the ZELLER box

Sad truth about my new pans

2012-01-26T13:56:00.004-07:00

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

2012-01-25T21:07:00.003-07:00

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

2012-01-13T21:51:00.003-07:00

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。

Christmas Eve & Christmas Dinner 2011

2012-01-04T20:59:00.005-07:00

This Christmas was a nice and quiet one for us. Since we were all sick, we didn't see any of our family as we had originally planned. Even though we weren't feeling well enough to go out to anywhere, I wanted something more than usual for our little Christmas.

I saw a recipe for hand rolled pasta called pici a little while ago and thought it was a good time to try it. I have never seen pici on a menu at any Italian restaurant here and don't really know what it's supposed to taste like, but that didn't make me stop from trying it. It was very time consuming to roll each noodle, but it was mindless and kind of therapeutic for me. I certainly cannot make this every week, but it was fun.

They look a lot like Japanese Udon noodles and have the same ingredients, too. I am not quite sure what the difference between them except that you cook pici in salted water.

I made homemade ragu to go with the pici.

Mike said he liked it better than spaghetti. I thought it was good, too. Maybe I'll make this our Christmas Eve tradition. We'll see...

This was our Christmas dinner. We had a roast chicken, homemade chicken gravy, green beans and cranberries with garlic lemon butter, creamed spinach, sautéed mushrooms with balsamic vinegar, mashed potatoes, and homemade Italian bread. Even though I cooked the chicken upside-down, everything tasted very delicious. Even though I made all the dishes all by myself, it was not so stressful because I didn't have to cook for a big crowd. So, no stress, great food and it was a great Christmas dinner.

Christmas Cookies

2011-12-23T20:31:00.004-07:00

Christmas is right around the corner. Mike has been making a lot of cookies recently to give to our friends and neighbors. Yesterday we made a bunch of Star Wars cookies and today was my turn to make some Christmas cookies.

Mike busy in the kitchen, making his sugar cookie dough. His muscly arms are very useful in the kitchen, too.

This morning Adeline made her first cookies ever in her life.

She was excited to use cute Christmas cookie cutters.

She chose the star cookie cutter for her first cookie.

She was so excited to see her star cookie and almost ate it before we put it in the oven.

She was a good helper and helped Mike roll out the dough.

She tried the Christmas tree shape.

After 10 minutes in the oven, she got her fist star cookie! She was so proud!

I made royal icing for the first time and had so much fun icing the cookies!! They don't look professional at all but I am still proud of it. Since we didn't have the right tools, we just used normal spoons and knives to paint the cookies.

They look pretty cute, right?

With leftover, I made an "A" cookie for Addie. She loved it!

RE: Nursery

2011-12-07T22:14:00.002-07:00

Hello.

Thanks for all the comments. I am feeling more encouraged now about my new nursery experience. Perhaps, the schedule we were given was more of a suggestion than a must-follow.

This is what we got from the primary prior to our first Sunday with the kids.

2:10-2:40 Play with toys

2:40-3:00 Music time

3:00-3:15 Snack time

3:15-3:25 Lesson

3:25-3:35 Lesson Activity

3:35-3:50 Play with toys

3:50-4:00 Clean up

This schedule has snack time, actual lesson time and activities that go with the lesson separately, drawn out to 35 minutes. So, we literally tried to implemented it and it was pretty difficult. So, in the future, we will take your suggestions and make them more bearable both for the children and us.

Wish us luck :)

Nursery

2011-12-05T21:40:00.003-07:00

Adeline is such a girl. She loves to dress up.

She wanted to do her hair like her mommy and insisted that she would put hot curlers in her hair with a flower on her head. Of course, I had to help her with the hot curlers but she was so happy to see them in her hair even thought I did such a lazy job. I never taught her but, she loves to wear jewelry and sometimes even picks her own clothes.

I don't know if anyone remembers my recent post about me rambling about my poor child rearing skills. Guess what! We got called to be nursery workers at church two Sundays ago. Who would thought, right? Perhaps, someone in heaven read my blog, realized that I needed major help in the area and put me to work without delay. Yesterday was our first Sunday and it was very challenging. We only had six kids but have a lot to learn. We were told to do a lesson for 10 minutes, but let me just say that it was a struggle... Are we supposed to have everyone sit through the lesson for 10 minutes? Or it is OK if someone runs around and distract the entire class? We came to a conclusion that it is impossible to have all the children quietly sit in their chairs for more than a minute or two. And, this is just one of many things. If anyone have any helpful suggestion for us, any comments are appreciated.

Let it snow. Let it snow. Let it snow.

2011-11-21T21:54:00.003-07:00

We had snow last Friday night. Adeline looked outside and said " sNOw! outSIDE!" (all the lowercase letters are silent and it sounds like "no! side!".) She looked at the trees and said "Oh No! Happa! sNOw!" Happa is "leaf" in Japanese and she was concerned about the leaves covered with snow. Then, she looked at the swings outside and said "Oh no! Whee!"

She says "Oh no! Ashi!". Ashi is "foot" in Japanese. Her feet were covered in snow and she wasn't quite sure what to do with it.

Then she goes, "Oh no! Te te!" Te is "hand" in Japanese. Snow got stuck to her little mitten and she didn't know what to do.

But after a while, she got over the snow all on her feet and hands and helped us make a snowman.

It was supposed to be a snowman, but it got skinny like a totem pole with a mean face.

Addie and Leaves

2011-11-17T21:21:00.005-07:00

Today is one of those days when I feel like I should not be a mom. Sometimes I feel like we should have another kid, but I really don't think that's a good idea when my blood pressure goes up like it did today. I don't know how many times I said "No!" in the last 12 hours. Maybe it was due to having three kinds under age 19 months at the same time in our small apartment. Regardless, I felt bad for the kids and for me. They are all good kids individually, but when they all get together they do things that they don't usually do. Perhaps, I am not a patient person and don't have a big heart. Or, maybe we need to baby-proof our place more. But at the end of the day, everything is OK. Hallelujah.

I took this picture last week. Even though I have a lot to improve in the area of motherhood, Adeline doesn't wait for me. She keeps growing up. She is looking more like a girl day after day. She never stops smiling at me. A picture like this is a good reminder of who I can become and I am thankful for the angel I have in my life.

Adeline's First International Trip - Part 3 - "Onsen"

2011-11-14T20:24:00.006-07:00

There is still a lot to be said about this trip. I should just finish it up really quick but am not going to because I am thinking about printing out the all the blog posts in the future for our family record.

That said, back to the trip. One weekend, my dad took us all - my grandparents, my aunt, my two sisters, my niece, Addie and me - to an onsen resort in Kofu, Yamanashi.

On our way to the hotel, we stopped at a restaurant to get hōtō. My aunt and Addie in front of the restaurant.

Hoto. I love these thick, chewy noodles with yummy miso soup. It's the best on a cold day.

After we dropped off our luggage at the hotel, we visited a nearby shrine called Takeda Shingen Jinja. Addie is pointing at her cute behind saying that she had poopied. She looks so uncomfortable but cute.

These girls love playing with rocks. Kanna is posing for the camera.

Adeline playing with leaves. She just goes and finds stuff she likes and makes her feel at home anywhere.

From the left: my dad, grandpa, grandma and aunt at dinner table.

From the left: my sister Mai, me, Addie, Kanna and Rei. Three girls and two daughters. The food was excellent but it was challenging to enjoy the good food with two crazy kids. I was reminded again why we don't go to a nice restaurant with Adeline. But, I really did enjoy the food.

Kanna fell off her bed. You can see her buried in futon. Luckily, my sister anticipated this to happen and had a futon right next to the bed. Since there was no pack n play, we had to share a twin size futon with our kids.

While kids were still sleeping we went to soak ourselves in onset a few times. It was so relaxing and perfect.

A group picture. It was really nice to spend time together with my family. I wish that we could go on a trip like this more often.

Adeline's First International Trip - Part 2 - Aquarium

2011-11-06T21:34:00.005-07:00

Adeline and I went to the newly remodeled aquarium in Sunshine, Ikebukuro, with Adeline's grandma whom she calls "Basshie". We think that "Basshie" came from the word "oba-chan" in Japanese. Anyways, this is the same aquarium that I went for the first time when I was Addie's age. I prefer an aquarium over zoo personally and this was a fun visit for me. I probably did enjoy it more than Addie did since she was distracted by other children around her.

Adeline wanted sit in the very front row to see the fish. But you can tell that she was also very curious about kids next to her.

There was a lot of fish, as you can see.

Finally, there is actually a picture of her looking at the fish. It was really cute to see her point at sharks and manta rays when they came close to us.

Ocean sunfish. It was really big and Addie did not like it very much. I tried to let her get close to it but she was too scared.

On the other hand, she did like the jellyfish. She kept saying "This! This!"

We also got to see a little show with sea lions. She seemed to be watching it a little but I think she liked the clapping and whistling from the audience more than the show itself.

Turtles. She liked them because she knew how to say "turtle" in her own way.

As a parent, I was really curious about how she would react to all these different kinds of fish because we had never even been to the zoo that's only 5 minutes away from our place. We had been to Petco a few times but that is it. I hope it was an exciting experience for her and stimulated her growing mind.

I love this picture because it's so colorful and interesting. I hope Adeline will learn about many beautiful creations in the world that she lives in.

Adeline's First International Trip - Part 1

2011-11-03T21:10:00.006-06:00

It has been almost 2 weeks since we came back from Japan. Because of the busy pace of life here, it seems like this trip never happened. But we had such a great time in Japan and we already miss it so much!

日本から帰ってきてもうすぐ２週間が経ちます。こちらの生活がとても忙しいので、この旅行がまるでなかったみたいに思えます。でも、日本ですごい楽しい時間を過ごせて、すでに日本が恋しいです。

Our 12 hour flight from LA to Tokyo was a very long flight as Adeline slept for only 4 hours. Because of jet lag and lack of sleep, She was completely out for that night and missed her first dinner in Japan. We tried to wake her up, but nothing worked.

アディーは飛行機で４時間しか寝なかったのでロスから成田までは長い１２時間でした。着いてから、疲れと時差ぼけで爆睡でした。

Our first meal in Japan. It was simple, but so good. It was worth the long flight, I thought. After the dinner, we said good-bye to Mike as he was going to spent the next 10 days with his class. It was really sad to leave him because we had never been apart for that long since we got married. But we were able to stay in touch for the whole time thanks to my dad who let Mike use his iPhone during our stay in Japan.

日本での最初の夕飯。おいしかったです。夕飯の後にマイクと別れて、マイクは学校のクラスの人たちと次の１０日間を過ごしました。結婚してから１０日間も別々に過ごしたことがなかったので、寂しかったですが、お父さんがiPhoneを貸してくれたのでマイクと連絡を取ることができました。

Adeline woke up at 3 in the morning the next day. I tried to tell her it was still too early to wake up and she needed to sleep, but her little body didn't understand. Unfortunately, this lasted the next four days.

アデリンは朝の３時に起床。寝ないとだめだよって言っても、わかってなかったみたいです。４日間くらいは時差ぼけで朝早く起きてました。

Adeline and I stayed with my youngest sister and her little family for the two weeks we had in Japan. Adeline met her cousin Kanna for the first time in life and they became best friends instantly.

アデリンと私は妹の家に泊まりました。アデリンも従姉妹のカンナと初対面。すぐに仲良しになりました。

They played, laughed, cried and fought. But they were together from morning till night for the next 2 weeks.

毎日朝から晩まで遊んで、笑って、泣いて、けんかしての２週間でした。

Adeline wanted to do everything Kanna was doing. During our stay, she learned so many new words, songs and even Kanna's habits.

アデリンはカンナのやってることを全部やりたいと言って、２週間で新しい言葉とか歌をいっぱい教えてもらいました。

It was so fun for me to see them play together. At first, I thought I wouldn't enjoy this trip as much because Mike wasn't with us, but I was able to really enjoy it. There was no work or chore to worry about. All I had to care about was Adeline and it was so nice. I think Addie and I got closer during this trip because we spent every hour of every day together. As a working mom, it was such a treat. I am really thankful.

