Archive: 2002
The Baby Shower
Auntie Bets threw a great baby shower. The best part about the gathering was that there were so many generations there: from Gina's girls to Nonny. It was great to get such a large scope of advice and wisdom from all the girls there. The family really came through with both practical and cute gifts for the little girl to come. John and I are so happy that we have such a great set of family and friends. Thanks all.
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| Bets, Donna, Maria | Char | Nonny |
Halloween at Aidan and Mi-La's
Here's one of our hosts: the dancing nun. We had a great time, even Liza, who doesn't drink now that she is with child. There was a ton of good food that none of the drunkards was eating. Liza was in heaven.
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| Hulkmania. Nice package. | J-Lo hammin' it up. | The Jester and Wednesday (from the Addam's family...duh) working on a Twix. |
| Whitney's Bday | ||
| We celebrated Whitney's 16 b-day a couple weeks ago. She's a drivin fool now and has offloaded Z and Gina as the primary taxi drivers in the family. The family went up to Monroe and had a big Mexican feast. Note also what a big hot-shot Whitney is. Sarah is also on fire. Their team won the Monroe Volleyball invitational on 9/29. | ||
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| Canning | ||
| We've been going crazy with jam and applesauce STILL! Liza and I have amassed quite a nice little stash of goodies. We've had a great time making this stuff too, with family and friends joining us frequently. All up, we've made peach jam, california raspberry jam, wash raspberry jam, huckleberry jam, strawberry jam, apple butter, apple sauce, tomatoe sauce, plum jam, blackberry jam, and blueberry jam. We'll probably make some pumkin butter at the end of the month and call it a year for the jamming operation.
Here are a couple pictures from a few weeks ago when we did our first batch of apple sauce and apple butter. We also whipped out another batch of blackberry that day. The applesauce was the best (thanks to Johanna's perfect palate). It was chunky and spicey... the next day, liza and i picked up a waffle iron at a garage sale and made whole-wheat waffles with warm apple sauce and glob of sour cream. Whoa nelly. | ||
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| Aunt Katie's Quilt | ||
| Aunt Katy sent an amazing quilt. It's a "bedtime" quilt, with a bunch of little pockets that contain little bedtime books. We have it on the wall in the kid's room. Click on the thumbnail here to see the full version. | ||
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| Labor Day | ||
| Blackberries are in season! Some might call this a weird obsession (betsy), but if you want to come to Duvall and pick blackberries, give us a call. We can make a few jars of jam. Well, not everyone was here Labor Day weekend (jamie, johanna, betsy, brady), but we still managed to have a great time. Harvest dinner on Saturday night was wonderful! We went down to the local produce stand earlier that day and picked up all kinds of fresh fruits and veggies. The highlight was the mixed berry pie: Marty and Liza had three helpings when all was said and done--yummy. Does Marty look satisfied or what? | ||
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| Malo Trip | ||
| The annual trip to Malo (August 8-10) was awesome! We swam in the Kettle River, slept under the stars, played with the dogs and grasshoppers, and spent time hangin' with Dad and Carolyn. Check out the picture of Whit driving the water truck. Next year we will set a whole week aside, so we can camp along the way. | ||
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| Betsy's Bday Trip | ||
| This may be the start of a fun tradition...Char took the Besty, Gina, Johanna, and Liza on a Girls' Weekend to Paulsbo for a mother- daughter retreat August 2-3. The town was very cute; we got our fill of antiquing and window shopping. We also had a ton of fun at "That's A Some Italian" Restaurant. Tom, the owner, somehow convinced Betsy and Char to try some of "d'Bomb Hot Sauce." A toothpick dab later and both of them were jumping out of their seats, eating bread and sugar, trying to put the fire out on their tongues. He said he paid $30 for an ounce of that stuff, and it was well worth it! We all agreed. Also the Paulsbo bakery rocked our world... | ||
