prep for nye

 Wednesday was another snow day - at least 15 cm of fluffy white snow fell overnight and into the day, enough for Carm to get the snowblower out. And now the snow is melting at a ferocious rate with temps above zero and expected to stay there for several days. It’s turning into one of those horrible winters with too much snow followed by a condition wrecking melt :-(

Yesterday we took advantage of good roads to pick up dog food and visit liquidation. The sun was shining and the roads were starting to dry out. Crazy! Liquidation had Christmas lights on sale half price but the starting price was double what it should have been - they stayed on the shelf. I did buy a huge fake fur pillow to cuddle up with which I needed as much as a hole in the head!

In between our drive to Winchester and Adia & Lupa’s nail appointment, I managed to prep a bunch of dips & spreads, as well as caramelise two batches of onions. I did screw up one of the spreads, forgetting that I wanted it thick so I added a touch too much cream to thin it out - dooh! Today has been another marathon day of cooking: walnut bread, stuff cut up and marinating for skewers, and a melted pepper dish that comes from a book I read ages ago called ‘Under the Tuscan Sun’ (I burned it a bit). It seems like we’ve gone for an Italian theme this year!

I did head out yesterday on my snowshoes for the shortest time possible… of course all my paths had to be remade but I didn’t have the energy to do more than one leg. The snow was heavy making progress slow and exhausting. 

When I made my last post I forgot to mention that Pat came for supper Christmas night - we had a prime rib with all the fixings. My meat thermometer stopped working (what the actual hell!) and I forgot to turn the oven down from 550 to 350 for about half an hour, so it was a real cr– shoot. Luckily, with help from a stick in instant read thermometer the beast came out pretty good :-) Small mercies :-)

Awesome!

“walnut bread out of the oven”

“driving in the sun”

the aftermath

We are firmly in the other-worldly time between Christmas and New Years. The bustle of Christmas is over and now it’s time to think of what I’ll serve New Years Eve… every year it’s the same conundrum: sit down meal or nibbles all night. 

Yesterday our family got together - all 16 of us gathered in Mom and Dad’s house - a wonderful sort of chaos! We had a traditional Norwegian Christmas Eve supper, just a few days late so that everyone could be there. The weather Gods gave us a special blessing - clear roads for travelling. (fyi - the cardamom buns were a big hit)

Today in the spirit of Christmas time, we cleaned the oven! Carm did the bulk of the heavy work while I flung gross paper towels into the trashcan (no reusable ones today). It was a quiet day, I have no excuses but I was lazy as all heck today - no snowshoeing - the thought of having to remake my trails was more than I could bear. I was even too lazy to watch a movie.

I’ll backtrack to Christmas morning: Carm got bundled up for the gargantuan task of clearing the laneway… well… the snow drifts were high along the laneway, some areas were too high for the snowblower, but worst of all was the horror story between the gate and the road! The snow on the other side of the gate was well over 3 feet high and it filled the 15+ feet between gate and road. Impossible for the snowblower. Impossible for a 68 year old man and an out of shape 60 year old woman to shovel out. The snow was hard packed from over 40 hours of high winds. Bricks of snow perfect for an igloo were carved out in an attempt to free our home.

Carm got the gate cleared so that it would (barely) open in and as luck would have it a guy driving by in a big tractor with snow blade and blower took pity on us! It was a hard 45 minutes for him to free us but gosh, we were happy to hand over a stack of bills! Even so, Carm was out for at least an hour and a half. I did a half-hearted shovel of the back deck - just a path from the door to the gate.

Awesome!

“family”

“John ‘Snow’”

Christmas Eve 2022

 Holy shit! It’s a horror outside this morning! Carm forgot to get milk yesterday so thought to drive to the store 7km away… well, he got out of the garage okay, turned the car around and headed down the laneway. As he emerged from the shelter of the house it was a white out so he didn’t see the 3 foot high, packed snow drift. The car - a Subaru - was stuck. He had to snowblow and shovel around and under the car to get it back inside the garage. We won’t be sticking our heads out longer than it takes to potty the dogs! And thank goodness for powdered milk!

Luckily, and touch wood, the power has not been glitching, but with the winds gusting to 70km I wouldn’t be surprised if the power went out at some point today.

