Thai, meat pies, and cake, oh my!

This weekend was so much fun.

On Friday Mike and I went and saw No Strings Attached. It was a RomCom. It was what you would think it would be like. I will give it props for being more funny than I thought it would be. Most of all, I just liked going to the movies with my honey. :)

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Saturday was spent erranding (to Target, where else?) and getting a pedicure with my friends Barbara and Amy. We all have pretty red toes now. My color? Chick Flick Cherry! (I didn't get a pic of us in our pedicure chairs. :( I guess we'll have to go again for a photo op!)

Mike and I had planned on going to Arcadia, one of my favorite restaurants for dinner that night. Mike was kinda sounding like he didn't want to go, and so I suggested we go for ... Thai food! Now that might not sound so exciting, but for me to suggest Thai food is something of a small miracle. I like Thai, but it's not my fave, and given the choice I usually always want something else. This night, I don't know, I had a hankering for some green curry. Knowing this was a once-in-a-million years occurance, Mike jumped on the chance to go. I got to catch up with my fabulous friend Sharon and our friends Shane, Margaret, and Manoj came too. It was impromptu and incredibly fun. I even tried Sharon's papaya salad, which was very spicy, but also quite yummy. We then got delicious gelato afterwards - mmmm, creme brulee flavor!

Me, Margaret, and Sharon; Manoj, Shane, and Mike.

Sunday we went to an Australia Day celebration at Shane and Margaret's house. Meat pies, sausage rolls, ginger beer, and chocolate caramel koala-shaped candy? Total wins. Vegemite? Not so much. But, I am super glad I tried it. Even though it was awful. :( The best of the afternoon? Eating the delicious pavlova Margaret made, petting their adorable dog Zeb, and holding our friends' baby Dorian. Overall a fantastic celebration.

Shane decked out in Australia themed garb; evil Vegemite and fabulous kangaroo-shaped cookies, and dogs Zeb and Roo, appropriately donning Australia flag scarves. :)

The last thing I did this weekend? I made a cakewich, friends!

It is just as glorious as I thought it would be. Who needs real sandwiches when you can have one made out of cake? Okay, regular sandwiches will still make up over 50% of my diet, but this is an awesome addition. Yay for cakes in the shape of sandwiches!

The "bread" is vanilla pound cake, the "peanut butter" is peanut butter frosting, and the jam is just regular jam. Strawberry Smukers, to be exact. Yum!

I was born in the wrong decade

I want all of these dresses. I would preferably wear them living in a past decade. Which I know is impossible. Scientists, let's work on those time machines, 'k?

All dresses from Shabby Apple Clothing (www.shabbyapple.com)

I'm looking forward to ...

Visiting Maryland over Spring Break! :)

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Valentine's Day, my favorite holiday. Pink, red, hearts, and sweets? Could a holiday be any more me?!

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Making Wayne Thiebaud-inspired cake paintings with my kids in a couple of weeks. I love this art project so much - their cakes are always so beautiful and creative!

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Making a Cakewich this weekend. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich/cake hybrid? Why didn't anyone think of this sooner?

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Happy Tuesday everyone!

Weekend Review

Hi Friends!

It has been a busy and wonderful weekend. I actually can't believe it is Sunday evening already ... what happened?? Here is a wrap up of what I did.

Friday: Mike and I were invited to go watch a basketball game. Mike's friends had tickets for those seats in the little boxes. I had never been to a professional basketball game before, and, if I'm being honest, don't even really know how basketball works. I mean I know that each team tries to get the ball into the basket, of course, but I didn't know how teams got which points and all that. Mike explained it to me as we watched the game, and it was actually really fun! The game got tied with only like 5 seconds left, and then the team we were rooting for, the Oakland Warriors, won! Hooray!

Our view from the game; banana cake delivered right to our box? Yes please!; the final score.

Saturday: After such a long Friday night, Mike and I kinda just hung around on Saturday. We slept in, and then I went to run some errands. I picked up gifts for my Secret Valentine, which starts at my work in a week. I'm not telling what I got yet, though ... not until after the reveal! I also stopped by a little sandwich shop/cafe by my house for the first time, and man, I don't know how I lived so close to this place for two years without going all the time! It is called Specialty's Cafe and Bakery, and it is the perfect place for me! An extensive menu of fresh sandwiches, salads, soups, and sweets, all house made and from scratch. Delicious!

I also finished cleaning and organizing my classroom with a little help from Mike. For those of you who don't know me well yet, it may be surprising that I had to clean and organize my classroom - I'm a bit of a neat freak. I'm not sure what happened this year. The outside looked great, it was all of the things behind cabinet and closet doors. I'll post more later with pictures, but let's just say it feels so good to have everything so neat and clean.

