New Year's Resolutions

RESOLUTION:

res·o·lu·tion /ˌrɛzəˈluʃən/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[rez-uh-loo-shuhn] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation –noun

1.	a formal expression of opinion or intention made, usually after voting, by a formal organization, a legislature, a club, or other group. Compare concurrent resolution, joint resolution.

2.	a resolve or determination: to make a firm resolution to do something.

3.	the act of resolving or determining upon an action or course of action, method, procedure, etc.

and there are many more definitions listed. hmmm..."the act of resolving or determining upon an action or course of action..." Yep, that's it all right. Every year I make up a little list of my resolutions for the New Year, at that moment I am determined that I will act, that I will find a method in which it is possible to keep my resolution, to fulfill my goals. Yet, every year I fail. Why? Well, I don't know. But I have a feeling that most people fall into the same category as I do. We just find it impossible to make those life changes, whether big or small that we resolve upon every year. Maybe like all the self-help books and web pages tell you it's because you don't truly want to change. I don't know about that, maybe that is the truth. Perhaps I truly don't want to change my habits even if it would improve my life.

Then again, maybe it's because I decide everything needs to be changes all at once and why not start off the New Year with a bang. Recreating myself into the new and improved me. Yeah, that's probably why I fail.

This year I have made up my list (and helped my DH with a few small resolutions of his own) and I am all gung-ho to make this year's resolutions stick. Yeah, yeah I know history will most likely repeat itself, but this year I'm following some wacky on-line guru and looking at a larger goal then breaking it up into smaller, I hopeful more manageable goals. so, we shall see, we shall see.

Good luck to all you other suckers out there who diligently write up your lists then forget them before February even arrives. Your in good company...that is if you think a dog-sitting, slacker who lives in France getting fat and lazy eating good cheese, bread and wine while her husband works his little fanny off is good company!!

Bonne Année et bonne santé!!!

Happy New Year and Good Health!

Holey laundry, Batman!

Aaaaah, the excitement of using foreign appliances never get dulled. After our visitors left on Thursday I decided to take advantage of my neighbors kind offer to use her dryer whilst she and her beau were away. What bliss I thought to have dry laundry without stringing it up all over the apartment! I can do loads and loads of laundry and it won't take 3 days for it to dry. Heaven. All I had to do was haul my wet laundry upstairs and figure out that pesky foreign dryer. It took a bit of button pressing and nob turning but I finally figures out how to get it working. It's one of those that doesn't have a vent, it has a water collection tank that you have to empty. Don't worry I emptied it before I started my laundry. I was good to go.
My first load turned out fine. It wasn't completely dry, but I was anxious to put in my next load, our comforter, and wasn't worried about a couple towels still being mildly damp. "But," I thought, "I don't want my comforter to be wet we need it for tonight..." So, I cranked up the timer to...well, I don't really know how long I set it for, and decided I'd come back up periodically and check how it was doing. Oops! big mistake. Naturally, I forgot about checking it and...oh say nearly an hour later I remember my comforter was in the dryer, I'd better go see if it was dry yet.
I bounded up the stairs put the key in the lock and began turning it when I thought, "ugh, what's that smell?" There was this acrid, burning, semi-sweet smell hanging in the air. Oh god, the laundry!!! Oh yes, it was my comforter. I punched the button to stop the machine, whipped open the door and was hit by the powerful stench of burned comforter. Oh it was burned alright, I don't mean a little melted, I mean great brown patches of burnt comforter. I beheld the mess and nearly wept.
Ok, I didn't really weep and it wasn't really that messy. The comforter, yes, was a disaster (an extra crispy disaster at that) but the machine was A-OK...if you don't count the offending odor, which now filled the ENTIRE apartment. I delicately pulled out the comforter and surveyed the damage. Shit. It was bad. Completely un-salvageable. Thank god it was mine and not my neighbors - I'd washed and dried a blanket we had borrowed from her in the first load.
Honestly, I didn't even know that dryers could do that! I must sound like a complete idiot but I have never, EVER, in my life put something in the dryer and had it come out well-done. (on a tangent...extra crispy, well-done...could I put in any more food references? How is it that even when I'm not talking about food I am talking about food? Does anyone else see this as some sort of deep-seated problem? we'll ponder that later)

I ran downstairs with stinky blanket in tow and barged into my own apartment, brandishing my failure to my DH. Who innocently looked up from the couch and said, "What happened?"
"I destroyed our blanket!" I screeched, "and their apartment stinks to high heaven. What are we going to do? I feel awful."

Luckily, my DH kept his head about him and said, "I'll come up and look." What he really meant was smell and whoa, it hit him the minute he opened the door. we proceeded to go around their apartment opening every door and window we could find. The air will clear it out, my DH was positive.

As we sat down to dinner late that night I heard someone moving around upstairs. Oh shiezboch (a new word CD created) they couldn't be home already. They're not due back until tomorrow! Ah ha, it's Marie and Michel, the dog sitters. Oh great, how am I going to explain this in French. My DH said, "Just don't go up there. You don't have to tell them anything." But I really felt like I should explain. So, I dutifully trudged up the stairs and told Marie, in my best French that I had burned, brûlé, my blanket. I think she told me, "It happens" and I know that she asked me if I had put it on delicate - which I had not. Oops, again. Marie was satisfied because she could now tell her husband, Michel, that she had not left on the outside light, as he had chastised her for when they had arrived. A happy ending for Marie. Not so much for me. Well, we kept the windows open till about 11:30 p.m. (the discovery of the burning had occured about 3:30 p.m. or so) and the apartment still smelled. Yes, it was better - 8 hours with the fresh, cold air blowing through I would hope it smelled better - but there were still distinct traces of funk in the air. Sadly, that funk was still there the next morning when our neighbors arrived home. I am so thankful that they were very laid back about the whole thing. They even said I could use the dryer again, they left almost immediately for a ski week. I guess as long as we watch Picasso, the snaggle-toothed slobber hound they're OK with us stinking up their apartment with the stank of singed synthetic fibers! All's well that ends well, I guess. Though I'm not sure I'll be using their dryer again. Then again, you never know....

