Out with a bang!

The restaurant has been busy. I have been working 60+ hour weeks and everything is going along as well as can be expected.
Kel's folks came to visit for Thanksgiving and we returned the favor by going to New Bern for Christmas.
On the way we re-routed to see the Meadow Lights. Although not overly impressive, it was good to visit the general store, were you could get all sorts of candy goodness and old-fashioned sodas in bottles (RC and Squirt anyone?).
We then carried our tired masses to New Bern where we ate. And ate some more, most of Monday we slept and ate. During Sunday's eating festivities, we met JAG (from Next Food Network Star) who is the Chef at one of the New Bern restaurants. We got to hear some of the behind the scenes info from the show and jibber-jab for a couple of minutes.
But most unlike me, who was going to wait until January, we broke the Amy-is-preggers news to both sets of grandparents-to-be, Kel's on Christmas Eve and mine on Christmas day.
Kel's mom always always always starts bugging the rest of the family to open a present on Christmas Eve. Always. Every year it gets earlier and earlier in the day - at one point it was 8 or 10 at night - this go round we somehow made it to 4 in the afternoon. Kel and I gave them a present alright - a Merry Christmas Grandma and Grandpa card with Ultrasound pics taped inside. It took them a minute, but when they figured it out there was an outpouring of OHHHH's.
It was tougher for the folks from Philly, because after gentle prodding to open up their frickin' email for 20 minutes, the stupid e-card didn't pop right up on screen. Thank you Hallmark.

Just as I thought, I never could've handled this whole pregnancy without them. Mind you I'm 11+ weeks along and the first thing from Kel's mom is - "you know you can't have alcohol now."
And from my very own flesh and blood after claiming she knew something was up - Mommacita Mel - "you know you should be eating healthy."
Good thing I've been throwing back the booze and eating crap food for the last couple of months 'cuz now I have to lead a life on the straight and narrow.

I have to say, out of the whole thing, the best two responses were:
1) from my dad who was still on the phone with me and started emailing everyone he knows. (dads are so cool when you least expect it) and 2) my mom saying that my dad could go completely gray to fit the part now - I thought the wedding was enough to do that.

Festive greetings y'all!

November?!?! Seriously.

Whew - one day you wake up and it is No-frickin'-vember.
Since I've been averaging about a blog a month, I guess I should make it a good one.

We have been training a new dessert person at the restaurant. I feel like she is getting it, but she is changing and adapting the station to her own ways (which gives me a weird feeling as a "trainer"). She has picked up some of the things that have been harder for others to pick up, but still gets flustered when the tickets hit hard. Between the pastry chef and I, we have been getting her on track, pulling 1 1/2 shift days and helping her with her speed. The toughest part for me is not taking over when I see something that can be done more efficiently. This week, she is on vacation, going to see her parents in California. I'll be working Thurs, Fri and Sat nights. Altough I'm not happy about that, I guess there are worse things. At least I get to go on vacation Sunday through Tuesday with my dad on the annual fishing/not fishing trip.
The pastry chef said she would help the new dessert girl last Saturday night (since her boyfriend was working Saturday night too) which gave me a Saturday night off for once. We had been planning on going west with friends who have newly acquired a mountain love shack and hightailed it to Sparta, NC for an overnight (not really a whole weekend). We relaxed, yet accomplished too, while we were there. We tasted bad North Carolina Wine. We went canoeing. We visited their neighbors' pottery shop. The weather was just how mountain weather should be this time of year - dipping into the 30s and 40s overnight and just being sunny but refreshing during the day.
Other than that - it has been work work work. I put in 108 hours over the last two weeks.
Also during the last two weeks, a little bit of salary depression. Gone are the days of dinners out on a whim, buying things without thinking. In are crazy hours and paying the bills. American dream, right? At least I'm not as stressed.
Last night we met friends for dinner that we hadn't seen in a while. A good couples group where everyone pitched in for a good meal. Kel came back for dinner from Wilson, where he is working all week.
One of these days the tires are going to come in for the car and I can stop driving on the donut. Won't that be peachy!

Part 2 of 2?

So Blogger wasn't letting me log in for a while there. Hate that!

Day 2 in San Fran we had brunch at a delicious French Cafe/Bakery and then headed to Monterey to meet my parents at the Airport when the picked up my sister. They didn't "really" know we were coming until the restaurant called to confirm the reservation for 5. After having Sarah stall for a bit, we made it and then went to Big Sur for a stroll through the woods.

After that we went back to the hotel, got ready for dinner and had a wonderful meal at http://www.pacificsedge.com/ in Carmel.

We stayed over in Monterey and walked around town with Mom and Sarah in the morning while Dad was in his conference. Mid-morning, Kel and I headed back to San Fran via California Rte1, stopping here and there to take in the sites. Including several hikes from roadside to beachside.

The next day we were tourists. Take all of the post cards you have ever seen from along the piers of San Fran and line then up. We went from Pier one and walked around, took in pier 39 -

ourt! ourt! ourt!
Went to Boudin to take a self guided tour of Sourdough breadmaking and then to Fisherman's Wharf so Kel could get his seafood on. After that we took the Cable Car back to the train to make our way to the Japanese Tea Gardens.



For dinner we went to a great French restaurant and hated that we had an early flight to come back to the Suck....

