Succumbed

Finally succumbed to the immense visual temptation of Pinterest!
(Have to curb my Pinterest frenzy!)

More accounts and La Bella Noeva

Getting my accounts done that I let slip off the leash with the general craziness and exhaustion of last semester.
To make it lighter, and enriching...

    La Bella Noeva: Musique italienne du XVII siècle

    01 - Giulio Caccini: Udite Amanti
    02 - Giulio Caccini: Amarilli 
    03 - Biagio Marini: Amante Lontano dalla sua donna
    04 - Claudio Monteverdi: Si dolce è'l tormento 
    05 - Giovanni Stefani: Amante felice 
    06 - Alessandro Grandi: O quam tu pulchra es 
    07 - Guido Morini: Concerto spirituale 
    08 - Claudio Monteverdi: Laudate Dominum 
    09 - Marco Beasley: Tarantella primma, siconna e terza 
    10 - Anonymous: La bella noeva   00:46:55  
    11 - Giuseppe Morini: La cantata sopra l'arcicalascione 
    12 - Giuseppe di Vittorio: Sona'a battenti 
    13 - Capurro & Di Capua: O sole mio 
    14 - Giovanni Stefani: Amante felice

    Marco Beasley: tenor
    Musicians:
    Guido Morini • Rossella Croce • Elisa Citterio
    Marco Frezzato • Franco Pavan • Stefano Rocco

    Ensemble Accordone
    Conducted by Guido Morini

    Ensemble website: http://www.accordone.it
    Produced by Ozango © Broadcast by ARTE, 2011

***

The bellissima La Bella Noeva, with lovely choir, also here.*
(Sorry, can't embed the video!)
*Found the same that can be embeded, below:

Walking Man

Today Grandson came over for a visit.

First day as Independent Walking Man!

With his Mamãe and Papi walked in all by shishelf...
... rather unsteadly, true, but with no handholding or other support!

He has been in training for a little while now but still insecure and at the finger-clutching stage when wanting to get around on those jus-wanna-bite-em, short&chubby little legs — when in first gear, the one hand/one finger clutch; to rev up into fifth, the two hands/two fingers clutch.

But now... FREEDOM!

***

I didn't have this with my kids: the sadness to see the Herr Baby phase ending...
I guess the older we get, the appreciation of Time's changes, the realization of the preciousness of each moment, is deeper and stronger.

Love: Orange and Small

This week I saw on tv two quirky movies that I enjoyed. Both comedies, but not those in-your-face overkill. Both exploring people's ideas of happines and the redeeming aspect of love. One, in a supposedly free-spirited spiritualist community in confrontation with a conservativer rural village; the other, strange and dreamlike, sad and dark, of the possible littleness of peoples' lives and the idea of personal happiness, in a rather strange and weird romantic point of view.

For me, in Sommer in Orange, dealing with a "love community", the acts of most loving kindness in the face of unknown and a different people come not from the "love" disciples, with the exception of a latecomer girl, Leela. They come rather from the mayor's wife and the mailman, in a way the "least" characters, for Lili, the young girl trying so hard to fit into the "normal" of rural village life, or perhaps, just the more ample, acute teenage desire and suffering to "fit in". The love expressed in actual actions, which takes them out of the realm of idealized modes of behaviour, whether "enlightened" or "conservative",

Sommer in Orange

For more...

Small Apartments

Reveillon ~ NewYear's Passage

More cooking!

Last minute get-together and overnight stay at a friend's beautiful new house in the countryside to celebrate the passage into the New Year of 2014, the Reveillon or as we also say here the "Entering", Entrada.

We were four couples altogether.

Hubby and I did the cooking for the ceia at our home in the afternoon. Translation of ceia: supper, but with a suggestion of a feast to it, as it indeed was!

We started a bit late as had lunch with Son³, BelleFille³ and Herr Baby — Playing with The Baby is Very Important Work and needs time and attention!

We only got started with the cooking on about four o'clock and went right up the time we left at eight thirty (with a little time out for quick bath, packing and party clothes).

Menu Reveillon 2013
Hors d'Ouvres

Hubby made several*, as he greatly enjoys inventing new combinations.
Kürbiskernöl is a special pumpkin seed oil traditional to the Steiermark region of Austria. It has a dry, nutty flavor and is a surprising dark green color; it’s also great fun to pronounce!

