Snowy Winter

We have been having a very snowy winter! Normal snowfall for Boston is just over 40 inches. So far, we've had 70 inches, and there's snowfall in the forecast for this evening, Tuesday, Thursday, ... We have to make it to 107 to break the record, but it looks to me like we're well on our way!

Winter weather brings an irresistable need to take pictures, and I've taken my share this winter. Here are a few of my favorites:

(Can you tell that's a picnic table?)

... and some icicle photos for my dad:

A Boston Christmas Tree

For the first time since we moved to Boston, we bought a Christmas tree! The acquiring of the tree was much simpler than I anticipated given that we have no car. The local hardware store was selling them all wrapped up (no agonizing over whether each branch was in the right place!). We just put our money down and packed one up. Brian carried it onto the subway straight to our house.

We opened the boxes of Christmas decorations we brought from Oregon but had never unpacked, and we had more than enough to trim a little tree:


Between Brian & me, we probably have enough ornaments to trim three trees, since both our families have a tradition of giving ornaments each year. But this year, Brian let me use my fragile set from my Great-Grandma. I love these ornaments! I think this blue one with the flowers on it is my favorite:


In the background windows, you can see the newest set of ornaments I got from my mother-in-law last year. So many pretty things this time of year.

Merry Christmas!

Show & Tell

Just a quick list of what I've been up to these last two months!

- Going to one last Red Sox game for the season (one of the few they won!)

- Playing games with Brian's parents, who visited us for 10 days

- Cooking with lots of seasonal vegetables (ratatouille in my new pot from Brian's aunt - thank you, Aunt Annette!)

- Helping one of Brian's classmates move (to a fifth story walk-up)

- Attending Axon's baby shower in Maryland

- Exploring New England with my mom, aunt, and grandma, who visited for a week

- Hiking in the Blue Hills with some ladies from church


Hooray for a great end to the summer!

Progress

For two weeks, our belongings set dumped exactly where we left them when we moved in:


But we returned from our trip to Oregon Tuesday night; and ever since then, we've been moving in. Here is a time lapse series showing our progress:

Day 1


Day 2


Day 3

We're still hunting for things from time to time, but we're slowly getting everything where it belongs!

Wedding Photos

I completely ignored my camera yesterday, so I have to send you elsewhere to see photos. But the pictures are far more beautiful than I would have taken anyway!

The main event of our trip...

Goodbye, Little Apartment

There's been a lot to celebrate these past few months, and we've been busy celebrating it all! In the line-up of this blog, I'm letting go of sharing about all of those events; but there's one thing I don't want to pass undocumented. We're saying good-bye to this little apartment next week:



Next week we'll be at a new place, and once we have it all set up, I'll invite you in. But between now and then, hopefully we'll get to see you at another celebration we wouldn't miss for anything - Brian's sister's wedding!

Rhubarb Crunch

It seems to be what all the cooks I read are blogging about these days - but who can blame them? Rhubarb is just SO YUMMY! And I have my own recipe I crave every spring, which comes from the cookbook put out by the Mennonite church I attended as a child. However, don't follow that recipe, because it has typos that will cause your crunch to fail. Rather, bake it from here:

Rhubarb Crunch

Filling
5 c. sliced rhubarb

Crust
1 c. all-purpose flour
1 c. brown sugar
1 c. thin-rolled oats
1/2 c. melted butter

Sauce
1 c. water
1 c. sugar
2 T. + 1 t. cornstarch
1 t. vanilla
pinch salt

1. Wash, trim, and chop the rhubarb.
2. Preheat the oven to 350-375*.
3. Mix the crust ingredients. Press 3/4 of this mixture into the bottom and up the sides of an 8x8 baking dish. Dump the rhubarb into this crust and shake the dish to even it out in the crust.
4. In a small saucepan, whisk together the water, sugar and cornstarch. Set over high heat and bring to a boil, whisking until thickened. Add the salt and vanilla.
5. Pour the sauce over the rhubarb, and sprinkle with the reserved crust mixture.
6. Bake for 30-35 minutes, until rhubarb is cooked.
7. Let cool for 2-3 hours to allow the sauce to cool and rethicken. Serve with vanilla ice cream.