my digital lifestream ... unfettered
[23-25 December, 2023]
With a bigger-than-ever family gathering this year, more Filipino food is again on order than ever as well, along with some old reliable holiday desserts. Also new this year, fun games and an exciting white elephant gift exchange. None of the white stuff this year but nevertheless a very memorable Christmas in the books!
[24-25 December, 2022]
No bomb cyclone (see this) can ruin this year’s Christmas weekend’s celebrations, despite the bone-chilling, sub-zero frigid weather. As is customary with our family holiday celebrations, food is front and center. As the photos below show, a more traditional, boodle feast-style Filipino cuisine-focused menu was enjoyed by all.
[22-25 November, 2022]
Thanksgiving has always been about spending time and eating all kinds of food with family. And in this family, “no turkey” is the holiday’s tradition. In the past, it would be seafood dishes, and beef, and crispy roast pork, and all kinds of noodles. Add to that the plethora of desserts from banana egg rolls fried in brown sugar to all sorts of sweet rice cakes. This year was no different.
Because of everyone’s different arrival and work schedules, the feasting started on Tuesday evening and went all the way through Friday, with the traditional big event on Thursday. This year’s eclectic, homemade-from-scratch dining selections included meatloaf and mashed potatoes with gravy, French toast casserole, green bean casserole, yakisoba, fried veggie rolls, eggplant omelet, fried marinated milkfish bellies, beef short rib caldereta, peach and mandarin orange pavlova, rice cake drizzled with a sweet coconut syrup, and a notable vegan selection (moussaka, roast tofurkey, and cranberry cake) for the vegan nephew.
Another year with much to be thankful for, another non-traditional Thanksgiving family holiday in the books!
In mid June, my 92-yr old aunt came down from Michigan with my cousin and her husband for a long weekend visit. They were joined by another cousin from New Jersey and a third cousin from New York and it became a mini reunion of some sort, with 4 generations of the family in the house. And of course, we had plenty of food as is customary with Filipino family gatherings. Won’t be the last this year.
Speaking of time, anyone who knows me knows of my fascination with clocks, and will have a story or two to tell about the many that adorn the walls in my house. Below is a definitive gallery of the clocks that I have collected over the years, many of which are originals of midcentury modern design, or modern interpretations from contemporary designers .
One of the inevitable outcomes of the several lockdowns during the pandemic was the welcome expansion of my culinary repertoire, for better or worse. All the dishes shown in the gallery below were my home-cooking, spurred no doubt by the mandatory closure of restaurants or restrictions on in-person dining, but also a result of my desire to otherwise re-create these dining experiences while safely getting together with family and friends in the comforts of home.
This has been on my house 'to do' list since the end of construction in late 2013. It was a simple concept for an address (house number) pillar to be located at the bottom of the driveway, based on the original house aesthetic (see exterior cladding detail on right photo). However, for some reason, it kept going down the priority list for almost 5 years, including the 2+ years that I worked and lived in Canada. It took a casual conversation over lunch after gym that I had with my good friend, Brad, that finally moved this project from 'to do' to 'done'! And one thing about Brad - when he gets his mind on something, it gets done! It wasn't a few hours after we talked that I get a text later that day that Brad had already gone to Home Depot and purchased all the materials we needed to build this thing. Drawings sketched on loose graphing paper were approved and now formed the specs for this espresso-stained, cedar-clad, double-post framed pillar, legs set in concrete 36" below ground, that would display my Richard Neutra-designed modern house numbers.
And so, over a period of 7 days the week before Easter, with Brad's help (and thus, the reason for this), my concept for an address pillar that is basically a "mini me" of the house, became reality. Immediately upon completion and just after the stain has barely dried, this year's infamous April Fool's snow that came on Easter evening gave it a late winter snowfall makeover that bestowed the thing a surprisingly ethereal and established look. This past weekend, I finally had some more time to do a bit of landscaping around it - Kar Foerster feather reed grass, a dwarf Western red cedar, some wooly thyme and blue star creeper for ground cover, and a couple of really heavy rocks gathered from around the property. I'm still looking to add some landscaping pebbles around the base and the plants, and that may come later in the summer, once that ground cover takes better shape.
Enjoy below a photo gallery of this project, from start to finish.
