Archive for December, 2004
December 30, 2004 at 8:20 am · Filed under Family+Friends, Woodwork
Both of our downstairs trees were completely surrounded by piles of presents when the opening ceremonies began. On top of that, everyone had stuffed stockings too so it was a gift extravaganza. It took two sittings to get through it all, but there were 15 of us so I’m not feeling too guilty. My loot included:
- Northern Exposure season 2 on DVD
- Kill Bill Volumes 1 and 2 on DVD
- Blood Simple on DVD
- A Dido CD
- A Norah Jones CD
- Various tools and implements required for my upcoming woodworking course (Jen called the instructor to find out what I needed!)
- An orbital sander
- Much chocolate and candy
- Two sweaters from Mum in England
- Some books from Kim, the Book Goddess
- Magic cards
- The America book by Jon Stewart
December 29, 2004 at 12:36 pm · Filed under Food
I did quite a bit of cooking in the week leading up to our big dinner. Here are some of the creations:
Sausage rolls: plain sausage meat mixed with onion and sage, wrapped in cheaters puff pastry (freeze the butter and grate it into the flour, and don’t handle the dough too much). Baked for 30 minutes.
Mince pies: I was too lazy to make the mincemeat, so I made these with cross and blackwell mincemeat, in my own shortcrust pastry. Baked for 30 minutes.
Nanaimo bars: graham cracker crumbs, sugar and coconut base; icing sugar, butter and vanilla middle layer; bittersweet chocolate and butter melted and poured over the top. Chill and cut up into bars.
Sugar cookies: flour, salt, baking soda, butter, sugar, eggs and vanilla essence made an easy to handle dough, which Jen helped me to cut into festive shapes. Baked for 10-12 minutes.
Pumpkin Pie: Shortcrust pastry pie shell, filled with a mixture of pumpkin, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and condensed milk. Baked for 40 minutes. Topped off with freshly whipped cream.
Stuffing for the turkey: toasted sourdough bread, bosc pears, sage and parsley with a sauteed mix of finely chopped carrot, celery and onion and lots of salt and pepper. That’s it for the vegetarians. For the stuffing that went in the turkey I added cooked sausagemeat.
The 16lb turkey: Stuffed, rubbed with butter, seasoned liberally, draped with bacon. Enclosed in a foil ‘tent’. Put in a very hot oven for 45 minutes, then turned down to 325F for a 5 hour roast. Opened the tent and removed the bacon for the last 30-45 minutes back up at 400F to crisp up the skin.
The gravy: I made stock from the giblets earlier, roasting them for an hour first. Once the turkey was cooked and resting, used some of the turkey fat to make a roux. Added the stock to the roux and stirred forever, got a little panicky when it wasn’t thickening up but a bit of cornstarch sorted that out.
December 28, 2004 at 6:21 pm · Filed under Family+Friends
Jen spent 5 days getting this room just right for the big dinner. Labelled blue and silver crackers were used as placecards, each one containing a personalised note about a small donation made to a suitable charity. White roses, freesias and tulips in blue vases, and blue candles and candlesticks provided the centrepieces. Even the tree in this room was decorated in blue and white.
Sadly we didn’t manage to get a single photo during the actual dinner, so you’ll just have to imagine fourteen adults and a baby around the tables loaded with delicious food.
Jen made sure the rest of the house was equally festive, with the three trees loaded with presents, and fourteen stockings hanging all around the house, including these decorating our staircase. Various elves ran around the house after dinner (yes, we did things in a weird order) filling the stockings to overflowing. One person even ended up getting two stockings, and mine got refilled after I’d almost emptied it once the next morning.
Generally my cooking day was a relaxed affair, except for the last thirty minutes after the turkey came out of the oven when things got a little hectic. It always seems to be at that point when everyone decides to come hang out in the kitchen, but even that didn’t faze me too much. Everything came together nicely though, with all the food arriving hot at the table.
Our friend Kim was the only non-family visitor, and she didn’t know many of the others, but she managed to make herself at home and chat with everybody, including granny.
A pull-along dog made by a local artist was a big hit with baby Simon, who received boxloads of loot, including his very own stocking.
After most of the crowds had left, Dan, Susan and Simon stayed with us for a few more days, giving Jen (and me) more time to bond with our new nephew.
December 23, 2004 at 11:11 am · Filed under General, Woodwork
It’s the last of the Monkeys from Blork. From his post:
The theme is “give me a year.” What would you do if you had a free year, all to yourself, to dedicate to whatever you wanted? Assume money was not a problem — you’ve just received a $60,000 Monkey Grant.
Well first of all, $60,000?? That’s not gonna work, unless we get Monkey-Mortgage-Payments too. It looks like travelling around the world isn’t going to be an option though, so I’ve been thinking about stay at home options.
One thing I’d like to try, that’s always been a little out of my reach, is to start my own business. I’d like to set up small web portal systems for small businesses who can’t afford the big corporate web development services.
That’s a bit too close to real work though, so I’m not sure it would count as a year off… I’m about to embark on a new hobby in January, attending the Merlin Wood School for an introductory woodworking course, so maybe I could dedicate my year to that and perhaps manage to produce more than a spice rack by the end of it.
Of course, I wouldn’t spend every waking hour in the wood shop, so to fill the rest of my time I would indulge in much reading, movie watching, cooking, hiking and exploring this great city of ours.