Meanwhile… I’m making a giant batch of Cardamom buns! Half of the dough has been formed into buns and stuck into the freezer for baking in a few days; the other half is doing its first rise. I’ll form it into buns then bake them (if we still have power).

The wind is roaring and has been all night. It’s a small mercy that we didn’t get 20cm of snow on top of this mess. Still, there will be snowblowing and shovelling - pretty sure the snow blower won’t make it through the drifts…

6pm - it's still blowing a gale and the drift across the laneway has grown into an insurmountable mountain of packed snow. Carm is going to have a real challenge tomorrow with the snowblower! I’ll be out there with the shovel to help.

The buns turned out okay although the rising took ages longer than normal. I either scalded the yeast, or the liquids were too cool, or my yeast is ancient. 

We’ve had our semi-traditional Christmas Eve fare: tourtiere leftover from our Solstice supper along with lefse, gjytost a Norwegian goats milk cheese, and jarlsberg cheese. We had a few more things to dress our lefse with but were both too lazy to bust out the new packages! I had the table set but we curled up on the sofa and ate with our plates on our laps. 

Merry Christmas to all!

Awesome!

“snug as a bug in a rug again!”

“electricity”

“the awesome power of Nature”

wild winter weather

Mother Nature is in a fury today, lashing out at the trees with a ferocious wind and clouds heavy with precipitation low in the sky. It’s above zero so the snow and ice from last night has melted off most of the trees, my snowshoe trail is in ruins… perhaps tonight’s snow will restore the winter wonderland…

We are ready for tonight’s flash freeze - nowhere to go and food in the pantry means we won’t have to brave icy roads. Carm cleared the end of the laneway with the snowblower which apparently was a slush storm!

later in the afternoon…

The rain has changed to snow and the wind is starting to pick up again. I’ve done some wrapping and unearthed my recipe for Norwegian Cardamom buns - it was the third last piece of paper in my recipe bookcase. It’s probably been 15 years since I last made them and if I recall correctly, they were Graham’s favourite so I might make them tomorrow to bring for Christmas. Meanwhile… I’m spending a blizzard afternoon streaming Hallmark Christmas movies :-)

Yesterday we dusted up the kitchen with tons of flour to make 2 batches of lefse. I didn’t use the tortilla press, instead I rolled and rolled the tender dough into thin, ragged looking sheets of Scandinavian goodness. Carm did the cooking while I struggled with rolling out the dough into 80, yes, eighty, circles of potato and flour. (Grace MAY have picked up a few more swear words…). 

8:30 pm - Tonight the wind is still howling but we are toasty with a crackling fire. The bad weather meant we had to have a virtual birthday party for Shawn but since the pandemic we’ve gotten good at visiting digitally! Unfortunately, none of us have the technology to render our singing voices into the sounds of angels… we sang the worst versions of ‘happy birthday’ ever (3 times!).

Awesome!

“snug as a bug in a rug”

the final dust up

 The final dance with sugar ended this afternoon: gingerbread has been embellished with gummy candies, ready for Santa’s enjoyment, and after letting the icing set for a while, I packaged up boxes of cookies for distribution ;-) The stash of cookies disappears quickly when there are 17 people that you are making cookies for!

I forgot to take photos of the Chinese Chews and the orange cranberry cookies.

Awesome!

“a final dustup with sugar”

“bright sun on a wintery day”

seven of seven

 With the aroma of cardamom, sugar, and butter in the air the last of the seven kinds of cookies are baked. The gingerbread still needs to be decorated but that will be for tomorrow. Today Christmas wandered upstairs in the form of an already decorated Christmas tree and a myriad of smaller trees decked out with fairy lights :-) I didn’t even open 2 of the decoration bins but I feel that the lily has been gilded and that there’s enough decor to collect dust.

I couldn’t convince Carm to iron the tablecloth so it looks like heck but I guess I couldn’t be bothered to do it myself either!

We also got cracking this afternoon and put some white fairy lights around the railing on the back deck. They are there to stay year round, at least until they break. It’s pretty on the dark snowy nights and will also draw out the long summer evenings.

I’ve been out on the snowshoes the last 3 days! Lots and lots (and lots) of snow means lots of work to get through the unbroken drifts. I’ve managed to pack down a few short loops in the field but gosh, it’s hard breaking a new trail. Especially with Lupa trying to stay on the back of my snowshoes :-/ It was glorious! 

