Watching an average of 2 Christmas movies a day

Winter has finally arrived in Redding. (I know you're all laughing at that in the Midwest.) It's raining almost everyday and the temperatures are between 50-60 during the day and 35-45 at night. I'm waiting for a clear day to go downtown and take some pictures of the community Christmas tree to post but the forecast doesn't show any opportunities being presented soon. I can't believe that Christmas is only a week and a half away. Part of me is sad because I won't get to spend it with everyone in Wisconsin and I don't feel like I'll have everything ready in time. Another part of me is happy the holiday season will be over because everywhere that I have applied told me to reapply in January because they will be hiring then. Maybe I will finally be able to get a job!
Last Wednesday, Susan drove home from Eureka because she had a flight going to L.A. Friday morning to visit Tyson's sister, Ashley. On Thursday the three of us went out and bought the Christmas tree. We only got a small one since Susan won't be home all December and maybe not even for Christmas proper. It was extremely different than getting a tree in Wisconsin. Going from having at 12-foot tree to decorate to having a 4-foot tree to decorate was different as well- the only thing that was the same was the price which really sucks for people out here. So eloquent, I know. Susan has about two dozen beaded ornaments that her mother hand-made. They are really beautiful and delicate. I can't imagine how much time she put into them. We didn't put a lot of them on the tree because their dog, Brutus, and cats, Aries and Garth, are fond of removing ornaments sometimes.

Tyson and I put up all of the lights outside on Friday, it was raining so our fingers got rather raw from stringing them but it was still fun and I think they turned out really nice especially since neither of us had really done it before. We also cut out paper snowflakes in an assortment of sizes to put on the front windows. Later in the week I'm planning on cutting out 6 and 8 pointed stars from old wrapping paper and stringing them up for decorations.
Yesterday, Tyson and I painted two walls in his room Neptune Blue. He has never had a painted room before so we tackled another first for him! It turned out really well and we're both quite pleased. We're going to paint the remaining walls a lighter color but haven't decided what yet.
(Notice the bed? I washed the sheets last week and it's not made...recall from last week's post whose job that was? Hint, hint Tyson :P )


We also baked his friend Kenny a giant cookie because his 21st birthday was today. We found neon food coloring to decorate with. The green color looks like it belongs on a Nickelodeon Slime show, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or any general children/tween show that needs snot for some type of gag. The realization of this led to a frosting fight trying to get it up the others nose...don't worry, we washed our hands before returning to decorating the cookie.

This morning Susan took us out to breakfast at IHOP before driving back to Eureka this afternoon. I got the Pecan Pie Pancakes...mmm...pecans...
Tonight I made Tyson pork chops cooked in apple cider over white rice for dinner and followed them with some baked pears for dessert. The pork chops turned out well but I don't think the pear was ripe enough to be baking it yet...and apparently Tyson doesn't like fruit anyway. I have faith that the pears would have been a good addition had they been ripe though. Recipes anyone? I replaced the capers with pickles in the pork recipe because, well, I'm poor and capers are not cheap.

Cotelettes de Porc au Cidre
Serves 4

2 tablespoons of oil
4 boneless pork chops (about 1 inch thick)
1/2 tsp salt
1 tablespoon of flour
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/2 cup hard cider (you could use regular apple cider, but not apple juice)
1/4 cup water
1 clove of garlic, crushed
1 sprig of fresh rosemary
1 tsp capers

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Heat the oil in a pan and brown the chops (that you have sprinkled with salt) on each side. Take them out and add the flour to the pan. Stirring with a whisk, let the flour turn golden. When it is smooth, add the cider and the water and cook for 2 to 3 minutes.

2. Put the chops back in the sauce, and add the pepper, the garlic and the rosemary. Cover the pan and put it in the oven for 30 minutes (if your pork is thinner or your oven hotter, you'll need less time - this is just a guideline). Five minutes before serving, add the capers to the sauce.

Pro tip: Double the sauce :D

After dinner, we indulged in playing some Little Big Planet...G-d (I went Jewish there in honor of Hanukkah) knows I'm a sucker for any game that I can play dress up on. It was a lot of fun although I'm terrible at jumping on things sometimes.


Our lemoncello is still fermenting. The longer you let it sit, the better it is supposed to be. There are quite a few people that let it sit for at least a year before drinking it. I'm not that patient and I believe that Susan will want her iced tea container back that we put it in so Tyson and I are thinking that we'll finish the process around Christmas. We were a little sloppy in peeling the zest but it is our first time making our own alcoholic beverage from (kinda) scratch so we'll deal with it if it's a little bitter. There is always next time to get it perfect. :)

All and all, it was a pretty good week. I miss my family and my puppy but things are getting to feel quite settled here and I laughed so hard I literally cried countless times and a good belly laugh really is priceless. I really will update sooner this next time...I pinky promise.

