Flashback Friday

This Week's Activities

** Blogger is doing wierd things and I can't get the text and pictures to align properly. I don't have time to mess with this so just do the best you can with this post.

Lately there have been signs that things are returning to normal around here. Well - as normal as they can be right now. I think Teri and I both needed to "do what we do" this week. For Teri that meant cooking - here is our breakfast on Tuesday morning. We saw this in two movies and so we tried it. I looked it up and it doesn't have an official name but it's an egg fried inside a piece of toast. She also made us hash browns from scratch.

My project was the kitchen back splash. My goal for the next few months is to complete projects I already have the supplies for. I'd had this "plastic tin" for at least 6 weeks and it only took 2 hours to complete. I adhered it to the wall with gorilla tape and it worked wonderfully.
Before and After's ...

Emma's First Birthday Party

I love my video camera!

A Christmas Story
Mother: Randy, how do the little piggies go?
Randy: [oinks like a pig]
Mother: That's right. Oink, oink! Now show me how the piggies eat.
[points to his plate]
Mother: This is your trough. Show me how the piggies eat. Be a good boy. Show mommy how the piggies eat.
Randy: [plunges face into mashed potatoes, oinks, eats, and laughs]
Mother: [laughs] Mommy's little piggie!

Vin's Version of this scene with Corn

Emma's First Birthday Party.
Unfortunately I didn't get any video footage of Emma since I had to keep up with Vin acting like a maniac the whole time.

We're Home

We got home from the hospital this morning and Teri is doing well. She’s able to walk a bit and sit up to eat. She’s still in a considerable amount of pain so she’s really just taking it hour by hour.
We’re open for visitors at any time.
Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers this week!

Teri Surgery Update

Teri made it through surgery in about 3 hours and her Dr. was very pleased with the outcome. He removed her L-5 disk and replaced it with a piece of clear plastic that her other bones will fuse to. He also inserted two titanium screws to hold everything in place. She’s doing well but is having some trouble getting strong enough pain medication. They are prescribing several different drugs along with some anti-inflammatory meds. Tomorrow she will begin walking and wearing her back brace. So far we are pleased with outcome and plan to be released from the hospital on Wednesday morning. I’ll post any new information as we have it.
Thanks for all the kind texts, emails and calls today.

We are especially grateful for Wendy who sat with me at the hospital, to Audrea for her visit, to James for keeping up with the dogs and to Jadi for delivering dinner.

The Perfect Snow Day Lunch

Grilled cheese and tomato soup

Snow post with the new camera

Teri received a flip video camera as a thank you gift from work. This is my practice run with getting it off the camera, onto the computer and then moved onto the blog.

Lost Dinner

This week we had Ludi's Chicken from one of my favorite cookbooks, Falling Cloudberries. It was sent to us by Teri's Swedish friend and it's just beautiful. I love the cover and the food pictures. The author shares recipes from her Finnish, Greek, South African, and Italian family.

The dish is a roasted chicken with garlic, onions, mustard and white wine. We've made this once before and the juice is always a hit. This time we had french bread and poured the juice in a bowl and sopped it up! We served it with sauteed garlic green beans and a green salad. You can find the recipe here

I don't have pictures but for an appetizer our friend Becky brought citrus lime shrimp and pineapple mango salsa. For dessert she made Dulche de Leche bars with shortbread bottoms and topped with chocolate ganache. I think this is a pretty similar recipe here.

What's up around here

Snow Day!

After the surgery Teri and Vin will be spending their time together in our bed. Here they are practicing by watching Sesame Street. She moved his booster seat into the bed so he has a chair. I bought him 4 new puzzles and other activities to keep them engaged with each other.

He's now learned how to open his top drawer while he's in his crib. The other day I could hear him talking to himself but wasn't prepared for the clothing explosion. He was very proud of himself.

Not all fun and games

I wanted to take this opportunity to let you all know about Teri’s surgery. She’s had back trouble and pain for quite sometime. Over the years she managed it with chiropractic care but her MRI revealed a herniated disk that was causing nerve damage. She is having a lumbar spinal fusion at the Texas Institute for Surgery at Presbyterian of Dallas. Her doctor is Dr. Desaloms
She checks in on Monday at 11 and her surgery is scheduled for 12. It will take about 3 hours and she will remain in the hospital for between 2 to 4 days. She will be on medical leave from work for 6 weeks going back on April 5th. During her recovery she will wear a back brace for 3 months and will use a bone stimulator for 9 months. This is what she'll look like for most of the next 6 weeks! She cannot:
drive for several weeks but can ride in a car
pick up heavy objects (like Vin)
load the dishwasher etc.

