!!) For some mysterious reason, even though I sifted the powdered sugar, I ended up with all these little lumps in the fondant, and then it was all pockmarked and holey when I rolled it out. Whatcha gonna do? You just gotta roll with it. I warned the bride not to look to closely, and that was that. And once they dimmed the lights a little in the gallery you couldn’t see a thing.

And here she is, after a series of minor mishaps (like the gallery being locked when we arrived, the linens not arriving, and the cake stand totally not working at all). You can see that the bottom tier is burbling a little, but it’s standing and doesn’t look totally misshapen, so I was happy. And the bride and groom were thrilled, the guests thought it was delicious…over all a great success.

With the cupcakes nearby.

A few shots from the top.

Final thoughts: After last night, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t want to make a career of this. Standing around watching the catering crew freak out when the gallery was locked and then their linens didn’t arrive was the stuff reality shows are made of, and so stressful to observe—never mind the fact that I couldn’t set the cake up either until the linens arrived. The baking can be blissful, but delivery and set up was a recipe for multiple ulcers. If anyone needs a favor, I’d be happy to oblige with a cake, but I don’t think I’ll be applying for a business license anytime soon.

Making a Star Wars birthday cake

2010-05-25T09:17:00.001-07:00

A friend of mine recently agreed to let me have a go at making a birthday cake for her son who has a food allergies, and who loves Star Wars. So I used my trusty egg/dairy/nut free chocolate cake recipe to get started. If you want to try my allergy-friendly recipe, you can find it on my food blog, Pregnant Lady Cooks.

Here’s the triple layer baby all frosted and ready to go:

Next I covered it with blue fondant:

It was Chris’ idea to put tiny Vader helmets on the sides—genius in action. An exacto knife made quick work of these tiny galactic overlords:

Hmm, sort of a Vader-Skeletor effect, but I think everyone will know who it is:

On the black fondant ribbon at the base of the cake I used my trusty letter cutters to write the immortal Star Wars message:

Personalized for the birthday boy:

Then added stars:

And more stars, and light sabers:

And then Meredith’s wicked cake topper:

And the birthday boy himself, the Force flowing through his veins.

The park is open, b*tches!

2010-04-11T10:23:00.001-07:00

Our totally awesome city park, mere blocks from our house and right across the street from the rec center and library, opened last week. We attended the ribbon cutting ceremony and opening festivities in outrageously blustery weather, and are only this week getting a chance to really enjoy the amenities. Come check it out, Erie is becoming so COOL!

In addition to the four beautiful baseball fields (with concessions and everything!), the soccer fields and the picnic shelter and the huge, open expanses of grass, there are two fabulous playgrounds. Sawyer’s favorite is the one with the trains:

Ok, I might have to eat him in this picture.

Running out that toddler energy with Stella and her vizsla energy.

Artisan-helper

2010-04-11T10:16:00.001-07:00

Sawyer is helping me get the garden ready by decorating the blocks with some of his priceless doodles.

Proudly displaying his technique.

I’m hoping for one hell of a successful garden this year, despite the challenges of living at 5600ft. Keep your fingers crossed.

It’s a..It’s a…It’s a…

2010-04-08T12:40:00.001-07:00

Well, there’s no denying this little triangle-shaped genital protrusion.

That’s right, between the Gray boys and the Bates boys we pretty much have a whole little league team.

Here’s his skeletal profile. I don’t think he has a Michael Jackson nose in real life, but that’s kind of how it looks.

And one adorable little foot.

I wasn’t wrong about this guy being a kung-fu master—he was squirming around so much that the technician had a hard time getting all the requisite measurements. But he’s healthy and everything appears to be in the right place. Hurrah! Now just to think of a name, hmm…

Living the Legend…in Cheyenne.

2010-03-22T21:50:00.001-07:00

Happy spring break everyone! And no one knows how to kick off spring break like the Grays! That’s right, what started as a weekend in Santa Fe or near Mount Rushmore turned into a weekend in and around Cheyenne, which then became an afternoon in the ghost town that is downtown Cheyenne. But never fear: we’ve saved loads of money and set ourselves up for an extremely productive week!

