Good Things Provo

Ok, I know I live in Houston, but Jon is in Provo this weekend  "on business", so I guess that got me thinking of my favorites in Provo and what I would do if I were there too. Other than hanging out with our families, which is my real favorite thing to do, eating wise, my perfect day in Provo would be to go to lunch at our favorite place:

                                                      

In case you didn't know, there is a huge debate between Bajio's and their competitor, Cafe Rio. Almost everyone else in my fam likes Cafe Rio better, but we are die-hard Bajios people. I'd order my "usual", the Veggie Ensalada Bajio. Half a scoop of sweet rice, extra black beans, corn, onions, tomatillo sauce (I could drink that stuff straight up), extra lettuce, "pico" and of course, a few lime wedges. (I know you all wanted to know that!) YUM! My mouth is watering. After lunch I'd drive up canyon and go for a walk or up to Squaw Peak etc.  Dinner would be a hard choice . . . there's always the old stand by, Bombay House and their wonderful "Hershey Kiss shaped things filled with potatoes and peas" (as Grace describes Samosas - her favorite). Lately the Happy Sumo has sounded really good too. Maybe it's a good thing I'm not there . . . too many choices. 

Advice

So we learned a few good things going out of town this weekend. First, kids, when "y'all" are driving down the middle of the busy 610 loop, even though you ask your mom 10 times for a _____ (you can fill in the blank), she still might not have heard you. Please don't grab her purse to get one yourself. First, it might give your mom a heart attack to see something flying by out of the corner of her eye. Second, one of the purse handles might be hooked on the gear shifter (is there a correct term for that piece of equipment?) and when you grab it, it might put the car into Neutral making your mom have a second "coronary" because all-of-a-sudden, the car won't go when she is pushing on the gas (remember the part about being in the middle of traffic on a busy freeway?) and she can't figure out why. 

Second, we won't name any names, but when we are traveling along and see a really interesting car that has religious statues glued all over it, please slow way down (yes, that means breaking off the cruise control) to let the car pass you (even it if is going 45 mph on a highway) if your wife asks you to. She wanted to pay attention to it, but she thought she had enough time to pass a banana to the kids and then get a good look. She didn't know that in the 3 seconds she turned away, that it would go from being a good 50 feet in front of us to eating our dust.  

Third, no matter how much preparation you do to ensure that the 64 cupcakes you are taking with you to San Antonio are cool and well packed for the trip, make sure that when you put them in the car (again, we won't mention names) they are in a place that 1) is completely horizontal and stable with no chance to topple or slide and 2) the AC can reach them:

                                Before

                                 After

Fourth, if you go to see Shamu at Sea World and sit in a bench marked Splash Zone, no matter how far up you are, expect to get wet.

This may not look like we are wet, but let's just say, I didn't dry out until we were almost leaving. I also had helmet hair from the salt water.

Fifth, kids, please listen to your parents when they ask you not to wear flip flops with rubber between your toes. They really will give you blisters! And dads back can't handle shlepping you around all day. Parents, maybe deciding spur-of-the-moment to go to a theme park all day because it's "pretty much on the way home" might not be the best idea. Also, don't forget to put sunscreen on your part (if you have one) in your hair, or wear a hat. 

And finally, before you go out of town, you all know to check lights and door locks etc. but make sure all hoses are turned off outside. The local wildlife might think there is a new lagoon on the block and stay at your house for days wondering where their new habitat went. Sorry, no pictures of the flooding. Let's just say emotions were running a little high wondering what our water bill is going to be next month, and today, thankfully all the puddles are gone. 

Oh. My. Goodness!

Did you watch the Opening Ceremonies tonight? I got chills and tears. Un-be-livable! Am-A-zing!

Wait a Minute . . .

That shirt looks familiar!

Oh yeah. Now I remember why. 

I don't know why she thinks that one is girly enough to inherit, but she wears it all the time!

Good Things Houston - Gelato

I guess one of the good things about having a hurricane (ok, I know Edouard got downgraded to a Tropical Storm, but hurricane sounds better) barreling down on you is that you get to play hookey from your routine. Jon didn't have to go in to work and as we were getting for swimming lessons at the YMCA, they got cancelled too.  So, I have exercised and now Jon is in the office dejunking (we never did get fully unpacked in there), the kids are playing games on the new and old iphones (both Jons, but with good reasons). Later, since a cool spell has come - only the low 80's today! - I feel a soup cooking coming on, but for now, I will post a blog - yes, another one about our favorite past time - food, but with some stories thrown in. 