We think we can make out where the beaver may have built its lodge…

Sunday night we joined Trudie, Leo, and Leo’s cousin Gio, for a wintery supper. It was one of those nights when gathering by a fire was the perfect way to spend an evening. As a bonus, Carm was able to get Trudie’s tablet working again :-)

The dogs have been enjoying the snow - I can’t figure out what’s so great about it, especially for Lupa who is close to the ground - she has to struggle to break a new path. And she gets covered in little snowballs that must be freezing. But she carries on with glee.

Awesome!

“the smell of Swedish Cardamom cookies baking”

“little twinkle lights everywhere”

“Christmas music”

“a freezer full of cookies!”

“the snow is a perfect texture”

is that your beaver

 The first real snowstorm this winter has been piling snow everywhere, most distressingly on the branches of the trees. We were out first thing this morning shaking off what we could, but there is so much that we can’t reach. I won’t be surprised if we have broken branches when it’s all over…

Lupa has been ringing the bell to go outside all day - I suspect she doesn’t have business to do but finds the snow a fun place to play! She’s a little shrimp in the heavy snow but she’s not deterred :-)  

The snow is sticky enough for a snowman!

Our electricity was glitching all day so I rearranged my cookie making schedule to avoid having to bake anything if the power went out, so I mixed up 2 doughs that could sit in the fridge:  Orange Cranberry and Gingerbread, baking only the OC cookies. I’d forgotten how badly frozen cranberries worked out so instead of neat little cookies, they are a mess, but oh so tasty! 

Tomorrow, once the gingerbread men have danced into and out of the oven there will be 4 of the 7 kinds of cookies made…

There’s a BEAVER living in the pond!!!!!!

I had in my mind that today would be a good day to watch Christmas movies all day but somehow the day passed in a blur!

Yesterday Jo Ellen and Don came over for a traditional Italian lunch - ragu with tomatoes from the garden, riblets, and homemade meatballs. I meant to bring out the lemoncello but forgot :-(

Awesome!

“visiting with friends”

“winter wonderland”

“dogs jumping through the deep snow”

i spy with my little eye

 The sun is shining and some flour, butter, and sugar has been tossed around the kitchen for the first batch of cookies: Norwegian Serinakaker. They aren’t our favourite ones, (although I like them a lot), but they do make a big batch which will start to fill a few cookie tins. It’s a fun cookie to make as everything needs to be done by hand, very tactile :-) The dough has to sit in the fridge overnight so we won’t get to sample until tomorrow.

Maybe I will make 7 kinds after all ;-)

Or maybe just 6 kinds and a batch of Norwegian Cardamom buns!

I’ve gotten on the treadmill a few times in the last week - only for 10 minutes at first - instead of duration I’m going for intensity using the incline to give my muscles a workout quickly. I felt pretty good this morning so did 16 minutes - enough to feel the burn and get a good sweat up. It might not seem like much of an effort but defeating the inertia of getting off the sofa is a hurdle!

I’m almost afraid to jinx myself, but my anxiety seems to have gone away except for tiny twinges that are easily overlooked. I don’t know if quitting the lithium had anything to do with it, or maybe my system was reset by 10 days in the sun… either way I’ll take it! I haven’t started taking CBD again yet - it seems prudent to roll with the flow for now!

Sunspots abound with the sun so low in the sky… the dogs are stretched out in one and soon (it’s 2pm now), it will bathe my spot on the sofa in blazing light. Ah! The joys of a sunny winter day! 

We got our new glasses yesterday. Buying them online seems like a crap shoot, but I’ve only had trouble with one pair - weirdly I think they are the pair that I unearthed from my giant stash of glasses a few weeks ago and they are now perfect.  

Last week I saw a recipe for a lemon, ginger, and honey mixture for tea and since I love a nice cup of tea, not to mention honey and lemon, I gave it a shot. It’s just basically diced lemon, fresh ginger, all covered with honey. I didn’t use as much ginger as was called for but I like it as it is. It keeps in the fridge for over a month, but it surely won’t last that long as it’s lovely to spoon into my afternoon tea :-)

Awesome!