普段は仕事をしててなかなかアディーと一緒にいる機会が少ないので、仕事も家事も気にせずに、アディーと一緒に時間を過ごせて本当にいい機会になりました。

Waiting...

2011-10-29T23:51:00.002-06:00

What am I waiting for???

Yes. My husband.

It's almost midnight and he is still not home.

Where is he?

He is on his way home from NYC. According to Jet blue's website, I think he is somewhere over Wyoming.

Since he has been away from us for a half of this month, I am kind of bored...

Reading blogs and browsing websites just add more things I want to my already-so-long wish list.

Not very good. Because my bank account doesn't grow as fast as my wish list.

Now you see that I am really bored...

18 Months

2011-10-02T20:29:00.003-06:00

Adeline is now 18 months old. I can't believe how fast she is growing. When I look at newborn babies, Adeline doesn't look like a baby any more. She is turning into a girl and sometimes it seems as if I can see a glimpse of what she is going to look like when she grows up.

This picture was given by our neighbor. You can tell that they have a nice camera and we don't. Anyways, maybe it's because we are first time parents, but we are so amazed by her ability to learn. We are excited about every little thing that she learns each day. Now she can say a lot of things and communicate her thoughts to us. It's really fun to talk to her and she makes us laugh with her funny words, too. My favorite word of Addie's is "Bammo" It's a combination of Bambi and Dumbo. Every time when she reads her Bambi book, she says "Bammo" and makes me laugh. She can repeat after us and say most of the alphabets and remembers the hand gestures that go with songs. I never knew that an 18 months old can do so much!

She has always been a good eater, but her favorite is probably blueberries. I think she would eat a whole pound by herself, if I don't stop her.

I wish I could save every image of her in my head because every face makes touches my heart.

FüD Feud 2011

2011-09-17T21:24:00.016-06:00

Today I spent the most of my morning and early afternoon at FüD Feud. FüD Feud is a cooking contest for armature chefs. I had never heard of it until a week ago when I got an email coupon from Living Social. After I saw the email, I thought...should I maybe try it if I get a discount to enter the contest? So, I went home and talked to Mike about it and registered for the contest that night.

This was the schedule for the day.

My spot was the corner with the black tablecloth.

Everyone was busy setting up their dishes. I walked around and peeked what everyone else brought. By this time, the room was filled with yummy smell and I was very hungry.

Here are some of my competitors dishes. I thought it was appropriate for the game day. (Utes played BYU today and they won!!)

Dessert section. It smelled so sweet and chocolaty everywhere.

This person went all out with her decoration. She even had a watermelon carved like a turtle.

This one was mine. I made cold buttercup squash soup with creamy custard as an appetizer. I garnished it with cherry tomatoes and basil from our garden.

Probably, the best part of the contest was being able to taste everyone's dishes. This person made salmon burgers. There were quite a few Asian theme dishes. It made me wonder if I should have done a Japanese dish.

Mike and I liked this one a lot. There was just so much food and I could not taste everything. Just imagine, it was like a huge potluck party, but better. We just ate and ate for an hour. At this point, I felt that the registration fee was worth it because it covered the lunch for three of us.

Right before the award ceremony....

Well, well, well.... After all, I did not come home with any prize. Sad! They were giving out great prizes. I think the best prize was $100 gift certificate and dinner certificates to multiple restaurants and cook books and so on. That was for just one person! I didn't even win the raffle! It was such a disappointment because I was probably one of the 5 people who didn't even get anything from the raffle.

But all in all it was a very good experience. I have never entered a contest before and I have finally done it. That itself is an accomplishment. I learned a lot from today. I think my dish was a little foreign to a lot of people and lot of people didn't know what to expect from it. I think when things are foreign to people, they are not well received all the time. So, I could have done a better job explaining my dish or named it differently. And, I should have thought more about what to make. My dish was kind of an experiment to me as well and I might have gone a little too far on the creative side. Since the dishes that won were spring rolls, fish burgers, salsa and etc., I probably could have stuck with something more tame. But the funny thing was that none of the dish that Mike and I liked won any prize either. So, it could be simply that my palate is very different from others and I am not so good at making things that everyone else likes. I will need a lot of practice learning what everyone likes without compromising what I like. Or, I have to cook like Paula Deen with lots of bacon, butter and sugar. So, if anyone wants to come over to my kitchen to tell me what I need to improve, you are always invited. Unfortunately, even if I want to, I can't stop cooking just because I didn't win today. I still have to cook for my family everyday, at least until when we can afford more eating out. So, I'll keep practicing until another opportunity like this comes again.

And, even though I didn't win a cooking contest, I am OK because I won the mom of the cute baby contest.

Labor Day Hike

2011-09-07T21:43:00.006-06:00

We went for a short hike to Ensign Peak on Labor Day. We didn't even take a baby carrier this time around, hoping Adeline would walk all the way to the top.

Well, if we let her walk, it might have taken all day to get to the top (even though it should only take maybe 20-30 minutes from the trail head) because she would stop after every step to pick up rocks.

So, we carried her most of the way up. It was really windy at the top.

There were big rain clouds and we had a kind of dramatic view of the valley. After the hike, we stopped at the Beehive House next to the Joseph Smith Memorial Bldg and got a tour there. It was kind of cool to see inside because I had never been there. The sisters who gave us the tour made me think of my mission a little bit.

Playing in the water

2011-09-01T10:25:00.004-06:00

Two weekends ago, we went to Gallivan Center for a BBQ event. After we had some yummy BBQ, Addie played in with the water feature that looked like a water fall.

She was super excited to see the water fall.

She got a little wet.

She touched the water and was super excited.

She even tried to drink a little.

She stuck her head in the water to give herself a little shower.

She saw a "woof woof".

She was all wet.

I love this video. It makes me so happy to see her scream with joy!

Summer Vacation - Ohio/Indiana

2011-08-20T21:26:00.021-06:00

We went to Ohio and Indiana to see friends for a week. Mike had been wanting to see his friend from high school for a long time and we were finally able to do that after almost 10 years! Unfortunately, we didn't take very many pictures from the trip but I am going to post some of them to tell you how our trip went.

Mike's friend Walter has three cute dogs. Initially, Adeline was scared of them but loved them so much by the end of the trip. Every morning when she woke up, she would say "woof woof", wanting to see the doggies first thing in the morning. This is Addie trying to place the water tray for the dogs. I was actually impressed to see that because no one told her how to do it. She just picked up an empty tray and got inside the house to get more water for the dogs.

Walter and his two dogs. One morning these dogs were going crazy digging a hole outside. I was wondering what they were doing, but about an hour later I understood. The dogs found a mouse. That's what Wally is holding in front of the dogs. The dog are looking at the mouse very intently.

Very graciously, Walter let us borrow his new car for two days to see my mission friends who live in Indiana. On our way, we stopped at Indianapolis for lunch and walked around the downtown.

We didn't know where to go for lunch and saw a Cuban restaurant called Tata Cuban Cafe. Since we had never had Cuban food before, we thought it would be fun to try some new food. I got a Cuban sandwich and Mike got some beans and yummy pork and plantains. My sandwich was good but it was a bit over priced for my taste because it was like a glorified version of grilled ham cheese sandwich to me. But we had a good time there. Adeline liked the food as well.

Faby, Del and Chloe. Faby, Del and I all served our missions together in LA. Now they have a beautiful daughter, and we were so glad to finally meet her in person. They treated us to Grand Traverse Pie Co. Our reunion was as sweet as the pies we had!

Adeline and Chloe became friends instantly. It was so cute to watch them play and laugh. And before bed time they were reading books together. How cute!

Next day was another fun day. Adeline and Chloe played in a kiddy pool together and we parents watched them play. Really, good friends are what makes our lives great. Without them, there is no fun. I hope we can come and visit them again.

Wally and Mike trying to be car mechanics. Well, they were really car mechanics that day. Wally was so nice to help his friend fix her car and spent hours working on it.

They got a little creative when they didn't have tools they needed. Chefs are not the only ones in the kitchen sometimes. Here in the picture, they were trying weld the pipe.

While the boys went on a motorcycle trip, Adeline and I drove 2 hours north to see Ayumi chan's family and finally met their cute son Koe. Addie had such a great time with Koe. It was also such a treat for me to see Ayumi chan. She made us yummy Japanese food and made us feel at home. Thank you for all the yummy food and fun time!

When we came back to Wally's home, Wally had an exciting news for us. His MCAT score came back that day and it exceeded his expectation in a wonderful way. So, we celebrated his job well done that evening with his friends. Before we had the cake, we went to a Korean restaurant. That was my favorite part of the evening.

We were going to go to a lake to swim, but the place we went did not allow swimming and there were cops patrolling. So, we decided to walk along the river instead. There was a lot of water there. A lot of trees. A lot of green. Everywhere was so pretty.

Adeline on the bench at Sunset. She is growing up.

Our last day in Ohio. We went to a dairy farm in the morning because we thought Adeline would love to pet some goats. But she was actually scared of them and this whole experience lasted for a few minutes.

After our encounter with the goats, we went to a driving range at the farm. Look at Wally's nice swing and his golf ball in the center of the picture!

Adeline got to try a little until she started throwing the balls everywhere.

Who did think that we would have so much fun in Ohio? I didn't. But it became such a fun trip and I am glad that we went. We publicly thank everyone who made our trip so fun and comfortable. We hope to see you very soon again!

Pioneer Day Vegas Trip

2011-07-26T22:03:00.013-06:00

We went to Vegas for the Pioneer Day weekend. Needless to say, it was very hot. I think it was 115F outside. But we survived and had a lot of fun with family.

We went to Japanese Noodle House Monta for lunch. Mike and I had been craving for good ramen for a long time and this was such a treat. I wish I could eat good ramen every week. Oh, let me tell you, good Japanese ramen is nothing like 10 cent top ramen. It is one of my favorite food that I must eat every time when I go back to Japan. I have heard that there are a few places who serve Ramen in Salt Lake and need to try those very soon.

Mike, Mike's sister's husband John and I walked around the new city center.

Addie playing the piano. She was even turning the pages of the music as she played.

On Saturday evening, we all went to Mike's brother's stake pioneer day event. They had food, activities and fireworks at a stake owned big park. It was a challenge to keep Addie close to us because she wanted to run around so much. We had to do all sorts of things to keep her entertained. She stayed up very late, almost 11 pm for her time.

She was very very hyper and out of control. That is what happens when she is beyond tired.

Right before we left Vegas, we went to Hash House a go go for breakfast. We had fried chicken eggs benedict which has been featured on Travel Channel before. It was probably one of the biggest breakfast I ever had. It had eggs, biscuits, bacon, cheese, spinach, fried chicken, tomato, mashed potato and what else? all on this dish. Even after Mike and I split this meal, we were still so full and skipped lunch for the day.

John had pork tenderloin eggs benedict. It looked almost scary because it was just so big.

On our way home to Salt Lake from Vegas. On Northbound I-15 we saw this sign. I interpreted it as, "God lives North of Las Vegas..." which means Salt Lake City!

Grow, Cook and Eat

2011-07-16T21:13:00.008-06:00

We finally got some food growing in our little garden.

Our zucchini plant is doing well this year and we already got to eat some. These are the first two for the season and there are many more getting big in the garden. Very exciting.

Addie is holding our basil. She was a little tired from being out in the sun while I was trimming the leaves. But she did a great job holding those basil leaves without dropping any.

I put the basil in a simply tomato sauce for pasta for dinner that night. You really don't need a lot of ingredients to make tasty food.

I made orecchiette with our swiss chard. It tasted very good except that I am still not very good at shaping this pasta and am not quite sure about how long to cook fresh pasta in general. This is going to take some practice, but I will be so happy when I feel good about making homemade pasta.

Vegetables are not the only things that are growing here. Adeline is growing like a summer vegetable everyday, looking taller and stronger. Now she likes to stand on the windowsill above the couch and looks outside when her mommy is too tired to go outside with her.

We made a Muffuletta

2011-07-02T20:24:00.010-06:00

The University Village, where we live, hosted a "sprinkler day" for kids to play in the water on a hot summer day.

