Thanks for the memories

It has been a BUSY couple of days! We said goodbye to our dear friend Michelle and headed to Amsterdam on Thursday. What a city...we enjoyed great weather, wonderful Dutch hospitality and the spoils of life in the Netherlands.

We arrived too late in the day to see much on Thursday but we did check into our B&B (amazing) and enjoyed a quiet evening in while watching the Dog Whisperer and The Devil's Own.
Brad Pitt is fitting even on vacation.

Friday was nuts. We mustered all the energy we had to see the state museum, Anne Frank house and the impressive Van Gogh collection here in Ams. We saw all of these sites via rented bicycles which was fantastic. A great way to see the city but also very tiring and at times a bit frightening thanks to traffic rules. After the three biggies we made our way toward the Red Light District. No photos to post from that (our cameras would have been thrown in the canal) but suffice it to say we had a few laughs and could have people watched for hours! The night ended with a long ride back through Vondel Park and McDonald's veggie burgers (YES!)

Today we finished our trip with more museums, more art and a canal tour. We flew to London where we will crash for the night then head home tomorrow!

Last Day In France and Belgium Adventures!

Bonjour.. Hallo..

We're relaxing in our room on Stalingrad avenue in downtown Brussels. The train station across the street is loud and we are tired.

Let's recap the last few days. They've been fun. Here we go:

Monday morning started with a quick breakfast and a delicious lunch with our hosts in the north of France. From there, Xav took us to Ètretat, France's answer to the Cliffs of Dover (so high you can't see ooovvveerrr). What a sight. Sprawling high above the choppy waves and tricky tides, these wind-whipped wonders (oh, yeah) of nature left us in awe. Hopefully our pictures will do it justice (not the ones attached, these are just phone shots).

After the cliffs we stopped by a distillery/monastery for a liquor called Benedictine. It was interesting. The liquor was sweet like bear meat and was overall not very tasty, also like bear meat.

Dinner with our hosts was bittersweet. It was our last night in France with some of the most wonderful people we've had the privilege of meeting. The sweet part was the dinner. Oh, man. So good. Homemade pies! Including ratatouille.

Cut to early morning. We say our sad goodbyes to great friends, then we are whipping through several French villages to get to our train station on time. Success! We're off to Belgium.

We arrive in Belgium mid afternoon and hit the ground running. We stop and get a well known dish, fritas (fries) served with mayo. Delicious. From there we people watch. A World Cup qualifying match between Belgium and Scotland is in town and the hooligans are everywhere! This town is a party!

This is when we meet up with Shelly. We've known Shelly for a year and a half. I worked with her at Yelp. About a month ago she moved to Florence to teach English, so it was a real treat to catch up with her!

We tooled around the town for a few hours then grabbed dinner and a few beers.

This morning we took a train to Brugges. We spent the entire day wandering through the streets. Really lovely place. We took a beer tour showcasing the last beer made in the city walls, ate lots of chocolate, a waffle, and had more fries. What a day.

Cutting this short as writing on my terrible phone is making me nauseous.

Tomorrow we'll walk around Brussels a bit more then head to Amsterdam, our final stop on this trip!

France as we know it

We have been eating too much bread and cheese to blog...apologies.

We are spending our fifth night in France and it has been wonderful. To wrap up the last few days...

We spent two nights in Saint Malo at the home of Mathilde's mother's cousin. It was lovely and very close to many beautiful sights. We spent the mornings waiting out the rain but took advantage of sunny afternoons at Mont St Michel and the old town of Saint Malo...which it turns out was bombed almost completely to the ground during the war and since been rebuilt. We were able to cook dinner both nights at the home which was a nice way to end the chilly autumn days.

Today we left Saint Malo and visited
the sites of the plages du débarquement (D-Day.) It was a very full day but well worth the walking and time in the car. Grégoire was a trooper! We began at Utah Beach and continued to the German cemetery. This was a path less traveled and had twice as many graves as its American counterpart. Sad and humbling as this was not all that long ago. We continued on to Pont du Hoc which house the remaining German bunkers for visitors. These were exactly as portrayed in the movies and very interesting to stand in.