“butter and flour between my fingers”

“bright sun and white snow”

“dogs having fun outside”

“feeling great on the treadmill!”

memories

 Icy wind howled around me as I made my way to Spike’s grave - It’s one year ago today that we took him on his final car ride. The overwhelming grief is a faded memory but still a few tears pricked my eyes. Last night I was remembering him in his final days and for perhaps the first time felt a certainty that we had done the right thing by easing his passing… he was too young though… he should have lived into his late teens but his brain got the better of him. Dementia and then either a stroke or brain tumour aged him beyond his 13 and three quarters years.

I’ll never forget you dearest friend.

As I’m writing this, with tears streaming down my face (thank goodness the tissue box is handy), I can’t help but be comforted by the little grey whirlwind that is curled up against my legs. It was a rough start with her and it took me so long to love her but she has won a place in my heart next to Spike. She’s not like him in any way but maybe that’s for the best - she has her own things that she’s good at.

Snow has started to swirl down, the small flakes flung about by the gusting wind - a good day to curl up with a book or perhaps do some baking. I did bundle up in my parka for a walk around the field with the dogs - they enjoyed their time outside but it didn’t take much to convince them that coming inside was a good thing!

Pat came over for a ‘catch up’ supper - we got to hear how bad Lupa was and how many heart attacks she nearly caused… bad bad girl!

Awesome!

“burger from A&W when I didn’t feel like cooking”

“standing outside while the wind whipped at my cheeks”

technology ugh

 The phone was gripped in my hand as I raged against the newest system update… bluetooth wasn’t working and I wanted music NOW. The urge to hurl it to the floor in frustration was strong but somehow good sense won out. After rebooting twice, switching bluetooth on and off countless times to try to find the devices, I passed it to Carm. Somehow - and I really don’t understand how, maybe I had already gotten it to the point of almost working but he did remove all of the old entries - my speaker was discovered and paired. I raged some more and then got into a hot tub with some of my favourite songs to ease my anger.

Today I was able to pair everything else with no problem. The update did screw up some of my widgets, including the one that counted the days since the first isolation of the pandemic started. We are inching up on 1000 days since that scary time.

I hope the update fixes the irritating problem of initiating mobile data which previously required a series of steps that sometimes got around the issue of mobile data not working and sometimes didn’t… I’d test it now (first thing Friday morning) but I don’t want to start my day on a bad note.

Yesterday wasn’t all bad, in fact the start of the day was quite lovely with bright sunshine and a trip to the ‘middle town’ to meet Kirsten for a quick shawarma lunch :-) The excuse was a shopping excursion to Bulk Barn for some fennel seeds (I use them when I make rice), and a few kinds of candies to adorn gingerbread men - assuming that I shelve my diet for a few weeks of cookie madness! I’m down 15 pounds in almost a year - it’s slow going as I’m not making drastic changes but I’ve been on a roll lately!

Wednesday we braved the rain for a trip into Costco, stopping first at the business centre. It’s a wonderland of giant products, most too big for a normal sized fridge. We did find some treasures :-)  From there we went to Home Depot to look at countertops. We didn’t see anything that we both loved… The last things on our list were gleaned from the regular Costco and then we were on our way home. Almost four hours later Lupa was hysterically leaping and barking in excitement at our return. I wondered if she thought we’d gone away for ages again!

There are still no Christmas things deployed but I did switch over pillows and blankets for winter colours… burgundy features heavily in the living room now. I wanted to bring up the shabby Asian carpet but with Lupa still chewing things I figured we’d just get frustrated. Maybe next year.

Trudie, Leo, and Marie joined us for supper tonight, our first company since our trip. Lupa won over Marie with her cuddly ways :-)

Three weeks ago today we left on our adventure in the Caribbean… it seems like a year ago!

Awesome!

“bright sunshine”

“a huge flock of snow geese glinting in the sun”

skunked

 Our house smells like a quiet country road with one too many dead skunks… Last night at bedtime Carm stuck his head into the house: “Adia’s been Skunked!” I jumped out of bed as fast as I do when one of the dogs is horking and grabbed 2 bottles of Skunk Kleen from the laundry room cupboard. We haven’t had to use it for a few years, but we always keep some on hand…

It’s great stuff and doesn’t require late night baths, it just needs to be poured on and rubbed in. Not all the smell is gone but it’s bearable, just. 

