I've been a complete slacker.

As Melissa so appropriately pointed out in a recent comment, it is high time for another post. So here is a truckload of pictures from a little jaunt we recently took to San Diego with the extended Banks family. We hit Sea World, the Wild Animal Park, the San Diego Zoo, the pool, and we also did some shopping sans children. It was so fun yet so exhausting, relaxing, and incredibly memorable all at the same time. What a week it was.

Here's the whole crew at Sea World.

These next few were taken on the Sesame Street rides at Sea World. I'll be honest and say that I didn't mind taking Anna on them one bit. Being the youngest of my big family, I feel like I missed out on a few classic kid things because I was probably too young to appreciate them when everyone else in my family was doing it, like how I was 5 when we went to Disneyland. I don't even remember it. So now I get to live out my dream of going on the lame-o kid rides by going with Anna. I enjoyed every minute. And look how much she loved it.

Me, Anna, Trevor's sister Natalie, and Anna's cousin Jedrik. I think this picture gives you a perfect example of how Natalie and I often get mistaken for real-life sisters. People just see a mass of curls and think we're identical. (Also, I LOVE Jedrik's face in this one.)

This time, we were accompanied by Trevor's brother Devan. Gotta love the vomit-inducing tea cup rides.

This needs no explanation.

Trevor's brother Matt, Anna, Trevor's dad Randy, Devan, and Jedrik at the Wild Animal Park. At this point in the day, after trekking across the entire park, we were almost too tired to care that we could see a few giraffes about 6 miles away. But now it seems cool that we were actually that close.

Notice the gorilla to the left of Anna. Not the one in the purple shirt.

At the San Diego Zoo.

I cannot get enough of this picture. We decided to head to the zoo, just the three of us, and we got there at 6 after a long day — only to find out that it closes at 7. We ran like the wind to see as many animals as we could, and I think this picture accurately expresses our fatigue and general indifference at seeing the animals before us.

We took this umbrella stroller wherever we went, but Anna almost never wanted to sit in it. She pushed it everywhere and even harassed a duck or two by chasing them with it, which entertained me to no end.

Awww...

Weird stuff

One of the great mysteries of my life has been this: Don't you find it incredibly weird that there are parts of your own body that you've never seen? Yes, organs and bones to be sure. But there are even parts of my own back that my eyes have never looked at. My own back! I feel like I have a right to know what my own back looks like, but I've never been able to take a really good look at it in all my 27 years.

And you know what else is weird? Tin foil. Isn't it strange that there are companies that manufacture small rolls of extremely thin pieces of metal, and then we buy the rolls at the store and use it to cover food and other things? A thin piece of metal? That's so strange to me.

Annacdotes Part 2

How can you not love this girl?

1. Anna was looking at a book about animals and she pointed to a prairie dog and said, "What is this, Mom? A mini corn dog?" You can tell what she likes to eat for dinner.

2. We were reading yet a different book with animals and Anna said, "Mom, am I an animal?" I said, "Yes, you're a monkey, remember?" Without missing a beat, she said, "Ooh ooh ah ah!" and did some wiggling. My little comedienne. (That's cute and all, but mostly it's just pretty amazing timing for a 2-year-old, don't you think?)

3. Anna and I went on a date last week to McDonalds. Awesome, I know. We ate our nutritious dinner in the play place area next to a window. While she was chewing, she just kept looking around — in awe of her surroundings, I guess. When she realized that she could see her reflection in the window, she immediately opened her mouth so that she could show herself the food she was chewing. Nice. She kept at that for a good 5 minutes. I hope the people coming inside enjoyed the preview of the meal they were about to eat.

4. The last couple mornings when I've gone in to get Anna, she's been on the phone with Robin Hood. She pretends to hold a phone up to her ear and has a fairly normal conversation with him, telling him what I'm doing or what she did yesterday. In the middle, she'll move the "phone" and whisper, "Mom, it's Robin Hood," and then she'll go back to her normal phone voice. Classic. She also has quite the crush on him and has said that he's very handsome and that she's going to marry him. He IS quite a fox...

5. Anna fell down the other day and had a teary moment. After we got it all taken care of, she still had the sniffles for a few minutes. Finally I said, "Is your nose okay? Do you need a tissue?" She said, "Yeah, I just have tears in my nose." Awwww....

Happy Ash Wednesday

Our internet has been down all day, so I didn't think I'd say much about what a special day it is today, namely the best day ever. ("Namely?" Ha ha!) But then it started working again, so I felt I had to do a last-minute post before the day is over.

Hope you all had a lovely Ash Wednesday, however you celebrated.

The end.

*My apologies if this offends any of you.*

Soup season

We've had a cold spell down here for the last couple of weeks, and only now is it warming back up to a normal 70 degrees. I'm being slightly facetious, which is required of you when you live in California, because "cold" means 55 degrees. But I want you to know that because Trevor and I are toughing it out and not turning our heat on, it has been a steady 65 degrees in our apartment and maybe colder during the night. Thus, among a bevy of other layers, I've been wearing socks to bed, which I am totally against. That alone makes my case, I think.

