not your average book club

Update: As of yesterday, Read the Change book club has an even better website!  Check it out here.  Snazzy bio of yours truly coming soon under the Board tab.

 Yesterday as I was editing my blog tabs, I set up one devoted to my love of reading and my 2012 Book Goal (to read a book a week).  Inspired by this love of books, I also wanted to share with you another book-ish thing going on in my life.

And that is: the Read the Change book club.

Some of you remember how much we hung out with our friends Lewis and Bekah this fall in San Antonio.  Bekah has gone on to do something wonderful with a group of her close friends.  She's started a book club for people who not only like to read, but want their reading do some good in the world, to make a change for the better.  

The book club is open to anyone... and that means you!  Members have to be willing to pledge $20 upfront.  Every two months, one member selects a book for the whole group to read.  That member also selects a charity organization that is in some way related to the book.  At the end of the year, all the members will vote on their favorite book/charity, and the collected money will go towards that charity.  This month we're all reading Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver and the selected charity is the Nature Conservacy.

Are you interested in joining our ranks?  We'd love to have you!  Visit the Read the Change website and email my friend Bekah (bekah@readthechange.org) to get started!

last day in San Antonio

On our last full day in SA, Elliott had to be out the door early for a graduation ceremony at Ft Sam Houston.  (I love saying Fort Sam Houston really fast.  Sounds so American and Texan.  Sad I can't say that every day anymore.)  We thought Lena and I weren't invited (although we were... whoops) so I stayed home and made him celebratory cinnamon rolls for brunch.

They were delish!  Paula Deen's fab recipe here.

As we began packing and cleaning, Elliott harvested his last crop of oyster mushrooms.  He ordered the Back to the Roots Mushroom Kit from Amazon and has been tending to them (and harvesting crops!) for the past month or so.  With these mushrooms Elliott combined a lot of fridge leftovers and made us elaborate omelets for lunch.  Yum!

I cleared out all our food from the kitchen to give away to Lewis and Bekah.  Lena had fun discovering that pile! Hippie child hair.

Suitcases filled our once-tidy little apartment... sigh...

I was alerted by my friends Sarah and Johanna that Starbucks was having a 2-for-1 holiday drinks sale, so we headed down the River Walk one last time for this treat.  Grande peppermint mochas... yessss.  On the way back we took a final saunter through Hemisfair Park and a tourist offered to snap this photo of us at the bottom of the Tower of the Americas (where we went for a date recently).

That night Lewis and Bekah took us out on a group date.  We got all gussied up, and I wore one of Elliott's birthday presents to me: lovely earrings designed by my nursing school classmate and dear friend Tara  Montgomery.

They chose Carmen's de la Calle, an incredible tapas bar with live music.  Flamenco dancers performed that night to live music, and they left our blood racing!  Innovative dishes, fabulous decor, sangria that went down oh-so-easily, and some of the sweetest friends... it was quite the farewell to this lovely town.

Thanks, dear Lewis and Bekah, for welcoming us and loving us so well while in your hometown.  We miss you.  Keep dreaming and planning that visit to Sicily!

a visit from her Grammie

Last week we were treated to a three-day visit from my mom.  We'd been talking up San Antonio for awhile and she was eager to see some of the places we've come to love here.  However, she was much more eager to see her little granddaughter!  

We took her to see a San Antonio landmark: the Alamo.  She took a few family photos for us... always a treat!

 

The next evening my mom watched Lena while Elliott and I went out on a date!  We chose an exciting location for this date: the top of the Tower of the Americas, 750 feet off the ground.  We were totally excited about our first one-on-one date since Lena was born (can that be right?!) and loved our little window booth with a view of the whole city.

The restaurant rotates on top of the tower so you can get a 360-degree view.  We tucked a tiny piece of paper onto the window to see if we would make it all the way around.  It took about 2 hours for the piece of paper to get around, and we missed it the first time.  Four hours later we were still savoring our wine and conversation when we discovered our tiny slip of paper again.  By then it was dark (this restaurant likes ambiance!) and impossible to take a picture without a huge flash.  We thought this was funny at the time. 

