A new session of ninja training started this week. I’m an old pro.
The warp wall is still giving me some trouble, though.
Check out this awesome shirt Uncle Chris sent. Best part? It will fit until I am 35.
I treated The Bigs to gelato this week. Just threw my gift card on the counter and told them to get whatever they wanted.
Friday night we decided to go ice skating. A 60+ degree day made the ice a little watery. We had to wait for it to freeze back up, so we decided to have dinner in the pub next to the skating rink. The chairs were old lift chairs. That was cool. The food was, eh.
Ice skating under a disco ball!
We stopped at a coffee shop this weekend. They had a lift chair too. Awesome!
The Bigs made lots of recipes from their new cookbook. Spicy peanut rice noodle bowl:
Pad thai:
Mac and cheese:
Breakfasts this weekend were smoothies and coffee cake, also from the new cookbook. Mixed-berry smoothie:
Sunday’s green smoothie had kale, banana, pineapple, and avocado:
President’s Day. No Growing Tree. I went to work at the COLLEGE. I wore a tie so the students knew I meant business. Mom and I started the day off with a donut.
The Bigs had a Happy Thursday. Great turns on a gorgeous day at Bachelor.
Friday night we stopped at Laughing Planet for dinner. They have an awesome dinosaur collection.
And some pretty neat dishes. Moroccan Bowl: baked tempeh, harissa-braised veggies, apricot mint couscous, and cherry apple chutney.
My new favorite song is ‘No Sleep Till Brooklyn’ by the Beastie Boys. As you’ll see, it is very appropriate.
Cordy-Roy had a rough week. I put splints on his ear and paw, but his heart still sounds bad.
More NINJA training.
I take Valentine’s Day almost as seriously as ninja training. I signed 21 cards (actually 25, Mom didn’t like my signature on a few, so she made me re-sign them).
I made special Valentines for my teachers.
We had Emmett’s pasta for Valentine’s Day dinner. YUM YUM YUM.
The doctor told Mom – no more coffee. Here is her matcha latte. Yes, it is GREEN.
More pictures from ninja class? Wrong! I had The Bigs bring me for a post-skiing ninja session. I had some moves to perfect.
New variation on waffle breakfast.
Skiing in the 100 Acre Wood.
It’s steep, and yes, the first three times I screamed and hollered all the way down, but I kept insisting on going back, and by the end of the day – it was easy as pie.
Another week, one step closer to becoming a ninja. Army crawling:
Climbing the net:
Eleni came to ninja training this week – I showed her the ropes:
It was Luminaria weekend at Meissner, so they built a giant snow dragon:
After all that dragon play, I was feeling a bit 11 o’clockish, so we stepped into the shelter for a little smackeral of something. (Yes, we just recently finished both Winnie the Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner.)
After some skiing on my own, I decided to hitch a ride back to the car:
where I turned back into Owl (remember we are reading Winnie the Pooh), and had some lunch:
After a few hours at home, we headed back to Meissner for the Luminaria ski, and more dragon play:
Having a little beef broth to warm me up:
Not only Luminaria, but also a full moon:
Blinded by the iPhone flash:
If the whole ninja thing doesn’t work out, at least I’ll have my jedi skills to fall back on (Mom, on the other hand, should not quit her day job):
This weekend’s breakfast. The only thing better than avocado toast is avocado waffles:
Lots of ice fell from the sky this week:
Post-ski gelato:
The Bigs are cooking; it’s time to get down to business:
Sometimes I feel like The Bigs do not appreciate my sense of style:
I am particularly pleased with one of my more recent clothing purchases – army pants. Watch out GI Joe:
In other news, ninja training continues.
It was good preparation for a weekend in the big city. Where I swam:
walked (and walked and walked – to awesome places like Powell’s Books, where I managed to leave with $100 worth of books. It’s pretty easy to manipulate The Bigs when it comes to books):
went to see a play based on Dragons Love Tacos:
rode the train (public transportation makes me giddy):
went to the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI):
and ate a lot of amazing food.
On the first night, I had a great piece of pepperoni pizza:
and some strawberry coconut ice cream.
The Bigs had Bibimbap bowls from Kim Jong Smokehouse – scorched rice and noodles, sesame sprouts, daikon kim chee, napa kim chee, pickled apple, fried egg, sesame seeds, and meat.
The second day we had a great lunch – with braised beet salad and a jambalaya soup:
and an amazing Moroccan dinner of majadra – brown lentils and rice simmered with sauteed onions in secret spices
and Moroccan chicken – slow-cooked and oven-baked chicken, served over a Moroccan sauce.
I LOVED every minute of the trip and begged The Bigs to move in to the Embassy Suites. It was the greatest. A pool, free breakfast, really nice wallpaper, and they even had extra Puppies, just like mine.
I was very sad to go. The good news is that the Oregon Children’s Theater has a play about “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” and “The Last Stop on Market Street” planned for later in the season.
Week 2 of ninja training. Yes, I have the same clothes on as last week’s ninja training. I am a creature of habit.
The intensity increased this week.
I got the job done.
Ninjas are supposed to be deadly and silent, but sometimes you gotta smile because you are having so much fun!
On occasion I stand still.
Those moments are brief and far between.
The weather report said it was supposed to be a wintery mix on Saturday. Wrong.
If The Bigs weren’t tired enough from me – Mom watched Sophie for 4.5 hours on Sunday (yes, she counted every minute), so Dad, Jess, and Tom could ski in the Great Nordeen cross country race. Here we are at 6 am.