Adeline was wearing her green and yellow swimsuit for the first time. I think she liked the idea of playing in the water, but she got scared of the sprinklers when they got too close to her. Because she started to run away from the sprinklers and would not go back to the field, we ended up going home shortly after the adventure.

Adeline got into my kitchen cabinet and was trying to make a tower with mixing bowls. She was very into it. Since she could be doing so many worse things, I do not care if we she plays with some of the safer kitchen items.

Some of you might already know about our sleep training nightmare that we are having, but we are trying to make Adeline a binky-free baby at last. Since she turned one, we have been letting her use her pacifier only during her bedtime and naps. She learned to leave her pacifier in the crib and never asked for it while she was awake. But we decided that it was time for her to say good-bye to her pacifiers for good. To be honest, it has been very difficult. On Wed, it took about 2 hours and 20 minutes for her to finally fall asleep. If I didn't go in to check on her every 20 minutes or so, she would have gotten tired and fallen asleep sooner eventually, but I went into her room to hold her every once in a while because it is hard for me not to check on her when she is crying a lot. Today it took her about 30 minutes. So, she is making a good progress. I am going to publicly apologize and thank our babysitters for also going through this with us. We are not bringing her pacifier any more. So, please just shut the door and let her cry as long as you can stand. Hopefully, she will learn to fall asleep during this long weekend.

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Have you heard about muffuletta? If you don't know what it is, you are missing out. It's a type of Italian sandwich that has originated in New Orleans.

My friend and I try to go out for a new restaurant or recipe monthly and for this month she suggested that we make a muffuletta. She recently returned from her New Orleans trip and tasted the real thing. Ever since then she is hooked and found a recipe to recreate the fabulous experience with me. I had had it once before at Caputo's but never thought to make it until she said it. She was so brilliant to think of making it at home!

This is how giant this sandwich is. Since we couldn't really find bread this big, I baked the bread from scratch.

It is loaded with different kinds of meat and cheese and olive salad. I was a little overwhelmed by the amount of meat. It is definitely one of more manly sandwiches that I know.

This is our muffuletta! 1/6 of this sandwich was enough to feed one person. It was really tall and barely fit in my mouth. The store-bought olive salad we used was too salty for our likes, but overall it was really delicious. If you want to try it, you can find the same recipe here.

Anniversary #4

2011-06-24T10:39:00.006-06:00

Four years ago on June 22nd, Mike and I were married...

After 4 years of a lot of bumpy rides and happy times, yes, we are still together!!

When I came home from work, I found these beautiful sunflowers on the table with a little note saying "you are my sunflower". Mike is so good about making me feel so special, and I love him for it.

He made a reservation at the Copper Onion. We had heard many good things about it before and wanted to try it for a while. Mike had a tri-tip steak with chimichurri sauce. I had a bite of it and it was pretty good.

I had lamb riblets with some yummy cauliflower and yukon potatoes. It was very tasty, except it was a little bit too greasy for my likes. Unfortunately, I had a measure heartburn afterwards. But we loved the atmosphere of the restaurant. I would like to go back there and try something different next time.

We watched Super 8 after dinner and enjoyed it very much.

Marriage is wonderful but definitely does not come for free. I have learned that it definitely takes work, but it is so rewarding. (Or are some people so good that they never have to work for their happy marriage?) Let's be honest, Mike and I fight a lot, but I always know, deep down in my heart, that I have a husband who I can come home to. Sometimes we misunderstand each other and pull away for each other for a moment. But, we know that we are meant to be for each other and I love that. We have learned a lot from each other in the last 4 years and hope that we can grow closer a little bit more this coming year. I am grateful to Mike for making our anniversary so special. I think it's so important to celebrate marriage regularly... hopefully more than once a year...

Happy Anniversary!

The Longest Day of the Year

2011-06-21T21:33:00.010-06:00

Today was the longest day of the year. I hope that the long daylight hours did some good to the plants in our garden. Since we had a late start this year because of the snow in May and we started everything from the seeds directly in the soil, all our plants are still looking very small.

Basil. I can't wait to make pesto with these basil leaves.

Zucchini. Last year we had only two or three zucchinis from one plant. Hopefully, we will have a lot this year. So far, it is looking promising.

Green beans. I planted more seeds, but they are not coming out. Where did they go?

Cilantro. They are growing very well. Yummy salsa is on its way.

Tomato. I am hoping that we will get some tomatoes before it snows again.

Cucumber. Our one and only cucumber plant. It is looking pretty sad right now. I hope it will grow.

?. This is a mystery plant. It started growing where I planted tomato seeds. When it sprouted, it looked a lot like a tomato plant with a brown stem, but it doesn't look like it any more. It is definitely growing faster than tomatoes. Does anyone know what this is? Is it just a type of weed?

Honeydew. We ate honeydew a few weeks ago and just threw a couple of seeds in the garden to see what would happen. And now, they are growing! It wasn't planned, but I am excited about it. We also have some mint growing voluntarily. I like useful plants that grow without any care.

I baked a loaf of whole wheat tonight. My lunch will be PB&J tomorrow.

Cheese Ravioli with mushroom butter sauce. It was on our table for dinner. I had some leftover ricotta cheese that had to be used soon and decided that ravioli would be a good option. I made the pasta dough from scratch, too. Making the dough itself wasn't too difficult, but it was definitely time consuming to roll out the dough because I did not have a pasta maker. But after all, it tasted yummy and I would make it again if I had a pasta maker. The filling was a mixture of ricotta, mozzarella, Parmesan, parsley and basil. The sauce was simply melted butter, garlic, olive oil, mushroom and more Parmesan cheese.

It was a good longest day of the year.

Finally! Photo Shoot by Marci

2011-06-13T22:12:00.004-06:00

Super talented Marci took Adeline's pictures recently. We are so happy to finally have Adeline's pictures taken professionally.

She is wearing the dress I made for her.

Check out her blog for more pictures!!

Adeline 15 months old

2011-06-08T21:15:00.007-06:00

Almost 15 months ago....

This picture was stuck in the internal memory of our camera and has been forgotten about for almost a year.

Almost 15 months later....

I cannot believe how big she has gotten!!

Now she does...

bring a book to us and sit on our laps for a story time
brush her teeth (she has lots of teeth now)
clap when she hears someone laughs
clasp her hands to pray
climb up the stairs
get scared of birds when they get too close to her
give a crying baby his binky
give the TV remote to Mike (she knows it belongs to him)
kiss to both Mike and me (never just Mike only or me only)
love chocolate anything
loves to help us with cleaning and laundry
know she is supposed to buckle up in her car seat
know where things (broom, dirty diapers, vacuum and many more) belong to
point at a helicopter or plane
put away her shoes when we come home
say "hi" to everyone she meets
slide down a slide
throw tantrums when she doesn't get what she wants
try to comb her hair after taking a bath
try to eat with a spoon or fork
try to wash her hair when taking a bath
use baby sign language when she wants food or when she wants to be picked up
walk and almost run
and many more that I can't even think of...

She can say...

"dada" = people
"f f" = dogs
this
no
o oh
hi

I wonder what she will learn this month...

Chocolate Sourdough Bread

2011-05-21T09:48:00.006-06:00

I had a very successful baking day last week. I had proofed sourdough starter sitting on the counter but didn't know what to do with it. I didn't want to make regular sourdough bread or sandwich loaf. Then, I thought... why don't I make a loaf of chocolate bread? That's how it started. I kind of had an idea of what kind of bread I wanted to make. So I consulted with my Bread Bible, researched the proportion of starter, flour and water and came up with my own recipe! And, doesn't it look beautiful?

It rose nicely and tasted wonderful. It had a bit of sweetness but not too much. Since the dough itself was not terribly sweet, I didn't feel guilty about eating a big slice of it. But the occasional chocolate chips mixed in fixed my chocolate craving just enough. In summary, I am very happy with this chocolate bread. Since I don't exactly remember how much sugar I used in the dough, I have to try to recreate this again this week. I hope I can make it again!!

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Another creation of the week.

I made Adeline a dress! We cleaned out our closets on Saturday and I found a piece of soft fabric with tiny yellow flowers on it. When I saw it, I thought it would be cute if I made a dress out of it for Adeline. So, after church on Sunday, I took my sketch book, drew some designs and made patterns. And, this is the dress.

Obviously, it looks very homemade. But that is OK. The sleeves and sides are not exactly how I'd imagined but I am not too worried. She will grow out of the dress soon anyways, and she is not old enough to complain about her dress. I have a lot to learn about dressmaking and hopefully will be able to produce something very good in the future.

On a side note, Mike thinks she looks like she came out of Little House on the Prairie.

Is this to stay?

2011-05-14T21:14:00.004-06:00

Finally, we had some nice days here in Salt Lake. I hope this is to stay because I am done with snow for a while. Another highlight of the week was that Mike had one week off from school and got to spend some time with us.

やっと、ソルトレークにもいいお天気の日がやってきました。もう雪は嫌なので、このままいいお天気が続けばいいのですが。今週のもうひとつのいいことはマイクの学校が一週間お休みで私たちと一緒に時間を過ごせたことです。

Mike is working on his bike and Adeline is working on her tricycle. (Actually, this tricycle does not belong to her...)

マイクが自分の自転車を修理してる隣でアディーちゃんも三輪車でなにかしてます。

My favorite thing to do with Adeline. Every time when I put her in the swing, she points to the bigger swing and asks me to swing next to her. If I try to leave, she will point to the swing again. I am not supposed to leave my spot until she is done.

アディーちゃんとブランコをするのが大好き。いつもアデリンをブランコに座らせると、隣のブランコを指差して、隣で一緒に座ってって言います。私が立ってどこか行こうとすると、だめって行ってまたブランコを指すので、アデリンが終わるまで私はどこにもいけません。

I can't remember why she was sad there, but I even love her sad faces because she is so cute.
なんで悲しい顔をしているのかわからないけど、悲しい顔をしててもかわいいアデリン。

But her smile is even better. She is saying "HI!"
でも笑ってるときのほうがもっと好きです。「ハーイ！」って言ってます。

Mike made us a dinner a few nights ago. What a treat for me and Adeline! Notice the wipe on her tray. When she is done (or sometimes even when she is not done), she likes to clean up her tray and mouth with wipes. She even wipes her spilled water and milk with towel, too. She must see us do that all the time because we never taught her to do it. What a funny girl.

先週マイクが夕飯を作ってくれました。トレイに乗ってるウェットティッシュでアデリンはいつもご飯の後（たまにご飯中も）、トレイと口を自分で拭きます。最近は水とかミルクをこぼすとタオルでちゃんと拭いてます。教えたわけじゃないけど、私たちが掃除してるのを見てるみたいです。

Spring Photo Shoot

2011-04-30T21:59:00.004-06:00

Last Sunday we attempted at an Easter photo shoot with our little point and shoot camera. Because the camera's shutter speed was so slow, we could not capture Adeline at the right moment. But here are my two favorites.

Even though Adeline isn't looking at the camera, I still like this with the cherry blossoms behind us. Mike the photographer of this photo says Adeline and I have the same eyes in this picture. Do we?

This is the only one that she actually looked at the camera without making a funny face. I haven't really had any pictures with her before and I am excited that we finally have pictures together!

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Here's my future cook.

Two days ago I taught her how to use a whisk and she has been doing it a lot since. Also it was her idea to put those puzzle pieces in the bowl. She is always curious about what's going on in the kitchen and is happy to grab any kitchen tool she can find. I hope she will be a good cook someday!

Adeline 13 months old

2011-04-20T20:34:00.005-06:00

Our little Adeline turned 13 months old yesterday.

She has grown so much and is beautiful as ever. She is no longer a helpless infant and is quite independent.

A couple days ago, she discovered that walking in my shoes were entertaining to her. She can't really walk in them so well because my shoes are just way too big for her, but she still has a lot of fun doing it. Ever since then she brings my shoes to us and asks us to put them on her.

Adeline has quite a bit of a personality. I love watching her and am always excited to see what she will do next. Lately, she is into puzzles. She can put pieces together pretty well. She can say "ball" and points to any ball whenever she sees it. It is amazing to see how quickly this little girl learns things.