So what the heck is there to see and do in Cheyenne? ‘Round about nothing. Apologies to Cheyenne natives. I thought it was a result of the economic recession, but some of you assured me that “Cheyenne has always sucked.” But it’s not a total loss: it’s obviously a summer city, due to the nasty winterly winds that make for frigid temperatures during spring break. What’s more, it’s got loads of beautiful architecture, history, and monuments of the West, all of which would be very enjoyable to visit on a nice day. In short, it wasn’t the Caribbean, but we managed to spend a fun afternoon with our northerly neighbor, Cheyenne, WY.

First stop: one of the many artisan boots that are scattered throughout the city. Hand-painted by local artists, they depict scenes from Wyoming’s history and culture.

And right across from this one in the main square is the Wrangler store, for all your western clothing needs.

Just opposite these two monuments is a true monument: The Depot. Originally built in the mid-19th century, it was the great hub for all trains moving through the west. It burnt down a few times, and the modern incarnation was built in the late 19th century. Here are a few of the plaques on the walls of the depot.

And here is a grand horse statue, with the depot in the background.

Another giant boot just outside the entrance. Here’s what’s great: when we went inside we discovered that some kind of wedding show was being held there. “Chris, take off your ring!” We hid all signs of our matrimony (we do live in a modern, permissive world now, but it was probably good that my pregnant belly doesn’t really show through my coat). Yes, yes, we’re totally unprincipled, we got samples of barbeque and wedding cake and talked to caterers and everything. “When’s your wedding?” they asked. “July,” Chris answered vaguely.

The horsey and rider on the Wrangler store front.

There were a lot of alleys that looked like this (like you might get mugged or electrocuted in them):

After a fair amount of wandering downtown, which included, actually, a very fruitful visit to a flea market (whose birthday is coming up??!!), it was time for lunch. Finding a restaurant was tough, but we eventually located “Sanford’s,” a kind of Hard Rock-TGIFriday’s-sports bar-y burger joint. But it was much more than just that. It was the temple, the epicenter, of everything that the health conscious media has been citing as responsible for the American obesity epidemic. Just take a look at the SIZE of this menu! And I feel like the angle of the picture doesn’t even do it justice. It was so big that Chris and I, sitting across from each other at an already very large table, couldn’t both sit straight forward and look at our menus at the same time.

And then there’s the cacophony of decor and TV screens that allow your focus on just about anything but your food, hence a lot of zoned-out, overweight people working their way unknowingly through several courses.

And the size of everything! Seriously, look at this fork! The tines are practically as long as my fingers! And I haven’t said a word yet about the food. Well, I’ll just say that a body would be hard-pressed to find something on the menu that wasn’t deep fried. Even the sandwiches were battered and fried. And the burgers were topped with fried pickles and onion rings. Don’t get me wrong, anyone who’s seen my food blog knows that I believe in indulgence, but it must needs be occasional and in a setting that contextualizes it as such. I have the feeling that people walk out of this restaurant and a few hours later can’t quite remember what they ate.

But we survived the deadly lunch and made it out to see Big Boy, one of only eight mega-sized locomotives on display in the US. Union Pacific had a number of them made in the early part of the 20th century, particularly to cover the rugged terrain between Ogden, UT and Cheyenne.

This here Big Boy, #4004, was retired in 1958, I believe, and now sits in a lovely park on the east side of town.

It’s hard to tell the scale from the pictures, but here at least you can get an idea: the wheels are about as tall as I am.

After Big Boy we trekked up to the Botanic Gardens, which are supposed to be lovely….but we missed them closing by just a few minutes. Right next door, however, is a completely charming garden and botanical education center for kids that we were able to wander through.

Why walk on the path when you can walk on stepping stones?

I’m really in the heart of America now, n’est-ce pas?

