Every once in a while, I take on a blog related task that my husband will enjoy.  If you ask La Jolla Girl what La Jolla Dad eats for lunch, even she’ll say soup.  So I thought I’d see how he liked Tabatchnick soups. However, I didn’t know that I’d have to have a gum graft a month later, and actually would need these soups.

A few days after the surgery, I was able to eat soft foods with small chunks.  I was so tired of applesauce, yogurt, etc. by that point, so Tabatchnick soups to the rescue.  They taste really fresh (unlike canned soups) and are made from natural ingredients. My favorite by far is the vegetable soup. It’s only 90 calories, makes me feel healthy and is surprisingly filling (though I need something else small to go with it). On the flip side, I added salt to the split pea…but that’s how I like it.

I was sent some coupons to try the product.  However, it took me a while to find it because I’m not used to shopping for soup in the frozen section.  It’s at VONS La Jolla where the frozen natural and organic entrees are, near the produce.  I wanted to get this post up ASAP, because…

Today I bought more Tabatchnick soups on sale at VONS La Jolla, 2 for $4.00 (there’s two packs of soup in a box).  They’re normally almost double that.

La Jolla Dad likes Tabatchnick soups too, but he’s been warned to not touch my stash unless it’s an emergency.

I‘m not sure how you can avoid placing a bet on a horse with a name like Mo Cheese, but he (or she?) did fail us in the end. Betting on names doesn’t work for me. Handing $20+ to my crazy friend who owns race horses, does work. I can’t always go to the races with her so I need to fend for myself, on occasion. Here’s a list of some things I didn’t know about the Del Mar Racing Season until this year:

1. The Del Mar Thoroughbred Club website is full of infomation: I’ve never looked at the site. There’s a DMTC beginner’s corner that will give you the basics.  A quick tutorial on how to bet, how much your bet will be and how much you’ll win.  There’s even chat rooms and a ton of information for the experienced.

2.  The Winning Ticket:  You may hire, Deb Giglio, a personal handicapper and tour guide for the day.  She’ll provide written analysis on all races, escort trips to the paddock & walking ring, and more.  Cost is $350-500 for the day, but you may win that back.

3.  Camp Del Mar:  Leave your kids at Camp Del Mar while you enjoy a day at the track.  How cute is the photo below?  The kids were having a blast. Cost is $24 for the day for ages 5-12.  I have a few years before La Jolla Girl is eligible but I’m looking forward to it.  You register your kids on the day.  A brilliant idea.

4.  Despite kids, remodeling and other life drama, the Del Mar Races are great for girl time:  I almost didn’t make it, but felt totally refreshed and in a much better mental place than when I arrived.  I had to leave early, but it was worth the effort.

Theresa, Beth, Christina and me.  Margaritas and wine oddly missing from the photo, as are many other ladies.  I’m disappointed the season is almost over, but am looking forward to next year!

*Photo Credits: Jennifer From La Jolla – because she has mad skills.
**My entry to the races was provided complimentary by Bailey Gardiner, but I was definitely not obligated to write this post.

Round two of the San Diego Wine Mafia’s ( #SDWM on Twitter) tasting events definitely stepped it up a notch.  It was lovingly dubbed the “Syrah Smackdown” and though I’m not sure who was more smacked down (me or the wines), it certainly was fun and another learning experience for me, the novice of the group. We celebrated at Brain Wines house, which luckily is near mine.

Anyway, we tasted 5 Red Mountain Syrahs (paper bags) and 5 Paso Robles Syrahs (red bags) blind.  And we made a lot of funny (to us) wine jokes such as “It’s like Puerto Vallarta in my mouth” – Wine Harlots.  Or “If you want a Pinot that’s fruity, go with Grenache” – either Cuvee Corner or Beau’s Barrel Room, I can’t remember.


Where is Red Mountain:  I’m sure you’ve all heard of the Columbia Valley (Chateau Ste Michelle ring a bell?) region of Washington state.  Red Mountain is a part of that, but the smallest wine growing region in the state at about 4000 acres.  It’s gets a little more sunlight than the rest of Columbia Valley. Red Mountain is known for their powerful, balanced red wines with awesome reputations.

My favorite Red Mountain Wine:  I happened to taste it along side Cuvee Corner’s awesome chocolate chorizo baguette.  The pairing of these two was memorable. It’s the 2004 Winemaker’s Barrel Select Syrah from Terra Blanca (4th from the right).  A few others in the room favored the Skylight Cellars 2005 Syrah(5th from the right), which got much better as it opened up.  Delicious.

Where to buy Red Mountain Syrahs in San Diego:  This is tough.  Most of our wines were media samples.  A list of Red Mountain wineries shows that there really aren’t that many to begin with.  So I’d recommend ordering online.  The shipping will be worth it. But DO look out for Red Mountain wines in your travels.

