A Little Late to the Party

Because I had other posts I needed/wanted to make after I got back from visiting my grandparents over the Fourth of July weekend, my patriotic post had to wait.

Over the weekend, my grandpa, who is almost 86 years old, and who has advanced Parkinson's Disease, and isn't always very lucid, got incredibly excited about showing us a Memorial Garden in the township his family and my mom's family had grown up in.

A few months ago, my aunt, who had been visiting from California, discovered that the township had laid engraved pavers for everyone from the town who'd been killed in military service, and family members could purchase pavers for anyone else who had served but not died in active service.  She shared this information with other family members in the area.

My grandpa's oldest brother was killed in France when his Jeep exploded early in World War II. Then my grandpa and his brother who was not quite a year younger than he enlisted. By the end of WWII, Grandpa had attained the rank of Technical Sergeant. At the time, it was the third-highest rank for an enlisted soldier. He never did talk much about his experiences to the family, but he gave my oldest cousin a Nazi helmet he brought home from Germany.

Then, one day, when I was about 19, we were watching some made-for-TV-movie about Anne Frank, and my grandpa started telling me about how his unit marched from Marseilles, France through southern Germany, through the Brenner Pass between Austria and Italy in 1945 and how they liberated a concentration camp somewhere around Munich. He kinda glazed over, and then started telling me details that I'll never forget - the skeletal appearances of the prisoners, the way they were too afraid to be liberated, the overwhelming smells, how the prisoners tried to steal the GIs' weapons to attack the Nazi guards... After he shared those harrowing experiences with me, my grandma, who had been listening from the kitchen, pulled me aside and told me he hadn't told anyone about that other than her, to her knowledge, since the end of the War.

I felt honored that he chose to share those memories with me, and I feel it only appropriate to honor my grandfather with this belated Independence Day post. Thanks, Grandpa, for defending our freedom!

Potter Party

A continuation of the HP geek-out...

My House-Elves Prepare... {via}

Many of you were seriously interested to hear about the HP-themed Halloween party we threw, so I'm gonna do my best to remember it all. This was 2007, I apparently had either a non-functioning camera or had tested the libations way too many times and didn't care about a camera at that point. So, no pictures, sorry. I'm seriously disappointed in myself for that faux pas!

Decor: 
For our front door, I made a wooden sign that said "Platform 9 3/4" on a scrolled wooden plaque painted with black and gold paints.

Then with calligraphy brush pens on "parchment" scrapbook paper, I made signs for various parts of the apartment. The living room, with our red sofa was the "Gryffindor Common Room." Our half-bath that happened to be under the stairwell was the "Cupboard Under the Stairs." The dining room was divided into four different "stations" labeled "Potions Dungeon" (the bar), "The Great Hall" (savory finger foods), "Honeyduke's" (sweets), and "Three Broomsticks" (HP-themed drinks).

Also, in the "Dungeon" and "Great Hall" parts of the dining room, I hung bulletin board paper (yes, I'm a teacher...) that looked like stone castle walls. We lit a lot of candles and turned off many of the lights.

Food: 
To be honest, I can't remember many of the savory finger foods I made, even though everything was inspired by the books in some way. I do remember making mini cottage pies.

The sweets, however... I bought some 1-quart Mason jars and labeled each one with a gold paint marker. There were licorice wands (Twizzlers), Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans (Jelly Bellys with some actual BB beans thrown in for random surprises), Cockroach Clusters (Dark chocolate and Rice Krispies candies), and Blood-flavored Lollipops (got them at Borders, officially licensed HP candy).

Drinks: 
In addition to our regular bar set-up that we keep stocked, I made a few themed beverages.
The cold butterbeer was:
vodka
soda water
Torani English Toffee syrup
 It was fizzy and buttery, just as it should have been.

I also made a Dragon's Blood cocktail: (This was stronger)
tequila
rum
orange juice (just enough to make it slightly opaque)
Torani Blood Orange syrup
splash of grenadine (if you need to get it redder again)

There were also ale (bucket full of beer) and Firewhisky (Jameson, I believe).

Costumes: 
At the time, my hair was cut very short, so I thought I'd use Halloween spray-in color and make it pink to be Tonks. I wore my black graduation robe, had a wand, and wore jeans with a homemade black and pink "Weird Sisters" t-shirt.

Sticking to canon, Hub was a partially changed Lupin. Sprayed his black hair with white to make it gray-ish. He wore a robe, and we took werewolf costume gloves, cut one apart, and used the gray fur to make it stick out of places in his clothes. He wore the other glove.

The costumes I can actually remember our friends coming as: Grown up Harry and Ginny, a Firebolt (I LOVED the costume made out of a cardboard box at the last minute!), Rita Skeeter, Madam Rosmerta, and Professor Trelawney.

It was a ton of fun, and I love throwing and/or going to theme parties. What are your favorite memories of theme/costume parties?

