Des Moines in the Fall.

Nothing beats Des Moines in the Fall. Joseph and I took a quick weekend trip to Des Moines for his mom's birthday and his sister's Confirmation, a couple of weekends ago. We booked our tickets on Monday and left on Friday morning. We didn't get to enjoy the beauty of Fall until we woke up Saturday morning to this view:

The weather was just perfect for the hot tub!

Fall is one of my favorite seasons. Though, what season can't you appreciate?!

There were so many opportunities for beautiful Fall pictures.

One of the best parts about coming "home" is re-connecting with old friends. Pictured above is Katie & I, and then Katie, Tony, and I in the second picture. We ended up hanging out at Sarah B's house, making our way to Carl's Place (a local bar), and then crashing on Katie & Tony's couch!

The next morning, we got ready and went to church for Sophie's confirmation. She sang "Amazing Grace" and had a luncheon at the house. That night after everyone had gone, we got to see Bethany and her babies Piper & Quinn.

Much later that night, Sarah B. came over and we saw The Nomad in the sculpture garden (picture to come soon). She tried to take us to the Des Moines Social Club but sadly it was closed to we ended our night at the Lift for martini's & shots!

The next day consisted of packing, eating, and saying goodbye.

Supervisor's Night Out.

I've been working at Extraordinary Desserts for about 7 months and last week was the first time that all of the supervisors had a chance to get together and our boss/manager paid for our dinner and drinks for the night. We went to two different places but the best part of the night was finding this sign:

Whether or not the Smokin' BBQ was any good or not remains a mystery!

Technique Class: Fall Baking

Last Week, I attended my second technique class at Williams-Sonoma. By this point it's one of my highlights of the week. Some might think that's sad, but if you truly love baking, cooking, and being around people, why wouldn't it be a highlight!

As usual we received a little booklet talking about essential baking tools needed for baking, advice from Chuck Williams, and (4) fabulous recipes.

We started out by making a puff pastry & the perfect pie crust. We then cut out these cute little pumpkin cut-outs found here. And then we filled them with an apple-cranberry filling. Into the oven they went while we moved onto our next project.

Our teacher showed us how to make Pumpkin-Pecan Bread Pudding. It seemed pretty easy and it was interesting to see since I have never made it before.

Looks like our little pumpkin pocket is all done. It was awesome and not mention really cute :-)

The best part was this Pumpkin-Pecan Bread Pudding. Yummy. We even made fresh whipped cream, my favorite! Can't wait for the next class.

The Ten Things I Learned.

So months and months ago I got slapped with a Traffic Citation. According to the stupid, old, un-happy policeman I had failed to stop fully at a stop sign. Of course I acted clueless of why he was pulling me over on his motorcycle. He even tried to make me feel stupid by explaining that perhaps I had been confused of the fact that all the stop signs in California look like yield signs. I thought he was educating me (at the time) so I thanked him for the new information, but then later had an epiphany of his "read between the lines you idiot" comment. Whatever...


I qualified to take a Driving Class to clear my record, so I opted to pay the ticket and pay the administration fee to take the class within two months. I had to take it by November 9th, so I finally made the time to take it two weekends ago. It was the longest day of my life. Why I needed to take an (8) hour class, I don't know but at the end we had to take a test and make a list of the Ten Things We Learned. Here's mine:

1.) The legal speeding limit in the state of California is 65 mph, unless otherwise posted.

2.) The first offense fine in the State of California for talking on your cell phone while driving is $100

3.) "Bambi" is the leading killer in motor accidents

4.) The legal speeding limit while driving down an alley is 15 mph.

5.) Surveillance cameras were first installed on the streets around WWII.

6.) It is illegal to smoke in a car with anyone under the age of 18

7.) Anyone under the age of 18 must wear a helmet if riding a bike in the State of California.

8.)The first offense fine in the State of New York for talking on your cell phone while driving is $1,000

9.) Running a red light can cost your upwards of $500

10.) Drinking while driving killed approximately 10,000 people last year

(Bonus) NEVER get a ticket or take this class. It will cost you about $300!

New Finds: Little Italy.

One Thursday afternoon a couple of weeks ago, I was out running errands on my Vespa when I realized that I hadn't purchased a gift for one of my best est friends Katie. As I walked/rode through Little Italy finding the perfect gift, I stumbled upon an area that I hadn't seen before. It seemed as though it was their "Design District" because they had a lot of different little shops.

The picture-esque shot that I saw in real life didn't transfer well with my iPhone camera. I wish it had because this could have been a potentially cool shot.

They had this little "sidewalk" made of this stone squares. I tried to make it a little interesting apparently by catching my fingers in the frame. I think it makes it look like you are peeking into a small cemetery or something. A shop owner saw me taking this shot and asked if I had an assignment in texture. I kind of giggled/blushed and said I was going to blog about it. They told me to stop by again in the spring when vines grow around the blocks.

And then I found the cutest little shop, The French Garden Shoppe. They had little lavender, rosemary, and bay leaf plants outside. Of course I was drawn in and loved everything from the setup to the scent to the shop keeper. I promised I would be back :)

Knife Skills.

