Thanksgiving

Since RTT and I are now adults, we hosted Thanksgiving this year for my marvelous family. Despite a frustrating couch delivery issue and some minor meal scares (the turkey was cooked upside-down), the entire weekend was relatively stress-free...

The Duck Boat!

Penny & Dan

Oh, Frances Palmer, how I love thee!

RTT cooks.

Charades is fun for everyone!

Mmmm...leftovers.

Keeping in Touch

I would keep in touch with so many more friends if I had a swank sofa on which to lounge and this retro-marvelous phone on which to make calls...

At Russell John Imports.

Skip's Best Performance

This past weekend having finally received our elegant wedding dinnerware from Frances Palmer, RTT and I decided to cook up a fancy feast, one-pot wonder to warm our spirits in this frozen tundra known as Boston (which, fortunately, also allowed us to use our new Le Creuset pan).

After extensive research on Epicurious we discovered the recipe that had collected the most rave reviews...like the best reviews we've ever seen for an Epicurious recipe. The Moroccan Slow-Cooked Lamb from a February 2005 Bon Appetit. Cautiously optimistic, we spent Saturday chopping, braising, stirring and spicing.

Um, seriously. This was the best thing I have ever eaten!

Make it. Now.

Skip Loves Websites That Work

Some might consider me to be a wee bit of a critic. Seriously though, who isn't these days? I simply have very high standards, which is not something I will apologize for, but which often results in my frustration (i.e. is it too much to want there to be more than 3 check-outs open at Stop n' Shop on a busy Sunday afternoon? is it too much to expect drivers to indicate when they are making a turn? is it that difficult for Comcast to build a website with even an iota of added value to the customer?)

Anyhoo, this rather frequent disappointment that I experience (or the vocal tirades that RTT gets to observe) is rendered painless when I discover something, or someone for that matter, that completely blows my already high expectations out of the water and makes my entire life shiny with beaming elation (OxiClean comes to mind and my Dyson miracle vacuum).

When RTT and I decided to drive down to New York City for my darling brother Penny's 24th birthday this past weekend, I was happily hit with not one, but two ridiculously helpful websites that were clearly created by someone with (a) common sense and (b) a modicum of intelligence. Being a wee bit of a planner as well, I embarked on world wide web quest for parking locations in the Big Apple and information regarding toll-plazas across states that take the Fast Pass (don't get me started on why all commuters don't have a Fast Pass) . The results of my searches were the incredible Icon Parking website, that allows you to locate, price and reserve a parking spot in Manhattan, and the vastly informative Mass Pike website which confirmed that you can use Fast Pass in all states west to Illinois (Ohio is coming soon) and even offered puppy break spots along the way. Both websites not only provided me with useful information in a wonderful format, but they actually worked in practice too! Parking in NYC was a total breeze as was speeding through the E-Z Pass lanes on I-90. YAY!

Now, if only Comcast could design a website that...er, just works even some of the time.

Skip Hits the Birthday Jackpot

Check out the fantabulous bag RTT gave me for my birthday!

It's absolutely perfect; lady-like yet hipster edgy, brown-ish yet black-ish, cavernous yet small....In other words, if Skip were a handbag!

Er, I wish.