Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Hi everyone! We hope you all had a fabulous Thanksgiving... ours was great! A day filled with a turkey trot run, family and fantastic food really can't be beat.

Our morning started out in Gig Harbor at an early hour (too early for Bryan and Kristen....) with getting up, facing the nasty rain and heading to downtown Gig for the Gig Harbor Turkey Trot! Blitzen was a little too tired to join in on the fun, but everyone else trotted! It was pretty wet when we started, but by the end, our rain jackets were not all that necessary any more and were only dragging us down. Everyone pulled through and finished the trot with a run across the finish line! The only bummer of it all was that we parked WAY up a hill and had to hoof it up after the run (we couldn't talk Dad into going and getting the car for us....). But, what a great way to start one of the most gluttonous days of the year!

The crew pre-race.... even Bruno's looking at the camera!

We did it!

After we got back from the run, Bryan and I headed up to Seattle and dropped off our pies for charity at the Hall at Fauntleroy (see last blog...). It was fun to help out with that and we got to meet David Haggerty (Kevin's brother) who I saw and knew they had to be related! What a neat event and we were so glad to be able to help out.

After that, Mom, Dad and Kristen picked us up and we began the trek up to Clear Lake. The rest of the day was fabulous and filled with family and wonderful food. Bryan and I brought some appetizers to complement Georgette's great cheese spread. We did veggies with ranch, cream cheese/cocktail sauce/shrimp dip, and fig jam/carmelized onion/gorgonzola crostinis (or what we had hoped for was crostinis). Unfortunately, due to the traffic, our appetizers were a little late, but it all worked out in the end!

Dinner was terrific- we were supposed to have a deep-fried turkey and a traditional turkey, but... um.... the timing on the deep frier was a little off (I won't name names... Uncle Mark!) :-) But there were great sides, salads and even a turkey-shaped butter to complete the meal!

What was supposed to be a fried turkey... oops! :-)

Bryan and Devin getting the turkey out of the pan- Devo gets splashed in the eye!

The turkey butter about to be beheaded

Dinner was followed by the usual chatting, giggling, baby cooing (oh wait, that's new!), and yummy pies!

Daddy Brett and Grace

Devin, Scott, Sarah and Kristen

Sarah and Kristen messing around post-dinner.... flying an airplane!

Mom and the Oregon Duck!

If you want to see all the pictures I took, you can follow this link:

Thanksgiving 2009

Anyway, thanks Venns for a great Thanksgiving! It was so great to see everyone-

Next on the holiday list.... FESTIVUS!!! Yay! See you all on the east side of the country soon!

Love, Lauren and Bryan

For the dog lovers out there...

Thanks for finding the link KLB!

Tonight Lauren and I decided to stay in and relax after a big day of piano moving yesterday. (for those of you wondering, we just strapped it to my back and I carried it out the door and into the u-haul myself). No big deal... So to celebrate I made braised short ribs over saffron risotto for dinner, which apparently I'm just finding out 8 years into the deal, is one of Lauren's favorite dishes. We attached a few pictures below. This dinner was also a way to say thank you to Lauren for her catching a cold while standing outside for 3 hours last week to get my signed copy of Bill Simmon's new book. It doesn't sound like there were a whole lot of other women there, so I know how lucky I am!

$18.00 for that little jar - it's a good thing she liked it so much...

Wow, $18.oo? Sprinkle some of that on my kibbles!

The process is kind of slow and painful, but it is well worth it in the end.

The finished product

In other culinary news, we are baking pies for a thanksgiving meal for the needy that is being offered down the road at the hall at Fauntleroy. The caterer putting on the dinner is called Tuxedos and Tennis Shoes, and to prove what a small world it is, that is owned and operated by the brother of one Kevin Haggerty (some of you may remember him as the dancing preacher from our wedding).


Plant update: they are still alive.


Congratulations to Lauren on becoming Senior research associate this week (i guess you do have something in common with her dad!) senior, get it? I'm sure her AARP birthday card will be arriving any day too.


