Christmas in PDX

Bet you can't guess where I spent my Christmas weekend! So much fun to snuggle and play with sweet little Tabor. Currently he's working on his fine motor skills - plays with tags and ribbon loops for hours, ok its really only a lot of minutes, on end. Give him a toy and he plays with the tag! Funny to watch him as his so intent as he manipulates the tags. His clever mommy even made his a tag blanket with great colorful loops of ribbon.

Speaking of his mommy and daddy, they are quite anxious for him to learn to crawl..... hmmm, that will be loads of fun! This weeked he did learn to deliberately roll over to his back and he's starting to sit up more.... still pretty wobbley as you can see in this great home video!....
A brief disclaimer..... granbabies make gramasans sound pretty silly so if you have a weak stomach, turn down the volume before you watch!!

While I was there I finally finished a brown knitted vest for Tabor and then failed to get a picture of him wearing it to Sunday morning meeting. Maybe he will wear it again and his mommy will get a picture for me. Now I need to finish a blue/green/white/grey sweater before he outgrows it - almost done - down to the button bands! Then I can start on something "pink" for little baby girl Wilson in Idaho!!

You think I am obnoxious now.... just wait until Gramasan has two little ones to brag about! I may be down right hard to live with!

The wimp has a new ride!

Well according to a son of ours..... you know, that oldest one who's initials start with Kevin Wilson......Gordon is a wimp (and a chicken) because he didn't keep on driving his Infiniti until the 300,000 mile mark. It only has 289,000 (too cold and snowy to go out and get the exact number) and runs well. Just starting to lose things like heater fan, dash lights, radio(Gordon says he checked the fuses) and it never did handle well in the snow. So.... for the second time in our 38 years of marriage we have purchased a new car. A few hints on buying a new car - do your homework first then go on a snowy day when they only have a few customers so not much prospect of a sale and then make them an offer that makes the dealer want to cry!

In case you can't tell from this snowy photo it is a Ford Fusion Hybrid. Turns out there is a steep learning curve to driving this - the first one being how to tell when is it really running and ready to go. The dealer forgot to tell us to look for the little green light on the dash - we sat at our mailbox last night perplexed and bewildered as it would not move. You can turn the key far enough for everything to look ready but of course the gas engine doesn't start up(that is a weird sensation to drive off without a sound)..... got turn the key just a little farther.

Here is why the poor new car is sharing the great outdoors with the other Wilson cars.... Snowing hard (again) even as we speak.

Great day to finally get cracking on some traditional holiday tasks. Just took my infamous fruitcake out of the oven. For those who don't know about this.... years ago I took Helen's (Gordon's mom) fruitcake recipe and morphed it. I just couldn't take the candied fruit and started substituting dried fruit. Quite a few years ago my recipe even made the Bend Bulletin -short article with the recipe and a photo! (must have been a slow week in the home and garden section). Anyway, it is a true fruit cake but not what you think.... although it is heavy enough to use as a door stop.

Just in case you are interested here is the recipe:

8 cups of assorted dried fruit: I usually use dried apricots, pineapple, dates, cranberries and papaya, except for this year I forgot the apricots (I was going to head to Costco and never got there) Be sure to cut up the largest fruit such as the pineapple and papaya and separate any pieces sticking together.
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
4 eggs
1 cup sugar
8 cups pecans

Mix the flour, baking powder and salt together. Put dried fruit in a very large bowl - you need room to stir (also helps to have a strong arm and a sturdy spoon). Mix up the fruit and then add flour mixture and start stirring. Make sure you stir from the bottom up - you are trying to coat all the fruit.

Beat the eggs and sugar together, add to the fruit and flour mixture. Again stir and stir until now it is all a gooey mixture. At this point at the pecans and stir again. I suppose the pecans can go in earlier but the original reciped said to add at this point so I always have.

Be prepared to get your hands into the goo.... Press mix into 3 regular size loaf pans - lined with oiled parchment paper. You can skip the parchment paper but it really makes is so much easier to get these out of the pans!

