Daddy-Daughter Campout 2015

One of the things Russell did when he was called into the bishopric was re-instate the Daddy Daughter Campout. The girls had enjoyed it when we first moved here, and it had fallen off. This year, however, they complained mightily about it (even though he'd gone through the effort to organize it), mostly because their good friends were out of town and wouldn't be there. As it turned out, Russell, Alison, and Kristen were the only ones to show up from our ward. But, it looks like they had a good time, after all. 

Friday night...

And Saturday morning.

Caitlyn Cooks Dinner (for an assignment)

Caitlyn is in a culinary essentials class and her homework this weekend was to prepare a three course meal (appetizer, main dish, dessert) for the family. So she did.

Appetizer was cheezy tomato bread with a garlic/balsamic drizzle:

Main dish was Mediterranean Baked Chicken

with a side mozzerella/tomato/basil antipasto salad.

And on the table:

And for dessert she made pineapple upside-down cupcakes.

All in all, it was a good experience.

School's Started, Which Means... Choir Concerts!

All the women in all the choirs... Caitlyn's good friend Hannah (who she did the You and Me, but Mostly Me with back in the spring, has the first solo)



The choir Caitlyn's in plus the Men's Chorus. The guys need help... but then, they're only freshmen (mostly) and they'll get better. Hopefully, that includes tying ties as well.



And ALL the choirs. The director is SO good.

The Making of Pastrami

You start with a good recipe:

Run around town looking for all the weird ingredients, and end up at your two favorite stores: Spice Merchant for the spices

and Dillons for everything else. Buy a different cut of beef -- can't remember which one -- because you can't find brisket.

Make a brine out of said weird spices

And then stick your beef in to marinate. For five days.

When those five days are up, bring to room temperature and then put water in the bottom of a roasting pan and the brisket on a rack. Wrap the whole thing in aluminum foil.

And then bake, for hours, on a low temperature. It should look a little like this (I assume, since that's what ours looked like) when you're done:

It was a LOT of waiting (not something you plan over night, that's for sure), but it was DEFINITELY worth it!

In Which I Turn 50-7

The older you get, the boringer your birthday gets. So you have to find ways to make it exciting. Like making pastrami from scratch (more on that in another post). Or trying out a decorating technique that no one else is interested in:

Or letting your kids talk you into opening cards first thing in the morning (even though you have to get to work by eight)

Or by saying yes when your coworker offers to buy you a muffin and hot cocoa.

Or by having the sister missionaries (YAY!) over for dinner.

And birthday math:

And silly renditions of the birthday song, that Kristen videoed.

As for presents, I bought myself a Nathan Fillion limited edition t-shirt, got my hair cut and dyed,

and Russell conspired to buy me a gift card to my favorite spa (guess what I'm doing Thursday?!) and a cast iron skillet.

So, all in all, it was a happy birthday.

Exploration Place!

Alison and Kristen had picked up free passes to the Exploration Place with the summer reading program, and they expired on Labor Day. So, of course, that's the day we picked to go.

The big reason we wanted to go (besides the free tickets) was that it was the Science of Fear exhibit's last day. Nothing like waiting to the very end.

They had four booths that went through typical fears. One was the fear of falling.

(I didn't do that one.) (They didn't have fear of heights, though. That one would have been terrifying.)

Russell wanted Caitlyn to mimic the faces.

And there were some interactive stations as well.

From there, we stopped in on a science show about parasites, in which Kristen got to help with the leech.

And then, since we were there, we hit the rest of the Exhibits.

And, of course, you HAVE to end with playing in the castle.

It was a fun way to spend Labor Day!