Paso Robles Syrahs:  It’s easy to go to any store around town and find a Paso wine.  It’s in the Central Coast of California, between San Francisco and Los Angeles, and the largest wine region in the state at currently 26,000 acres. The color of the wines are deep due to the intensity of the sun and the cool nights keeps acidity in balance. Paso Robles produces a wide array of wines, many of which are SIP Certified, or sustainably grown.

My favorite Paso Robles wine:  This was not staged because I hadn’t had the wine yet, and also because it was truly a blind tasting. You’ve heard me talk about Herman Story wines before.  I brought the 2007 Herman Story Nuts and Bolts Syrah(5th from the right).  The only place I’ve seen Herman Story sold around San Diego is at Bristol Farms in the UTC area.  Otherwise, you’ll have to order it online.

What to eat with Syrah: I should mention the food!  Aside from the chocolate chorizo baguette, we sampled cheeses from Trader Joe’s (Australian Parmesan, Spanish Manchego and Honey Goat Cheese).  Beau’s Barrel Room suggests hard cheeses when going with Syrah, though the blue cheese he also brought was excellent as well. And we raved about the Honey Goat Cheese at our last San Diego Wine Mafia tasting. Wine Harlots brought the “fig and pig”.  Whole figs and sliced prosciutto, eaten together.  More meats and a bruschetta tray that I picked up from Whole Foods La Jolla.  I could eat like this everyday.

The bottom line is that I love Syrah.  I happily tasted a bit from all 10 bottles.  Fabulous. The Pinot Pistolera is happening next month.  Stay tuned and follow #SDWM for more. We also use #SDTTL (San Diego Twitter Taste Live) because our intention is to tweet while we drink wines.  We do, but sometimes we get caught up enjoying each other’s company and at least I don’t tweet as much as I would like to.  I’ll work on it.

*I talk about wine every Wednesday from the perspective of a busy mom.  What kind, a little background, where to get it around town, how much it costs and/or what to serve it with.

Right, so this is one of the things that look much better in real life than in a photo. Especially, with my photography skills.

With Labor Day and the end of summer coming, I thought I’d post these since many of you will be firing up your BBQs. They are mini banana cupcakes (promise the recipe is coming) with cream cheese frosting. Ridiculously simple to make, and easy to serve at a BBQ. We had a small gathering on the 4th of July so it would have been overkill to try to make an American flag on full sized cupcakes. Therefore, we opted for minis.

As you will see over the next week, I am always looking for crafts, recipes and ideas that La Jolla Girl can participate in. She placed the fruit on these cupcakes. I had to readjust it a little while she wasn’t looking, but it was a lot of fun. We showed her photos of the American flag and told her all about it. I’m sure all of that knowledge has been retained.

You can figure out how to do this by looking at the photo. My tips would be:

• Make sure your strawberries are about the diameter of a mini cupcake
• Don’t place the strawberries too far in advance.  A few hours prior is ok.  Otherwise, they will bleed into the frosting and change the taste of it.
• Plan extra time.  This might take you 10 minutes but with a 3 year old it takes forever!

Otherwise, enjoy! If you’re having a Labor Day BBQ, try a slider burger bar.  We did it last year and it was a big hit!

I wrote a post last year about how nervous I was for La Jolla Girl’s first day of preschool.  I look back on that and laugh a little bit (ok, a lot).

We made a big production of buying a cute backpack and talked up preschool like it was equivalent to living at Disneyland. On the first day, we took cute pictures of her walking out the door, got in the car (whew, was worried about that one) and arrived at school.  We placed the backpack in her cubby and walked over to meet the teacher and kids.  All was fine. I said goodbye and she began to panic.  The tears came rolling down and the wailing started. The teacher dismissed me and then, within seconds, La Jolla Girl lunged toward my legs as I leaped over the baby gate to the outside. Major guilt. On the second day, there were a few more tears.  By the third day, all was fine.  One week later, she didn’t even turn around to say goodbye.  The kid looooooves school and it was not necessary to be stressed about it.

I also was unusually stressed about snack duty. In the end, keeping it simple worked best. I ducked into VONS before school one morning, having forgotten about the snack. I bought blueberry mini muffins and bananas. That was the most popular snack I ever brought. Go figure.

This year, all I can think about is that Staples commercial with the mom gleefully loading up a shopping cart full of supplies with “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” playing in the background.  Now, I can totally relate to it.  I must confess:

I can not wait until school starts.

I don’t feel one iota of guilt about it.

