I got another shot of the-buck-with-the-strange-antlers this week when he re-appeared in our back-woods again.
You'd think he would have shed this ugly pair by now, which they usually do around January through March, but he's still hanging on to them ..

Talking about deer and woods, we went 'into the woods' ourselves during McMinnville's Gallery Theater's first show of the year:

As usual we picked the Sunday matinee, which is a good choice during this time of the year when evenings are dark and can be frosty and therefore slippery!

'Into the woods'  is a 1987 musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by James Lapine. The musical intertwines the plots of several Brothers Grimm fairy tales, exploring the consequences of the characters' wishes and quests.

The story line:
As the result of the curse of a once-beautiful witch, a baker and his wife are childless. Three days before the rise of a blue moon, they venture into the forest to find the ingredients that will reverse the spell and restore the witch's beauty: a milk-white cow, hair as yellow as corn, a blood-red cape, and a slipper of gold.
During their journey, they meet Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel and Jack, each one on a quest to fulfill a wish.

As before we were very impressed by the talent and professionalism of the play, for such a small-town theater they're doing such an amazing job. The show was fast and very funny with great songs and quirky conversations.
We're blown away every time we go!

                                             

This season's shows seem to lean a little more to the 'for the whole family' style of musicals but, as with this latest show's fairy-tales (which are actually pretty gruesome), they are probably just as delightful for us adults/young at hearts!
We're looking forward to Harvey, for which we already have tickets for the second of April!

James had signed up for another golf-lesson at the Red Tail golf Center:

 

So I spent another hour in the close-by Washington Square shopping mall.
                                                        
                         

As you can see in the pictures it's a rather upscale mall and after cruising the stores for a second time I now know that none of these stores sell anything remotely interesting for me.

                                                                            
 
The shoes, clothes and accessories are too stylish and fashion-y (which is just not my style), I'm also not interested in jewelry or all kind of crazy gadgets or newest electronics and we have all the furniture we can possibly have in our small 'house' and are not interested in replacing anything that still works perfectly fine to begin with!
On top of that, or is it just me, but everything seems just insanely expensive these days?!

Any-who .. been there, done that!

We did go for an early dinner at Din Tai Fung this time around though.
Last time we were there we had no desire to wait for over two hours to be seated as walk-ins (!) so this time we'd made reservations.



The interior is rather simple and dark, all black with bamboo accents and stylish Asian lamps.

We ordered their signature dish Xiao long bao, a soup and pork meatballs filled dumpling, spicy chicken wontons and string beans with garlic.

                                                      

Well .. we can't say it was bad, but we weren't too impressed either.
The food was rather bland and the dumplings not very hot but the beans were great, the atmosphere pleasant and different and the waiter very friendly and knowledgeable, explaining into detail how the food was made and supposed to be eaten.

Of course we'd eaten most of it before I thought of taking a picture ..

But as with everything in this mall, for what we got, it was over-prized and lacking that something that would make it 'special' for us.
There are lots of Asian restaurants that do an equally, and often better, job. I don't think we'll be back.

After dinner we also picked up some pastries from the 85ºC bakery. (Another thing I didn't do last time and had regretted since).
By the way, the name 85ºC comes from the idea that the perfect brewing temperature for espresso coffee is 85º Celsius. It symbolizes their devotion to provide coffee, breads and cakes of the highest quality to every guest.

The French pastries and fluffy Asian breads and buns are baked onsite and are still warm when you get them from the self-serve bakery area. All are delicious and uniformly light, fluffy and not overly sweet and prices are very reasonable.
Funny enough, almost everything is individually wrapped, or will be placed in beautiful and artfully folded boxes at the check-out.

We took a tray and tongs and went to town filling our tray with goodness. 

                                         

We stopped ourselves at 2 pieces each (such restraint): a chocolate 'bun', a mixed berry bun, a sort of coconut danish and that box is hiding a slice of double chocolate mousse cake, the latter we had for desert when we got home.
Delicious! And Yes, we'll be back!

Let's see, what else?
Last week's snow had melted away by Saturday, which was convenient because we had places to go, but Monday morning we woke up to ..

                      

Yikes! 22F! And not too long after breakfast it started to snow again!

I guess Punxsutawney Phil wasn't kidding when he predicted 6 more weeks of winter!
Unfortunately the snow didn't stick around for long, after a couple of hours it turned into sleet and by the afternoon it was raining and everything turned green again.

Oh well, it was fun while it lasted and according to the weathermen (and Phil) we have more coming. I'll take it!

Last, here's James' swing as recorded during his lesson and compared to Rory Mcilroy's:

As you can see, if you're a golfer and know what you're looking for, Rory swings beautifully 'in to out' as they say (see his club there coming from the left) and James ... not so much.

It makes a big difference in accuracy as well as distance so .. back to the driving range it is! Practice, practice, practice ..

Finally! We have a winter! Yes!
We woke up to a beautiful winter-wonderland this morning:

                         

They'd teased me all winter and never got it right, but finally those weathermen guessed correctly! Really .. I believe those predictions are as much a crap-shoot as anything .. even I can get it right 10% of the time!



Any-who .. it is white and soooo pretty!

                                     

                                     

It was a little cloudy in the morning and although the temperatures never came above 33F (1C) in the shade, the sun came out for a bit in the afternoon ..