This is Chris’ great strength in photography: isolating interesting surfaces and shapes with unexpected contrasts in the background. This is part of a giant spinny-wind thing in the kids garden.

And one more train to end the day, the good ‘ole 1242, also now in a park on the West side of town.

Thanks for your faithful service, UP hero!

And that, my friends, was Cheyenne.

Chateau de Chambord, end of the visit!

2010-01-16T08:14:00.001-08:00

On Jan. 5th our only occupation was to drive back to Paris and prepare to fly out the next morning. We decided to spice up the drive by detouring through the Loire Valley to visit the Chateau de Chambord, one of the largest and most impressive of the Loire chateaux. And here it is as we approach.

Few things are as cute as little boys running, seen from behind.

Posing in front of the imposing facade. A whole busload of Chinese tourists had just arrived and were crazy about Sawyer—they took pictures of him running around all through our visit.

Blue skies, but it was freezing, freezing, freezing…

Sawyer poses on the luxurious benches in the ticket office.

Lots of good running terrain.

Freezing, yes, but there was a good fire on each level where visitors could warm their bones before moving on.

The chateau was began by Francois I in the early 16th century, to celebrate his victories in Italy and serve as a hunting lodge. He never saw it completed though.

Louis XII and XIV were responsible for finishing construction.

And the 18th century is responsible for how most of the interior looks today. This is the hunting corridor.

The roof provides great views of the grounds…

And the scores of chimneys.

What a great trip it was! We hope we can do something like it again before too long. Happy New Year everyone!

Le Jura

2010-01-16T08:06:00.001-08:00

Our second outing during our stay in Beaune was a quick daytrip into Jura, the mountainous region just to the east of Burgundy. The first village we visited was called Chateau Chalon, and was perched on the edge of this rocky outcropping with grape vines dotting the slopes below.

Both villages that we saw this day were on the list of The Most Beautiful Villages of France.

Views looking over the vineyards…

And the Jurassian valley.

Entering our second destination, Baume-les-Messieurs

So ancient

So beautiful

Dijon-Beaune

2010-01-16T07:58:00.001-08:00

The last official stop on the trip was to stay with friends in Beaune (in the Burgundy region), but we couldn’t resist spending an hour in Dijon where I studied all those years ago.

La Place Marechal Foch…

…with its classic merry-go-round

Our friends went to great lengths to make sure there were plenty of toys for Sawyer, and he was in heaven.

One afternoon Aude’s Brazilan husband Flavio made a classic dish—pumpkin and shrimp—for everyone for lunch. Inside the giant squash was a coconut cream sauce with peppers and shrimp, to be served with rice. Mmmmm!

Here they are posing with their nephew Ahmed.

The weather had gotten terribly cold at this point, but we did venture out one morning to visit Beaune’s major tourist attraction, L’Hotel Dieu, with its magnificent tiled roof.

Conceived as a hospital for the poor, construction was started in 1543.

This is where most of the sick stayed. The hospital was self-funded through vineyards and salt mines, and was the main hospital in the city until 1973. Marie-Chantal, the friend we were staying with, did her nurse training in this building and worked here for many years.

The apothecary’s room—with eye of newt and everything.

Route du vin, day 2

2010-01-16T07:40:00.001-08:00

That first night on the Route du Vin we stayed in a little inn up in the hills near Kaysersberg. We had a whole apartment to ourselves, and the price included dinner and breakfast in the lodge dining room

Looking over the courtyard from our door; the restaurant is in the building across the way.

The picture is probably too small for you to see the sheep….but there were sheep wandering around on the property.

Chris enjoyed an itty bitty carafe of Alsatian wine in the restaurant that night.

The dining room.

And our dinner: the classic Alsatian dish Baekeoffe. We’d been seeing this on restaurant menus all over and I was delighted to finally find out what it was: four kinds of meat stewed in white wine and spices with sliced potatoes and onions. They have special ceramic pots that they make it in, which were for sale in all the cities we stopped in.

Our first city stop that morning was Kaysersberg—possibly the most beautiful place we visited.

