ginger bread extravaganza

Last week we got together with our neighbors the Barnwells and had a ginger bread house raising... much like an Amish barn raising.  It was a lot of fun.  Here are the entrants:

Chelsy went for the classic, candyland approach.  Picturesque, quaint, delicious!

Ashley went for the... "big on landscape, little on house."  Unfortunately she didn't finish as she got distracted by the party and putting George to sleep.  She didn't want the paparazzi (me) to take a picture of it.

I went for the classic, Frank Loyd Wright's Falling Waters.  I have never gone for something so ambitious and I was certainly limited by the medium and patience, but I was happy with the overall end result.

Tyler went for the ultimate neo-gothic castle.  Fresh with suspension bridge held up by licorice strings!

Look at that attention to detail!  Tyler definitely wins the craftsmanship award.

Here's Ashley's submission.  As she was putting the finishing touches on it I heard her say under her breath, "Ashley, you've done it again, another masterpiece."  : )

We also went to see Santa at our Church Christmas Party.  As we placed George on his lap, George kept his arms stiff as a board, as if he wanted to keep contact at a minimum at all costs.

We hope you are all having a great Christmas and Holiday season.

Merry Christmas

You probably already received this in your email, but just in case:

Also, I'm curious. How does this year's rate compared to 2009 and 2008? Cast your vote here.

I was also thinking of funnier captions than "Happy Holidays."

I was thinking of:
"Don we now our gay apparel."
"Have a Royally Awesome Christmas"
"Montana's really rubbing off on us...

Any ideas there?

it's winter

Slowly - but surely - we are coming to grips with the fact that it's winter here in Montana.  As we had been winter-free for nearly four years, we weren't exactly sure how we'd adjust to the cold slap in the face that is a Montana winter.  We've braced for it, and made adequate preparations.  We've bought our winter coats, snow tires, shovels, and dusted off our mittens and hats.  It kind of seems comical that we even owned a pair living in Los Angeles.

Something that was ironically fortunate, was that the first "real" cold week was a string of days that were in the negatives.  It was serious cold.   It has since warmed up... and now we find ourselves enjoying the 20's and 30's quite well.  We have got a lot of snow (at least two feet I'd reckon) since it started, and I am now a firm believer that if you want to enjoy snow, there's got to be a lot of it.  A couple of inches and it's just annoying.  A couple of feet - now there's a party!  We've got several strategies in place for enjoying the winter... with more to come I'm sure:

Ashley and George pause from a fun day in the snow.  When the sun comes out and its 30, it's quite easy to spend a comfortable few hours out playing.  We go as long as George can handle it... wear him out.  And just when we think he's ready to go in...

... we put him to work shoveling the snow.  Nothing like burning off the ole "Thanksgiving five" with some manual labor!

We cut down this beauty, for the steep figure of $5 smackers.  It is probably about 7 feet or so (our first full sized tree) and I'm absolutely in love with it.  At night we turn off the lights and though I'm supposed to be watching season four of prison break (a death march right now), I can't help but look at this beautiful tree.  It's got everything I want.  The look, the feel, the smell of a family tree.

We also are experimenting with George's housewear and lounge looks... everything from the...

German tourist at the beach, to the...

Indie hipster in Brooklyn picking up a redbox rental for him and his sweetheart.

Last Saturday they closed down Main Street for the "Winter Stroll."  Bozeman has a great civic scene... lots of events and tons of kids out.  We meandered our way through the caroling and crowds and settled in on some delicious fry bread, pizza by the slice, and hot apple cider.  So much fun.

George enjoying fry bread

Ashley caught this spectacle on Sunday afternoon.  It was quite cold, but the sun was out. It had completely frozen everything on the tree... reminding me of an image of bronchioli from a 7th grade biology book.

I'm sure there are more adventures to come.  We're kicking around the idea of becoming snowshoe or cross country ski-enthusiasts... though I may also take up snow-sculpture.  We hope you all are enjoying your winters, near and far.

retiring the food blog, now on to death defying adventures

8 foot plus icicle on our roof.  I knocked it down with a shovel and it seriously almost knocked me over. 

Photoshop recreation and scale so you can see the magnitude of this bad boy.

big news, pulsipherad is turning into a food blog

Over Thanksgiving and with a little help from Ashley, I made my first pumpkin pie. I documented the highlights and I was inspired to quit my job and rebrand this blog.  I'm going to take super high quality pictures of the meals I make, in painstaking detail.  Don't try to talk me out of it... because I know no one's thought of this idea already.

It was a pretty good pie though... all joking aside.