When I Don't Know What to Say...

...God always has the right words.

Isaiah: 40:28-31

Do you not know? 
   Have you not heard? 
The LORD is the everlasting God, 
   the Creator of the ends of the earth. 
He will not grow tired or weary, 
   and his understanding no one can fathom. 
He gives strength to the weary 
   and increases the power of the weak. 
Even youths grow tired and weary, 
   and young men stumble and fall; 
   but those who hope in the LORD 
   will renew their strength. 
They will soar on wings like eagles; 
   they will run and not grow weary, 
   they will walk and not be faint.


More posts to come this weekend! Promise! Stay tuned!  

Things I am Loving Right Now

This old-ish picture of my goddaughter, Emersyn. I look at it all the time when I need to smile. She is a like this every day. I can't believe how much spirit and personality are tucked into her tiny little frame. We should all be this confident.

My mom and little Peanut. Peanut has a few more weeks of undivided attention. Live it up, puppins. And Mom has recently retired, so she's available for chats about anything 24-7. Much better than data entry, right Mom?

Baby MoMo's cheesy windsuit.

And his sailor suit.

And his daddy.

7 weeks to go!

Recipe 'Rithmetic

In the past, I have usually made Asian food the American way: Open bag of Wanchai Ferry Teriyaki Chicken, replete with its handy sauce packet, and warm it all up in a pan. Easy Peasy Japaneasy. (I couldn't resist.) Occasionally, I will go the extra mile and make a stir fry with a mixture of fresh and frozen vegetables, add some type of meat or fish, and finish with a bottled stir fry sauce. Both taste pretty reasonable and are mindless to prepare, but who knows what kind of mystery ingredients are in those prepared meals and bottled sauces. Furthermore, who knows how much you more you are paying for all that "convenience."

Tonight, for dindin, out of necessity and sheer unwillingness to NOT make a quick, unnecessary run to the grocery store or get fast food for dinner, I decided to concoct a stir fry sauce for with my bare hands and sheer human intellect. Oh, and Google helped, too. See, I had all the ingredients for American Stir Fry #2 except the bottled sauce. No way husby is eating stir-fried frozen vegetables and chicken breast without some kind of sauce chaser.

Ahhh, Google. What did we do without you?

Huge success! Never again will I buy a bottled sauce or those overpriced frozen meals! I found a great recipe online for a simple, homemade stir fry sauce, and it was delicious and easy to make! I have to share! I tweaked it a little, having no Tabasco or Siracha at home, so I will call this one my own, thus no credit to my Googling.

Basic Stir Fry Sauce

1 1/2 sesame oil (In my opinion, this ingredient is a non-negotiable. Sesame oil has so much flavor, so no other oil will really suffice. Just get a bottle and keep it on hand. It will last a long, long time.)

1/2 tsp minced garlic

1/2 tsp minced ginger (Again, an important ingredient. I have ginger paste in my fridge at all times, pretty much because it really doesn't go bad and its fun to throw into lots of Asian dishes for a little extra kick. Trust me. Also good in some baking recipes like gingersnaps. Hmm..I'm hungry again.)

1/2 cup chicken broth

1-2 Tbs. soy sauce (In the words of one of my Asian pals: "Kikkoman. Only use Kikkoman." So I do.)

1/2 tsp chili powder (More if you're feeling dangerous.)

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1 Tbs lemon or juice of half a lemon

1 1/2 tsp cornstarch

Saute the garlic and ginger in the sesame oil for a quick minute then add remaining ingredients EXCEPT the cornstarch. Bring to a boil. Whisk in cornstarch and allow to a simmer. Pour over cooked vegetables and meat and saute for 5 minutes. The sauce will thicken slightly during cooking.

Nom nom nom!

Bonus Points:

# ingredients in this stir fry sauce: 11

Cost of my stir fry sauce: Pennies.

Cost of frozen stir-fry vegetables: $2.

Cost of 12 oz of chicken $2-3 dollars

# ingredients in bottled stir fry sauce (La Choy): 17 (Some of them are scary! Don't even ask about the powdered kind...)

Cost of stir fry sauce: $3

# ingredients in Wanchai Ferry meal: Many, many more than 11.

Cost of Wanchai Ferry meal: $7 (And no way are you getting 12oz of chicken out of that bag, sweetie)

But I do love that panda.

Why I Haven't Blogged/Things I Have Learned

I am not sure why I haven't blogged in three months. I think it stems mostly from not carrying my cameras around and such. The best blogs always seem to start with a good picture.

Also, we moved, which has brought lots of new tasks, most of which involve Swiffers, furniture bargain hunting online, and looking for the perfect throw pillows. I am also trying to cram as much actual paid work into these months before maternity leave, and I'm working on a few unpaid research projects. Its a lot.

