Cluckingham Palace

I get around!

I am off to LA today.   Friends are arriving there tomorrow from NZ - and we are meeting them there.   Can't wait to see them and their boys who I will spoil rotten!!

I bet they have grown since this pic was taken!

I was talking to Jake (the oldest) on the phone yesterday and having him on that I might not recognise him at the airport and he better call out my name if he sees me

... in all seriousness he told me ...

well I have grown taller and lost some teeth

... gotta love kids!!

We are spending a couple of days at Disneyland and DCA so will be a blast.

We are heading out of LA on Monday via the La Brea tarpits.   I have to admit - after all these years in California and all my trips to LA - I have never been there.   Lunch in Solvang  and  then it's on to San Simeon for an overnight stay.

Early the next morning its Hearst Castle.   I am kidwatching while the 'dults go for the tour - I have done a lot of them - several times over!    Then carrying on up PCH1 - hoping there are still some elephant seals breeding on the beaches, lunch at Big Sur - then its San Jose bound - back here Tuesday!

FINALLY!

made it back to my pre-Italy and pre knee injury weight!   It has been no mean feat either with not being able to exercise because of my knee.  

However I have now been given a clean bill of health - albeit with certain warnings - but hopefully I can now see more of a downward trend and quicker in the scales!!

So to celebrate - here is a little diet humour for you!

Scrap Review is having a SUPER raffle!

All the details can be found here

and I will have the blinkie over there on the left until the raffle is done with so make sure you enter!!

.....he was robbed!!

if I needed Vanilla - I would have gone to Baskin Robbins - BAH!   

I will be watching and waiting for Adam's music - he will be iconic

it's been a long couple of days

but we are finally home.   The op was meant to be on an outpatient basis only and we should have been home mid afternoon yesterday.    However things did not all go according to plan and in the end Cait was admitted - as she did not respond too well afterwards.   Mike and I got back here around midnight last night and were back at the hospital just after 7 this morning.

So glad though - all is now well with Cait and we finally got home - with her around 2 today

thanks for the well wishes everyone

wish us luck

we are off to Stanford Hospital for Cait to have her VNS implant removed.

   She had it put in - back in 03 - it was meant to help with the Epilepsy - but for her it never did which was a shame.    All that money and 2 scars for nothing.    So today she is having the same 2 scars opened up so they can remove the implant - and the wire that goes up and around the Vagus nerve.  I am hoping that as they are cutting in the same place - she keeps the same very small thin scar lines

We are having it removed - because she needs to have a Tessler MRI and with the VNS in - she can't.    We are hoping that with the Tessler MRI they can see whether or not she does have a tumour on her hypothalmus.   If she does, and it can be removed - she may well be epilepsy free.

Hypothalamic hamartoma - I would just like to add here - that WAYYY back in the beginning when Cait was first diagnosed - I asked about all this - as Cait displayed every single symptom - and no-one seemed to know what I was talking about .... I would be so PO'd if we had gone through nearly 10 years of seizures and drugs and all that goes with it .. for nothing

Still more Italy photos to come

this week has flown by ACK! 

I have a crop here tonight and I am so not prepared - double ACK   I still have to run the hoover around, clean up the bathroom and tidy up my scrap desk.    At least I have dipped some HUGE strawberries in chocolate - and have some salsa and chips, and dip and chips - so that much is done!

I am hoping to get the last of the photos up this weekend - barring any unforeseen changes of plan.  The weather forecast for here is HOT HOT HOT so I might well be spending a lot of time in the pool   and last time I checked the laptops don't really like the water !!

A feast for the eyes and palate!!

The wedding breakfast was held at Già Sotto l'Arco a beautiful Michelin starred restaurant in Carovigno - which is about 50km away from Bari.

Every course you got fresh silver etc, and it WAS silver too.   The meal was just beautiful.   Both in presentation and in taste.   So you can see each course we had - and look at the menu - and they should correspond.     They very first line of the menu means the little nibbles on the side plates that you can see in the table setting photo,  that they kept bringing around.   It was bread, hard pretzel sort of things, and little hot bread things filled with either spinach (I think) or ham.

Then it leads into the first photo.. the burrata cheese covered in pastry strings, which was so yummy.    It is a kind of mozzarella cheese with a creamy middle - to DIE for!   The sundried tomato was the best ever, and the capicola (ham) I think I could get addicted to. 

Then it was the asparagus cake served with the mortadella sauce, and the crispy bacon on the spaghetti skewer!   I think that was almost my favourite course - I could have eaten a plateful of those.    The pasta course was yummo too and stuffed with eggplant and potato and served with a thyme and parmesan sauce.

I add here - with each course we were getting a different wine, we had started with champagne - and it was quite warm in the restaurant - I admit halfway through - with all the food, the heat and the wine - I felt a bit flushed!     The good thing was - each course was nicely sized - so although we were filling up - we did not feel overstuffed!   Plus it was not being rushed at us - we had a bit of a gap between each course.

Then it was on to the risotto with vegetables and the big fat shrimp.   Needless to say Mike inherited my shrimp!   That was followed by the fish - a local species (which I ate!!! and actually it was lovely) wrapped in bacon with the veges, potato and I think it was an olive kind of sauce - I can't remember now - I know it was not pesto.    To cleanse the palate we then had the lemon sorbet which was so so yum.

The only thing we forgot to take a photo of was the piglet (Maialino da latte etc)  - which was the main course, sort of.   Although the fish course was pretty much a main course too!   Shame really as it was beautifully presented too and lovely to eat!  It was a pork chop - although an odd cut - almost like a pork rib - very tender though and it came with roast potato and an onion marmalade (which I could happily eat a whole bowl of).

We had quite  a big break then - well 20 mins I guess, before we did the cheese plate - oh my god those cheeses were to die for.   All made locally, all freshly made, and just yummo.   Normally I am not a huge fan of gorgonzola but that one... I would have liked to have made off with a wheel of it to bring home.   The orange stuff on the side was made with rind and it was sort of crystallised and runny all at once.  Almost like eating an orange version of honeycomb.

Then because wedding cake would not be enough - then we got the pastries YUMMY - then the wedding cake - all washed down with the very very drinkable dessert wine.

All in all - BEYOND fabulous!
 

The wedding!~

finally a few minutes to sit down and post some photos of the wonderful wedding we attending in Italy - and some comments!!

Mike and Riccardo - the groom

Mike and I outside Chiesa Russa - before the wedding - so nice to see him in a suit again - I miss that!!!  Believe it or not I had actually curled my hair - but it was quite humid and it just fell out!

AnnaRita was just radiant and her dress was beautiful - the photos just do not to justice to the lace.    Riccardo was also looking resplendent in his made to measure Italian silk tux!

During the service - which of course we did not understand a word of as it was all in Italian - I remember sitting there thinking...

here we are.... sitting in a courtyard of a russian church in a small town in the south of Italy listening to a wedding service in Italian .... it was all very surreal

Despite not understanding the language - we knew enough to know when the deed was done-  and the kiss the bride part - and the ring exchange

The church was really pretty both inside and out - as was the interior garden courtyard where AnnaRita and Riccardo were married

I was very glad to see some traditions are worldwide!!

Tomorrow I will post some pictures of the amazing wedding lunch/dinner!

Happy Mothers Day Everyone

and most especially to mine!