Yep, that's an actual hole. I seriously burned a hole, TWO in fact, in my comforter. Who would have thought little old me not being able to use a French dryer! Hey, in my defense, instructions were not included....

Christmas is nearly here!!!

Can't write too much seeing as it is Christmas Eve and, as you now, it's necessary for everyone to scurry to bed so that Santa can arrive. I'm afraid we'll just have to leave him a note to help himself to cookies and milk (or Remy Martin, if he prefers) in the kitchen. If we left them out our little piglet of a puppy would gobble 'em up faster than you can say "Merry Christmahannakwanzmicas!"

We spent the weekend doing a little bit of traveling. We were in Neuchatel, Switzerland Friday and Saturday night then drove down to Montreux, Switzerland for Sunday night and now we're back home. We had a lovely time despite JD and CD having to fight off pesky colds. Poor CD has been hit pretty hard and has been feeling under the weather, but luckily we had no urgent plans so lots of breaks and nap times have been worked into our days to everyones satisfaction.
I haven't looked through the tons of pictures I've taken yet, but I will post some of the best ones once I have.

Well, it's getting late and we still have to take the doggies for a walk (we told our neighbors we'd take Picasso out at night while they are away). so, I'll fill in all interested parties about our travels in a future post but for now it's au revoir

Bonnes fetes!

Joyeuse Noel!!!

yum, yum...the scent of Christms continued

Dear me, it's nearly 9:00 a.m. and I find myself the only one up and alert. Even Ally is curled up fast asleep on the couch next to me. Thus, I thought I would take these free moments to post my previously mentioned thoughts on orange and cinnamon rolls. But before I get started did I mention that our guests, CD and JD, arrived safe and sound yesterday morning. So, it's quite possible this will be one of the very few posts made until after they leave on the 27th. Then again if sleeping this late is a regular pattern then perhaps I will find some blogging time. But, enough about that.


No doubt everyone has samples a cinnamon roll, warm and sticky with cinnamon oozing out the bottom and the glorious sweetness of glaze drizzled over the top. I'm salivating just thinking about it. But have you ever had an orange roll? Heaven. Pure and simple heaven. At least my mother's are and for me the aroma of hot orange rolls baking in the oven is the ultimate herald of Christmas. That sweet, tangyness wafting through the air. The delicious odors of yeast bread baking tinged with a faint scent of oranges...mmmm, perfection. For me this smell over almost any other stirs up images of my family gathering for the holidays. The warmth of our comfortable kitchen, my sisters and I sitting at the counter, legs swinging back and forth lazily watching my mother bustle about the kitchen. Her chastising us with, "Just because you're on vacation from school doesn't mean you don't have to help around the house!" The house filled with laughter and memories as we drag out the boxes of Christmas decorations and argue over where they should go on the tree. Laughing at our lopsided Kindergarten ornaments. Helping my mother adjust her village of electric houses on their cotton ball snow. Blowing on a steaming mug of hot chocolate after helping my father shovel the sidewalks. Funny how just a little thing like filling your own apartment with the aromas so familiar to your childhood can make it feel more like Christmas and more like a home. True it also makes me more homesick, but I'm trying to focus on the positive here.

So, on Tuesday I made up a batch of my mothers orange and cinnamon rolls. Being my first attempt I think they came out very well. Also being my first attempt I didn't think about the fact that my mother always baked to feed an army. Not only was her baking for our own household of five, but we would take rolls to my grandmother's house for Christmas eve dinner, she would make extras to give to friends at work, for people at church, etc. So, when I followed her recipe I ended up with nearly 3 dozen rolls! And I only have 4 people in the house to feed. Granted I did put some together as a little gift for our neighbors, but diminishing the supply by 4 rolls isn't really ALL that significant. Here is my mother's, now famous, recipe:

Yeast Rolls

21/4 cups milk

2 pkgs. Granular yeast

¼ cup water, I use about 1/3 with the 2 pkgs. Of yeast

¼ cup sugar

11/2 teaspoons of salt

1/3 cup shortening

1 egg

7 to 8 cups of flour

Scald milk, 190F.

Soften yeast in lukewarm water separate cup

Measure sugar, salt, and shortening in mixing bowl

Add hot milk and stir until all is dissolved, add the softened yeast when mixture is about 95F (lukewarm)

Add egg and beat until well mixed

Add bout half the flour and beat vigorously. Add more flour, ½ cup at a time to make dough stiff enough to knead easily. Keep dough on soft side rather than too stiff.

Turn dough onto floured surface and allow to rest 10 min. covered with wax paper to prevent drying. Clean mixing bowl and grease bottom and sides with shortening.

Knead dough until it is smooth and satiny about 5 to10 minutes or until it springs back when you press it with your finger. Place dough in greased bowl and grease top and sides lightly, cover and let rise until double in bulk (in a warm place). When double punch down to remove air bubbles. For orange rolls split dough into two balls and roll 1 out to about ¼ thick. Spread butter or margarine on and sprinkle with granulated sugar and orange rind (if you do both balls as orange rolls you will need to use 3 or 4 oranges) Scrape the oranges to get the rind while the dough is rising. Roll up like a jelly roll and cut slices and place in a greased baking dish. I use 9 x 13 cake pans. Cover and let rise until double again. Bake in 400 F oven for 15 – 20 minutes.