Also I have been very preoccupied with the Baby Momo experience. Which brings me to the second portion of my current blog -

Things I Have Learned (About Being Pregnant)

1. The more pregnant you feel, the more excited and ready you are for the big arrival. I don't mean this in an "I-can't-wait-to-not-be-pregnant-anymore" way (although in a few months I am sure I will!) I mean this as in each day my body is less old Kara and more Mommy Kara, and Mommy Kara is every day even more joyful about Baby Momo's upcoming arrival.

2. When you are pregnant, people are really, really nice to you. "Please go ahead." "Oh, aren't you cute." "Do you want this chair?" They also like to feed you, which is good because you are very hungry (to be discussed in more detail later). Total strangers will make eye contact with you and smile knowlingly, which is lovely. Flip side: My wise sister Kelly thinks that this is one reason for post-partum depression. After the baby arrives, its all about them (and rightly so!). But mommies miss those kind acts and that attention. I'm glad I know this in advance.

3. When you are pregnant you will eat a lot more than you normally do. You will think about food a lot more than you used to. You will eat odd combinations of foods, like tortilla chips and ranch dressing. You will go to the store for cold medicine for your husby and return with three pints of ice cream. You may stop in at a UDF for milk and leave with an additional dozen Krispy Kremes. It is lovely and somewhat startling and you will be completely unable to rationalize yourself out of it. The ice cream always wins. Or in this case, Sister Kiki's yummy raspberry cheesecake.

4. After gorging yourself into a delightful sugar coma, you will want to take a nap. You will want to nap a lot, actually. You may also want to elevate your feet. Good thing you have all those pillows.

Pregnancy is a wonderful, happy experience.

As is child rearing, so I am told.

Two Kinds of Ovens

This one...

...in our new house in Worthington.

And that one...

Guess who?

With any luck, Baby Morris arrives 4/29/11!

Prayers appreciated. God is great.

Husby and the Triangle.

My husband is a simple man. This is good because I am very complicated. The list of things that Jeremy loves is actually pretty short. It goes something like this:

Things I Know Jeremy Loves (Other than the requisite faith, family, and Furball)

1. Sports

2. Beef in all forms

3. Conservative politics

4. Sleeping in on Saturdays (only Saturdays)

5. Football (wait, I think already said that)

6. White cake (especially the grocery store bakery day-glo variety loaded with high fructose corn syrup and partially hydrogenated vegetable oils. Shiver. I think he does this on purpose because I won't ask for a bite of that junk!)

7. Coffee

8. Law & Order

9. Rocking chairs

10. 80's hair band rock, especially Guns -n- Roses, which he will argue incessantly is NOT a hair band at all.

Seriously it took me fifteen minutes to come up with that list of ten. Simple man, like I said. I am sure I put more than ten products on my face alone before I leave the house in the morning, and I know I love them all.

Things Jeremy Does Not Love:

5. Technology

4. Open-ended questions

3. Football officials

2. Vegetables, especially tomatoes

2. Me, but only when I try to talk him into getting orthodontics

1. Mornings

Indeed, his "Not Love" list is much shorter than his "Love" list. To that effect, here are a few pictures of something Jeremy loveslovesloves: Duke basketball. Earlier this summer, we jaunted off to The Triangle for a dear friend's wedding. This afforded us lots of QT at Duke Chapel, and several Locopops, which are were so cold they didn't melt or drip at all in the scorching July sun. How do those Duke geniuses do it? We also made a stop in Krzyzewskiville, visited our pals Ray and Tina and their new little buddy, Ray Jr, and brunched with the lovely Karen, Rex, and Noelle, my old friends from my UT days.

Ahhh, brunch. My favorite meal.

Hi, we're the Tsengs and we're adorable.

The happy couple. They hosted a fabulous reception at the North Carolina Museum of Life and Science...

...but first they said their vows at Duke Chapel

So handsome

"Stop making me pose, Kara."

Old school.

Duke University has lovely, peaceful campus. We toured the Sarah P. Duke gardens before our flight home. We spent most of our time in the well-manicured Terrace Garden and also enjoyed the frosty air-conditioning at the idyllic Terrace Cafe. This cute stone cottage had icy bottled water and a cute collegiate working the register. It was a great afternoon.

(Jeremy at the reception in the Apollo Test Module)

Happy Anniversary, darling. You are out of this world.

Happy Ever After in the Marketplace

You could say I love The Beatles.

So its a good thing Paul McCartney came to Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati so Jeremy, Mom, Dad and I could enjoy some of their songs.

True, Dad's favorite Beatle, John, wasn't there. I was hoping he would show up. Miracles happen!

The show was INCREDIBLE. "Live and Let Die" with perfectly-timed, out-of-this-world fireworks. "Something" by ukulele. TWO encores. And to cap it all off, finale with my personal favorite (and tagline of this blog!): the last songs from Abbey Road.

"And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make."

(That there links to probably my favorite piece of television ever.)

Marvelous.

And Dad even smiled. He may have danced, but I'll never tell.