Sunday was a book club meeting, which really wasn't a book club meeting at all, since a lot of us weren't finished reading the book. We decided to get together and play board games instead! It was so much fun. We played Time's Up, which I had never played before. It was like a mix of Taboo and charades, two of my favorite games. We had a blast! My favorite clue of the night? "His name sounds like Maine Fun Cat!" "Chow Yun Fat?" "Yessss!" :)

Time's Up; me acting out something crazy to Hanna; Jen and Emily looking serious over their clues; the girls posing pretty; each of our favorite poses from the night (Jen = Janet Jackson, I = Hannah Montana, Hanna = Woody Woodpecker or Mr. Bean, depending, and Emily = Albert Einstein).

Correction: That is Jen's Queen Latifah. How could I have gotten that wrong?! ;)

Thankful Thursday

I am thankful for wonderful friends who let me vent in the school parking lot, and who show me funny videos of honey badgers.

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I am thankful for a book club meeting this Sunday that includes board games. I love boardgames.

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I am thankful that Whole Foods decided to make Cajun steamed shrimp. It is not the same as Old Bay steamed shrimp from Maryland, but since I can't get those out here in CA, this is a pretty decent replacement.

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I am thankful that it is Friday tomorrow. :)

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Wordless Wednesday

Foods that I really, really, really want to eat right now but can't because of my stupid, stupid diet ...

Sigh. :(

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Reading Fail - I'm blaming my Kindle

I belong to a few book clubs, and The 19th Wife, by David Ebershoff, was the reading for one of them.

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So I finished the book, I enjoyed it, and I learned a little bit. Anyway, I bought the book on my Kindle, and I never even looked at the cover or the back cover before I started reading it. When I got to the end, I skimmed through the author's notes, and then, only then, after I had read the entire book for over a week, did I realize that the book wasn't a non-fiction. What a total fail on my part!! The whole time I was reading, I thought the main character was real and this was his real story. Sigh. Can I blame the Kindle for this? Would I have known it were fiction if I had read the back cover? I can only hope. I at least take solace in the fact that it is a historical fiction, which may have added to the deception.

Up next, for another book club, is The Time Traveler's Wife (I've heard about this book for years now, so I'm happy to finally read it), and The Shame of the Nation by Jonathan Kozol (I loved his book Savage Inequalities, so I'm hoping I will really like this one as well).

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And, because I am strange and the most off-beat topics intrigue me, I also bought Dirty Secret, a non-fiction (for real this time) about a girl's struggle with her mother's illness of compulsive hoarding. Yep. This is what I read about in my spare time. ;)

Yountville Getaway!

Mike and I went on a little overnight last night. It was so fantastic! We went to Yountville (near Napa) for a day. We relaxed at our hotel, the cute little Vintage Inn, and then went to dinner with friends at Mustard's Grill.

A foggy Napa morning, flowers in a bike basket, our amazingly cute bathroom, me on our private balcony/porch, and Mustard's Grill

All pictures taken by Mike except Mustard's Grill (photo source)

I had a delicious salad and a cobbler for dessert. I still like Bouchon (one of my favorite restaurants, which is down the street from where we ate) better, but it was nice to try something new, and the food was truly fantastic. Mike did a little photography while we were there, but mostly we just relaxed. The next morning, we stopped by the Bouchon bakery for some treats before heading back.

(baguettes, bacon and cheddar scone, lemon tart)

Can't we make it a rule that every weekend is a three-day weekend? Please? :)

P.S. - see more of Mike's amazing photography at http://flickr.mikewiacek.com

I Heart Michel Gondry

I have loved the work of director Michel Gondry ever since I saw his video for Daft Punk's Around the World. Could it have anything to do with dancing astronauts and girls in sequined bathing beauty suits? Perhaps.

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I love his style, his mix of homemade and surreal, that makes you feel like you are having some sort of fabulous strange dream. I always kept an eye out for his music videos, like Foo Fighter's Everlong.

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When his wonderful movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind came out, I was in love.

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It still is one of my favorite movies. I also loved the adorable and endearing Be Kind Rewind, which was so funny and sweet. Mos Def was absolutely hilarious, and it is one of my favorite Jack Black movies.

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Tonight, Mike took me to see The Green Hornet, his newest flick.

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It was definitely way more mainstream than his other films, but there were still some little bits of his style here and there, which was nice to see. It was a funny movie in addition to being an action movie, and seeing as I love Seth Rogan and his flicks, too, it was win-win for me. Mike liked it, too, which I am so glad for since I kinda had to beg to see it. :) My favorite line? "You brought a gas mask? Why did you only bring one?!" Hehe.