For the icing I use a walnut size margarine and shortening, 1 tsp. vanilla, maybe 2 cups of confectioners sugar and orange juice to make a spreading consistency.

You can make cinnamon rolls with the other ball by rolling out the same way, spread with butter or margarine spread brown sugar and sprinkle cinnamon over it. Follow directions for orange rolls. If you want to put icing on just use hot water instead of orange juice.

You can also make plain rolls by rolling the dough in balls and putting 3 to a muffin cup, they make nice dinner rolls. The recipe makes about 3 dozen if you want to freeze some don’t put the icing on until you are ready to use them.

As you might have noticed from the first picture I didn't have a candy thermometer so I just used our regular thermometer for when we get sick. Josh had a fit when he discovered this, absolutely sure that I had broken it. Apparently, and this does make sense, those thermometers are made to only go up to a certain temperature - if a humans temperature went up to 200 degrees they'd be dead. So, yeah, I get that I just didn't think about it. Luckily, Josh was wrong I didn't break the thermometer. I used it only to make sure the mixture was cool enough to add the yeast.

Well everyone has suddenly awoken. Isn't it funny how everyone gets up within 3 minutes of each other. Each stumbling out or their rooms, bleary-eyed, tousled hair, searching for their reviving cup of coffee. So, here's my last photo of my rolls to fee an army ( I made both orange and cinnamon rolls, by the way). Who knows when I'll be able to post again, but, gotta go!

the scent of Christmas

I don't know about you, but for me Christmas is all about wonderful smells. Whenever I smell certain things throughout the year they immediately evoke memories or just plain old warm fuzzies. Does that happen to you? For me the scents of Christmas are very distinct and they all remind me of family. Of course, there is the lovely, crisp smell of pine trees. Every year my family would go to the local tree farm, pick out, and cut down our own Christmas tree. You'd think that this wouldn't take a terribly long time, but for my family it was a momentous and LONG occasion. We'd bundle up in our warm clothes and trudge through the fields of trees examining each as we passed. There were 5 of us and we all had different tastes. One would find "the perfect" tree, but someone else would disagree, it was too short, the next "perfect" tree found would be vetoed for being too tall. Too fat, too thin, doesn't have long needles, needles are too long, has a branch missing on the back side, it went on and on. Eventually, we would all settle on one tree that everyone was satisfied with. If it wasn't the "perfect" tree it would be once we decorated it. If it still didn't meet someones specific requirements for the perfect tree then they had a whole year to plot their strategy for how they would get the tree they wanted next year. Usually, it was the bitter cold and thoughts of a hot lunch and hot chocolate that finally forced all 5 of us to come to an agreement. My dad would manfully saw through the tree and we'd or should I say, he'd, haul it back to the front to pay and strap it onto the car. Inevitably, once we got it home and put it in it's stand it was always so tall it wouldn't fit into the living room until we lopped of a little. I think my mom secretly sang, "I told you so. I told you so." in her head every year. So, yes the fragrance of fresh pine reminds me of cold winter days and family fun (hey who needs to remember all the fights and fits we had over picking the Christmas tree? Those temper-tantrums are long forgotten - at least by me, since I was probably the one throwing them.) This year Josh and I debated over whether we should get a real tree or buy a fake one. We hmmmed and hawwed over it, tried to purchase a fake one but returned it immediately when it was rung up at 2 times as much as the sign said. We tried to find the one in the price range we wanted, but after struggling through 2 conversations, in French, with 2 different store employees we gave up. And in the end we bought this cute, if tiny, live tree. See, it even fits on top of the table, which we decided was a bonus if our apartment decided to take on water again! Lucky for us we have great upstairs neighbors. Marion and Beat let us borrow their Christmas decorations, which they weren't using because they are going away for the Holidays. Yeah!! We had plenty of ornaments to choose from for our little "Charlie Brownesque" tree. I added some red ribbons I had and we had been smart enough to grab some string lights from a couple moving out of the country this summer.

The other smells of Christmas for me are those which emanate from the kitchen. My mother is a wonderful cook and an even better baker. And at Christmas time our house was always full of the warm, delicious fragrance of baked goods. Classic sugar cookies, which we would help decorate, orange rolls, cinnamon rolls, pies, chocolate crinkle cookies, haystacks, chex mix, you get the picture. There was always something in the oven creating wafts of mouth-watering smells. So, I thought to put myself into the true Christmas mood I'd have to fill my own kitchen with those magnificent and nostalgic aromas. Yesterday, I kicked things off by making some sugar cookies. I followed my mom's recipe with only some minor substituting. I might have mentioned this before, but I'm not sure, my mom used Crisco in EVERYTHING. I, personally, think everything she makes is fabulous so when I'm in the States I use it to. Unfortunately, I can't find shortening, or any close approximation, of it here. So, I use butter instead. When I told my mom this she sighed and said, "mmm....butter just makes them better!" I don't know if I agree with her on that, but maybe I'm just biased because I think mom just makes everything better!
Last night, I sat around frosting the cookies and watching White Christmas, my all time favorite Christmas movie. My DH looked at the screen and said, "So let me get this straight. You are watching White Christmas now and then you are going to force everyone to watch it again on Christmas day?" I replied sweetly, "of course." and that was the end of that. I mean really, who can EVER watch too much White Christmas? Not I.
And here is the finished product




I do have more to tell of my Christmas kitchen exploits, but alas that will have to wait till later. So, tune in next time to see pictures of the infamous Mama Collins orange rolls and cinnamon rolls. My first attempt at making these yummy goody - the ultimate aroma of Christmas!

