Friday Things
1. How TALL does Duke look?! He’s like a weed! He keeps growing at a crazy rate, and is now exactly half of Einstein’s size. He still has a ways to go, but I can’t believe how big he’s gotten already! It’s fun to watch him continue to learn and discover new things. He went through a phase of being completely obsessed with the skylights in our family room at night since he could see all sorts of crazy reflections. We seem to have made it over the hump with both housebreaking and sleeping through the night, both of which seemed light years away just six weeks ago.
2. I apologize for any issues that you may have had accessing the website on Wednesday and Thursday this week. There were some backend server issues causing a few hiccups; they have since been resolved, so we should be good moving forward!
3. We got our first snow of the season this week! I know so many people hate the snow, but I just can’t hide my enthusiasm for that fluffy white stuff. I was so excited to pull up the blinds on Tuesday morning to see everything covered in a layer of white. It was Duke’s first time seeing snow and he was much more indifferent than we thought he would be; he just ran around trying to eat all of the snowflakes ;-) Â Einstein, of course, plopped himself in the yard for the better part of the morning; he loves the snow as much as I do (even though he looks rather grumpy in this photo) :)
4. Last Friday night, my Chief Culinary Consultant and I started watching Band of Brothers, which neither of us had seen. We were totally engrossed and had covered six of the episodes by Sunday. The miniseries follows one company of soldiers in the Army’s Airborne division during World War II. It’s a fantastic series, I highly recommend it if you are looking for something new to watch. (A fair warning – it is about war, so some of the scenes can be a little graphic.)
5. Speaking of new/old shows… I’ve never seen The Wire, which was on HBO many moons ago. I’ve decided to start from the beginning while I walk on the treadmill. Seems like a good way to pass the time since I’ve already seen every single Beverly Hills 90210 rerun multiple times ;-)
6. I’m a Pittsburgh girl through and through, so I was immensely proud to this tweet from Andrew Zimmerman about my hometown:
#Pittsburgh is an amazing city… It’s on the rise and you should go see it for yourself. Food scene there is old world tastiness.
— Andrew Zimmern (@andrewzimmern) November 12, 2013
7. Who’s ready for Thanksgiving PIE?!
I have a couple of new recipes coming next week, so stay tuned!
8. My Chief Culinary Consultant and I are hosting our first holiday this Thanksgiving! We’re excited to have our families at our house and I’ve been having fun playing around with a menu. I’ll be sure to share it with all of you as soon as it’s finalized (likely this weekend)!
9. I realize that I may be a day late and a dollar short when it comes to putting together some Thanksgiving-themed decorations and centerpieces, though. I was at some stores earlier this week and everything is Christmas-related. You all know how much I love Christmas, but I was hoping to score a few things for Thanksgiving first!
10. TGIF! Lots of puppy bonding to be enjoyed this weekend!
Hello,
I stumbled across your blog on Pinterest. I wanted to know what size crate cage you use for your golden retriever? We about to get one but not sure if we should go with a 42inch or 48inch cage.
Thank you,
Colleen
That pie is so crazy gorgeous!! I love eating pie but my results making them are so hit or miss in terms of appearance.
Duke…is certainly big…does he have much more to grow? Looks like he will be eating you out of house and home before you know it!!
http://vodkaandarose.blogspot.co.uk
Those pups are PRECIOUS! I adore how they snuggle together!!
That pie is gorgeous as well!
Have a great week!
xoxo
Loving the puppy pictures! I have a 7 month old golden right now – I’m curious how the dynamic with two dogs is going?
Hi Alison, It’s going well. I feel like Duke pesters Einstein quite a bit, chewing on his tail, his ears, his face, etc. However, Einstein takes it all in stride and puts him in his place when he’s goes too far. They play together – tug of war, chasing each other, and Einstein certainly enjoys that. Seems like a pretty typical sibling relationship – little one annoys the older one, but they find ways to coexist and still have fun together ;-)
Re: #6 Andrew Zimmerman is right on target. I saw that show for the 1st time the other night. The name is deceiving as I could not imagine what Pittsburgh would have that would be bizarre. What IS bizarre is the amount of fantastic food places there are . . . ranging from dining establishments to fresh markets (Wholley’s) to fresh produce. I live about 1 1/2 hours away from the Strip and when I get the chance to make the trip, I make it a long all day trip. It is so much fun, so if anyone would ever get the chance to make it to Pittsburgh, please take the time to go to the Strip. The only bad thing I can say about Pittsburgh is that it’s hard to navigate the streets for someone not familiar.
I’ve been following your dog diary and love the pictures each week. Thanks for posting them. If you ever decide to make a short road trip, please head on over to Atwood Lake in Ohio and I can babysit the dogs while you guys go off on your own. They’ll be well loved!
MIchelle, you might check at Kohls for Thanksgiving decor. I ordered leaf-motif tablecloths this week & in the stores I noticed quite a few Tksgiving items. You’d still have time to order online too. My orders usually arrive in less than a week.
