This is my Screen Saver...

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How do you Celebrate Father's Day?

With an asado of course!!

But there was the small problem that our landlord had loaned her charcoal grill - I was counting on using it. However, the silver lining was that I had the perfect excuse to use the large chulengo sitting at the stake center (stake/steak - no pun intended!). Of course, since it was the last minute, I had not choice but to use Jiggy - and that was no small feat!

It took a while to get the coals ready, but the meat was gorgeous. Here I am excitedly showing off the size of the rib eye and sirloin steaks as they cook on the grill.

An asado is of course a social event. I discovered this is mainly due to the amount of time spent cooking the meat! We invited our new friends, Ken and Becky (and Tyler) to join us as it was their anniversary! We also invited our good friends Sherri, Jay R. and Ethan who we already knew would appreciate an asado. Jay R. served a two year mission in Brazil (can you say churrascaria), and Sherri lived in Buenos Aires for a summer.

The cooking and eating lasted late into the night. While I initially doubted if I had bought enough meat for 6 adults, I soon discovered I had more than enough. We started with chorizo and ensalada rusa (potato salad that Lisa said was "actually good"), followed by 2 pounds of rib eye, 2 pounds of sirloin, and finished with a plate of smal ribs (see below).

The meat actually turned out pretty good (it was the rock salt!), and the company was excellent. I joked that I spent my inheritence on the meal, but I'm definitely tempted to do it again and even bigger (can you say farewell party!). After all, the grill is still in my back yard!

Private Party

In the peace and quiet of our home, and well after her usual bedtime, we presented Sophie with her very own cake. Her reaction wasn't quite all we hoped it would be, but we had a fun time!

In the spirit of family traditions, we played "The Number One Song" performed by Big Bird from Sesame Street (Lisa's family), sang to her, and then played happy birthday on my hurdy gurdy (Bryce's family).

Then we cut her a piece of cake and let her go. Much to Lisa's surprise, Sophie showed less interest in the cake than in fruit she had been snacking on earlier. That was of course attributed to my DNA. However, she did get the hang of it eventually.

Of course we took a video of the cake eating. Sophie quickly turned it into a new sport - the frosting fling!

She really enjoyed opening her presents, and REALLY enjoyed shredding the ribbon!

As if this weren't enough, she also fielded a few phone calls from adoring fans around the world!

All in all, it was a great day - hope you don't mind the onslaught of photos here - we've never had a daughter turn one before!

Birthday Party at the Park

Sophie got together with some of her life-long friends (Ethan and Jane are pictured below) to celebrate her 365 days of existance. I cringed when I saw this photo - she's 1 and already working it for the camera.


There was a great playground at the park - and it was in the shade - so everyone played for a while.

Oh isn't that cute?

Uh oh - did I turn my back for one second...

As you can see, the kids let us know they were ready for the cupcakes!

And just for fun - here's a couple more pictures from the party

Has Anyone Heard from Lisa???

Nope. Nobody has. That's b/c Sophie and I are currently having a blast in Boston with Marse, Matt, Sam and all the LaPs! More later, but here are a couple of cute pics that Marse took yesterday on our way to the park.
toodles!! These babies are the cutest. EVER. Speaking of... one of them needs me - gotta run. Toodles!

The COOLEST Frog

Blue, purple, orange and yellow frogs are cool - but how cool is this one? I can't believe Lisa didn't put its picture up as well. I stared at the tank for about 10 minutes before I finally saw it, right in front of me!

Go Fish

Last weekend we made a trip up to Baltimore to check out the National Aquarium. And WOW - it is amazing. I'd even say it was am-aaa-za-ZING. We forked over the 3 extra bucks for the dolphin show, as well, and that was a well-spent 3 dollars if I do say so myself. My favorites were the dolphins and the blue poison frogs. They were SO COOL!!! Such cute little things. Shame they're poisonous, eh? There was this whole exhibit dedicated to frogs and Bryce and I had a great time jumping around looking at them all and trying to find the ones hidden in the leaves. Sophie had a great time roaming around in the open space and socializing with any kid under 10 that she could find. Pretty sure she made a few new best friends while we were there. Cute little baby. :)

Sophie and Bryce watching the sting rays being fed -- and then next to an enormous tank of fish by the name of Alewife. We decided that's where the Alewife T-stop in Boston got its name.



















