Happy Birthday to A Great Friend!

Danielle and I have been friends for over 14 year, not quite half of my life, but close!  We met my very first day of college, when I was green and scared but super excited to start a new adventure.    I remember thinking she was so cool and I never thought she would want to be friends with someone like me!

Over that year, we became workout partners at FitSpace, classmates-memorizing the state capital and US presidents together, and over the course of a year, great friends.  That first summer, Danielle and I exchanged handwritten letters (back before email was so easy and so normal).

 I realize now these early clues ( that I would work out with her despite being a very grumpy morning workout person  and that I would handwrite letter despite having awful handwriting and spelling) should have foreshadowed that we would become lifelong best friends.

Over the years, we have experience life, celebrated/morned together, laughed a lot and grown up quite a bit.  I could not ask for a better friend to help shape the person I am today.

Happy birthday to a great woman and a great friend!  Love you and miss you Danielle!

(I just noticed I am always on the left in these photos, too funny!)

A tisket a tasket. . . bountiful baskets

Chris and I finally decided to take advantage of the local produce provider: Bountiful Baskets food co-op.  This organization is a co-op that works to provide its group members with " a variety of high-quality seasonal produce. We balance variety with seasonality in order to get the most appealing and cost-effective basket possible. We also choose to use local produce first when available, then regional produce (California, Utah, Colorado, Northern Mexico!)".  
That is the technical language.  In reality, I just kind of like the idea of having someone else providing me with a basket full of fresh, organic (available every other week), local(ish) produce that we have to eat/try/experiment with.  It is a little like cooking roulette and I love a good challenge!
Although both of us were excited to retrieve our bountiful basket on Saturday morning (7 am pickup, yikes!), one of us was more excited than the other.  At about 5:30, I looked over at Chris who grinned and said "Almost time to get our bountiful basket!!!" as if it was Christmas morning and Santa had left bountiful presents under our tree.  Up we were, bright and early, off to pick up our basket!

For our first time, we ordered an organic basket, a mexican pack, and 3 pumpkins (promised to be basketball size).  We had no idea what to expect in our organic basket and I was pleasantly surprised.  We got kale, portobello mushrooms, 2 heads of cauliflower, romaine lettuce, apples, pears, grapes, all organic.  In the mexi pack we got avocados, green onions, regular onions, hot peppers, cilantro, and tomatillos.   Last, we got 3 HUGE pumpkins.  We had to make 2 trips to the truck.  Here is some of our loot!

So far, the best thing I have made was the salsa verde with the tomatillos.  To.die.for. . .  


We brought the pumpkins home carved one.  Before the carving, we let the pumpkins hang out in the living room.  These are my first Arizona pumpkins and it was nice to have something so seasonal in the house again!  Rocco was not sure what to make of the pumpkins.  I think he thought they were giant toys!

We carved one of the pumpkins, cooked the seeds and put the pumpkin outside.  I am not sure which picture is more spooky, the one with the glowing pumpkin or the glowing eyes?!

We must have been summoning the Halloween spirit, we were even visited by a ghost!

 We have already ordered our basket for next week, I cannot wait to see what we get! 

New York State of Mind

I was lucky enough to grow up in the Hudson River Valley, arguably of the most picturesque (holly crap, I spelled that word right on the first try, I should stop here and retire) places to live.  For college, I attended Binghamton University.  The drive upstate toward school included visions of tree covered hills and rivers that lured you further and further west toward higher learning.  Next, I move to Amherst, Massachusetts, a classic New England college town nestled in the Connecticut River Valley.  If I was forced at gun point to choose which of these three places was most beautiful, I think I would eventually spit out "AMHERST" - but only after visions of crisp blue skies, multicolored hillsides and roadways littered with fallen leaves from each of these three locations flickered vividly through my mind's eye.

I layout this geographic history because it has clearly shaped the woman I am today.  Growing up in these locations has made me love fall and all the wonderful things that come with it.  I love the summer to fall transition when the nights start to get cool and you can hear rustling leaves as you lay in bed at night dreaming of what you are going to wear on the first day of school (only me, no way, I don't believe it)!  I love the first offering of pumpkin spice lattes, butternut squash soup and roasted acorn squash.  I even love the displays of candycorn despite my actual dislike of this odd tasting candy.   Turtlenecks, plaid skirts, tights, knee-high boots, coats, (OH MY GOD COATS!) all add to the joys of fall.

