Interesting find

No sewing or crafting lately.
Last week end we were very busy and I will share why with you later this week hopefully. MAC had a birthday party to attend at 6pm on Saturday pretty far south from us. Not the most convenient location and time but he was really excited.
My husband and I really really don't have a liking for birthday parties whether it is for our own kids or attending others. We like the few friends we hang out with a lot and that's about it. I know very very asocial of us, actually probably more introverts.....
So we drop of Miles to this birthday party at Ultrazone a lazer tag thing and go run a few errands with MEC at home depot and then we are in need of a place to eat.
We are in the sports arena area which is not known for their haute cuisine, to make matter worse we are all hungry tired and cranky. B is also sick....

So we need to find a good place to eat and fast!

I pull up my phone and yelp a restaurant in the neighborhood which isn't too greasy or boring.

Taste of Himalaya a nepali/indian place pops up with lots of stars. We are a bit reluctant to try but decide to drive by and see what it looks like! Well it was kind of a hole in the wall but with a lot of people in so we decide to give it a shot!
I'm really glad we did it was delicious! B who went to India said the flavors reminded him of his trip there.

We had chicken tika masala and it was delish. It may not be the best place for kids especially if they are not super into spices. However they served us a complimentary dal soup that MEC found absolutely delicious!

All in all it was a great success!

Ultrazone is another great success of the night! MAC had an awesome time there with his friends. The moms were actually super nice and we had a friendly chat.

MAC wants his birthday party there and it is probably the first organized birthday party that I approve of. Now we just have to find the time to invite his friends and make reservation... especially since his birthday was yesterday!!!!!

Not much

Nothing creative is happening at this house! Unfortunately my full time job, the family and my interest in diverse books and shows are eating up my free time to sew booh.

I did start a pair of shorts for MAC based on the Oliver and S pattern Field trip cargo pants and some houndtooth fabric to make a statement!

I have to say so far I love the quality of the pattern and I learn to do things the right way! Win win right!. Unfortunately I won't be able to finish them for a while because I have to pack all my sewing things back in the garage for a little bit of time. You see my sewing room is the dining room and every once in a while we need to use that room for its intended purpose. To be honest we also need to have this room clean. I love seeing my sewing mess in display but not all agree with me!

We also have gone a lot to the mountain lately to do a little bit of this....

I wish but mostly this!

I have always loved the snow and mountain probably because I never actually had to shovel any of it ;) 

The kids are old enough to learn snowboarding and since we live by the beach, our big trips are taken to visit family in France (I know tough right). We decided that our family and friends vacation would be to go snowboarding! 

It is an amazing experience to see you kids develop and they both love it. At 6, MEC is going down blues saying Yeeeeeh and clapping her hand! MAC is tooling around having a blast!

Anyways the season is done for us as the summer is looming! 

Music Love

I thought I would take a minute off of work to list a few current music favorites:

• The XX is a group I discovered a several months ago with their no-lyrics piece "Intro". I have "The XX" radio station on Pandora. I heard Fiction yesterday on Suits (awesome show btw) and it's one of my Fav!
• Other new addition is Lana Del Rey discovered when watched MIB III. I love the song from Pitbull Back in time. One of the female singer has a similar voice than Lana Del Rey.
• Finally if you are into fun and corky lyrics I encourage you to listen to the latest album from Train "California 37". Favorites include "Drive By", "Mermaid", "50 ways to say goodbye".

If you come by my cube and see me rock in front my screen chances are I'm listening to this music!

Happy coding.

2013 Projects

One of my goal this year was to post more of my sewing projects. Unfortunately, I find myself more often than not at my desk to write a post and then scrambling to get the pictures of my phone etc...
So until I streamlined the process you won't have many posts.

However I thought I would share some of the patterns I have already purchased and some I'm planning to purchase.

A few month ago I bought a bunch of the Blank slate patterns and started making projects. I am almost done with a blazer for my son, I used her vintage tee pattern as a starting point to make fleece for the kids. I am using it again to make PJ top along with the PJ bottom from the christmas pj pattern.
Unfortunately I haven't mastered the neck quite yet.

Just a couple of weeks ago I have expanded my kids pattern collection.
First I purchased two patterns at Clever Charlotte. I chose the summery ones as we are exiting the cold here in Southern California.

Then, I splurged over at Oliver and S and bought the following 4 patterns, I would not be surprised if I have another one lurking in my inbox that I completely forgot about.