 

Of course no trip to San Antonio would be complete without some evening exploring along our River Walk.

 

My mom took us out to a local gastropub (ie. foodie restaurant) on her last night in town.  The dishes were amazing!  We chose about 6 or 7 little tapas-sized plates with Brussels sprouts in a sweet chili sauce, Bourbon pork belly on sweet potatoes with torched marshmallows, fried chicken in Old Bay spices, cauliflower and paneer in a curry sauce... I'm getting hungry just remembering it. 

Lena went to town on the aforementioned sweet potatoes, which were pureed as though intended for her.

I finished off the meal with a delicious mug of thick cinnamon hot chocolate.   Sooo good.   Highly recommend this if you come through San Antonio; it's called The Monterey.

The next morning we all got up at 3:45am to go to the airport.  Ouch!  My mom flew back to Virginia while our little family flew to California for the weekend.  More photos to share about that trip tomorrow.

... and we're back!

After another visit to the gorgeous central California coast, I am convinced it is one of the prettiest spots on God's green earth.  We loved every moment of our long weekend in the Santa Ynez Valley, from knitting by the fire to playing Settlers of Catan to winetasting to feeding the horses to hiking to window shopping to walks on the beach... so lovely.

Activity I am most looking forward to this morning: downloading pictures from my camera to share with you soon!

But in the meantime, here are the long-ago-promised photos from SeaWorld San Antonio.  One of the first things we discovered when we arrived is the dolphin pool.  You're permitted to lean over the low wall and splash your hands in the water, calling the 10 dolphins towards you.  The younger ones enjoyed coming close to get head rubs, and that was the way I finally got to touch my first dolphin!

 Lena wasn't so sure at first.  What are these giant creatures coming out of the water, Mom?

But she enjoyed this!

Later we took her into shark- and ray-infested waters.  Her fascination was fairly short-lived. 

By contrast, I think we could have sat by the duck and flamingo pool all day and she would have been happy.  

At the end of our day there we went to the orca and beluga/dophin shows, which are full of lights and music and action.  Elliott and I love scuba diving and have been in close contact with a lot of cool sea creatures, but somehow every time I see an orca or dolphin or penguin or ray up close, it takes my breath away.  By the time we have reason to return to San Antonio, I think Miss Lena might agree with us even more.

ta-ta for now!

Isn't this photo amazing?!  We went to SeaWorld and I have a bunch of gorgeous photos to share with you.  Much to my delight, I touched a dolphin for the first time ever.  After Elliott's work with dolphins in the past, I like that I now also have that familiarity with a dolphin's rubbery skin.  There are some darling pictures of Lena at SeaWorld too.  Of course.

We've been busy with my wonderful mom visiting this week and now are heading off in the morning to California for a few days.  In case there's some radio silence on my end, you'll know I'm just collecting fun things to share upon our return!

First Fridays

There's a tradition in our neighborhood called First Fridays.  (Remind anyone of Fridays After Five in C'ville?  Sigh!)  It's a collaboration between local restaurants and artisans, a celebration of food and craft.  Sections of our neighborhood were transformed into miniature markets filled with artwork, and a huge artists' studio (once an old warehouse) opened all its doors to welcome passersby.  As the sun set, restaurants seated patrons who had just finished tours of little neighborhood museums and crafters' studios. 

Later we walked home down our beloved River Walk.  The leaves change colors and there's a hint of autumn in the air... even in Texas!

My mom is here for the next couple days and we're having so much fun with her.  This morning we went out for an early breakfast to the Guenther House, a beautiful little mansion that's been transformed into a restaurant and museum.  Wish I could start every day with pumpkin pancakes and strawberry waffles!

afternoon at the Alamo

I've been operating for months (no, years) under the false impression that admission to the Alamo is extremely expensive.  Therefore I never went, although I walk by it to go to the post office or on jaunts around downtown San Antonio all the time.

