BFF's, Road Trip & Signs of Spring

Well, well, well.  This week seems like I jammed in as much as possible, but I guess there's nothing new about that.  Steve's best friend from college, David Silpa, paid us a visit at the Ponderosa this week.  He has lived in Paris for the last seven years and is a wonderful photographer.  Steve (and perhaps every man) can live vicariously through his adventures, beautiful women and world travels.  He comes back to the States every year for about three months.  You can read his blog and view the world from his unique perspective   My blog was created to share our world with him (thus the similar name) and catalog our life a little bit at a time.

I cooked up a storm while David was here and enjoyed seeing my husband laugh out loud (a lot) with his friend.  Grady LOVED having him here and called by his full name each and every time he addressed him.  Um, David Silpa, can you read to me in French?  David Silpa, watch me hit the baseball.  Hey, David Silpa, can you sit by me?  I like the fact that Grady has such a close relationship with him, despite the fact that he lives all the way in Paris.  We send him Grady videoclips and G loves receiving odd presents from David Silpa all the way from France.  

I decided to hop in the car and take a road trip this week to see my best friend, Kacy and her sweet family.  We had a great time.  Lots of laughs and the kids were so perfect together.  They haven't seen each other since June when we went to Maui for a week and they just pick up where they left off.  They share everything and the imaginary play was in full swing the entire weekend.  I put all of my HGTV-watching to good use and helped Kacy with some home decorating and brain-storming for future projects.  We saw Jack's last basketball game and his first Little League Game.  I caught a chick flick with Kacy and had late night margaritas.  Too much fun!!!  Her husband even let me sleep in their bed (minus him) on my last night.  They have this incredible Tempurpedic (sp?) bed and I slept so soundly.

We left with way more than we came with (thanks Kacy) and now have a box of scrapbooking supplies and a keyboard for Grady to use when he starts taking piano lessons.  I miss my friend so much and it was just what we both needed.  The image below is the cream cheese won-tons she made on Friday night.  I'm going to see if I can recreate tomorrow night for a dinner party at my place.  

We ended our Southern California journey at Grandma Jan's house.  We hung out, ate homemade minestrone soup and watched the Oscars.  It always feels good to stay with Jan and this was no exception.  Oh, we also got to visit with Great Grandma Beezer.  Grady was in Grandma heaven!


While I was gone, Hecht worked on creating a wine rack in our small kitchen closet.  I currently have a really fancy system of running to the garage and grabbing a bottle out of the dark, dank, back corner and hoping that I've grabbed the right one and then running back into the house.  I would love to have the ability to pick and choose from a few cases that are housed right in the kitchen.  I'll post the after picture when he's done.  What a handy husband.

While we were gone over the last four days, signs of Spring arrived.  The daffodils totally busted out and the cherry blossom trees exploded on our property and our neighbors.  This means I need to get started on plotting and planning my garden.  I have a complete black thumb, but I look forward to chronicling my attempts at vegetable gardening, raising chickens and reenforcing an outbuilding as a chicken coop, talking my husband into two goats, fine-tuning my composting abilities, planting a cutting garden, creating an outdoor dining space and hanging my laundry out to dry.  Oh, and learning to make bread for our family from scratch.   

My first assignment is to get dirt, manure and straw for my beds.  Wish me luck...