Luckily, she is a very friendly girl and behaves pretty well in public. She has just learned to say "hi!" and is not afraid to go say "hi!" to people she doesn't know so well. The bad side of her being a social butterfly is that she never sits still. On Sundays during classes, she roams around the classroom, walks up to people, says her "hi', points to things and says "n! n!" without a break. Probably, everyone is annoyed by us freeing our child but I am a little reluctant to let her throw tantrums and usually let her do her things to keep her happy. I know I am being selfish but what should I do?

Yes, tantrums. She is only 13 months old but sure knows how to throw tantrums. She gets very upset when she doesn't get her way. When it happens she drops her knees, arches her back, throws her arms and legs and cries really hard. She doesn't want you to pick her up to hold her. I didn't think it was supposed to happen until she is 2, but I am already seeing it. To be honest, I am not quite sure what to do about it.

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I had a successful baking day last week after having baked a few loaves that were like bricks.

This is whole wheat sourdough sandwich bread. I was pretty happy with the result and am hoping that I can do it again.

I made whole wheat carrot & sesame crackers last night. Since I give Adeline Cheerios too often, I thought it might be a good thing to give her something else for snacks. Actually, I didn't use any recipe and made it on a whim. Last night was one of those nights when I didn't want to turn on the computer to look for a recipe and had to use my brain. Surprisingly, the result came out pretty good and it's totally healthy!!

gibber-gabber on Friday night

2011-04-08T21:32:00.005-06:00

Today there isn't really anything I can blog about, but there isn't really anything I want to do, either. TV is too loud for me and I don't want to turn it on. Besides there isn't anything I want to watch. I should probably clean the house but am not into cleaning right now (or ever). I should maybe exercise but it's almost 10 pm and and I am not motivated. I should read some good books but don't feel like it. I should be having a date night with Mike but he is still at school... and the list goes on. And, it is snowing!!

Even though it is snowing here in Utah in April, we had some nice sunny days a few days ago.

Miss Addie on a swing

I wasn't quite sure what she was doing but I kind of liked how the sunlight came through. She doesn't look like a baby any more in this photo. She is growing up too fast!

Two posts ago, I wrote about my monotonous life and was surprised to hear from many people that they were feeling the same. It was nice for me to hear that I was not the only boring person in the world and was grateful to those who shared their thoughts with me. After reading everyone's comments and emails, I felt encouraged and thought about what I could do to make my life more rewarding.

I like a reward, like a yummy piece of dark chocolate after a long, hard day. But I don't give myself a lot of that on a daily basis because I don't feel like I do anything so praiseworthy. So, I have made a small short-term goal for myself that I want to do and that takes some work to accomplish.

I am not going to say that I will become a doctor or lawyer. I am not going to change the world. But I am going to perfect my sandwich bread! I know it sounds silly. But I am OK being silly. Great people are only great because there are people like me who are not so outstanding. Baking bread doesn't make me an extraordinary person in any way, but at least I am excited about it. When I reach my goal, I will have a loaf of yummy sandwich bread as my reward. The last 10 loaves of my sandwich bread were all disappointing and I was feeling defeated. But now I feel like I have a mission to accomplish. Once I feel like I have something I am happy with, I will move onto some new goals.

Anyways, all I want to say is that it just took a small thing to get me out of the feeling of "I-am-stuck". It is nice to feel that someday I can be good at something if I practice. I think I will be proud of myself when I can say "I bake a perfect loaf of bread".

Happy Birthday to our little Adeline

2011-03-22T21:36:00.004-06:00

Adeline turned one year old on Saturday and we invited a few of our friends to celebrate her first birthday.

She wasn't quite sure about what to do with the candle but was very cute.

I made cocoa buttermilk cake and banana cupcakes with vanilla cream frosting. I made the cupcakes for Adeline but she actually liked the chocolate cake better. She must be my daughter.

Adeline got her birthday present. She did a very good job opening it.

Adeline liked her cupcake. She ate more than a half of it all by herself. Now when she sees cake or ice cream, she demands that we give it to her because she knows how good it tastes.

This is just a cute video of Adeline and Mike playing with her bunny. I love how she laughs.

I cannot believe that she is already a one year old. She has grown so much. She was just a tiny infant a year ago and now is walking and even has her opinions. She surprises me everyday by showing me her new tricks. I am so grateful that I have her in my life. There are hard days, but nothing can replace the happiness that she brings into our lives.

A happy birthday to my little girl and we hope to celebrate many more birthdays together...

Work - Life Balance is hard!

2011-03-09T21:44:00.005-07:00

Adeline is going to be a big one year old in 10 days!

I cannot believe that she is almost one year old. Time has gone by so fast. Yet, it is believable because it feels like she has always been part of my life, but it's still unreal that I have a child that old.

I know that I have a lot to be grateful for, but I feel like I have a lot of uneasy feelings building up these days. Even though Adeline is healthy and the cutest ever and Mike is learning a lot at school, I feel like I have no direction in my life. I feel like I am going nowhere. I feel like I have been in the same spot for the last 3-4 years. I've been working at the same place for 3+ years and not progressing. I am not pursuing higher education. I don't have hobby (except for cooking and baking). Every day I do the same thing: I get up at 5:45am and go to work by 7am. I come home around 3:30pm and play a little with Adeline and cook for dinner. I clean up and put Adeline to bed. I work a little bit more to finish up the work I could not get done during the day. I prepare for the next day and retire by midnight. And, the same thing again next day. When finally I have time to sit down, I am burned out and have no energy to think about anything productive. I want to have a dream or goal, but there is no brain power left in me to even think about it. Then, the sun comes up again the next day and I don't even have a purpose or goal for the day. Another day goes by. Then, I think to myself... am I just spoiled to even have time to dream about a dream?

Addie 11 months old

2011-02-25T21:44:00.010-07:00

Adeline turned 11 months old last week. I can't believe that she is almost one year old! She has learned a lot of things in the last 11 months and is lately enjoying reading quite a bit. It's fun to read with her.

She also started walking a few weeks ago. I love her penguin walk but am always scared that she might fall and hit her head.

I baked my second sourdough bread. This time I doubled the recipe and made a bigger loaf.

It looked good and tasted good. Tomorrow I am making sourdough waffles. I am so excited!

Last week we got together as a family and had a turkey dinner. We lined up the kids in a row. Adeline kept eating off of her cousins plates.

The food always looks better when it is on other people's plate. That seems to be true even when you are a little kid.

My first sourdough bread

2011-02-16T21:05:00.010-07:00

Finally, I made my own sourdough starter and baked a loaf of sourdough bread.

Day 1: I mixed whole wheat flour and water and let it sit in one of the pots Mike made.

Day 2: No change.

Day 4: I didn't have a camera on Day 3. But by Day 3 and 4, the flour and water mixture started getting bubbly. The starter has attracted good bacteria and is alive.

Day 5: The starter has an alcoholic aroma an is ready to be used.

Day 7: It took me 15 hours to bake this bread. My starter was very active and didn't take me as long as I expected. Usually, it takes about 2 days to make a loaf, but the actual hands-on time is very short. You just need to wait for a long time until the dough rises. Patience is the key ingredient.

The final result. I got crunchy crust and nice big holes and was very happy with the result. We had yummy pastrami sandwiches with this bread.

Adeline seemed to like the bread, too, and made me very happy. I think I am going to bake sourdough bread every week from now on.

Bread is my new love

2011-02-07T20:29:00.006-07:00

I picked up a book called "The Bread Bible" from the library last week and am religiously reading it in the way that I ought to be reading my regular bible. I am learning a lot about bread and experimenting quite a bit. I want to say that I baked 4 times last week.

Friday I baked a pizza. The next day I had some leftover dough and pizza sauce and made these pizza sticks.

I sprinkled some black pepper to make them slightly peppery. It was actually a bad idea to use pizza sauce for this because it made it almost impossible to twist the dough like I wanted to. The dough became too soggy and I almost had to give up the whole thing, though thankfully they turned out pretty yummy in the end. When I try to be creative, always the unexpected happens.

Saturday was pretty warm outside and I took Adeline out for some swing ride.

She looks very cute in her pink romper bodysuit.

I really love my weekends with her to just play with her and to enjoy who she is. Just watching all kinds of faces that she makes brings a big smile to my face.

This is my newest experiment out of the bread bible: Basic Hearth Bread.

For the first time using this recipe in our student apartment's not-even-full-size oven, I think it came out quite nicely.

I would have liked some bigger holes but cannot complain the result of this crumb. It was chewy and super delicious and we finished the loaf in a day.

This weekend I am intended to make sourdough bread for the first time with my own sourdough starter that I am developing right now. The starter should be hopefully ready in a few more days!

Bagels

2011-01-30T21:50:00.006-07:00

I made bagels for the first time on Saturday. They were chewy and delicious. They weren't so dry as those you buy at a grocery store. Adeline even liked them and kept asking for more! I thought it tasted better after a few hours of baking but we couldn't wait for that long and ate most of them right after they came out of the oven. How can you resist the smell of freshly baked bagels, right?

Since it took me three hours in the morning, I wondered...how did bagels become breakfast food? Do or did people get up at five in the morning to prepare and have this at 8 am for breakfast? Next time I should try another recipe which seemed to require less time in the morning.

Today, I baked another loaf of bread. This time I made a loaf of whole wheat bread. Except that it stuck to the bottom of the pan and almost didn't come out, it came out very nicely. A successful bread making day makes me very happy.

Cooking with Adeline

2011-01-23T22:39:00.012-07:00

Sometimes cooking with Adeline can be a little frustrating because....

But what can I say after looking at those pictures? I just had to laugh and say "oh, she is so cute!"

When I am in the kitchen, she wants to be there, too. She pulls my legs and pants and tries to get my attention. Even when Mike is home to play with her, she wants to be where food is being cooked. She knows where her food comes from and naggingly waits for me to give her a piece of something I am cooking.

After juggling between my baby monkey and dinner experimentation, we had a pretty good rib dinner on the table. I was actually pretty happy with the result.

I don't have the name for it, but let's call it "Braised Beef Ribs in Demi-Glace Sauce" or something. Again, I am not very good about remembering portions, but here's my very basic version of the recipe.

Braised Beef Ribs in Demi-Glace Sauce

Ingredients
Beef ribs or short ribs
red wine
beef broth
onions
tomatoes
celery stalks
garlic
bay leaf
butter
flour
brown sugar
paprika
olive oil
thyme
salt & pepper

Preheat a crock-pot ( I set it at the high temperature)
Cut the ribs and trim excess fat
Sprinkle some salt and pepper on the ribs
Sear and Brown the ribs in a hot frying pan with a little bit of olive oil. Take the ribs out of the pan.
Cook sliced onions until translucent
Add chopped celery, carrots, tomatoes and garlic. Transfer it to the preheated crock-pot.
Add the ribs to the crock-pot
Add brown sugar, paprika, thyme and bay leaf to the crock-pot
Add red wine and beef broth to the crock-pot. Change the crock-pot's setting to low and cook for a few hours
Take the ribs and some of the onions and carrots out of the crock-pot
Scoop out the rest of the vegetables and puree it in a food processor
Skim the fat off of the juice. Save the juice
In a sauce pan, melt butter. Add some flour to make roux
Add pureed vegetables to the sauce pan and stir until smooth
Add the reminder of juice to the sauce pan. Cook and stir until it is thickened and creamy. (You could probably add more beef broth or red wine here, if you want)
Return the ribs, and the thickened juice into the crock-pot and cook for 20-30 minutes.
Serve it over rice, mashed potatoes, or noodles of your choice
Bon appetit!

And, for those you want a recipe of the oatmeal bread, click here! I have a couple of favorite bread recipe websites and this is one of them. Enjoy!!

Heavenly Oatmeal Bread

2011-01-21T20:38:00.005-07:00

I am a hungry person in general, but my appetite has been out of control more than usual in the last few days. I feel like I am eating nonstop all day but can't get enough. I can see that I am definitely eating enough when I see my belly, though. What's happening to me? But, don't you worry! I am not pregnant.