More gluhwein!

With a river running through town…

And my one big souvenir: a hand-painted Alsatian ceramic tart pan. A big one. I’m going to have to double all my recipes.

The city of Colmar was our final stop on La Route du Vin. These first few pics are from the Little Venice part of town.

And getting into the old town we see the typical pastel-colored wood timbered houses of Alsace.

Quaint streets..

The cathedral near a frosty tree.

Route du vin, day 1

2010-01-16T07:17:00.001-08:00

Our plan was to drive south on what guide books call La Route du Vin—a driving itinerary that takes you through the heart of Alsatian wine country and that passes through several adorable villages. Vineyards, vineyards, vineyards as far as the eye can see. First stop is Barr.

No one was out, it was so peaceful and quiet…

…and so beautiful! This is the central square.

Up behind that church is a ‘sentier viticole,’ a 2km stroll through the vineyards with great views of the city and valley.

The entrance to the sentier.

Notice the vines on my right. Every few hundred feet there would be an informational panel talking about the kinds of grapes that are grown and the fermentation process.

Looking across the vines…

…and back down the path to the church where we started

…and across the vineyards to what can be seen of the town through the fog.

And these are the vestiges of the New Years celebration: a heavy dusting of red firecracker paper in the cracks of the cobblestone.

Next stop Selestat, where we strolled through another adorable old town.

I fell in love with a lot of the unusual architecture, like this turret…

…and this huge thatched roof with all the sloping windows…

…and this irresistible little holly-covered residence.

The main square near the cathedral…

…which was hard to get a picture of with all the surrounding buildings.

Strasbourg

2010-01-16T06:59:00.001-08:00

Our next stop finally took us into Alsace: Strasbourg, the capital of Christmas. They have one of the largest Christmas markets in the world at the base of the cathedral, and sell gluhwein (warm spiced wine) on every street corner. We ended up here for New Years Eve and it was obviously a huge destination for foreigners—every third person we saw on the street was pulling luggage and speaking German. The main tourist area is called La Petite France and is a neighborhood of old wood timbered houses that line the canal, formerly occupied by tanners.

It is so unbelievably picturesque.

The Rhine river runs through the city…

…making an excuse for loads of adorable bridges and walkways.

Wrapped up like a little sausage, Sawyer prepares to ring in 2010.

Chris starts things right with une petite coupe de vin chaud.

Place Kleber, the main square, with its impressive Christmas tree.

Buying Gateau de Noel at the Christmas market.

‘Les Illuminations’ really bring the city to life at night.

Every little square has its own special installation.

One last look at the canal before heading back to the hotel. There were a lot of celebratory shouts and explosions around midnight, but overall, a pretty quiet night. I went out the next morning for breakfast and saw nary a trace of the festivities in the streets, unlike the tiny city that we visited next.

Metz- Nancy

2010-01-15T10:34:00.001-08:00

The next day we drove into the Lorraine region—yes, where quiche lorraine originated—and stopped in Metz for the afternoon. The cathedral is the big draw—the locals call it “La Lanterne de Dieu” because of its height and its golden hue.

Breathtaking inside, with an inordinate number of stained glass windows, none of which photographed very well.

I was mesmerized by the wear on the steps leading up to the altar—centuries of hopeful or hopeless, faithful or faithless, trudging up and down, has left its mark in the shape of the stone.

And then we ran across a great little Christmas carnival! Oh man did we eat the best boudin blanc smothered in sauce…

One of the attractions was an animatronic “wonders of the animal world” type installation for kids. Sawyer loved the bears and farm animals but was a little freaked by the monkeys.

That evening we drove into Nancy, famous for its Place Stanislas (featured in the book “1000 Places to See Before You Die,” if anyone has that one).

Holiday lights highlighting the gate and fountain.

You can see the cathedral at the opposite end of the street through the gates.

That night we stayed in a BnB in a working cattle farm. Here’s the hang out space; our room was to the right.