Always Behind

Geeze, I can't seem to keep up with my blog. In my defense I have been a bit busy lately getting ready for our holiday guests, CD & JD, to arrive. They get here tomorrow morning about 10 a.m. So, naturally, we've been trying to get the apartment in presentable shape (which became a bigger task due to the flood last week, but not insurmountable). Sunday we drove out to Lausanne, which is about a 45 minute drive from here. Unfortunately, we were there on the mission of acquiring a guest bed. We decided that perhaps the air mattress just wouldn't suffice for our guests and since we found a very cheap bed on-line we went for it. A couple was getting rid of their bed because they are picking up their lives and moving to Florida! We understood their need to get rid of everything and anything they could at any price. In fact, they gave us tons of stuff for free. Granted, we probably didn't need all of it...but it's difficult to refuse free stuff. There's always this little voice in my head saying, "Why are you taking that? You're just accumulating more junk. You said you weren't going to do that here." but then there's a warring voice saying, "But there might be something good in there. Why would you pass up FREE stuff!?!?!?" So we came away with our little ford fiesta loaded down. It must have been a site our little white fiesta chugging down the highway with a mattress strapped to her little roof. Cars just whizzed by us, little kids faces pressed against the windows, small cheeks squashed against the pane, eyes wide as they craned their necks to stare at this bizzar site as they sped on their way to la maison de grandmere (grandma's house). Thank goodness the bed frame was one of those handy Ikea ones that comes in pieces easy to assemble and disassemble - which was a huge blessing considering we wouldn't have been able to get it home if it were one solid piece! It, miraculously, didn't take us more than an hour to reassemble the bed in our guest bedroom/craft room. Although we did have one casualty - the wooden coffee table you see in the picture with the bed. Four of the beams from the bed were leaning against the wall
and fell over right onto the table, putting a huge crack down the middle of it and breaking off one side. Thanks to super-strong wood glue it's back to normal.
So, all in all a good trip. Oh, and I even got a cupboard for the entrance hall that has a spot for shoes. Very convenient. I don't know why more people in the States don't have these. I'm definitely a huge fan. It's such an easy way to hide shoes away and keep the front hallway looking uncluttered. I would imagine it'd be great for people with kids, that is if you can teach your kids to put their shoes in there when they take them off. I foresee trouble with my 30 year old husband on this issue, but right now it's new so he makes an effort to utilize it.
OK, well I need to go deal with my rising orange rolls. Hopefully, I'll post again later with all my holiday baked goods! Wish me luck.

Shall we dance?

Saturday Josh and I took our second Milonga Lisa workshop. It's a great deal of fun. Our Argentine Tango teachers, Domenico and Paula, teach it. They're are great. For those who don't know the Milonga is similar to the Argentine Tango, but faster. From what I understand it is more basic and came before the Argentine Tango. I believe that the Argentine Tango has it's roots in the Milonga, but I could be wrong about that. I tried to insert some videos from YouTube of our dance instructors doing the Milonga in the upper right side bar. Hopefully, it worked. You should be able to click on it and the youtube video will pop up. This will give you an idea of what the Milonga is like.
Josh and I attended both the beginner and intermediate classes. So, our schedule was: 3:30-5:00 beginner class, 5:15-6;15 Milonga/Argentine Tango guided practice, 6:30 - 8:00 intermediate class and then 8:30 celebrating Paola's birthday (food and drinks provided to all who wished to attend). We stayed for it ALL! My legs and feet were so sore, even Josh complained about his leg being sore and that's saying something for him. We learned a lot and we had fun though we were exhausted by the end of the night. There is a tradition among Tango dancers that the birthday girl/boy has to dance with everyone in the room. So, they got out a mop and you would pass the mop to the next person to dance with Paola, the birthday girl. When you had the mop you could cut-in on the dance and then the next person would cut-in on you after a few minutes. Josh didn't want to participate - he hates dancing in front of people, but he was a good sport and did it and he did a great job. I, on the other hand, did a lousy job! When her new partner cuts-in Paola has no choice whether she leads or follows (does the man's or woman's part). Of course, i made her lead because I don't know how to lead to save my life. After our 3 minute dance I realized I also had no idea how to follow either, but oh well! As the
party was progressing we both were so tired we didn't really feel like Tangoing and it was nice talking with people and getting to know them a little better, but you know that point when you're tired and all you want to do is go home, but you can't find a way to leave without seeming rude? that was where Josh and I were for most of the night. It wasn't that we didn't like the people at the party and it was enjoyable, we just wanted to go home, see our puppy, and relax. We didn't want to have to think about making polite conversation or what the next dance step was. Thankfully, after we had Tangoed with Paola we thought we could make out escape without being rude....but, no they then brought out a birthday cake. So, of course we stayed a bit longer. Can I just ask, what is the deal with cakes with no frosting here? There were 2 different cakes and neither one of them had frosting, they were just the plain old cake? what's that about? In my humble opinion, the frosting is the best part of the cake! but maybe I'm just spoiled because my mom made the world's best frosting. Yet, I digress. After the singing, everyone sang in English, then individual people sang in: Italian, Spanish, Bulgarian, Polish, Swedish, and Russian. I think I got 'em all! It was very nice. Luckily, after the cake was finished we chatted for a few minutes then made our escape. Whew! It was 10:30 p.m. by that time. 7 hours of dancing is enough for anyone. But, I think that we are better Milonga dancers now. We just have to try and force ourselves to practice at home. Does anyone else do that? They take a class or participate in an event and have tons of fun, yet you never practice it at home. It's not as though you actively try to avoid doing it you just don't think about it until the next class, or next event and then you think, "Gosh, I really should have practiced that. I barely remember what I'm supposed to do!" Hopefully, we're not the only ones out there who do this.....