I love seeing pics of your doggies! Duke is huge! I have two goldens, (best dogs ever), and they LOVE the snow! Hopefully, Duke will come to love it as much as Einstein.
Oh my perfect pie!!
Can’t wait to see your Thanksgiving menu. I’ll probably be copying a few items on it…And on another note, the ad across the bottom of the screen is quite distracting :(
I had to comment again about a Golden I saw on David Letterman last night(Friday).Letterman had one of his “stupid pet tricks ” segments but the tricks were more interesting than stupid. First up was a man with a beautiful Golden named Dudley. The owner said Dudley had an unusaul way of returning a fetched ball. The owner then threw the ball and Dudley retrieved it. When the owner asked for the ball, Dudley got down, rolled on his back and put one paw on each side of his mouth. Dudley carefully lifted the ball out of his mouth then reached it up to “hand” it back to his owner!! It was amazing. I have never seen a dog used his two paws in such a purposful, coordinated, “human” way.I don’t know if you can find it on the Letterman Show website but it is worth seeing.
That is so cute, thank you for sharing, I’m going to check it out!
I’m in the retail business world so next year your target date before November 8th thats usually the retail worlds deadline to be full Christmas!! If you want “fall” gear do it before November !!! It’s Valentines to Christmas in 90 sec these days!!!
I seriously LOVE seeing the weekly pictures of Duke and Einstein! I can’t believe how fast Duke has grown, how is that possible!? I love that they love each other so much, just melts my heart!
Just love your furry babies. Duke is so adorable,and he seems as laid back as Einstein, so nice to see them cuddled up together. Happy Thanksgiving weekend, Michelle.
Band of Brothers is GREAT!! My hubby and I watched it practically nonstop because it was so captivating.
I don’t think you were late when it came to Thanksgiving decorations, I don’t think they existed this year! Everything around me was like a mish-mash HallowMas during October and then straight into Christmas Extravaganza as soon as the candy was gone.
Your pups are SO cute. They clearly love each other a whole lot!
OMG those are the cutest dog photos EVER!! Now I want a new puppy…..sorta. I remember those days, not sure I’m ACTUALLY ready yet. But I LOVe seeing the photos!
I just LOVE your doggy photos! More, more!
As an animal lover with husband that is allergic to dogs, cats, I so enjoy pix of Einstein and Duke. I want to reach in and scratch behind their ears.
Geeeeezzz those puppies are the cutest!!!! Would love to see a video clip of that cute little fur face playing!
I love all these darling photos of Duke, and especially the photos of Duke and Einstein together. We have a 3 year old yellow lab (how old is Einstein) and I am already looking forward to the day when we get another puppy for him to play with, but that’ll probably be in 4 or 5 years so we can get settled with our baby thats coming this spring.
Anyway, we haven’t had any snow stick on the ground yet, but our pup loves it when it comes. He runs around like crazy and tries to eat all of it!
I love band of brothers. So many surprising cameos. I’ll be flipping through the TV and land in the middle of an episode (that I’ve seen 10 times) and watch the rest of it. I love your puppy, mine just turned one!
First of all let me tell you that I look forward to Friday posts more than any other because I truly love Einstein and Duke. It is always a great start to my weekend. Thank you for sharing them with us. Secondly I love your recipes. I have tried so many and my family actually enjoys them. Finally HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND.
Michelle, Your pups just make my day and week. I love Friday posts!! I have been trying so many of your recipes and have loved them all. You are the one blog I look at every morning. Take Care. Happy Thanksgiving.
Hi Michelle! I love reading blog and trying your yummy looking recipes! Seeing how sweet your dogs are made me want to comment. It was fun to see our golden, Zoe, in the snow as a puppy and to see her reaction each year when it’s the first snow fall. I live in Wexford so I got to watch her go out into the snow just the other day as well. After reading some comments from various days, I was wondering if you live in Butler? That’s where my mom grew up but then she moved to Philadelphia after college. I grew up in Philadelphia and moved to Pittsburgh after college!
Anyway, I had a question about a recipe from a while back. I’m making your Black Forest Cake and wanted to know if you’ve ever tried to add anything to your whipped cream to stabilize it. Someone mentioned gelatin and I’ve read before about adding 1T of instant pudding mix before whipping a cup of heavy cream to stabilize it. Any suggestions?
Hi Jane, I actually used cream cheese for the whipped cream frosting on my pumpkin spice latte cupcakes and they held up beautifully! https://www.browneyedbaker.com/2013/10/23/pumpkin-spice-latte-cupcakes/
Every week I look forward to my fix of golden’s. I have tried some of your recipes as well and they are fabulous.
you know, these puppy photos are really unfair!!!!!
I have been quietly peaking around your blog (and have even tried a couple recipes!!) for a couple months now. I truly look forward to Friday things every week just to look at your beautiful photos of Einstein and Duke! So nice to see how much they mean to each other! I look forward to your Thankgiving menu! Keep up the great work!
: )
Love your pics of Einstein & Duke. We have always had two goldens, great to have found a blog that not only shares a love of cooking and great recipes
but that of Goldie’s too!