Last night at 11pm, I baked a loaf of oatmeal toasting bread.

Because I kept thinking about food all night and we were out of bread, I ended up making this. I was patient enough to wait to slice the loaf until this morning, though it was very hard to try to fall asleep while smelling the wonderful freshly baked bread. Mike and I had a few slices for breakfast and lunch and it was delicious!!

This is going to be my favorite recipe.

Recently, I have been slightly addicted to Wasa. It's Swedish crispbread. I will have to find a recipe and try to make it at home really soon...

This is my new haircut. I don't know why I am posting it, but I chopped off 12 inches and donated my hair to Locks of Love.

Photo by and for Mike

Caught in the act

2011-01-13T21:53:00.007-07:00

This picture was from Christmas but I thought it would be fun to share. She is wearing her new hat that barely fits her big head, her new Japanese traditional vest and a Santa dress that is slightly too short. Her chunky thighs are very adorable.

This is Addie caught in the act.

She is eating at her cousin's snack station. We don't have such a thing called "snack station" at our home because she would never leave there, ever. Every time when we go over to her cousin's place, she stands there and eats all the food and waits for more. They probably think that we never feed her, but that's not the case. She just LOVES to eat. She eats anything. Even after her meals, she patrols underneath her highchair and table and picks up the food she dropped on the floor earlier and eats it. She is constantly HUNGRY. And then, that's the moment I realize that she is my daughter, just like me.

Adeline is quite entertaining even when she is not eating. The other day, she was trying very hard to sit in her Bumbo. This video caught her third try.

She still hasn't figured it out yet.... Will she someday?

Christmas and more

2010-12-29T22:32:00.022-07:00

This Christmas was very special for us for many reasons. First, it was Adeline's first Christmas. Second, my dad came from Japan to spend Christmas with us. Third, Adeline met her grandpa for the first time. Fourth, it was my first Christmas with my family in nine years.

今年のクリスマスは私たちにとってすごい特別なものになりました。１、アディーちゃんの初めてのクリスマス。２、お父さんが日本から来てくれました。３、アディーがおじいちゃんに初めて会いました。４、９年ぶりに私の家族手クリスマスを過ごしました。

Although I was expecting her to cry, Adeline didn't cry when she met her grandpa for the first time. Here's the video of when they met for the first time.

おじいちゃんに初めて会うときは泣くと思っていたのですが、泣きませんでした。二人の初対面のビデオです。

She seemed a bit nervous but made him fall in love with her at first sight.

アディーちゃんはちょっと緊張気味でしたが、おじいちゃんはアディーにメロメロでした。

We went to our favorite BBQ place called "Pat's" for dinner. This was the beginning of our daily feast of the Christmas week.

夕飯にはマイクと私の好きなPat'sというバーベキューのレストランとに行きました。これを始めに、一週間毎日いっぱい食べました。

After eating a lot of meat, Adeline's true personality came out.

たくさんお肉を食べたのでアディーちゃんの本性が出てきてしまいました。

Next day we went to snowshoeing in the Big Cottonwood Canyon.

次の日にみんなでビッグコットンウッド渓谷にスノーシューイングをしに行きました。

Adeline looked very cute like a pink marshmallow man in a space suit.

アディーちゃんは宇宙服を着たピンクのマシュマロマンみたいでした。

My dad had a very good time there as well. We couldn't go too far into the canyon because of the avalanche controls going on that day, but we enjoyed the beautiful Utah winter scenery.

お父さんも楽しんでくれたみたいです。その日は雪崩のコントロールをしていたため、あまり奥にはいけませんでしたがユタの素敵な冬景色を楽しみました。

In the afternoon we changed our location to Mill Creek so that we could do some more snowshoeing. It was just so refreshing to be surrounded in the cold, crispy air and snow.

午後に場所を変えてミルクリークに行きました。冷たい空気と雪に囲まれてすごいリフレッシュしました。

After our walk, Adeline fell asleep. I wonder if she was comfortable....

帰りはアディーちゃんはちょっと疲れて寝てしまいました。あんまり、寝心地よくなさそう、、、。

We cleaned up and went to dinner at Cucina Toscana, and then to the Temple Square. The dinner was very very good. It might be one of the best Italian we have had. It was amazing! The lights at the temple square were so beautiful and there were a lot of people! The fog made the temple look more majestic.

夜にはイタリアンのレストランですごいおいしいものを食べて、テンプルスクウェアに行きました。今まで食べたイタリアンで一番だったかも知れないくらいおいしかったです。テンプルスクウェアのイルミネーションもすごいきれいでした。人もすごい込んでました。神殿の周りには霧がかかっていてすごい荘厳な雰囲気でした。

They had a lot of nativity sets from different countries and one of them was Japanese. We looked at it and couldn't help laughing a little.

こけしバージョンのクリスマスのイエスキリストの誕生のシーンを発見。ちょっと笑わずにはいられませんでした。

On Christmas Eve, we went to Mike's sister Jen and John's for dinner. We had two cute Santa's helpers.

クリスマスイブはマイクの妹のお家に行きました。かわいいちびっ子のサンタのお手伝いさんたちです。

When her cousin Kaylin was with her mommy, Adeline went there to let them know that she wanted a little hug as well.

アディーのいとこのケイリンがお母さんと遊んでいると、すかさずアディーも。ちょっとずうずうしい子です。

Yep, that's our baby.

これがうちの子です。

On Christmas morning we opened our presents. My dad brought us really nice gifts and spoiled us so much!

クリスマスの朝にプレゼントをあけました。お父さんが日本からいいプレゼントをいっぱい持ってきてくれました。ありがとう！

I got dad and Mike matching bow ties as Mike had previously requested.

私はマイク頼まれた蝶ネクタイをお父さんとおそろいであげました。

After playing with our new toys, we went up to Snowbird Ski resort. We took the tram up to the top of the mountains to see the awesome view. It was such a clear day and we could see so much!

新しいおもちゃで遊んだ後、スノーバードというスキー場に行きました。ゴンドラに乗って景色を見に頂上まであがりました。すごいいいお天気だったので遠くまですごいたくさん見えました。

The elevation at the top was 11000 ft. It was very cold and windy!

標高は3353メートル。とっても風が強くて寒かったです。

We were the only ones to take the tram down to the bottom of the mountain. It made me feel like we had a private tram service just for us.

帰りのゴンドラは空で貸切みたいでした。

Right before my dad left for Japan, he and Adeline played together with her new blocks that she got from her grandpa. She loves them and plays with them every day. Needless to say, we had so much fun during my dad's stay and made a lot of good memories.

お父さんが日本に帰る前にアディーちゃんはおじいちゃんと一緒に新しくもらった積み木で遊びました。お気に入りで毎日遊んでます。短い５日間でしたがすごい楽しかったです。

---*---*---*---*---*---*---*---

This is a video from the day after Christmas. Adeline was so tired after church and falling asleep during lunch.

このビデオはクリスマスの次の日に教会から帰ってきた後にとりました。アディーはかなり眠かったみたいです。

We probably should have stopped the video sooner. Sorry, baby.

たぶん、もっと早めにビデオを止めたほうがよかったかも。ベイビー、ごめんね。

Yesterday she learned how to clap her hands. She is so cute!

昨日、拍手ができるようになりました。かわいいでしょ！

Adeline meets Santa

2010-12-04T23:38:00.008-07:00

Adeline is 8 and 1/2 months old. She is a lot of fun and makes us laugh all the time.

This video was taken about 2 weeks ago when she first started learning how to feed herself crackers. Every time when I watch it, it makes me smile.

She has gotten a lot better since then, but she is just so cute to watch.

Adeline met Santa for the first time today. I think she did pretty good for the first time.

Adeline is so curious about everything and wants touch everything. Usually I don't let her touch our Christmas decorations but we let her today because it wasn't ours and she looked so fascinated by it.

A few more weeks till Christmas....

Already 8 months

2010-11-18T21:17:00.008-07:00

Adeline turns 8 months old tomorrow. How did it happen so fast?

She is a very funny girl and this is how she sleeps.

No matter how we lay her in the crib, she always curls up and puts her head against the corner.

I don't know how that could be so comfortable...

This one shows how she crawls. She is very very fast.

Lastly, this is what she does most of the time. I recommend that you turn down the volume of your speaker before you start this video because our computer couldn't convert her high pitch voice very well and it might hurt you ears, unless you are a dog or dolphin or something...

By the way, we think she is too big for those baby skinny jeans. They are for 12 months old babies, but she can't tuck her tummy in very well...

A future singer?

2010-11-07T21:14:00.006-07:00

We are one of those parents who get excited about small things that their baby does and try to guess what the baby is going to be in the future. Because now Adeline can talk a lot and it sounds like she is singing, we are thinking that she is going to be a singer. You might say that she is just talking, but let us just imagine that she is a singer. Enjoy her singing!

Halloween

2010-11-03T22:32:00.003-06:00

Our Halloween was pretty mellow this year. We didn't have many trick-or-treaters or Halloween candy.

Mike and I curved pumpkins. Mike made a pirate (?!) and I made a cat.

One project I actually did for this Halloween was to make Adeline's costume. Since she does awesome army crawl, we made her little G.I. Jane. Mike said she looked like a guerrilla with that hat on, but either way I thought she was very cute.

I let her eat an apple core on Saturday. She loved it and chewed on it forever until it was so gross. She looked like she was eating adult food and it made me feel like she was growing up too fast.

Rui always wins

2010-10-23T23:00:00.003-06:00

So - usually Rui writes EVERYTHING on this blog, but tonight, she axed me for some suggestions on a new title. After I gave her about 50 or 60, and she turned them all down, she finally agreed to our current "the ZELLER box" - which was one of my first suggestions. I had included in the description a simple line: "comments/donations welcome" which I thought was hilarious... she didn't. So, to save our marriage, I accepted her invitation to leave it off. I hope you all agree it was the right thing to do... donations are still welcome.

Adeline 7 months old

2010-10-20T22:12:00.006-06:00

Adeline turned 7 months old on Tuesday. She has accomplished so much in the last seven months. Lately, she is...

doing G.I. Joe army crawl
eating her fruits and veges
talking a lot
sleeping through the night
getting big (over 18lbs)
enjoying playing with her duckies in the tub
teething
learning how to use a sippy cup
being cute as ever

We went to a corn maze on Saturday and had a lot of fun! She enjoyed a bumpy hayride and it was just so much fun to be together as a family on a gorgeous fall day.

I love her chunky cheeks.

Daddy and Baby.

After the fun outing, we went to Mike's sister's place for dinner and games. Adeline fell in love with her cousin's Legos and had so much fun with it. We might have to buy some.

September at the Zellers

2010-10-02T21:38:00.006-06:00

Adeline likes to "read" her magazines.

It's kind of nice when I have to work at home because she can get really into it...

I just have to check on her every once in a while so that she won't eat any of it.

Peaches are in season right now and I was inspired to make a fresh peach pie. Thanks to the wonderful recipe book Mike gave me, it turned out beautifully.

This is my favorite. Adeline is big enough to sit at the table with us at mealtime. Since she can't eat what we eat yet, she chews on the table and watches us with the puppy eyes.

First hairdo. Her hair is getting so long!

Tonight's dinner at the Zellers: Calzone. It was super delicious. I should be more humble about my cooking, but this one was really really tasty. The filling was tomato sauce, spinach, olives, ricotta cheese, mozzarella cheese, and Parmesan cheese. The one sad thing about this was that my pizza stone broke while it was cooking for no good reason. I guess I can't make my bread and pizza until I get a new replacement. So sad...

We halved the huge calzone and ate it just like that. Good food = a happy family.

Red Pine Lake

2010-09-07T22:06:00.013-06:00

Two weeks ago we had a picnic at a Big Cottonwood picnic site. It was Adeline's first time to see campfire and we had a lot of fun together.

Baby Addie is finally big enough to wear the hat I made when she was in my tummy.

On Labor Day we hiked in Little Cottonwood Canyon. This was Adeline's first hike and my first one after she was born.