Busy as a Bee

Sorry guys! I've not had much time for reading blogs, let alone writing them this weekend. First, Hub took me out to dinner for an early anniversary on Friday, since he leaves next week for a long business trip. Then we had a little party that night to celebrate the fact that our really close friends found out they're having a baby boy! It was the day of the 20-week ultrasound.

Then Saturday, we had a friend's birthday party and Hub took me shopping all afternoon. :) For the party I made bacon brownies and raspberry mojitos. Both turned out well and were absolutely delicious. And apparently my right leg was also delicious, as it's covered in mosquito bites.

And today. Happy Father's Day to my awesome, spoiled-me-rotten-while-growing-up dad! He and my stepmom came over for a late lunch. Hub's parents are on vacation. Hub grilled tuna steaks and some veggie kabobs. I made a peach and raspberry custard tart. There are no pictures. We nommed it all. I'm crap at taking pictures of food I make before it's devoured. I need to get better at that!

Hope you all have had a great weekend. I shall return full-force to the Interweb world Monday. I'm pretty sure of that...

Also, I blame 3 World Cup games per day for much of my lack of productivity. Those guys are so fit!

Show Your Geek!

Today is the celebration of two momentous holidays, and I hope that you will also partake. Let your true geek colors show!


First of all, today is  Towel Day. Yes, in honor of Douglas Adams, intergalactic hitchhikers, and Vogon poetry, please carry a towel with you, ponder the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything (hint: it's 42), enjoy some beer and peanuts for lunch, watch for falling whales and petunias, and most importantly, DON'T PANIC!

The second (and I only list it second because it's a newer holiday) way to celebrate today is Geek Pride Day. You should be proud to be a geek, no matter what kind of geek you are! Geeks are passionate. We truly love whatever it is that interests us. I for one am a sci-fi geek, a food science geek, a physics geek, a lit geek, a blog geek, a TV geek, a trivia geek, a board game geek, and the list goes on and on. Celebrate by wearing your geekiest tee! Spout random knowledge! Play your favorite games! Spend some time with an awesome book! My geekiest tee has yet to arrive. It will actually be at my doorstep this afternoon, what a perfect time to receive this:

 Also, from what I have read of this book, I think it is perfect reading for a geek holiday such as today:

Here's to Arthur, Zaphod, Trillian and the rest! Unleash your inner-geek!

My Friends Are Made of Awesome

As you may or may not know, in the US, we have somehow misappropriated the Mexican Day of Beating the French into Submission (Cinco de Mayo, not a true Mexican holiday) as a ridiculous excuse to go out to the nearest Mexican restaurant, eat lots of enchiladas, and get drunk off as many Dos Equis, Coronas, and margaritas.

Also, this year, said holiday of American debauchery (do we REALLY need an excuse to drink and eat lots of cheese?) fell on a Wednesday. Most of our friends are no longer in university. They have real jobs, like us. Those that are still in school at the local university had final exams that week. So, as it starts to be come clear, we were completely unable to celebrate said fiesta. But some friends came up with a brilliant solution. As we're not really celebrating 5/5 for it's true purpose, can't we just celebrate some other time?

This is how yet another great theme party was born. Last night, we celebrated Catorce de Mayo. And here's how:
(I apologize none of these pictures are mine. The food was too awesome and disappeared too quickly!)

{via}

I made turkey enchiladas. I've made these in a more "gourmet" way before, but since I had all of 45 minutes last night, I used canned enchilada sauce... They were still delicious.

{via}

Another food geek friend made carnitas de puerco , pico de gallo, and guacamole all from scratch. EVERYTHING was delicious. I bow to his kitchen skills. And he's like me. If he's gonna cook at someone else's house, he travels with his own chef's knife, salt, and pepper grinder. Yeah, we can be picky.

Of course, there were margaritas. I love margaritas, and one of my friends once gave me his awesome recipe. Now I use it, and share it. He's from San Antonio, TX, so he knows his Tex-Mex stuff. I will now share my recipe with you. If you're not in the US, use whatever you can find that's acceptable. This recipe takes the pre-mixed Jose Cuervo Golden Margarita mix and makes it MUCH better.
PS - Margaritas shouldn't be fluorescent green! 


Margaritas of Awesome
This is for each serving: 
2.5 ounces margarita mix (75 mL)
1.5 ounces gold/reposado tequila (45 mL)
1.0 ounce orange juice (30 mL)
0.5 ounce *good* orange liqueur such as Grand Marnier or Cointreau (15 mL)
0.5 ounce triple sec (15 mL)
1 pinch kosher salt

Stir together in a pitcher and serve over ice. I will warn you, these are strong, not for the faint of heart. If you need to cut anything down, go a bit easy on the tequila. I also recommend trying different juices, not just the orange. Lime works nicely as does my favorite, blood orange! Enjoy!

Then, we watched Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory dubbed in Spanish with English subtitles and decided to apply fake tattoos. I have kanji that does not mean what it claims to mean on the inside of my left wrist. It was a wonderful night!