Weekend in the Valley - Part I

I have to admit that everytime I get ready for a trip to the Valley to see the family... I'm happy, yet sad.  Most often, Chad doesn't get to go home with me and most often, I try to make my trip down there count...taking as much time off of work as I possibly can (thank goodness for our usual half day Fridays!).  This time, not really thinking and probably due to the price of the flight, I scheduled myself to leave bright and early Thursday morning... not remembering that this was Chad's usual Thursday off.  What theeee...?!  Wa-wa-waaaaaaa....

With the schedule set in stone, I quickly realized that just meant that I'd get MORE time with the little one once I got home...who come to think of it, isn't so little anymore :)

Dallas to Harlingen - 10am

After a pretty uneventful plane ride (thank you sweet baby Jesus!) I was rewarded with THIS sweet face who told me the name of the plane I had come to visit her in! (Note to self:  I still haven't figured out this whole YouTube thing so this video is unedited...)

Sweet Addison Grace

Happy 3rd Birthday Miss Addison Grace

I can't believe it's been THREE years since this little one came into the world.  She's not even MINE and I can still remember every single detail about that day.  She's growing up to be such a spit-fire...every day reaching milestones and every day making me miss her more and more.  Thankfully, Christi (her mom and my sister-in-law) does a great job about keeping me in the loop with her life in the valley. 

Aunt Yvette and Uncle Chad love you Sweet Pea :)

Happy 3rd Birthday!

Easter 2011 - Beauty & the Beast at the Bass

I love that the time that Chad and I have together... we actually SPEND together.  Especially Sundays.  No distractions.  No television.  No time with separate friends.  No individual sports watching.  No "you do this and I'll do that, and I'll see you later tonight"- type thing.I'm sure that seems odd to some people... hell, it probably sounds odd to MOST people out there....but with Chad's crazy restaurant schedule, Sunday is OUR day.  Our day to explore the city, take in an event, hang out with our mutual friends, eat a nice dinner or just be alone together.  We obviously have the luxury of minimal distractions without kids right now... but I'm sure that even when our bambinos come along, this will still be Kelley Family Day ;).  This Easter Sunday was no exception.  With a visit to the valley in the works for this next weekend, for Addie's 3rd birthday (I STILL can't believe how fast that little one is growing up!), Chad and I planned our own little Easter celebration in Dallas.. Well actually, Ft. Worth to see Beauty and the Beast at the Bass Performance Hall.  It was AWESOME! 

View of Bass Hall from the parking garage. 

Instagram photo application at it again.  I love how simple Iphone pictures can be transformed so quickly and easily into something cool.  I'm gonna have to stop relying on my phone though and remind myself of our pretty awesome Canon handheld thats ALWAYS in my purse.  ;) 

An early dinner at Reata before the show.  :)

Reata - Ft. Worth Restaurant

Specializing in Southwestern cuisine, located in Sundance Square

A little vino to start things off..

Treana - Marsanne Viognier (one of my new favorites)

Just a teaser picture of all the incredible food we had.

The portions were ridiculous and we left there barely able to move..but soooo worth every yummy bite! ;)

Bass Hall Exterior

Bass Interior Dome above our seats..

Beauty and the Beast - Program

Perks of a Chef's Wife :)

So... it goes without saying that I'm one hell of a lucky wife being married to a bonafide chef.  Not many people can eat the delicious food that I eat as often as I get to eat it.  And for that, I'm blessed.  This whole-y body is blessed and I'm perfectly content (read: SMELLING food makes me gain weight) with having to workout like hell everyday (read: it does NOTHING, I'm still gaining weight because my metabolism SUCKS!!) for the rest of my life to keep eating the things I do.  ;)  it's a perk you see...and I'm willing to embrace it.  ;)

Tonight some of the ladies in my office joined me to do a first run of the newest Spring and Summer items on The Moth menu .  :)  It was a treat to not only get the best seat in the house (overlooking the kitchen and my hottie husband doing his thing) but to be amongst a fabulous group of women.  Fabulous food, fabulous atmosphere and fabulous company.  What could be better?! 

A little beer bubbly to start the night off...