She was carried by Mike and was very happy in the carrier.

Our destination was this beautiful Red Pine Lake. After about 3.5 miles from the trail head, you can find this beautiful lake. The whole trail was gorgeous and we were so happy to be there.

Mike and Adeline. It was a pretty cold day but Adeline looked very cute in her pink hoodie.

A Family photo with the gorgeous lake in background. Adeline was sleeping on Mike's back when this picture was taken. We'll definitely want to do this hike again.

First bite

2010-08-30T18:50:00.007-06:00

先々週の日曜日に初めてアディーちゃんにおかゆをあげました。ご飯よりもスプーンを食べたかったみたいで、なかなかご飯は食べてくれませんでした。この２週間で４回くらい試しましたが、なかなかまだ食べてくれません。アディーちゃんの初めてのごはんの様子を見たかったら、ちょっと長いですが、次のビデオをご覧ください。

Two Sundays ago we gave Addie solids for the first time. She wanted to eat the spoon more than the food and didn't really eat any of the rice that we gave her. In the last two weeks we tried to feed her about 4 times but she didn't really eat much. If you want to see how her first eating experience went, check out this video. It's kind of long though...

Homemade Feftuccine

2010-08-19T20:51:00.003-06:00

I made homemade pasta for the first time a few days ago. Since I didn't try any fancy shape, it wasn't actually too difficult to make. All you need are just eggs and flour.

I used a lot of basil that we got in our garden and made basil tomato cream sauce with mushrooms. The parsley for the garnish came from our garden, too. Mike loved it and that made me very happy. Now I need to learn how to make different shapes.

Baby Vampire

2010-08-16T17:43:00.004-06:00

When the sun goes down, Adeline becomes a baby vampire...

日が落ちると、アディーちゃんはベイビーヴァンパイアになります。

But she loves playing with her daddy during the day.

でも、昼間はダディーと遊ぶのが大好きです。

4 month old Adeline's crazy arms

2010-07-31T23:20:00.003-06:00

This was from a week ago.
先週撮りました。

It's really funny to watch her whacks herself with her arm.
自分の腕で自分のお腹をすごい勢いで叩くのでおもしろいです。

Chocolate Yeast Waffles with Strawberries

2010-07-31T16:19:00.004-06:00

It's wonderful to start my day off with waffles. But it's even better when there is chocolate involved. Our apartment smelled like delicious chocolate baked goods this morning and I was happy.

I just added cocoa powder and additional amount of sugar to a yeast waffles recipe and it came out pretty good. If I had chocolate syrup, it would have been better though. The chocolate flavor in these are very settle enough that you won't feel guilty for eating chocolate. If you feel like you need chocolate in the morning but are not ready for brownies, you should try it! You've got to have a good breakfast to start your day right.

Chocolate Yeast Waffles with Strawberries

2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water
2 tbs sugar
2 cups flour
3 tbs cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3 tbs melted butter
1 3/4 cups milk
2 eggs
Strawberries
Powdered sugar

Dissolve yeast and sugar and let it sit until it gets foamy.

Whisk together flour, baking soda and salt in a large bowl.

Add the yeast mixture, butter and milk in the dry ingredient mixture. Whisk it until combined and let it sit covered for 45-60 minutes.

Whisk eggs with an electric mixer until foamy and add to the batter. Fold the eggs gently into the batter.

Cook the batter in a hot waffle iron.

When it's done, decorate it with fresh strawberries and powdered sugar!

Summer + weekend = yummy food

2010-07-24T23:48:00.026-06:00

This week I had an opportunity to share my pita bread and hummus recipes with some of the Relief Society sisters in our ward. They set up the kitchen as if I was on a cooking show and I had to explain what I was doing while making pita bread and hummus. It was quite difficult to cook and talk at the same time but I hope everyone learned something from that evening.

Since I had some leftover dough and chickpeas from that evening, I baked some more pita bread at home and made roasted red pepper hummus and lentil with zucchini and Italian sausages. I got to use cilantro from our garden for the lentils and everything tasted very good.

I came across a recipe for a blueberry cream cheese braid a while ago but had never tried it because blueberries were always so expensive. Then the Smith's had an amazing price for blueberries - $4/2lbs - and I had to try it this weekend. The dough was sweetened a tiny bit and had cream cheese and blueberry fillings inside.

Right before the bread went into the oven.

Freshly baked cream cheese blueberry braid. It smelled amazing.

Mike and I each had a huge slice. It wasn't as sweet as we expected but it surely tasted wonderful.

Our garden isn't doing so well this year, except for these green beans. They have been always good to us since we started gardening three years ago, even other herbs and vegetables have not been so consistent. I harvested some for dinner yesterday and cooked them with sesame paste dressing. Fresh beans taste so good. I think I am going to plant some more so that we will have beans later in the season.

My pretty 4 month old girl. Since Mike was at school on Pioneer day, Adeline and I spread a blanket on the grass outside, played and took a nap together. I think I took 3 naps that day to catch up on my sleep.

We all dressed up to go and see the fireworks. It was fun to dress up and made us miss Japan so much!

Summer '10

2010-07-13T22:23:00.015-06:00

My silly little girl will be 4 months old next week.

She isn't camera shy and stares right at it.

She is also getting better at sitting by herself. She looks quite comfortable in her Bumbo.

Mike and I celebrated our three year anniversary last month. Mike wasn't almost able to see me that day because of his demanding school projects but made time for me to go out for dinner. Happy marriage year #3 for us! 3 more years at the student housing!!

4th of July. Adeline watched fireworks for the first time. She actually looked very interested in the flashing colors and lights of the fireworks.

It has been already a month since I went back to work. Thanks to Mike and our kind friends, I have been able to work without worrying about Adeline much. It's comforting to know that she is in good hands when I am away. Again, thanks to the flexibility of my work, I still have time to play with her after work and weekends. She is growing so fast that I don't want to miss any second of it!

This last weekend Mike's mission companion Tel got married to his beautiful bride in St. George. We were able to attend their wedding ceremony and had a great time.

After the wedding, we drove down to Vegas to see Mike's brother and his family. It was SO HOT and windy and felt like we were getting blown by hot blow dryer. Adeline did not like the summer Vegas weather very much.

Her swimming debut went pretty well. She didn't cry at all. But, for some reason, she wanted her mommy more than daddy in the water. I felt like that was my oh-my-baby-knows-I'm- her-mommy moment and was quite happy with that, though she should have known that I can't swim like her daddy.

Lastly, Adeline rolled over all by herself two days ago from back to tummy. She has been practicing this really hard for the last few weeks. Mike and I were so happy to be there when she did it for the first time!

Last Week As A Stay At Home Mom

2010-06-13T16:31:00.004-06:00

Today is my last day as a stay at home mom. 12 weeks went by way too fast. Some people say that they can't stay home for a long time and rather work, but I am not feeling that way after 12 weeks. I would much rather stay home with Adeline than go to work. But sometimes you have to do what you have to do. Hopefully, I can balance home and work for the next three years until Mike graduates and gets a job.

This week I tried a couple of new recipes. Grissini or Italian Bread Sticks were really fun to make and very delicious!

I also felt like I needed some comfort food to forget my sad feeling about going back to work and made myself a steak dinner. Garlic Rosemary Mashed Potato and Polenta with Thyme were the sides for the meal. It was delicious and helped me forget my negative thoughts. I am making chocolate cake today to fill my mind with more happy thoughts.

Happy mommy and baby.

She is growing so fast!

2010-06-01T13:19:00.010-06:00

Adeline is already more than 10 weeks old. She is almost growing out of some of her 0-3 month size clothes that she might have worn only once. I am glad that our family and friends gave us a lot of hand-me-downs and we have not had to buy any new clothes for her.

She finally figured out her days and nights and is very playful during the day. She smiles a lot, talks a lot, even to her favorite stuffed Japanese cartoon character (カレーパンマン or curry bread man). It's really fun to watch her talk to her カレーパンマン.

When she takes a nap, it's my free time. I just finished making her baby blessing gown today. I hope she can wear it.

She doesn't like playing "tummy time." So, I lie down on the couch and put her on my belly to play with her. She's very cute and it's a lot of fun.

Even though she doesn't like playing on her tummy, she likes looking at the bright colors on her play mat. She stares and drools all the time.

I love her smile. I'm so lucky that I get to see this everyday.

Vegetarian Week

2010-05-26T23:18:00.002-06:00

Mike and I had a vegetarian week last week to cleanse from the week long road trip diet. It was kind of challenging for me to come up with a different menu every night, but we loved it and didn't miss meat at all! Now we are almost not so happy going back to our regular diet. I am not sure if I can be a vegetarian, but I think it is a good idea to eat less meat and more vegetables often. Here's the list of what we ate last week.

Sun: Whole Wheat Vegetable Sandwich with hummus spread- It had spinach, red onion, cucumber, tomatoes, and olives.

Mon: French Bread, lentil soup and salad

Tue: Sansai Okowa or sticky glutinous rice with flavored mountain vegetables, tofu miso soup, and potato mochi

Wed: Rice, vegetable egg rolls, and tofu salad

Thu: Shell pasta with Tomato, Basil and Cheese Sauce, Beets and Spinach Salad and French Bread

Fri: -We didn't do vegetarian that night due to another commitment...

Sat: Pearl Barley Risotto with mushrooms, Corn on the cob, and Jicama Salad

We felt healthy all week and didn't even crave sweets for dessert! Hopefully, our garden will yield a lot of vegetables and herbs this summer, so that we can enjoy more vegetables.

First Road Trip with Baby

2010-05-17T12:48:00.004-06:00

We just came back from a week long road trip. Adeline did really well on this trip. She even slept at night for 5 hours straight a few nights in a row! We are hoping that she will keep that sleeping pattern at home, too. In fact, she slept almost 10 hours last night and we are very hopeful.

Well, the trip was so much fun. We stopped at my friends' homes in Colorado and Kansas before we got to Mike's sister's place in Missouri and had wonderful times with awesome friends. We are so thankful for our generous and kind friends who provided us with food and shelters! Thank you!

When we stopped at Katie's in Kansas, Adeline and Zeke met for the first time. Zeke was giving Adeline a ton of kisses, and every time after he kissed her he clapped his hands. It was just adorable to see them together.

In Missouri, we spent time with Mike's sister Sara's family and had so much fun! On my first mother's day, Sara's kids Eden, Emmie and Elise made me pancakes and eggs for breakfast and made me feel so special. On the same day, we got to go to Eden's violin concert, too. We just had so much fun spending time with them.

Next day we went to Nauvoo for a day. One day was definitely not enough to see all that we wanted to see. With the limited amount of time that we had, we went to Jonathan Browning's gun shop, blacksmith, and boot shop. Since did not realize that the Red Brick Store and the Nauvoo Mansion belonged to the Community of Christ, we were not able to take a tour of those buildings on this trip, but we really want to go to them in the future.

Another thing we could not do was to go inside the Nauvoo Temple. Hopefully, we can come back here soon again.

Beside seeing the beautiful temple, I had fun with visiting Elder and Sister Watts from my mission, who are now serving a temple mission in Nauvoo. They treated us to a dinner and we had a great time.

On our way back to Utah, we stopped in Independence, MO. and got a tour of the Community of Christ's temple.

We both really enjoyed the tour very much. Their temple was definitely different than our LDS temple, but it was really neat to learn about it. Inside the temple, there was a small museum that had awesome artifacts of the Smith family. They had the real door of the Carthage Jail, the original key to the Nauvoo Temple and so much more! The tour made us really want to study more about the church history.

After Independence, we stopped at Oklahoma Joe's BBQ in Kansas City. Ayumi recommended this place and it was awesome! The diner was inside a gas station and their food was yummy!

Though we didn't plan this trip to be a church history trip, we were glad that we could go to those places.

Baby Pants

2010-04-29T09:57:00.004-06:00

My friends had a sewing class two days ago and I was inspired to sew something yesterday. As I was looking inside my box full of fabric pieces, I found the cute corduroy fabric that I used to make a diaper bag a while ago. Then, I thought about making Adeline a pair of pants! She is even posing for the camera!