Chris photographed the property a little while I talked to the owner, who told me that in matters of health care, America is “pas très avancée.”

Sawyer bookin’ it to see the cows.

And there they are! This guys used to sell his meat all over the world before the mad cow outbreak. Now you can’t buy European beef in the States.

The house that we slept in was built in 1760.

A shot of the countryside as we cruised out of town, on our way to Strasbourg.

Reims-Tattinger

2010-01-15T10:15:00.001-08:00

We flew back to Paris on accursed Ryan Air, which I can’t recommend to anyone, and began our road trip through several regions of eastern France. Our first stop was Reims in the Champagne region. Unfortunately I was suffering from food poisoning when we arrived….so we didn’t tour the city. The main attraction, once I was on my feet again the next day, was to visit one of the Champagne houses. We chose Tattinger. But first Sawyer drove his train all over the grounds and practiced his camera smile.

Welcome to Tattinger. Yes it really was founded in 1201—not by Tattinger himself, but by a bunch of monks living in an abbey surrounded by vineyards, under the direction of the Count of Champagne.

Like so many other religious edifices in France, the abbey was destroyed during the French Revolution, but the caves and some ruins are still intact and are an interesting part of the tour.

In the caves: after the champagne is aged for an initial 6 months, it’s tilted to allow the sediment to settle in the bottleneck. A special turner comes by every so often and rotates it. The guide said a turner can rotate up to 60,000 bottles a day. Eventually the bottle is completely upright, and after that it goes to the degorgement workshop, where the sediment is removed rather explosively.

Here’s an example of a vestige of the abbey: the staircase that led to the sacristy.

All the sizes of Tattinger bottles, for all your champagne needs.

As far as the eye can see….

The caves are chalk—called Les Creyieres—and people haven’t stopped carving throughout the centuries. There’s a lot of ancient graffiti, and also interesting artwork.

Next stop Metz!

Madrid!

2010-01-12T15:48:00.001-08:00

After our week on the coast we drove up to Madrid via Granada (where we visited the Alhambra, but the number of pictures is too intimidating to me right now to post about it). Madrid is where Chris lived for a year before we met (and what encouraged him to sign up for French 101, thank you, Spain). He had a great time showing me and Sawyer around, and it was nice for me to relax and be led about without having to make any decisions.

One of our first stops on the walking tour was a square where he often came to eat with a nice statue of Lorca, but of course Sawyer only saw the playground, so we had to stop and frolic a little.

While playing there this huge toddler went cruising by on his own little ATV. I asked the father how old he was, and he was the same age as Sawyer—birthdays within a few days of each other. But I couldn’t believe this kid’s driving skills! He was weaving in and out of the different toys on the very cramped playground, doing circles around the adults, without any narrow misses even. The dad said, “He’s had lots of practice.” Then he asked if Sawyer wanted to give it a try. Why not? He’s never going to have a shameless toy like that, I’ll see to it, so he might as well go wild for 5 minutes. Turns out he was a little too small to go wild; his foot couldn’t reach the pedal.

This is Spain’s rival to the Galleries Lafayette, called El Corte Ingles. Their holiday installation was bigger--but not necessarily better--than the cone boob bears in Paris.

El Plaza Mayor

…with its Christmas market

And the restaurant on the plaza where we had lunch: The Museum of Ham.

I’m not kidding; here’s the menu. Smoked meats galore!

That night Chris took me to a mysterious urban monument called El Templo Dibod.

Artisan market! December is such a great time to travel!

And who was lurking behind the artisan market? My two Spanish heroes, Don Quixote and the faithful Sancho Panza.

Rendering homage up close.

And now: the Palacio Real. Not just beautifully illuminated by night, but a gathering spot for rollerblade tricksters and skaters.

And a quick tour of the holiday lights…

The Plaza de Espana by night….

The next day we took a walk through Madrid’s giant park, Retiro…

…where we saw many of the standard cabbage-like plants used for landscaping.

