zippy.

Wow. I made my favorite veggie chili again, and decided to put in a little extra chipotle pepper(in adobo sauce) since I couldn't really taste it last time. The recipe calls for 1 and 1/2 teaspoons to 1 tablespoon finely chopped pepper, but I make only a half pot (since a whole pot's huge), so I only used one chili pepper. I'd guess it was about 2 teaspoons. This time I wanted to get more of the smoky flavor, (plus I had an open can in the fridge that was moving towards the trash- does anyone know how long they last once opened anyway?) so I used three peppers. About 6 teaspoons/2 tablespoons. Boy oh boy did I get some smoky flavor. I think the big difference was that I definitely got in more of the adobo sauce this time, while last time I had mostly pepper. My nose was running and my lips were stinging. The good news is that my tolerance for spice has been cranked up over the past few years, so while it might be too spicy for some people (cough..mom..cough), it's a-ok for me.

to.do.list

I made a big dent in my christmas shopping list today. I picked up gifts for eight people. This is good since there's less than three weeks left until the big day. I really only have five people left to get gifts for, and of those five, I only need an idea for two. I have one other group of little gifts to get together, but that's pretty straigtforward, so I'm not really counting them as items on my to do list. I'm sure I'll count them as gifts once I get them, but for now, I'm more focused on the "real" presents. graiongatninja

old.friend

So this is weird. Since my high school reunion, I've been spending more time on myspace since I can keep up with people I don't see often. (I thought it was kind of silly to have just people I actually see on it, so I never logged on.) I started doing name searches and just entering in names from my past, and I found a friend I've literally not seen in 18 years. We were best friends before my family moved, and then fell out of touch (espeically since she was 7, her sister was 8, and I was 9). The crazy thing is that she looks exactly the same, just grown up. Weird.

musical.chairs

I mean bottles. My mom forwarded me this clip. I thought it was cool enough to stick in here:)

*For some reason, I couldn't embed the video directly into this post. I think blogger's acting up again.

cookie.castles

Holy hell. I just spent two hours with the girls and one of their friends, and it felt like ten hours. We made gingerbread houses. *a* got some premade pieces that I put together and then let the kids go to town on. It sounds pretty straight forward, but was far from it. These are the steps involved:

1. Heat up sugar to make syrup.
2. Use the syrup to attach the pieces of gingerbread. Careful! Hot sugar will burn you!
3. Hold the pieces together until the sugar solidifies. Then pull all the stringy pieces off and put them back in the pot.
4. By now, forty-five minutes have passed and all four houses should be put together. Spend a few minutes running your burnt fingers under cold water.
5. Have kids open all the candy and dump into bowls while you melt butter and cream on the stove. Add some confectionery sugar and vanilla, beat with the mixer, and you have some darn good frosting.
6. Spread frosting over one roof section of each house. In thirty seconds, half the candy's gone, and they're all asking for more frosting.
7. Frost the other side of the roof and the chimney. *e* pushes too hard on the roof, and one of the short walls breaks. Fix it with frosting, and tell her to be gentle.
8. Make some more frosting so they can decorate the walls too. See *e* cramming candy in her mouth when she thinks you're not looking.
9. Add some frosting to *m's* roof to keep some gumdrops from falling off.
10. *e* crushes her entire house. It's reduced to a pile of gingerbread rubble. Surprisingly, she's not upset. Apparently the fact that she can still eat it outweighs any dissapointment at the disaster.
11. Put the finished creations on the counter and have the kids clean up the table and the leftover candy. (All two pieces of it.)
12. Send the kids off and start to clean up the disaster of a kitchen.

There you have it. You too can be the proud owner of some fancy schmancy gingerbread houses. It reminded me of when we used to make one for christmas every year. My dad would make the dough from scratch and cut out the pieces. He'd put it together, and my siblings and I would fancy that thing up with a necco wafer roof, m+m windows and a menage of trees, steps, etc. It was a beauty. People would nibble on the gingerbread, but mainly eat the candy off of it. We stopped making this several years ago, and it was sad. Very sad.

stinging.mouth

I have some freaky food allergies. I don't get super sick or have my throat close up or anything, I just get a strong stinging sensation on the roof of my mouth. I generally know what will set it off; walnuts, raw broccoli, cooked spinach, banana strings (I have to get every little stringy thing off before I eat them), cauliflower. The list goes on. Something I ate tonight drove my mouth crazy. It's stinging pretty badly even now, hours after dinner, after I brushed, flossed and rinsed with act. I can't figure out what it was. We had a bunch of random stuff; smoked pork, roasted potatoes, schnitzel, schpaetzel, sauteed green beans and some super special tres leche cake. (There was a ton of uncooked pork leftover from the party yesterday, so *p* cooked up some different meals. Plus, a guest brought the cake and we conveniently forgot to put it out.) It's perplexing. I've had everything before and don't remember having issues with anything. Maybe it's the combination that bothers me.

london.

My london friend *ab* just called to say that they're coming back to the states for christmas and new years. This is exciting since he thought that he might not get the time off work to come back. I'm excited. I miss them a lot, so it will be good to catch up. I'm also excited to go back to london in march to see them. I told *ab* the dates I'd be there, and he pointed out that I'll arrive early on st. patrick's day. They're getting a babysitter so we can go out. It should be fun.

christmas.list

Santa was at our house today. He stopped by to see the 30+ kids who were waiting with bated breath. This one was a real professional as opposed to the friends who've filled in the past two years. The kids each got a present and told santa what they'd like for christmas. *e* told him she wanted tic tacs (the holiday ones with three packs; red, white and green) and marbles. I'm happy that she has a reasonable list. Sometimes they go overboard and end up with a multiple page list with ridiculously expensive items. Maybe at four, she's already realized that if you come up with a smaller and more realistic list, you're more likely to get what you ask for. Speaking of which- I have to get my list going.

december.one

Happy december! Only 24 days until christmas which means I better get my butt in gear. I'm actually doing pretty well. I have about half the gifts I need, and have ideas for most of the other people. This is a real step up from last year which is good. No last minute stress outs for me!

old.tv

I just watched family feud. I don't watch this on a regular basis, but I do enjoy it every so often. My brand spanking new tivo recorded an episode in the "recommended" category, so I thought I'd zip through it before survivor came on. This was no new episode of family feud. It was on the game show network, and was, I found out, from 1988. Not only were the people funny looking, but the questions were a riot. Who'd have thought that television could be so entertaining?