Who loves opera in the ballpark?
The Bea does! She made it through the entire hour-and-a-half-long first act of Lucia di Lammermoor on Friday, June 20th. This is a shot of her applauding at the start of the intermission. Then Dad and Grandpa bundled her up and took her home for a very late bedtime.
And, really, what's not to love? Opera combined with unusually warm weather and a delightful outdoor setting, your own delicious picnic (including yummy picnic loaf!), friends and family, and Natalie Dessay and Giuseppe Filianoti starring?
Yesterday was my day off, so Bea and I took a trip to the zoo and as always we fell in love with the giraffes right as we entered the gates. This one walked right over to see us and Bea kept saying to her "Hi, giraffe." Then the giraffe bent down to take a drink from the pond. We were pretty impressed.
Also, we finally made it deep enough into the zoo to see the new grizzly bear exhibit and they were playing in the water, cooling off on a very hot day. They certainly had the right idea.
Both my cuties got involved with face-painting at the play group "end-of-year" party (but is it really the end of the year? From the pictures, Ruby looks like she was hanging back and watching the big kids a little, but it certainly looks like everyone had fun. And I hear that the cupcakes were delicious! See all the pictures here.
Emily beat me to the posting, but this past weekend's festivities while Doug and Nikki were in town were great and just as kid-friendly as you would expect. Thanks to Ted and Naomi for organizing and hosting and to Emily for the delicious Oprah burgers that I thought would be terrible. I was wrong!
Those of us who discussed it agreed: our crowd was too much to be contained within Dino's (although the pizza was delicious as always). Ted and Naomi's backyard was a much better fit. And it was super cute to see those kids together.
Our babysitter is also in the circus -- which is yet another reason that she's so awesome. So our tiny daughter got to attend her first theater performance on Sunday because we took her to the City Circus Sunday matinee, And if We Shadows at the Brava Theater in the Mission.
The performance was superb; we were really impressed -- hip hop, aerial tricks, contortionist, juggling! The Bea sat on my lap, enjoyed the music, clapped and kept fairly quiet. Except for one moment in the hush after a woman dressed as a chicken left the stage when she asked a bit loudly: "Where chicken?"
Plus, our dear Dale was practically the star of the show. We were thrilled.
Check out their video promo -- it's from rehearsals for the live show.
And, if you're looking for something to do in the City over the next 3 weekends, I highly recommend it.
This topic of eating locally has been increasingly interesting to me in recent years. It sort of started with the convenience of shopping at the Civic Center farmer's market every week and now we've recently started making the Alemany farmer's market a regular part of our Saturday morning routine (and that market is so much bigger and better!). We are part of the Bay Area Meat CSA and in the summer we grow a few crops in our backyard (the tomatoes last us from August through December, I swear!). Of course, once our baby was on the scene, this all mattered to me on a deeper level and I started making my own baby food and really working to keep the amount of processed foods that any of us consume to a minimum.
I'm not ready to go Kingsolver on you and move to a family farm in Appalachia, and I do find it impossible to resist dipping into a box of Cheez-Its... but I do find some inspiration in this book that I hope to apply to my own life and way of eating. I find myself searching the wine list for Bay Area wines now and looking at the menu to see whether any of the options are locally raised/grass-fed meat choices. And I'm much less interested in buying out-of-season fruits and vegetables at the grocery store.
Sweet Beverlee hosted a lovely party for our work group last
Saturday night in honor of Jessica and Al who just got hitched. Bev provided absolutely everything you could want for a party -- fabulous appetizers, sushi, egg rolls, handmade spring rolls, crab louie, steak, ham, deluxe cheeses, potato blintzes, and more ... all laid out with style.
Malcolm manned the bar and was pouring some seriously stiff drinks. (I nursed my single monster martini all night yet still managed to leave my purse behind when we left the party.)
For dessert, Bev ordered a delicious cake and let Kyle and me bake cookies. After much consultation, Kyle chose his World Peace Cookies and Oatmeal with Chocolate Chips (at the request of the bride). I made lemon bars with the Meyer lemons from our yard and also baked my favorite cookie recipe from my mother-in-law.
My folks were in town for a Ruby fix, so Mom helped me mix up both recipes and bake the lemon bars and then my Dad did all the baking of the Best Cookies recipe while I was out running errands. So the cookies were a full family affair.
I'll post the lemon bars soon too, but for now, here is the recipe for:
Belva's Best Cookies in the World
Ingredients: 2 sticks butter1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 cup mazola oil
1 cup uncooked quick oats
1 cup corn flakes, crushed
1/2 cup coconut
1/2 cup pecans, crushed
3 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
Directions:
- Cream butter, add egg and sugars, and mix well.
- Add flour alternately with oil, then add rest of
- ingredients.
- Refrigerate mixture.
- Drop by teaspoons onto ungreased cookie sheet, press down with fork.
- Bake at 335 degrees for 12-14 minutes.
When I first made this recipe a few years ago, I noted that
it made about 6 dozen medium-small sized cookies. They are
crumble-apart-in-your-mouth delicious -- I'm sure it's because of the high amount of butter and oil. But if you only make them now and then and share them with lots of others, it can't be all that bad for you.
You are the best -- I hope your birthday celebration keeps on going!
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Kyle Minor said:
I think Brett is going to have that iPhone before you, Rebs. I think mine still has some of his... read more
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You cheeky monkey. I say it's an oldie but a goodie! When (if?) I get an iPhone I may consider... read more
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Kyle Minor said:
I am making the official call right now for no more pictures of either you or Emily or both you... read more
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on Bravo!