a november to remember

what a month. well it really started in october as we closed on the house on october 24th. after 10 counteroffers and lot of BS, we finally got our house. It is not a big house and it does not have a garage and it is on kind of a busy street but it has three bedrooms and a full bath upstairs, a living room with fireplace, a dining room, an incredible eat-in kitchen and an addition off the back which is the family room that everyone wants (all windows, plenty of space and a door to the patio). The basement has plenty of storage and a guest room and full bath. There is a former carriage room/garage in the basement that has glass sliding doors to the outside which is perfect for bikes.... Big enough backyard for fun and not too big to care for..



well, after enlisting all my new friends to help us move, we finally had everything we own in the house. maybe not the best idea. why you ask?? well, we decided that our house should have more than one room with overhead lighting and the wood floors upstairs needed refinishing and the kitchen countertop should not be purple...... need i say more. We have some kind of work going on in every room which means i have been sleeping in a sleeping bag in the family room for 15 days. this week is the flooring day which means everything had to be out of the second floor, the doors had to be taken off and all the quarter round moulding had to be removed... I will not continue. suffice to say, we are nuts. Did I mention we are hosting Christmas for both families??? 35 people on the 23rd... all are invited.





that brings us to nov 12th. the day it was finally nice enough for us to go to turtle park for a new picture of jan and and the little man. they took a picture at the park last year in november that I have on my desk. they also gave one to all the grandmas and such... I said I wanted a new one and there was finally a beautiful day. after about 30 minutes of pictures, little n was playing on a giant stone turtle egg while I told jan I wanted to take a few pictures of her. I kept getting closer and then took a few from my knees and then asked her. I felt it made sense to be outside since that is where we like to be and I also felt that little n had to be there. the ring - i think it is incredible but that it probably because I had it made. I will try to get a good picture of it here soon. wedding is in 2007 - not sure of where, when or how....






this past week, we took little n on his first plane trip that he will remember (he flew a bunch of time when he was 1). we flew from stl to norfolk VA and then drove down to my brothers house at the beach. we flew in tuesday night and stayed until early early early saturday morning. little n was great on the plane. I would rather travel with him now than most people I travel with for work. it rained most of the time we were there but it was still fun. we got to go up in the currituck lighthouse and watch the nor'easter tear apart the beach.... the food was great and it is always fun times with the family.

this whole training thing has pretty much been backburner so I had promised myself that december will be the time to get in a groove. there will be so much going on that i will need it for my sanity.. i can see spin classes and the pool in my future...

Thanksgiving in Excess

So this year, I was not local for Thanksgiving, no traditional eating but loads of fun, friends and wine. John and I, along with three other [married] couples ventured off to Sonoma Valley/Healdsburg, CA for the week. We left DC on Saturday the 18th and flew into Oakland, CA to begin our adventure. We were to drive up to our house [rented a nice 4 br house on the Russian River] on Sunday and hit a few wineries along the way [why not?]. So we go first to the Dry Creek General Store, very cute, quaint place with great sandwiches, a wide selection of bottled exotic sodas [Verners Gingerbeer] and other tasty tidbits.

Sunday Our first destination is Preston of Dry Creek which is an organic family vineyard and they only sell their jug wine on Sundays [see the man on the jug] and did our first tasting...yummm. They have very good whites and reds [loved the Madame Preston, the Carignane, and the L. Preston]. Apparently I still don't like the Barbera, I think its too strong for my taste. We then moved on to a small, family owned winery David Coffaro Vineyard & Winery
and did a tasting there, that included tasting the futures, or barrel tasting. I highly recommend their wines and they're only available through the web site or at the winery. Great reds. We then moved onto the Dry Creek Vineyard and made it just in time for a tasting. They were closing for the day but we got to sample their wares and purchase a few bottles for future consumption. All in all it was just the beginning of a roaring great 4 days. Dinner, breakfast, wineries, lunch, dinner, sleep, breakfast, wineries, lunch, repeat....you get the idea.

Monday
This was Napa, Calistoga, St. Helena day. We subsequently visited V. Sattui in Napa Valley, Heitz Cellars and Summers Winery and Vineyards where we had a rousing game of "women vs men" Bocce Ball. We also got to see the famous Old Faithful Geyser of California...one of three "old faithfuls" in the world.

Tuesday
We had to be respectable this day since we were visiting more "snooty" upscale places, like J Wineries, Merry Edwards and Alderbrook. See photo below of the group at J Winery. From Left to Right, Cory [me], Dave Shove-Brown, Dave Tracz, Kim Sullivan [married couple], John Murray [my sweetie], Sharon and Todd Friedlander, and Maureenn Shove-Brown.

Wednesday
The group spilt up in the morning, all the women but me going for spa treatments and the boys off to more wineries. This was our last day in the Russian River/Dry Creek area so we made the best of it. We went to Ferrari-Carano Winery not for a tasting but to purchase Black Muscat, then to Bella Vineyards, where the tasting room is in a manmade cave and the Estate wines are to die for. For fun we went to Francis Ford Coppola's new vineyard as yet to be named. Lunch was our next stop and then off to our final vineyard of the visit, Ledson Winery and Vineyards, where we certainly got our money's worth. Maureen challenged our host to find a wine that pleased her pallet and he went to great lengths to do so. We left with happy tastebuds. On to San Francisco, a burger and a beer...enough wine for one week.

Thursday
We thought it might be tough to find a place for breakfast on Thanksgiving morning but were pleasantly surprised to find World Famous Sears Fine Food serving yummy silver dollar pancakes, eggs, bacon, and a broiled grapefruit. Back to the fabulous hotel [oh, yea, great Priceline score of the day, Hyatt Regency San Francisco on the Embarcadero for less than $100 per night...sweet!]. Change for the evening festivities and off to Todd and Sharon's for dinner in Oakland. Suffice it to say that food, wine and fun were had by all [some more than others] and there are videos out there somewhere of dancing...check out YouTube for a posting sometime. Menu consisted of yummy butternut squash soup [I think], stuffing, turkey done on the grill, green beans with bacon and shallots, carrots with beets, and spur of the moment gravy [my first]. I think nearly every dish had bacon of some sort in it [the gravy started with bacon grease] so you all would fully appreciate that.

Friday [our last full day]

After a trip to Haight-Ashbury to go to the Kid Robot store [indulge the kid in me, and John's gotten me hooked] we headed up the coast to Tomales Bay Oyster Company for oysters by the bay [tasty and when grilled, a spectator sport] and then went to Point Reyes to experience the harsh wind of the beach and the corresponding light house.

Here we are at the observation deck at Point Reyes, where the original lighthouse used to be:



All in all, it was a fabulous time, good food, fun things to see, more than enough memories and photos, and new friends.