Curried Shrimp and Summer Vegetable Couscous

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon evoo
1/2 cup chopped scallions
1/2 pound broccoli florets
1 small zucchini, diced
1 small red bell pepper, seeded and diced
2 1/2 teaspoons curry powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 14.5 ounce can reduced sodium chicken broth
12 ounces uncooked, peeled and deveined medium shrimp
10 ounces (1 2/3 cup) whole-wheat couscous

Instructions:
In a large skillet with a lid, heat the oil over medium heat. Add scallions and cook, stirring for 1 minute.
Add the broccoli, zucchini and bell pepper. Cook, stirring often until the vegetables begin to soften, about 5 minutes.
Stir in the curry powder, salt and pepper. Add the chicken broth and increase heat to high. Cover and bring to a boil. Stir in the shrimp, then add the couscous and stir to combine.
Remove from heat, cover, and let stand for 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork. Yum!

For the 4th of July this year we celebrated by staying home and playing with our new barbecue and meeting many of our new neighbors. There was a block party on our street for which over fifty of our neighbors showed up to enjoy good food and set off fireworks! Ryan and I barbecued our burgers at home and then brought a big bowl of loaded baked potato salad (recipe to follow) along with us to contribute to the party. Having grown up in dry California with laws restricting how high fireworks can be shot, I was surprised and even a little frightened of the fireworks being shot off in front of our house this year, but we had a lot fun!

Ryan manning our new grill for lunchtime hot dogs, and yes, he is wearing a raincoat on the 4th of July!

Loaded Baked Potato Salad

From the May 2008 issue of “Every Day with Rachael Ray”

Ingredients: (I halved this recipe because I don’t own a bowl large enough to hold 7 pounds of potatoes nor did I want to be eating leftover potato salad for the rest of the summer!)
7 pounds baking potatoes
extra-virgin olive oil, for brushing
2 pounds bacon, cut crosswise into 1-inch pieces
2 sticks butter, softened
2 pints sour cream
salt and pepper
1 bunch scallions, thinly sliced
1 pound cheddar cheese, shredded

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 400°. Pierce the potatoes with a fork; brush with oil. Bake until tender, 1 hour. Let cool, then cut into bite-size pieces.
2. In a skillet, cook the bacon until crisp, about 10 minutes. Drain.
3. In a large bowl, combine the butter and sour cream; season with salt and pepper. Stir in the potatoes, bacon, scallions and cheese. Serve at room temperature. (It’s good heated up, too.)

In order to celebrate the summer solstice (and also the one year anniversary of our engagement) Ryan and I decided to go for a picnic and a hike near Lake Cushman on the peninsula. Unfortunately, all did not go as planned. First of all, despite predictions for some sun, we never saw any. Then, the road to the trail we planned to hike was closed. And finally, we couldn’t find the park where we planned to picnic! So we ended up eating our picnic in the car (overlooking the lake) while looking at a map to decide where to go instead. We ended up at Westhaven State Park, which apparently is the place to surf in Washington State. I have to say I wasn’t too impressed with the surf, but I’ll assume it was just a bad day for it. I was impressed, though, with the number of people out there trying to make the best of a rather dreary day!

Today we decided to do some work around the house. We went to Lowe’s and bought ourselves our very own ladder and then removed the bird nest from our dryer vent (don’t worry, the birds were done for the season and had moved out), put a cover over the vent to keep them from coming back, and scrubbed the birdie poo-poo off the side of our house. Phew! Good work!

Looking backward at our wedding, and forward to our honeymoon, that is. In between, we’ve been working graveyards (or being quiet so as to not wake my sleeping wife), opening wedding presents, writing thank you notes, not doing dishes, and sorting through some of the nearly 3,000 pictures that our photographer Grant took of our wedding. We loved this particular picture so much, we just had to share it as soon as we saw it. This is Kim’s friend Wana, in stunned horror as the tossed bouquet falls at her feet.

And here’s the lovely couple… awww….

And so we say Farewell, for now. We’re off on our honeymoon! More cute pictures will come after we get back. We’ll see y’all later!

-Ryan & Kim

Kim and I got married on Saturday! Yeehaw!…

— from wanderin_louis

More pictures forthcoming…

I woke up on April 1st and looked out my window to see Winter!

But it turned out to be Mother Nature’s April Fools Day joke–later in the day it was Spring–hooray!

Friday night it snowed a little over an inch on Snoqualmie Ridge. I went to work and Kim stayed home to take pictures of the beautiful white stuff before it melted (pictures, um, forthcoming…).

Well, Saturday night, it snowed again, this time a little more than two inches. Kim went to work, and I took a morning walk around the neighborhood, taking pictures in the snow.

By the time I got to the Deep Creek Trail, the sun had come out and started melting the snow in the treetops above me. Snowballs and ice chips rained from the canopy as I strolled back home. Very cool.

After work today, I drove one exit up I-90 to Snoqualmie Point Park (it was closed for the evening, but I snuck in…. shhh, don’t tell) to get some photos of Mt. Si at sunset. Once again, I forgot my tripod adapter, so it’s not particularly sharp. But I have a feeling it’s just the first of many such opportunities we’ll have over the coming years.

Yeah, the commute really sucks. But it’s pretty cool to live in such beautiful country.

It was a dark and stormy night, except the storms weren’t outside in the atmosphere, but inside my sore muscles as I lay on our mattress on the floor, desperately trying to fall asleep. With some greatly-appreciated help from my family and our coworker Kevin, and even our new neighbor Coast Guard Andy, we moved our furniture to our new home in one big truckload on Sunday. Couches, bookcases, tables, beds… you name it. We managed to get it all in the front door & up the stairs. We’re officially moved in to our New House!

Now comes the part where we unpack and make it feel like home.   

A Big Thank You to everyone who participated in the great endeavor.

Kim and I bought our first house! It’s on Silent Creek Ave in Snoqualmie (off of I-90, almost out to North Bend).

The big moving day is on February 24th, two weeks from today! We’re already packing!