Well, it's 2008...

Yes. I fell off the face of the Earth.

Ok, actually, I got uber-sick after Chicago (lovely girly germs!) and spent most of Christmas and New Year's wheezing and sleeping.

I literally only started feeling better by the time I went to Walt Disney World, which was last week. I think my ear FINALLY cleared on the plane there. Ha!

So, to recap:
~Went to Chicago. It SNOWED. We went to tea. Ames got really sick and ate cookies.
~Baked cookies here. Jack and sugar don't mix.
~MaxJET...don't even ask, let's just say this trip to Italy will go on as scheduled and will be fun.
~Christmas. Mmm, Pie.
~New Year's.
~Walt Disney Word - it was cold, but soooo much fun. MICKEY WAFFLES!!!

In other news...Portland is in a few weeks! And Italy planning continues. :)

Ah, Gingerbread and Peanut Butter Kisses

Soon, soon the Christmas Baking will begin! Whee!!!

I survived Thanksgiving, only having one slight issue - pulled a muscle or tendon in my leg and spent the next six days limping and swearing. A lot. As the parents made cracks about me pulling up lame.

Ahem.

But I got to try Sweet Potato pie. And? I'm in LOVE. Yum-o.

It's Thursday, the new Friday. This weekend promises to be packed and fun: Christmas Lights, Disneyland, the whole bit.

The Mom's birthday is coming up and we're going out to dinner. Whee!

And two weeks until the Chicago Cookie Day 2007...the low on Monday is going to be 11. 11 DEGREES! Yikes. I need more layers!!!

Brrr! Baby, it's COLD outside!

I am so in trouble...I'm already freezing and it's not even December. Or Winter. Ahem.

Almost two weeks from Turkey Day! Whee!

The Mom and I are doing the Turkey Trot in the morning. Yay! Dinner is still under negotiation. Stay tuned. And Friday (aka, Black Friday, which I don't do at all!), we're having Thanksgiving Deux, our version. Hee! There may be Christmas movies and pie involved, I'm just saying.

In other news, still reading the book. I got so upset (crying, everything), I had to stop on Sunday. I'll report back when I finish. But it's good - Publisher's Weekly named it one of the best of 2007.

On the horizon? Christmas Shopping...the Mom's birthday...Bauer Sale...Auntie Em's!
And? Cookie Day!!!

Day One, Version 2.0

So today was my first official day.

I had a safety orientation. FYI, you should scrub your hands for at least two renditions of "Happy Birthday" - either sung to yourself or out-loud, your choice.

Then I went to Human Resources, who had nothing for me to sign or look at. Payroll was equally stumped as to why I was there with my forms of ID.

I'm not sure if I should be worried. Thoughts?

In other news....
~That problem is slowly clearing itself up. SLOWLY. Grrr.
~The Chicago clan will be in town this weekend, Whee!
~Portland!

A Whirlwind of Nothingness

Yay, I made it through another week. Monday will mark my official first day at work, which I suppose is a good thing. ;)

Many good things in the works, but I'm afraid it's kind of boring and quiet for now. There are four (4!) trips in the next 8 months, which is cool-o. Last weekend the Mom and I walked to the Farmer's Market - try the scones from Sconeage, they rock! Next weekend we're going to Disneyland to check out the pumpkin-ness.

But, for now? Quiet.

Saturday: $, Coffee, Pedis, Bristol, Wild Oats, Market
Sunday: Newport Beach

Yawn. What?

Is it wrong to want to sleep all weekend? Anyone? *yawn*
Have a cookie, it's Friday.

We're sticking kind of close to home this weekend, after the Mom being in Boston last weekend and my trip to Chicago the previous one.

Saturday, 9/15: Coffee, Pedicure, perhaps some Jean Shopping, Bristol Farms, Pie, Wild Oats, Market

Sunday, 9/16: Coffee, Coach (?), Olives

I need to plot out some Italy stuff (whee!) and buy tickets for Chicago for the cookie baking. Does anyone have a diabetic-friendly cookie recipe that does NOT involve fake sugar?
(We're screwed, he's on low-sugar, I don't do fake sugar...)

Complications

Life is hard sometimes.

~The Uncle is recovering nicely, thank you.