Pride

Can I just tell you guys how proud I am of myself? The word of the day is: fierté (fee-air-tay)= pride or fier, which means proud. Why you might query am I so proud of myself on this particular day? Well, sit back and I shall tell you.

It's quite simple really. I accomplished a few small tasks in French. That is the reason for my fierce fierte. This morning after dropping Josh off at CERN, he had promised me the car today to run errands and, naturally, he missed the bus. I shouldn't complain, but sometimes I wonder about his time management skills (Honey, if you're reading this I'm obviously over-exaggerating to make it more fun to read - obviously....) Umm....anyways. It was actually a good thing I had to drive him in because it meant I got off my butt and out of the house early instead of farting around twiddling my thumbs growing more and more anxious about my upcoming task of talking to the insurance company. Now, this is something that would make me neurotic in the States, just think how I felt at the idea of having to accomplish this feat in French! I gathered together all my insurance info, along with every ounce of courage (ironically courage is the same in French, just pronounced more French like). So, armed with proof that I had insurance there, mon courage, and a French/English dictionary I bravely entered the insurance office.
I sat nervously awaiting my turn. A very nice gentleman asked if he could help me and with a flustered smile I began with my usual phrase, "Je suis desole, mais je ne parle pas tres bien francais." For those who know French you know there are a bunch of accents left off, it's just that it's such a pain in the arse to put them in, so I'm leaving them out for now- please forgive me. Back to the story at hand. Josh thinks it's pretty funny that I start out every meeting with a French person this way, but in my mind it tells them straight off the bat, "hey, look I'm trying. If I sound like a child you know why." It also, often, helps in getting the native French speaker to immediately slow down their insanely fast French so I might actually understand 1/3 of what they are saying.
Upon hearing the word inondation (flood - see Tuesdays post if you don't know what I'm referring to) I was ushered into this kind gentleman's office and the paperwork was pulled out. All-in-all it was a pretty easy process. We didn't have much damage to claim and through hand gestures and words pulled earlier from the dictionary I was able to describe what had happened and how our landlords proposed fixing the problem. They are having a drainage pipe installed along the side of the house and they are supposed to have someone put a sealant on/in? the kitchen walls and floor. Who knows when that will happen. Because we only had a rug that was damaged (and second-hand at that, though I didn't tell the insurance agent) I don't know as we'll get any compensation. We need the receipt for the rug, which we don't have. The insurance man suggested I go to the store and see if they will give me another receipt. I have no idea if this would actually work, who knows!?! Maybe I'll try it anyways.
After accomplishing that hurdle, with very few problems, I might add it was on to my next big task. The Bank. dum dum dah. When we first got here and opened our bank account we were told that we really didn't need checks. Most people don't use them they just do money transfers from one account to another. This was surprising to us, but seemed the thing to do so that's what we did. I have to say it's pretty convenient. Every month our rent is automatically deposited into our landlords account, our electricity, Internet, and phone, are all paid automatically. All we have to do is ensure that there is enough money in the account to pay for everything (a difficult task in and of itself) The problem comes when you receive a bill for something new, something that you can't just run down to the local branch and pay in cash. We received 2 of this sort of bill. I was stumped as to how to pay it. One was for an a doctors exam. I had paid the doctors bill, in cash, at the office (I find it hard to believe that neither the dentist or doctor that we've been to thus far accept credit cards -it's cash or check so now we make sure we have loads of cash on hand when we visit - but I digress, again) but then I get a bill in the mail for the lab fees. oy vay what to do now? So, this morning I made my way to the bank, started off with usual deprecating sentence then asked how to pay these bills. One was easily taken care of, he just entered the transfer into the account. The second he told me I had to go to a Swiss post office (the bill was from Switzerland and in Swiss francs) and do it there. I wasn't terribly clear on what exactly I could do there, except I know he said it was free - gratuit - all I could gather was that it is maybe similar to a money order. I haven't done this in States, but I know it can be done. So, next week I shall venture to get this bill paid, or perhaps this afternoon. Once the glow of accomplishment wears thin and I need another shot of fear induced adrenaline and the following rush of pride at managing to get some small task finished in French and without breaking down into tears.
Yay, for me. I'm giving myself a nice little pat on the back. Hope your day is filled with little accomplishments as well!

Ally Babba strikes Again!

Upon our return from tracking down a place to rent skis for the season, a bit of grocery shopping and christmas tree hunting (with no success, I might add) we discovered our little butter thief had struck again.
AGAIN? you might ask incredulously? haven't you learned yet not to leave your butter where that roly-poly puppy can get it? And the answer is I did try. The butter dish with it's cover was in the dish drainer having just washed it and I didn't have time to dry it and put the butter in. I shoved the butter to the back of the counter and put a jar of instant coffee in front of it, figuring that was barricade enough - I was, obviously, wrong.
We came home to more half eaten butter and a contrite little princess. It was pretty hilarious she walked in a big arc around the butter studiously ignoring it, like "What? I didn't do anything. Oh my! There's butter on the ground, how did that get there?" As if by disassociating herself from it would prove her innocence, but I know better.

"THE FLOOD"

Today's word is: l'eau (pronounced low) it means water. At a restaurant you might hear someone asking for "une carafe d'eau, s'il vous plait" (a carafe of water, please). Odd are these people are Americans who are used to having the waiter or waitress automatically bring them a glass of water and to keep it coming. This is one thing I find very strange about Europe, I don't think they drink as much (and I mean regular liquid, not alcohol you lushes) as Americans...but, that's just the impression I get. Maybe I'm just a weirdo how chugs down more liquid than the average person! But, I digress. I am not here to tell you about drinking water in a restaurant. I am here to reveal the exciting events that unfurled in our apartment yesterday.

