Proud of this one...

I remember once in my life running a mile in less than 8 minutes.  It was high school and to get an A in P.E. we had to do it.  I think I finished in 7:58 (yeah, competitive student!).  I've been running more lately - my first full & 1/2 marathon goal was 10 min miles (so close!).  The next 1/2 marathon goal was 9 minutes miles (yay!).

I wanted to see, if 15 years later, these old - but increasingly strong! - legs can run a mile in less than 8 minutes.  Well.....

You might say, "Hey, Care, that's alot more than 8 minutes...", and I'd say "Guess what, that was TWO miles under 8 minutes, not just one!"

Yay yay!  And number 26: CHECK! (*I understand that for many people this is a very small goal, but I am quite pleased with myself.)

Got any fitness goals you're working towards??

A different red meat

This new food isn't all that wild and crazy, but it was new to me -- so it counts!

We were browsing around our local Costco and committed to two big ol' packages of ground bison!

 Ok, so it was only two 1 lb packages... but it seemed like a big commitment!

The finished product!  Nick cooked up some bison burgers with blue cheese and a yummy homemade coleslaw.  I wouldn't say I liked the flavor of bison better than ground beef, but it was just fine. :) 

So item #17 (eat new things): CHECK (5/10)!

Have you ever had bison?  Any suggestions for our next package of bison??

Cookin' some meat

I saw an offer on Travelzoo weekly deals for a half price BBQ cooking class through a caterer near us.  I bought us two passes and found a random little Sunday in February to take advantage of it.

It was nothing really at all like I had expected.  I thought we'd be a small group in some guy's kitchen - cooking, hands on, tasting, taking home the leftovers.  Nope.  It was in a Barbecue's Galore (a retail store that sells barbecues and was open for business) and there were about 40 people in the class.

 Big Jim teaching the rookies

It was definitely just demonstration, although there was lots of eating eventually:  brisket, pulled pork, salad, coleslaw, potato salad, chicken, sausage, asparagus, pineapple, tri tip, steelhead (fish), ribs, ribeye.  All the food was appreciated since the class was 5 1/2 hours long!!

Overall, Big Jim was realllllly full of himself.  He looooved to talk about his competition cooking (no one here wants to cook competitive BBQ, really!) and didn't really have his teaching skills honed.  We definitely had some take home points - but it was a long 5 1/2 hours. 

The top secret recipe that we were specifically told NOT to put on the internet

All the recipes were for slow cooking (read 12 hours long), and large cuts of meat.  So if anyone wants to come over, we'll test out our new barbecue skills on ya!

So #97: LivingSocial item #2 - Check!!

The biggest cake of all time...

This was a fun recipe I found a while back and have had in my mind for a while.  Valentine's Day seemed perfect!

Peanut butter cup chocolate cake cheesecake 

or PBCCCC for short

The inspirations:  On the top - from the Cheesecake Factory (the point of this item on my list) and the "home made" version I found online.

 

A partial look at the before.  And my little helper in the background.

The recipe said it takes 2-3 days and is FIVE PAGES long.

NINE layers:  Chocolate cake, caramel, cheesecake with Reese's mixed in, caramel, chocolate cake, caramel, cheesecake, caramel, chocolate ganache, peanut butter mousse swirls with mini Reese's garnish.  Did you gain weight reading that?  Because I think I did!  (Believe it or not, I left out a full cup of peanuts.)  It weighs ~10 lbs (not even joking) and cost ~$35 in groceries (yikes!).

And..... my version!

Look at those cute swirls Nick made!

Inside

Little messy, but you get an idea of the voluminousness...

And the aftermath... FOUR towels worth of dishes AND I put away at least two during the day.  We did it in one day, but it was a WHOLE day of baking.  Nick and I ate two little pieces and then he brought it to work on Valentine's Day to get alllllll those calories out of our house!

So to number 14 - bake a crazy cake - I say CHECK!

Can you imagine eating something this big??

Oh, we won't climb that

Nick and I had three days off and ski country is lame this year.  So, we decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather and headed to the Sunol in the East Bay with our Lucy.

 

At the bottom of Flag Hill we were joking around, "Oh, 1.3 miles - piece of cake.  And we won't climb straight up that mountain face - it's definitely more than 1.3 miles.  Oh, the trail description says steep switchbacks?  No worries."

 

I'm pretty sure this cow wanted to attack Lucy.    It was a beautiful day.

 

The top.  Holy moly.

It was muuuuch steeper than we thought.  I said - more than once - how I'll need to train before tackling the Inca Trail this fall!  After this one, we went on the "easier" trail to Little Yosemite (Not any easier! Liars!) and since there's no rain, the waterfalls weren't active.  I do love getting out with my Lucy - even if she runs circles up and down and around and past and around us and still has energy to spare!