This blurry pic on the left is of the 3 of us in the Amazon room where there were tons of birds, fish and even a little Golden Tamarin monkey. And below is one of Sophie and I hanging out with the cool Amazon-weather-enjoying fowls.















This dude here was just snoring away and we thought he was pretty, so here's his little beaky mugshot.









And then... THE FROGS!!! Do we look excited about them or what?! The little blue fella that I'm pointing to is one of the Blue Poisonous Frogs that I mentioned above. They were just so bright and small and perky-looking. Again, too bad about that whole poison thing.

















Here's a great shot Bryce got of one of the other frogs. This guy's just happy to be here.














Well folks, that's a wrap. Now that I've filled you all in on our weekend north I can head to bed and sleep happy thoughts. Good night!

Best Socks Ever

For Christmas this year my brother in law gave me two pairs of hiking socks! I have been breaking them in with one of my boy scouts who is earning his hiking merit badge. This merit badge requires 5 ten-mile hikes and one 20-mile hike. I spent Memorial Day hiking part of the Bull Run/ Occoquan Trail with him.

Thanks for the great socks Jake!

Little Moments

You may have heard the song, "Little Moments" by Brad Paisley. It's currently a favorite of ours.

Last night as I gave Sophie her bath, Lisa was grinding wheat to make bread. While it seemed to take longer than I thought it would, I didn't think much of it.

When the grinder stopped, she joined Sophie and I in the bathroom just in time to help take her out of the bath and dry her off.

At this point, I need to interrupt with a little history - Lisa has found that our wheat grinder goes much faster if you leave the filter out. Normally the amount of dust that gets blown out is minimal, and she just angles it out the window anyway.

So, back to the bathroom. Lisa told me she had tried to grind the last of the wheat in our bucket and that it had been just a little more than it could hold. I opened the door to the bathroom and looked into the kitchen - it looked like Christmas! Our African violets in the windowsill were totally white, as was the entire window screen!

I started laughing. Then Lisa told me that when she had noticed that significantly more dust was coming out of the grinder, she had tried to block it with her hands - and was holding about a cup of flour by the time it finished! When I swept the floor, I got another two cups of flour. Later than night, I discovered everything on top of our refrigerator also had a fine layer of flour!

This certainly qualifies as a "little moment."

Perhaps in your comments you can share your "little moments." You can listen to the song on Yahoo Music if you need to get the context.

All that training finally pays off

I was enjoying a relaxing bus ride home from work the other week, mostly because I knew the paper I had brought home to edit would keep me up late that night. As I was reading the newspaper, the folder holding my work documents kept falling onto the floor, so I finally put it behind me.

When my stop came, I stood up and waved a thank you to the driver and got out of the bus, eager to see Sophie and Lisa, however I couldn't drop the nagging feeling that I was forgetting something. As soon as the bus doors shut, I realized my work was still on the bus. I quickly turn around and slapped the side of the bus a couple times before it pulled away, but I wasn't able to get the driver's attention.

At this point, bear in mind that I'd already edited most of the 20 page document, and knew that I could only do about 2 pages an hour. Getting that work back was the difference between sleeping at all that night.

I only hesitated a second before tearing after the bus, waving my arms and trying desperately to get the driver's attention. Just when I was about to give up (about a block), I saw the bus pull over at the next stop - but I could tell the driver still hadn't noticed me. I found a new gear and was just able to reach the bus as it was pulling away again, but this time the combined efforts of the discharged passenger and myself got the driver's attention.

As I walked home with my work, I held it up like a trophy and gave a thumbs up back to all the people in the cars behind the bus.