Chanukah Blog Crawl

Welcome everyone to the Chanukah Blog Crawl!

It's my turn and I am talking about latkes. 

Those yummy fried potato pancakes we all love to eat. 

Please make sure you check out the 

 Host Blog Page

Make sure you check out Hey, it's Jet Here too!

Me making latkes last year at my sisters house

Like most Jewish holidays, Hanukkah has food traditions. Fried foods like latkes and sufganiyot (jelly filled donuts) are especially popular.

Hanukkah celebrates the oil that burned for eight days so fried foods are popular as they remind us of the miracle of the holiday.

In my family, for some reason, I am always the one that ends up with latke duty.  Peeling, grating, draining the never-ending liquid that comes out of the potatoes. Chopping the onions that always make me cry, and frying them up.
And of course the fact that I smell like latkes for days after. Another favorite dish our family has at Haunukkah is Noodle Kugel (I make mine without the raisins) and it's yummy!

 @Ryker_Tyker 's family made regular potato, purple potato, and sweet potato latkes. Very colorful!

We have tried different recipes over the years, but always have the traditional latke as well. They are typically served with sour cream and apple sauce. The link here has a good traditional recipe plus some other not so traditional. Might try a few of those next year!

Latke Recipes

TSK in the holiday spirit


TSKs Hanukkah Miracle Wish is that every
pet had a forever home.
And that
May all who are lost, be found
May all who are ill, be well
May all in harms way, be safe
May all without homes, be loved.

My family and friends, Hanukkah 2011

Make sure you visit all the blogs in the Chaunkah Blog Crawl

12/8:    The Musings of a Crazy Cat Lady

12/9:    Gromek the Cat To-ra

12/10:  A Tonk's Tail - err, Tale...

12/11:  Two stops!
             Meandering Moodys (@danapixie)
            and Hey... It's Jet Here

12/12:  Two stops!
            Pumpkinpuddy
            and Spike the Cat's Blog

12/13: Two stops!
           Terrier Torrent (@GizmoGeoDog)
           and Adopted mom to Chazz the Dog

12/14:  Two stops!
            Catself: Cat to Self, the Conversation
            and Author Darlene Arden's PerPETually Speaking

12/15:  Cat Wisdom 101

Of Sun and Skis

TSK has been loving the new house! As the sun makes its way around he follows it from room to room. He especially likes the guest room as it gets the good morning sun.
If you come visit us, TSK is sure to be your roommate! :)

awwww.....

Now that we have gotten the boxes out of the garage there is a spot to set up the wax bench.

and a-waxing we go!

The iron is heating up while I get the skis

First up, the Nordic. Skating and Striding

Then I wax the Alpine skis, now all are ready for scraping.

Wax on.... wax off....looks a little like snow!

All waxed and ready for the snow

Back in the ski/boot closet ready at a moments notice!

We are participating in the Chanukah Blog Crawl, make sure you check out all the blogs for the 8 days of Chanukah!

Home Sweet Home

It seemed as though it would never come... but here we are! In our new house in Bend. And it's great!

Took possession on a Monday, the movers came to deliver our stuff from Truckee on Tuesday and it's been non stop unpacking and setting up housekeeping ever since. 

The horror of moving day! Where to begin?

TSK loving the stairs!

The great room, and it's  GREAT room!

guest bedroom

View from guest bedroom

guest den

Kitchen and Dining room

deck, office, the cutest cat ever, master

We are loving our new house and we were already loving Bend. We will be very happy here!

Here are a couple bonus photos below

A view of Mt Bachelor between two layers of clouds.

Some locals passing by...

Thanks for reading our blog!

The Final Countdown

We have waiting to do a new blog post until we had some big news. But the last month has mostly been waiting. When we were busy with three real estate transactions the phone was always ringing. Now we are done with that and everyone has quit calling leaving us a little more time to

explore our new town while we wait to move into our new house. 

Our wait is almost over as the countdown is now in days, rather than weeks.

Bend is GREAT! We have rediscovered mountain biking... actually we have become beer drinking mountain bikers in Oregon instead of the wine drinking road riders we were in California.

