Happy St. Patrick's Day from the Geaghans!

Yeah, I had some fun with photoshop. I really should have added mr. kitty in here somewhere, but what can you do. We couldn't find a tiny orange beard for him and I'm loathe to spend money on non-necessary items for him - like silly hats and bow-ties. If I had a green ribbon, that would have worked. Anyway, first St. Patrick's day with an Irish name! Woo hoo! And I think it helped in my corned beef and cabbage dinner.

So, I think this started in 2006 when I decided to corn my own beef. We get a brisket from Grazin Angus Acres (this year was a 5lb year - I definitely wanted leftovers.). Corning times vary - I've done a little as three days to 3 weeks before. This year, I had a week and half. It is essentially a brined brisket - water, kosher salt, and pickling spices. I crush pickling spices in my mortar and pestle to break up the aromatics - don't really know if this does anything, but I feel like a medieval apothecary whenever I use the mortar and pestle. Rub the powdery goodness all over the brisket and toss it in the salty water. The stock pot then moves into our chilly back area (we are lucky to have a chilly area in the back of our apartment to store the brisket because there is never enough room in the fridge!) A good paddle stir once a day and we get a delicious corned brisket ready for the big day!

I started cooking the brisked yesterday around 7:30am - before I left for work. I know - the brisket is not so lovely in the le creuset (or at least SOME people might not see this delicious hunk o meat as lovely). I hope that the delicious aroma gave my sleepy Irish husband lovely dreams.

Tim had quite an adventure at the New York Public Library and the Union Square Farmers Market yesterday - since the St' Patty's Day parade starts at 5th Avenue and 44th street - two blocks from the library. Poor researcher trying to do work among the party people. But the sight was nice according to him - a sea of green people. I think I even forgot to ask him if he accomplished his task at the library. Maybe? It would have been hard for me. He even spotted some of the orthodox Jewish residents in our neighborhood wearing shamrocks and green ties or shirts. On St. Patrick's Day, everyone is Irish.

Moving on - I got a text from Tim sometime yesterday afternoon - something that could have completely derailed our festivities - the farmers market didn't have cabbage. Gasp! Ol'reliable Key foods had some and in a late dash to the grocery after work, our dinner was saved. Just a few more shots of the Geaghan family St. Patty's Day - Here we see how happy Tim is that we found the cabbage. Remember to take your Beano! Tim! He was also the bar tender yesterday. We had a delicious Irish Red beer from Sly Fox called Seamus Irish Red - chosen with love and filled in the growler that he gets from Bierkraft in Brooklyn. It was so tasty - I had 1 1/2 glasses - and I drank from one of the Geaghan's pint glasses from Geaghan's Pub in Bangor, Maine (this was a lot for me).

If we could have been anywhere else yesterday, it would have been with the family at Geaghan's. We'll hopefully be with them sometime this summer. Geaghan's is super fun on St. Patrick's Day. I've only been once - 3 years ago now. But what a great time. I hope they had a great day yesterday!

While I completely forgot to take a picture of our finished meal (inner fat girl really wanted to eat), here it is cooking with all the delicious winter veggies. I think St. Patrick's day is really the day that we say goodbye to heavy winter foods. After we have leftovers - tonight is Reuben night! - I'm completely ready for asparagus, ramps, fiddle heads, and oysters. It's going to be around 70 degrees here today and I'm ready for sprouts. I'm longing for light greens and I think that the farmers market will be delighting my palate soon.

That's all for today kids. More news soon. We just got the cd of wedding pics from the Empire State building of photos from the day before the wedding. They're pretty cute. I'll post some over the weekend. Also - new blog name? I'm still not sure what to change it to...thoughts? Help?

Video Cleep!

Hello readers. I'm drinking a delicious brown ale. It's a Dogfishead. Not as good as Smuttynose Brown Dog. Tim and I decided last night that we are going to brew an imperial stout and name it Imperial Russian Blue Stout - for kitty of course. So, just a short post tonight - got a super fun email from the Knot today.

For those of you who have cable (rar - just got sneak attacked by oscar. Not awesome. No beer named after him now. Jerk). Anyway, if you have the learning channel, you can catch the Empire State Building couples on the Cake Boss sometime in the early summer. We'll have an exact date at some point. Yay. cake.

Next, we'll be getting an official photos sometime in the next few weeks. Will update you with that too... hunh, lots of promises for updates... that's kind of crappy. Oh well.

Finally, drum roll please..... as the title of this post suggests, we have a video clip. This came from the knot today - it's very silly and you have to go through about half the video before the ESB weddings come up. Make sure to watch Season 2 video 2. I think it's queued up with this link, but just in case, I don't want you to have to watch all the wedding tip videos. These would have been fun with a group of girlies - or Tim since he IS such a girly man. Anyway. The video is short but it's pretty fun. And lots of shots of my shark fin nose!
Just click on the photo of New York skyline (taken with my sassy new camera) and enjoy!

