My California Christmas 2009

I had a wonderful time in sunny California for a week long Christmas holiday. We spent a beautiful day in Santa Barbara with a stroll along the Santa Barbara beach and pier. We also spent some time wandering through the outdoor mall and of course stopping for a Starbucks gluten free soy latte!

With my new Celiac Disease diagnosis, Mom and I spent a lot of time in what came to be known as the gluten free test kitchen. It may has well have been the Betty Crocker test kitchen because we use all of her mixes and recipes. Bravo!! Two thumbs up for Betty and her team!! Here mom is showing off the only thing we cooked all week that contained gluten, peanut butter dog cookies!! All of the cousins, Kiska, Macie, Gabby and Bingo all loved them.

Mom, Dad, Meg and I celebrated Mom's birthday at our now annual ceramic painting extravaganza. Armed with paint brushes and cupcakes a good time was had by all!

Christmas...was lots of fun. All of the usual wonderful traditions, steak dinner, presents and a rowdy game of balderdash. Dad was extra creative and crossed the finishline first.

Mom was this years Fantasy Football champion and now has the jersey of her favorite quarterback to remember the season (and the romping she ensued on everyother team) by.

Merry Christmas Everyone!!

Thanksgiving, New Closet and a Snuggie!

It's been a busy month. Too busy for blogging, so this is a mish mash of blog catch up, in reverse order, chronologically.

Sara's first Christmas gift of the season from her friend Patty in Minnesota. Yes, it's true you are looking at Sara in a Snuggie. Turns out they really are EXTREMELY warm.


Next, the new walk in closet.

The mess before...

Gabby measuring and laying out. Sara doing the same...

Dry wall is up...

Final photo on next blog (didn't take photo yet!)...oops!

We celebrated Thanksgiving at Odie and Jessica's house this year. We had a fabulous day long celebration filled with learning to brew a batch of mead (like wine but honey in the place of grapes), we cooked, enjoyed friends and played a lot of rock band. My first gluten free Thanksgiving was wonderful time after all!

Sara was assigned to the buns, both gluten free and glutenous. I will have to say that the wheat filled buns looked delicious compared to the hard tack that I choked down, well the first bite anyway (the rest were abandoned). After that I chose to proceed both gluten free and bun free. We have some work to do there before next Thanksgiving.

Lot's of Rock Band. Totally embarrassing but we, Odie and I, wore the same shirt to dinner! :-)

The day before Thanksgiving we met Adam and Susie's new baby girl ,Kaia. She is a beautiful bundle of Joy.

A Brady Halloween

Halloween 2009 started with photos at John and Sherry's. Sara as the New Jan Brady. Mia as Greg Brady's stage name Johnny Bravo, Gloria as Twiggy, Colleen as Babooska, Sherry as Little Red Riding Hood and John as her Big Bad Wolf.



Wasn't long before we were cutting a rug at Todd and Gary's. The DJ was playing some groovy tunes and we made the best of it.

Twiggy showed off her practiced moves while the mail order bride had some fun in her new country.

Johnny Bravo showed also off some moves.

Meatballs anyone? A quick snack and then back to the boogie!

There is always a little extra time for some hack. Here is Colleen showing off her first ever successful shoulder stall. Impressive move by the way.

Some of the other favorite costumes of the night. Sara hanging with the jelly fish and the Care Bear.

Fall Fun

Fall has been filled with, well work, but we have been trying to throw some fun in here and there. Gabby celebrated her 4th birthday yesterday with some ice cream! Brain Freeze!!

This is at one of my customer's in Southern Oregon. Notice the two greeting goats!

Sara and I decided to throw some relaxing facials in the mix. Can't neglect the skin, every Cosmo girl knows that!

You may have to blow this one up to see but there are 5 deer in this pic. Drives the dogs crazy!!

Now to the beer. I have done 5 total batches. The Bubbling Blonde was a raging success. Here are pics of some of the following batches.

Odie is a friend of mine from hockey who also wanted to get into brewing. This was my first batch as the "Master Brewer." It is an IPA and will be ready for drinking on Thanksgiving. She's calling it the Concessions IPA since her first choice was a stout. Jessica is a big fan of the IPA.

Colleen and I just bottled our Northwest Moka Porter. This was intended to be our Christmas brew (for gifts), but it smelled so good when we were bottling, I am not sure how many will get out the door. Coffee, beer and chocolate all in one beverage. Does it get any better than that?

These two pics were from a few weeks ago when we were brewing the Moka Porter.

This is the Wise Ass Red in it's primary fermentor and then bottled.

And finally, Mr. Charlie's Amber fermenting and then bottling. Can't wait to share the booty. Come Over!!