La Jolla Girl is 3 years old and goes to a lovely preschool 3 times a week.  If I had the choice to enroll her 5 days a week, I would.  I know I can at other schools, but we like where she’s at too much to switch. I get some productive alone time while she’s having a great time learning.  Possibly because the weather in San Diego is just starting to warm up, I haven’t felt like we’ve had much of a summer.  My dahlias have just started blooming – 3 months late. Not to mention our remodel.  She’s only 3, and doesn’t yet require a shopping trip to Staples or any other hype.  So I feel remarkably relaxed about the whole thing, but we have until mid September until she goes back. 

I also just stumbled on post I wrote from last year that might be useful to you -  When to Keep Your Sick Preschooler Home From School.

(I am so grateful to be a member of the Yahoo! Motherboard. Our monthly blog topic is Back to School and I’ve loved reading all of the other member posts regarding this topic!)

My life as a parent is busy. I personally rely on reviews before making all kinds of purchasing decisions. I read all sorts of car websites and magazines before buying my car. I rely on movie reviews before seeing movies and restaurant reviews before eating out. Even records on iTunes and products on Amazon have star ratings next to them that I pay attention to.

Consumers do not want to waste their time and money on a poor experience, especially if it’s a critical one. I wish that before I had gum graft surgery, I could have read patient reviews for my surgeon and other San Diego Periodontists I considered. Yes, you can and should review your health providers on MojoPages.

I write reviews, because I use them. I also write them because I like to support nice people and local businesses I frequent, especially in tough economic times. I’d like to know why you write reviews. If you don’t, what would prompt you to? Suggestions might include:

• Interactions on review sites such as making friends and gaming mechanics, like becoming a mayor and unlocking badges.
• Receiving useful newsletter emails from the site with lists of popular activities to do around town, etc.
• Making your own lists (favorite restaurants, shops, etc) for users to view.
• Having the option to link your reviews to your own website via a widget or similar.
• Contests and/or coupons incentives. If so, what kind?
• Local pride.  Being known as the expert in your area.
• Being able to write blog posts on the site and linking back to your own.

The KFMB MojoPages Mom With Mojo in me is dying to know. Please share!

The waste involved in remodeling really bothers me.

I have this really awesome 1960s plaster which is kind of like concrete. I can’t hear my cell phone if it’s in the other room (my friends know this so often call the land line if they know I’m home). Before buying this house, I looked a lot of newer homes with walls that seemed hollow and had terrible acoustics. I took the video below before it occurred to me that there really wasn’t a reason to demo out a lot of the plaster (like the ceiling), other than it saves time and money, both which are in our best interest. The waste associated with that, a long with the loss of my awesome sound proofing, kept me awake last night. I’m sure it’s now just sitting in the landfill, along with a lot of our cement foundation, old bath tubs, and much more.

This video makes the space look really small when it’s not in reality. I wanted to explain a little bit why I’m MIA, the scope of what we’re doing and the irony really trying to do an eco-friendly bathroom remodel.

Bathroom remodel: after the demo from Katie Dillon on Vimeo.

Long story short, we had to renovate these bathrooms because our sewer pipes underneath are old and failing and the rest of the house had already been remodeled. The waste was inevitable and as far as I can tell, 3-4 truckloads of debris have been hauled away. It’s hard to believe it’s that much. I wish I would have looked in to how to possibly recycle some of it, though I’m sure it would have added way more cost to an already way over budget project. Our house was built in 1961, so there is a lot of extra work necessary to bring it up to current building codes too. In the meantime, we’re trying to remain sane and patient.  I think it’s going pretty well so far.

Yes, that is Ronald McDonald checking out the Chevy Volt.  The future is electric, you know. Somehow, they got the car inside the Hilton at BlogHer (I meant to ask how as it was on the 3rd floor).  I was thrilled to see it in person.

As I’ve mentioned before, my husband wants this car.  He has temporarily decided not to pull the trigger on the first batch, because he’s worried about glitches and feels the second round should have them worked out. I mentioned this to Chevy. They suggested a lease option which starts at around $350 per month.  This might make sense for people with similar concerns, as the Chevy Volt also has a 3 year warranty.  La Jolla Dad does not finance cars, so barring his current car breaking down or an unbelievable deal, the Volt won’t be in our driveway for another year.  The federal tax incentive is good for the first 200,000 cars (Chevy Volt, Nissan Leaf and similar) produced, which is going to take a while to reach.

Chevy Volt Design:  A while back, I had been disappointed in the photos I saw. The car went from looking sports car hip, to more like a family sedan. I thought the interior and exterior were MUCH nicer in person than the photos I’d seen online.  And it does actually look a little bit sporty.  The seats are very comfortable and the interior felt more like a luxury car than I had expected.  I got to sit in it and pretend to drive.