Links to photos

Hello readers. It's been a while. I miss you. What have I been doing since the last time I wrote to you? Enjoying life. Many things in motion right now as the upcoming visit from Enta - Tim's poet sensei. We are really digging in and making Gogyohka a focus right now - many events in NYC. I don't know if there is a schedule up yet, but I'll post it once I get it from my dear husband (I like writing that).

I still haven't changed the name of the blog, as you can see from the title. I'm trying to be a bit to creative I think. I've been reading books like mad and maybe one of the fantastic books will give me some inspiration. I've been dreaming a lot lately as well, so somewhere between saving wizard friends with a chomped wand or visiting grocery stores in the cold northern regions (yeah, my dreams are kind of weird) or maybe from conversations between Tim and I about our future, I'll figure out what to call this lovely blog.

So, I've promised some links. I cannot remember if I've posted the link from my sister-in-law Traci. Nope, just checked. I didn't. Click on the photo and you'll be directed to her flickr page and you can watch a fun slide show. Yay slideshow!

And now for our friend Margaret. She is the wife of Peter Fiore and just a lovely lady. I'm so glad that I had the chance to meet her. I hope I get to meet her again. She took some beautiful photos and you can see them here:






Still waiting for photos from my parents - no rush mom! And if you all are sick of photos - let me know. I'll change up the monotony with some pics that I took at the zoo a few days after our last snow storm!! The tigers and bears were quite playful in the snow!!

Ok. Think that's it for now. Enjoy!

Is Married life different?

Hello readers. Just waiting for ladies figure skating short program (not kitty's favorite - he likes men's ice skating the best. He was cheering for Plushenko and was very cranky that a) we had to go to bed before Plushenko performed - why are the olympics on so late? and b) he was even crankier that Plushenko got the silver (Oscar is a Russian blue and still has loyalties to his mother country). We had a discussion the next morning about this - I told Oscar that Lysececk stayed true to fundamentals - nothing flashy like the quad. Kitty got really upset about this and he believes that daring and chances should be rewarded. No talking to him when he is like that. He then proceeded to chase his tail to show his example of the quad. not really impressive at all.

Anyway, married life. I must say that since Tim and I have been together for so long, and living together for a majority of our relationship, that married life really doesn't feel that different. while the photo suggests one thing - I must say, no babies (this is an old photo of us with our niece and nephew twin babies Nicolas and Charlotte - we're in love with them!) I feel a bit more protective - when Tim leaves the house I get a bit more worried about him. Maybe that's just me. And it's fun to look over and see his ring on his hand. But it didn't hit me until I was walking home tonight - and I thought that someday I might be a widow. It hit so hard (and I've only felt this way once before - the day that I realized that Oscar would someday die) that I felt my heart stop. So I wrote a Gogyohka about it:

Looking through the rain
I saw myself a widow
and my heart stopped.
I ran home
to feel his heartbeat.

Great thoughts, right? ugh. Some days, I wonder about my self. Anyway, loving life right now.

And, I realized that I haven't uploaded photos of the brunch. So, here you go.

So, this little bride decoration came from my office bridal shower. I placed her in my small tree - it's a weeping willow. I think she looks lovely there!















Here is the front of the apartment. We had flower garlands, paper flowers, paper bells, and this nifty Empire State Building ornament hanging from our chandelier. Many of these decorations will be on our Christmas Tree this year! Yay Christmas!

Here is a photo of the dining room. Our apartment is so little that it's really hard to get grand photos of it. This room was decorated more for Valentines Day. Lots of reds, pinks, purples, and hearts! And of course, paper flowers. It really did look pretty, this doesn't express it... Below you'll see the flowers - I made sleeves for the the vases (which were old sauerkraut jars!) Lots of carnations =good smells and lots of surface area. And they last - they are still on the dining room table. I make sure to stick my face in them ever chance that I get. I do the same thing to Oscar's belly and Tim's beard and chest... I heart them! More later!

Yeah, I forgot to take the butter dish off the table. That's my gift to you readers. Butter.

First week of wedded life.

Hello darling readers! Thanks for being patient. This week I hoped would be a recuperative week. It wasn't. Now I see the reason for honeymoons. Oh well. We'll do that later. Not a long post tonight, but hopefully more later. This is just a general thanks for all the wonderful well wishes that everyone has sent along. We are sending out announcements this weekend and will probably start the thank you cards next week. Or Sunday, who knows.

This is such a great picture of my men. One of which is quite jealous of the laptop and has just planted his warm purring gray-ness on my hands. It is quite difficult to type. I guess this is payback for tying a blue bow around the neck. But there we are! The Brooklyn Geaghan Family!


We were interviewed by the New York Daily News tonight. Not sure when the story will run, but I'll surly let you all know. Here is one of the pictures that appeared in the Daily News last Saturday:
Tomorrow I'll post some images of what the apartment looked like for brunch. But for now, it's time to spend more time with the men.