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| 4th of July | ||
| 4th of July was a good time. We went to Betsy's place, where all the neighbors set up tables and brought out a ton of food. We blew up hotdogs; we jumproped; we had a couple drinks. This picture shows the crew before dark. I think Betsy has the "after-dark" pics. | ||
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| Dong and Taylor. | ||
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| Memorial Day. | ||
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| An Update from Andy and Serena! | ||
| O.k.-we're offering our 2 cents: Andrew is in summer school at EWU too, taking Microbiology-aaaah, what a great way to spend the summer!! One of his professors asked him to work on a project this summer in his "free time". So he's spending hours in a dark, cold basement trying to electronically fertilize fish eggs. Creepy, eh? Serena's filling the days working in the yard and visiting her new niece almost daily. And of course we're still working at the KREMlin. We're both really excited about our nieces/nephews!! Congratulations Johnny, Liza, Mike, and Gina!! | ||
| Elmer | ||
| Elmer has killed 4 birds in the last couple weeks. What a bad cat. A fifth one, the chosen bird, outsmarted him by sitting on the top of the doors and shower curtain rod in the bathroom. Liza had to rescue him with a towel. He flew away unharmed. John, on the other hand, cleaned all the bird crap from the walls and floor of the bathroom, because, as we know, liza is preggars and can't come near any feces. | ||
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| Cooking Class | ||
| On Saturday, June 15th, Liza and I joined some comrades from work for a cooking class at Mistral in Belltown. It was cool and yummy. We had a little pinch of fois gras with a little salad and a mini cheese tart to start, then pan -seared halibut, some risotto that was great (no meat stock in it... it was really good), and a strawberry sorbet in melon soup for dessert. | ||
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| Here's a picture of Chef William Belickis, with work-comrade Leon and his daughter Jen looking on. On the right: our strawberry sorbet with melon soup. | ||
| Father's Day BBQ | ||
| The family converged on the Migliore (Jo's grandparents) household for father's day. We had a great time mixing it up with the extended families. I don't think there could be a more compatible match between families; when we walked in, it was just like the Speare-Z-Mattana households: salads-a-tossin', marinated veggies everywhere, total chaos in the kitchen, Anthony and Nonna pounding away on the piano... it was really fun. | ||
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| Early June General Update | ||
Everyone has been super-busy lately. As the family coordinator I've failed to get the family
together in the last couple weeks. Here's all i know on the state of the
fam:
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| 5/24-27: Memorial Day Weekend | ||
| Friday: Ma, Marty, Char,
Dad, and Ivy all showed up at work on Friday. Ma and Char went to
warteam to observe Betsy in action, while Marty and Dad went to the
Flight Sim World. Jamie, Z, Bets and John had lunch with the parents and
a couple friends from work. Since Betsy was expensing the whole lunch,
we really took advantage of the opportunity by going to Red Robin.
Needless to say, the food was fab... oh, to die for. We then went back to Microsoft where Mom showed how she can shoot latte out of her nose during a meeting. Impressive. If we only had pictures. | ||
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| Saturday: Sarah and
Whitney competed in the
Emerald
City Classic volleyball tournament. The family piled on down to UW
to watch Whitney play a couple games. We were amazed at how good they
were. Sarah's team is so formidable that their opponents forfeited
without even stepping on the court, so we didn't get to see Sarah play.