Yup that's right.. a BEER CHAMPAGNE... who knew?!

Fabulous Instagram Application Fun :)

Here's my newest Iphone application in use to document some of the tasty treats we had.  (I've added a few "normal" photo versions of some of the dishes for those not into the Instagram thing.. ) 

Shrimp and Grits with Jalepeno gravy...

Not a new item...just a MUST item for the newbie at the table. 

Always a HIT amongst the crowd.  :)

Carribbean Spiced Chicken with a Banana Ketchup

Heirloom tomato stuffed with a tasty crab salad on top of Israeli couscous

Creamy Risotto with sliced asparagus, peas and preserved lemon

Green beans, carrots and asparagus veggies topped with a garlic like viniagrette

Mexicali creamed style corn topped with a cotija cheese crust

Sweet Texas Skies.. :)

I'm not exactly sure why...but over the course of this last year, I've noticed an INCREDIBLE amount of truly breath-taking sunrises and sunsets.  Like, almost an UNUSUAL amount of beautiful sunrises and sunsets.  Have I really been missing out on these magical events these past 30 years!?  It is LOVE in the air that has made the skies bluer and the sunsets just spectacular??  CHEESE and super salty crackers, I know!!..  Sorry Chad, I HAVE, in fact, discovered a new lease on life since meeting you..but surely that's not why all of a sudden I'm noticing the most glorious skies I've ever seen !  Surely I've just been living in a hole or something... lol.  Regardless, I'm thankful for seeing them now and doubly thankful for having an incredible phone camera to capture it all on my walks with Macie or while driving to work each morning.  (Ssssshhhh... I'm a safe driver...I promise, I only snap pictures when stopped at red lights.. ;) 

And a shout out to my sweet friend Lori Wilson for her own love of beautiful Texas sunsets!  Lori Wilson's Blog - Why I love Texas


Just a few more reasons to love Texas. 

Blog's-A-Changin' :)

It seems like every so often I'll try to "re-invent" my blog in some way... changing the background, updating the main picture...yada, yada, yada.  For those of you who have followed us in this blog since the beginning, you've probably noticed about three MAJOR changes in the last few years since this blog was created.  As much as it pained me to change out our sweet "walking-down-the aisle" main picture, I figured since it's been a year an a half since our wedding, it was due for a change-up.

Literally TWO seconds after I FINALLY decided to go ahead and change the main picture (at first that was the only thing I was going to swap out!), things got a little out of control and I very quickly remembered why I hadn't changed anything in so long... Cue: INDECISION...followed quickly by CONFUSION at all the choices of layouts and colors and text fonts and....uhhhhh.... and lastly came ANNOYANCE for taking so long to find something simple and clean and not too distracting.  And that was just PICKING out the LAYOUT and BACKGROUND template!  The main picture alone had about three different variations of similar, yet DIFFERENT things... What pictures to use?...HOW many do I want? What size do I need them to be?...followed again by the font type, color and so on.  YIKES!  Needless to say, after quite a few trial and errors, I'm happy with the final product and I hope you are too cause it's going to stay like this for quite a LOOOOOONNG time!  ;)  (or until I get sick of looking at the same stuff...lol..hopefully after MORE than a year or so.)

Just to point out a few other changes, (which thankfully only involved text so it was easy to do).... Chef Chad's page (under EXTRA BITES) has been updated to show all the totally awesome press love he's gotten since his move to Dallas four years ago.  It DID take quite awhile to try and gather all that info, but thanks to good 'ol google and the internet, his internet articles were a breeze to gather up.  ;)  And how freakin' COOL is it to be able to GOOGLE your husbands name?!  ;)  Proud wifey here.  ;)

My own ABOUT YVETTE page will be updated very soon... I hadn't looked at it in, I don't even remember when, and when I did... I laughed at how STERILE it is!  Who the hell IS THAT girl?!  I think I stole the copy off of some resume something or other I did at work.  Either way, be on the look out soon for an updated profile... a rambling of sorts (I'm sure) of all the things I love.  (I don't have articles written about me or anything cool like Mr. Kelley, so you'll have to be entertained by my wit alone ;)

(NOTE:  Since this post was originally written: The ABOUT YVETTE page HAS actually been updated!) Whew... cross that off my to-do list!) Happy Reading!)