The morning of December 10, 2007 day live on in the memories of the Mosslins family as the day we started our battle with Mother Nature - and poor drainage. Ok, to be fair it started last week when I awoke to find a puddle in the corner of our kitchen. It wasn't too large, but enough to make me worry and contact our landlords. We also needed them to call a plumber because our stupid toilet has been running non-stop for days (what a pain to shut off the water and turn it back on every time you use it!) Our landlord thought perhaps the kitchen leak was due to a pipe in the wall. I, secretly, thought he was an idiot. It's been raining for days with very few intervals of dryness, the walls weren't wet only the floor, and this side of the kitchen is below ground! Obviously, the water was leaking in from outside. Regardless, he said he'd find someone to check it and I had to be satisfied with that. That is, until we awoke Monday morning to find the ENTIRE apartment underwater! The water had come into the kitchen, ignoring our feeble towel barricade it ran down into the living room, into the entrance hall, and was creeping into the craft room/guest bedroom! What a disaster.
We, of course, had to clean it all up, contact our landlords again, and make a list of damage for the insurance company. Luckily, the carpet is the only thing that suffered any damage - all of our furniture has legs so they were kept up out of l'inondation (the flood).
Unfortunately, before we could really get to work on the clean up we had to figure out a way to contain the incoming water in the kitchen. So, off to Botanic, the local garden store, we went in search of sand. I had to make use of my excellent (ha, ha) French skills and I'm proud to say I managed to make the woman at Botanic understand and be sympathetic to our plight. Thankfully, they had two small bags of sand left. Apologetically, she explained that sand is an item for l’été (the summer) pas l'hiver (not the winter) so they didn't have any more in stock. But, two bags ended up being just fine for our purposes. Once we returned to our drenched home I began the mopping up process and Josh began the sandbagging process. Oh, we also bough an extra mop to double team the damned (or dammed) water.

Look at the sheer delight and joy at mopping which is plastered all over my face! This picture was actually taken late Sunday night when we entered into a small skirmish in the kitchen. We thought we had won the day, but oh how wrong we were.

Here is Josh on Monday morning employing our useful weapon, the towel, to soak up the pools of rain water. We bought an extra mop after Josh's hands became so red and raw from wringing out sopping wet towels that his hands looked as though they belonged to a little old washer woman. All day as we mopped and soaked up the water we kept peeking out the windows with the query, "has it stopped raining?" the answer was always, "NO". After about 3 hours the house was fairly dry. The ruined carpet was outdoors (probably getting even more wet though we did try to put it under the cover of the overhang) and we were able to bring some of our furniture back into the living room. We erected our sandbag dam in the kitchen doorway figuring if it were to flood again it would be best to contain it in the kitchen. We had already removed the kitchen chairs and we had placed little plastic booties on each of the table legs (and by booties I mean empty ice cream containers we've washed out and use as tupperware!).





Some of you might be curious as to what Ally did all day whilst we were in the midst of battling that acursed Mother Nature and her minions of rain...Ally was extremely helpful, let me tell you. I think this picture explains it all:
Yep, that's our little princess. She spent the day hopping from couch to dry towels trying not to get her precious paws wet! Can you believe that this is the same dog that happily and purposefully, splashes through every singled puddle on our morning walks? Go figure.

And an update for those interested on Friday I actually managed to finish covering one couch cushion. Here is a rather bad picture of the results. Not too shabby if I do say so myself. It is pretty time consuming sewing all this by hand, but in some ways it's pretty fun too. Today, I'm hoping to get the next one finished. Wish me luck and keep your fingers crossed the rain stops soon. It can't rain forever, can it?

L'Escalade

This evening Josh and I bravely headed to Old Town Geneva to watch the Escalade parade. I say bravely because it was pouring down rain all day long until about 4 p.m. at which point we said, "Do we risk it?" and, naturally, the answer was an emphatic, "bien sur!" (of course!). Ok, maybe it wasn't that emphatic, in fact, to be quite honest both of us had sort of settled into that lazy, gray, rainy day dull-drums and didn't really feel like leaving the house...but, then we thought, "hey, this happens once a year. What if we don't get a chance to see it again?" So we went. We're both glad that we did.
So, I guess I should explain what L'escalade is. In 1602 the Duke of Savoy attacked the walled city of Geneva. His attack started the night of December 11 (technically it was December 12 because supposedly it was after midnight). They launched their attack by climbing up ladders to breach the wall - hence l'escalade, which literally means the climbing. The best part of this story is that those sneaky Savoyards were foiled by the alert citizens of Geneva. Legend has it that Mere Royaume, the mother of 14 children, saw the mercenaries scaling the wall and dropped her large cauldron of hot soup on the soldier, thus killing the first Savoyard in the battle to save Geneva. To honor her, chocolate cauldrons filled with marzipan vegetables are sold. I believe these are called Marmites. It is tradition for the youngest and oldest child in the room to smash the chocolate cauldron while yelling, ""Ainsi périssent les ennemis de la République! " (Thus perish the enemies of the Republic). Unfortunately, we didn't witness this because, well we were standing on the packed street watching a parade of 17th century clad folks marching by.
Yeah, did I mention that? Sunday evening they have this HUMONGOUS parade that winds its snake-like way through the Old town. Everyone is dressed in 17th Century costumes, there are horse-back riders, men carrying tall javelin-esque spears, Mere Royaume marches by with her cauldron of soup, kids carry poles aflame to light the procession, horses and donkeys pull various carts some loaded down with cannons and other weapons, some displaying their patriotism with flags and the swiss colors. It's a good deal of fun.
Another tradition is that kids dress up, like kids in the U.S. do at Halloween - though I'd say there are more cute animals and less scary ghost, goblins, and witches. Supposedly, the kids often go along collecting money by singing at cafes and in the streets. We did not personally witness any singing for money or otherwise, but we saw a bunch of adorable kids in costume. Most notably, the cutest little penguin ever seen! Here's a picture of my favorite little flame bearer. I just thought he was adorable! I also thought, "Man, they really trust those kids! I don' t think they could get away with 9 year old boys (I have NO idea how to judge the ages of kids) being in charge of flames with no apparent supervision!" But, hey these kids did a great job. They seemed to know exactly what was going on and what they needed to do. Impressive.

