A Day That Will Live in Infamy

I leaned over the balcony of the USS Arizona Memorial, watching the tears of the Arizona glisten in the water, as oil continues to leak out of the ship sunken below.  She is called "the ship that weeps for her dead", and fittingly so.

I stood in front of the wall that is etched with the 1,177 names of our heros who lost their lives that day. 

There were tears in my eyes and chills on my skin as I tried to take it all in.  Tried to understand the magnitude of where I was. 

I was standing in a moment that has been written about in text books...I was in a place that shaped our country...our families...our history.  

Today, we remember those people.

70 years ago our country was forever changed.

The next time you see a soldier, please go say Thank You.  

You might feel strange, awkward, or a little uncomfortable.  

Do it anyway.

These people are willing to die for us, yet we often forget about them. 

Their ship could sink in a moment and it could be their name etched on the wall....

Let them know you're grateful.

Missin' Maui

Have I mentioned that I fell in love with Hawaii when we were there last year?  Yes, I'm sure I have.  Once, twice, maybe a dozen times.  There is a reason they call it paradise. 

Over the past year, many reminders of our time in Hawaii have crept into our lives.

Ornaments.

Window decals.

Birthday parties.

Greetings.

Most recently, I cleaned the shells we brought back.  I soaked them in a bleach solution and scrubbed them up the best I could. 

This is where we found them:

And this is where they are now:

A constant reminder of the place that invades my dreams.

Where are you dreaming of today?

Longhi's

I know I've written about Longhi's a few times, our favorite restaurant in Maui.
Several months ago I purchased their cookbook off Amazon.com and recently tried my first recipe from there -- Lemon Zucchini Pasta. 

Oh me oh my. 

Creamed wine sauce.  Ohhhh yes. 

Eating this pasta takes you to a place where calories don't exist.

Are you drooling yet? 

Want to try making it yourself?  Go right ahead.  Make your tastebuds happy.  They will start singing with joy.  By the second bite, you will be in pasta-bliss. 

Lemon Zucchini Pasta

1 tablespoon salt
1 pound linguine
1 teaspoon chopped garlic
½ cup dry white wine
¼ cup fresh lemon juice
Zest of 1 lemon
1 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons salted butter
2 small zucchini, julienned
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper


Fill a large stockpot with water and bring to a boil. Add salt, then drop the linguine into the boiling water. Cook until al dente, and drain.
 
While pasta is cooking, combine garlic, wine, and lemon juice and zest in a large sauté pan with high sides and reduce until 2 tablespoons remain, about 5 minutes. Add the cream and simmer for 1 minute.
 
In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add the zucchini and sweat for 1 minute.
 
Add the cooked pasta to the cream mixture. Add the zucchini and toss. Season generously with salt and pepper.
 
***  I also included a grated carrot which I added in with the zucchini and some diced grilled chicken.  It was a complete meal all by itself and so good. ***

Happy cooking,

Hawaii - Part 2

Yes, I've been back on mainland soil for 3.5 months already, but a piece of my heart stayed firmly planted in Maui.  Here are more glimpses of the loveliness of the Island.

Beautiful flowers and Hawaiian blessings were left on my pillow each day.

This lovely waterfall was on the grounds of our Resort.

We passed this gorgeous Hibiscus bush on our way to breakfast each morning.

Longhi's was our favorite restaurant and you could find us

there most mornings before starting our daily adventures.

This particular morning we lingered over French Press coffee

and a warm-from-the-oven blueberry scone. 

What they failed to mention when we ordered

our coffee that it was $15.  Yes, a Bodum of coffee,

holding appox 3 cups worth was $15. 

Have I been living under a rock?

In the town of Lahaina we went on a 2 hour whale-watch and afterwards our guide

said we saw a weeks-worth of humpback whales in that single outing!

Also in Lahaina we stumbled across the Banyan Tree -- so cool!

The perfect ending to any warm day in Hawaii is Shaved Ice.

Soooo delicious!

On this trip I became an Island Girl 

 

and forever fell in Love with the beautiful Island of Maui.

Aloha,

Sesame Goodness

Last week I made Asian Chicken wraps and the sesame dressing on them took me back to Kimo's Restaurant in Lahaina, Maui were I ate the most amazing chicken salad on the face of the earth. The dressing on these wraps was very close to what they used on that luscious salad.
Their menu calls it: Wo Hing Salad and per their description is has Fresh greens, vegetables with wontons, roasted peanuts, sesame dressing, and teriyaki chicken breast.

Be still my heart. It was absolutely amazing.

So if you want a small taste of Maui, try making these chicken wraps and you’ll be transported from your kitchen table to a beautiful Island, if only for a few bites.

Asian Chicken Wrap:

Tortilla, large

Chicken -- crunchy, teriyaki or plain

Mandarin oranges

Salad greens

Almonds, slivered & toasted

Cheese, shredded

Sesame Dressing (below)

Sesame Dressing:

1/2 c. Mayonnaise

1 Tbsp. Sesame Oil

1 Tbsp. Lemon Juice

1/8 c. Sugar

2 Tbsp. Milk (more if too thick)
1 Tbsp. Sesame Seeds

Layer all ingredients in the tortilla and drizzle with Sesame dressing. 

Wrap tightly and enjoy!

I promise to tell you all more about our trip but it's not going to happen until we get the rest of our pictures organized. All I currently have are ones that were still on my camera from our last two days there. The rest are on the laptop waiting for us to have some “free time” because we have to renumber about 1,000 of them (long story…).

And yes, I said 1,000 more. We really enjoy taking pictures.

Have a great weekend, ya'll!