Could Duke get any cuter??? Those pics of him and Einstein are the sweetest!
Derby, my Golden LOVES snow-he will lay in it forever! That pie is truly amazing! Where did you get the cool cutouts? LoVe!
Hi Betsy, I used a pie topper thing I bought from King Arthur Flour, like this one, only it was an autumn version with apples, it doesn’t appear they’re still selling it. http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/items/double-sided-pie-topper-lattice
Hi Betsy, I also thought this was an adorable pie top cutter and found the leaves theme on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Nordic-Ware-Reversible-Apples-Leaves/dp/B001717TNM/ (just over $10).
Savory Sweet Life had a centerpiece done with cranberries, very nice and you can tweet it for a large container or several small ones. It is crazy the way store market holidays. If you want thanksgiving items you need to get them in September, in October everything is Christmas.
I LOVE the ‘back to back’ photo of Duke and Einstein! It’s super cute! My golden/Stella will be a year old on the 20th. We can hardly believe how she has grown. I’m seeing much the same with Duke. One day he was tiny and now he’s gaining on Einstein.
:-)
Happy Friday Michelle! Try Michael’s for Thanksgiving decorations. I was just in there 2 days ago and they had a lot of things left. It was actually right near all the Christmas things in the center of the store where they sell their holiday napkins and assorted tableware. I wish we would have gotten snow! I am a bit further south in Maryland and don’t always get that much snow, although they are predicting a snowy season this year! Yeah!
OMG they are too cute together! He’s like a fuzzy shadow! I’ve enjoyed watching him grow up on your Friday posts. Just mind boggling how quickly they grow up.
And LOVE LOVE LOVE Band of Brothers. I watched it when it originally aired. The last episode I remember distinctly. I was sewing my wedding dress and just stopped, dead, and started to cry. Just warning ya. ;) It’s an AMAZING show.
All the adorableness! Make it stop! I can’t take it anymore!
Seriously though, I don’t know how you get any work done, I would be staring at those adorable loveable pups all day. You are so lucky!
Happy Friday!
First I have to say how much I look forward to your Friday Things! Love the pix of the pups together. They are just adorable and the pix make me want to just squeeze them! Also wanted to say, I too loved Band of Brothers. Tom Hanks directed and it is just a phenomenal series. I may just have to go back and watch it again!
Duke’s growth reminds me of the children’s story “Clifford, The Big Red Dog”.
I love seeing the “buddy”pictures. Thanks for continuing to share.
Oh oh the cuteness is insane with these two gorgeous dogs. I love your posts all week long, but really look forward to your furry babies on Friday, lol. Thanksgiving in a week and a half, Yikes! Luckily I am not hosting, but have to bring a couple of dishes. I thank you for all your inspiration. Have a great weekend.
Your dogs are so adorable. I want to reach through the screen and give them a little head scratch.
That’s a good looking pie for sure! I thought my crust crimps were nice looking but they’re never as lovely as that. When you present that recipe, will you please give us a picture of your finger positions as you perform your magic crimp?
I am with you. I love the white fluffy stuff too and so do my dogs. They ask to go out over and over. Maybe we enjoy it so much because we only get it once or twice a season and it lasts a whole day if we are lucky.
I assume Einstein lies down first and then Duke gets up next to him. They are so cute. It is amazing how fast Duke has grown. Has he had difficulties learning the size of his body trying to get into places? So adorable. I love the photos.
Oh yes, definitely Einstein down first, and then Duke snuggles up to him :)
Your dogs are so sweet! I wish your website did not have so many ads. It takes away from your posts (which I was reading before you added these things anyway).
I’m not speaking for BEB – this is strictly my opinion. If you think about these ads as the way we are able to have Michelle devote her creativity to us fulltime, I hope you would agree that having them on the page is a small price to pay. Where else do you get this kind of quality content for free? Plus the community she has built is nothing short of amazing. I’m not a koolaid drinker, only someone who truly feels the value BEB brings to all of us is worth putting up with some ads.
Check your programs in your control panel to make sure you haven’t picked up any adware. I think the ads are minimal compared to most sites, but you may have picked up some “extras” while surfing..
Aww, those paws!
I love your dogs! I am thinking of getting a Golden for my little girl. She asks me all the time!!!!
Oh and Band of Brothers? My husband was totally hooked! I couldn’t get him off the couch!
Can I steal your puppy? I’m not even sure if I am kidding haha
That pie looks AMAZING. Like crazy amazing. I’m also super jealous of the snow, we need some here in Vancouver! xo
First of all, Duke is HUGE! What happened? Did you feed him miracle grow? ;) Second, I see you have a pie posted, I would love to see a good pie crust recipe! Also, with regards to number 6, my co-worker just got back from visiting family in Pittsburgh and could not stop talking about all the yummy food she had! I think I need to start planning my trip! Good luck with hosting your first holiday, try not to stress and enjoy the day! :)
P.S. I pinned this e-card last week and it goes perfectly with number 9!
http://www.pinterest.com/pin/147141112799203904/