Collin's best friend, Brendan had a welcome home party on Saturday so we asked Grace what she wanted to do. I loved her response - "go to CPK and eat noodles (?) and then drive over to Gelato Blu for dessert". My kind of outing! We did as requested and ate at CPK (did you know they have great salads?) and then headed to Gelato Blu. We found this place because it's on the way to Jons work and is fabulous. We've been going almost every weekend lately.  The only drawback is we somehow always seem to miss the days they make our absolute, all-time favorite - gianduja (chocolate hazelnut). They have a lot of flavors we have never heard of and great sorbeto too. They had one - can't remember the name made with blue cheese, figs and something else. They have a great vanilla with a tart cherry swirl going through - another name I can't remember. . . and again, they didn't have gianduja BUT, they did have . . . OLIVE OIL!! Which brings me to one of my other favorites - reminiscing. 

Last year all my sisters met in NYC for a weekend and we had such a good time - despite the extremely cold weather. We ate some great food - the Magnolia Bakery (I ate all 4 of my cupcakes and then finished off my sisters!). We also ate at one of Mario Batali's restaurant Otto. The highlight of the meal was the olive oil gelato. I have been talking about it ever since because of how surprised I was at it's fruity taste. So it was fun to see it at Gelato Blu and I was even more glad that Jon liked it as much as I did. 

So, this is Grace trying to decide which flavors to get . . . 

And a shot of the Olive Oil gelato, and the popularity of it. This shot is for you Sarah, Laura and Ems!! We need another sister trip soon!

Good Things Houston - BBQ

AKA another one of our favorites . . . 

So, you can't live in Texas and not have a favorite BBQ joint! I'm sure a lot of locals would not agree with our favorite - Pappas, it is a chain after all. But to be fair, we have tried quite a few different ones and this is our fav. We like the brisket, the turkey (YUM!), the kids really like the smoked sausage and their sauces - the sweet cola is so delish. My favorite part are the sides - green salads (I know "any BBQ place that has green salad can't be good"), slaw, beans, fruit in a cinammony sauce etc. The only downside is that they only have 2 dessert options, neither of which appeal to us, BUT they have 3 kinds of Agua Fresca - watermelon, cantaloupe and our favorite, pineapple. Not too sweet and so refreshing. Just one more reason to come visit!

Happy August!

Scout Day Camp

We had our Rising Star District (for those of you Scouters) Day Camp last month and it was one of the funnest experiences we've had. We were so sad every day that Jon had to work while we went. Can I just say how much we all love the scouting program? Collin of course went as a Bear scout, I was a Bear teacher and Grace was a "sibling". Grace would love to become a cub scout if she could. The boys did requirements and belt loop projects all day. I got to teach some of his classes and Grace got to have fun all day. One of the classes I taught was different knots so here are some pictures of that. 

Grace and the other siblings with Miss Debbie (Grace is the one looking at the camera). . . 

All of us with a thick coating of sweat at the end of the day. It was held in a rodeo arena, so no AC. (Not sure what that is on Collins face!)

The kids practicing their Archery skills . . . 

Collins favorite part of the week - all the building he got to do. Especially the Pirate Ship he made. 

This was one of the highlights for Collin - the Rocket Launch. He got picked for good Den behavior to shoot one of the rockets the Webelos had made. His was the last rocket, so he got to shoot off the biggest, fastest, most "rockety" one. He was in heaven. It's kind of hard to tell, but Collin is on the right in a black hat and the rocket is on the left in between the two light poles. 

We had so much fun we can't wait till next year!

Adventures in the Boondocks

 Yesterday we headed Southwest of Houston to a town called Blessings. We had been there before when we lived here and Collin was little, and on the spur of the moment decided to visit it again. Blessings was originally Thank God, Texas but the postmaster didn't think it would be appropriate, so the name was changed to Blessings. There is an old Hotel there that serves "home cooked" meals. You fill your plate up with fried meats, vegetables with meat cooked with them (think green beans and ham), home made rolls etc. and as the cashier told us, "if you go away hungry, it's your own fault". It's served buffet style on old ovens and was really tasty (from what I ate anyway, you'll have to ask Jon about the meats). You eat as much as you want and it's $6 a plate. Their cherry/pineapple cobbler was buttery, not too sweet and so yummy. 

We found out they actually still rent out rooms upstairs. We had a look around, but it was creepy in a Psycho sort of way, so we hit the road. On the way down we had seen "historic" Danevang. It was settled by Danes and since I have a lot of Danish blood in me we had to stop. Plus, the museum was too cute to pass up. They had a collection of the Bing & Grondahl Christmas Plates I collect that covers an entire wall. It was really interesting.

We read in our Day-trips out of Houston book that a little place called Wharton had a nice river with canoes etc. so we decided to head there next. While we were driving around, we found Collins St. so we had to get a picture. 