We continued on to Omaha Beach (aka Bloody Omaha) and the American cemetery and memorial. Breathtaking. Neither of us have many words for what we saw but I think it's true when others say you will never forget it. The feeling of camaraderie was palpable and I am grateful we were not there to live through such horrible times. We finished our day at the musée in Caen dedicated to the war and to a future of peace.

Now we rest at the home of Mathilde's good friend Bea and her famille near Etretat where we will spend the remainder of our time in France. We had a delicious dinner of crepes and laughed together in spite our mutual language barrier :) I love France and have very much enjoyed our time with Mathilde and Xav. Mathilde has been wonderfully patient with my French and I look forward to impressing her with my skills next time we see them! Bonne nuit!

Avrillé

Today was rainy but it was maybe a good thing as it helped Steve and I  catch up on sleep. We woke up at 11:30, had a late breakfast with Mathilde, Xav and little Grégoire. The rain cleared for the rest of the day and the five of us took the opportunity to tour Château Angers. We also saw Mathilde and Xav's new house which will be ready for move in by the end of the month! C'est magnifique and so beautiful.

We had a quiet evening at home eating pizza, drinking wine and watching Final Destination part deux en français. Tomorrow morning we depart for Mont St. Michel where we will tour and then spend the next two nights in Saint Malo. Au revoir for now.

Bonne nuit

We are saying goodnight from Angers, France. As we have been neglecting our duties, here is a recap of the last couple days.

Yesterday we attended a morning tour of St. Paul's Cathedral. The highlight of the tour was the view from the top, 600 feet above the church floor.

From there we went to Buckingham Palace to take another tour. Turns out, you can only tour during the summer months. The Queen did not respond to requests of a public viewing.

We then walked to the museums in South Kensington. They were nice.

The next morning (today) we woke up at 3 to catch an early train to France. We said goodbye to our amazing host, Kaitlin,and the city of London.

Lots of hours on trains landed us in Blois where we met up with our friends from Angers. We hopped over to Chambord to tour the castle then back to Angers to wrap up a long, fun Day.

Please excuse strange formatting or misspellings. It's late.

Pictures:
Top of St. Paul's
French train station
Chambord Castle

London: rainy day two

Oh, hi there.

We started our day with a huge breakfast at our hotel room. T'was delicious.

We then hit the street to visit the Yelp UK office! Once outside we were showered with a proper English rain. First thing Lindsay said was, ”Would ya look at it?!” I looked at it.

The Yelp UK office was awesome. Really great building, great people. There we met up with Kaitlin, our host for the rest of our London stay, then we were off again.

First stop was the British Museum to see the Rosetta Stone. That was swell. Then we just kinda walked around. We ended up at St. Paul's Cathedral. We popped in a bit late for a tour, so that'll be tomorrow.

Tomorrow will be a busy one. St. Paul's, Buckingham, and 3 museums.

Hopefully we get a wee bit of sun as well.

Attached photos:
Lindsay's ILLEGAL photo inside St. Paul's.
Lunch
The Rosetta Stone
Lindsay
Roasted cacahuetes (peanuts)
Us!

Day 1...complete.

We arrived safely in London this afternoon and struggled to get ourselves out of the hotel room after check in. To combat inevitable jet lag, we decided to enjoy our first night here with a palace, dinner and yes, Starbucks.

We toured Kensington Palace which unfortunately was a bit disappointing. Not much to see and expensive to boot. I was looking forward to the Princess Di collection and it did not do her justice! Anyhow, we just finished a yummy meal at a burger place we stumbled upon during our last visit. Nothing says England like french fries, onion rings and a portabello burger!

Turning in early tonight and getting an early start to the day tomorrow, beginning at the London Yelp office!

Leaving on a jet plane

We are at Sky Harbor waiting for our departure to London. Ready for a good night's sleep and to get this party started Euro style!

Growing Up

On Saturday, Dexter officially graduated from his first round of training courses (best in class if you ask me.) We are very proud parents.

The Eye of the Beholder

I'm sure the upgraded quality in photos on here lately has not gone unnoticed. To answer that burning question, no--I have not become a professional photographer. However, my amazingly talented (and smokin' hot) husband is superb with a camera and has been willing to be the official photographer for our little blog. Lucky me :)

The man at work.

