Message to all my chefy friends ...

If you're looking to attend a one day cooking class, I would recommend taking a look at Sur La Table's program. They have demonstration and hands-on classes. On Friday I took the hands-on, Tuscan cooking class. It was an absolute blast. There were two chefs, two assistants and six students (class max is 12). The chefs introduce the ingredients, demo how to use the kitchen tools, and then set you free to work with the food. I liken the experience to being live in the America's Test Kitchen. As you cook and play with the kitchen gadgets, the food experts walk around engaging you technical discussions and giving valuable advice on the menu's ingredients and steps.

The equipment in the Sur La Table kitchen is amazing. As a participant you can try out whatever tools they sell in the store. The kitchen is stocked with both fancy and standard pantry ingredients. A lot of specialty ingredients can be found at your local Trader Joes so I felt like the recipes were accessible to a home chef. Sur La Table is kitchen gadget heaven. I've been looking for a good garlic press so this was the perfect opportunity for me to play around and pick my favorite one.

Students cook together and then share all of the dishes that are prepared. On Friday we dined on:

• Caesar Salad with Bleu Cheese and Homemade Caesar Dressing
  
• Grilled Steak with Balsamic Onions
• Spinach and Ricotta Timbales (Quiches)
• Steamed Broccoli and Cambozola Cheese and Cream Sauce
• Fresh Strawberry Gelato

(Special thanks to Katia for asking me to sub for her in this class!!!)

O-M-G this super cute guinea pig is named TOE JAM! I'm not sure what I love more ... cutie's name or the bunny he breaks bread with. Note the one ear up, one ear down action on the bun.

Oh what a week ...

Monday: Woke up tired and grumpy. Left the house in such a hurry that I forgot to wish Mr. Smong an official "happy birthday" ... Thank god the dry cleaning lady reminded me of the date !!! OOPS

Tuesday: Sent my classroom assistant to the office to cut tissue paper squares for a collage project planned for Wed. Mike had a mishap with the paper cutter and a sliced a chunk off of his thumb. 911 is called. Mike requests a joyride in the ambulance, but is politely declined. His mom takes him to urgent care ... CRUD

Wednesday: Stabbed the palm of my hand and sliced the tip of my index finger with scissors ... CRAP, who knew crafts were so dangerous??

**Good news from my assistant Mike !!! He is doing fine, sans a couple of stitches. -- We wish you a speedy recovery Mike, the kids asked about you all day long. Everyone, misses you !!!

Thursday: Much, much better today. The little kids made pirate flags and the older kids made home-made stamps. Grilled chicken and bean burritos for dinner tonight. Yum !!!

Friday: (update) ... I miss my kids already. Special thanks to Jen and Raquel for giving me the opportunity to teach this program. Viva la crafts! (stay tuned for pics of my students craft creations).

Happy Birthday Rob !!!

Two more days and my hubby finally turns the big 33. (I have been anxiously awaiting this day as I have been 33 for 4 months and I secretly hate the fact that I'm robbing the cradle and am married to a younger man.)

Tonight we will celebrate with Ravioli from Fiorellos and Carrot Cake from Peter's Bakery. Stay tuned for pictures of the birthday boy and his homemade party hat. Man he's lucky to be married to a crafts teacher.

Happy Saturday

Message from the craft teacher to all of my parental friends ...

Comcast: Save big bucks.

Stop spending your hard earned dollars on video games, barbie dolls, DVDs, etc. The following list details the items that the kids from my craft class go absolutely APE over:

• Pipe cleaners
• Popsicle sticks
• Masking tape (ohhhhh they could play with a 99 cent roll of masking tape all day long)
• Sponges (cut them into inch sized cubes, call them "Sponge Bobs" and they jump up and down with utter glee when you tell them that the sponge is just for them and they can keep it for-ever)
• Felt
• Pom pom balls

As odd and cheapy-cheapy as all this seems ... I have found that the most basic art/office supplies are really the ones that the kids love best. Empower your kids to channel their "inner artist" and everyone wins. Ping me personally if you want lesson plans for Paper Bag Puppets (think Fandango), Pipe Cleaner People, Popsicle Stick Puzzles, etc : )

.