OOOOOOOO...one last update, since I took down our main wedding picture, I made sure to have our wedding properly represented with it's very own, WEDDING page.  You can catch a glimpse of our wedding video and if you're patient enough to sit around for a while...even see a SLIDESHOW of all our wedding pictures!

ENJOY our new surroundings..  :)

Stone Brewing Beer Dinner - The Meddlesome Moth

For those of you who keep up with our blog, you might recognize Stone Brewing from our December visit to their Escondido Brewery in California.  (You can see our cool pictures of the brewery & food from their restaurant on our past blog post - here ) This time, they flew to Texas and paid a little visit to the Moth, starting out April Ale Week with beer and food pairings like no other.  Greg Koch, Co-Founder of Stone was the HILARIOUS guest speaker this evening while Chad did a great job (as always) preparing the menu and delighting the over 100 guests with spectacular food.  :)  

Brief introductions from Jason Armstrong - Stone's Regional Rep.

Sea of beer. Enough said.  ;)

Greg Koch, Co-founder and comedian ;)

Pate on rye with malt mustard - Carpaccio with peach, olive oil & celery - Carmelized onion & gruyere tart

Beer Pairings:  Green Flash - Pizza Port Carlsbad - Stone Hwy 78 Scotch Ale

Crab "Boil" with sweet corn - Red bliss potato with andouille butter

Beer Pairing:  Stone IPA 

Cocoa braised short rib with burnt leek polenta & garlic kale

Beer Pairing:  Stone Sublimely Self-Righteous Ale

Candied orange duckwith wilted curly leaf spinach

Beer Pairing:  Oaked Arrogant Bastard Ale

Chocolate fig stout cake with Henry's malted milk ice cream

Beer Pairing:  2008 Stone Imperial Russian Stout

left to right:  Chef Chad Kelley, aka "The Hubs", Greg Koch, Matt Quinette and Keith Schlabs

Funnyman Greg went around "stamping" all he could with a personalized stamp with his jolly mug on it!

He was even passing around temporary arm band tattoos with the same thing...lol.  crazy kid!  :)

Greg and some of the bar staff

Mama Lisa was my date for the night... :)

Chad and Greg enjoying the night after all the plates had been served and speeches had been given. 

One of my favorite pictures form our visit to the Stone Brewery. 

I love this gargoyle guy! Scary but cute perhaps??  lol..

Office/Den Update Pictures

So recently I posted a picture on Facebook of our new kitchen chalkboard wall and I couldn't believe the positive response. ;)  It reminded me that not many of my friends have seen our office/den since we finished the framed chalkboard wall we did IN THERE back in October.  For SHAME!  Looking back on my October blog post about it, I saw that the office area was definitely a work in progres....so last night I grabbed my camera for a few updated snaps of that room as it stands today.  (hence the night-time photos with obvious flash use)  It lets everyone see how the house has evolved since October...well at least how THIS ROOM has evolved since October... ;) Enjoy!

I'm really quite proud of this particular piece of art above the sofa. It cost almost NADA. :) Thanks to my wonderful employers (AGUIRRE RODEN).. I scored (and SAVED from the trash bin)...the 12"x12" foam core boards used for the pictures. They were hours away from being trashed..and even though at the time I had no idea what I was going to do with them, I gathered the nearly 40 perfectly cut boards, and started to plan my project. I then photoshoped some of our honeymoon pictures with borders and such (The KELLEY lettered pictures on the top took a bit more photoshop tweaking than the bottom) and printed them out on 11x17 good quality paper. For that glossy look that most pictures have but even good quality paper doesn't give you... I laminated them. Instant ART! :)

Another way we personalized our wedding. 