Living in AZ for the last 3 falls has really made me appreciate "fall" but in a totally different way.  Our summer to fall transition consists of daytime temperatures that drop from the 100's into the 90's and nighttime lows of 70 (and this does not happen until the first week of October).  We are able to open our windows for the first time in 5 months and cooking indoors is possible again.  The convertible top can be put down without risk of spontaneous combustion.  Pants become a work outfit option again and not an awful punishment.  And last, and most important, our family runs can occur in the morning hours and do not need to be ending as the sun comes up.  While I do miss the fall antics of the northeast, these tastes of southwest fall cannot help but make us feel like "Life Begins Again"!

This week fall hit AZ.  I kicked off the season by celebrating "2 soup Sunday" where I made pasta fagioli and cream of broccoli soup (using my new AMAZING le creuset dutch oven, thanks Christine and Jerry!).  The joy of eating soup again was only second to being able to wear jeans to work this week!  Yesterday, we took a long family walk, exploring portions of a walking path that we have never been on.  We joined the path about 1 mile from our house and were able to walk past the flood overflow area of Tempe Town Lake (more on TempeTown Lake in a future post).  The flood overflow area has become a wetland sanctuary where huge birds come to hang out to eat.  It was really cool to see this much nature juxtapose to ASU's stadium.

The dogs loved being on a long walk.

The path even had a dog specific water fountain, totally cute!

Our walk was a great way to spend the morning and really made us feel like life was beginning again!

P.S. The pasta fagioli soup was so amazing that it is making a repeat appearance this week.

Time flies when you're sweating in the desert

Well, it has been too long since my last post!  Not too much has happened in the desert.  Work has been really busy and I have been in the lab 7 days a week babysitting some aspect of my scientific endeavors.

I had a birthday in September.  Thank you for all the wonderful birthday cards, wishes and gifts.  It was a wonderful day (as wonderful as turning 30+ can be on a Tuesday when you have to go to work).  Chris brought me a special lunch and coffee -to work- just to make the day that much more special.  I left work a bit early and treated myself to some beautifcation services.  When I got home, we took what is becoming my annual birthday picture with the animals.

 (the dogs are not really sniffing Dodge.  I actually have food in my fist to lure everyone to the right side of the room!)

Chris surprised me with a new camera for my birthday.  Although I have not had a chance to practice or learn the ins and outs of my new toy, I have been able to take a few pictures of my favorite subjects!

Adriane is such a funny dog.  She moves her each of her ears independently.  Sometimes one is up and sometimes one is down.  This makes her really funny looking sometimes.

Tormenting the dogs is fun.  

Dodgie looks so mean here.  She is really quite sweet!

This is Rocco's reaction to the camera.  He hates having his picture taken inside!  He barks furiously like we are torturing him.  This has caused us to refer to the camera as the soul stealer.  He may believe that we are taking a bit of his soul with every shot. Maybe he knows something we do not.  

Big bird.

We took the dogs to our favorite dog park for some swimming and ball throwing action.  Swimming in the summer (or September 25st, whatever the case may be) is a must.  It burns a lot of energy and keeps the dogs cool!

Lastly, today we got great news today.  I checked the weather and found this:

Thank goodness.  Life can begin again.  Goodbye 105 days and 80+ degree mornings.  Hello 70's (and 60s!!).  I may even wear pants this week.  Joy!

I promise to keep the updates coming!  Happy October!

Good morning Sunshine. . . .

The Earth says hello. . .

Chris and I make a concerted effort to get up and run the dogs (and ourselves) each and every day.  This effort is aided by the instant whine that comes from Adriane at 5:30 every morning.  Because of this, we have taken to calling her our fitness trainer.  We are considering getting her puppy sweatbands and a whistle to complete the outfit.  But, I digress.

