in good company

What do my Mother, Ina Garten, and I all have in common? Come to find out my Mom and I are in agreement with the Barefoot Contessa on the ideal comfort food. The grilled cheese sandwich! This is the second time in a week I've mentioned this heavenly food. I still dare you to find someone (an American) who doesn't dig this meal. It's all about the bread and cheese (Colby is my favorite lately). Ultimately this sandwich is delicious because of the butter! A grilled cheese is just a lame piece of toast with melted cheese without the butter flavoring and crisping the outer sides of the bread. Yum! I caught Cora making Adelaide a grilled cheese without butter, just placing the bread on the pan until it was sort of crusty with the cheese still solid. Pathetic! I quickly had to fix that problem.

So how, do you ask, did I discover this commonality with the Barefoot Contessa? Yesterday, I had my regularly scheduled 6 week trim with Pascal, my French hair stylist (don't love HIM, but love his philosophy with hair. He's been a stylist for 40 years, trained in France, apprenticeship in London with Vidal Sassoon, developed Vidal Sassoon Germany, owned his own salon back in France as well as stylist school, now bringing his thing to Asia. He doesn't use thinning scissors or razors to add texture or shape, only his blunt scissors which really builds a healthy head of hair that grows really fast. He builds a shape around the geometry of the head and how the hair grows along with the architecture of the face. Lots of artsy fartsy talk but I've noticed a serious difference in my hair. The best thing is how fast it grows while holding the shape of the cut). Anyway, totally off topic. I decided to relax and get a pedicure after the trim. I figured, I'm here and I deserve a bit of relaxation after the weeks alone with the girls right? So I settle in with my bar of Koko Black chocolate and cup of green tea, along with a stack of magazines (heaven right?). Only I start to get antsy and here's where my American tendencies come out. I want to relax and enjoy the pedicure but I get bored and irritated that it's taking so long. I finish reading two Town and Country magazines in the time it takes the gal to get through one of my feet. That's like 45 minutes!!! I'm looking at my watch and finally tell her that we're going to have to hurry this up a bit. As a result my right foot looks and feels great while my left foot totally got the shaft. Next time I've decided to be up front, like the American I am, and tell the gal I have an hour for a pedicure, no more, can you please get the job done in that time. Humph! So instead of enjoying the pedicure I was feeling guilty for having sat in the salon for almost two and half hours while my girls played at home with Yaya. To top it off the dark purple nail color I chose looks more like Goth black after two coats on my toes. It's summer-hello bright fun colors. Oh well! Oh and the girls were happy as clams when I walked in. I love getting that welcome home love. It's so rare cause I'm always with them.

Long story short (too late), the only redeeming moment of the pedicure was the Jan 2010 issue of Town and Country magazine (U.S. version not the Philippine version which is just a wanna-be). I landed on a great interview with Ina Garten, all about her East Hampton "barn" house she built for her show the Barefoot Contessa on Food Network. The article includes lots of favorites. Scrolling down the list, she is asked what her favorite comfort food to indulge in is. Sure enough, she says it's a grilled cheese sandwich accompanied by tomato soup. She might as well be in my head as well as my mother's. I love Ina! I think a tea party with the three of us would be lovely.
Ina Garten in the barn at her East Hampton home. Check out the article at WWD.

Photo By: Talaya Centeno

I couldn't locate a link to the Town and Country article. If you come across it, set it aside for your next way-too-long-pedicure. She's one cool lady!

is this Kosher?

The face she makes the first moment she puts the dill pickle in her mouth is priceless. After the initial shock she just starts gnawing on it. When I'm racing to put together her meal and she's hungry and restless I just hand her a sliced pickle and she chills out. She uses her two front bottom teeth to scrape the inside of the pickle but leaves the outer skin.

new found freedom

Adelaide had a surge of confidence while watching a friend use his arm floaties in the swimming pool. Now it's all she wants to do. It's like the few weeks after you learned to ride your bike or the cross bars at school. Using her floaties is her new favorite accomplishment. I'm really proud of her. I feel more comfortable taking both girls to the pool now that I can focus on Bella. I need to be close to Addie but not holding on to her like before.

too excited to sleep

While Justin was away, Addie was waking early in the morning and falling back to sleep with me in bed. This morning she was up at 5AM but once I laid her down in our bed right next to her Daddy who had arrived earlier that night after she had gone to sleep, she was too excited to go back to sleep. All sorts of things started popping in her brain that she wanted to tell her Dad. She was so excited she just wiggled around snuggling with him for 30 minutes. Finally they got out of bed and I blissfully got to sleep an extra hour and a half alone in peace. Justin was in heaven with his girls all today. Addie and Bella wanted to get as much Daddy time as they could. Addie doesn't want to let Justin out of her sight for awhile when he returns from trips. We are all so excited to have him home. He came bearing Koko Black chocolates (quickly becoming my favorite chocolate next to See's). They are blissfully decadent! I had a few bites of my dark chocolate bar with orange slices and almonds. Perfection. Love the modern minimalist packaging and branding. Genius. The 74% dark chocolate with roasted Arabica coffee beans has to be my ultimate favorite. The Aussies got this chocolate right.

legs crossed and all

We catch Adelaide with her legs crossed all the time. It cracks me up because it's such a grown-up thing to do and here she is not even three years old, just munching on her grilled cheese sandwich (probably the best thing on the planet you could put in your mouth-find me one normal human who doesn't love a grilled cheese). This look on her face tells me she knows I am taking her picture and she's kind of pleased that I am.