I just used her other pants and drew a pattern on a piece of newspaper. It took me only 2-3 hours to complete this project! It is super easy and you don't need a lot of fabric to do this. If you need an instant project with fabric scraps, you should totally try it!

Family Time

2010-04-25T15:37:00.009-06:00

Does Adeline look more like her mommy or daddy?

Maybe more like her daddy. What do you think?

She turned 5 weeks old on Friday. She is cute as ever. For the most part, she likes her bath time and it's fun for Mike and me to play with her, too.

The same Friday was also Mike's birthday. Since we were still not so sure about taking Adeline to a restaurant for his birthday dinner, we decided to have a family time at home. After having thought a lot about how to make his birthday dinner special, I finally decided to make nigiri sushi for that night.

I had never made nigiri sushi before and it was a lot more difficult than I thought.

When you go to a sushi bar, those sushi guys whip these things out so quick, but it took me a long time to make one piece. But we got nice fresh fish from a downtown fish market and it tasted very yummy.

Mike's first birthday as a daddy.

I made a birthday cake for Mike. The recipe was taken from Martha Stewart website, and it turned out pretty good. You just don't want to know how many sticks of butter are in there. It was kind of challenging to make it because I had never frosted cake while holding a baby in one arm before.

And,

My two most favorite people in the world

Already 4 weeks

2010-04-15T14:42:00.005-06:00

My baby is already 4 weeks old tomorrow. Time is going by so fast. We had her 2 week follow-up on Tuesday, (though it was really 3 week follow-up,) and found that she had put on 3 lbs since she was born. That is almost a half of what she weighed 3 weeks ago. I am very tired everyday but slowly getting used to baby's odd schedule. Though it is tiring to wake up every two hours during the night, it is a lot of fun to watch her grow everyday. I am definitely enjoying my time home with my baby. Here more pictures of her since the last post.

Adeline and her cousin Kaylin meeting for the first time on Easter

Picture Time!

2010-03-31T16:33:00.005-06:00

We have been home for more than a week and our baby is already 11 days old today. When you are on a constant 2-3 hour cycle of feed-play-nap, one day goes by really fast. Even though all I do everyday is spend time with her and don't do much, I like staying home and not worrying about going to work. Our current biggest challenge is that she still has her days and nights mixed up. Hopefully, she will figure that out soon.

Now my favorite pastime is taking pictures of her. Here's some that we have taken since we got home.

Her right ear looks like someone got a bite out of it, and it has a patch of hair. It's Mike's favorite.

Posing for the camera.

She has long curly eyelashes.

When we bathed her for the first time, we discovered that she has curly hair!!

She stares at me when we play

She is very cute when she smiles

Again, I love her eyelashes

She is falling asleep

I know I am super biased, but I think she is really cute....

Adeline's Birth Story

2010-03-24T22:26:00.013-06:00

It has been a week since Adeline was born. I have been so exhausted for the past week but finally am getting myself together again.

Friday, March 19, 2010

I woke up with some cramps around 2 AM on last Friday morning, wondering if this could be it. But I ignored it because I didn't think that baby was coming that day. Despite of my attempt at sleeping through the cramps, they kept coming at a fairly consistent rate. So, I finally got up and started timing how often they were coming. They were about 10-12 minutes apart.

Mike got up around and 6:30 AM and noticed that I was not in bed any more. I told him that I had been counting contractions since 2:30 in the morning but they weren't coming so fast that he could go and take his exam. He came home about an hour later, but things weren't progressing. Since contractions were still 10 minutes apart, I told him to go to work, assuring him that I would call him if I felt any change. Even after Mike left for work, nothing changed. I called in sick to work and count contractions all morning while lying on the couch until Mike came home around noon.

After 12 PM, contractions slowly started picking up at a rate of 7-8 minutes. But they weren't so painful yet, just uncomfortable. My early labor phase slowly progressed throughout the day, and contractions were finally 4-5 minutes apart around 5:30 PM. I told Mike that they were getting more painful and I wanted to go to the hospital.

About 5-10 minutes later, we were at the hospital. It was already pretty painful and walking to the car to the L&D was not so fun. After a nurse checked us in at the L&D, a midwife checked my cervix. I was 4 cm dilated and 90% effaced at that point. The midwife told us to go for a walk around the unit while they prepared our room. But as soon as we started walking, I couldn't walk any more because it was too painful. We slowly walked back to the room and started trying all the comfort measures we learned in the childbirth class. However, nothing really worked. Finally, I decided to take a bath to see if the pain would be alleviated. The warm water was very nice but contractions were still painful. I sat in the tub for about an hour and a half, and then I couldn't even stay in the tub because of the pain. I got out and contractions were coming so fast, every few minutes or less. At that point, I told Mike that I would like an epidural even though that was not what we had written in our birth plan. A nurse who was with us during this whole thing asked me if I wanted to be checked before I would decide to get an epidural. I agreed. She checked me and said I was almost fully dilated and cervix was almost completely gone. I asked her how soon this baby would come out and she told me that it would take about 2 hours. But I was so much in pain that I could not give her any answer as to whether I wanted to get an epidural then. All I could do was focus on contractions one at a time. That was how I missed my opportunity to get an epidural.

More doctors came into the room and checked me again. She said my water had been broken already and it must have happened while I was in the tub. She also said it was
OK for me to bear down if I felt any urge. So I did. For me, sitting on the toilet made the pain somewhat more manageable during this phase. But once the urge to push kicked in, it was a different story. We told the nurse that all I could think of was to push, and she called in a team of doctors. They positioned me on the bed and I was pushing. It was about 10:30 PM.

Pushing was definitely hard work. When I could feel a contraction coming, I had to regroup myself and focus on pushing. Of course, baby didn't come after one push, and I had to repeat the step of rest, regroup, focus and push for the next 45 minutes. Amazingly, I was so aware of everything I was feeling, including what my body was going through and what everyone in the room was saying. The last part of pushing was something else. I definitely felt the so-called "ring of fire" as baby's head was crowning. I could feel something was trying to go through me and I was so determined to push it out. After exhausting all the energy I had, Adeline finally slipped out of me and came into the world. That was 11:12 PM, almost 22 hours after I started feeling the contractions.

I was so relieved once she was born and didn't even have energy to be emotional, while Mike was very moved by the birth of his first daughter. But it was such an amazing but kind of weird feeling when Doctor put my warm baby on me. It was sort of a surreal feeling to have my own baby on my skin. I was amazed by the baby I was holding, thinking she just had come from my belly. It was wonderful.

She weighed 6 lbs 14 oz and measured 20 inches long. She is healthy, and just perfect. Just perfect.

Waiting but nothing

2010-03-16T20:23:00.004-06:00

It's not my due date yet, but I am getting anxious. Except that I have been a little bit effaced and dilated, there is NO sign of this baby's arrival. I have been having Braxton-Hicks contractions more often, but this baby is getting too cozy in her mommy's belly.

Since I am just waiting and can't really feel like doing too much, I just tied some bows for baby... I wonder when she'll come. And hopefully, it's really SHE!!

Full term!!!

2010-03-01T22:39:00.006-07:00

I am full term this week. My belly is bigger than ever.

To feed my hungry baby, Mike and me, I made my version of BLT pizza the other night. You can use your favorite pizza dough recipe for this. For this pizza, I put some mozzarella cheese, sliced garlic, fresh tomatoes, bacon, sea salt and drizzled some olive oil and baked it in the oven until the crust was done. Then, I took the pizza out of the oven and mounted some chopped lettuce dressed with olive oil and salt on top. It wasn't an ordinary pizza but tasted pretty good.

I finally finished my diaper bag this week. I didn't know that a diaper bag could be very costly until I started looking recently. So, I made one for myself. It looks very home-made, but I am not going back to fix all the mistakes. I do not have that kind of patience.

I put a zipper.

There are 12 pockets inside this bag. Since I have never had to use a diaper bag before, I have no idea what a good diaper bag is. Hopefully, this will work for me!

Mike and I celebrated my birthday last week. We went to a restaurant called Tin Angel Cafe. I had wild boar stew and Mike had mushroom and roasted tomato ragout. It was pretty good. For dessert, we got some Italian gelato from Capo Gelateria. I love Italian gelato and it was great! It's so weird to think that was my last birthday without baby!!!

Weekend Getaway to Las Vegas

2010-02-16T19:43:00.010-07:00

I very much needed to have a getaway before the arrival of baby and we decided to drive down to Vegas over the weekend. Thanks to Hans, Jody and their kids, we had a fabulous time there.

We spent a lot of time with these kids during our stay. They were so full of energy and I was totally blown away! It made me wonder if I should be having baby of my own so soon. Anyways, on Saturday we packed them in our little car and went to get some yummy lunch.

Well, you have to go to a buffet when you are in Vegas. Hans and Jody graciously treated us at a Korean BBQ buffet. There was so much food! I wish my stomach wasn't so squished by my baby because I could have eaten a lot more than I ate there. I think I tried too hard to eat too much and was hurting for the next several hours.

In the evening, we went to Serendipity in Caesars Palace to meet up with my old roommate Jen. We had their famous frozen hot chocolate there. It was really good and perfect for the Valentine's day.

This weekend was also Chinese New Year. Bellagio was decorated with a lot of Chinese things including this huge Chinese guy.

There were a lot of these red lanterns. They were very pretty.

I did like the Chinese New Year decorations a lot but liked this chocolate fountain at Jean-Phillipe, too. Since it was right after we had that frozen hot chocolate, I did not have any more chocolate , though it was very very tempting.

We got to see a water show, too. It was awesome!

Next morning Hans and Mike set up a swing in the backyard. It was so nice! Kids absolutely loved it, too. I took a nap there that afternoon and it was great. I so needed this vacation and was so glad that we could do it. Now, we need to start prepping for baby!!!

32 weeks

2010-01-26T21:20:00.007-07:00

First off, I want to thank everyone for your comments on what I should get to prepare for baby. I was very relieved when I read your comments because your lists were considerably shorter than what I found elsewhere. Thank you all for your insight!

My belly is growing everyday. I wonder how big it will get in the next 8 weeks... I don't think my skin can stretch any further than now. The new thing for me this last week was that I actually had some food cravings! Probably it wasn't related to pregnancy, but it is fun to say I am craving something. I've been really wanting Vietnamese noodle soup Pho and milk shake.

To manage stress, I have been crocheting burp cloths. Working with hands tends to help me not to focus on things that negatively affect me.

Finally, tonight, I used the ceramic pot Mike made for me for Christmas. It worked great and we had some yummy Japanese one pot dish. I am excited to use this pot more in the future!!

At 30 Weeks

2010-01-10T15:24:00.003-07:00

I am 30 weeks today.

Everything is going well with pregnancy so far, except for one incident we had last week. At my regular checkup, my doctor noticed my baby's heartbeat was skipping and sent us to do a non-stress fetal test. I got to sit down in a comfy chair for 40 minutes, while a fetal monitor on my belly recorded baby's heartbeat. Everything went fine and we were so relieved.

Now that we have only 10 more weeks until the arrival of this baby, I feel very unprepared. Only things we have are a crib without mattress and a few baby clothes my coworker gave us. We don't have anything else. We don't really know where to start or what we need. Can anyone tell us what things we MUST have and those that are GOOD to have?

A good year starts with good food

2010-01-04T17:44:00.002-07:00

I finally made kakiage right for the first time!! Kakiage is a type of tempura made with lots of chopped vegetables and seafood. This time, I put carrots, green beans, green peppers, Japanese sweet potatoes, onions, and mushrooms.

Tempura goes very good with Japanese noodles like soba. Eating soba or buckwheat noodles on the New Year's Eve is one of Japanese traditions, and I went to buy all the ingredients and was so prepared for it until the day came. But, it didn't happen. Although we were too busy to keep the tradition on the New Year's Eve, we still had to eat the food. I had never been able to make perfect kakiage like my Grandma's, but I did it right for the first time yesterday! It's silly but this is such an accomplishment for me. I feel like I am starting this new year right.

