Erik's Potatoes

Erik's garden is proving QUITE successful this summer and most recently, he pulled up potatoes!

Check out all of these potatoes he had in his garden!

Potatoes grow in the dirt. He planted them, a plant grows up from the dirt, but to get the potatoes out, you just dig your hand into the dirt and grab them. 

And there you have it...lots of potatoes for us. He dug up another plant and he had some huge ones in there!!  

Tomatoes, cucumbers, basil, and peppers are also actively growing!

My DIY Project

A few weeks ago, I found this table on the street. I've actually found a lot of great stuff on the street over the past six years including a weight set (that we still use today), books, workout DVD's, and who knows what else. After watching many episodes of Flea Market Flip, it made me start to see how easy it can be for "one mans trash to be another ones treasure."

I found this table on the street one day and decided to pick it up. 

Scratched up and painted a gazillion times but in good shape

I bought a sander to sand off this paint and re-paint. My vision was to make this into a bench with a cushion on top to simply live in our bedroom.

Sanding...

Painting...

I wished that I didn't try to sand this thing down. I could NOT get all of the paint off. It was painted literally six times and it was not possible. I tested out spray painting a leg and realized it looked fine on a non-sanded area. Oh well, you learn! 

The finished project!

The body is sprayed dark gray and I made the cushion for the top. It looks great! The paint job is not perfect  due to the sanding but it is perfect enough for me. 

Can't wait for the next thing I find on the street to fix up!

Wimbledon Win and Tomato Basil Chicken

First of all, can we talk about that plane crash at SFO? Wowzer. Very scary but also crazy that people walked away from the plane. Out of the 200+ people on the plane, only two were killed and while that is NEVER a positive thing, that is pretty remarkable. We keep hearing tidbits about what happened including the latest that the pilot was in training and had only 40 hours of flight time on that plane!

This morning began with some WIMBLEDON. We were up by 8am to watch the match and how thrilling it was!! You can tell Evie was excited...

After so many years or playing, reaching the Semi's and of course, last year's Wimbledon final, it was so great to see Murray win!

Back to Evie for a second...

She has this thing on her face. We thought she had a cyst or got stung by a bee because she had this big bump on her face. Then, the bump burst the other day...

 I noticed that one of her whiskers looks broken off and now we think it might be an ingrown hair? I don't know. Always something with this dog!! Speaking of always something, it was one year ago on 7/4 that she tore her CCL.

Erik went surfing again today and I finished my project and did some chores. Then, we took Evie to Tilden Park to get some running in.

Got some errands done and then we had a DELICIOUS dinner using some ingredients from Erik's garden. 

Yum....tomatoes and basil. Yes, purple basil!

I made this recipe and it was delish!

Tomato Basil Chicken

Ingredients: (4 servings)

• 2 chicken breasts 
• kosher salt and black pepper
• 2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 2 cups chopped fresh tomatoes
• 2 tsp minced fresh garlic
• 4 Tbsp cold butter
• 1/2 cup fresh basil, chopped
• freshly grated Parmigiano reggiano cheese, for garnish

Season chicken breasts with kosher salt and fresh cracked black pepper.  Add a couple of tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil to your skillet.  This may seem like quite a bit, but it will form the base for the sauce.  While waiting for the oil to heat up, go ahead and get your water going for the pasta. When the oil is HOT, add the chicken breasts.  After about 4-5 minutes, the chicken breasts should be ready to turn.  By the way, when did chicken breasts get SO HUGE?!   You'll want to cook them on the second side another 4-5 minutes,or until the juices run clear when you pierce them with a small sharp knife.  If you pounded yours out thinner, they will cook faster than this.

After the second side has been cooking for about 4 minutes, go ahead and add in the fresh tomatoes that you have chopped up.  Next, add the fresh basil that you have chopped into ribbons, the cold butter, the minced garlic, and you will probably want to add some more kosher salt and black pepper to season the sauce.  Now give it all a good stir so all those flavors will marry together.

When your chicken is "done," turn the sauce down on the lowest setting to keep it all warm until the pasta is cooked, which should be any minute now.  At this point, if still waiting for the pasta, you can remove the cooked chicken to a cutting board, and after resting just a couple of minutes, cut the chicken into slices on the bias.   Divide the pasta among individual bowls, and top each with half of a chicken breast, sliced into pieces, and equal portions of the tomato basil sauce.  Top with more fresh basil and freshly grated Parmigiana reggiano cheese.

