Weekend Things

This morning I had a cavity filled and last night I broke the glass container I brew kombucha in and all 14 cups of liquid leaked out in my kitchen.  These sound like bad things, but really, the rest of the weekend was a good one and if you already had to pull everything out of the drawer and cabinet plus move the fridge and mop the floor three times then things can only go up from here.

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Saw our very last Best Picture nominee on Friday night and look, Darkest Hour is very interesting from a historical standpoint and I guess Gary Oldman was good?  But I actually have no idea what Winston Churchill was like so who knows if his performance was uncanny or not.  I guess I was getting too many Fat Bastard vibes from both the makeup and the personal hygiene to really enjoy the film.  Also, there were so many underground scenes that had me craving sunlight afterwards.  The train scene was a pure delight though ♥

How strange that there happened to be two movies about Dunkirk this year!

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Saturday morning, Joey felt like making eggs, hash browns and toast, so since I was on my own, I made Joy the Baker’s “Single Lady Pancake” and look, I’m never not making ONE GIANT PANCAKE ever again!  Okay, not really but this big fluffy pancake was very fun to eat.  Afterwards, we drove up to Windsor to watch my nephew’s basketball game and it wasn’t until I saw him standing next to other kids his age that I realized how tall he is!  Joey caught a video of him making a basket!  Also got to soak up some time with my niece and sister-in-law.  Gennaro’s team won 29-4!

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We spent the rest of the day with Lori and Adam, seeing the Oscar Nominated Shorts.  The animated shorts were up first and I thought they were sort of lackluster this year.  I really enjoyed the animation and bittersweet tone of “Negative Space” and “Revolting Rhymes,” which is based on a Roald Dahl book and weaves a bunch of fairy tales together, was creative and such fun to watch but overall, we weren’t blown away.  Also, a group of young guys behind me talked through THE ENTIRE THING.  Ugh!

The live action shorts were SO INTENSE.  They usually are but this year’s nominees seemed heavier than usual.  We went from school shooting to the story of a deaf child to the night of Emmett Till’s abduction when they threw a funny one in and I’ve never been so ready for a laugh.  I think my very favorite was “The Silent Child” though honestly, they were all very powerful and well done.  Afterwards, we put our hearts back together with pasta at Dio Mio.  It was a busy Saturday night but we were able to grab a table fairly quickly and my cocktail and rotolo were so so good.  I truly love that place!

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Aside from the giant mess I made, Sunday included breakfast at Stowaway (I heard the guy at the table next to us say he hadn’t been in in a while and his significant other snapped “it’s only been two weeks!” but hey, that sounds like “a while” to me too :P), grocery shopping, salad prepping, cookie baking and dinner making.  Oh and it was absolutely lovely outside (except for the wind…) so we went for a run and how is it possible that it was my first outdoor run of the year?!

I guess it’s a good thing that quiche took so long to bake because it gave us time to clean up the kitchen.  Oy!  How was your weekend?

Weekend Things

I don’t even know how to start this post because there were so many good things this weekend.  Namely, visiting with Hannah and Josh and Mason, — who is starting to support his own head already?! — making pasta for the first time ever (!!!!) and lots of family time on Sunday.  I mean I also burnt my mouth on coffee, yucca fries and a bite of farro but shhh, let’s not talk about those things.

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I love this little baby!!!  Oh sorry, that’s probably too much yelling for a Monday morning but seriously, he’s the cutest and the best and watching him throw his little baby arms in the air, mid-nap was heart-melting.  I feel I could just gaze at him forever.  Bonus: we got to eat some delicious pizza and exchange Christmas presents with Hannah and Josh.  What time should we come over this Friday, guys? 🙂

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Some Saturday morning scenes.  Including a Greek yogurt, tahini, date, granola toast pre-eye exam and grabbing a latte from a new coffee shop with the prettiest details post-eye exam.  Guys, I’m pretty sure my eye doctor is semi-insane.  I found it half entertaining and half annoying so I’ll have to weigh the pros and cons of laughing really hard but also having to wait 15 minutes to see her and another 30 minutes for her to get through the exam.

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We took on a double grocery store trip afterwards and I’m pretty sure Joey was suffering from caffeine poisoning and didn’t even know where we were or what day it was.  He’s lucky I was in a good mood 🙂  But let’s skip over afternoon activities of lunch, reading and going to the gym to hit the most important event of the day… HOMEMADE PASTA!  Lori got us pasta attachments for Christmas and I had been reading up on how to make it all week.  Suffice it to say I was a bit excited.

We used this really detailed guide — there’s a shortened recipe at the end — and mixed the dough, then Joey kneaded it for A LONG TIME because it was sort of stiff but we got it all sorted out and the actual pasta rolling process was so dang fun!  I had to give myself a pep talk beforehand that went something like “if this turns into a giant disaster and we end up throwing it all in the trash, IT’S OKAY.”  But then it wasn’t a disaster.  And it was fun.  And we ended up with some wonderful pappardelle that we loaded with beef ragu, ricotta and parm for dinner.  I’ve never been so happy!  Also, please know we were listening to the “Italian Cooking Music” playlist on Spotify and “Mambo Italiano” was playing at the time of those pictures.

P.S. We started The Handmaid’s Tale that night and there will be more on that once we finish.

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Sunday started with breakfast at my parents’.  My mom knocked it out of the park with the food — Mom, Joey and I decided that was the best your French toast casserole has ever tasted! — and I drank coffee out of that hilarious mug, then my mom, Dad, Joey and I drove up to my brother and Nikki’s to give them their Christmas presents.  Joey was out throwing the football with Gennaro and I was inside making/putting up Valentine’s Day decorations with Belle and then when the boys came in to play Madden, Belle, Nikki and I did some crafting with this jewelry kit.  Apparently, Joey and I are the kind of psycho non-parents who think it’s a good idea to give a child something with that many beads.

We dropped my parents’ off back home around 3 PM then grabbed linner at Vital Root and finally headed home ourselves to do those adult duties of laundry and making lunch for the week.  Not going to lie, after getting our salads made, I mostly lazed about on the couch for the rest of the night.  Feels necessary to do that sometimes.

How was your weekend?