The Crystal Palace! Normally it houses art exhibitions, but was closed due to the rain (I guess the roof isn’t rain proof)

There’s an adorable little grotto right by the Crystal Palace…but mostly this picture is great because of that Weekend at Burney’s corpse I’m carrying around on my back…

Before leaving Madrid we had to indulge in the number one native pleasure: churros y chocolate. The churros were greasy and the chocolate thick as oatmeal!

Benalmadena

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Glenn and Judy very generously agreed to watch Sawyer one afternoon so that Chris and I could go out and have a little afternoon date. We decided to go to Benalmadena, a little city up the coast with a castle and the usual seaside charms.

We found the castle right away from its impressive silhouette.

And it was really beautiful. But it turned out it wasn’t an actual historical castle, but a kind of folk art monument honoring Columbus. Fair enough.

I just can’t resist imitating creatures in stone.

And I totally fell in love with this inconceivable cactus tree thing.

Some tight squeezes around this place…

Chris spies land from the prow of the boat and claims it for God and King.

Isabella’s castle in the background, gardens beneath the boat in the foreground.

A little drizzle never hurt anyone.

I’m always obsessed with food when traveling, and this bowl of soup, ordered in a smoky and totally unpromising little bar, was possibly one of the most delicious things that I ate on the trip.

Chris’ beans weren’t bad either. And these were only the appetizers.

After lunch we strolled through the charming streets of the old town.

The main square.

The brilliant oranges with delicate raindrops…this place is very photogenic up close.

Chris and I are still laughing about this picture. It’s someone’s shopping list that he saw laying on the ground in the middle of the plaza. It’s hillarious because it says “Orange Fanta, potatoes, olives, sausage.” What else could it possible say, Chris wondered, this is all Spaniards ever eat. (Chris lived in Spain for a year, so he speaks with authority). What’s the point of the list when people buy the same seven things every time they go to the store? Then he confessed that it was missing tuna and olive oil. We turned it over, and lo and behold: aciete de oliva, atun.

Chris poses outside the bull ring.

Oh yeah, delicious pastries we picked up for the next morning…

Andalusian White Cities

2010-01-12T14:42:00.001-08:00

Our next day trip was into the hills to explore several jewels of the region: the white cities of Andalucia. Our first stop was Mijas, famous for its donkey taxis, but they were on vacation. This was good because we were able to park in the donkey taxi loading zone. Here is an adorable little shop where we oggled the local ceramic handicraft.

Mijas was enveloped in a blanket of fog that morning which, while increasing the mystery of the place, made photography a little challenging.

One of the famous sites in the village is a centuries-old grotto-chapel that a monk carved out of the rock in the hillside.

It was stunning, but even better was the amazing nativity that they had set up next door. In fact we saw a lot of elaborate nativities in Spain, but this was the only one that was so attentive to realism that it had a guy taking a crap in an outhouse in a distant part of Bethlehem, far, far from the lowly manger.

A foggy stroll after leaving the chapel.

I just loved the narrow streets and plunging staircases.

Strolling the back streets of Mijas.

Next we planned to take the long way around to Ronda, and it was a bit of a drive—sometimes on vertiginous one-lane roads—but the scenery was amazing, and the weather was getting better and better the further we went into the hills.

Here we stopped for a scenic photo, but again the light and fog were challenging.

We drove through a beautiful little town called El Burgo, but didn’t stop. A little further down the road we were able to get some amazing views back onto the town.

We pulled over here for a designated scenic overlook and found a beautifully maintained pathway through rocky outcroppings leading to a cliff overlooking the valley and El Burgo.

Looking east-ish, the city is behind me.

Chris and Sawyer make the hike.

And there’s El Burgo tucked into the valley.

And the magnificent and diverse landscape…

El Burgo again, en miniature.

Chris and Sawyer pose off the pathway.

Maybe two hours and much carsickness later, we made it to Ronda, which is very possibly the most stunning city that ever existed. Unfortunately we came at it from the wrong side, so you’ll have to search online for the really magnificent shot. Basically it stretches across a 400-foot deep ravine, and what you’re looking at here is the old roman bridge that spans it.