Anyhow, with all the cold and all the rain we've been having, I've been in the mood to make soup and more soup. I thought I'd post a few of my favorite recipes for the rest of you, since your winter is going to last another month or two. Bwah hah hah...



Smoked Sausage, Butternut Squash and Wild Rice Soup

2 medium butternut squash, about 3 to 4 pounds, peeled, seeded, and cut into 1-inch chunks
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
12 cups chicken stock
2 1/2 cups chopped onions
1 cup wild rice
3/4 pound smoked sausage, such as kielbasa, cut into 1/4-inch
2 cups fresh corn kernels
1 1/2 cups half-and-half
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley leaves

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Season the squash with 1 tablespoon of the oil, salt and pepper. Place on a baking sheet and roast for 45 minutes to 1 hour or until tender. Remove from the oven and cool completely. In a blender or food processor, puree the squash with 2 cups of the chicken stock. Puree until smooth and set aside.

In a saucepan, over medium heat, bring 4 cups of the stock and 1/2 cup of the chopped onions to a simmer. Stir in the rice and cook until the rice is tender and the liquid is absorbed, about 1 hour, stirring occasionally with a fork. Remove the rice from the pan and cool. In a large saucepan, over medium heat, add the remaining tablespoon of oil. When the oil is hot, add the sausage and brown for 3 minutes. Add the remaining 2 cups of onions and corn. Season with salt and pepper. Saute for 3 minutes. Add the remaining 6 cups of stock and squash puree. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium-low, cover and simmer for 20 minutes. Skim off any fat that rises to the surface. Stir in the rice and continue to cook for 10 minutes. Remove from the heat, stir in the half-and-half and reason with salt and pepper. Stir in the parsley and serve.

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I got this recipe from my sister, who got it from the Food Network. She copied it directly from there, which makes the typo about the salt and pepper near the end even funnier. But the soup is absolutely delicious. A little involved, but totally worth it. I made some adjustments for Trevor's diet, and it's just as good made with turkey sausage, white rice (which I made in the rice cooker with chicken broth), and no corn.

The next fave is a Russian soup that I learned how to make in Poland... and which ironically comes from the all-American allrecipes.com. It's called Sweet Russian Cabbage Soup. There's a sweet and sour element that makes it quite delicious. (I won't post the recipe here; just click on the link.) It's very easy and very tasty.

Lastly, here's another from my sister and allrecipes.com: Best Italian Sausage Soup. A few words about this one, however. I usually use smaller pasta because fettuccine is hard to eat in soup, as are whole tomatoes, so I use diced. Turkey sausage does not work as well for this soup, and I also like it best using red cooking wine (surprise, surprise) instead of a grape juice-rice vinegar substitution. But either way, it's also quite good.

Silly names

I saw this on a friend's Facebook page and it gave me a chuckle. See if it gives you one when you figure out your own wacky names.

1. ROCK STAR NAME: (first pet & current car)
Daisy Accord

2.YOUR GANGSTA NAME: (fave ice cream flavor, favorite cookie),
Chocolate Chocolate Chip

3. YOUR “FLY Guy/Girl” NAME: (first initial of first name, first three letters of your last name),
A.Ban

4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal)
Green Kitten

5. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born),
Scoresby Provo (Kinda lame. See, this is why you should give girls middle names.)

6. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first),
Banas (I don't really know how to pronounce that.)

7. SUPERHERO NAME: (”The” + 2nd favorite color, favorite drink),
The Lavender Pina Colada

8. NASCAR NAME: (the first names of your grandfathers)
William Alvin

9.WITNESS PROTECTION NAME: (mother’s & father’s middle names)
Judy Lynn (ha ha. This one made me laugh. So generic...)

10. TV WEATHER ANCHOR NAME: (Your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter)
Bennion Baltimore

The Banks Hotel

Our dear friends Tamra and Rob came to stay with us a couple weeks ago, and we had some fun times with them. We went to the beach, to the Griffith Park Observatory, we shopped at H&M, and they went to the grocery store for me like 5 times. Thanks, guys. What a good trip.

As a sidenote, I thought I'd share my favorite quote of the trip, which came from Tamra, who has such a way with words. She had been commenting on what a delightful and smart little girl Anna is. (I know.) She talked about how fun it was to see Anna using complete sentences and using fun connecting words, like "I just think" and "So anyway..." But, Tamra said, sometimes Anna struggles to get everything out because her brain is working faster than her mouth. "So really, it's like listening to an 8-year-old with a learning disability." Awwww...

I'm posting pictures we took at the beach by the Santa Monica pier so you will see what an exciting destination the Banks Hotel can be.





I love this picture, but I tried to upload it like 7 times and this was the best it got. Small and a weird stripe at the bottom. Oh well.

(By the way, often when I upload pictures to the blog from iphoto, they upload like this. But not all the time. Does anyone know why?)