Bake at 275 degrees for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Turn out and cool on rack.

Playing catch up for the last month!

Can't believe it has been over a month since I last posted. Part of my problem is I sit at a computer 75% of my work day so sitting at a computer in the evening is not exactly high on my list. Give me a book or some yarn or a pillow and that makes a great evening.

I had hoped to get up to Portland to see Corey, Danica and Tabor (had a work meeting) but the passes were icky and we were pretty icy around here. Had to settle for calling into the meeting and looking at pictures of Tabor on my desk (and new ones on Danica's blog!) I plan to head their way for Christmas. Poor grandpasan has to work.

These are from the end of October when Tabor and I got to spend the day - just the two of us. Check out Danica's blog if you want to see anything current! Or to verify just how cute this little guy really is!

Fast forward to Thanksgiving!!
During the past month winter came upon us with a vengence. Of course Dave and Sandra and I headed over to Idaho to see Kevin and Shauna when it was the coldest. Hit Burley in the single digits and left Burley in howling wind, blowing snow across the road. But Dave is an intrepid driver and the whole trip was great! Had a wonderful time!

For those of you have been to Sandra's blog some of these Thanksgiving at Kevin and Shauna's will be repetitious and BORING.

We all took a turn or two at the lefse - a real learning curve here!

Shauna had this great plan - making snazzy watches for Sandra's birthday!

It was a bit overwhelming at first - mixing, matching, stringing, un-stringing.... until wah-lah, finished watches!

Pasta lessons from a 'lil ol' lady from Bend whose been to Italy once! Very authentic!?

Ready for the boiling water

Scout just before she does her nodding, head bobbing, dozing off move. Sorry Bella, didn't get any pictures of you but so glad you and Scout decided to get along. And I really did enjoy having you as a lap blanket dog on the long ride home.


For those of you who have made it this far.... I have a vague recollection of another reason why I don't post very often.... I have uploaded several pictures several times as I accidently delete while trying to fix fonts, alignment - where oh where is the re-do/un-do button? If you know of one let me in on the secret, please! Until next year?!

Finally got our travel pix under control!

I cannot believe how long it took me to get to these pictures... I think the task was a bit daunting. Two cameras, two different sets of eyes, 1598 still shots....that is after weeding through prior to uploading to the computer.

Managed to get what I hope are 318 enjoyable photos to share. OK, there might be a few too many mosaics in the mix but I was quite taken with these. Of course photos don't quite give you the same feeling but you will get the idea and flavor of our trip.

Hope you enjoy and if 318 pictures just aren't enough come on over; we can put you to sleep with the rest of the stills. And we haven't even touched the video other than to find out they cause the computer to crash (high definition) but they do play quite nicely on a TV!

You might notice I have a pathetic little album of Tabor on Picasa. Danica keeps so many great pictures on Flickr that I just cruise over there on a regular basis. All the pictures I try to take turn out blurry or weird. I got to spend some time with Corey and Danica and Tabor this past weekend. I had to go to Portland for work and stayed over. Spent Friday with Tabor while mommy and daddy worked all day. What a great time! He is just so much fun. The wider you smile, the wider he smiles back. He's getting to where he likes to sit on your lap but he won't talk much in that position, lay him on his back and he starts to converse. Besides enjoying Tabor it was so good to see how much he is adored by both his parents. They are doing such an awesome job of being parents!

Speaking of parents... Kevin and Shauna are expecting. OK, I have been corrected on this already, Shauna is expecting next May. So more excitement and another grandchild to steal our hearts! I am counting the days to Thanksgiving which I will spend in Heyburn with Kevin and Shauna. Riding over with Dave and Sandra. Should be a really fun trip!

Back to reality

Have been home for 5 days now, and back to work for 3! But before we actually got home we stayed one night at our favorite park and fly...and got some Tabor time. Stole this pix from Danica's flickr site as I was a bit too tired to even consider trying to snag a picture of the little cutie.



