Delectable Foods

David enjoys trying out new dishes, and perfecting them to be restaurant quality. This weekend, he added Chicken Parmesan and Stuffed Portabella Mushrooms to his repertoire.

Here's the Chicken Parmesan:
And the Portabella mushroom stuffed with mozzarella cheese, pesto, and sun-dried tomatoes.
David doesn't like mushrooms, so he also made stuffed bell peppers. Here are both stuffed with sausage.
They were delicious! (And there are plenty of leftovers to eat, which means that I don't have to cook for a while.)

Baking Adventures

I made a bunch of goodies for a dessert auction fundraiser. Here I am cooking.
My first cake was a chocolate chip bundt cake. It came out of the oven looking beautiful! The recipe said I should let it cool 10 minutes in the pan, and then turn in out onto a cooling rack. That part didn't go so well.
In retrospect, that's really the best cake for me to have messed up on, because it tasted amazing and David and I got to eat it!

For the next cake, I was super careful about getting it off the pan. I succeeded. (I know, this picture shows it still on the pan, but trust me.)
I was going to make a cheesecake, but cream cheese wasn't on sale and I only had 2 packages. So I tried a no-bake cheesecake recipe, which really had so little cheesecake filling that it was more of a cheese torte. And then I made it look pretty. Here, I needed three hands to hold spatulas to make sure the graham cracker crust didn't break as I moved the torte from the pan to its platter. This dessert created a bidding war.
I also made a moist chocolate cake with fudge filling and whipped cream frosting. It looks pretty plain compared to the other cakes, and consequently sold for a lower amount. Even the lemon bars beat its price.
Here are the lemon bars. I kept them in one piece because it makes for a nicer presentation. This kept sliding around on my "platter," and every time it moved, I could see the grease that was transferred to the paper underneath. Not the most appetizing thing.
All in all, a good contribution to the fundraiser.

Another Baking Story
I made David a cheesecake for our anniversary. (This was when I still had 5 packages of cream cheese in the fridge, so it was a real cheesecake.) I made it the day before, and then washed and put away all the pans that would give away the surprise. I hid the cheesecake under some tortillas in the fridge, where I didn't expect David to look.

I decided to make Sesame Chicken for dinner, which incidentally happens to be the first dish I ever made David. When I pointed this out to him, he jokingly asked, "And is there cheesecake in the fridge, too?" There went my great surprise.

Kevin's Wedding

Kevin and Audrey got married in March, and the whole family went out for it.

Getting Ready
Grandma had to help Bradford with his shoes.
David could put on his shoes without help.
This captures a classic facial expression of my dad's.
A funny story about the guy's ties. All the men were supposed to wear dark blue ties. David forgot to bring a tie, and Derek never got the message about the color, so he brought burnt orange. Kevin didn't approve. Also, Kevin thought Jeff's tie was too light a color. So Kevin, Derek, and David went out shopping for ties the evening before the wedding. They came back with some nice ties, too.

In case you were wondering, I look about the same right when I get up as I do when I'm ready for the day.

Wedding and Reception
This is one of my favorite pictures of Kevin and Audrey. Too bad I caught the glare of the sun. I really like the way the sun hits her hair.
And this is my favorite picture of Kevin. He had that super happy grin on his face the whole day!
Wow, I feel short. This goes youngest to oldest: Janene, Derek, Kevin, Shelly.
Yep, I look short from this angle, too.
But I don't look short here! Brooklyn, Shelly, my mom, me.

Deja vu
It was fun to watch Kevin and Audrey taking pictures, and having some poses just look really familiar . . .
If you just switch the bride and the groom, you can see something like this . . .
Okay, so it's not that close, but the ones that looked more similar weren't as good pictures to begin with.

What everyone else was doing during pictures
Well, I was taking pictures, too. And enjoying it, as you can see.
I filled up my memory card just as the reception started and my mom was asking me to take pictures of the spread of food.
David was walking around with Emma. David is Emma's favorite uncle.
Bradford was running around.
Brooklyn was meandering about, enjoying the stairs.Later, at the reception, Emma just made herself comfortable on the floor.

The Whole Crew
Top row: Derek, Jeff holding Bradford, Audrey, Kevin, Mom, Dad, David.
Next row: Janene, Nicole, Emma, Shelly holding Brooklyn.

A Wind Turbine Blade

This is an actual wind turbine blade. It is 14.5 parking spaces long, and taller than David can reach at the middle. (David is standing in front of the blade, and my dad is right at the edge of the picture.)
It's so big that we don't have space for it in my lab yet. That's why it's still in the parking lot.

My brother

For those of you who don't know my brother, Derek, here's a taste of his personality:

http://beforewegetstarted.blogspot.com/2010/05/beth-dies-spoiler-alert.html

I'm the baby sister he refers to in the background information. I'd relate the story myself, but he tells it so much better.

A Seven Course Meal

When we go to restaurants, David often says later, "I could make that." He thinks through the ingredients, and imitates the dish. Recently, he was asking about what would be the courses in a 6 or 7 course meal. We came up with some ideas. Then, for my birthday, David prepared a fancy 7 course meal, complete with all the sets of silverware, and . . .
. . . menus! Since this is Janene's personal restaurant, the menus are green (which is the same color as the kitchen towels, the bathroom towels, the bedspread, and about half of Janene's clothes).
We had cran-raspberry juice cocktail to drink.
Course 1: Mango SorbetCourse 2: Salad
Course 3: Bread with Italian Dipping Spices. This picture does not do justice to how good it tastes! We learned about this artisan bread and the dipping spices from David's sister. The spices are amazing. You add them to olive oil, and it's just like you're at an Italian restaurant!
Course 4: Mozzarella Sticks. This picture almost does justice to how good they taste. You might also refer to this picture.
Course 5: Rotini Robusto, a recipe inspired by Fazoli's Tortellini Robusto.
Check out that sausage and cheese, mmm!Course 6: Fruit Plate
Course 7: Baked Fudge Pudding with Vanilla Ice Cream
The mess that David had to clean up.
Something that you can't tell from the pictures is that 6 of the courses were served on medium sized Corelle plates. We got a set of Corelle dishes when we got married, but the sets don't include the medium sized plates, which I love for lunch or salad. A month or so ago, I saw the plates on a good sale, and I bought them. I then handed them to David and told him that he could wrap them up for my birthday. Instead, he decided to inaugurate the plates into our kitchen.

This meal was so delicious! We were stuffed afterward. I have a wonderful husband to make my birthday so lovely.

Changing an Air Filter

Sometimes screws on a car's air filter are stiff.
But I guess I would rather have the screwdriver break than the air filter.