December 22, 2004 at 11:24 am · Filed under Family+Friends
On Sunday we went up to the country to visit Richard and Elisabeth. The place was truly a winter wonderland, especially when it dropped to -30 overnight.
We spent the early evening sitting in front of a roaring fire and admiring the fine tree brought in from the forest by Richard and expertly decorated by Elisabeth.
Dan, Susan and Simon arrived shortly after us and much hilarity ensued as Elisabeth played the arm flapping game with Simon. The evening was polished off very nicely by a delicious meal of spaghetti, meat sauce and pesto with one of Elisabeth’s fabulous salads.
The next morning we all huddled in the dining room away from the chill hanging over the rest of the house. Simon was passed around as we all enjoyed our breakfasts and the stunning winter views.
December 22, 2004 at 10:52 am · Filed under WTF?
Yes, it was indeed a bowl of nuts as expertly guessed by Jen. The photo quiz is now taking a short break for the holidays.
If you’ve had trouble getting here the past few days, it was due to a botched domain renewal. All now sorted.
December 18, 2004 at 9:18 pm · Filed under Family+Friends
We went to visit my father-in-law George and his family (wife Mary, sons Julian and Stephan) today, arriving an hour early as we always manage to do. We chatted with Julian and Stephan while George and Mary ran around preparing a smoked salmon and bagel brunch. Dan, Susan and baby Simon arrived at noon and we all dug in to the delicious food. George always buys Boddingtons when I’m visiting, so I had a good beer too.
Mary is making a movie about George, so a lot of the rest of the afternoon was spent being directed by Mary while she or Julian operated the video camera. Apparently it was very important not to show any snow views because the movie was a “fall movie”. Not sure what that was all about… We all got interviewed with tricky questions like “George is Hungarian, what do you think about that?” and “How much influence has George had on Jen?”.
Simon was a happy smiley baby nearly the whole time, only getting tired as we were leaving. He did jump out of his skin several times at George’s barking ebullient laughter though.
December 17, 2004 at 10:50 am · Filed under Blogging
I must apologise for the lack of content here over the past week. I’ve been swamped with work and the blogging time I have had has been spent arguing with Creationist Chris. I promise the festive season and the new year will bring much juicy blogness for your blogreading pleasure.
December 15, 2004 at 10:36 am · Filed under WTF?
A nice easy one for you this week. What is it?
December 14, 2004 at 3:34 pm · Filed under WTF?
Well here’s what it was. If you’re still unable to tell, it’s a blurry photo of a Pentium processor. Sorry for the late answer, busy busy!
December 13, 2004 at 5:45 pm · Filed under Family+Friends, Pubquiz
We had a very pleasant weekend at home with Dan, Susan and Simon. He’s such a good baby and hardly cried at all until he got over-tired. Grandma Elisabeth and Grandpa Richard joined us for dinner on Sunday night. I cooked a fish curry, vegetable curry, lemon rice, cilantro chutney and lemon pickle, finished off with a lemon sponge pudding, all of which came from Jamie Oliver’s first book.
Tonight is the postponed grand final of the McKibbin’s Pub Quiz, so get your thinking caps on and go for that $250 cash prize!
December 10, 2004 at 9:29 pm · Filed under Family+Friends
Dan, Susan and baby Simon arrived from Vancouver. Can’t talk, busy eating pasta and rocking baby. Back later.
December 9, 2004 at 9:48 am · Filed under Rants
Ever been sitting in a restaurant when an obnoxious woman (yes, it’s always a woman (well nearly always)) at the table next to you takes a call on her cellphone and starts yabbering away incessantly while you’re trying to eat?
Well the good people over at design firm Draplin Industries have created a wonderful antidote. Take your pick of several cute cards that you can print out from this PDF file. Cut it out, fill in the blanks, and thrust it under the nose of jabbering woman.
December 8, 2004 at 1:36 pm · Filed under Rants
Advertisement: If you’re in a jam and need a gift fast. Check out our special occasion gift baskets for more info and get great gift ideas here.
I was having some trouble coming up with gift ideas for Jen this year, so when she opened one of those smelly pages in the magazines she reads and rubbed it on herself, and said “oooh, this smells nice, I like it”, I thought all my problems were solved. I rushed out and purchased said smelliness.
Two weeks later we were wandering around The Bay or Sears or some such smelly store when she decided to try it again. “Oh, it doesn’t smell so good now” closely followed by “No, I don’t like it” meant I was back at square one.
A flash of inspiration gave me another idea. Ever since we saw them in Maxi a couple of years ago, Jen has been talking about getting a dancing hamster toy. They’re cute and cuddly, they dance, and they sing in annoying high pitched voices. So, maybe I can find one of those for her instead. Before I’d even started researching that she came bouncing in from her office one evening saying “I’ve ordered 4 dancing hamsters online!”. Gah. Women.
So now I’m back at square one again, looking for another flash of inspiration and hoping I come up with something before it’s too late.
December 7, 2004 at 9:13 am · Filed under Pubquiz
McKibbins was a disappointment last night, quizmaster Sean was there, but only to tell us that there would be no quiz because of some miscommunication between him and the pub. The big quiz final will now be next Monday.
On the plus side though, I did have a wonderful salad of tuna, salmon and rice with tempura shrimp. And we ran into Procrasto, Ginner Girl and JonasParker, so the evening wasn’t a total loss.
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