Next step I'd like to start sewing for myself and will shortly buy the following patterns from Wiksten, Sewhaholic and make it perfect, I saw a lot of versions of those tops on the various blogs I follow and I really like how they turn out. Now we will see how it works for me.

Now I have to finish the christmas pj I was supposed to give a month ago and maybe I will be able to start on some of those projects soon!

Also a lot of babies are popping around me so I think there will be some baby gifts as well.

Now if I could only figure out how to easily post the pictures that I take of the project I make along with the post that will be grand!

2013

So I'm one year older and wiser I hope! I don't have many new years resolution besides try to sew more for the kids, for the family kids, for the friend of the family kids and maybe for me ;)
Since I have decided to buy patterns, this has opened the door to more project for a wider range of people.

Another resolution is to be more diligent at posting step by step of my projects. This requires taking pictures and posting the pictures!

The other day I stumbled upon this quote which I love:
You can do anything not everything!
This will be my 2013 moto.

Snickerdoodles love

I really love that word, honestly for a non american the first time someone told me that I thought they were joking, then when I understood they were cookies I was expecting something peanut buttery.... Now they are our new favorite cookies.
Anyways my friend gave us a bag of home snickerdoodle they were so delicious that between the four of us the bag lasted hmmmm 2hours. Yum!

So inspired I went on the net to look for a recipe. Those are the family favorites and super easy to whip together. I think the kids will find that in their lunchbox soon. Speaking of which I need to do some serious thinking around lunches....
Here is the recipe I found not remembering from where and I can't seem to find the recipe at this time but here it goes.

1 1/2 cup of sugar
1 cup of butter at room temp
2 3/4 cups of flour
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Cinnamon Sugar

2 teaspoon of cinnamon
1/3 cup of sugar

Mix the butter and sugar until creamy. Add the eggs one at a time and mix well in between. Add the vanilla and incorporate/mix well. In a separate bowl mix in the flour, baking powder and salt mix well. Then add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix well.

Preheat your oven at 400F
If the dough is too soft you can stick in the fridge covered for 2 hours. I don't have any patience so I just roll my dough right then into 1inch ball, roll them in cinnamon sugar then put them on a baking sheet with parchment paper spaced about 2 inches apart.
Flatten with the bottom of a glass to 1/2 inch thickness.

Cook for 7-10 min (mine are done in 7) until the edges of the cookies are golden and the center is still soft.

Enjoy!

Noel

We always try to keep Christmas magical whether it is just us with the kids the current norm, us visiting family in France the old norm that we are missing, or us with family visiting the exception but maybe the upcoming norm.
This year we hosted Christmas for the first time since I moved to the states. My in laws came to spend Christmas with us and the kids. It was great. Look we even decorated the fireplace with snow flakes and cinnamon ornaments. Thanks to my very patient mother in law who spent hours cutting the snowflakes with MEC. It was quite an operation.

We are hoping that the dark gray rug will survive our grubby feet

Our tradition is to have a fancy dinner on Christmas eve and Christmas day is spent playing with toys and lounging in our PJs.... Which means that usually on the 24th I'm running around like a mad woman, finishing the kids fancy clothes, going to the store to buy food and cleaning up. Of course B is there to help as well. This year finishing MEC's dress took longer than expected maybe because we had company. I didn't have time to really finish it note to self still need to serge the lining of the dress and finish the arms oops. MAC didn't want to wear his jacket so I didn't even bother finishing it.

Dinner was delicious! To munch on something while drinking champagne, I prepared gougeres, and had a cheese plate. For dinner, I made standing rib roast recipe courtesy of Williams Sonoma with mashed potatoes and a big salad followed by the deep dish apple streusel from the same source. The dinner was super delicious. 

I was trying not to panick when my husband and his dad left for the Apple store at 4:30pm to buy new iphones. Luckily they were back at 6pm and the standing rib roast while too cook for my taste was still moist and oh so delicious. 

The tradition after the kids are in bed is packing their gifts frantically while sipping some more wine in front of a movie. We chose to watch Fly Fishing in the Yemen since we could not find the subtitles for Les Intouchables. Both movies are amazing in different ways. 

All of this for two lucky lucky kids

Crud the house keeper is coming tomorrow, we have to clean

After brunching on homemade waffle with apple compote, drinking a ton of coffee we needed to get some air. Even though the weather was more Christmasey than usual we had to go spend some time at the beach. The kids shrieked in delight alternating scaring off the seagulls and dancing Gangman style. If you have a second-third grader I'm sure you are experiencing this new contagious disease. If you find a cure please let me know!

I hope you all had a wonderful day!