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Christmas the Midway Way

Jason and I try to make it to our timeshare in Midway once every winter. Sometimes it doesn’t happen but this year it did. Just a couple days before Christmas we took a break from the holiday hassles to enjoy the crunch of man-made snow under speeding inner tubes and the repose of an endless night of board games.

Jason and I never have to be convinced of the merits of going downhill fast.
Tubing entertained Isabelle for about an hour and a half and then she was no longer amused.

In keeping with tradition, we invited my brother’s family to join us on this outing. We started our getaway with an afternoon of sledding on the slopes of Soldier Hollow. Tubing went over far better with Drew’s kids this time than it did a couple of years back. Instead of disliking any rapidity, Isabelle alternated between demanding and detesting swiftness. Although she couldn’t decide if she wanted to go faster or slower, she handled the mountain mayhem relatively well. Jadon, the family chicken, surprisingly wasn’t intimidated by the hill this time; he particularly enjoyed racing down it. Even though he repeatedly insisted that his dad was the fastest sledder, experience proved otherwise. Drew failed to win any of our descent contests. Jadon eventually got wise and requested Jason as his racing partner, which resulted in an anticipated victory.

Jadon loved putting crusty chunks of snow in our inner tubes.
There’s never a dull moment with this boy.

After tubing we ate a yummy dinner at the Spin Café in Heber. This joint doesn’t look too impressive from the outside but the inside is cozy and the food is tasty. My favorite part of the meal was the candy cane chocolate gelato I ordered for dessert. The Spin Café makes their fantastic gelato in-house and I made a particularly excellent decision when I chose the candy cane flavor. Scrumptious!

Jadon thought getting served root beer in a cowboy boot was the height of sophistication.
We played a variety of games until 2:00 AM. Bananagrams turned out to be a little too extreme for Andrew. He had a wee meltdown during one round.

A night of intense board gaming later our quick trip was over. It was nice taking a breather from the all-consuming Christmas craziness. In just 24 hours we slid, gobbled, and gamed. Did I mention I lost at Sticheln? Such is the might of the mini-vacation!

Rachel January 2, 2013 No Comments

We Wish You a Hairy Christmas!

Mustaches were hung by lips with care in hopes that St. Nicholas would dig that hair.

Every year for one brief evening we welcome ugly whiskers and hideous jumpers into our lives with open arms. The Christmas spirit is, after all, about accepting the outcasts among us and what’s more untouchable than lip hair so bushy it might transform into a beautiful butterfly at any moment? Therefore, let it never be said that the Sabins are scrooges for not only do we repeatedly embrace the disgusting but we mercilessly force our friends to do the same.

The Ashleys dressed in ugly Christmas shirts instead of sweaters.
The ladies looked nearly lovely dressed in their attire glitches.
Yes, ridiculous comes in homemade.

Last week we held our annual Christmas party and the theme was once again unsightly holiday attire and revolting mustaches. Over twenty chums joined us, primed with their tacky sweaters and even nastier facial hair, as we celebrated the season of stuffing by enthusiastically consuming tacos from Rubios and cupcakes from The Sweet Tooth Fairy. Although our full tummies protested, we boogied away the hours after our meal with some beats from Dance Central and then proceeded to the highlight of the evening: the white elephant gift exchange.

Bart and Brandi wore the grossest sweaters they could find but they weren’t gross enough.
Kenny didn’t want anything to come between him and his clean shave so he opted for fabricated follicles.
Brett and Lauren forgot to bring the ugly to the party.

In our version of the white elephant game the gifts remain wrapped until the end of the frenzy. The uncertainty of what’s under the paper doesn’t stop people from picking favorites though and that makes it all the more entertaining when the present everyone’s been fighting over turns out to be a panpipe CD or a box of chocolates so old an archaeologist would consider it an artifact. The unbridled gift stealing this time took over an hour to finish in what was quite possibly our wildest exchange yet.

Jason's
Jason’s mustache was hideous indeed. It made him look like a disturbing combination of French king and country hick.
The men took foul to a whole new level with their knitted fineries, hefty hair, and flighty sentiments.
Jeremy had to shave his mustache for a business meeting a few days before our party so we mourned his recently deceased facial fur with signage.

It was a diverting evening filled with all the jovial overconsumption and cheesy superfluity you’d expect from the season. We hope those who partied with us enjoyed themselves and didn’t have too much of a lingering bellyache from the night’s constant bombardment of tacos and graphic staches.

Happy Mustachemas to all and to all a hairy delight!

Rachel December 11, 2012 No Comments

Thankful Fluff

I love to cook. Sadly, Jason and I are not often home long enough for me to do any serious cooking these days but I always insist on preparing a number of desserts for our Thanksgiving dinners whether time permits or not.

I quite enjoy cooking even when there’s an overabundance of it to be done.

This year I made Mayan chocolate pecan pie, sweet potato praline pie with maple sauce, pineapple upside-down cake, and a host of from scratch toppings for banana splits, including marshmallow fluff. As you might have guessed from that long list, I was in the kitchen for 5 or 6 hours baking alongside my faithful assistant Jason. We didn’t finish until around 1:30 in the morning.

Obviously, I only volunteered to taste the from scratch marshmallow fluff we made because I care about the quality of my cuisine.

Despite our grogginess at the time of cooking completion, all of our food experiments turned out well. While everything tasted yummy, the marshmallow fluff was my favorite of our treats simply because crafting it was like creating a magical brew. It mystically transformed from a thin frothy concoction to shiny sticky stuff in a matter of minutes. Maximo Marshmallio Fluffius!

The Mayan chocolate pecan pie I made contained a few extra ingredients: ancho chili powder, Kahlua, and semi-sweet chocolate. Therefore, it was extra tasty.
Jason made a great sous-chef. He happily chopped, washed, or crushed anything I asked.

Thanksgiving was a little crazy for us this year, as always, with our dual family appearances but our pies disappeared quicker than we had to so yeah for that! Yes, not only did our goodies go fast but we were able to hang around long enough to catch a few rays at the park with my family, as is tradition, and chill with the Sabin clan until any and all spare abdominal compartments were overflowing.

After cooking for five hours our kitchen was quite the mess. But no need for disgust, we had it all tidied up by the next day.
My family always heads to the park after our big meal. Sunshine is a good digestive catalyst.

I feel I cannot boast of culinary and familial holiday success though without confessing my secret shame: I didn’t make my piecrusts. How could a food scientist not make her own pastry dough? You don’t need to tell me what’s wrong with that. Next year I vow to create any and all crusts. I would have attempted that feat this time but easily-bungled gastronomic research is best left to when you’re not feeding company. (I have learned this lesson the hard way over Thanksgivings past.)

We ate dinner number two with the Sabins. My stomach did not appreciate this double-supper design.

Being able to see both our families every year on Thanksgiving is a joy and a burden. We enjoy spending this holiday with every single one of our loved ones but it wears us out. We come home at the end of the day exhausted. I guess baking until the wee hours of the morning doesn’t help either but sometimes sacrifices must be made in the great cause for deliciousness. Even with my complaints about the fullness of our Thanksgiving, I must admit that between fluff and family I have much to be grateful for.

Rachel December 4, 2012 No Comments
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