When I was younger, that was definitely one of my favorite books! Today, I hear it more often from adults as just a phrase.... My children will definitely have a copy of this book in their library. I digress....
WE ARE HOME!
We are back in our home and it is wonderful! I cannot, on this blog fully tell what we went through the past five months. What I can say is that it helped T and me learn how to work together in unplanned circumstances, depend on the Lord even more that we thought we were, and that is was exactly what we needed, but we didn't know how to get it. The Lord did! He is so clever the way He orchestrates our lives. T and I are so thankful for that season in our lives, but we are beyond THRILLLLLLLLEEEEDDDD that is is over :)
While I was gone, we celebrated many birthdays, the normal holidays, and we reached our first of many- our Anniversary! I can't believe we have almost been married 13 months. It seems like yesterday I was looking for the perfect dress, even last week that I was on my first date with T...
Now we enter the Holiday Season... We have two Thanksgivings, two Hanukkahs, one work party, two Christmases, and New Years. For T's family Thanksgiving, I will be bringing a salad, oatmeal coconut cookies, cranberry and blueberry pie. I am contemplating bringing a from scratch green bean casserole. For Thanksgiving at my parents house I will be bringing two pumpkin pies, 5 cup salad (which is now 6), deviled eggs, and possibly another dessert? Did I mention his family will be eating mere hours before mine. I learned my lesson last year after I attempted to eat at my parents house at 12 and his parents at 1. I didn't think I'd make it to Friday morning. I did, seriously, think I would die. This year the key is portion control! oh dear.
I am trying to figure out how to blog and enjoy blogging. I love having the past to scroll through, but I don't love taking photos while I cook. So please, be patient with me as I attempt to discover my style of food blogging. I will continue to show you what I make and the places I dine.
Today, I will leave you with a review of Andrew Michael Italian Kitchen, where T and I ate Saturday evening.
We had an early reservation so that by the time we got home Saturday night we would have enough energy to watch our wedding video. We are already so old, by 8:30 we are ready for bed. Stay tuned to hear about our "late night" movie marathon! All that to say, we were the second couple that arrived at AM that evening. We were greeted by a very friendly host who after finding our reservation took us to a table for two. Our table had a view of the patio, which on this warmer than usual November evening looked like a lovely place to dine. The restaurant is in a home, so there are a few rooms in which diners are seated. The ambiance of this place is great! It is lit well and has great art throughout. While we looked over the menu we had thinly sliced baguette with a shredded olive tapenade? It was good, minus the fact that I don't like olives or bread, really :) Moving on, We decided to split the AM salad which was :farm greens, buffalo mozzarella, balsamic reduction, shallot vinaigrette, tomato confit. It was good. I love salad and I loved this one! We also shared the potato gnocchi: gorgonzola cream, arugula, and balsamic reduction. I LOVE gnocchi and I love gorgonzola, arugula, and balsamic, but I do not love cream sauce. It was a cream sauce, it was pretty good, just not awesome. Their website doesn't have the other items on it that we ordered, but T got the duck with polenta, pecan stuffing and I got the pheasant with chestnut risotto. Everything was good, but like the gnocchi, not awesome. I liked the chestnut bits running through the risotto, but I did not prefer the addition of beef? to it. I told T before we were even on our way to dinner that no matter where we went, we had to get dessert even though we were going to have our freezer burned wedding cake that night. I explained that we were only going to taste our wedding cake and it was probably going to be subpar. Well, we ordered what I thought looked the best on the menu although it wasn't too tempting to either of us. It was an apple and pear crostata with pecans and a cinnamon gelato. The gelato was GREAT! The crostata, not so much. It doesn't help that I don't prefer baked apples, but it wasn't just me, T said it reminded him of potpourri. After dinner, we headed home to find that the interior or our cake did taste better than the exterior. We also discovered what we already knew, neither of us made it through the wedding video. We fell asleep watching it at probably 9:24. But it's ok, because I feel asleep in my home, with my sweet T and the Lord has shown me over the past 5 months, that there is so much I look to in vain for satisfaction. I know what matters now and I pray that as we enter our second year of marriage it doesn't take such a huge fiasco for Him to catch our attention. I'd much prefer something less drastic. So here is to year two with listening ears, watchful eyes, and broadening palates. oh and maybe a house sitter when we go out of town...