Vin is going to Mayme’s on Sunday afternoon and will stay through the week. Our friend, Jadi, is organizing some meals to be brought to us for the next few weeks so you may be getting an email to this effect.
We appreciate any prayers or good energy put into the Universe for us. We like and trust Teri’s doctor and hope for a full recovery and a pain free future.


So, while we on serious topics…


We’ve come to the end of the road on Vin’s adoption by Teri. Our lawyer has worked for a year and a half on our behalf but Judge Shannon refused to hear our case. She also refused to transfer it to another Judge. Same parent adoptions have been granted in Texas but the statue reads “spouse” which leaves room for interpretation. Had we had a different judge perhaps things would have been different.
After months of trying to work around and with the system our case was dismissed. There are other legal options possible but we’ve decided to let it rest for now. Here is the email Teri sent yesterday to our lawyer Karen Askew.


Hi, Karen,

We know you have exhausted your efforts and time for us and we deeply appreciate your efforts. When starting this process with you, I myself was naïve to the obstacles that we still face in today’s times.

We appreciate your perseverance for our family’s situation and understand when it’s time to take a step back and gain our composure. This has been a bit difficult to go through.

We think it’s time to take a break from this battle and let things calm down. We have always seemed a little ahead of the mainstream with what we do in our lives and this doesn’t seem to be the exception. Our little family is busy enough with itself to prolong this to no end. We will try again another time and continue with our life as we would regardless if we are recognized by our government. We are recognized by our family, friends, and peers for who we are - We are a family, we are the De Leon’s.

So please stop all legal proceedings you have going on in our behalf.

Teri, Kam and Vin De Leon

Wordless Wednesday

De Leon Projects

There are two things that I can guarantee are always going on at our house.
1. I am either working on a house/craft project or planning one.
2. Teri is either cooking a delicious meal or planning one.

This post is dedicated to some our recent projects.

Kitchen:

This is what our kitchen looked like when we first saw the house. It was old, had a huge hole in the ceiling and needed to be completely gutted.

The double oven completely blocked the view of the living room.

Check out those curtains! I think they'd been there since the house was built in 1940. In this picture you can see part of the ceiling laying on the floor.

View from the living room into the kitchen. We took almost this whole wall out to open up the area. In pictures from the Lost Party further down in this post, you can see how we now have lots of counter space for entertaining.

Kitchen After:
My project for winter break was painting the cabinets. Our cabinets were bought at an architectural salvage store and had to be reworked to fit in our kitchen. We really liked the old finish but opted for a green instead taking the color cues from the pomegranate painting. I like the green, it's a color but it's really very neutral.

I can however, in the future hear Vin say, "Hey Mom, remember those awful green cabinets we used to have!"

Curtains:

I had totally fallen in love with this Pottery Barn design but it was very expensive. Last week I ran across a terrific fabric & trim sale completely by accident. I found this fabric and which I thought was pretty close and I could afford it.

Hard to see the color because of the lighting but here is the finished curtain. James described it as "very Kam De Leon". I think that's a good thing.

Valentine's Day

Since my house has very little curb appeal I've got to work with what I have. Right now that's a bench and a flag pole. I've decided to change out my front bench pillows according to season or holiday. At Christmas I made gingerbread men pillows and now of course hearts for V-Day. There is a house in Llano that changes out their front decor seasonally also, Patty and I just love to see what she's going to do. The ultimate goal for front yard design is for people to say, "I bet she's an interesting person. I'd really like to see what that house looks like on the inside."

My helper. I feel a cape project coming on very soon!


Lost Party - this past Wednesday was the Final Season Premiere for Lost. We've been watching from the start and have a group that almost always comes for dinner/viewing party. For the kick off we had a tropical themed meal, drank Pina Colada's and wore lei's.

Menu:

Fried Rice, Coconut Sweet Potatoes, Chips with Mango Salsa, Spinach, Strawberry and Feta Salad, Red Curry Shrimp with Pineapple and Snow Peas, Ribs and cupcakes for dessert.

Random Food Pictures - I think it goes without saying that we eat well around here. I'm fond of saying that my hips are not due to eating junk but rather delicious and indulgent meals that come from my kitchen. Teri has been cooking a lot with barley lately, it's an easy substitute for rice and much better for us.

I take food pictures all the time and I plan on posting them from here on out.

Marinated skirt steak with barley and garlic spinach.




Saturday's lunch: Roasted pork tenderloin and a red bell pepper stuffed with barley, cheese and garbanzo beans.
Random picture I found from last spring. It's an herbed cheese with marinated onions and roasted garlic. In the back there's a roasted chicken breast with lemon and veggie pasta.