"But it's free," Elliott told me the other day, a confused expression on his face.  "You didn't know that?" He'd been there on some Army field trip awhile back.

Nope!  So one fine afternoon we decided to go explore the Alamo.

We discovered that apparently the story of the Alamo is bigger than Texas.  Who knew?!  We also got a great refresher on Texas history as related to the Alamo, which reminded me of many things I learned in that old John Wayne film years ago.  Remember that one, my siblings?

Lena was more interested in the pigeons in the courtyard outside, though.

Someone saw us taking lots of pictures and offered to take a family portrait.  I'm learning to never say no when someone offers, for we have precious few photos of us all together as it is.  Even if we're very awkward family photo takers...

P.S. I would just like to draw your attention to Lena's darling new overalls  Doesn't she look so squeezable in them?!  My cousin Katie bought them for Lena and now my baby girl wears them all the time (in case you haven't noticed her outfit in this post and the last one).  They'll be a staple in her wardrobe this winter.  I only wish it were so easy for mamas to pull off the overalls look and I'd be wearing a cute pair myself!

the mission to drink from a Starbucks red cup

The Starbucks red cups have been in stores since November 1 and have always heralded the start of the winter holidays for me.  This year the red cups seemed especially seasonally celebratory thanks to an email series my former roomie Sarah started to chronicle every day between Nov 1 and Dec 25 to celebrate the coming of Christmas.  She has extolled the Christmas-y joy of the red cups, and her excitement is usually infectious. Starbucks is a treat in this house, and an extra-special treat with all this build-up!

For our journey to drink from a red cup, Elliott packed some old-fashioned soft pumpkin cookies, which I made a couple of days ago with my fourth can of pumpkin so far this fall.  Here's a photo that will hopefully make you want to come over and sip coffee with me while we discuss knitting projects and eat cookies...

(recipe included at the end of this post)

Anyway, back to our journey to Starbucks.  We decided we had to work for our rewards, so we were going to take a long walk to a large downtown Starbucks.  We set off on that chilly Thursday with Lena's Peter Rabbit blanket tucked around her legs in the stroller.

First stop was at the San Antonio Art League Museum, which is down the street from our house.  Elliott snapped this gorgeous photo of Lena in their permanent collection upstairs.

Next we slipped into the steamy warmth of The Filling Station Café, a former car repair shop that has been transformed into a popular lunch spot.  We all read the paper while we waited for our pizza.  Reading the paper was easier for some than others.

And finally, on to Starbucks!  After a long walk, we pushed the stroller into the cozy store, interlaced our fingers behind our backs, and studied the menu.  It didn't take long to decide.  Peppermint mochas for both of us.  Ahhh.  Christmas is coming!

Near the Starbucks is Hemisfair Park, which has a fabulous playground that reminds me of my favorite childhood playground in Australia.  We introduced Lena to slides for the first time, and she loved them!  (This was her last ride down the slid out of many, during which Elliott sent her down and I caught her, and photos were impossible to take.  That baby traveled fast.)

 

Here's the recipe for the old-fashioned pumpkin cookies, which I found on this creative blog:

Old-Fashioned Soft Pumpkin Cookies

Ingredients:

• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1/2 cup butter (1 stick) softened
• 1 cup 100% pumpkin (Libby's)
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla
• Glaze (see below)
• Optional: 1/2 cup chocolate chips or nuts

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350. Grease baking sheets.
2. Combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt and set aside. 
3. Beat sugar and butter in large bowl until well blended.  Beat in pumpkin, egg and vanilla extract until smooth.  Gradually beat in flour mixture. 
4. Drop by rounded tablespoon onto prepared baking sheets.
5. Bake for 15 to 18 minutes or until edges are firm. 
6. Cool on baking sheets for 2 minutes; remove to wire racks to cool completely. Drizzle glaze over cookies.

For Glaze

Combine 2 cups powdered sugar, 3 tablespoons milk, 1 tablespoon melted butter and 1 tsp vanilla in small bowl until smooth.