Seats 4 passengers only:  There are 2 seats (albeit comfortable) in the back, in lieu of a bench that can seat 3. This design is because of the car’s battery and may be a deciding factor for you, if you’re a family of 4 or 5.  Even as a family of 3, this bothers me a little bit. We rarely have 5 people in my car, but it does happen when grandparents come to visit.  I would not feel comfortable having 2 cars in my garage that only seat 4 people each, but I can’t say I know anyone who owns 2 cars that are exactly the same.  La Jolla Dad, however, does not care one bit about this issue.

Trunk space:  Eyeballing the trunk space, I could fit my big Bugaboo Chameleon in there.  It takes up most of the trunk space in my Audi, so this would not be any different.  I wish I would have taken a photo of the back seats.  There is a space in the middle of the two back seats (where the 3rd person would normally sit) that I believe gives you access to what is in the trunk, if you want to get at it.  I like this.  The back seats also fold down flat if you ever need to haul something big.

Why the Volt makes sense:  I did see some moms online argue the pros and cons of this car.  From a cost perspective, some believe that you might as well buy a regular gas efficient car, at a much lower price.  The Nissan Leaf could be an answer, if cost is an issue (though I admit I’m not a fan of the Leaf’s aesthetics).  Some also argued that the electricity used has the same environmental impact as gas.  This might be true is you don’t have solar panels and live in a part of the country powered by coal.  You have to take a look at your current circumstances and analyze the variables to determine if an electric car like this is right for you.  This car makes sense for us to own in San Diego, in my opinion.  Even without solar panels, the car is supposed to use as much energy as one household appliance.  In San Diego we also receive a good amount of electricity from San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station and not as much from coal as other parts of the US.  We are putting solar panels on our house when we buy the Volt, but we were going to put them on the house regardless.

San Diego EV Project:  To top it off San Diego is going to be a test city for the EV Project where 15,000 charging stations are going to be installed in 16 cities.  We’re lucky to be one of them.  Furthermore, according to the EV Project website, “Drivers of the Nissan LEAF zero-emissions electric car and the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid with extended range, who qualify to participate in The EV Project, a residential charger will be provided free, and most if not all of the costs of installation will be paid for by The EV Project.”

For the first time, I’m pretty psyched about this car.  I was not expecting to like it as much as I did and can see it being a pretty cool mom car. I wish I could convince La Jolla Dad to get comfortable with the first release.  We’ll see.

I am biased because as I’ve mentioned many times, Luna is one of my favorite vineyards. I love Pinot Grigio but it can be too fruity for my taste, at times.  Luna’s Pinot Grigios have a very slight oak flavor to them, which I love, because it cuts the fruitiness down a bit.  They are 95% Pinot Grigio and 5% Chardonnay grapes.

Right now at VONS La Jolla you can still buy the 2007 Luna Pinot Grigio for well under $10.  I think it’s in the $8 range.  THAT is a deal.  We just stocked up and I have served it at parties.  The 2008 is similar in flavor, but has a fabulous new label redesign.  It’s Tiffany blue-ish.  I love me a cool label.

Winemakers Notes: “The 2008 Pinot Grigio is a pale golden color. The nose is scented with grapefruit and pear, and on the palate citrus come to the forefront. Mango and orange zest are accented by notes of guava and a pronounced minerality. The wonderful acidity and full-bodied texture carry through a delicious lemony finish with hints of apricot.”

The suggested retail price through the winery is $18.  I suspect that soon it might be available around town for less.  If you’re in Napa Valley, stop by and visit the Luna Vineyards Tasting Salon.  From the look of it, you may not want to leave.  It’s like they’re encouraging you to get comfy and stay a while, which is fine by me.

www.lunavineyards.com

Rating: I still love it. Luna, in my opinion, is always reliably good. I’ll let you know when I see it around town and for what price.

*I did receive the 2008 Pinot Grigio as a sample to try.

My favorite issue of San Diego Magazine every year is the “Best Of San Diego” issue, which occurs at the end of the summer.  I love San Diego (La Jolla is technically a part of the City of San Diego) and am interested where people like to eat out, visit, shop and more around town. I actually keep this issue and sometimes refer to it later when looking to do things around town.

A friend of mine sent me an email letting me know that La Jolla Mom had been included in San Diego Magazine’s August 2010 issue.  I was elated to learn that it is the annual “Best Of San Diego” issue which I hadn’t had a chance to look at yet.  If you have a chance, check out page 73.  La Jolla Mom is mentioned in the local blogger section.

I’m very flattered and grateful to all of you!

(P.S. It’s been a busy, busy few weeks. I have a ton to write about. Stay tuned!)