~Apparently I'm gainfully employed again. Or about to be. I'm not entirely sure.

Is that vague enough for you all? Ahem.

Hugs.

*blink* What?

September? What?

Yup, it's back to school time! Whee! Ames started PRE-SCHOOL! She was adorable...I just got back from Chicago and...so want to be there!

Not much to update beyond that: G-Ma was here, G-Ma flew home after a lovely BBQ here at the house. I got a migraine and went home sick. I flew to Chicago with AJ1 and hung out with the kid for AJ1's birthday...mmm, Sweet Mandy B's!

In the works: Cookie day plans! WDW plans! Georgia plans! Italy plans! (note to self: PASSPORT!)

Hugs to all...

Mmm, cookie! SuVan's Cafe and Bake Shop

Mmm, peanut butter.

This is a cute little bakery across the street from Starbucks near my Aunt and Uncle's house. I saw them. I read about them in TimeOut. I had to go.

So the Mom went to Starbucks and I went to SuVan's.

A peanut butter chocolate chip cookie. It was 3-inches round, very home-made-y. The peanut butter dough was studded with bittersweet chocolate chunks.

It was moist, it was buttery. It was good. Yum-o!

SuVan's - A!

SuVan's Cafe and Bake Shop
3351 North Lincoln Avenue
Chicago, IL 60657
773) 281-0120

Mmm, cake! Rolf Patisserie (Whole Foods)

Seriously, what is not to love with a cake named Death by Chocolate?

Hee.

This was my back up cake, in case the Tiramisu was lacking. And it was. But that was for another review, this is about the chocolate goodness that was Death by Chocolate.

It was a wedge of sliced cake, in a cute little plastic container with a spork attached. Hee.

And wow, was it chocolate. Chocolate walnut brownie base, two layers of chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream filling, iced with chocolate buttercream and decorated with chocolate curls.

Ahem. I wish I had more now.

It kind of looked like it had been dropped a few times, but that didn't really hamper the chocolate-y coma that resulted. In fact, the layers had completely separated into individual segments, but the it tasted good - I think that speaks to the quality of the product, really.

The whole mess was moist, buttery and yummy. The buttercream was kind of grainy, but really, that was because it was ice cold and I was impatient and didn't wait. Snerk.

Rolf Patisserie - B+.

Rolf Patisserie
4343 Touhy Avenue
Lincolnwood, IL
847) 675-6565
http://www.rolfpatisserie.com

Whole Foods Lakeview
3300 North Ashland Avenue
Chicago, IL 60657
773) 244-4200
http://www.wholefoods.com

Mmm, entrement (mousse cake)! Vanille Patisserie

I so wanted to be impressed by this place and the mousse cake. And I was. Kind of. It was as small store front in Chicago and it felt both homey and very refined, all the cakes and macarons beautifully displayed.

I got a tiramisu entrement and a chocolate macaron. I ate the macaron first, but the picture sucked. Sorry.

French macarons are made with egg whites, creating a pastry that is crunchy on the outside and moist on the inside - think of a dome of meringue, with filling. Yum. This one was delicate and chocolate-y. It was about 1.5-inches in diameter and a nice treat.

The tiramisu was light and delicate, made of marscopone mousse, coffee mousse and a thin layer of cake. It was soooo pretty, 3-inches round and about 3-inches tall. It was decorated with lines of chocolate and a little chocolate sign for the pastry shop.

Adorable!

But kind of lacking in execution. It was airy, it was kind of just there. All I remember is that it tasted lightly of coffee. That's it.
Oh well.

Vanille Patisserie Macaron - B.
Vanille Patisserie Tiramisu Entrement - C.

Vanille Patisserie
2229 North Clybourn Avenue
Chicago, IL 60614
773) 868-4574
http://www.vanillepatisserie.com

Mmm, frozen custard! Scooter's Frozen Custard

When we were in Chicago after the big birthday trip last year, it was freezing. It was November and it was COLD! Well, cold to me. Anyway, one of my Aunt's teacher's was newly pregnant and craving a milkshake.

In Chicago.
In November.
Brrr!

The Aunt, in an effort to make the girl happy, suggested the Uncle try Scooter's. I was intrigued. Scooter's?

