Our Trek Through Texas

Well, we recently returned from a 1 week adventure through the Southwest.  We drove into Texas to see Mary and Michael in Del Rio and Sarah, Dom, and Mia in Houston.  The driving a little excessive, but it was worth it to see the family! :)

Our first stop was in Del Rio, TX, where Mary and Michael were fabulous hosts.  We traveled around the city and saw the Del Rio sights.  We also experienced Lake Amistad and it was a blast! Barley was unsure at first, but with some coaxing he managed a little swimming. 

We also ate at some cute local spots around town, including Memo's. We had some fun and did some acro in the grass outside of Memo's, and when we went inside, the patrons gave us a round of applause for our performance (we didn't know they were watching... or could even see us!)

Tommy got into the Texas spirit and almost walked out of the store with the lasso :) See for yourself how good he is with the lasso.

 

 



Thank you Mary and Michael for a great trip!! :) You guys were great hosts and we had a blast in your small world of Del Rio! :)

After Del Rio, it was on to Houston for some more family visits.  When we arrived, Mia was VERY excited to see Barley! He was pretty excited too, at first, but eventually I think her constant "Doggie!"-ing got to him.  Our entire visit, he was very patient with Mia, which was very comforting :)

 Our first morning was spent at the Houston Zoo. It was fairly big but very well-kept! Here's a shot Tommy took of a jaguar mid-jump.

 









Tommy and I went to the climbing gym in Houston. It was pretty nice, but we are very spoiled at Rocks and Ropes in Tucson.

 Sarah made me a birthday cake. It was not just ANY birthday cake, but a Kennedy favorite... chocolate parfait cake! It was bowl-lickin' good!

Then it was off to Galveston. Barley loves the ocean!

 A little ocean yoga :)

Mia loves her uncle Tommy!

She loves him so much that she feeds him bagel chips without him even asking!

And then she stuffs them in his mouth until he can't fit anymore :)

 Sarah and Dom have these great bamboo floors but are too soft to withstand Barley's claws, so we bought him booties to wear around the house.  He actually did a great job with them! This is the face he gives me when he's practicing being patient and wants to be reassured that he's a good boy.

Thank you Sarah, Dom, and Mia for an awesome time in Houston! It was so much fun to watch Mia and Barley together! 

 What a trip! Barley was worn out by the end f it and slept for the entire 17 hour drive home. Though we decided to split the drive into two days. As we arrived in El Paso to spend the night, out poor car couldn't take the 90 mph driving anymore and overheated.  We added coolant and made it home the next day, though our head gasket was mis-shaped and it turned into an expensive repair... At least we made it back!

 Even God is bigger in Texas!

Yay! Alternative energy! There are quite a few windmills along the interstate in Texas.










"Clearly, we need more incentives to quickly increase the use of wind and solar power; they will cut costs, increase our energy independence and our national security and reduce the consequences of global warming."
~Hillary Rodham Clinton

Acro Yoga with Babies!

Mia and I attempted some acro yoga during her visit :)

This pose is called bird

This is a new pose, not quite as easy with 2 adults... :)

A Tucson Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving we had a Kennedy Klan (minus the Paris Kennedy's) to our house. We were a full house with 6 adults, a baby, a cat, and a dog, but we somehow made it work :)

Sarah and I were relieved when we found out that Mia LOVED Barley! 

I was shocked and how well he behaved around her :)

He also LOVED her :) He gave her kisses any chance he had...

Barley was trying his best to be good around all the yummy food :)

Tommy worked on Thanksgiving, so we went to Cottonwood to eat lunch there. It was DELICIOUS (of course) :) Then, he came home and helped cook another Thanksgiving dinner! 

Whew! We wore him out that week :)

Mia also had her first Sweet Tomatoes experience. It went pretty well :)

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving as well! :)

Cheers!