* Tomato, fresh mushroom, hearts of palm drizzled with Kürbiskernöl  

* Dried apricots, softened in port wine and filled with cream & bleu cheese, garnished with nasturtium flowers

* Carpaccio with capers, grana cheese, and seasoned olive oil

* Parma ham, mini Italian tomatoes

* Cheese plate: bleu, camembert, brie... and cherries

Assorted breads – black olive and plain ciabatta, French baguette

 Dried fruit
Nuts

Fruit

Entrée

For the entrée Hubby made again his delicious

Smoked Surubim* Crêpes with Wasabi and Dill Cream Au Gratin

Plat Principal

I made my
Filet Mignon à la Moutarde aux Herbes de Provence 
and Deglacê Cream Sauce
served with the Hostess’s Fluffy Rice

Dessert

Apfelstrudel with Vanilla Ice Cream

Repeat performance — onto a delicious yummy good thing here!

The next day, after a leisurely breakfast that I just love, we were to be treated to Bacaulhau a Portuguesa to be made by the husband of one the couples, but there was so much left over from The Feast, that we just served it again for a very late lunch.
As we get older, although we do appreciate food more, we do eat less of it, and a good thing too!

The bacalhau has been set up for another dinner party, a legitimate excuse for more conviviality!

Good friends, beautiful surroundings, good food — an excellent "entrada" to the New Year.

Christmas 2013

Christmas blessings.

Our grandson spent Christmas day with us. At 1 yr 3 months, he now was able to interact more with the moment. He had quite a bit of hard work getting some balls off the tree and checking out the lighting — cool bulbs, verified by Grammie first...
Discovering that the plastic, baby-proof balls do boUnCe!

Family over for Christmas dinner.

Got up at seven, after going to sleep only at two-thirty am, to put the turkey in oven... with the finalizing etc, actually got it in a little later.
The "stuffing", my father's recipe of Outside the Turkey Onion and Sage Stuffing, I had already made in the day-before's cooking session: a whole other turkey, stuffing and sauce (gravy) for my co-suegros (my Belle Fille-to-be's parents).
When turkey done, made the gravy, again.

For someone "who doesn't cook", I sure was cooking a lot.
I guess the secret is out.

All this irregular cooking on my part in a busy kitchen (I'm a "lone"cook!), with my co-chefs, Gourmet Hubbie and BelleFilleToBe, who was in charge of the crêpe-making, and with "management" and support from said Son², till I got him cracking on the decorating.

During this time, also running about organizing the house, getting Son² to finish the Christmas tree decorations and other last minute things, setting the table — which envolves digging out the special plates and glasses from their hidey-holes as still don't have my kitchen cupboards! — hiding organizing the magazines and books that abound 'round the living room into the various bedrooms...

The last swipe of cloth, the last detail of the table setting finished, the last red bauble hung ... just three minutes before the doorbell rang!
Felt like one of those tv remodling shows!

Christmas Menu

Hubbie's
   • Smoked Surubim* Crêpes with Wasabi and Dill Cream Au Gratin
   • Roasted Pork Loin with Mustard&Dill Yoghurt Cream Sauce
   • Caraway seed and Olive oil Oven Potatoes
• Ginger and Honey Turkey
• Dad's Outside the Turkey Onion and Sage Stuffing

Dessert
A beautiful and delicious Apfelstrudel, that a friend makes, with Vanilla Ice Cream
She makes it just like the good ones in Austria and Germany.

*Surubim - Brazilian catfish

No pictures of the "before"!

After all the rush, a tranquil delicious dinner and time with family — best way to spend Christmas!

Up/Back-dates

This week doing some back-posting of half-started posts in my draft folder:

Les Revenants
Thanksgiving

To be closer to real-time, if not accurate blog-time.

Post Christmas and Hope

Christmas tree and decorations down till next Christmas, and on the Epiphany, or Dia de Reis, as is the tradition here that I've adopted ... when I can manage it!

This past year of 2013 was a very strange year: most excellent times and some very bad times. Certainly not boring!
And my folorn blog very lonely as no energy left for posting. We'll see this year how it goes.

With a chronic mental health problem in the family, which wore me down, and which I let get to my "energy marrow", for the first time I was feeling afraid of a new year starting. At least the "old" wasn't too good, but the known devil. A great part of this fear was just pure exhaustion, and now that I'm a bit recuperated, I'm feeling glimmerings of hope, and my regular good humor somewhat returning.

 Fingers crossed.