Scooter's, it turns out, is a local frozen custard shop in Lakeview. It's like all of four blocks from their house and was closed. *ahem*
But I was intrigued. They close for the winter and re-open in March. So when we went in May, I insisted we go to Scooter's.
And, comically, it was all of 51 Degrees when I ate the custard. *snerk*

By their definition, frozen custard is ice cream that has less air whipped in and has less ice crystals, making it look like soft serve but taste very creamy. That's way too scientific for me, I don't really care. All you need to know is that they have several standard flavors, they make a special flavor of custard and ice every day, they make concretes (custards with mix-ins) and shakes and are now open.

By the way, today's flavor: Key Lime. Concrete of the Month: Blueberry Pie

I got a small concrete: chocolate custard with peanut butter and peanut butter cups. And wow, was it creamy. Creamy goodness. The peanut butter butter, because the custard was cold and it was cold out, was frozen slightly. It was all chunky. And the peanut butter cups were huge chunks.

Yum-o. It tasted like a mix of my two favorite ice creams: Ben & Jerry's Peanut Butter Cup (peanut butter ice cream with peanut butter cup chunks) and Haagen Dazs Chocolate Peanut Butter (chocolate ice cream with swirls of peanut butter).
*thud*

Go to Scooter's.
Scooter's Frozen Custard - A.

Scooter's Frozen Custard
1658 West Belmont Avenue
Chicago, IL 60657
773) 244-6415
http://scootersfrozencustard.com

Mmm, cake! Dinkels Bakery

Awww, Dinkels. The Aunt and Uncle better not move from Lakeview, because I love Dinkels. It's sooo cute and old-fashioned.

Dinkels is famous for their butter cookies and other baked goods. Me? I love the huge-o cupcakes! Hee.

This is a Dinkels Chocolate Chocolate Dessert Cake - it's awfully cute. It came in a little round saucer container and I fell for it immediately when I saw it in the case.

It's a 3-inch round mini layer cake; it has layers of yellow cake with chocolate buttercream filling. It's iced in another layer of chocolate buttercream and then has a layer of chocolate ganache with a cute little design in white chocolate on top.

The cake was super yummy and moist. The chocolate buttercream was light - it's real buttercream, as opposed to the toxic faux-buttercream stuff. It was slightly chocolate and balanced well with the cake. But? The ganache, which I LOVE, was grainy. It tasted grainy, it looked grainy, it was grainy.

I did some research online - grainy ganache is due to over-mixing it, this caused the cream/chocolate mixture to actually get too cool too quickly. Who knew?

So, the cake kind came across as ehhh....Props for the cake and buttercream, major points lost for the ganache.
Dinkels - B- (for the ganache, basically).

Dinkels Bakery
3329 North Lincoln Avenue
Chicago, IL 60657
800) 822-8817
http://www.dinkels.com

Chicago, continued...

Ah, where were we? Oh, yes.

Sunday, Mother's Day: We all woke-up rather slowly that morning. The Uncle made all the Moms a great breakfast, lucky for me, cousins/faux-Aunties could have it also - fruit, eggs, bagels and bacon. *thud* Ames got her Mom a new cell phone, mine got a Starbucks card. Ha!

We went to Armitage (neighborhood/street) to shop, where I got a great new blouse and a custom designed handbag. *drool* I don't have an addiction, I don't! Then we went to the Aunt's parents house for a Mother's Day/Birthday dinner. It was yummy (Pompeii!) and fun to catch up with them all. I love hanging out with her family, it's soooo....filled with brothers and sisters! ;)

Oh, and there was Dinkels. *thud*

Monday: Going home day. The Aunt and Uncle went to work, Ames went to Grandma's (with syrup on the back of her dress, how I ask you?). The Mom and I went to Dinkels to search for chocolate croissants (weekends only!), then had breakfast at Wishbone. Mmm, warm banana bread...

And? The waiter at Wishbone told me I was the healthiest ever - carrot juice (interesting), banana bread and a big bowl of fruit. *snerk*

Anyway, we went to Whole Foods to stock up on travel supplies, then dropped the stuff off before going to Starbucks. And Su Van's, a neighborhood bakery I hadn't been to, for a peanut butter chocolate chip cookie, because HELLO....?!?! That's when the fire erupted, after we got back to the house and we were waiting for the town car...