Ever accidentally tackled something bigger than you expected??
And #47 (3/10 hikes): CHECK!

Secret Ingredient Cookies

When I put the item to try different foods, I wanted it to be something truly "new", not like "Hey, look, a new Cooking Light recipe".  So I did make this cookie... but it had a secret ingredient that I thought was fun. And different enough to count.

I whipped up these little cookies - a pretty basic shortbread recipe with a twist! 

Dunked half in chocolate and then ran out

Up close

So.  What do you think this mystery ingredient is??  Item #17 we're at 4/10 new things: CHECK!

Answer  &  Recipe

Once you know... have you ever tried this?  Would you??

Roses, step one

Item #41 is to have healthy roses.  Nick & I know so little about tending roses that for our "wedding present" our neighbors - basically strangers - came over and pruned them for us. I've noticed that around our neighborhood recently the rose bushes are trimmed wayyy down and starting to get some new growth, so I figured it was time for us to catch up!

We have three large rose bushes (trees?) on the path to our front door.  Nick watched a youtube video on how to trim them :) and off we went.

 This is one, before - easily 7 ft+

The amount we hacked off

After, maybe 4 ft

Yikes! It looked like alot!  But it DID seem healthier and similar to the other bushes I've seen.  Now if we just get the fungus/rust killer, we might get a healthy rose check... have a wait and see!!

Do you think they'll grow back?? Any tips on rose maintenance?

Cary's Sports Grill

Since Northern California is not a Green Bay Packers t.v. market, we are constantly looking for some where to go watch the games. The options in Sonoma are pretty limited - there's a "townie" bar that has been overall very kind to us this year. There's always a little Packers crew and they put the game on one t.v. - sans sound - but we've enjoyed it.

So when a new sports bar opened up LESS THAN A MILE from our house AND it was named CARY'S - omg was I excited.  It was open before the (grumblegrumble) NFC divisional game - although they didn't have their liquor license yet, awesome.  So we headed there, with high hopes - that were rapidly crushed.  We ordered some of our regular stuff - cheesy fries, meatball sandwich, house side salad and REALLY were underwhelmed. Bummer bum bum bum bummer.  Maybe it'll get better?  Tonight on the way home from work it was packed... guess time will tell.

So after a really quick meal we headed to our usual place, just to have ALL of the fans rooting for the Giants so the 49ers would have home field the following week.  Super hostile environment.  Overall a weaksauce end to my football year!

So to #63 - try new restaurants in Sonoma, I say (2/10) CHECK!

How long would you give it before trying the food again??

Glassblowing counts as fun!

I get a daily reminder of fun things that are a deal.  Some I immediately delete - skydiving & random salons, for example - but others catch my eye.  I tend to be a wait-and-seer, so I put on my 101 list to buy and use three things.

Source

I got a notice for a two hour glassblowing class at 1/2 price, right in downtown Sonoma.  I had NO idea such a thing existed!  

Source

Alex, the owner and our teacher.

We bought the vouchers and signed up for a private (well, two person) class one beautiful January Saturday morning.  We were greeted by Alex who was verrrrrry patient with us and our complete rookie-ness.  "Oh, look at that, well, let me see if I can help make that a little more symmetrical. Well, the lopsidedness makes it unique."  Thanks Alex.  I wiiiish I had taken pictures of us with our sunglasses and ghetto arm heat protectors, etc.  But I was busy trying not to get burned and wasn't sure if we could. 

Nick and I were such good learners, that we were able to complete the beginner's piece:

Pulled, not blown, flowers

It was really hard (and hot!) to pull the hot glass fast enough to get the "petals" even.

The second "more advanced - actually blown glass" piece:

Our glasses, I included one of our normal glasses to show the relative size of the ones we made (aka, tiny and super duper thick). We've tried to use them for drinking, but it's really tough!  I'm proud though!!

AND since we were so awesome, we got to make an EXTRA piece each:

 A bowl and a vase - can you tell which is which?? :)

It was NFL playoff season, so the bowl is in 49ers colors and the vase in Packers colors - we're so cute.

The combo glass sits on our modern art wall!

Well, that's the kitchen counter, but you get my drift.

And then one week later we went to Las Vegas with the multiple Chihuly exhibits...

The lobby of the Bellagio - Source

Let's just say I appreciate the beauty of this even more (and my poor little flower hangs its head in shame!!)

And to item #97 - do fun things on LivingSocial, I say (1/3) CHECK!

Have you ever wanted to try glass blowing?  What's your favorite piece we made?