Carm’s got the cold now. I guess he should test for Covid but it doesn’t really matter as we are laying low anyway and he always wears a mask when he’s out of the house. It seems funny to put on a mask after 10 days of living as if Covid wasn’t a thing - we rarely wore masks on our trip - but now we are back to full on mask wearing!

The sun was out for part of the day today but it wasn’t motivating enough to get any Christmas decorations up. Maybe in a few days. I’m not feeling anti-Christmas, just not festive yet. Some snow on the ground would probably get me going. As it is, I’m still dragging myself around a bit - another few days and I’ll be back to normal, whatever that is.

Carm brought home a couple of pork sirloin roasts so I made up a dry rub for them and got them into the fridge - I’ll stick them into the freezer tomorrow. I cooked one a while back and it was excellent as it had sat with the rub for a few days.  The rub has garlic, rosemary, thyme, sage, parsley, as well as kosher salt and baking powder. They’ll be tucked away for company. Sunday dinner some time in the future when we are both healthy enough for guests :-)

Tonight we had sauteed bok choy with chicken & rice noodles. Drunken noodles with more greens. We both agreed that it was as tasty as anything we’d eaten on the cruise. I’m slowly getting back in the groove in the kitchen!

We were at sea one week ago.

Awesome!

“starting another book by Graham Norton”

“music belting out of my little speaker”

“Michael Buble Christmas songs”

“poinsettia from Trudie”

“the dogs energy matching my own”

getting back into the groove

 As I walked down the laneway late afternoon on Thursday, a half moon hung overhead - not a crescent but still the same moon that we saw in the Caribbean Sea just off the coast of Bonaire. I was transported for a moment to that magical time on the Chinese Junk and also, for a second, to summer days long ago when I was young and carefree. The cold wind seemed to die down, leaving the gentle caress of a warm humid breeze. Oh, it didn’t last, but the memory wrapped itself around me, warming me from the inside out.

Now I’m old(er) and perhaps more carefree but my life isn’t stretching out before me in that infinite way that it does when you are young. I appreciate these moments more than I did then and perhaps live them with more awareness. I don’t usually wish to be young again, but that time in Bonaire made me yearn for a return, if just for a while.

I’ve been pretty lazy since we got home, barely getting off the couch except to go for a nap! Oh, I exaggerate a bit - we did go to the pet store to get a new kind of food for the dogs - we can’t get their current kibble which is a shame as they’ve been doing well. We are trying Acana Classic Red as it’s easier to get.

Lupa got a new harness while we were there… she’s not crazy about getting into her strappy black one for car rides, hopefully she’ll like this one better. She’s a bit like Spike in her aversion for anything tight around her! She was pretty good in the store, surprisingly good actually, until a dog came in. We need to get back to practising I guess.

Cooking has been more miss than hit… on our first night at home I made pasta with tomato sauce in the instant pot but overcooked the pasta so it was a gooey mess. Not up to the standards of the Princess kitchen! Thursday night we had rice cooked with mushrooms and sausage - an easy comfort food cook. Last night was also a cheat dinner - chicken swiss with rice & canned green beans! 

Somehow I have to get the motivation and energy to put something nice on the table! Tonight I tried for an mushroom onion soup in homemade chicken broth with lentils and carrots for good measure. It was more time in the kitchen than I’ve spent in weeks! Carm gave it a ⅘ so I’ll make a few notes:

1 chicken leg w back w water, rosemary, salt in IP for 30 min; strip chicken from bones, set aside broth w chicken; saute 3 slices bacon then add 2 chopped onions; once soft add celery, carrots, mushrooms, garlic; saute for another few minutes; add broth, chicken and ½ cup dry lentils; close pot & cook for 12 minutes HP; 10 minute NR; release rest of pressure, add some cream & marsala; reduce for a few minutes. Serve!

I do need a stair climber blocking the way into the kitchen though… flights and flights of stairs between me and food…

The second load of laundry was hung to dry today. One more to go. We have to space the loads as almost everything hangs to dry and we have limited space on the rack. No rush though… almost everything goes into the suitcase for our next trip… who knows when…

Awesome!

“cuddling up for naps in my own bed”

“steaming bowl of soup on a windy night”