Sirens, fire trucks, traffic, helicopters...Lakeview is relatively quiet and suddenly? Smoke, confusion. Luckily it wasn't any neighborhood icons. Whew.

Onward to O'Hare, then a LONG flight home.

I want to go back. NOW!

Chicago...what we did...

It was a fun weekend, for sure. After getting up way too early on Friday and watching two American Airlines employees fight in the Starbucks line (*seriously*), we hit the Windy City.

Friday: Airport Express stood us up and we took a taxi to the house. Ahem. We dropped our stuff and the Mom got to look around the newish house before we headed for coffee and...well...cake. Ah, Dinkels. Mmm, Dinkels. The Aunt came home and we headed to pick-up Ames. Dinner was a nice place in Bucktown, Jane's Restaurant. People kept telling us how cute Ames was. *snerk* Got custard at Scooters and fell asleep.

Saturday: Woke-up and headed to breakfast at Victory Banner. Where I resisted the peanut butter and jelly-stuffed French Toast. Hee. We headed to the Lincoln Park Zoo, where every animal was asleep. Hee. On the way back home (*nap time*), we stopped at Vanille Patisserie, which was very French. Got a treat for dessert, then on to Whole Foods to prep for our baby-sitting gig.

The Lakeview Whole Foods is so much bigger and well-stocked. I'm just saying. Dinner was, of course, a pb sammie. Ha! The tiramisu was OK, very light and airy and yummy...just not what I was expecting. We crashed shortly after the kid did and the parents? They made it home from the fundraiser at like1:30am. Ha!

To Be Continued...

Um, FIRE!!!

For a minute there, I was really worried...
Massive amounts of black smoke and fire trucks and news helicopters...
Dinkels? Starbucks? Whole Foods? Wishbone?

Actually, an office building across the street from all those places, right near the M&M house though.
Dude. We need to get to the airport soon and Lincoln is shut-down. D'oh!

Happy Mother's Day!

So, I'm not a Mom, but my Uncle made all the Moms brunch, so yummy! :)

Happy Mother's Day, everyone! We're off to do some window shopping (oh, shopping!) and then have a nice dinner with the Auntie's family.

Last night was kind of successful:
Dinner was yummy (peanut butter sammie!), but the Vanille stuff was just OK. Kind of ehhh. A review will follow.

Fun. Yay!
Bacon. Mmm, bacon...
*thud*

Ouch.

You know that headache I get from not eating enough and clenching my jaw and traveling? Yeah.
*ooowww!*

Ahem. It's a beautiful sunny day in the Windy City. So far we've:
~Walked to Roscoe Village and had breakfast...at a vegetarian restaurant...promoting...spiratualism and transcendentalism...or something. But the pumpkin bread was warm and rocked. Ha!

~Went to Starbucks.

~Went to the Lincoln Park Zoo, where we saw the Lions (sleeping), the Bears (sleeping) and other animals. Hee. I bought Miss Ames a cow. Stuffed, of course.

~Went to the hoity-toity Vanille Patisserie place. It was...snotty, in a good way. Tiramisu for tonight, yum-o!

~Walked to Whole Foods. Got cake, just in case the Tiramisu blows. Ahem.

Hugs!

Chicago, the Windy City...Brrr!!!

Well, we made it. And so far we gotten coffee and I've gotten cake at Dinkels, so life is normal for the Mom and I...
Ha!

The flight was good, I read the whole way. It was a huge 767, but not totally packed. Nice.

I'm not quite sure what the plans are, but O'Hare is lovely, as always. It's sunny, but very windy and chilly. Well, chilly to me, at least.

And? Dinkels! Hee.
Updates to follow!

Chicago!

Yay! I so can not wait - in less than 48-hours I will be on the plane to visit Miss Ames! Yay!

*ahem*
I'm excited, can you tell?

So far, our plans are pretty loose. I want to go to Vanille Patisserie and Scooters. Mom needs to be shown Dinkels (*ha!*) and the neighborhood. We're baby-sitting Saturday night - Whole Foods run! Ames wants to go the zoo. Yay!

It will be a fun Mother's Day, for sure! :)