So, that's my version of L'Escalade. We enjoyed it immensely. Oh, and the parade stops at certain places and one of those fancy horsemen reads a proclamation. I have no idea what he said because it was, of course, in French. But I did hear un mille six cent deux (1602) and joyeux (joyous) and it closed with a rousing "Vive la Suisse" immediately leading into the crowds surrounding us bursting into song. I'm told it is the Geneva "anthem" which is a song about this great victory and, to me sounds like we stole the melody for our very own "My Country tis of Thee", which is written to the same tune as "God Save the Queen" so perhaps the Swiss filched it from the English or vice versa - who knows. I think it was pretty standard back in the day to have just a few melodies floating around and people making up different lyrics to them. I seem to feel as though someone musically inclined told me that when I was working at Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Then again, I could be completely out of my mind! So, don't feel you have to believe anything I say.

Raclette, mmmm, mmmmm, good!

We had the most wonderful dinner with our neighbors last night. They invited us over after our Tango class to have some Raclette and to play a little bridge (which Josh and I are still learning). I just have to tell you about the Raclette. Raclette is both a specific type of cheese made in the Valais region of Switzerland and a meal made with this cheese.

Raclette (the meal) is a traditional dish in Switzerland, apparently the cow-herders of old used to take this particular type of cheese, Raclette, with them when they moved the herds. At night they would place the cheese on a stone near the fire until it melted then they would scrape it onto bread. Thus, making a delicious meal and giving rise to its name: in French the word racler means to scrape, since they would "scrape" the melted cheese off the stone the cheese became Raclette (or so my sources say - thanks wikipedia). Now adays things are a bit more advanced we did not have to build a roaring fire and place slabs of cheese on stones till they melted. These days there are electric raclette grills
making it quick and easy to enjoy this yummy melty cheese. Instead of scraping the cheese onto bread you scrape it onto boiled potatoes. Also, you can add all sorts of goodies to your cheese while it melts - mushrooms, tomatoes, spinach, garlic, olives, you name it. The melted cheese goes in these little square dishes you place under the grill and the top of the grill is reserved for cooking up meat to go along with your cheese and potatoes. We had thin slices of pork, veal, and beef as well as some sausages wrapped in bacon. To tell you the truth the "sausages" tasted like regular old hot dogs to me, though they didn't really look like hot dogs! Along with all this deliciousness it is traditional to serve small pickled onions, gherkins and/or cornishons (a type of pickle) as well. It is a wonderfully simple and filling meal. We had fun trying out different variations of veggies and cheeses (we had different flavored raclette cheese - pepper, plain, garlic, paprika, etc.)

We had a fun evening drinking white wine - a must with Raclette. An old-wives tale claims you should not drink water while eating Raclette because it "interferes with the digestion of the cheese". So, white wine is the drink of choice when partaking in either Raclette or fondue. Hey, I'm not going to argue about the necessity to drink wine!
Bon appetite!

p.s has anyone else started to notice how often I write about food?

Some new projects

The Sweater


Well, I've mainly been working on some new projects around the house, so I thought I'd share them with you all. Breathe a sigh of relief, most of this post will be pictures. I don't think I have too much to say about my ongoing projects past a brief description of what they are...then again, once I get started you never know what I might come up with to say!
Let's get started. First off, my knitting projects: I started my very first sweater a few months ago and am finally getting back to working on it every now and again. It's about time I did some work on this project. I bought this yarn - a tweed wool - while I was in Ireland last September. It was in Donegal, which is known for their wool and tweeds. I love this yarn so much and I wanted to find something special to do with it. It took me a long time to fabricate a makeshift measuring tool, figure out how much yarn I actually had to work with then wind all that yarn into center-pull balls. Once I discovered I had enough for a sweater I had to find a pattern. A big thanks goes out to Mrs. Tire (aka Bereni) who helped me find a pattern and gave me the belief that I actually could succeed in knitting a sweater. Unfortunately, since moving away from Williamsburg I no longer have her to lean on and fix my knitting mistakes. I have a feeling its going to be more difficult going alone on this sweater, but I shall forbear...at least I hope I will. We shall see, we shall see. For those interested I am attempting to knit a Raglan sweater ( I got the pattern from some book of Mrs. Tire's but I can't remember the name). I am still trying to decide if I will make it a v-neck sweater or a crew-neck. it's not the easiest pattern for a semi-beginner, like myself, to follow because it's a sort of build your own as you go. Should be a good learning experience if nothing else. Plus, the good thing about knitting is if you don't like it you can just frog it (rip it apart -frog, rip it, rip it - get it? don't worry I didn't get what the heck people were talking about the first time I heard it either).

