Happy New Year

We celebrated New Year's east coast style, and we were home by 9, which was perfect. We got some excellent pizza from a new pizza place in town, Dove Vivi, and brought it over to Kama & Joes. After dinner, Craig and Joe were demonstrating (according to Kama) why Joe doesn't need speakers that big in the basement, while Chloe, Max and Ella had some fun with playdoh.

Fun in the snow

Hanukkah

I decided to make Hanukkah dinner this year. We finally bought a Menorah and decided since Chloe was getting older, we wanted to start some traditions around the holidays for her. So I planned a delicious meal of:
Appetizer:
White bean spread with walnuts
Main menu:
Brisket
Brussel Sprout and Cauliflower Gratin
Spinach Salad
Dessert:
Black Bottom Cupcakes
We had originally planned to have our friends Liza and Mark, and Liza's mom over, but due to the snow, they couldn't get out of their house and Liza's mom didn't end up flying in. Instead we invited our dear friends Mark and Carol, who own a large truck with studded tires and we knew they would be up for venturing out.

It was a lovely evening and my brisket turned out awesome. My Aunt Arlene had told me her secrets for preparing, and I cooked it in the slow cooker overnight, let it cool the next day so it was easy to slice, then reheated it while the Gratin cooked. Next year I'll find a different dessert. The black bottom cupcakes were not as good as the ones my mom used to make! The gratin was sinfully good, and we had leftovers for days. Chloe even liked the brisket.

Snow? In Portland?

The week before Christmas Portland got hit by a huge snowstorm. They kept predicting it, and I kept not believing it. But, once it started snowing it seemingly didn't stop for days. Everything was closed. Chains were required everywhere in Portland. And most roads remained unplowed entirely, until the snow melted. It created a really white Christmas, which was lovely. And also quite a few homebound days in a row, which was, well, not as lovely. Portland State was closed for the better part of 3 weeks, from the snow days to the holidays so I had a lot of time off. Craig was on snow shifts at Trimet, so he was working odd hours. All in all, though, it was fun.
Here is the start of the snow, on the day we decided to take our annual Christmas photos.


And many inches later:

A snow day

what to do? Daddy bought me a new Dora sticker book. Yeah!