Thanksgiving in Richfield

Here are some highlights of our weekend in Richfield with Gary's folks:

*Getting nice and dirty (and lost ... oops!) on an extended four wheeler ride with the dogs
*Getting nice and clean in Gram's uber-cool tub

*Great food (including mom's 2-hour turkey, my Maglebys rolls and the famous Larsen Family Cream Cheese Pie)
*Sleeping in a little because the kids ignore me to race upstairs to see Gram, Grandpa and the dogs. Luckily they are early risers!
*Getting to go see New Moon - twice! (once with Gary, who though he'd never seen Twilight actually liked NM, and once with my dear NC friend Sarah Cannon. Send me pics, Sar!)
*Playing Legos and Scum
*Lots of Spongebob Squarepants. Ew. I despise that show. But the kids love it and only get to watch it at Gram's house. I can live with that... I guess..
*Reading a charming new book (Dragon Slippers)
*Admiring all of Grandpa's new projects

A Brave New Recipe

I don't normally create a recipe from scratch; usually I alter existing dishes to my specifications. But after having a lovely pasta dish with butternut squash at Il Fornaio in Del Mar, I was craving a something similar at home. So after doing some research, I came up with the following. If you stir it too much the sqash falls apart, so just lightly toss with the sauce and serve.

Cheese Tortellini with Butternut Squash
serves 3-4

1 small butternut squash
2 9-oz packages fresh cheese tortellini
1/2 cup butter
1/3 cup chopped nuts (I prefer pecans)
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/2 t. cinnamon
1/4 t. nutmeg
1/2 cup cream or half and half (I used fat free half and half and it was great)

First, cook the squash however you prefer. I cut mine in quarters, rub them with olive oil, then bake on a cookie sheet at 400 degrees for 45 minutes. This can be done well in advance, then the rest of the meal comes together very quickly.

Boil water and prepare tortellini according to package instructions. Rinse and set aside. In a frying pan on medium-low heat, melt butter and heat just until it stars to brown. Add nuts and stir for a minute or two, but don't let the butter burn. Add the brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and cream and stir. Cut warm squash into small bitesized pieces, gently toss with butter sauce, and pour over pasta on individual plates.

Yummy yum yum. This is a sweet pasta dish, which is unusual, but I though it was delish. All my favorite fall flavors! I tried the sauce over regular pasta and that was good too, but the creaminess of the cheese tortellini added the perfect touch. If you don't like it I'm very sorry, but what's not to love about butter, cinnamon and cream?

It's a Mermaid Birthay Party!

So everyone was finally healthy and we finally got to have Sophie's birthday party last Wednesday. She loves mermaids so long ago the theme was decided, and I had a lot of time to research fabulous maritime motifs. We had blue jello in clear cups with swedish fish swimming around in them; pin the flowers on Arial; musical chairs to Little Mermaid and Muppet Treasure Island songs; find the fish relay races; a pinata; treasure box treats; dancing with the disco lights; and the movie Mermaidia for when I finally burned out of energy. It was a memorable day for my sweet Soph; on the phone with Gram and Nana that night, Sophie gushed repeatedly, "it was the best birthday party ever!" Phew - I delivered.

I'm going to go collapse now.

Ahhhh....

... a weekend at Nana and Papa's. Gary taught at a conference in Salt Lake this weekend so we got to go down. Things I loved:

*getting away from the incessant cleaning, dishes and laundry at my house. It's more fun doing all that stuff somewhere else, I guess!
*seeing deer two mornings out of three in Nana's back yard while eating our black and white pancakes at breakfast time
*running out to pet every dog that goes by on the golf course
*seeing Maggie and Sophie's excitement to crawl into bed with Nana (at the crack of dawn) for morning cuddles
*helping them decorate their 20 foot Christmas tree! We blasted holiday music, drank hot chocolate, and watched Miracle on 34th Street. Bring on the holidays!
*eating a roquefort bacon H and root beer freezes at Hires. mmmmm.
*walking "the circuit" through the Fairy Forest (the golf course) at sunset. Is this gorgeous warm weather really November? wow!
*Costco! yay!
*tea parties and duck duck goose with Papa
*Maggie's incessantly playing the piano. Duets with Nana and Papa, her first Christmas song... she's getting pretty good but if I hear Old Joe Clark again I'm just going to lose it.

Happy Halloween!

Halloween is not my favorite holiday, but I enjoyed it more this year than I ever have with kids. I actually even decorated for it! Other fun things we did this year are:

-carved pumpkins grown from our very own gardens!

-made cinnamon sugar pumpkin seeds

-had a neighborhood movie night out in the party barn, watching "Nightmare before Christmas".

-made orange, pumpkin-shaped popcorn balls -yum!

-easy costumes - got them all off Ebay! We love cats, Dorothys and knights! I can sew, but the kids don't really know that yet...

-Watched "Clue" with Gary as we did our nightly chores. "Would anyone care for fruit, or dessert?"

-Had a fabulous Halloween day with Nana and Papa at Nanny's house out in Lewisville. Went on a long walk down the fields with Nana and Papa, hearing stories about Papa's youth and looking for wildlife. Maggie learned new piano duets with Nana and Papa and picked out fabric for Nanny to make me a pillow. (She is so darn amazing!)

-played Monster Memory with the girls

-Ate the traditional Dinner in a Pumpkin Halloween night, with wassail, Magleby's rolls, and a chocolate cake Nanny made us for dessert! Then trick or treating with dad and Papa until Papa got the chills and had to go home. Papa does not like the cold!