I know I am gramasan but what an adorable baby! I was so privileged to be able to pack that little guy around and snuggle, coo and laugh with him. He is really quite social, watching your face for cues, trying so hard to imitate facial expressions and trying to make the same sounds you do. Was hard to put him down for his nap... can't we play just a little bit longer?

Jet lag is pretty much behind me, .... now. It is surprising how much you might think you have converted back to the right time zone, only to get tripped up in the early evening. Do not lay down for a short nap at dinner time...

I have been asked several times what was my favorite place on the trip.... what a tough question. Each place we went had its own special appeal. I would go back to pretty much any of them in a heart beat except for perhaps Mykonos. The water there was great and the town charming but a few days there would be plenty, and only when the beaches aren't packed. Rome deserves more time, Venice we only glanced at and Athens is much more than the Acropolis I suspect. Florence... well that beautiful city also deserves more time but I think really I would love to go back and spend a week or more in a smaller Italian town absorbing the culture and the great food.

Speaking of food, we came home and bought a pasta 'machine' and have made fresh pasta two nights already. It is an art but after a few flubs we managed to make some pretty great dishes, simple but yummy. Cooked some eggplant tonight, sort of following a recipe; turned out pretty good. Probably if I did follow the recipe it would have been really great.

Have managed to upload and rotate all 782 photos from my camera. Gordon has some pix on his that I would like to pull into a 'small' Picasa album. He took his camera to work to share some pix with his co-workers so... once he is back home I will get cracking on the small album. Otherwise, you will be sorry if you ask to see any of our travel photos!

Day 5 in Rome and starting to figure it out!

Well,not that you can really figure out Rome but we are getting the hang of the buses and metro, still being amazed at pretty much every corner. For all its chaos it is really a great place. Went to the National Museum [there are 3 major parts and we covered them all]. Explored a catherdal designed by Michelangelo but built out of, over, into... as essentially a remodel of Roman baths that could serve 30,000 people. The original structure covered blocks, we saw only a small part. Originally had a 30,000 sq ft pool, hot or cold? Not sure which but there were two pools.

Found a great place for lunch, packed with locals, waiter seemed to be ingoring us for seating but he had already figured out we needed a tavolo per due and was waiting for one to open for us. [don't be impatient, it does not help] Incredible, simple food but very, very yummy. Got our waiter to pose for a picture with me. Lots of benissimo's later, up the stairs to street level. Ate at 2,30 and its 8,30 pm [can you tell i can't find the colon symbol] and we are not hungry - could eat but really not hungry.

Last stop was part of the museum, three metro stops away, where we walked down 1000 years below the street. Across the street were more ruins where old Julius was stabbed. Also a charity home for cats and more cats.

Still think our biggest threat is getting hit by a scooter, a taxi or a bus. Pickpockets seem to be afraid of us and we're figuring out the food so the restaurants can't rip us off any more.... starting to fall in love with the crazy place!

Off to the Colesseo e Forum domani - that would be the Coliseum and Forum tomorrow. Whew!

Side trip to Naples and Pompei

Today we took the train south to Pompei to visit the ruins. That was a trip in itself. Had to change trains in Naples but couldn't find even the right set of tracks and then we did end up on the wrong train. With virtually no English we got help from a kind Italian who let us know to get off at the next station and wait for the next train that was behing us.
Spent almost 4 hours at Pompei and easily could spend 4 days. It was fascinating to say the least. Wanted to spend time in Naples at the Archeologic Museum so we headed back to Naples. Another adventure to find where to purchase Metro tickets and then which line, etc ... quite a bit different than Rome. You buy these in the magazine store.. anyway after all that I had failed to read the fine print, the museum is closed on Tuesdays! So we walked around Naples. It is quite a bit rougher than Rome, lots more graffiti and trash, narrower streets with more scooters. But all in all not as bad as everything we had read. We half expected to be robbed on every corner but we had absolutely no trouble. Had great authentic Naples pizza as Naples is where pizza originated. Very simple, thin chewy crust cooked in a wood burning pizza oven. Really yummy!

Tomorrow is a sleep in day and then the National Museum and ? - ahh, I found the ? mark ont this keyboard!