Chicago

Hectic and tiring.

As good as this summer has been, it has been hectic and tiring. For the last 4 months, we've had packing and unpacking, sanding and painting, cleaning and organizing, trips and company, tests and appointments, projects and paperwork up the metaphorical wazoo.

Don't get me wrong- we've been very blessed, but down time has been sparse. After the whirlwind of the last 4 months, John and I decided to take a short, one night getaway to Chicago.

And despite the temperature reaching 100 degrees (!), it was just what we needed.


Even when we were in Florida for a summer, I don't think I saw our car thermometer read 100*!

First stop: Millennium Park





I've always wanted to see the Cloud Gate sculpture in person, so we dragged ourselves through the park, dripping and sweating all the while. I'll say: it was worth suffering the heat! It is really quite a remarkable piece; it seems as though it dripped down from the sky in liquid form, like mercury, without beginning or end. One seamless whole. If it wasn't so hot I think we cold have stayed and stared for a white but we were eager to get back into the air conditioning!




Check out that sweet couple holding hands behind us :)

We spent the night relaxing in our hotel and hit up IKEA the next morning to pick up a new bed frame for our guest room (pics to come). After IKEA we headed back into Chicago and took a long walk down the Navy Pier which was bustling with people. We were there on a Monday so I can't even imagine how busy it must be on weekends!











It was stifling hot again on Monday, but we did get some relief on the pier with a gusty wind. Figured out why they call it the "windy city" at least.




And we finished our visit with a long-craved dinner of Ethiopian cuisine. If you're ever in the Chicago area, this place is worth visiting. Sour and fluffy injera, spicy stews, and a beer named after the elephant who killed one of the brewery's founders. Really, what more could a person want for dinner?







Only regret was that it couldn't be longer!

Have you ever gone on a mini-vaca? How was it? Any recommendations in the MI/IL/IN/ON area?

Oma and Opa Visit

Hear this, you elders;
listen, all who live in the land.
Has anything like this ever happened in your days
or in the days of your ancestors?
Tell it to your children,
and let your children tell it to their children,
and their children to the next generation.

- Joel 1:2-3

My Oma and Opa have been visiting with us for the past few days and we've had a wonderful time together. We've been touring around our town, visiting the local bargain stores, buying lots of cheese and liquor (cheaper to buy it there take back to Canada, you know), and drinking gallons of coffee on the front porch every day. We took a few longer trips and laughed while we listened to the GPS spit out directions in Dutch because "She stutters in English!" (Truly. Good thing my grandparents are bilingual!). But the best part of all has been listening to all the stories.

That's the best thing about grandparents. The stories.

My Oma and Opa immigrated to Canada from the Netherlands after WWII. My Opa grew up in a foster home before determining to become a minister and leaving for the USA to study in seminary. My Oma got married in Canada to a wonderful man, had 3 young children (one of whom was my mom), and then lost her husband to cancer at the young age of 28. After returning to the Netherlands with her little ones for a season, my Oma returned to Canada where she married my Opa. The 5 of them became a family and added two more children in the next few years. I believe they could talk for months on end with all the stories they have. Some filled with so much humor they can barely be told for all the laughing (like the time Opa had to climb down into a grave after a funeral service to retrieve the about-to-be-buried man's watch, which the funeral director had forgotten to remove!); and others more sobering, of hard times and sadness (like struggle to maintain hope during my mom's long illness in 2007), and some that just make you reflect on our lives (like my Oma's comment that her grandmother was illiterate and here 5 generations later both John and I work "so fast on da computer!"). But always laced with optimism, faith, and confidence in God as creator and sustainer of all.

We took evening trips to the beach, to feel the cool water lapping at our toes and the pleasant warmth of the setting summer sun on our faces.





We walked the pier and listened to the powerful sound of waves crashing on the rocks and of Oma repeating in her soft Dutch accent, "Oh dis is sho beautiful!"








sho beautiful, indeed.

Soup & Salad

If you name your daughter "Apple" you might get a side eye from me, but I'm all for second chances. And a second chance is just what I needed to give actress Gwenyth Paltrow, who, as it turns out, wrote an awesome cookbook. Our friends Paul and Lindsay (who I'd comfortably label "foodies") gave us this book as a housewarming gift a couple weeks ago and I've been loving my kitchen life ever since.

