Chef William

This summer William's independence in the kitchen grew leaps and bounds.  He began by making his own rotation of meal favorites for awhile in the microwave (cheese quesadilla, mac 'n cheese cups, hot dogs, chicken nuggets) but he is getting more comfortable with the stove and with recipes.   He also has a flair for garnish and presentation!  For hot dishes it's a sprinkle of cheese over the top.   For desserts it's all about the Rediwhip and the chocolate chips.   During winter he graduated to making  his own yeast dough for pizza crusts and even made us a Christmas dinner of homemade pasta with marinara and meatballs.  He also accepted my lunch request of scrambled eggs (his specialty!) and crescent rolls earlier this week and delivered them to me in my home office.   I could sure get used to this!

 

Chocolate chip cookies cooked in the microwave. He found the recipe on YouTube and executed on it himself.  They weren't bad.  A little brittle.  Each time the flavor was improved.  He made them a few times.

Parfaits are not for sharing!

Chocolate chip cookies in the oven.  These were just my style!  He likes to beat his ingredients by hand.  Works out fine as long as he remembers to soften the butter in advance!

Pizza using fresh dough.  We almost always have the toppings to make a pizza, but we don't always have naan or a pre-made pizza crust, so he's gotten crazy and found his out recipe for a quick yeast dough.

And then we had the fresh pasta, marinara and meatballs for Christmas that I already posted.  Pretty much my only contribution was to form the meatballs while he was busy seasoning the sauce.

Oh, I guess I made these cinnamon rolls mostly myself.   William didn't love the waiting part for cinnamon rolls so I ended up rolling out the dough and making these so we could get them into the oven before church.

 William using leftover meatballs to make another pizza.  This time on naan bread instead of his own.

Christmas at Home

We celebrated Christmas at home on the 28th, since the presents under the tree that I bought, as well as what my parents and brother shipped up didn't get hauled to Florida.  William was thrilled with his additional haul of kitchen utensils, flashlights, books, pajama pants and a Call of Duty army men set!

 

 While the guys did some assembly for the Call of Duty set, I assembled my Disney tree and attempted to keep glitter from infiltrating my entire house!   Later that afternoon, we made homemade spaghetti, marinara and meatballs.  The house smelled so good!

 

 

Since we missed the end of Advent and the Christmas services at St.. Thomas we were excited to see the beautiful decorations on the Feast of the Holy Family. 

Christmas at Disney - Final Day

On our last day, we donned Classic Mickey shirts and headed to Epcot.   (Only John is still sporting the original!  He did get a new one in his Christmas stocking but is saving it for a future trip.)   Our plans included Test Track, breakfast at The Land, the aquarium, Spaceship Earth, pin trading and exploring some of the new construction.  The guys rode Mission Space and then went miniature golfing while I walked back to Beach Club to work for the afternoon.

 

 First up was Pluto!

 

Then Mickey!  William showed him the "Angry Mickey" trading pin he'd gotten earlier in the day!  We all agreed farm life was better for his disposition.

 

 

 Then Chip, whose pin he also had, and who borrowed his hat for the photo.

Dale was our last visitor and he had a lot to "say" and write in the autograph book.   Especially since his pin in the Chip 'n Dale set that William had collected was far better than the Chip pin! 

 

 

After brunch we had some time to kill before our Spaceship Earth Fastpass, so we enjoyed the sunshine and the views!   And then we walked through the aquarium and learned so much!  We've been there multiple times but I always feel like I'm seeing something new.   We enjoyed watching the dolphins which I didn't realize were there.

 

William's final collection of trading pins.  This was the first time he had done pins, and he mostly traded with cast members, although the Boba Fett was from a hotel guest.   I bought him the lanyard and 10 pins from a neighbor before we left and he traded off all but one of them (flag Mickey head).   He also got some Stitch and Pandora pins in his Christmas stocking so that he ended up with 14 or 15 total.   It was fun to do something different.

I grabbed myself a Grand Marnier slushy in France on my way back to the resort and then set up in the common room of the villas for my conference call and work.  You can tell that I only had a half day at Disney that last day with how my steps dropped off!