Merry Christmas Eve

Merry Christmas Eve!

Joe, Olivia and I made the long ride down to Bridgeport Connecticut on Saturday when he got out of work. It took a tad over three hours to get here. Thankfully, I had a few drinks at the restaurant before we left which made the trip long haul a bit more tolerable.

Since we have been down here we have been relaxing and Joe has been doing some last minute shopping. We (  the three of us, Joe's parents who flew up from Florida, and his grandparents) decided to go out to dinner last night.

I searched Google and discovered Bin 100 in Milford, CT. They had a great pre-fixed menu-- which four of us order from. Four courses for $32-- you cant beat that!  And to top it all off they have everyone a complimentary after dinner drink when they dropped the check off. Lucky for me Joe and his mom don't drink so I had THREE  :-) If you ever check out the restaurant ask for Paulo, he was great!

  Alcohol always makes the holidays better... especially when you are with inlaws family... .  Agreed?

The Sweet Sound of Nothing

This is perfect... the Christmas lights are on. THATS IT! It is so relaxing sitting here with the candles in the windows and the twinkle lights on the tree reflecting on the gifts. No noise!!!!! Olivia is sucking on her thumb fast asleep in her room and Joe is out Christmas shopping. I could be starting dinner right now but, why interupt the peace?

Back From R.I.

After a relaxing weekend in Rhode Island we are back at home.

Sunday, the three of us went for a walk through my dad's neighborhood . Then later in the afternoon my stepbrother and his family came over. We celebrated Christmas early with a nice lunch, Christmas music and some gift opening. Olivia had a great time hanging out with her cousins and the dog Patience.  

Olivia, Jordan, Duncan,Devin, and Liam

Olivia as a Reindeer

My cheesecake that I made must have been good wonderful because there was only one piece left this morning.

Yesterday, we did some shopping  and grabbed some lunch at  the Cuban Revolution. It was so nice to have lunch at a restaurant that has both character and good food.  Places like that are hard very hard to find up here in N.H. I really miss the restaurants in Rhode Island  so Joe and I try to make an effort to go out to eat every time we are down visiting.

Hopefully we can make a trip down to use another dining card that was given to us from The Tiny Hummingbird. Thanks Tara!

Chocolate Is Always a Good Thing

After Joe gets out of work tomorrow we are loading up the Subaru and taking the two hour drive down to my Dad's house in R.I. We are going to be having an early x-mas because the three of us will be in C.T. for Christmas.

We are going to be having a Feast of 7 Fish or something like that on Sunday. My stepmom is Italian and I guess they do fish for Christmas. Since my cooking is sub-par I decided to contribute by making dessert. I can't ruin that mess that up too bad.... Right? So I set out to find a chessecake that doesnt have a typical crust. Joe can't stand crust on any dessert so thankfully I found a recipe that uses Oreos as a crust :-) 

I used Oreos, Bakers Chocolate and three boxes of  Philidelphia Cream Cheese.  I took pictures to prove that I did it but, for some odd reason my pictures won't upload. 


So here is a picture of Olivia while I was baking. She is such a great helper!

 

Hopefully, this dessert is edible on Sunday... or my family is nice enough to nibble on it if it's terrible. I guess I won't know until Sunday.

 

I guess I should go vacuum up the glitter from the carpet so it looks like I was  productive somewhat productive while he has been working a double today.

 

Happy Weekend!

The Smell of Bananas

Today, Joe stumbled upon an interesting smell in our kitchen basket. This basket I speak of keeps our bread and fruit organized on our counter. He found a bunch of spoiled spotted bananas and claimed they were stinky. I didn't believe him. I personally feel that they are ONLY spotted . He must have been sneakily trying to get me to make Banana Bread which is his favorite.

So the nice lady I am decided to pick up on the hint and make homemade Banana Bread. This was the first time I have attempted to make any sort of bread that DIDN'T come from a box. I always figured that bread making was a complicated processes since they sell so many easy options to grab at the grocery store. To my surprise it is extremly  miraculously simple! I used the recipe I found from the foodnetwork online 

 MUCH, MUCH, MUCH cheaper than purchasing the boxed make it your self version. And I must say... my condo smells FAB!

I feel super productive today. Made banana bread, addressed Christmas cards and dropped them in the mail box and cleaned up the kitchen. Now I am watching Eloise at Christmas while Olivia kicks around on her .playmat.

I'm thinking of going above and beyond by making porkchops in the oven for when he gets in from work.... Any good recipes besides shake and bake?