Standing on the bridge and looking left and right, this is what you see.

After overcoming our awe staring into the ravine, made all the more impressive by the recent rains (thousands of gallons of water shooting through the opening and cascading down the hillside), we took a scenic walk through the back streets of the town.

Our third stop, a tiny village whose name started with a G and that I totally can’t remember, unfortunately appeared around the bend right as it started to rain. Nonetheless, we visited a lovely garden beneath the fortress, a beautiful cemetery…

And got a spooky picture or two of the Gothic landscape.

Our last stop was a breathtaking little village called Casares, and we got there right at dusk when the city was just beginning to glow. Unfortunately we had a little trouble getting a clear shot. Chris performed the most amazing 28-pt turn to get out of a parking spot in this town. He also successfully navigated a street that was so narrow that we had to pull the side mirrors in to make it through.

We ended the day—Christmas Eve—with a seven-course meal at a Thai restaurant. Non-traditional, but delicious.

Day trip to Gilbraltar

2009-12-25T04:09:00.000-08:00

Blogger just erased all the text I wrote for this post, so now we're going to do the short and sweet version.
Gibraltar is maybe the weirdest place I've ever visited. The rock is much bigger than expected (that's not what makes it weird).

Chris and Sawyer marvel at its bigness.

Welcome to the strangest cradle of history ever.

Chris and I renew our vows (one of our wedding pics is in a like booth).

The weather was much more clement than expected, but we did have to fight some serious winds during the day.

On one of the Rock's peaks is a Moorish fort, built and rebuilt from the 8th to the 14th century.

Here our gregarious guide William shows us the pre-Colombian conception of the world; the Straits of Gibraltar used to be the last known outpost of charted ocean. William, a native Gibraltarian, was quite a character and said things like "come 5 o'clock, it's all choc-a-block out there!" and "Me? I have salt water in my toilets! It's how I live!"

One stop on our tour was the St. Michael's caves. The rock is full of caves, but these are the most impressive.

And they have very unfriendly monkeys that hang about preying on people like me who keep crackers in their purse. William promised that later he would take us to the nice monkeys that we could 'play with."

The marvelous stalagtites of St. Michaels'.

It's so caverous inside that they've installed a concert space. Bring your rain poncho and your galoshes, it's very wet inside.

Next stop was the highest point of the rock, with a view down on the coast.

The highest point is where we met the friendly monkeys. But they were too busy contemplating eternity.

And there is the highest point itself.

Oh, now they're ready to play. Sawyer didn't really want to be near them then, but has talked of little else since.

They really are friendly little creatures. Or at least they'll do anything for a peanut mnm.

We thought this whole series of pics of Glenn with his favorite son was truly hillarious.

Now Chris has a turn.

And a mama with her little monkey.

They even stake out your car and have been known to break in and steal your 'sweets.'

Second to last stop was the tunnels of the Great Seige. They were built during the 1779-1783 seige of Gibraltar by the Spanish--a failed attempt to get the rock back, one of 14, I think.

Great views of the city, but not a very cozy place to live for 4 years.

And very, very, very wet. There was even a great hall where one of the commanders gave a dinner after the seige was over. This is not the great hall, but the great puddle.

Gibraltar has its own airport, and seeing as how the whole thing is so small, the road that enters the city bisects it. So when you're coming into town there's a sign that says that you're crossing a runway and so be quick about it! They close it every now and then to let planes land and take off.

You can see the holes in the rock where the canons in the tunnels shot from.

The last stop was another Moorish castle built by a honey for his lover, but now it's the local prison. And apparently it's really bad. William said that human rights groups have been on them for years, and so they're finally building a new one with soccer fields and such. Sawyer had a great time frolicking on the roof.

That boy love to run!

Marbella...in the rain

2009-12-24T01:25:00.000-08:00

On Monday afternoon we went into Marbella to see the Casco Antiguo, aka old quarter. Starting the wet journey out of the parking garage:

Just south of the Casco is a fabulous little park, and a paseo Dali where loads of his sculptures make their way down to the sea.