Hawaii - the Flowers

I absolutely love flowers – their colors, scents, and individual beauty. Hawaii was definitely no exception to this and around every corner was another piece of floral exquisiteness beckoning for me to gaze upon it.

The resort where we stayed had garden after gorgeous garden, both inside the lobby and outside on the grounds. Some of the flowers I didn’t know the names of, but I found each of them uniquely lovely and filled with the fingerprints of God.

Come, walk through the Maui gardens with me and look upon the flowers of paradise. . .

I'm Baaaaack!

I'm back!

Yes, I’ve been MIA the last couple of weeks – first to vacation, the second week to sickness.  2 ½ days off work and a whole weekend at home has left me with a touch of cabin fever, but I’m thankful to finally be on the mend.   It’s a quiet Saturday in my happy little home, I have the laundry in the washer, dishes all done, a big pot of soup on the stove and now it’s time to blog for a bit. … before I forget how!

Thursday morning I finally dragged myself to the doctor (actually, my dear husband drove me there…) and I got some antibiotics.  The diagnosis: Sinus infection, Ear infection, Upper respiratory infection.  No wonder I didn’t feel good.  I drank a hundred cups of tea, spent long hours watching old TV show reruns, and rarely left the couch.  I haven’t been that sick in several years, and I’m thankful to be well on the way to “normal” once again!

Vacation was AMAZING.  There was nothing about Maui that I didn’t fall in love with… it’s all I’ve been able to think about since coming back to the freezing Midwest. But the sun is shining through my window right now, so I’m trying to forget about the fact that it’s only 23 degrees out and just bask in the glow of the rays.  We have roughly 2000 pictures from our trip, so when we get everything organized I’ll do some posts about vacation – it was certainly something I’ll remember forever.    A big highlight for me:  getting to swim in the ocean.  It was a first for me and SO much fun!  The taste of the salt water definitely takes some getting used to, and my eyes never did quite adjust to it, but it was incredible.  I fell in love with so many things there.  More on all that in future posts!

Our health-food kick is in full swing now, and the past couple days have gone really well.  Green Monsters are going to become part of our regular diet (now that I’ve actually become brave enough to make them), as well as more natural and Organic foods.  Yesterday I made some lovely hummus, which is delicious on sandwiches or with veggies.  I’m getting the hang on disguising the taste of veggies and we’re eating many more of them, which I’m rather proud about.  We don’t mind eating them, we just aren’t big fans of tasting them!  We’re also drinking some V8 Fusion in the morning to get the extra servings that we need.  I am so excited about going to the Farmer’s Market in the summer to buy local produce and stock up on all the fresh goodness!

I need to catch up on my blog reading and get back to commenting.  Sorry about the delinquency!  A part of me has enjoyed the break from technology, but I’m starting to miss all my bloggy friends!  Hopefully posts will start coming more regularly again. 

Time to go fold some laundry and enjoy a bowl of soup. 

Bon Voyage

Aloha, my friends!

In two days I’ll be winging my way through the air headed for blue water and sunny skies! Hawaii, here we come! I can’t begin to express how excited I am!!!! I never really minded winter while I was growing up, but I’m coming to dislike it more and more with every week that passes. I love snow for the holidays, but after that, I’m ready for springtime -- birds, sunshine, flowers, open windows, and just being outside!

Plans for our time in Maui include whale watching, driving to the top of the volcano Haleakala to watch the sun rise, soaking up lots of rays on the beautiful beaches, swimming in the amazing pools, driving the Road to Hana to see the beautiful waterfalls & lagoons, visiting Pearl Harbor, eating great food, and whatever else strikes our fancy! Who knows, maybe Mike will even get me to try snorkeling! We are both looking forward to warm weather and relaxation, a break from work and the busy schedule we have around here. I hope to come back with hundreds of pictures and plenty of stories to tell.

I need to whip up a couple snacks to take on the long flight with us, charge my iPod, load up all those camera batteries, and hopefully finish up making my new sack purse before we leave (I’ll post pictures if I get that accomplished!).

We are literally counting the days and hours until we can leave the cold Midwest and head towards the sunny tropics! I’ll doubt I’ll be posting while we’re gone, but I’m still going to try and put up my 365 pictures which will give you a glimpse of what we’re doing!!!

Do any of you have “winter escapes” planned while we’re waiting for spring to appear?

Our January Life

In case I haven’t mentioned this before, I blog in my free time, therefore, absence of posts = absence of free time. Going into year 2010, I knew January would be a busy month for us.

My best friend got married last Saturday, which made for a very busy week of preparations. I will have a more lengthy post about it some other time, when I actually have a picture of the Bride. A plethora of pictures on my camera and yet somehow I managed to neglect getting a good picture of her. But you can still see a sneak-peak of her here. My husband was an usher and I was the Matron of Honor – it was a simply beautiful day and the bride was stunningly gorgeous.

The next big event in our lives is getting ready for our Hawaiian vacation! We leave next week and are SO ready to get out of this Midwest weather! Six full days in the beautiful tropics, 80 degree weather, soaking in the sights, sounds and sunshine! We are beyond excited and are literally counting the days until we leave! This trip will be my first airplane ride, about which I am both nervous and excited. So many new experiences; I’ll be taking pictures galore on this trip!!!!  We are staying at a resort in Maui, and I drool (not literally...) over the website looking at the beautiful pools and lush surroundings.  Oh beautiful Sunshine, you can't come soon enough!!!

On an unrelated topic, I am in the midst of constructing a post on Thrifting & Frugal Fashion (as I’m wearing my NY & CO dress pants that I bought for $4.99), which will hopefully get finished and posted sometime this week. It's a topic that I personally get very excited about, and hopefully some of you will too! :)

… so stay tuned!