Although we do not have a perfect track record, this summer, we have been very good about getting up and out the door before the large ball of fire (aka- the sun) comes up and starts to bore into us.  In order to get a decent run in and not endanger ourselves or our pups, we need to be running as the sun is coming up.  On these picture perfect mornings, I marvel at the desert landscape as it is touched with the first light.

We run on trails in a local park called Papago (or as we affectionally call it- Puppy-go).  It is a little oasis in our cement city that we have shared with almost all of our visitors.  Here we can enjoy the red rocks and great hiking, all about 4 miles from our doorstep.  We love it at 5:30 am because we have the place practically to ourselves.  Our puppies hunt the jackrabbits that race to and fro and on occasion, we have seen coyotes roaming the landscape.  (Incidentally, this is also where Chris proposed.)

After starting this blog, I knew I wanted to share some thoughts and photos about our morning runs.  On this particular morning, I actually remembered the camera and was able to snap some photos as we were running.

(if you look closely, you can see Rocco in the shadows making his way up the butte to join Chris and Adriane).

A morning run, time with family, and a bit of appreciation for how beautiful the world can be- all before my first cup of coffee.  How much luckier can a girl be?

Unfortunately, we have not figured out a way to bring Dodge on these morning fun runs.  I think she is sad that she does not get to go and is usually waiting in the window for our return.

Slacker's Paradise

Oiy!  I have been behind on my blogging!  Noting much new to report here in Hotzona.  We are trying to hold out for about another month when the daily high is less than 100 and the nighttime lows will dip back into the lower 70's.  Until then, we will enjoy the random storm that blow through here during monsoon season.  While they do bring beautiful skies, they rarely bring cooler temps.  Sigh. . . .

Perhaps these last 2 would make nice real-estate listing pictures in the not too far future. . . ?

Dish on the Dishwasher

There are some things in this world that I am very good at.  Dishes is not one of them.  You may be wondering how someone can be "bad" at washing dishes.  I have wondered this myself and I really have no explanation.  I just know that when I hand wash dishes, they rarely come out clean.  This was true at age 12 (when my parents thought I was trying to force them into getting a dish washer to keep them from getting poisoned) and it is true at 31.

Thankfully we have a dishwasher.  However, our machine has proven not to be the most powerful or efficient machine.  Over the last few months, I have noticed that our glasses have gotten progressively more cloudy and more food is left behind after each load.   In order to lessen the cloud formation on our dishes, I have increased the amount of pre-rincing but to no avail.  I even tried loading the dishes only on the bottom shelf to lessen the washing burden.  No luck.  This weekend I officially decided that it was ridiculous to keep using it.  The dishwasher was worthless; I would become the dishwasher.

I did not want to complain about the dishwasher.  It was not Chris's fault the thing did not work.  Instead I just figured we would deal with it when we had a chance and I would try not to grumble.  Chris noticed that I was not putting dishes in the dishwasher.  He also noticed a few flecks of food on the newly hand washed dishes......  no comment from either one of us.  We briefly looked at dishwashers at the Home Despot on Sunday but none called to us so we did not buy one.  We were both being completely breezy about the whole situation.

This is where my story gets good.  Monday night I had a work dinner that caused me to get home late, around 9 pm.    When I got home, Chris had almost completely finished installing our new dishwasher.  Unbeknownst to me,  he went to the store after work, bought a new dishwasher, carried it in himself, and installed it- all while I was out of the house.  When I got home, even the huge box was on its way out the door.  Incredible.  So stress free; such a pleasure!  I am so impressed with him and appreciative that he just took care of it and tried to make it as painless as possible for me.

We ran our first load of dishes right before we went to sleep.  The new dishwasher was silent; we could hardily believe it was actually doing anything to the pile of dirty dishes.  The next morning I heard Chris yell to me in an excited voice "want to open the dishwasher with me to see how clean they are!"  Yes honey, I would like nothing more.  Into the kitchen we go- together -to peer into the new machine.  With baited breath we dropped the door and revealed 2 levels of spotless dishes. We gazed at each other with love and happiness in our eyes and closed to door.

"Great job hon" I said, "I think you know where they all go?" ;)


Just kidding! Many thanks to Chris!  May all the home installation projects be this breezy!