Just a few teaser photos of the day!

Good morning readers -

I'm going to post just a few photos - my friend Megan (who is getting married in the late spring) sent some photos last night! Thanks Megan and enjoy readers - I haven't had any coffee yet, so the commentary on the photos should be fun. Let's see:

The photo to the left was taken after the ceremony. I think, along with the official photographer, our family and friends taking photos, that there were quite a few tourists taking photos as well. This may be where I held the impromptu press conference.








Below, in no particular order are photos at the ESB as well as at the New York Public Library and in the subway. I love the subway photos! Thanks again Megan!

Time to change the blog name.

Hello my patient readers! Well, we are the Geaghan family. I sadly have no pictures of the actual event, as my camera was in a bag all day. But fear not, lots of you and other family members - not to mention the ESB people and the Knot people were total papparazzi. Not to mention lots of tourists in NYC. Once I get some of the photos from my friends, I'll post those pictures.

But an update on the day. First, here is a clip of what was playing in taxi cabs in NYC: olivia-tim-wed-taxi-news.mov I think this will work. Our beautiful friends Sam and Lynn sent this to us - Lynn is such a tech savvy lady - she asked the taxi cab driver to restart the fare counter? (I don't know - I've taken exactly one taxi in my life and that was with a cat on my lap). I guess this is the screen in the cab that entertains you while the cab driver maneuvers around the city. She saw this clip of me and the the other brides and pulled out her flip camera and shot the video for us!! She is great! Yay Lynn!

Saturday was really fun. Woke up at 6 - I think I posted a small write up about my lovely man in the morning (jipes, he's my husband now!!) and started to decorate the apartment for the Sunday brunch party. Only got panicky when the three train didn't come and I cursed myself for not checking the train schedule. But fear not dear readers, I made it to the ESB on time for hair, make up and bouquet/boutonniere stuff. Oodles of fun - once I get a photo of the bouquet, I'll post it. But let me describe it - first the flowers were beautiful. Lots of pinks and purples, and deep reds, and fuscias and stuff! There were hydrangeas - a purply/red color with blue centers. And I got them all!!! So, needless to say the bouquet was huge - oh, did I tell you the theme was birds and feathers??? EEEE! So, there were pink feathers coming out of my bouquet and about 10 birds sitting on top. The bird from Tim's boutonniere is in the top photo (Tim's boutonniere had a big pink aster and a pink feather with that bird!). They wrapped a navy blue ribbon with pink polka dots around the stems. It was beautiful. The ladies that helped with the bouquet were super nice and loved that they could use the hydrangeas in a bouquet! Hurrah! Happiness!

Hair and make up. I don't wear make up and I have thick curly hair. I just wanted an updo that was similar to the one in our contest entry photo. I described this to the stylist and for some reason he proceeded to blow my hair out straight. Oh well. But he had a little too much fun with my hair because it took him over 45 minutes to style it - so long in fact, that I was late to the wedding! The make up artist ended up working on my face (and applying fake eyelashes - the first time I've ever had fake eyelashes in my life - not counting the ones I drew on my face when I was Raggedy Ann in a dance recital). I looked up an suddenly there were several people with clip boards tapping their toes waiting for me - yeah, it's 2:00 and I'm supposed to be at the ceremony. Oops.

I'm leaving a lot out of this post - it's really long already - but the next 5 minutes of getting dressed, siging my marriage license with my upper body completely exposed (yeah, fun to talk to the officiant with bewbs hanging out...) and a few more photos before I actually walked out to get married and finally I see my dad. I do have to say that I didn't see what I looked like at all until we got to dinner - there was a mirror there. For a brief moment I thought my dad was crying because I looked terrifying. But it was because he was happy! And Tim didn't run from the marriage platform when I walked in so, I guess I looked nice.

I could tell you about the ceremony - but I'm hoping to get a copy of it to post here - if anyone wants to see it... I would love to see it. But it was beautiful. Our families were so happy - I'm just sad that it went by so fast. That's the sad part. I wish I could remember every detail, but I've got lots of the highlights.

After the wedding, we walked around the observation deck, took more pictures, were filmed by lots of tourists, held an impromptu press conference, and then walked to the NYPL at 5th and 42nd street to take pictures. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but lots outside with Patience and Fortitude.
Overall, it was a really lovely day. We took everyone on the subway to get to dinner - my dress was super poofy in the tiny subway seat. Oh - we also took a picture in front of the Pacific Branch of the Brooklyn Public Library! Ate dinner, went to Union Hall bar got exhausted and came home to kitty.

Tim was super sweet when we got home - this included him pulling the million bobby pins out of my head and unbuttoning the millions of buttons on my dress. He's such a sport.

I leave you with a photo of my shoes. They were a hit! I'll update you when we get photos of the event. In the meantime, I'll be thinking of a new title for the blog - perhaps, domestic bliss?