I had this 2'x2' foam core picture set out for our guests to sign.  It didn't get around to everyone who celebrated with us but between this and the Shutterfly Guest Photo Book I made for people to sign in...we were overwhelmed with lots of love from everyone at our wedding!  :)

Our "work" desk which houses my amazing MAC computer that Chad got me for my birthday this year.  :) 

Bottom Left Corner:  Yet another 2'x2' picture of us taken the day we got engaged which we also set out on an easel at our wedding...this time near the cake!  Mmmmmmm....  :) 

Top Left Corner:  Remnant from the apartment I shared with Lola Cat in Barcelona, circa 2001.  :)  I still remember the day we bought this beehive lampshade (that always makes me smile) in a little hardware shop down the street from where we lived.  It hung over our teeny, tiny, fold-down-from-the-wall, dining table for the entire semester.  Soon after, it hung over the dining table in our apartment in College Station and finally came to live with me.. permanently.  :)  No worries Lorraine, it's in good hands.  ;) 

Middle:  Another work find/save.  About a year and a half ago, Aguirre Roden moved office locations.  In the hustle and bustle of trying to clean out the old stuff to make our transition easier, I came across this blown-up water color print someone had done of a project waaaaayyyy before my time.  I didn't think it was trash so I asked if I could have it.  :)  That simple.  It now has a new home ;)

For one of our first holidays as husband and wife (I'm not sure if it was Valentine's or Christmas..) I got Chad this print from an Etsy shop that was giving away a free print of your choice.  One of the verses offered in this free deal just so happened to be one of the readings from our wedding, all I had to tell her was our NAMES!  How cool is that?!  :) The frame is from IKEA (which I already had just waiting for something fabulous to be put inside it!)

Here's a shot of our first chalkboard wall.  :)  We were both so proud that the frame was actually centered and level! We use this as an inspiration wall, jotting down words and phrases to inspire our own restaurant concept one day.  It's ever-changing and always evolving so some words mean something now..some were just fleeting thoughts...some, just plain silliness.  :)

I couldn't decide which picture of our IKEA console I liked better, so I thought it best not to choose and go with them BOTH!  I still want to actually put UP those pictures...maybe on a ledge perhaps, but since I will most certainly need two sets of hands to do it, I'll have to wait for a Sunday when Chad doesn't mind working on the house to help me.  ;)  Until then, they are fine where they are.  (Don't you just love the candy cane colored striped candles that have been left on there since CHRISTMAS?!) Don't judge, just pretend they are solid red or something.. ;)  Oh and the HU-MON-GOUS pine cone isn't holiday related either by the way... it's a year round accessory that I brought back (read: somewhat illegal contraband ;) from Yosemite.  ;)

The newest additions to the Kelley house.  :)  A super fabulous, I've-been-looking-for-you-everywhere, where-have-you-been-hiding, Fork and Spoon find from Garden Ridge for a whoppin' $12 bucks!!  I'm a HUUUGEE SUCKER for a great deal so you should've seen the look on my face when we stumbled upon these guys...talk about stupid silly!  :)  They're oversized, wooden, stained in a dark chocolate/espresso finish and unfortunately don't photograph as fabulous as they really are in person...but you get the idea.  We were even lucky enough to find another pair that we are keeping for future use in our future house.  (No plans to move yet, just thinking ahead ;) 

Awww... and this little flying piggy friend that I stumbled upon at Ross.  I couldn't NOT bring him home with me, he was just too darn CUTE!  Oh and he's a bona-fide piggy bank too!  Cute and functional?...SOLD!  :)  He weighs about a ton too, well not literally, but this chunk of solid iron would do some serious damage if it fell on a toe or something.  OUCH! 

Oh and that super adorable, don't-you-just-want-to-squeeze-those-fatty-cheeks, baby on the far left.. is... ME!  :)  I know, I was super cute, wasn't I?!  No idea what the hell happened after that... ;) 

The facebook photo I posted which inspired this blog post.  :) 

We had originally intended to hang the fork and spoon in the area where the menu is written, but when I realized we still had chalkboard paint left over and we could get a space for writing menu items and such, I took matters into my own hands and painted the wall while I waited for Chad to get home from work.  Luckily he liked my idea better and loved that the wall finally had a purpose.  :)  I also like that the black paint creates a nice transition from the kitchen cabinets to the living area.