Always Save Room for Dessert

As many of you already know, Steve and I were given a Kitchenaid mixer for Christmas this year. My Grandma Marlys, who knows me all too well, has officially and single-handedly been able to cross something quite important off of my bucket list. Before you roll your eyes at me and scoff at how ridiculous this sounds, allow me to justify my sentiment about this wonderful appliance that is now in our home.

Many of my fondest memories as a young girl, a teen and now a grown up (if you can call me that!) were in the kitchen. While I feel fairly apt in the kitchen, I know my confidence has always exceeded my actual skill and this surely comes from my parent's consistent, overwhelming and gracious compliments of my culinary skill. Even when I ruined a meal or set a smoke detector off, it was a learning experience and nothing to fret about.

Example numero uno. Many years ago, I was entrusted with making the family pumpkin pies for Thanksgiving. This is a large responsibility and one that should not be taken lightly. Usually it goes just fine and dandy. Three years ago, I made 4 pies to stretch across both of our family's turkey tables. It was with horror that I realized right before they were served that this lady forgot to put the sugar in the pies. The SUGAR, people. I was so upset--Thanksgiving was surely ruined. My dad, who is the least picky eater I have ever known, quickly plopped a huge dollop of whipped cream on top of a slice and announced that it was actually pretty good with the sugary sweet Cool Whip to finish it off. Nice save, Dad.

Example numero dos. I couldn't have been more than 13 and we were in Minnesota for Christmas. It is Purdy family tradition to have Swedish meatballs for Christmas Eve dinner, a staple that is perfect every single year. I was helping my mom in my Grandma's kitchen as we bustled away getting everything ready. My Grandma allowed me to use her Kitchenaid (which I think she has owned since before I was born) and I started mixing away. Again...horror quickly struck when I realized that after putting all that ground beef in the mixer, I had failed to remove the thin paper that lines the bottom of meat packaging. It was finely torn to shreds, coating the raw beef mixture before me. Embarrassed, I told my Mom what happened and she grabbed the mixing bowl. pulled up a couple of chairs and painstakingly went through that batch with me until every last bit of paper was gone. It was a "thanks Mom for saving the day" moment and I'll never forget it.

So those are the mistakes. The things that we can all laugh about later. Moreover, there are plenty of good memories and perfectly cooked meals that were made with my parents in our kitchen, many of them using my Mom's Kitchenaid which has always been placed carefully and practically in her kitchen. Those Swedish meatballs I mentioned earlier are a heartbreaker. I loved those little slow cooked morsels of beefy goodness and think of it as one of the few things I truly miss since giving up meat. Even now, when preparing for a big dinner, it is a family event. Dad's usually the pro at prep work, Mom focuses on the stovetop, Erin tries her best (love you, sister), Steve and Ron are eager to volunteer their services as taste testers and me, frantic and unorganized--but also, completely comfortable and at ease.

Hopefully this gives the world a little insight into the madness within (especially when it comes to cooking) and why this gift is so important and was thought of with such love. Thank you, Gram for this wonderful addition to our home. We will love it as long as her little motor keeps purring! :)

The first treat I made with the mixer is a Pletkovich family favorite. The recipe belongs to my Aunt Mary and I know our bellies are thankful to her for sharing it! From our (now green) kitchen to yours!

My new child (she has yet to be named)

Black Bottom Cupcakes

For chocolate batter:
1 1/2 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cocoa
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup water
5 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon cider vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla

For filling:
1-8 oz package cream cheese
1 egg
1/3 cup sugar
1-8 oz package of semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line cupcake pans with muffin tins or papers.

Add cream cheese, egg and sugar to mixer. Beat on medium speed until well mixed. Gently fold in chocolate chips by hand. Set aside.

Combine all batter ingredients and mix thoroughly.

Spoon chocolate batter into tins filling only half way.

Spoon a heaping teaspoon of cream cheese filling into the middle of each tin.

Bake for 20-25 minutes. Let rest for 5 minutes in pan then remove and place on cooling rack. Enjoy slightly warm or at room temperature.