Being married to a pastor I have ample opportunity to hone my culinary skills. Tonight we had a couple from church over for dinner and with the heat today, I decided to go simple: soup and salad. I've also been trying to health-up our (well, "my"- and John's be default) eating habits by reducing refined sugars and using more fresh, nutrient rich ingredients. Our eating habits weren't bad... but there's always room for improvement.

On the menu:

• Fresh baked (bought) bread with pesto inspired by the Simply in Season cookbook
• Slow Roasted Tomato Soup from Gwyneth's My Father's Daughter cookbook
• Mayo-less Tuna Salad with Arugula from skinnytaste.com
  
• Berry Crumble from My Father's Daughter

Pesto

I've always wanted to make my own pesto, but that much basil is pricey to buy in store. Luckily the basil plants in my garden are doing great and I've been searching for reasons to use it!

This is a basic recipe:

• 1 cup basil leaves
• 2 cloves garlic
  
• 3 tbs Parmesan (I use nutritional yeast)
• 1/3 cup pine nuts, toasted
• 1/3 cup olive oil
• Combine and blend
  

Basil from my garden (1 cup)


I use nutritional yeast instead of Parmesan because I'm lactose intolerant. Nutritional yeast has a savory taste that rivals the best cheese and is full of B vitamins (3 tbs).




Love my Magic Bullet!


Delicious on a fresh baked loaf of bread.



Slow Roasted Tomato Soup

• This recipe is copyrighted but worth buying (or borrowing from the library) this cookbook!
  
  
  
  Slow Roasted Tomatoes. These take 4 hours at 250* so I left my oven on while I drove to pick up John from work; I worried the entire time. I left the doors unlocked in case the house burned down so our cat Jasper could escape. Like that would help.
  
  
  Soup! (My plating-without-spilling-on-the-edge skills need some practice)
  
  
  
  
  Inspired by blogger Mama Natural I made the switch this month from regular iodized salt to natural salt, which contains lots of good-for-you trace minerals. The salt has a more earthy taste than what I'm used to, but I am starting to prefer it.
  
  
  

Mayo-less Tuna Salad

• recipe found here (skinnytaste.com)
  
  Capers, arugula, and pasta oh my!
  
  
  

Berry Crumble

• Another copyrighted recipe (again- buy this cookbook!) but what I love about this recipe is that it only uses 1/3 cup brown sugar. The rest is all natural sweetness from the fruit. Awesome!
  
  I used strawberries (picked 'em myself when we went berry picking with our small group!), raspberries, and blackberries.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

The only problem I really had with this meal was that a certain someone kept napping in the middle of my kitchen rug and refusing to move out of my way. He also went a little nutso when I opened the tuna can for the salad. Good thing he's cute. ;)

Jasper

"People with pets are generally happier."

Have you heard that one before?

I have. And I think it's true.

John and I had a cat for a few short months in 2010. He was a re-homed adult ragdoll for whom we had great affection. Unfortunately barely 3 months into our new lives with him he developed an untreatable and incurable lung disease. That was the end of our kitty Sterling (RIP).

You can imagine the trauma of loving a pet and picturing years ahead with him only to have him up and die. (Not to mention the grumbling at his veterinary bills!)

It took us a while to gather up the courage to try again, but a few months ago I started searching petfinder.com for another Ragdoll.

I'll tell you what: adopting a cat is serious business these days. I filled out a bunch of pet applications, answered essay questions, and provided references (no joke!) and got many "sorry so-and-so the cat has already been adopted."

But this past Wednesday I opened my inbox to a great surprise: one of the kittens for whom I had applied never got picked up by his adopters! He was ours if we wanted him. And how we did!

One three hour long round trip with my mother-in-law later, I brought this little guy home:



He came with the name "Desi Arnaz" who, apparently, is a guy from I Love Lucy.
















But that was way before our time (who's Lucy and why do you love her, btw?), so we renamed him Jasper. If you watched Road to Avonlea growing up you might remember the taunting tune, "Jasper Dale, Jasper Dale, like to hid in a garbage pail!" Despite the bad rap poor ol' lispy Jasper got in Avonlea, I've always been partial to the name. So Jasper it is.

We think he's pretty cute.



Well, most of the time anyway. ;)