Where I have been working. Last week it was 11 straight work related days with a little head cold in the middle. But hey! I can run a four diamond restaurant's bake shop by myself for over a week (mind you, it wasn't the busiest it has ever been, but still - over a week!).
We are back to a suck schedule. This week it is two nights - including Saturday night. I worked yesterday too, and am kind of hatin' that. It just kind of screws over your whole weekend. But I have to end on a good note, The restaurant served close to 300 last night. And I was on top of it.

Pics, As promised (part 1 of ?)

First, Baby blankets are finito...

The blue.gold.green one has been given to a sweet young one named Nikko and the others are wrapped and ready for gifting. The most pastel looking one was completed on the San Fran Trip.

Without further delay - the San Fran Trip, day one.

The plane landed, we got the rental car, we went and we chocolated. Scharffen Berger Chocolate to be exact, their plant is in Berkeley California, and I recommed the tour/chocolate tasting to anyone who appreciates European style (not sweet and waxy) chocolate. Kel and I were early for our tour so we participated in one of the quintessential Californian activities - Cafe going.

How convenient that Scharffen Berger also has a chocolate laced cafe experience. Here you'll notice husband Kelly with a piece of lush chocolate cake that was quickly scarfed down. He enjoyed an iced chocolate while I had the cacao coke. Everything was ridiculously yummy.

After the gastronomically pleasing visit to the cafe we perused the store and bought copious amounts of chocolate even before we had the tour/tasting - where we all got to sport hairnets and look like uber-goobers...

Let me tell you something though - the tasting was worth it!

After the tour, we made our way to Rach and Douglas's, Kel's cousins, to pop in, unload, relax and see their house and say hi. Kel and Rach are the cousins that are closest in age. And they were more than welcoming, their house was our house, and they let us treat it like a home base. They have recently aquired a new family member - Chewie - and we fell in love with this little bundle of energy....Douglas took us to a fun place for dinner, a bar and restaurant where we walked right in amid a busy Saturday crowd for another great meal.

There you have it - day 1.

2 days does not a gymrat make...

But I felt better when I went to the gym today. I kind of hit a three oclock wall today. I am starting off slowly so I don't hurt myself and/or get discouraged. Very slowly. Like today for example, I walked 1.7 miles and then got off the treadmill and came home. And ate a bag of cheetos - hahahahah - just kidding, I had some carrots with a little bit of dip to make it "not as healthy". You see, the gym near me isn't open yet - so I'm going to a smaller version of the gym - at least from what I can tell it is smaller - mostly treadmills, bikes, ellipticals and such, then free-weights for the not-amy types.

Yesterday was great in Raleigh - the weather has gone from 90-100s to whooo-hooo 70s and 80s and comfortable. Kel and I played tennis for the first time in probably 2 years (he says it hasn't been that long, I think it has been longer). I was slow. My backhand must have slowly degraded over that time too because it was comical at best.

Here's to more good weather.

For the rest of the weekend - Kel and I went to Greek fest - where Kel got to meet one of my ex's. JOY. At least the food was decent. I love me some spanikopita. Kel's folks came into town on Saturday for the day (bad weather on the coast again the weekend - we will never go sailing).

While I worked, they went to Bug Fest and then we went to a favorite nearby joint for outdoor mexican - Dos Taquitos.

And the slackassedness continues...

Almost a month since my last post - must have been busy. or lazy. or something.

Kind of busy -
Went to San Fran/Monterey and had a bunch of fun with Kel's cuz and my family.
Saw Bill and Heidi's new kiddo - Nikko. He is adorable, cute and heathy, and completely changing his parents world.
Went to racing club meeting even though I have missed a couple of events (joys of working on Saturdays).
Visited with Margaret today to say hi, her father passed away shortly before the California trip. It was so good to see her and talk. She is my walking buddy from long ago and I just miss the opportunities to vent.
I finished the fourth in a series of baby blankets. Shortly thereafter I finished a mitten. I might even have enough yarn to make another mitten. They match the earflap hat I made when I needed a quickie project that wasn't a baby blanket.

Kind of lazy -
Although I have had a couple of days off here and there, I keep meaning to blog. Oh! If my well-meaning-ed-ness would actually convert itself into blog entries.

Kind of something -
I joined a gym. You can't beat the rate and we'll see, maybe I'll actually get off my lazy butt and go.
I think the dessert plating guy is going to give notice at the end of September. Will it be back to Nights for the Aim-ster? (I hope not, but, someone has got to train the newcomer, and it might as well be done correctly).
Dance is on hiatus for me - Vacation, then working at night has caused me to miss the last three weeks or so. That sucks. Plummeting far behind is always a good thing.

Pictures later, really.

Booties, Blankets and Caterpillars

Whoo Hooo - Thursday - my day off. So far I have iced two cakes and worked on baby blanket #4. Here are the first three... sorry about the lighting, this is what seemed to work.

I finished #3 last Sunday, also finishing an ear flap hat the same day. Must have been some virtuous knitting going on.

I was wondering why our parsley plant was kind of looking "eh".

I knelt to take a closer look - turns out something likes parsley faster than we have been using it. It was a lush and beautiful plant. Oh well, Kel keeps planting, forgetting that I have an ability to make plants die. I guess this time is isn't my fault.

ps - since I can't let anything just go, I had to see what these buggers were going to turn in to. Thanks to a couple different sites - they are "parsleyworms" eventually they will be black swallowtails. Pretty!