Ice Cream and other updates :)

So, Tommy and I are in the processing of preparing for my family to visit over Thanksgiving. We're trying to clean and collect items for Mia, etc.... But the most important thing that we are doing it making ice cream! We made a pumpkin ice cream with a whipped cream swirl (don't know if the whipped cream part will work out or not...), and a HOMEMADE Phish Food ice cream!! I'm extremely excited about the latter! :) 

On another note, Tommy and I have a new hobby. It's called Acro Yoga. It basically involves acrobatic moves with yoga breathing and poses. There are some elements or massage as well :) Here are some pictures of us:

 In this picture, Tommy is completely supporting me on my upper arms.

This is me trying star... it's a really tough pose! Eventually, the goal is to bring the legs up straight and bring the arms to your side.  You use your head to balance you :)

 These two pics are of us with our friends Naya and Miguel. We met them in an Intro To Acro Yoga class and have met up with them on the U of A campus to practice :) It's nice because we all need spotters for the harder poses :)

These pics are ok, but I hope to get a video of us doing a flow so you can get the whole effect :) Though it might be awhile since we are without a camera right now :)

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On another note, Tommy and I went to San Diego for my birthday! It was my first time to California. It was so beautiful there!!! Though... it felt pretty fake... We took Barley with us on his first road trip and he did great too!! :) We took him to a dog beach and he got in the ocean. He was a little leery at first, but got used to it pretty quickly. We stayed with Tommy's Aunt Amanda and Uncle Bob. They were so open to having Barley at their house too :) It worked out great!!!!  

We can't wait for the holidays!! I guess they already started with Halloween :) We went through 7 bags of candy for Halloween! Our streets were lined with cars of people who drove to our neighborhood to trick or treat. We see this as a good sign for the neighborhood :) We are definitely kid-friendly and safe :)

I hope everyone is well and will write soon! :)

Namaste :)

Family

June was family month for us. We spent over two weeks traveling to see family and then returned to Tucson with family :) Here is a rundown of our family frenzy.

June 3rd to June 9th - Fly to Atlanta... dinner with Dad at amazing Italian pizza restaurant... drinks with friends... little sleep... caravan for 4 hours to Thomasville, GA... rehearsal dinner for Gregg and Anna's wedding... reception setup... drinks with friends... little sleep... explore Thomasville downtown... cute coffee shop visit (twice)... shop... pool time at hotel... wedding... reception... drinks with friends... little sleep... reception cleanup... drive 4 hours back to Atlanta... outlet mall shopping... dinner at Angie and Corey's amazing house... drinks with friends... little sleep... relaxing morning (yay!)... rock climbing... dinner and drinks with theSiegel's... little sleep... carpool with Angie to Knoxville... visit HPER building... lunch withDocand Dale... Market Square shopping... dinner at Tomato Head (Yum!)... drinkswithfriends...little sleep... drive back to Atlanta at 7am... Siegel'spooltime...Mary'sapartment and goodbye to Michael... delicious dinner and drinks with Dad and friends... little sleep

June 10th - Fly to St. Louis, MO... drive 3 hours to Santa Claus, Indiana... eat dinner at horrible "Amish" restaurant... welcomes from Kennedy Reunion Klan... little sleep on rickety futon...

June 11th to June 13th - Holiday World!... sit in muggy Indiana heat with family... babies falling asleep in our arms... pizza for dinner... little sleep... wake up to coffee... adorable nieces and nephew... boys go on hike... fun with Ellie... sit in muggy Indiana heat with family... lots of pictures... babies galore... late night cards with the fam... little sleep... repeat...

June 14th to June 17th - drive 5 hours to Columbia, Missouri... meet Josh's girlfriendElizabeth... babies galore... cards with the fam... little sleep... hang with family... walkdowntownColumbia... amazing coffee (thrice)... babies galore... pool time (amazing!)...yummy food...cards with fam... little sleep...

June 18th - Drive 2 hours to St.Louis... Fly home to Tucson... Pick up Erin and MomatGuadalajara Grill... return home to stuffy house... GREEN pool... little sleep...

June 19th - 23rd - Shopping with Erin and Mom... yummy food... Mom painted our ceiling in main room (YAY!)... frown at green pool... return to work... celebrate Tommy's birthday... play with animals... little sleep...