Here's an adorable little park bench in the rain--

--and one of the lush, tropical corridors.

Entering the Casco Antinguo...

One of the narrow white streets so common in the coastal and hillside towns.

A handsome little square...

The old church (with, it must be admitted, some seriously creepy mannequins in the chapel installations).

Chris and Sawyer frolicking in the square in front of the church.

Some vestiges of the old fort still surround the city.

Looking down on the Plaza de las Naranjas

Sawyer checks out the goods in a local boutique.

Spain-bound

2009-12-22T12:37:00.000-08:00

Later that afternoon we caught a Ryan Air flight into Madrid, where we stayed in THE sleekest 59 euro hotel anyone could ever conceive of. Seriously. It's called the Tach, if anyone is looking. The next morning we picked up our wee rental car (a Citroen Nimo) and made the drive down to Malaga.

About an hour out of Madrid we went through a small national park with amazing views of rocky precipices.

Driving through La Mancha was great for two reasons: the whole region pays hommage to its hero, Don Quijote, which means loads of windmills, statues of him and his pudgy sidekick Sancho, and references galore. In a restaurant where we stopped for lunch they were selling local sweets with this sentence written on the box: "En un lugar de La Mancha, cuyos dulces no quiero olvidarme..." That should be hilariously funny to anyone who's read DQ recently...
The second reason why it was great is because of the olive trees! The whole landscape is COVERED with lines of olive trees, as far as the eye can see, and they go up and down the hill sides and in and out of all the craggy cliffs of the mountains. It's hard to imagine how people harvest them, the slopes are so steep.

More blankets of olive groves as we enter the Granada province.

It's pretty amazing--or at least it seemed amazing to us--that we told Glenn and Judy that we'd pick them up on a street corner in Malaga on Saturday at 4pm, and it actually worked. We were about 10 minutes late, due to there being virtually no street signs in Malaga. Anyway, after getting loaded up we drove to our timeshare destination and got settled in, enjoying dinner at the restaurant that night.

On Sunday we had a mellow day: took a stroll in the environs and let Sawyer explore a little. Made a great little dinner in the apartment kitchen and played some serious games.

Sawyer is completely obsessed with the muppets right now, and putting some of their music on an mp3 player was one of the ways we got through the long flights (this was a genius idea, thanks, Brigitte). He had a little trouble with the ear buds though, so Gram and Gramps brought him this old school set of ear phones.

But they were a little too big; we're still working on the perfect solution to make them fit properly.

The next day we took a very rainy but beautiful and fun trip to Marbella; pics will be up soon. That night we dined at an Italian place down the street where the waitresses were sitting on their tushes looking for something to do (major off-season syndrome); their solution was to fall in love with Sawyer. They looked for every excuse possible to come by the table and talk to him--sneaking him bowls of potato chips, making sure he had a napkin or a tiny fork, asking compulsively if we had everything we needed, etc. One of them even said, "I love you!!" as we left. He gave them both huge kisses.

It was possibly the happiest night of my life because we ordered some croquetas. Sawyer, suprisingly, amateur de toute friture, did not like them. More for me.

Paris monuments

2009-12-22T12:02:00.000-08:00

After the department stores we walked over to the old Opera...

...and then jumped on the metro to the Champs-Elysees, where Chris thought we'd see some mad Christmas decorations. Turns out things were pretty subtile. Here's the standard shot of the Arc de Triomphe by night:

The Champs was lined by beautifully lit trees.

At this point Sawyer had fallen into a deep coma, so we strapped his head in, which was very alarming to him when he came to.

We thought for sure he would wake us up in the wee hours of the morning, but to our surprise we all slept until 10am. After a quick breakfast we head to Montmartre (boy was that artist square empty in the snowy weather) and made a quick stop at Sacre Coeur.

We lunched in Pigalle just across from the Sexodrome. Classic.