Making lemoncello and snowflakes

Icing

I hear that it's snowing in Wisconsin right now. Here it was 67 degrees and sunny all day! It's really nice to be able to go outside in the morning, sit in the back yard and drink coffee while overlooking the valley Redding is in - very peaceful. I spent the late morning and early afternoon filling out and turning in applications around town again. Tyson and I made sugar cookies in the afternoon. I think we found the smallest cookie cutters ever made but they still turned out well. It made me miss baking Christmas cookies with Grandma and Claudia when I was little. Tyson had never made sugar cookies before and when I took the dough out of the fridge from cooling before rolling it out he asked me if they were ready to decorate already. It was pretty cute. Speaking of things Tyson has never done before, last night Tyson learned how to make a bed for the first time. I had washed the sheets and was pretty shocked when I asked Tyson to help me make the bed that he had no idea how to put sheets on a bed. Grandmother would not approve. Now that he knows how to make a bed I think I will make him practice for a while before I make it again. I didn't get out in the town today to take pictures to post up. Oh where did the day go? Take care until tomorrow <3

Welcome?

First off, I want it to be known that I am terrible at blogging. I have tried before and I never know what to write and all attempts at being clever fail terribly but I figure this is the easiest way to keep everyone that is interested up to date and have some pictures included. I planned on doing this blog a lot sooner but as everyone should know, I'm somewhat of a procrastinator so this post will probably seem rather randomly put together with way too many photos.


Here goes nothing....


WYOMING, surprisingly more boring than Iowa! This was the only state that I saw snow in besides California! The mountains were beautiful near Cheyenne but got old fast...perhaps it was because I had already been driving 9 hours by the time I got out of Wyoming that I found it so boring.


Tyson, Susan and I went out to breakfast the first Sunday that I was there and it was amazing! We all got the breakfast buffet which had wildberry french toast (um, what is a wildberry?) - YUMMY! I also had eggs benedict for the first time and I must say that I do approve, however the English muffin on the bottom was a little tough from being on the warmers and took a lot of elbow grease to get through. They might want to reconsider having something like that on a buffet.


I've been doing a lot of cooking and baking since I've been here. I've made Tyson breakfast almost every morning (I think inherited my mom's fondness of cooking for the people I care about. LOVE YOU MOMMY!) This is a picture of some homemade hot chocolate I made. I really didn't like it. The recipe calls for a lot of dark chocolate to be used and really I'm just a sugar addict and milk chocolate or white chocolate are more my thing. The second picture is of the half butter sticks that butter is sold like here. I tried to find long sticks but they are only sold in small sticks! It's a good thing I find them cute ^_^ The butter, by the way, sucks. I've found that margarine substitute tastes better. The cheese is terrible as well. It's funny to see items with a seal on them proclaiming they are "Real California Cheese". I definitely couldn't sit down and just eat a brick of California cheese like I could Wisconsin cheese. I haven't really tried the milk yet to compare because I'm not much of a milk drinker anymore, however, I have found Almond milk out here that is California almonds so ...go California? You can win that one...


THANKSGIVING!
We had a small get together on Thanksgiving day with Tyson's mom (Susan), dad (Dave), their two friends, Becky (I think), her husband Eric, and of course Tyson and me! We had prime rib, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, homemade rolls, and vanilla creme pie. Quite a bit smaller than I'm used to and very different quisine. I missed Jean's stuffing, cranberry sauce, fudge melt-away's, and mama's pie. Can someone crop me into the cousin's picture please? ;)


BLACK FRIDAY! Tyson, Susan and I drove to Eureka to stay with Tyson's grandparents for the weekend. The drive there is completely through mountain passes and takes about three hours. Tyson slept basically half of the way, photo evidence provided. The trip is beautiful but the road is windy! I don't know that I'd ever be able to drive it confidently. When we got to Tyson's grandparents house, his aunt Judy and uncle Paul were there visiting too. His aunt reminds me a lot of Sandra and his uncle of Frank ironically. We had Mexican food that night which Susan, Tyson and I went to get. We waited for the food in an adjoining bar where Susan and Ty tried to teach me some of the basics of playing pool. I think I'll need a few more lessons to graduate to the level of terrible.



The next morning Tyson and I went out into Old Town Eureka to a small coffee and pastry shop. I got coffee and Tyson got a chocolate doughnut and Pepsi. They had some really amazing looking pastries and cookies but I figured I shouldn't have them after all the pie I had earlier in the week and all the goodies I knew I'd have later. After that we went back to his grandparent's house and out with Susan. She took us to the coast and it was my first time seeing the Pacific Ocean! It reminds me a lot of the Wisconsin coast but with much bigger waves. Everyone had their dogs out there and it made me miss my dog a lot. After that Susan took us out to an Irish pub for lunch called Gallagher's. I thought about going completely Irish and getting fish and chips with a black and tan but got a portabella burger and an Irish Kiss instead. It was delicious.

Eureka is known for it's Victorian houses and this in the biggest one there. It has a black-tie only type restaurant and bar inside that I can't remember the name of...Incabar, Ingamar...something like that. It is the biggest house in Eureka. Mom would have loved to see the houses.

After we got back from going out to the coast and lunch, Tyson and I went to the zoo. They had this random house thing there that was a memorial to someone that I obviously don't know but I found it really neat so I took a picture. There is another memorial inside to a chimp named Bill that lived to be 61 years old (about 20 years longer than a normal chimp's life) at the zoo. Apparently he flung poop at people. I thought my brothers would have liked to see that happen.


That's all that I have pictures for right now...I'll try to update this every few days so that there are more detail to my posts. I'll take pictures of Redding and the new digs tomorrow to show tomorrow!

Much love :)