Happy hour in the snow .. a sort of 'après-ski', without the skiing!

My birds went through their feeders like there was no tomorrow ... I had to fill them again in the afternoon!

 

                 
 Look at these icicles:

Meanwhile, although we're not Catholic, we 'observed' another Mardi-Gras Day this week.
Since we spent quite some time in Louisiana during our travels we're sort of hooked to the tradition .. well, mainly to the food-part of the festivities!

I really didn't think Oregon had much of a party going on for fat Tuesday but apparently there are a couple of Krewes in Portland and one of them, the 'Mysti Krewe of Nimbus', formed in 2010, puts on an annual ball and a parade!

 

(Fun fact: The source of the word Nimbus in Greek Mythology means a 'cloudy radiance' said to surround a deity when on earth, and also is the name for an actual rain cloud.
Living in the rainy Northwest, this name certainly fits the bill!
They even changed the traditional “Mystic” to “Mysti” to further reflect this rainy condition)

We didn't go to Portland for the parade but I did make a traditional King Cake.
I choose a different recipe every year (there are hundreds of them on the Internet) and this year I (mostly) followed the one from one of my favorite websites 'the stay at home chef'.
Probably due to the insane amount of yeast and eggs this one came out the fluffiest, and certainly largest(!), cake yet:

I'd cut back some on the butter and sugar it called for but had to add a lot more flower to make the very sticky dough somewhat workable, hence the monster-size!
It didn't look very pretty and I didn't have high hopes but guess what .. it was (and still is because it is enough for an army and than some) is delicious!

To finish of the day in true Louisiana Mardi-Gras style, I made a hearty Gumbo and some honey-cornbread muffins for dinner:

                                                              

As they say in Louisiana 'Laissez les bons temps rouler'
(Let the good times roll)!

These clouds came up one evening after a beautiful sunny, but cold, day. I always love how the setting sun can give the edges such a pretty glow!

The next morning we woke up to a dusting of snow:

It wasn't much but I guess beggars can't be choosers and I only wished for 'snow' so .. there you have it! Next time I have to be more specific .. as in 'a foot of it, please'!

It only stayed white for a couple of hours and when the sun came out it turned into such a nice day that when James came back from a round of golf I'd uncovered the BBQ and prepared some steaks to go on it!

Barbecuing in Oregon on the 11th of February,  how about that for a change?

It was a little too cold to eat outside, it's amazing how quickly that temperature drops when the sun goes down, but it was a fun meal, a little reminder of the summer which will be here before we know it!

Valentines day is not something we particularly celebrate but I discovered some lobster tails in the freezer (bought for Old Year's but unused since we were in Europe) and followed a recommendation on a recipes-site to prepare them in an air-fryer ..

I don't have a true air-fryer but I have an air-fryer lid for my instant-pot, something I haven't used very much yet, so I gave it a try.
I'm very pleased with the result, it worked perfectly and those were some of the easiest and best lobster-tails I ever made!

A favorite meal for my happy Valentine!

And that was all she wrote for this week I'm afraid.
I have almost no pictures due to the fact that my toe, which I stubbed a week ago (and I might actually have broken) is still causing me so much pain that I've decided to stay off of it for a while to give it time to heal instead of ignoring it and making it worse. What a concept, eh?!
Fortunately I have enough indoor hobbies to keep me entertained for a while but I sorely miss my daily constitutionals ..
(I looked it up. A constitutional is a walk, typically taken regularly to maintain or restore good health. How true!)

Here's a sunset. Not the most colorful of the week but I often discover too late it's going to be a colorful one and have to rush out to catch the last little bit of it .. one of these days I'll catch it in the act!

This week's cold, wet nights made for foggy mornings when the sun tried to break through, with every tree and shrub covered in glistening water-drops ..

                                                              

A couple of days the sun even managed to stay around for a few hours .. how different everything looks with a little sun on it!

I even got to sit outside for my morning cup-of-Joe, I actually could feel the sun on me!

But the weekend was grey, windy and cold and we spend most of it indoors.
James did play a round of golf during which it stayed as good as dry but to say it was hugely enjoyable .. (which he'll never admit by the way).

I kept myself busy with the usual little house-hold chores (quick work in a RV) and made some time going through and cleaning out our closets.
Which was mainly triggered by me buying a dress and skirt when I went grocery shopping this week! Ha!
Finding clothes I like is pretty much a miracle in itself and finding them in a grocery store when you're not looking is rather funny of course ..

My loot!

Feeding 'my flock' is of course still a daily occurrence and according to them my most important, and definitely not to forget and haven-forbid most certainly not to be late, job!

I've been scavenging around the yard for anything flowering to bring inside, just to fill the empty places where the Christmas decorations have been, but there's not much to find .. yet.

I settled for a few mossy branches and a little bit of evergreen for a somewhat 'winter-y' decor:                            

And for good measure, I hung some outside next to the front door as well.
I kind of like it ...

I really have nothing much else to report  ... work has picked up a little so we're staying afloat, a little above break-even, which is pretty much normal for this time of the year.
And since I'm only helping out when they are busy, I'm off for good behavior for the time being ..

Since I have a ridiculous amount of hobbies my only concern is which one to choose, which at the end of the day actually sometimes results in me having done really nothing at all .. weird?