Bend has over a dozen or more breweries! And a ton of good restaurants.

We are very thankful we had the RV to live in while we wait to move, but now can't wait to get out of it and get it in storage. Don't think we will be planning any RV trips anytime soon since living in it for going on 3 months. It's been ok, but now getting tiresome since our move in date is just around the corner. TSK can't wait! He will have so much room for zoomies and endless sunpuddles.

Here are some images of various outings.

Jim in action!

Broken Top in the distance at Swede Hut

Big Skies in Central Oregon

water feature

Parking Passes... we are ready!

Drake Park, a very popular spot for photogs

Deschutes River, Drake Park

Cyclocross races in downtown

Our next post will be from our new house as we get onto mover mode... unpacking and setting housekeeping. We are so ready!

Moving and Grooving

It all started with our friend Tori saying 'you should buy the house next door'....fast forward 3 months and we are now living in another state! Not what Tori had in mind at all... :)

So... first let us apologize for being remiss on our blogging. Real Estate sure takes up a lot of time...and worry...and psychic energy! 

We started thinking about our friend's comment. We were pretty sure we didn't want the house next door to them, tho we did look at it (wacky floorplan) but maybe a little house in Truckee. We thought that since we were now up in Truckee full time that maybe we needed just a bit more space. The condo (which we love) was a little small, perfect for the weekends but maybe small for full time living. So we put the condo in Sacramento AND in Truckee on the market. And started looking at houses in Truckee. We saw houses we liked, but holy cow, you had to be fast with an offer. Houses in the price range we were looking at were being snatched up quickly and lots of cash buyers too. We soon realized that we were shopping at the bottom of the market in Truckee (Tahoe Donner) and we were going to have to take what we could get..and fast.

Have you ever heard of the mobile apps Trulia and Zillow? Very addictive when you are buying/selling homes..So in looking around we saw that Bend Oregon had a lot more house for the money!! And nice houses too. We had both been to Bend before, to ski and cycle, and liked it allot. Bend is very similar to Truckee in that it's sporty (tons of mountain bike trails, a river for SUP and kayaking, a big mountain to ski on, and lots of groomed trails for Nordic skiing) it's just a bigger town. In many ways Bend is the town that Truckee aspires to be when it grows up.

So here we are.... In Bend Oregon. Living in our Motorhome with the kitty...who has been a great sport about this whole thing. Cats are not known for embracing change.

Both condos sold, Truckee was a cash buyer and a fairly easy transaction (tho he did want a fast close and move in date) and Sacramento sold but the transaction moved at a snail's pace. We packed up Sac first, and for the first time in a long time all our stuff was in the same town albeit the Sac stuff was in a storage unit in Truckee. Then we packed up Truckee and that stuff in also in storage in Truckee. We are pretty familiar with the routes between Northern California and Bend Oregon. so if you want to know where to get a good peach shake just ask.

We found the most perfect house here in Bend. On Awbrey Butte, a great house with spectacular vistas of the Cascades. Made an offer, was accepted.....except.... the owner is building a new house in the country and it's not quite ready yet. So while we now own the house, he is renting it back from us for a month or so while we live in the RV. We are Oregon homeowners, just not homedwellers. A strange situation - being homeless but being landlords.

But we do feel the house is worth the wait. And hopefully close to this time next month we might be moving our stuff in!

In the meantime we have been exploring our new town. Bend is a wonderful town that feels almost custom made for the activities we enjoy. Doing hikes and mountain bike rides and festivals and such! Here are some pix of our outings

Our new house....someday

Jim along the Deschutes River

Wiener Dog races at OktoberFest

Dana at Smith Rock

Shrine on the ELV trail on Phil'sTrail

Kitty taking in the sun

Tumalo Falls

Hike to Benham Falls

Enjoying Belgian beer at BrokenTopBottleShop- our soon to be local pub

Crooked River at Smith Rock

Moooooo!

PawsCrossed we move into our new house soon!

Stay tuned for more exiting adventures as we explore our new town!