Wharton had a town square that looked almost exactly like the one from Back to the Future. We walked around, but it was either tacky Antique stores or Law offices but we did find a coffee shop that had some ice cream (Blue Bell of course) so we stopped before we melted away. 

Little did we know that one of the best things we have found so far was just a few miles away. We rounded the corner of the road after leaving Wharton and looked up to see  . . . Tee Pee Motel!!  We all immediately said, "It's Radiator Springs!!" (from the movie Cars, in case you're wondering). We really wanted to stay there but it was booked and I had to speak in church the next day, but we are definitely going back there some time. The kids talked about it the whole rest of the way home. 

Lest We Forget . . .

That we're in the Bible Belt . . .

There are a TON of things called Grace around. Grace's Taco Truck, Grace TV etc. and we always say, "Grace there's your . . . (fill in the blank)". This is one of our favorites - Grace Southern Baptist Church. Sorry for the not-so-great pictures, but we were driving on the freeway at the time. 

Hair Woes

To quote my sister Sarah, I don't wear make-up, I don't wear jewelry, so my hair is my one adornment. . . kind of my identity.

I'll start close to the beginning of this story. When Jon was trying to figure out what he wanted to do in life, he was choosing between: a chef, hair dresser, interior designer and graphic designer. And no, he really isn't gay. When I was pregnant with Collin he did an Illustrations internship in NYC (or "Yew Nork" as Grace calls it) and was around a bunch of single girls who were trying new things with their hair. They told him he would look "so cool" (said with a Valley Girl accent) with highlights and begged him to let them do it. He of course, couldn't let his fans down, and "reluctantly"consented. When he got home, he felt like he had graduated from Hair Design School and begged me to let him use his skills on my hair.  After listening to him beg for more than a year, I said sure, but if it doesn't work out I was going to go to a really expensive salon to have them fix it. . . . and that is how I met my first favorite "hair guy" of all time, Chris. Chris was a rail thin, slightly shaky, chain-smoking guy from Texas, who loved to tell me about his and his partners dog anecdotes (mostly about getting caught eating Hershey's Kisses, again!).  He also told me that I had some of the softest, best hair he had ever worked with (I don't care if I was pregnant at the time and 200 pounds, and he was trying to make me feel good. Let me live in my fantasy world!). By this time I had finally come to accept that the best style for my hair and face was an a-line bob. He did the best ones I've had and I was sad to leave him behind when we moved back to Provo when Grace was born. 

Through the 5 years we lived in Provo I tried so many different hair stylists and finally found one that could do an a-line (I finally had to ask for someone over 30 since the young "newbies" don't know that style - Why not?? It's a Classic!), but it was right before we moved back to Houston, so I only got to go to her once.

Last fall, I needed a hair cut and decided to see if Chris was still around, and to my amazement, he was! I was so excited to get back to him! He was still as skinny as before with the same partner, but no dog - too many Hershey's Kisses I guess. But I did notice his hands were somewhat shakier. I think that affected his hair cutting skills because when I got home and looked in the mirror, the stars fell from my eyes concerning Chris. My hair looked like a mushroom with a short stem on my neck, AND no a-line. I was SO mad! My hair grows about 1/16 of an inch a month, so this was going to be around for quite a while. 

Since then, I have been scared to get my hair cut, so I've just been letting it grow. A couple of weeks ago Jon wanted to test his "skills" again on my hair. To make a long story short, he actually did a good job of a bob, just not very a-line or stacked. He wanted to try stacking it in the back so last week he tried, and . . . butchered me. No photos of the accident, I was too busy looking for a salon around us.  Jon said there was a really good stylist - Kevin at the hole-in-the-wall he goes too, and that I should try him. I figured, what have I got to lose. 

I went the next morning and said I was there for Kevin. No one seemed to understand what I was saying (they are all Asian) but this short guy - I've got a few inches and a lot of pounds on him- comes over to the counter. I ask if he is Kevin and he still didn't understand me. Another lady yells to me from across the room "He's Kevin" and I'm thinking "Oh no . . . " Luckily I had brought a picture of an a-line and show it to him. He tries to tell me that mine is too short to look like that but he'll try. About 30 min later, 30 very quiet minutes, and some techniques I've never seen before, he is done. It looks pretty good from what I can see. I pay and come home to check in out in my mirror and "Wonder of Wonder, Miracles of Miracles" . . . it is a GREAT hair cut!! I have been so happy about it! It's much shorter than I wanted, but considering what he had to work with - YAY! 

So, how much did this miracle cost? $15 . . . $20 with a tip!! I've paid quadruple that amount for mushroom hair. I think Kevy is here to stay.