Date Day!!

Hello everyone!!

Happy Labor Day weekend to all of you, and I hope you are all enjoying some time off from work/school and spending some time with your loved ones!

It's been kind of funny because this three day weekend happened after only the first week of school  haha  but honestly, this was so needed, and probably much appreciated by all of the Rice University student body, I'm sure  ;) 

Another reason I've been looking forward to this weekend was because...!!!   David is finally back in Houston!  =D  
No more long distance, oh yeah~  *doing a little happy dance*

I mean, it was only for the summer, but I'm always glad for it to be over  =)

To celebrate, we scheduled a 'date day'!   so instead of going on a date night, we just did a marathon of dates all day!

The 'date day' actually began the night before when we took a leisurely walk over to the Hermann Park and the Miller Outdoor theater to catch the Golden Dragon Acrobats! 

It was pretty crowded on the lawn with hundreds of people out and about enjoying the slightly cooler Houston evening, but we found ourselves a little spot of grass and sat there holding our breaths and wowing with the rest of the crowd as the acrobats performed amazing tricks after tricks.

It was such an awesome performance, and it was really great to just enjoy being back together after 3 months of being apart  =)

We had to call it an early night because I had an audition the next morning, but we resumed our date marathon after my audition!  

For lunch, we headed to Jason's Deli because I was craving their salad (the salad bar there is the best!).  I know, I know, it's a chain, and David protested a little at first because that's where his department tends to get all of their 'conference foods' from, but what can I say, when a girl is craving a salad, this is the place to be!  haha

and besides, they have soft serve ice cream!  It was a big childhood thing for me, so whenever I see soft serve ice cream, I get uber excited  haha   

making little sculptures with their brownie bites and ice cream  =p

Then, for our next date, we went grocery shopping.

Yup.

It's one of our favorite things to do together  haha

I mean, how can you not like grocery shopping?  It inevitably leads to amazing (hopefully.. but at the very least, experimental!) food experiences!  We usually just meander through different aisles, discussing which dishes to try next/which ones we want to repeat, etc. and always end up with an overflowing cart by the end  haha.   

And this time was of no exception.  We had originally gone to the store without much of a plan, but when we got there, we decided to get ingredients for the Korean seafood pancake (파전) and make that!  and while we were walking around, we decided to have Korean cold noodles (냉면) for dinner as well!    We went to the frozen section and saw the noodles with the pre-made sauce, and then thought... why not try to make the sauce/broth ourselves?  I was a bit hesitant at first because I thought it would be too difficult, but David convinced me otherwise, and off we went to go buy more stuff for the broth!  haha  this is how it always goes with us.  Whenever one of us is hesitant about trying something, the other is usually excited about it, and then we go ahead and do it anyway...

So we came home, and embarked on the next leg of our dating marathon.  Cooking dinner together!  We had to start the broth early because it needed to boil for an hour, and then chilled, so we started that first.

Then, we went to go buy a little pot for my little 'garden'.  I've wanted a garden of my own for awhile now, but David was a bit hesitant about this one because we are both gone so much (who's going to water them?), and he wasn't sure how plants would do in the scorching Houston weather.  But we had such a perfect opportunity to do a little experiment because we had just gotten a whole lot of green onions for the seafood pancake, so off we went to Home Depot to buy my green onions a home!

and tada!!!

My very own little green onion 'garden' on our kitchen windowsill  =)

Amulet came back home while David and I were digging up some dirt, and when she heard what we were doing, she gave us the 'oh, David and Janny are doing something crazy together again' look and went inside  haha

Now here's hoping that they do a little better than our last 'gardening' experience...

Then, we really got to cooking so that we (Amulet, David, and I) could all eat dinner together before David and I left on our last segment of the dating marathon.

double skillet action!

our 냉면!!!

haha  =)  dinner crew!

The 냉면 was a bit... interesting.  I think it was lacking in the salt and vinegar department, but hey, now we know.  live and learn.  haha.  the seafood pancake, however, was SO good!!!  and so easy to make too!  I'll have to post a recipe soon so all of you can enjoy it as well!

With our bellies full, we headed off to dance off the calories with the Rice Ballroom Dance folks  =)   We met last year around this time at the first Rice Ballroom Dance meeting, so it seems that we've done a full circle  =p

Thanks for stopping by, and have a wonderful rest of the Labor Day weekend!!

--Janny