DIY Family Wedding!

One of my amazingly beautiful step-sisters got married this weekend.  Meet newlyweds Josh and Kasey Day! Aren't they ridiculously cute?!

The past week has been filled with wedding prep, wedding crafting, wedding baking, and family gatherings. Goooood times!

My (step)family is scattered all over the U.S.  So times when we can all get together are pretty special.

My little man and his mustache sucker wedding favor.

Hudson has only seen his cousin, Nan, a few times but they're pretty tight : )

This pic of Andrea and Tye cracks me up every time I look at it. Crazy kids.

The beauuuutiful twins.

Fancy homemade strawberry champaign cupcakes!

My little family : )  24 weeks along with boy #3!

The wedding was filled with family-made details. This was my first attempt at a wedding cake topped by the hand-carved cake topper my step-brother-in-law made.

Instead of a traditional guest book I put together this tandem bike + fingerprint balloon poster per Kasey's request. Each guest left their print and initials. Such a cute idea!

And this is the art I made for the front of their wedding invitations-- inspired by one of my vintage floral pillowcases and Josh's love for chess.

My step-mom has quite an arm ; )  

Congrats to Josh and Kasey! We're soooo happy for you! Love you guys!

Arian

New York!

 Daniel and I just came back from a short trip to New York City! He had several meetings there so I tagged along!

 I never get tired of the view from an airplane. Amazing.

 Times Square!

 Being in NY felt a lot like our years living in Japan.  We got to shop at some of our favorite Japanese stores and eat some of our favorite Japanese food.

 Japan makes the cooooolest pens. That's one of the things I miss most-- Japanese stationery.

 And Japanese food! Mmmmm, curry : )

 And while Daniel spent the day in meetings (doesn't he look cute!)

 I spent the day venturing out into the city on my own. It's been a loooong time since I spent a whole day by myself. Must say, it was pretty sweet : )

 Central Park and a good cup of coffee. Yessss.

 And I got to meet up with long time friend (circa 5th grade) for lunch at an amazing vegetarian restaurant.  Oh man, New York has some of the best food! It's making me hungry just thinking about it.

The trip was short and sweet but much needed. I love New York!

Arian : )

Granola and "Milk"

 I've been having fun browsing through Ani Phyo's Raw Food recipe book my mother-in-law gave me. We drink plain almond milk here in our house so I though I'd try making our own nut milk. It's super easy! Just blend 5 cups water, 1/2 cup nuts (like cashews or almonds or brazil nuts), a pinch of sea salt, and a bit of sweetener (I used Stevia).  You can watch Ani make a vanilla-flavored one here with dates as a sweetener. I want to try that next! Sounds tasty!

 You can strain the mixture using a nut milk bag or something similar. But I left the tiny bits of cashew sediment in ours because, when eating it with granola, you don't even notice.

I don't have a recipe for the granola because I just threw it together--- oats, wheat germ, sunflower seeds, walnuts, flax seeds, chopped apples, cinnamon, melted butter, and maple syrup. You can't really go wrong with yummy ingredients like that!!  350 degrees on a foil-lined baking sheet for 20-25 mins (stirring once or twice). Then let it cool and store it in the fridge! Soooooo good!!

Off to try out some more recipes!

Arian : )

The sun!

Man, I'm so grateful for yesterday's blue skies and warm weather!! We jumped right out there and got to work preparing for our summer garden! Hudson loves mowing with our new reel mower and we love that our 6-year-old can mow the whole lawn by himself without inhaling gas fumes or chopping off a valuable appendage.

We're so excited to be in this rental HOUSE with a YARD!! The yard, however, was left uncared for for awhile and there are a lot of dead trees and crazy overgrown bushes to be cleared to make way for the garden and all the lawn parties we hope to have!

So we rolled our sleeves up, called our good friends and garden partners, and got dirty! Loved it. It's going to be a good summer in the backyard.

(Taking a break to talk to Pop Pop on the phone)

We took a break to enjoy our first picnic of the season and our latest batch of home-brewed kombucha. Have any of you guys tried or brewed kombucha? Good stuff!!

Looks like those little feet had a pretty great day--flip flop tan lines and lots of dirt : )

Arian

Fried Yard Clippings

 Jude and Grammy have been enjoying spring today-- spring weather AND spring flowers!!

Grammy taught Jude how to fry dandelions and wild onions from our yard.

First, remove the stems and discard. Then soak and rinse the flowers with salt water to get rid of any dirt or tiny critters.

Dip the dandelions in flour and seasoning (salt, garlic powder, pepper, etc), then in a raw egg/milk mixture, then back in the seasoned flour.

And then just fry them in a pan of oil til lightly browned and crispy

And there you go!

Pretty tasty!

Date night tonight! So excited!! Daniel and I have been working on a detailed weekly family rhythm.  Being artists, we tend to be weak in the "planning" area and tend to just go with the flow. But we've really noticed that our family could benefit from some structure in our week. It's going to be great. Things like "date night" and "family night" and "art with friends" will hopefully become regular weekly occurrences in our home.

Do you guys have a regular weekly family schedule or do you just take one week at a time?

Either way, hope you're week is going well!
Arian : )

Experimental Cooks

I've always been an experimental chef and rarely follow recipes, for better or worse. I think it started when I was a kid with my "microwave Bisquick and spaghetti sauce personal pizzas" and my flour+water+sugar+peanut butter cookies that looked more like fake rubber vomit than actual cookies.

But the results of yesterday's experiment turned out pretty good! (I've learned a lot since the fake vomit days). Hudson wanted to replicate a dessert we had on one of our coffee shop dates called "Better Fingers" (because they are better than Butterfingers, I'm guessing).

Of course we didn't measure anything so if you want to try this at home, well, good luck : )

Here's the "recipe":

1. grind a good bit of dry oats into flour with a blender
2.  in a bowl, knead enough peanut butter in the oats to make it into a dough ball
3.  add a bit of maple syrup or honey so that it's a little sweet but not too sweet
4. press the mixture firmly into a wax-paper lined baking pan
5. sprinkle chocolate chips on top
6. place in a warm oven just long enough to melt the chips
7. spread the melted chocolate around til it looks awesome
8. pop it in the fridge til the chocolate hardens
9. cut into bars and enjoy!

Pretty tasty and easy and kid-friendly! Success!

Any interesting experimental cooking success or failure stories? I once tried to make chocolate pudding by blending silk tofu and cocoa powder and sugar but used a cup of salt instead of a cup of sugar by mistake. Total failure. Note to self: use labels.

Arian : )

Rollover Goals

 (click to enlarge)

So October ended up being full of the unexpected--- an unexpected death in the family, unexpected house guests (a happy thing!), unexpected emotional wrestling, and impromptu party, several last-minute road trips to see family and old friends.... So I think I accomplished maybe 4 of my 10 goals for October. Thankfully, they can all rollover into November.

 Pick a pumpkin---check.

 Make (and eat) a pumkin pie (or 4)....check.

 Pumpkin spice latte...check..check...check.........check.

 Celebrate my birthday all month long...

...CHECK!!! Birthday trip to see an old high school friend turned pro opera singer perform, birthday vintage dress shopping with Andrea, birthday coffee and used book shopping with mom, birthday bike ride, birthday presents and long-distant phone calls and surprise treats. I felt the love.

So the other 6 goals will just have to wait til November. Thanks for stickin with me through this heavier-than-usual month! Here's hopin that November is full of cozy, light-hearted crafty goodness : )

Arian