We made it through our week without Dad. This week was much easier, which just goes to show you that when you get used to having someone gone, you compensate. Sucks-but totally true. I'm thinking of all the families I know who have one parent separated from the rest of the family for a year or more. My God how terrible! Bella has be teething again so I'm so exhausted I'm on the verge of getting sick. Last night I was in tears in her room at 1:30AM, begging her to stop fussing and in turn let me sleep. It was about 2:30AM by the time I fell into a deep sleep. Addie was in bed with me at 4:00AM. Luckily we had a date with friends to walk to Krispy Kreme for a doughnut after lunch (I needed the sugar to mix with my cup of joe I had earlier). The day flew by with naps and our doughnut date and then the pool, another nap, dinner, walking Lucy (and petting every dog at the park making all the Yaya's days), then baths and sweet Jesus silence!

My friend Jenny confirmed something for me that I had a pretty good idea about. She and her boys made our day with all the fun we had together (their Daddy is out of town too). The kids love spending time together and Addie adores Jenny's 5 year old son. There was lots of hand holding and laughing and little kid jokes being made. I love what makes kids laugh! Anyhow, after we got to Krispy Kreme, Jenny commented "Wow, you guys really draw a lot of attention when you are out together!" It was funny hearing it from someone else because I guess I try not to notice so much any longer. Walking around with my two girls (all three of us with blonde hair, two pretty little girls) is like I have a sign on my forehead that says "Please annoy the crap out of me by getting in our faces and talking to and or touching my kids". It's really unreal. Adelaide is like Suri Cruise; same fashionista style but prettier and just as much of a superstar tot in the Philippines. It just gets weird sometimes.

Speaking of weird. Well, not weird but unusual for me. As I was walking Lucy dragging both girls with me this evening I was stopped by a jogger. A European man, possibly Scandinavian (nice looking and young-for a minute there I thought "HA! I'm almost 30 and I still got IT"-then I remembered that I am a harried looking Mom and at the moment a pack mule with Bella in the Bijorn, Addie in the stroller and a little black dog getting dragged around while I yell at her to poop so we can go home. Clearly this guy is stopping me for another reason). He asks me if I am the author of the blog Our Yuppie Life. To which I am taken aback but, why yes, I am the author. I'm sure he could sense my questioning eyes and before I could form a question he quickly told me that he had Googled a local location by it's title and third on the list down was one of my blog entries as a top search result. He saw the family photo in the entry, then saw me (looking rather similar with the Bijorn on) and the girls walking and put two and two together. He mentioned that he's moved here for a short term work project and blah, blah, blah, it was nice to meet you, good luck, and good night. Definitely a first! I got home and Googled the location and sure enough there we are. I decided you will be reading much more creative blog titles from now on.

Arabella at 10 months

Our little Bean is 10 months now, going on 2 it seems sometimes. She's eating only solid floods and feeding herself. She refuses to be spoon fed. The strained baby food was extremely short lived for this girl. She's gaining confidence on her feet and balances with no hands. She's taken a few desperate steps when I hold her up standing and let go. She kind of step/falls into my arms. No voluntary steps yet. We went to the medical clinic yesterday to get a measles shot to protect her from the measles outbreak here in Manila. Normally babies don't get their first dose of measles until the MMR at 1 year. She got the measles portion a bit early just to be safe. While we were there we discovered she weights 23 pounds now! Here she is with the Tylenol not looking too terribly sad after the shot (but oh so cute at 23 lbs sporting a halter top).

the perfect cookie

Once again, Addie and I wound up baking cookies yesterday. She really likes helping me bake so it's become a fun activity for us to do together. My Mom taught me the basics of baking at a really young age and it gave me confidence in the kitchen. I want to give my girls the same type of memories cooking with their Mom. Plus it's a great skill to learn and perfect. Addie can't wait to stir the flour and the baking powder together and she counted the eggs in the bowl for me. I let her measure out the ingredients with a little help even though she'd prefer to do it "by myself" (her mantra these days). I let her flip through 101 Cookie Recipes and choose which cookie to make. I wasn't surprised when she chose these chocolate crackle tops with M&Ms. What kid wouldn't choose these? They ended up being the best tasting cookie we've made in a long time. The cookie is sweetly dusted in sugar on the outside and light and airy on the inside. I think I'd make them without the M&Ms next time. Not because I didn't like it, but because the candies get in the way of savoring that fluffy, airy, chocolate cookie middle. The M&Ms are Addie's favorite part! Good news is that there will definitely be plenty left for Justin to try this weekend when he returns home.