Z, Gina, and Brad busted their arses all weekend putting time into this
tournament: Gina and Brad were putting in the volleyball floor late into
the night on Friday, while Z flipped about 500 burgers for a few hours
during the Saturday lunch rush at the concession stand. We had a big-assed spaghetti dinner here at the Mansion on Saturday night (see home page picture). Liza made a giant pile of great spaghetti...It was a great meal. Finished with hot brownies, ice cream, and fudge. | ||
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| Sarah was pretty pooped. She just zonked after dinner. One minute she's carrying on, screaming, running around...the next she's drooling all over the couch. | ||
| Sunday: Betsy had a big stinkin' BBQ at her place, where she made the best BBQ'd ribs many of us had ever tasted. Yum. There was a ton of great food. This was the official meeting of the families b/t Bets' and Brady's sides. There was no brawling, so things went well. Hopefully, Betsy will have some more pics that we can post from the event. | ||
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| Here's Liza, Bets, and neighbor Ted. | ||
| 5/19/02 | ||
| Well, Liza and I visited Urb and Mo this morning. Mo has definitely gotten used to his new pad. He hates us now, and who could blame him. | ||
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| We put a stinkin cat door in for him and we called him a fat bastard. He wouldn't even go hang out with Liza, who was totally ignoring him and watching TV (a rare treat in the Speare-Mattana household). In fact, once Martha Steward came on TV, urb and mo lost us both for the whole time. Mo seems pretty happy with the UrbPad, and Urb is a lot nicer to him than we ever were. Mo avoided us the whole time cause he thought we were there to take him away. | ||
| Wiped Out | ||
| The z-jamison-meuller family was the target of a good old-fashion tp'ing a couple weeks ago. Z says he's not sure which of the girls prompted this, but we've all got our suspicions. | ||
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| The vandals did a reasonable job. Kudos. | ||
| Mo' Gone | ||
| Our buddy Mo is now living at urb's house. Pissing on the wall in front of us (while staring us down) was the last straw. Wait...Maybe it was crapping on the counter. I'm not sure exactly. Anyway, the fat bastard was never the same after we brought Elmer home. We brought Mo over to urb's yesterday and hung out, bbq'd, etc. Mo was diggin it. We talked to Urb this morning, and Mo doesn't miss us at all; he's lovin life, and urb is totally getting trained. | ||
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| Mo gettin' some good urb lovin | ||
| Midwifery Midwifery Midwifery | ||
| That word just rolls off your tongue. Like charcuterie, or Nibelunganlied. Anyway. Liza and I talked to the Midwife place on Weds. It was cool. It will be very interesting to talk to OBGYN in a couple weeks. The place is right next to a hospital, and they bring patients there if requested, or if the situation demands. We were really impressed by the whole organization and the level of expertise these woman have. In addition to 3 years of training, midwives must attend 100 births before getting a license. The "birthing rooms" are like homey rooms, except they have a very female-centric bidet attachment sticking out the toilet bowl... and like a 50 gallon bathtub. We learned that some first births, labor can last 3 days. Hardcore. We're going for four. | ||
| Cyclery | ||
| Got the bike. Liza's dad gave us this bike; it's so sweet. I layed it down already. I'm a completely uncoordinated turd. It's definately gonna be a while before I'm riding it to work. But i'm gonna dig it when i do. There are two basic motorcycle groups at work, the ducati/crotch-rocket type with the full-body one-piece (loud obnoxious color goes here) leather android rubber suits; and the harley guys; you know the type. Except (most) of these guys don't really look scary. One type we don't have is the 80's buttrocker wasteoid rider. I'm gonna fill that niche on this bike. I need a mullet to really do it right. We'll get pictures up soon. | ||
| Mothers Day: 5/12/02 | ||
| Here in Duvall, we had the traditional cabbage balls and spuds at the mansion. Z, Gina and the girls came by. Bets and Brady were up in Mount Vernon taking Brady's ma out to brunch. Jamie, jo, and chris were no where to be found. Z brought a famous dish, taught to him by his mother: home-made angel food cake, toasted and slathered with butter. We ate two cakes. Whoa. | ||
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| Z and his cake. | ||
In the 'Can, mom did it up
real good with waffles, strawberries, and cream. Granny came by and
indulged. Here's what mom has to say:
Grandma was in wonderful form for Mother's Day. She loved her waffles with strawberries and whipped cream. Gosh, I wonder if she is in the same condition as Liza? On our way home, not terribly long after her feast here, she decided she wanted a hamburger. So we stopped at Burger King and picked up a hamburger and coke, anything to make the mother and Grandmother happy...she ate the WHOLE thing. Wow. We had a funny day.Love it when she has these kind of days.They are few a far between but we embrace them with gladness. Happy Mother's Day to Gina and almost a mother...Liza. We love you all. | ||
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| Ma and Granny | ||
| Mom,Marty, Char and Dad Win Bloomsday: 5/7/02 | ||
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From mom:
Here we are the WINNERS of our city's Great Timed Race (well, we think we are winners anyway). Overall finish for Marty: 25,520 out of 45,704 runners/walkers. Overall finish for Char: 25,512 out of 45,704. We walked 7.5 miles @18 min. 30 sec. per mile. Pretty darn good when you can hardly budge to begin with for all the people. We had a great time!! These are our shirts (have to finish...no cheating, eh, hem, Bets, and John) and we are standing in front of Spokane Falls which is gorgeous this time of year!!! | ||