Drake's Brewery and a Chupacabra

On Saturday, Erik went surfing and I worked on my "project". Remember I found this table on the street a few weeks ago? Well, yesterday was painting day so I will show you a before and after shot. 

In the afternoon, we went over to Drake's Brewery in San Leandro. The brewery and barrel room are located in the same spot. It was a very industrial building that was no frills but they had a great deck with outdoor seating that worked for us!

What's on tap...

Yesterday was a big day because they were serving some beer called "Aroma Coma" which was an IPA of some sort so I did not have one sip.

I tried the Hefe and also a beer that was a Blonde/Hefe mix aged in an oak barrel. It definitely had a Chardonnay taste to it. Interesting blend!

Erik tried the Aroma Coma and the Ferkin, which who knows what that was. 

For dinner, we went to Little Star in Albany. Albany is a town just north of Berkeley and Little Star is a pizza place that was up the street from our place in SF. The place in SF was always packed and had a line to get in. We went to the Albany location and literally, walked right in. We said that we found the "chupacabra" because this is something very rare!!

Great Saturday and the best part was that we STILL had another day in our weekend left!

Davenport, CA

Sunset Magazine had an article about the small town of Davenport, CA this month. Davenport is a town with a population of 400 about 10 minutes north of Santa Cruz. So, I wanted to check it out since we were already down there. 

Davenport Landing Beach

So pretty and quiet

The "town" is literally a strip of shops off Hwy 1. We stopped at the Whale City Bakery and got a piece of homemade pie and ice cream. 

They make everything in house!

So good!

We stopped at a roadside berry farm to pick up some strawberries. 

 These strawberries were delicious!!

Fun little day trip down south. So happy to have two days left in the weekend!

Bigfoot Museum

We both had Friday off so we went down to Santa Cruz and Davenport. We stumbled upon this Bigfoot Museum a few years ago when we got lost in SC. I vowed we'd be back and we finally went. 

First of all, you had to ring a doorbell to get into this "museum". It was literally two rooms and I honestly think we were in someone's house--the owner must live in the back in the house or something. Of course, this older guy with a big white beard answered the door and let us in. 

"Skulls" found in China 

Memorbilia from Harry & the Hendersons. Remember that show!? Seriously, it made me scared of Bigfoot back in 1987. 

Footprints that have apparently been found...

I'm pretty sure we were in there for a total of three minutes. We were joking that the owner seemed like a guy that you could've talked to for hours if you wanted to really get into it with him. We were saying that he would probably show you the "good stuff" if you asked him aka, Bigfoot fur in some back room that he has. hahaha

We also made a pit stop at the Home Brew shop for supplies....

Then, we had lunch at the Seabright Brewery. We would not recommend this place. The service was horrible  and the food was just OK. 

Next, onto Davenport...

Happy 4th Of July

Happy 4th of July!

On Thursday, we packed up and headed down to Pacifica for some beach time. As we drove down south, it was foggy and gray but when we came down the hill to the beach, it was nice & sunny!

 Erik surfed and I sat on the beach. Our friends Betsy & Greg met up with us and we also saw Erik's friend Phil  & his kids down at the beach, too.

After surfing, we went to a place called the Surf Spot in Pacifica for some food. It was a pretty cool place that had a big outdoor patio with a live band playing. Here's a shot from a site showing the set up. 

Fun day for the 4th!

Fire and Ice

I watched a great documentary the other day about Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe. LOVE tennis so it was great to see the history of these two rivals and champions. Please just look at these two when they were in their early 20's! Haha. In the film, McEnroe said that Borg looked so hot in his headband and when he tried to wear one, he looked like Bozo the Clown. Bahahhaa



Bjorn was the first real "Tennis Superstar" -- he was a great player but he was also good looking and fans would rush the court after a match to see him. He had that long 70's hair that garnered him a lot of attention, too. He actually didn't LOVE playing though. If you've ever read Andre Agassi's memoir, you'll hear the same thing.

McEnroe was this little, mouthy squirt from Queens who was surprisingly really good at tennis. It was a dream of his to play Borg and before he know it, he was playing and beating him at grand slams.

It was a great behind the scenes look at the sport and these two great players. If you like tennis, check it out!

Looks like you can actually watch the entire film on You Tube!