Well, that is all from sunny Seattle for now, can't wait to see everyone soon, some for Thanksgiving, and others soon after for Festivus. Hope all is well, and enjoy the short week.

Keep on fighting, little plants!

A few weeks ago, while cleaning our house, I took a look at our plants around the house and realized that most were in dire straights and I was headed for the well-deserved label of having a black thumb. Here's what the heat this summer did to what was supposed to be garlic:

Nicely enough, when Sarah was last visiting, she thought this might still survive...

Then, I found some hope. Just over a year ago, Bryan and I went and visited Kristen in AZ. I was a typical Phoenician tourist and bought a mini cactus to take home. Well, my, my, my, in a year this cactus has sprouted some new horns and I am SO PROUD!

Those three spindles coming off the main stalk have appeared in the last year- yay!

My proud little cactus resides on our bookshelf in the main room, yes, propping up Desert Solitaire. Not by accident, by the way.....

There are two other plants I consider myself responsible for (indoor plants, at least): my little succulent/bonzai garden and my "family heirloom" spider plant. Two weeks ago, both my charges looked as if they had spent a year in the desert, like Edward Abbey. So, I did what any reasonable gardener would do and cut those suckers WAY back. I only left really a main stalk or anything that looked like it might live one more day. I am so pleased to report that today, after re-examining the plants, I think they are well on their way to recovery! I am quite excited that I haven't placed myself on the list of those who have killed the spider plant (Mom and Sarah, ahem), and I think that given enough time, I will finally have some plant to pass along to Kristen and whoever else may want some! Below are some photos of my triumphs.... Now, I know that they may not look like much yet, but you should have seen them before!

The mini-garden's home is in our hallway window- plenty of light!

Look at that- NEW GROWTH!

The recovering spider plant calls our office home. This room gets a lot of sunlight and has wide-open windows (mainly because we haven't put down the money for blinds in the room yet....)

New growth on the spider plant.... keep on going!

Well, that's about enough for now on my musings on houseplants. My big goal: nurse them back to life. Wish them luck! :-)

Sunday Brunch

Hi all- hope you had a great weekend!

Today we had a bunch of friends over for a Sounders playoff game brunch. Our friend, Ryan, brought some fresh crabmeat and smoked salmon (that he caught himself!), so Bryan made smoked salmon hashbrowns and a crab scramble.... soooo yummy! In case you're wondering, coffee with Baileys goes along GREAT with smoked salmon and crab! And Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale does too. :-)

Homemade breakfast potatoes with smoked salmon

Our friend Gavin admiring the smoked salmon-cream cheese setup

Unfortunately, the Sounders lost in overtime. Oh yeah, and the poor Panthers looked as if they might beat those stinking New Orleans Saints, but alas, they fell a little short. At least the Seahawks won (but they played the Lions, so thank goodness they won).

Some of us were more interested in the game than others.....

So, a sports-filled day for the two of us, with a great brunch with friends!

(Blogging action shot)

Lots of love, Lauren and Bryan

I saw a drowned rat at the dog park

Or maybe it was just a really, really wet dog......

Happy Halloween!

Happy November everyone- hope you had a great Halloween! Bryan and I are (finally) feeling a lot better- almost like new! Still lingering coughs, but not enough to keep us in on Halloween :-)

We were trying to decide what to wear and I just looked at my trenchcoat in the closet and...

Yes, we were flashers- complete with tennis shoes in order to run away.... Here's a picture from the party we went to. When we walked in the door, we were a hit- the party stopped to watch us :-)

Look at those legs!!!!!

Others were celebrating the day:

(Bruno claims he is both a Seahawks fan and a Panthers fan... but he has a new Seahawks scarf and decided to wear it for Halloween)

The weather in Seattle these days is basically wonderful! It hasn't been raining too much and the air is cool and crisp. Leaves are turning too, it's great. This morning we all went for a walk to the "Junction" nearby to get coffee and a pastry from the famed Bakery Nouveau- yum!

Hope you all didn't forget to "fall back" last night (except for you crazies who live in Arizona) and we really hope all is well with everyone!

PS- HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM/LINDA!

Love, Lauren and Bryan