A month away from becoming two

Adeline turns 2 in a month. I've been fearfully waiting for her to become that terrible two, but she seems to be OK so far. Rather, I am actually really enjoying her new abilities to do a lot of things. Of course, she is emotional and volatile, but she is a girl. So, let her be.

I love this photo of her. She looks so sweet, yet she has a lot of rice on her hands. Mealtime is a mix of joy and mess.

I've already posted this on Facebook but am posting it again for those who haven't seen it. This is typical Addie whom we love. On Sunday, she called Mike and me and said "Look! Addie Marble Shoes!" She stuck her marbles on the back of her feet and started tap dancing for us. She is such a performer!

This is another one from today. This version is "cup feet" as she calls it. She has been doing it for a while, but I finally got to capture it today. I love all these fun things she shows us and wonder from where she gets the ideas. Need less to say that there is no boring day for us as long as we have her.

Valentine's Day

I had a great Valentine's day this year. Mike spoiled me with so many good things.

He brought home these beautiful orchids in a pot for me. I've never grown orchids before in my life but pretty excited to have these at home. I love orchids. As a matter of fact, I wore orchids in my hair on our wedding day because I thought these are beautiful flowers.

Then, he got me huge chocolate covered strawberries. Ever since we've known each other, he has always gotten me chocolate covered strawberries for Valentine's. This is a tradition to keep for sure.

Then, he made me a huge Surf and Turf dinner! He said he spent only a half or less of what we would spend at a restaurant, but I had nothing to complain with the lobster tails, shrimps and steaks. Now I won't take his "I-can't-cook" because now I know he can. Since Mike and Addie are both allergic to shellfish, I got to eat most of them and they were delicious!

And, Addie and I made people shaped chocolate sugar cookies with a heart because we "heart" each other very much.

Spinach Pasta

Today I made spinach pasta with mushroom cream sauce. I really wish I had a pasta machine so that I don't have to roll out dough by hand every time when I make pasta. But it tasted pretty good and it had a lot of good green spinach. I won't call it healthy because of the butter, cream and cheese I put in the sauce, but hey it's green and there is your veggie for the meal.

What is in our water?

Have you ever wonder what is in your water?

For the last week or so, Adeline's humidifier has been making a loud rattling noise. The humidifier is only about 1.5 years old. It's too early for it to break down, I thought. To investigate the cause of the strange noise, we decided to open up the humidifier.

This is what we found. It's about 2/3 cup of "mineral" deposit. I hope it's "mineral" because if it's not, I don't know what it is. I promise we never put anything but water in the humidifier. After 18 months, that's what you get. As you can see in the picture, it was so hard that we had to use a screwdriver to chisel the deposit into pieces. No wonder why it was making a rattling noise.

Now I am a little bit scared to know that this is in our drinking water.

Sad truth about my new pans

After my post about the new pans, I researched a bit more about the pans I bought. Then I read that the nonstick surface that is used for my new pans were pretty much the same or similar as Teflon and even made by the same company... Maybe I should have gone with stainless steel. Sad sad....

I reviewed more about the return policy. I'll be paying for my own shipping (which I did not pay when the package arrived) and potentially a restocking fee since I partially opened the package. So, I am going to lose at least 10% of the original cost and potentially up to 30% if they determine that the packaging is damaged. Sigh. I am really wondering if it's worth returning the item if I don't get all my money back. It doesn't seem to be a bad product. I liked their pot and haven't had any problem for 5 years. Anyways, now I am leaning towards keeping it. This is, indeed, an expensive lesson learned for me.

Bye Bye Teflon

Yesterday I got a set of new pans from Amazon. I am pretty excited about it.

This is the non-stick pan I have used ever since we got married. I think it was one of the wedding gifts. A lot of my daily creations have come from this pan.

As you can see, the non-stick coating is badly damaged. I guess a non-expensive non-stick pan doesn't last for a long time when someone like me uses it. Since I do not own any stainless steal or cast iron pan, my effort in trying to sear some meat at a high temperature in this pan must have ruined it all. In the process of it, I and my family probably have consumed chemically dangerous smoke and food, too. So, it was time for me to get something new.

These are what I got. I have a 3.5 quart pot from the same brand for almost 5 years and liked it a lot so far. Everything cooked nicely and retains heat pretty well even at a lower temperature. Nothing burns and cleaning is so easy. Only thing I did not like about it was the silicon rubber handle that gets slippery when it gets warm. So, this time I bought pans from the same brand with no silicon handle. I hope these will be nice replacements for my old pans. The next step is to get some bigger stainless steel sauté pan and improve my cooking skills.

Presents

A few days before Christmas, Adeline accidentally stepped on her present under the tree and waited for a long few days to finish up her job.

クリスマスの数日前にアディーがクリスマスツリーの下にあるプレゼントを踏んでしまって以来、プレゼントを開ける日を長々と待っていましたが、やっとクリスマスの日にプレゼントを開けることができました。

She got a new kitchen set. My intention was that she might learn how to do dishes with this new set.

新しいキッチンセット。これでお皿洗いを覚えてくれたらいいのですが。

"Elmo Abby book", as she calls it.

Addie's pirate tea party. On the Christmas day we noticed that Addie was quiet and were wondering what she was doing. And, this was what she was doing. She instantly loved her Christmas present and still calls it "Addie present" when she wants to play with it. Now she got a little more creative and sits her stuffed animals and babies around the tea cups and feed them food.

海賊のティーパーティー。ちょっと静かだなと思ってのぞいてみると、こんな風に一人で遊んでいました。最近はぬいぐるみを座らせてご飯を食べさせてます。