Most people aren't aware of my weird schedule. My part time job consists of doing Visual Merchandising for a well-known retail store (which can not be blogged about because of their "policies") & my full-time job is at Extraordinary Desserts. I work early mornings at my part-time and evenings at my full-time. So as you can guess, I have most of the days open!

Most of the time when I leave my part-time job I come home, do some cleaning, working on personal projects, or nothing at all (aka nap) since Joseph is at work. Well, I have found the perfect "project" to work on or pass my time effectively (not that I need any more on my plate!) I was on my way to Neiman-Marcus, only to browse of course, and I saw that Williams-Sonoma was starting their Fall Technique classes, and next week would be Fall Baking! "How fun" I thought. So I went in to sign up. I then realized they were having one today and they asked if I would like to attend. I had nothing else planned so I thought "Why not?!"

This was my teacher:

Today's lesson was on Knife Skills. My class consisted of mostly housewives and some old people. I was the youngest person there but probably the most skilled. It seemed like a lot of these people probably have never really had to "cook". They own a lot of the best knives but didn't know how to use them or what each one was for.

For the class we got this little booklet to take home and follow along. Our teacher showed us how we should pick a knife that suits us, how to hold it properly, and even various types of cutting techniques. I knew most of everything she was teaching but she did demonstrate some new things I didn't know how to do. It was a great refresher course and FREE!

After about 90 minutes of talking and demonstrating how to slice, dice, & chop a bunch of different things, our teacher threw them in a bowl, made a simple dressing, and we enjoyed the fruits of her labor, a fresh salad. Yummy. Can't wait for my next class :)

Californian Autumn.

Last week with the weather cooling down, and all of the Fall catalogs that I was getting the mail, started to make me feel home sick. I started to miss the turning of the leaves, the sweet smell of a burning fire, and taking our annual trip to the pumpkin patch. My remedy: burning a Pumpkin Spice candle for the night.

Of course that wasn't enough, so I told Joseph we needed to find a pumpkin patch in the area. I did some research, Joseph asked around, and everyone kept recommending a certain pumpkin patch in Julian. So, come Saturday we made the trek up there with one of our friends from Des Moines who just recently moved here. The drive was nice but it took about 1 1/2 to get there.

This was their version of a pumpkin patch:

To me, it looked some one's backyard in Iowa. Seriously? (I thought & probably complained about for the entire time) It was a nice attempt but nothing compared to what we're used to. It was enough to "cure" or maybe intensify my homesickness.

I did happen to find a very pretty pumpkin. I usually like to pick the pumpkin directly off the vine myself, but I guess it was fine this time. The pumpkin had a lot of character and pretty coloring. And it only cost $4 :)

This is the pumpkin Joseph chose. It was totally unique. I thought it was perfect!

For some reason they were offering to give you a tour of their farm for $12 which included Cider-Making (hence the Cider House, which was swarmed with bees), Raspberry-Picking (which we walked to and noticed all of the berries were dried), and Candle-Making.

I'm not sure if you are supposed to use rotten apples for cider?? But still a pretty picture!

They even had "Gold Mining" for the kids. A cute idea, I must add.

Not completely satisfied with the pumpkin patch, and having made the drive up, Joseph thought we should go Apple-Picking!

Smile!

The Apple Orchard wasn't too bad overall but still not the typical orchard that we're used to. The people were friendly and told us all about the apples they grew and what works best for different recipes. But all of the apples were picked over and really expensive.

Nothing beats doing Fall Things in Des Moines but I'm glad we tried to do it the California way (even if it didn't meet my expectations) Can't wait to make it back to DSM for Thanksgiving!

Tour De Fat.

Saturday morning, Joseph and Shannon (a friend that just moved here from Des Moines and we went to college with) went on a bike ride with the Tour De Fat, which ended with a festival. The whole event is put on by New Belgium Brewing, the company who brought us Fat Tire beer. I, of course, did not ride because I don't have a bike, and Joseph advised against me taking my Vespa, so I just met up with them after the ride.

We found out it was San Diego's first year holding the Tour De Fat event, which makes it the 11th Western city on their "tour". After Joseph did a little research, he realized how dedicated some of these people are and how much time they put into their costumes for the festivities.

This guy's "costume" was probably the tamest of all. A lot of people got really creative with their outfits. I saw one lady with "hair" made of bicycle chains, another group were Teletubbies, not to mention all of the accessories made of tire material.


These girls, The Rockettes, did some crazy tricks with mini-bikes and did a whole dance routine for about (20) minutes. I can't believe someone didn't faint, it was so hot out and they were non-stop!


After watching a mini-concert, a magic show, a sipping on a couple of cups of beer, the finale began. What I didn't know was that the main event includes someone volunteering ahead of time to trade-in their car for a bike. The "winner/volunteer" vows to ride only a bike for a full year! Can you imagine?! Crazy... (The woman above gave her 1997 car for a bike and made the vow. Let me mention that Tour De Fat auctions the car off and gives back by improving & creating more bike trail within the city)

The final musical performance was March Forth Marching Band. They were awesome. Very entertaining!

They even had performer's on stilts that were doing crazy flips and dance moves. It was a nice way to spend the day/afternoon. Who could resist?? Yay for Joseph finding out about this event and actually riding his bike for it!