wheel of fortune!

How do you play a family game with all your kids even when one of them is living half way around the world? Through Skype of course! Shawna may live in Israel, but that doesn't mean she can't get in on the weekend fun.

My brother, Matt, recently won an iPad. How cool is that?! And we all had fun playing with it over the weekend at my parents' house. Matt had an iPhone too which allowed Shawna to join us on a couple walks - all from the comfort of her room in Israel.

But, what takes the cake in fun use of cool technology was playing Wheel of Fortune with Shawna on Matt's iPad. Shawna was on Skype on my dad's computer. On the screen she was almost life-sized. My dad held the iPad up for her to take her turn. We all laughed as she reached out a finger and pretended to spin the wheel.

One more quick little story to relate. When Matt handed my mom his iPad for the first time her first comment was to note the finger prints and say, "It's kinda dirty isn't it?" Nothing to say about how cool this little piece of technology is. Well, later she did but we all had a good laugh about that one.

mmmmmmm

We've been taking little steps recently to have a more healthy lifestyle. Just little things like planning meals based more around the veggie and much less 'meat & potatoes'. And one other small change - we've only been having dessert once a week. As Lukas says, if it's only once a week it better be good.

And oh boy have these desserts been yummy! The latest triumph was this tasty and surprisingly simple flan. Now looking back at the recipes I'm pretty sure that I actually did a cross between this one and this one. The dangers of having more than one recipe open at a time. Thankfully, the flan turned out just fine. Actually better than fine - it was mmmmmmm tasty!

I did...

1 cup sugar

6 eggs

14 oz sweetened condensed milk

12 oz evaporated milk

1 tablespoon vanilla

betty's bag

In a moment of inspiration I remembered that my mother-in-law had mentioned wanting to find a long and skinny purse. I'm great at storing random bits of information that may {or may not} be useful in the future. Not so great at remembering the non-random bits. Like yesterday while folding laundry I turned to Lukas with one of his shirts in my hand, "You have a brown Oakley shirt?" Umm, yeah, he's had that shirt for about 4 years now.

Anyways, back to the topic. I remembered Betty wanted long, skinny purse. I put that together with another bit of information - the Amy Butler Kimberly Bag. It fit the bill perfectly. Except... there was just a little over a week to Christmas. I quickly found the pattern on Etsy. Debated fabric options for a minute before deciding that the Amy Butler primrose was just a really great fit for the pattern. Both Etsy sellers were prompt and I got the fabric and pattern with enough time to finish {in theory} by Christmas.

The pattern was challenging, but do-able. The little tucked pleats at the ends of the bag were tricky. Fitting the zipper ends in was also hard for me. But with relatively few pieces and clear directions the pattern wasn't all hard. And I did get it all finished before Christmas. I am super happy with how everything turned out in the end.

the Pioneer Woman came to town

When I found out the Pioneer Woman was coming to San Francisco for a book signing I was super excited. I hurriedly told my friend Emily who was just as excited. The day came so quickly and Emily ended up having to do her clinical rotation {gosh darn nursing school getting in the way of fun} instead of joining me and the hordes of PW fans at Books, Inc. Then Lukas put in a bid for husband of the year and volunteered to go with me. {you'll see later, that while I am grateful to him for going with me, we may be even in the brownie points}

I came home from work a little early and we swung by Barnes & Nobel to pick up a copy of The Pioneer Woman Cooks. I got to use my nifty Groupon - those things are fun. Then it was off to the city for the rest of evening.

We pulled into the parking garage connected to the plaza with the book store - $2/20 minutes! I don't think so! So we drove directly across the street for a better deal of $2/1 hour. And what do you know... we were there over 4 hours. Wow! Ok, maybe Lukas still deserves some major brownie points.

We waited and waited. Then Ree showed up and declared that she needed to use the restroom. And a little more waiting and waiting she came back out and chatted with the group. {group=lots and lots and lots of women who knew just about every detail about her} Ree was cute, sweet, personable, funny. After the Q&A we did lots more waiting for her to sign my cook book. As the time crept past 10pm I started to worry about the parking garage that would close a 11pm.

But no need to worry. At 10:35 we were finally next in line. Then in a quick blur of a minute Ree signed my book. Took a picture with me that she totally wasn't ready for because she was signing my book. Asked me where we were from, told Lukas he rocked for coming with me {may be those weren't her words}. I told her thank you and that was it. It wasn't till I was home that I remembered I'd wanted to tell her she'd picked our kitten to feature on her blog. And that she'd also chosen some of Lukas's photographs too. Oh well, I had been star struck.

Oh, and the reason why Lukas and I just might be even in the brownie points? While waiting for Ree to speak Lukas texted Emily's husband Zach. Zach responded by asking what led Lukas to offer to come with me. When Lukas replied that it was a momentary lapse of judgement Zach reminded him that "Well, Megan does watch MMA with you". Still, I think waiting over 4 hours to meet the Pioneer Woman probably puts Lukas ahead in the brownie points.

Lukas's favorite part of the night? Ree's marriage tip that you should give your husband lots of foot rubs.