10 year anniversary

My husband and I celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary back at the scene of the crime, South Lake Tahoe in July. Our actual anniversary was in June, but I was off traipsing around Europe with our oldest daughter and Brandon was stuck home working and caring for our son. Sucked to be him.

So in July, I owed him a real vacation. Thanks to my mom and dad, who kept the kids, we ventured off to Tahoe for 4 days and 3 nights. We stayed at the Let me just tell you I love the Embassy Suites. I love all the ones I have stayed in, but especially the Tahoe one. It is next door to the major casinos, but offers a hot cooked to order breakfast and a 2 hour happy hour, which we utilized nightly.

Brandon and I reflected while we were there on how much Tahoe has changed since we wed. Back then, I bought my wedding dress off the rack at Clothestime, a store I don't even know exists anymore. Tahoe back in 98 had an old outlet shopping center, a Kmart and a Millers Outpost as its major shopping choices. Restaurant choices were mainly in the casinos. Fast forward to 2008 and there are the Shops at Heavenly, dining choices out the wazoo and a more upscale vibe.

The next morning we had to wake up before the crack of dawn and went sport fishing. While we didn't catch any fish, it was a wonderful morning on the lake. Tahoe is just gorgeous, bright blue lake, green trees, the weather was as good as I could have asked for. The crazy boat we spent the morning sport fishing on. Our captains were so much fun. I definitely recommend Tahoe Sportfishing http://www.tahoesportfishing.com/. Here is a picture from our boat.

Another fun excursion was the paddle boat 3 hour lake cruise. The captain told funny stories, they cruised us about the lake to Emerald Bay, we saw osprey in the nest with babies and met many fun and friendly people.

The gondola ride was fun, especially for my husband who enjoyed my fear of heights as we made our way up the mountain. We had a private gondola which took us from about 6000 ft elevation to over 9000 ft elevation up the side of a mountain. There are two places to get off, one is a viewing area with a little snack food place, the top is the ski area with full bar and a zip line that dh wasdying to try. Book ahead if you want to try the zip line, they are booked ahead! Here is a vie of the gondola lift from the lake, See that skinny line going up the side of the mountain? It continues up past the mountain and up another mountain. I survived and partially overcame my fear of heights. Partially.

My son

My son... where do I begin? He is a *special* child in so many ways. When I say special, I mean it in so many ways too. We often tease to other people that Dylan is special, as in odd, weird, different, kooky, crazy, off the hook, funny and a whole multitude of other describers.

Here he is in his little water wings. I don't know what this face is, but I think he was doing some sappy eyed thing similar to Puss N Boots in Shrek. Why is he wearing water wings? Who knows, somebody left them at our pool and he likes playing with them. He doesn't need them, the boy is a fish. In fact, swimming was one of the first times I noticed how *special* Dylan was. It was summertime and Dylan was about 18 months old. He, in his little life jacket, would cannon ball off the diving board and swim in the pool for hours like he was a pro.... except he was about 25 pounds of baby.

Another is Dylan's special talents is he can make all sorts of unusual sounds with his mouth. Not just your typical boy farting noises, he can make machine gun sounds, lasers, rifles, bombs, other weapons I haven't a clue about. He does this usually by himself playing with his 'guys' (i.e. power rangers and the like) or playing outside with a stick by himself. He can entertain himself for hours.

We realized Dylan was bright as a toddler. Just little odd things he would say or do. Like he would beat Ally to the punch on simple math at age 3 and we had never really worked with him on addition. We never really 'taught' him to read, but by 4 he was reading some and with a little bit of time with me on sight words, he was completely reading by 4 1/2. He just surprises you with the stuff he knows sometimes. Like when he was a baby, 9 months old, he had barely started crawling and was a chubby thing, he stood up and walked 4 steps out of the blue. We didn't even think he would be walking until 12 months or more because he wasn't even cruising furniture.

In every way he is a boy. Except when he wants to play with the girls. Last week the girls were doing makeup and asked if they could do his nails and makeup, "I don't cawe' (he cant say his r's still, Ill get to that in a minute). He let these two nine year olds do a total makeover on his with makeup, nail polish, the whole shebang.

He cant say his Rs, th's or sh's. He has a little lisp. He will be telling you all about dinosaurs and the factoids about some Jurassic era or a specific about a certain dinosaur, something very intellectual, and it is coming out with a lisp and a lack of ths, rs, or shs. Its comical to me. He was kicked out of speech in kindergarten because they say these are things we dont worry about until 7. He is independent.. 'did you miss me when I was gone for 2 weeks to Europe Dylan?' his reply, no, I was fine.
He is a sweet kid. He comes in some mornings and snuggles... that is until he realizes he has a Wii he can go play.

