cutie pie clarification

perhaps i was misleading in the last post... i didn't get another bunny. no worries. bunkins is the only bunny in my eye. i was tempted though because she is quite the cutie pie!

gf for the bunks?

i found this adorable netherland dwarf bunny up for adoption in annandale, va on craigslist yesterday. sometimes i worry that bunks is too lonely. however, he loves people and pesters us quite frequently so i think he's ok. also i'm not quite down with caring for 2 things (my parsley garden died a while back). isn't she absolutely adorable?

happy chinese new year

really it's happy asian new year, since many asian folks celebrate the new year of the lunar calendar. my people believe you should get new shoes for each new year to stomp on the enemies of the past year and start the new year on new footing. well, shoes can get expensive, especially if you have expensive taste like me. so socks it was!

now remember, i don't know how to knit and my first 6 attempts at that military cardigan failed miserably. luckily (if it can be considered as such), my former math student emma was home during winter break to have foot surgery and was stuck at home. emma is a fantastic knitter. and i have a fantastic moving vehicle. so, with some offers to pick her up and deliver her to free $1 happy hour sushi in exchange for true knitting lessons, we had a deal. so far i have knit 6 pairs, with plans to complete 2 more... here are the 3 different varieties of wool.aren't the kids' socks cute? i felt bad that bunks feels deprived of attention when i craft (he pokes my leg constantly to be pet), so i even offered him my ball of yarn. however, bunks doesn't understand what to do with yarn, so he opted to sun himself next to it instead. hehe and when i got back from spending the new year in hawaii, julia and i agreed to continue our snowpocalypse cook/bake fest. so, on monday night we made calzones (i still haven't mastered working with yeast, so the dough was again fairly dense, though not as much as last time) and i baked a lemon chiffon cake for dessert! i liked this cake more than the angel food cake because it was not as sweet yet equally fluffy. also, this cake was different in that only 8 eggs were used instead of 11!i was supposed to mix a lemon icing to top the cake, however i've been so exhausted from jet lag and too many tutoring sessions that dusting each slice with a little confectioners' sugar has done the job quite well!tonight i must start cutting fabric to make dad's bday shirt. jimmy and i return home next weekend to celebrate. it's a big deal that i finish. must. finish. on. time!!!!

and the snowpocalypse continues...

this week started with a short lull in the snowfall. bunkins even took it upon himself to survey the snow situation outside. he estimated about 20 inches (the bunny is quite adept at math)!! however, on tuesday we got a blizzard with 55 mph winds and an additional foot of snow! i am currently on day #5 of snow days and missed work!! i can't say bunks is a fan though, as he tends to sleep peacefully while julia and i are at work so us being at home translates into sleepless days for the little buns. since restaurants weren't exactly open during the blizzard, julia and i continued our cooking/baking fest and made a pizza from scratch. 2 pizzas actually because i messed up in halving the recipe! (**blush**) here's the dough rising, although not all that much because i realized too late that i didn't halve the water added, so i had to add the rest of the yeast and the other ingredients later, which didn't let the rest of the yeast dissolve properly. here is one of the pizzas all ready to go into the oven! giant didn't exactly have much stuff left. people bought out all of the produce by the 2nd time i went to the store this weekend, so we had to rely on an old yellow pepper, broccoli that we had bought on the 1st trip, and turkey pepperoni. and here is the other one, ready to eat! we were definitely fans and will be making this again, but hopefully with a properly halved batch of dough. last night i started baking goodies for my trip to hawaii this sunday. here are the oatmeal, fruit and chocolate chip cookies. they are from the same recipe as the new years cookies i made this past break, although with proper ingredients! unfortunately they turned out much more crumbly, but still tasty. next up will be gingersnaps and banana bread! cross your fingers that the hardworking folks at dulles airport will clear the snow and ice out in time for my flight to take off! bunks is finally starting to experience the cabin fever that is plaguing the humans in this abode. his lack of sleep is wearing on him to the point where he has now taken to plopping his tired self right in the middle of the cage, something he never does! he usually opts to lie down on that bare spot on the left side of the cage. he's also starting to shed again because the heater has been blasting automatically to combat the blizzard winds that are outside. ok snow, time for you to go away now!

what to do in a snowpocalypse

so the world is going to end, but in dc only. why, you may ask? the weatherpeople have predicted anywhere from 1 to 3 feet of snow for this weekend. i think we're currently at 2 feet, although i can't be sure since it is so windy out. julia and i were planning to go to philly to celebrate our friend martha's bday before she returns to snowy nh, but unfortunately we're stuck. so, we decided to spoil ourselves with lavish meals. to see the general mood around town, visit http://snowpocalypsedc.com/. hehe

to start off the potentially snowed-in weekend, i baked a quiche thursday night. 2 weekends ago, marcus, julia's bf, baked a quiche for us but he used a pre-made crust. tsk tsk. since he swore that a quiche was easy to make, i figured i couldn't mess it up. however, i wasn't in the mood to roll dough, so the crust looks like poo, and i missed the part in joy of cooking where it says to sautee the vegetables beforehand. oops. so after quiche came out, it was a little soggy. i poked several holes in the quiche and used paper towel to wick out a lot of the moisture. phew. "spinach, yellow pepper, and enoki mushroom" quiche, saved! last night, julia and i cleverly avoided the massive lines at the grocery store by going at 9 pm when everyone else would be snowed away! (we can access our grocery store by walking underground, hehe!) people bought out the weirdest things: lemons (???), biscuit dough, bagged salad (but not heads of lettuce! lucky for bunkins!), chocolate chips... anyway we got our ingredients and julia made pasta with peas, cheese and crab meat. it was tasty! i made angel food cake. lan's hand mixer saved my life! the recipe called for 11 egg whites and i was supposed to beat until the mixture was 5 times its original volume. FIVE! here it is midway through the baking process, nice and fluffy and beginning to brown: and here it is unmolded with sliced strawberries all ready to go. i had 11 egg yolks left over and didn't want to waste them, so we googled "what to do with leftover egg yolks" and found a recipe for zabaglione on chowhound.chow.com. so ridiculously appropriate! zabaglione is an italian custardy mousse dessert made from wine, confectioner's sugar, and egg yolks. it's very rich, but goes really well with the lightness of angel food cake. here's how we served up the cake: happy birthday martha! we celebrated you in spirit! one week till chinese new year. must get busy!