Countdown to Juarez

Hey everyone!  Sorry it's been a month since the last post on the ol' blog here.  It's crunch time for the Petersons, as we are getting ready to move to Ciudad Juarez with the Foreign Service at the end of April.  So the last few weeks have been filled with applications for diplomatic passports, immunizations, visa applications, and so on and so forth.  Now that I'm done with Spanish, I've moved on to Consular training, which is a six-week course designed to teach us everything we need to know about Consular work at our first assignment.

Consular work consists of three main areas: Immigrant Visas (people who are coming to live in the U.S.), Non-Immigrant Visas (people coming to visit for a few months), and American Citizen Services.  It's all pretty interesting, and involves reading lots of statutes and federal regulations, which I'm ashamed to say is pretty exciting for an attorney like myself.  

But we have managed to fit in some fun stuff as well over the past few weeks.  Here's a brief recap of what we have been up to (or more accurately, what we've been cooking):

Sarah had a sinus infection the week of Valentine's Day, so we held an observance of the holiday the following week.  I don't know if she appreciated my Mexican-themed card, but I felt like it was one of my best.  Perhaps one day I should just do a post on all the cards I've made for her over the years.

However, something we can both agree on is the traditional Valentine's Day surf n' turf dinner that we've been making for years.  It includes braised short ribs and scallops, and this year we added brussel sprouts and mashed potatoes.  Topped off with molten lava cake, as per usual.

We also had a snow day last week!  Sarah and I were snowed in on Wednesday, which meant I made scones and bacon, and then we sat on the couch and watched "Wreck-It-Ralph."  I've decided I'll just start taking every Wednesday off as a nice mid-week break.

Finally, some friends of ours invited us to an "Iron Chef" event at their place.  For those who haven't seen the show, two chefs compete to make meals with a certain secret ingredient.  For this party, the secret ingredient was lemons, and Sarah and I blew up the dessert category with a lemon meringue tart.  It was especially satisfying since we made this dessert once before and it was a complete catastrophe.  Redemption!

So that's it for now.  Hopefully, I'll find some more time to update the blog before we head south of the border.  Adios.