Aha moment ...

You know you're tired and shouldn't fight sleep when you approach your husband who is in the kitchen making a sandwich and you shout out ... "don't eat my bread !!!!!"

: ) I'm not sure when the food in our fridge started receiving labels like "mine", "also mine" and "mine as well" but lets just say that it's been rough couple of weeks since I started working again. I haven't had a chance to do much grocery shopping so the Smong house is running low on our favorite foods ... including low carb bread. I guess when that happens ... Mrs. Smong gets a little territorial about (quote un quote) ... "the consumption of **her** bread".

As it turns out (sigh) ... Mr. Smong was making Mrs. Smong's lunch for the next day. Man I'm lucky that my husband loves me unconditionally : )

I sure hope this isn't a sign of what's in store for me and Uncle Rob

I started teaching my second session of kiddie craft classes on Monday. What are the odds that out of a group of 23, myself included-- that the group would have 3 groups of multiples births !!! I have a set of triplets (cute little blondies) and a set of twins (a sweet brother sister duo who are a mix of Hispanic and Chinese heritage). Being the nosy lani I am ... I always watch other multiples to see ... how they compare to me and my twinnie.

In the case of the Wallace triplets, the Alexandria is the spokesperson and "task assigner" for the group. Olivia always sits in the middle (between her brother and sister) and is very easy going. Logan is cool following Alexandria's lead for the most part but he's not afraid of telling her no. I haven't seen Olivia tell Alexandria "no" yet but it's early in the session : ) Surprisingly ... the triplets don't look like brothers and sisters. Their hair color is blonde but it's 3 different shades of blonde. Alexandria's hair is frizzy curly and is so blonde it's almost white. Olivia has yellow blonde hair and it's stick straight. Logan's hair is pretty straight as well, color wise it's a shade darker than the whitish blonde hair sister who has the frizzy curly hair. All three have different body shapes (Logan is a head taller than his two tiny sisters) and their facial features are all distinct.

On the flip side, the Teh twins (a brother sister duo) look amazingly similar to each other, same height and facial features. If the twins were the same gender I would bet that they were identical twins not fraternal. Strong family genes. The little girl, Jocelyn is the spokesperson for her and her brother. After we had the class discussion about the Wallace triplets, being triplets, she raised her hand to say that she and her brother Justin were twins.

I don't think I like being a twin when I was growing up but I guess it does make for interesting conversation. Our groups of multiples are very popular in the class as of now : )

Stay tuned for pictures of the crafts we're making.

Don't throw away your bottles of vinegar !!!

When my chefy friend Terrina moved to Bangladesh last year, I inherited all of the goodies from her pantry. Being the gourmet chefy person that she is, I acquired numerous bottles of specialty vinegars, flavored oils and such. As it has been almost 6 months since she left, and I don't use specialty vinegars all that often I have found that some of the vinegar bottles have formed a sedimentary rock layer on the bottom. (Note: The sediment isn't really "rock-like" but I've always loooved the phrase "sedimentary rock" so I'm going with this description today.) Long story short, Rob's inclination was to toss the vinegar but I decided to Google words "vinegar and sediment" and I found this interesting tidbit.

"Research shows that because of its acidic nature, vinegar is self-preserving and has an indefinite shelf life. It does not need refrigeration. White distilled vinegar will remain almost unchanged over a long period of time. Some vinegar may show change such as developing sediment or becoming hazy, but this does not affect the usefulness of the vinegar."

P.S. Thank god for spell check. If I hadn't run the spell check on this post you would have read "When my chefy friend Terrina moved to Bangladesh last year, I inheireted all of the goodies in her panty." Thong, bikini brief, pick your poison.

Vader, we hardly knew ye

This use to be my lunchbox. I took with me everyday to work at my old job. It was the best lunchbox ever. The handle had a clasp that you could hook onto a bag. It rocked.

But now that I'm all grown up and have a real job, I finally had to give it up for a more "professional" lunchbox. It's your standard, run-of-the-mill lunchbox. The new lunchbox is boring and average, just like my job.

I will be holding a tradional Jedi funeral pyre for the Vader lunchbox soon.

Goodbye, Lord Vader. May the Force be with you.

Always.