weekend update

Weekends go by WAY too fast but we managed to pack this one with fun activities...Friday night we had a great date at Troquet - I have no idea why this restaurant isn't more popular - we loved it! Saturday was spent running a lot of errands followed by dinner at Big City and a Bruce Springsteen cover band at Paradise - definitely fun for something different!

We were supposed to go meet the Yang's newest addition, Lana, on Sunday morning but due to a few of us having colds we had to postpone. We ended up grabbing brunch at Stella - Ben was a total hit waving and flirting with the waitstaff - hope everyone else had a great weekend!

back to school

Last night was my first interior design class at the Boston Architectural College and I loved it! I'm hoping to get my certificate in Interior Design as a possible career change down the road. The class is small, the teacher is energetic and if all goes well I'll be creating sketches like this by the summer!

weekend update

What a great weekend - just wish it didn't go by so fast! Tucker and I had a delicious and relaxing date night and woke up to a winter wonderland which this little guy enjoyed to the fullest.

Saturday night was spent celebrating Ian's birthday at Osaka. We had a blast! Ian was nice enough to take the bullet for poor pregnant Emily when the waiter tried to squirt saki in her mouth.

We capped off the weekend with these delicious s'mores cookies and a Patriots trip to the Superbowl!

Hope everyone else had a fun weekend!

pizza + snow

Tucker is finally home so we had a much needed relaxing night in and broke out our new pizza stone (thanks Emmy and Mark!). We whipped up a fig, prosciutto and arugula pizza on whole wheat crust which ended up being delicious!

This morning we woke up to this - I'd actually love a big snow storm (now...and not in March).

Looking forward to a date night tonight at Stella and celebrating Ian's birthday at Osaka tomorrow night. GO PATS!

black bean soup

Nothing too exciting to report on the home front. After an 11pm soccer game Monday night I was wiped out! With Tucker in Vegas for most of the week I've been cooking things he probably would rather not have for dinner. :-) Tonight was black bean soup - recipe is below. If anyone has a similar recipe to share with a little more spice let me know! I ended up adding more spices after the fact because I found it to be a little too bland.

Ingredients

• 1 pound dried black beans (2 cups)
• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 medium onions, finely chopped, 1/3 cup reserved for garnish
• 1 red bell pepper, finely chopped
• 2 large stalks celery, chopped
• 1 jalapeño pepper, seeded and finely chopped
• 3 large cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tablespoon ground cumin
• 4 cups water
• 2 cups brewed coffee
• 1 ham hock (optional)
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 teaspoon salt, plus more if needed
• 6 tablespoons reduced-fat sour cream or plain Greek yogurt for garnish
• Chopped fresh cilantro for garnish

Preparation

1. Pick over beans; rinse well. Place in a large bowl with cold water to cover by 2 inches. Let soak for at least 6 hours or overnight. (Or use the quick-soak method: Cover the beans with 2 inches of water and bring to a boil; simmer 2 minutes. Remove from the heat and let stand, covered, for 1 hour.) Drain.
2. Heat oil in a soup pot or Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add all but 1/3 cup of the onions, bell pepper, celery, jalapeño and garlic and cook, stirring frequently, until the vegetables are beginning to brown, 5 to 8 minutes. Add cumin and cook, stirring, 1 minute more. Add the beans, water, coffee, ham hock (if using) and bay leaf; cover and bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Skim off any foam that rises to the top, reduce the heat, cover and simmer until the beans are very tender, 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours. If using, remove the ham hock and set it aside to cool; remove the bay leaf. Stir in salt.
3. Puree about half of the soup in a blender or food processor until fairly smooth. (Use caution when pureeing hot liquids.) Return the pureed soup to the pot and heat through. If desired, cut meat off the ham hock, trim away any fat and chop the meat into small pieces; stir back into the soup.
4. Serve the soup garnished with the reserved chopped onion, a dollop of sour cream (or yogurt) and cilantro, if desired.

name needed

This little lady needs a name! After a really fun and really fast trip to Milwaukee for the Zywave Snow Ball we headed back to Boston just in time to host some friends and watch the Patriots trounce the Broncos and Tebow! Sunday we decided to head out to Concord to meet the newest member of the extended Bailey family above...only no one can agree on a name! So far we have Smudge or Kona in the top spots - what do you think?

Milwaukee bound!

Packing up for Milwaukee - Snow ball bound!

Why the Blog?

Well...first post! Two very close girlfriends have moved away recently and while making photo books for them I realized that I haven't been chronicling life the way I used to...in high school and college I used to make all kinds of photo books but now we tend to upload to Facebook and call it a day. I wanted to have somewhere to keep track of what we've been up to - more for the two of us than for anyone else. So that's the genesis of this project - hopefully I can keep it up!