New year!

It’s 2023! Joe will be 34 this month! Which is impossible, because in my mind we’re still in our early twenties. We had a great Christmas this year. The kids went on winter break and we took advantage of all the down time. Virginia and I went to a production of the Nutcracker in Bellevue, it was so well done! It was much better than the train wreck of a show we saw last year in Seattle at the ballet school. The first week of break, Joe was still working. We were lucky that we didn’t have anywhere we had to be, because a big snow/ice storm hit us on Tuesday. I’d seen the forecast, so the kids and I ran to the grocery store on Monday and bought literally everything we would need for the week, all the way through Christmas dinner. I’m so glad we did, because the roads got really bad! On Wednesday I thought that the snow plows had been through the area, so the kids and I thought we would go to Redmond and paint pottery. We made it down a few hills, sliding the whole way, when I realized it was not at all safe to be on the roads. We turned around and came home. We didn’t go back out until Saturday!

Luckily Joe and I were done with the majority of our shopping, so we weren’t too stressed about being stuck. We watched a lot of movies, read, and hung out! The kids played outside with Freya. It’s nice that they are old enough to get into their snow gear mostly on their own! It was nice to be at home, without having to worry about traveling or the threat of illness! The bad weather that hit us was all over the US, basically anyone that flew anywhere had a lot of trouble! Rick was stuck in some of the chaos, he got stuck flying even on Christmas.

We had a very chill Christmas Eve. We decorated our Christmas cookies and I made Joe’s favorite Christmas tree pizza for dinner. We watched The Santa Claus and the kids were so ready to go to bed at 8! Joe and I had a few santa related jobs to finish. I made the mistake of putting our plate of cookies for Santa out on the coffee table before putting Freya up our in room. I realized my mistake too late, and Freya had eaten 4 of the 6 cookies! Joe and I had a good laugh. It saved us from having to nibble on any!

We told the kids they could wake us up at 7, so of course they came barreling into our room at about 6:50. They just couldn’t wait any longer. I got my cup of coffee and turned the oven on for breakfast, and we got ready to start our morning! The kids loved seeing their full stockings. They tore into them while Joe and I slowly woke up. After the stockings were open, I put our breakfast in the oven. I’d made sausage rolls and chocolate chip scones the night before, so it was easy! We opened our Santa gifts first. Virginia was excited to see a huge Lego Friends set, and Luke was so glad he’d gotten a drone like he asked for. Joe got me a Theragun, and I got him a bidet attachment for our toilet. We are really settling into our old age. Haha.

We took a break to eat breakfast and got right into all of our gifts. The kids are so good at waiting for their turns, they know how we do it! Freya was a little freaked out by the amount of noise, and all the chaos in the living room, but she handled it well. It was a really nice cozy morning! We ate, Joe and I had mimosas, and we took our time opening everything up. We spent the rest of the day enjoying our new things! We had toys charging, being assembled. We had ham with brown sugar pineapples, mashed potatoes, roast veggies and rolls for dinner. The kids loved it!

Joe took the following week off from work, we loved having him free to hang out with us! The kids and I made our favorite rugelach cookies. We were still opening a lot of new gifts to play with. On Tuesday we had the sitter come, Joe and I went to dinner at The Butcher’s Table. It was one of the best meals we’d had in a while! We followed it up with blizzards from Dairy Queen for dessert. It was a great date night. On Wednesday we finally got to go paint pottery, which was more fun with Joe! On Thursday we went to the trampoline park and then went to Burgermaster for dinner. On Friday afternoon we saw the new Avatar movie. It was the kids first 3D movie, and it was 3 hours and 10 minutes long. Plus previews, we were in the theatre for almost four hours! Luckily the reclining seats are very comfy. The kids did great with how long it was, and the 3D didn’t scare them too much! On Sunday night we went out to Renton to Top Golf. Joe was so excited! We were in a bay on the third floor, which was cool but also a little nerve wracking with the kids! I was a little nervous they’d chase a golf ball and fall off the edge! Luckily they were very well behaved and they had fun hitting balls with Joe!

It was a great week, I think Joe was really able to relax and recharge! We did a lot of fun activities, but Joe was able to play a lot of Destiny and take naps when he wanted! It was a nice easy vacation. I was just so glad we all stayed healthy! It was a nice change after having an under the weather Thanksgiving. We did a lot of facetiming with family back home, which was nice! The kids went back to school and I immediately ran to wander the aisles of Target on my own. I’ve been finding things to put on our new built in shelves. I don’t want to just cram them full, I want to be kind of picky about how we fill them. After the Christmas tree was taken down, we could really appreciate how nice the shelves look. I’m so glad we had it done finally!

The kids are back in the swing of things with school, and Joe is back working. We went to Olive Garden on Saturday and had a good lunch, but Joe was sad because they took the lemon cake off the menu that he used to love. I found a knock off recipe online and made it on Sunday. It’s all I can think about! It turned out amazing! I’ll definitely be making it again and again! I made the crumb called for in the recipe, but would definitely leave it out next time. It didn’t add much to the cake, but added extra time and dishes that weren’t worth it. I found the recipe on Pinterest- https://foodfolksandfun.net/copycat-olive-garden-lemon-cream-cake/?fbclid=IwAR0evwkqRSsM34VNqt3A0Z4hVZrC-sw6MbOdWMoKku_aC2NQZYEzF1WWi9o

Knock Off Olive Garden Lemon Cream Cake

FOR WHITE CAKE:

• 1 cup whole milk room temperature
• 6 large egg whites room temperature
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 ¼ cups cake flour
• 1 ¾ cups granulated sugar
• 4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 12 tablespoons unsalted butter cut into 24 pieces, softened but still cool

FOR FILLING:

• 1 cup heavy cream
• 8 oz container mascarpone cheese softened
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 3 Tablespoons lemon juice
• ½ Tablespoon finely grated lemon zest

MAKE WHITE CAKE:

• Adjust oven rack to middle position and preheat to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease bottom of a 9-inch springform pan. Line with parchment round, and lightly spray entire pan; set aside.
• In a large measuring cup whisk together milk, egg whites, and vanilla; set aside.
• In a large bowl whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt on low speed until combined. Add butter, 1 piece at a time, and mix with an electric mixer until only pea-sized pieces of butter remain about 1 minute.
• Pour in half of the milk mixture, and mix on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 1 minute. Reduce speed to medium-low, and add remaining milk mixture, and beat until incorporated, about 30 seconds.
• Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth top with a rubber spatula. Bake until lightly golden and a toothpick inserted comes out clean, about 45-50 minutes, rotating halfway through baking.
• Cool cake cool on a wire rack in the pan for 20 minutes. Remove cake from pan, discarding parchment, and let cool completely on a wire rack, about 2 hours.

MAKE FILLING:

• Whip heavy cream until stiff peaks form; set aside. Beat mascarpone cheese, powdered sugar, lemon juice, and lemon zest on medium speed until smooth. Fold in whipped cream until combined.

FINISH CAKE:

• Split cake horizontally, and place 1 layer on cardboard round. Reserve ½ cup of filling, and use the rest to fill the cake. Place the second layer on top of the filling. Use reserved ½ cup filling to frost just the sides of the cake. Press crumb topping into sides of the cake, and chill at least 1 hour. Dust top of the cake with powdered sugar. Slice and serve.