Europe

We spent a wonderful two weeks touring Europe. First stop, England. We were all over London and had day trips to Stratford, Oxford, Stonehenge, Bath, Canterbury and Dover.

Your standard Brittish phone booth photo!

Shana & Ally at the Roman Baths in Bath, England.

Bath, England.

Ally at Stonehenge

Ally at the Tower of London

This armor cracks me up. I think it is Henry VIIIs armor, but my eighth grade mentality cracks up at his package armor.

Speaking of immature humor, Ally was pretending to use the 15th (?) century toilet in the Tower of London.

Here are the Cliffs of Dover as we loaded a boat for the hour ride across the English Channel into France.

Onward to Paris. We hit the Musse d' Orsay, House of Versailles, Louve, a cruise down the river Sienne and many other hot spots!

Ally & Shana at the Eiffel Tower.

Our group at the Louve

Ally at Montmarte overlooking Paris.

Now is where the real adventure begins. We board a train in Paris for a 14 hour trip to Rome. By this point, we have spent about 9 days together, so we were all pretty well bonded and comfortable with each other, which proved to be a good thing. As we lug our 50# bags onto this train, we quickly realize that 6 of us, with our huge luggage will be spending over half a day - some without air conditioning - in a 6 x 7 train car. It was a long hot night!

Notice the feet dangling from the top? They cram you in three high bunks. I am just glad we shared with our group, this could be a nightmare with people you don't know!! But look at us, we all wanted to huddle in one car together. A few of us jumped off the train in Switzerland at midnight just to say we had been there, but also to get 5 minutes of fresh air.

Now onto Rome! After our 14 hour, hot, crammed train ride with no showers, we hit the ground running in Rome straight to the Colosseum. Boy were we a pretty sight. Plus is was 90 degrees with about 90% humidity. Rome - the Colosseum with the girls.

Our crazy group in Rome.



Trevi Fountain - Rome - the water that pours from the aqueducts is amazing. Around every corner you just put your water bottle in and fill with fresh ice cold water! This was awesome since it was sweltering.

Need a fill up for your water bottle?

Ally with Katie & Lance in Rome

Ally, playing in the fountain after she filled up another bottle of water.

Sitting at the Forum.

Ally & Shana at the Vatican - lightning did not strike me dead.

Our fearless leader, Salvatore with his best buddy Ally.

WHOA NELLY CHICKEN ENCHILADAS

WHOA NELLY CHICKEN ENCHILADAS
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4 lbs chicken breasts, skin on with rib bone
1 c. chicken stock
1 tsp vegetable or canola oil
1/2 c. finely chopped yellow onion
1 Tbs. flour
2 c. sour cream
2 c. heavy cream
2 tsp salt
Freshly ground pepper
8-12 burrito size tortillas
2-3 c. Mexican style shredded cheese (or Monterey Jack, Cheddar or combination)

Optional ingredients:
1 small jar pimentos
Cooked sweet corn
Roasted jalapeños
Fire roasted chilis
Sliced olives
Preheat oven to 350.

Boil chicken in large pot of water with 1 tsp salt until cooked. Reserve 1 c. chicken stock or use store bought chicken stock. Shred chicken removing bones and skin. Set aside shredded cooked chicken breasts.

I large fry pan, sauté finely chopped onion in 1 tsp of oil. When onion is clear, add chicken stock and flour and heat until slightly thickened. Stir in sour cream, heavy cream, 1 tsp salt and pepper and bring to boil. Let cream mixture cool until you can handle it.

One at a time, dip tortillas into cream mixture. I like to use a big plate to work with the mess! Down the middle of the dipped tortilla place approximately 1/2 c. chicken, a handful of cheese and optional ingredients. I like to put a row of sliced olives, jalapeños, a little corn and a few sprinkles of pimentos. Be creative, this is where you can make this dish hot and spicy or cater to those you are serving. I often make half hot and spicy and the other half more kid friendly. Roll up stuffed tortilla, tuck ends and shove to end of large, deep baking dish. Continue until you run out of pan or chicken. It depends how thick you make each tortilla, you can do 8 - 12 tortillas depending on how thick they are.
Pour remaining cream sauce over enchiladas. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes. Sprinkle with remaining cheese. Top with some sliced olives or pimentos. Serve with pico de gallo.