On to knitting project number 2: the scarf. This is something I can definitely do. it's super easy and it was started by someone else! My friend Christine discovered that lugging around size 5 straight knitting needles and yarn while attempting to backpack across Europe was not an ideal situation. Thus, she left her needles and partially knitted scarf with me. Perhaps I should mail them to her in California, but I have a feeling between planning her wedding and dealing with her first year of film school, on top of settling into a new apartment she probably doesn't have loads of free time for knitting. She started her scarf out with just knitting plain and simple. I decided to spice it up a bit and do that basket-weave sort of pattern I've seen so many places. It's simple in itself, you knit 5, purl 5 over and over to the end and you do this for 5 rows, then you switch and purl 5, knit 5 for 5 rows. You get these fun little squares. I attempted to take a close up picture of this pattern, but the picture isn't very good - sorry.
Color is utter crap, but you can kinda see the pattern!

Last of the knitting is a finished project: My Christmas stocking. I finally finished it. Much to Josh's disappointment mine is bigger than his. Men are always concerned about size! hee, hee.
I didn't mean to make mine bigger, I was attempting to knit it the same size, I just have idiotic moments when I forget that if I 'm using
thicker yarn I don't need to cast on as many stitches to get the same size. Oh well. Actually, I think my stocking looks a little ridiculous, short and fat - kinda like Ally!

And finally, a non-knitting project. Josh suggested the clever idea of recovering our couches. I was a bit reluctant even though I agree the nasty green couch could do with a makeover. It's kinda falling apart and most of it is no longer nice faux suede material, it's pilling faux suede material! My objections were: 1) we have yet to find a fabric store
2) we don't have a sewing machine 3) I forget, but I'm sure it was a good one. Naturally, we just happen to be at Ikea and what do we find? Fabric at a decent price. We decided then and there to get some and see what we could do to spiff up our old, worn-out couch (which is pretty new to us since we just bought it used in July!). So, we selected some red fabric and after having measured, cut and washed it, I spent some time today hand-sewing some pieces together. This is going to be one long and bumpy ride! We'll see what the final product looks like and hey, if it doesn't work oh well. I'll have had something that occupied my time and we'll be out maybe $30, so that's not too bad. We couldn't have bought a new couch for that, even another used one! So, all-in-all I think it'll be ok. Yeah, you can all point out this post to me in a few days when I start ranting and raving about how my beloved husband convinced me to take on this cockamamie project! Till then, adieu....
The Fabric












The Couch

Ha, ha, ha it's rather funny to me that we are covering our green couch in red fabric - how Christmasy of us!!!!!

Princess Ally Babba the Butter Thief

A story:
Once upon a time in the land of Mossopatamia their lived a young Princess name Ally Babba.

Princess Ally Babba

Now, Princess Ally Babba lived with the King and Queen of Mossopatamia and was treated very well. In fact, many thought her to be rather spoiled. She never wanted for new toys to destroy, treats, or the most comfortable spot on the couch. Yet, Princess Ally Babba was not content. You see, she loved butter and this was the one thing the King and Queen forbid her to eat. The King and Queen had decreed that none in Mossopatamia should eat the delicious butter produced in this region except themselves, and their honored guests.

They felt that Princess Ally Babba should be excluded from eating butter because she was a rather roly-poly little princess and they worried about her health. So, you see, this decree was not entirely selfish and mean. But, Princess Ally Babba could not see that the King and Queen were looking out for her health. Being rather spoiled all she could think about was the injustice and deprivation she suffered by not being allowed to have even the teeny tiniest pat of butter.

So, one day when the King and Queen were out enjoying a Christmas Market Princess Ally BAbba discovered that they had been careless and had left some butter on the counter. Yes, she could see that they had cleverly pushed it all the way back to the farthest corner of their kitchen counter, but that would not stop this little Princess. She was determined to have that butter. With stealth and cunning she managed to pull the butter from the counter (lucky for her there were no courtiers around that day) and began to devour the forbidden butter. After eating a good bit of that scrumptious butter Princess Ally Babba began to feel a bit sick to her stomach. At first she ignored these pains, but eventually they grew so bad she was forced to stop eating the butter and go lie down. She wondered what could possibly be causing such pain in her little tummy. The King and Queen never had achy bellies after eating butter! It never occurred to her that the King and Queen had sense enough not to gorge themselves on the mouth-watering butter (at least the Queen did, who then prevented the King from enacting such outrageous behavior). So Ally found her favorite spot on the royal couch and promptly fell asleep her tummy full, but aching rather badly. She slept soundly for some time and was awoken by sound of keys turning in the lock. Oh joy! the King and Queen were home. Ally stretched herself and began to wiggle about in anticipation for she truly did love the King and Queen. Also, she was anxious to see what treat they had bought her for she always expected a little something when they returned from their outings! The butter and her theft of it had completely vanished from little Ally Babba's mind.
The King and Queen, who loved Ally Babba very much showered her with pets and belly rubs until the Queen noticed an empty butter wrapper lying on the floor. "What is this?" she exclaimed in dismay turning a beady eye on Princess Ally. Who happily wagged her tail at the Queen and tried to lick her face. The King went into the kitchen were he discovered the lump of butter Ally Babba was not able to eat. "Ally," roared the King.
"Oh dear, " she thought to herself, "What am I going to do? I forgot to get rid of the evidence!" She attempted to place the blame on her sometimes friend sometimes arch nemesis Pici (pronounced pee-kee), the snaggle-toothed slobber hound.
Unfortunately for Ally Babba, the King and Queen were much too smart for her and knew she was lying. Besides, the King and Queen knew that Pici could not have stolen the butter because they had seen him put securely away in the cave sans espoir (the cave of no hope) for slobbering on their royal couch. With the evidence stacked against her and the King and Queen in a royal high temper, Princess Ally Babba hung her head and tail in shame. Remembering her horrible belly-ache she promised the King and Queen she would never again steal their precious butter. And she meant it too...that is, of course, until enough time had passed for her to forget that terrible butter belly-ache and the King and Queen were foolish enough to leave the butter somewhere she could so easily get it.....