Ongoing Memorial Day Festivities

MUST. STOP. EATING.

Sorry for not posting anything new lately. We have all been enjoying one humdinger of a Memorial Day weekend over here. It started on Saturday and is still in process.

Saturday: I attended a fun little baby shower where many tasty treats were served. i started out with a small healthy plate, but soon went back for seconds, and when no one was watching I went back for thirds. I couldn't help it. There was lots of yummy fresh fruit, a rich spinach and artichoke dip with crackers, and some very addicting cranberry turkey pinwheels. I only had a sliver of cake, but was stuffed to the brim by the time I went home. Only an hour after the shower we attended a dinner party at one of my very best friend's home. Jamie and Andy were celebrating their 7 year anniversary and did so be feeding all of their friends. Jamie is a great cook and is my source for very good pasta. She made a great cold pasta salad with rigatoni, tomatoes, olives, feta cheese, basil, olive oil, and I'm sure there were other things in it. Now I was VERY stuffed.

Sunday:
Sunday night our very good friends Shawn and Wendy came all the way from Utah to visit. Shawn and DSSH have been best friends since 1st grade. Shawn has also served 18 months in Iraq and, considering the areas that he served in, we feel very lucky not to have to be memorializing him right now.

We started our bacchanalian marathon with awesome nachos ('awesome' referring to the size as well as the flavor) and multiple bowls of ice cream and tall glasses of Root Beer Floats. The cheesy nachos were served with taco meat, sour cream, Lizzy's Salsa, and butter black beans. The evening was spent eating and talking. We talked until 1 in the morning, just catching up on old times.

Butter Black Beans
melt 1 Tblsp. butter in pan. Add 1/4 C. finely chopped onion and cook until onion begins to brown. Add 1-3 cloves garlic minced and cook for 1 minute. Add one can black beans UNdrained. Smash a few times with a potato smasher. Stir and cook to desired consistency. Salt to taste. MMMMMMMM

Monday:
Luckily for me, S and W like yard saling as much as I do, so we left the kids with DSSH (he doesn't like "junksaling") and hit a few Memorial Day sales. I found some wonderful things, including a great art easel for Pablo's B-Day. For lunch we had make your own sandwiches with pickles, chips, and veggie sticks on the side (and they were some mighty big 'samiches'). With full bellies W and I took the kids to a local beach park to play in the sand and look for shells. We found a huge barnacle and had fun watching it poke its frilled head out. DSSH and S stayed behind to do some man bonding which requires that they sit in different rooms communicating over two computers while playing Age Of Empires III. For dinner we had a good ol' Rockwellian BBQ. W and I prepped all the veggies and side dishes while the manly men sat around drinking rootbeer and tossing a pigskin to the kids while waiting for the coals to turn grey. We chowed down on Peppered Burgers, Broccoli Salad, corn on the cob, 3 kinds of chips, 2 kinds of soda, watermelon, and ice cream. It was a lovely day. We tried to finish the night with a Mystery Science Theater 3000 called Puma Man but, about half way through all the laughter, I fell asleep. I think W fell asleep soon after so we called it a night.

Tuesday:
We took our guests on the requisite Pike Place Market tour. I LOVE Pike Place Market! It is crowded with so many people from all walks of life. In the same three feet you see a bodily pierced young woman selling her handmade purses, a man with a 2 foot beard playing his fiddle, a wealthy business woman buying flowers, a group of Japanese speaking tourists, and me with my big family holding a screaming Sweet Terror on my shoulders. Of course no trip to the market is complete without sampling foods from around the world. Our first culinary stop was Japan with a fresh shrimp spring roll dipped in peanut sauce (or is that Cantonese?), then some Mexican Pan Dulce, a few sweet flavored honey tubes to suck on, freshly fried doughnuts that the dreadlocked man flings behind his back and into the bag while knocking a beat with his tongs on the counter, a few Greek Dolmates wrapped in tangy grape leaves, a free slice from a heavenly sweetened California peach, a stop at the spice store for little bags of pepper, paprika, curry, herbal teas, and sea salt, followed up with some Chinese food at the Genghis Khan (I highly reccomend the broccoli and mushrooms, YUMMERS). After the Market feast we took a two hour break from eating before leaving the kids with our awesome babysitter and escaping to a great indian restaurant called the Sahib. The Sahib is located down by the ferry dock so you can enjoy a great view if you get the right seat, or sit on the deck. We all highly recommend the mixed appetizer platter, the mixed grill, the Malai Kofta, and Chicken Korma. The appetizer platter had something I've never heard of before, let alone tasted, they were fried spinach leaves. I know, it sounds funny but they were addicting. I'm already planning a second visit just for that combo appetizer. Oh, it was GOOD. We were all laughing about how full we were. Then we were laughing about the fact that we still had ice cream in the freezer that wanted to be eaten. After putting the kids to bed we not only ate multiple bowls of ice cream while watching episodes from the 4th season of The Simpsons, but I managed to polish off the leftover Chinese food too, AAAUGH!

As bloggers are my witness, I WILL NEVER GO HUNGRY AGAIN! That is, until 5 minutes ago when I had another bowl of ice cream for breakfast =). Let me just say that I'm actually glad that the ice cream sale is over so that I can return to my normal "three meals and two bowls a day".