The last 6 weeks have been busy ones, hence my absence from posting any new entries. Lots has happened – with 2 downers but also lots of good stuff happened. One downer being the Seahawks losing the Superbowl due to a strange decision to throw the ball 1 yard instead of running it over the goal line. The ball got intercepted and the Patriots won the Super bowl. The second downer being 2 weeks of a nasty respiratory infection coupled with a middle ear infection and it took all my energy to get up in the morning and go to work; there was no more energy left in the evening to do anything else than crawling into bed.

On the positive side – the Hawks made it to the Superbowl – again; that was just an amazing experience to see an entire city support their team; young, old, human or furry everybody was wearing a Seahawks shirt and preparing for the big day – well there is always next year!

Although none of us like getting older, I guess my birthday will fall onto the positive side of the balance sheet. Mike and I had planned to spend a day in La Conner cruising the shops and checking out the local eateries – well that was the plan – until I mixed up the regular Advil with Advil PM and drugged up Mike and myself each with 2 sleeping pills instead of headache pills. I blame my lack of attention to the cold medication and not age! You can imagine what happened next. We hurry to the next coffee hut hoping caffeine will keep us awake and so I barely make it to drive us back home and Mike takes his first nap immediately when his body hits the car seat. La Conner will be a do over for sure!

Most of my time though besides work that stopped me from making delicious food; I would say was consumed by our bathroom remodel which will finally be done this week – wow so many things that have to be decided during a remodel and so many things that can go wrong no matter how well you plan, but the end result will be amazing, stay tuned for the finished project! Mike and I are getting a kick out of the new bathroom every time we walk in, its now 75 degrees with the heated floor instead of minus 20 degrees how it used to feel; no heater could get this room warm and the heated floor finally did it!

A week prior Tina, Tami, Christy and I got together for our yearly girls weekend, our 11th one so far, this year we stayed on the Hood Canal in Quilcene.

Once again 10,000 (a dice game) dominated our evening time and I learned something new about my friend Christy – she really likes quarters, she likes them so much that needless to say that if you play for quarters and have to give up something you like you are getting quite cranky after huge piles of quarters change hands, who would have guessed that losing quarters would make Christy sad. Even trying to let her win did fail.

Our day activities were spent shopping, eating and drinking in Port Townsend, a really neat little town right on the ocean close to Quilcene.

As well as enjoying the beach in front of our cabin, picking up oysters, drinking box wine, and hot tubbing at night listening to 80’s music assembled by DJ Ajnud. Christy supplied us with gourmet snacks; Tami cooked her delish Croque Madame sandwich and Tina finished off the weekend with an amazing Monte Cristo Casserole. Girls weekend as always was outstanding, we celebrated our birthdays and our friendships – friends are truly the family you chose for yourself, at least in my case.

Monte Cristo Casserole (feeds 4 -6 people) – compliments of Tina

Ingredients:

• 8 slices of Brioche Bread
• 6 slices of Ham
• 6 slices of Turkey
• 6 slices of Swiss Cheese
• 6 eggs
• 1 cup of milk
• salt, pepper, Dijon mustard
• Blackberry jam to serve on the side
• Powdered Sugar

Directions:

1. Mix the eggs with the milk and add 1 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of Dijon powder and 1/2 teaspoon of pepper.
2. Put a first layer of brioche into a 8×8 casserole and pour 1/3rd of the egg mixture over it. Then layer 2 slices of ham, 2 slices of turkey and 2 slices of cheese on it.
3. Repeat this layering process with the remaining 2 layers.
4. Finish the last layer with cheese and pour over the last 3rd of the egg mixture. Let the casserole sit over night.
5. Next morning preheat the oven to 350 degrees and bake the casserole for 30-45 minutes.
6. Sprinkle with powdered sugar and serve with jam on the side.

Note: we had some left over croque madame béchamel sauce that we also added in. If your casserole seems a bit dry once you assembled it, you can add more milk; half and half or cream to your liking.

Guten Appetit!