Baby blanket & Onesie

2009-12-27T22:43:00.001-07:00

I finished my first baby blanket a few weeks ago.

I like this ripple pattern a lot and it was actually very easy to make. Even though I did not work on it consistently, it took me only 3 weeks to finish. If you want to make a small blanket in a short amount of time, I highly recommend this. The pattern that I used can be found here.

I made a onesie, too.

This one was not as easy as the blanket. It turned out to be a much bigger project than I anticipated. The hardest part was making the pattern. Since I could not find a pattern I liked to use, I used an already made onesie, took its measurement, and drew the pattern on a piece of newspaper. The second hardest part was sewing the necklines. Sewing bias tapes is kind of time-consuming. But, I like how it turned out and am very proud of myself for it. Don't you think it's cute? (I just want to say it to make me feel better.)

Originally, I thought this would save some money but don't think so any more. If you can buy a pack of 5 onesies for $10, it will give you greater savings in your time investment, for sure. This project is only for those who really want to make one. I spent about $5 for the fabric and the buttons and can make two or three more of the same thing for the size 0-3 month old.

Christmas 2009

2009-12-27T22:36:00.008-07:00

We had another good Christmas.

This year we bought a smaller fake tree so that we could use it again next year. It was perfect for our tiny apartment with a few presents for each other.

On Christmas Eve and Christmas Day we went to Springville to spend time with Mike's mom, sister and her husband. On Christmas Eve, Mike's mom prepared a delicious dinner and we each opened one gift. Opening one present on Christmas Eve is one of the Zeller's Christmas tradition.

Mike's mom chose a gift for us to open that night, and we got a homemade baby blanket for our baby. Very Nice.

We slept in next morning, which was so nice, and opened the rest of the Christmas presents. Mike's mom made a Utah Swoop scarf for Mike. Go Utes! John's mom got us a hat, scarf and gloves to keep us warm. That was very nice of them.

Mike gave his mom his pottery collection that he made in his class this semester. This jar, (she calls it a cookie jar,) was her favorite.

We also got a little nursery book from Jen and John. Very Very cute.

We spent all day playing a game on Christmas day until we went back to our apartment pretty late at night. Even though it was already close to the end of the Christmas Day, we still had a gift for each other to open.

Again, Mike got me very nice things: my favorite perfume and a set of dishware and a cooking pot! My favorite thing was this pot that he made with clay. (He made the bowls, too.) I can use the pot to cook or to serve, and there is only one in the world! It's so wonderful to have a husband who can make amazing things.

Yep. We had a good Christmas.

Feeling crafty

2009-11-29T16:14:00.005-07:00

First of all, I want to thank everyone who gave me advice on leg cramp remedies. After reading everyone's comments and talking to my doctor, I went to buy some calcium supplements. Since then, I have been on a calcium + potassium diet and haven't had a painful midnight leg cramp for more than a week now. I also have been keeping a water bottle next to our bed so that I won't get dehydrated. It's been great and I really thank you for all your comments!

During the 4-day Thanksgiving weekend, I got a little crafty and crocheted a baby hat with a big flower for my baby girl.

If you want to make one, here's the link that I used --> Baby Beanie Hat. Or you can come over to my place and make one with me. This little hat made me want to crochet more and I started making a baby afghan this weekend. It's coming along really well and should be done in a few weeks. I'm so excited!

AAAAAAAH!

2009-11-22T14:35:00.006-07:00

I am like this Homer just about every other night. I get super painful leg cramps in the middle of the night and wake up, screaming. Sometimes I get only in one of my legs, and other times in both of them. It's really not fun. For the rest of the night, my legs are usually very stiff like wood logs and remain the same for the next 24 hours. When it happened for the first time a few weeks ago, I really scared Mike because I screamed so loud and he didn't know what was going on. Now since it happens pretty regularly, as soon as I scream, he reaches for my legs and gives me a massage. Sadly, everyone whom I have talked to said it is pretty common...sigh....

Does anyone have any advice on how to make this not happen???

My first maternity skirt

2009-11-10T21:21:00.003-07:00

By the way, my due date is March 20, 2010. It's actually a very special date for Mike and me because it's our engagement anniversary. It's cute that this baby girl picked this date. We'll see if she sticks to her original plan.

Well, a few weeks ago I made myself a skirt that fits my growing belly.

Recipe for a maternity skirt

What you need:
your favorite fabric - I used red Indian cotton
stretchy fabric - I used thin knitted material
thread that matches your fabric of choice

Stand in front of a mirror.
Wrap around your favorite fabric around your lower belly. Because this part will not stretch, you want to make sure that you can fit in the circle you are making with the fabric.
Mark the fabric at where you want to seam the front and back materials together. Pin the fabric together if you want to see how it looks without you holding it.
Mark the fabric at the length you want. My skirt comes up right below my knees.
Wrap around the stretchy material around your big belly.
Mark the fabric at where you want to seam the fabric. You don't really have to worry too much about your belly becoming too big because this part of the skirt will stretch.
Cut the material as you marked. I made my skirt slightly A-lined.
Sew the bottom of the skirt so that it won't fray.
Seam the sides of the skirt and make a loop.
Sew the top and bottom of the stretchy material so that they won't fray.
Seam the stretchy material and make a loop.
Pin the stretchy material and the skirt material together as you stretch the stretchy material. This is probably the most tricky part.
Seam the material together.
Done!

It cost me less than $5 and a few hours!!

Half Way Through

2009-11-05T23:32:00.002-07:00

I am 20 weeks into my pregnancy. I can't believe I am half way through it.

Some people asked me for my pregnancy photo and here it is. It's kind of hard to see my growing belly under a thick sweater, but it is there.

Because I didn't talk about my pregnancy with anyone (but Mike) for a long time, it almost seems that my last 20 weeks never existed. Therefore, I am going to take this opportunity to write my midterm pregnancy report.

My first trimester was not as terrible as some people say about theirs. The biggest thing was that I was tired all the time. I could sleep all day and needed more. I didn't want to eat because food didn't look or sound good. My nose was very sensitive and I could smell things from miles away. The worst smells were meat being cooked, garbage, and Mike's burp, which he sometimes "accidentally" did and made me run to the bathroom. But, that was pretty much it.

Right now I am just hungry all the time, all the time. I have been eating food around midnight three days in a row now. It's scary, but I am saying it's the baby who's eating. Not me.

Oh boy!!!

2009-10-27T20:32:00.004-06:00

I thought it would be fun to keep more secrets, but I am being a good girl and telling you what we are having!

Here's our baby's first shot saying "hi!" to her daddy and mommy.

Yep. It's a GIRL!!!

Both Mike and I were thinking the baby would be a boy, but we were both wrong! It's a girl.

Our first ultrasound experience was really fun. It was simply amazing to be able to see so much of her body parts. I was so amazed when I saw her strong heart pump and her mouth open and close. She was super active during the ultrasound and it made us very happy. However, she was not very cooperative and we could not see her spine very well, we have to go back again in a month to check if everything is OK. But she seems to be pretty healthy so far.

I hope you all enjoyed our news as much as we did!

Let me tell you our secret...

2009-10-24T14:02:00.006-06:00

"Look within!. . . The secret is inside you." by Hui-neng

Yep. It's inside me.

Our families and most of our neighbors know about it, but some of you who live far away from us might not know about our special secret. We've kept it between us for almost 5 months and thought it was about time to share our happy news. I started feeling the baby move about a week ago, and our baby is becoming more real to us. We'll know the gender of the baby this coming Tuesday and are so excited! Stay tuned!

City Creek Excursion - Meadows Trail

2009-09-27T17:01:00.008-06:00

We went to City Creek Canyon two weeks ago for the first time and really enjoyed our walk there. Because we only saw and walked a very small part of the canyon that time, we decided to go back there to explore the canyon further this last Saturday and drove the City Creek Canyon Road we walked last time all the way until the end of the road.

On the way to the trail head, Mike all of sudden stopped the car. He just said "did you see the spider?" As he was jumping out of the car, I was thinking "did he just stop the car to see a spider?"

He opened my side of the door and pointed his finger towards this. TARANTULA! I had never seen such a big hairy spider outside of a zoo or a PETCO.

This picture kind of tells us how big that spider was. It was almost as big as Mike's hand! Eeeew!

After our encounter with the spider, we got a little bit too excited but drove on to the meadows trail head. As we drove, we could see fall colors surrounding us, and it was simply gorgeous.

The trail was pretty friendly, and we even got to see awesome views like this.

Though I said that the trail was pretty friendly, as we got deeper in the canyon, there were places like this where grasses were taller than us. We saw some moose footprints and tracks along the way, too.

I like this time of the year. It is so pretty!!

We could hear the water from this creek during our hike and it was so refreshing.

After the hike, we got to see this beautiful scenery as we drove out to the city. I feel so lucky that we live so close to a beautiful place like this.

Good stuff from the Andes

2009-09-24T20:18:00.003-06:00

I cooked quinoa for the first time tonight. It was a good experience.

They remind me of something that I have eaten before, although I can't quite figure out what it is. It's kind of like couscous because it's fluffy, but it tastes more earthy and hearty.

On our dinner plate for tonight: we got the quinoa, salmon meuniere, pesto mashed potatoes and steamed carrots and green beans. "Meuniere" sounds kind of fancy because it's French, but how to make it is quite simple. All you have to do is to coat the fish with flour and cook it in a buttered pan. You can squeeze some lemon juice and put horseradish on it if you like to have a little extra flavor. My mom used to make it once in a while, and I remember it being one of my favorite dishes.

Fresh basil and fresh food

2009-09-22T21:14:00.009-06:00

More good stuff from our garden.

I picked some basil from our garden on Saturday. We get about this much basil every other week or so. I have frozen and dried some, and even given out more to friends and neighbors. But I thought it was time for me to make some pesto!

I used more than one cup of basil and only got this much pesto in the end. It really takes a lot of basil to make a little bit of pesto! The ingredients for my pesto are basil, olive oil, garlic, Parmesan cheese and macadamia nuts. Pretty standard. I was going to use pine nuts but they were too expensive: $27 /lb! So I went with a different kind of nuts. I think you can use walnuts or pistachio nuts as well.

Pesto spaghetti. All you have to do is to cook your noodles and add pesto and salt.

Pesto salad pasta = pasta of your favorite kind + tomatoes + avocado + cucumber + green onion + any veges you like + pesto + red wine vinegar + salt + lemon juice

Then, this is just a loaf of whole wheat honey bread I made on Sunday. After modifying a few recipes, it's getting more refined and tasty. So far, this was the best of all the whole wheat bread I have made.

Dinner Hunting

2009-09-17T20:25:00.003-06:00

I like this time of the year when you can go to your garden more often than to a grocery store. Today was one of those days. Since I didn't know what to cook for dinner, I went outside and picked some vegetables from our little garden. Then, this is what we got.

Of course, chicken didn't come from the garden, but everything else did, including the parsley that's on the chicken. We had sauteed Swiss chard and roasted vegetables that had green beans, red and yellow tomatoes and zucchini. Mike really liked the vegetables and this is going to be our favorite side dish during the harvest season.

Photographing the Photograper

2009-09-04T21:32:00.004-06:00

This is my favorite photographer.

He is taking a digital photography class this semester. I went along with him to Great Salt Lake today to "help" him with his homework. Really, all I did was taking pictures next to him.

It was just fun to be out and to take pictures. He got some really cool photos.

I too got to practice taking pictures with our little Nikon point-and-shoot camera as well. The more I use it, the more comfortable I get with it. My goal is to master this little camera and to take great photos with fun memories.

A Diaper bag for Anna Jo

2009-08-25T17:20:00.007-06:00

I made a diaper bag for Anna jo because she told us she wanted something semi-handmade or recycled or eco-friendly for her baby. So I designed and sewed a bag for her.

This is it. It's got a big pocket outside. Since it's a diaper bag, it probably should have had more pockets, though.

It snaps in the middle.

And, there are pockets just made for the bottles. I picked this fake leather-ish material for the inside layer so that she could wipe out any liquid or mess without making stains. By the way, the outer material is corduroy with the eco-friendly green colors.

I hope she will like it.