June 24th - Erin and Mom leave on trek back to Atlanta... empty house... couch time :)

It was SSOO amazing to see everyone in June! I can't believe that we fit it all in! Though it was busy, it was a great vacation and break from our Tucson life :)

Here are some pics of the frenzy :)

The Grandbabies :)

The boys preparing for the hike :)

Not much better than a baby sleeping in your arms...

Great Grandpa and Grandma :)

The boys and their childhood toys.

Uncle Tommy :)

Auntie Em

Mia just chillin in the pool :)

Amy and her babies :)

Anticipation

The holidays are coming soon! YAY!! Tommy and I are having my parents and brother over for Thanksgiving and we are so excited! It's our first time to have family over for a holiday meal :) It makes me feel grown-up. My little grown-up self will be going to bed before 10... Now I just feel old...:) good night.

Life on Mars

VIEW!
I took this picture when we first set up the office, where I'm sitting now, but never posted it. The building in the foreground is the other building in our complex (ours is two stories). The northern part of the city secretly unfolds for about 10 or 15 miles behind the sparse trees until the dramatic rise of the Catalina mountains. With little exception, the city is flat and surrounded by mountains that dominate the skyline. From any mountain around the city you gain enough elevation to see all the way across the city to the mountains on the other side, and the dust that rises throughout the city blurs the bottom of the mountains into the city, making the mountains look like they are just floating in space. It's too surreal for me to appreciate.



HONORED GUESTS!
Mary and Michael were our first visitors. We had a great time with them. We did tons of cool things with them like mountain biking, hiking, concert, brewery, and in typical Mattimoe fashion we had to cook and eat (and take pictures of the process).


They are scared to be outside of Tech's library for too long, but they were brave and did great.



Ceremonial chickens grilling themselves on Em and my $25 craigslist charbroiler (the same one my parents had when I was a boy). I put diamonds on all my food. My Mom got me that veggie grilling pan a few years ago, and I recommend it. The leftover peppers and onions make the best pasta sauce I've ever had.



Dinner is served! I love the way food looks on our peacock fiestaware plates, and they're durable. We are getting to where we have a respectable house - a far cry from all my other wartorn apartments. If you didn't know us better, you'd swear we were grownups.

FOOD
Roast chicken is my new favorite meal. It's healthy, cheap, delicious, beautiful, and cetera. Between the two of us, we eat like royalty and have leftovers for under $10. My favorite part is saving the carcasses and making Chicken Stock; my chicken stock is so good, I drink it by the glass.


Emily hd to hold the chicken still while I took this pic. I follow Jacques Pepin's recipe from La Technique, the best cookbook and the final word on preparations of classics.



I season the bird with lavender, grains of paradise, ground bay leaf, and some other stuff for heavenly citrusy floral overtones along with the solid base of classics like S, P, garlic, celery salt, and cumin. I would freak out if there weren't parsnips in that pan too; they give the dish a wonderfully clean earthiness (I think the earthiness the have is more like what mountains would taste like rather than the forresty taste of good fungi).



This is the worst range in the world. I hate induction tops because they get a film of grease on them and look gross, they heat in a nonlinear fashion, and we can't use our tin-lined copper on them.



This is what's for dinner. I've been experimenting with using yogurt instead of butter or cream sauces. After working in a French kitchen and gaining twenty pounds in a matter of months, I don't care what traditionalists say. I make a concentrated flavor sauce base, blix it into the warm yogurt, and then sieve it. They are getting delicious. The main consideration is the acid in the yogurt; I deglazed this sauce with white wine before adding chicken demi and if I'd used butter or cream to thicken it would have been balanced, but it had too much edge with the yogurt. Still a delicious.


Pretty bird.


Not bad for $10.

Em and I are currently busy with work and wedding planning. We are running like dinner with our heads cut off. That's life, and it's made palatable with good cooking and delicious with good company.

"There are some people who lived a lifetime without finding the one who relieved the heart's overflow." -E. Welty