Travel Log for All!

[treebeau]

Originally posted by piqaboo:
...with beer on the side.

*sigh*
Do I even NEED to say it?

Regards,
Tim B.

[Schmeelkie]

Well, my next trip isn't as exciting as Thailand or Europe (speaking from an American perspective), but we are taking Pumpkin on his first plane ride to NYC this weekend (grandma's coming too) for a wedding. It's only an hour flight, so even if he's fussy the whole time, it shouldn't be that disastrous. Then he gets to experience a cab ride, and maybe a subway trip too! The wedding's in the Brooklyn Botanical Garden so that ought to be cool. I'm an old hat at visiting NYC (half my college buddies went there post graduation and I visited a lot, plus my grandma used to live in Jersey), so won't really do much sightseeing. Let you know how it goes...

[piqaboo]

Oh yes! And please share any helpful hints you devise along hte way!

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

Hint: Carry Benedryl. The liquid kind for babies. Useful as a general decongestant (for plane rides) and also as a sedative if Pumpkin turns way fussy from being overstimulated with all the traveling and new events. A little Tylenol and a little Benedryl can help a lot of things. Use only as needed.

[OperaTenor]

Originally posted by Selma in Sandy Eggo:
A little Tylenol and a little Benedryl can help a lot of things.

....and a little whiskey. Good for the kid and the parent.

T-bo, I'll save you the trouble:

And yet another thread goes alky!

[piqaboo]

benedryl......... I wonder if our pediatrician will give her seal of approval???
Altoid is likely to need it at the transatlantic portion of our trip when her fellow passengers are losing patience and she's getting a bit loud in her fatigue.....<hopeful smilie>

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

Don't know why not. Benedryl and Dimetapp have been around forever; both are gen1 antihistamines and I think infant doses are calculated by weight. Ask her!

[Haggis@wk]

When the twins were not yet two, we tried Morgan David cut with water.....it only gave them hangovers.

I still have pics of their little bloodshot eyes, Sharon cries when she sees them, convinced she was a child abuser....Well, she was, but it had nothing to do with MD!!!

Selma has the right of it, Benedryl, and maybe powdered Amoxicillin if 'Toid's subject to ear infections.

Our military doc, after 2-30 ear infections, use to give us the prescription strength Amoxicillin (just add water) when we went camping because he was convinced that the MRHYN would be able to diagnose an ear infection if she saw it, and convinced that if he didn’t she’d call him at “Zero dark:30” if he didn’t

She had his home number, a useful skill set for a budding USAF investigator in those days.

Some grape flavored Benedryl shoud be a staple in any family's emergency kit.

[treebeau]

Having been on many flights that included babies I have generally seen that the babies cry during takeoff because their ears don't adjust to the pressure changes as quickly and don't know how to cause their ears to pop. I think that sucking on a bottle of milk might help if you can time it right for takeoff.

Other than that, they are usually pretty good. Often a little excited though. And they generally fall asleep, to the relief of the other passengers, during descent.

Regards,
Tim B.

[OperaTenor]

Originally posted by treebeau:
I think that sucking on a bottle of milk might help if you can time it right for takeoff.

Precisely why Piq hopes to keep Altoid nursing through the coming trip to England and Ireland.

[tan]

hi shapley,
sorry i' m late in posting.
personally i do prefer chicken saytays with my drinks, but beef is just as good, but a different sauce and marrinade,
here the chicken receipe we use- and our broadset friend from thailand:

1 lb of chicken breast cut into strips about 1/8th of an inch thick

Saytay sticks the thin kind made of bamboo

2 stalks of lemongrass preferrably fresh, cut into as small slices as possible

3 small chillies chopped very fine

2 cloves of garlic sliced thinly

4 black peppercorns crushed

fishsauce just a few drops- from a thai brand unless you' re an afficiaonado

1 teaspoon kurkuma (optional)

For the marinade:

3 tblespoons of cocnutcream - nutricia or any orher brand, comes in a can
a little water

3 drops of sesame oil (optinal)

Mix the coconut cream with just enough water to make it into a thin sauce (cocoanut cream kan be a bit clotty, just keep whisking), then add all ingredients, including the chicken. Set asside for at least an hour.

soak the saytay sticks in water- about 20 minutes.

when ready to start cooking, shake most of the marrinade off the meat, and string the chicken strips, one piece lengthwise- to a stick on the saytay sticks.
the best way to cook saytays is on the bbq, as the are so small. it would not take long, or use a moderately hot electric grill. the meat should be done but not dry.

Peanut sauce:

5 tblespoons peanutbutter - unsweetended, maybe at a healthfood store??

3 small chillies chopped, not too fine you want to be able to avoid them!

peanutoil as needed

salt to taste

mix all the ingredients, whisk into a thick sauce,
if it keeps too thick because of the oil a little water and lemon juice will help.Set asside.
When ready to serve put sauce into small plates one to a person so people can use the dip individually.

Salad:
3 cucumbers as finely sliced as possible
squeeze out as much liquid as possible

1 carrot sliced into the finest strips you can- or use themagimix

1 bunch of sallions cut nto small pieces

fresh beansprouts -about a hand full


For the dressing:
cane sugar the equvalent of 3 teaspoons,
if not available use normal or brown sugar.

salt and pepper to taste

2 tblespoons ricevinegar if not available any cheap white vinegar will do

Dissolve the sugar in the vinnegar, add all ingredients and let the salad marrinate, about two hours, taste and add more sugar or vinnegar as you like. The salad should have a strong but still sweetish flafour.

serve in little plates as the peanut sauce.

when you pick up a saytay, the idea is to drag it through the peanut sauce first, the try to spear up some of the salad.

Hope you like it.
tan

[tan]

sorry guys didn' mean to kill this topic with a booring receipe, keep up your travellogues and ask, there sure will be people who know jusr that little romantic restaurant out of the way, that great view or that place for a wonderful memory.. to share,as i understand people in america do not get a very long vacation, you have to make the best of it! so, let' s help each other to make the best of it!
tan

[Schmeelkie]

Brought the Benedryl, but didn't need it. Pumpkin didn't seem to mind be forced to drink from his sippy cup during takeoff (and landing on the way home - was asleep on the way into NYC). Other than a seat kicking incident that was stalled by a determined daddy - resulting in about 5 minutes of crying. A girl in front of us offered Pumpkin her stuffed cat - he snuggled and fell right asleep. We bought him his own cat for the way back and he was great! Course it was only an hour flight, but a great success nonetheless.

Only napped about 45 min the first travel day (in the plane, then I got to carry deadweight Pumpkin through the airport) - woke up when we got into our cab and was actually about 30-60 late going to sleep. He was pretty pumped up - but then had a good night's sleep and slept until 8! As he's usually up between 6:30-7, this was wonderful for us!

Anyway, the wedding was great - Brooklyn Botanical Garden is beautiful! Had the reception in the Palm House on the grounds with wonderful food. Great to chat and dance with friends without constantly running around and leaving in the middle of conversations to keep the boy out of (insert dangerous thing here). Pumpkin had fun chasing pigeons on the Promonade with Grandma and pointing out buses, boats and airplanes. Oh, yes, and stomping on bugs. Hotel (Brooklyn Mariott at the Bridge) was pricey but very nice. Even brought a books (one coloring) and crayons with the crib for Pumpkin!

Next week, it's the train to Worcester, MA to see his other Grandma. We're not doing any long driving trips this summer, as Pumpkin isn't great at sitting and entertaining himself for long and doesn't sleep as long in the car any more. And we're not willing to start a 6-hour drive after he's gone to sleep or at 3am or something. The train will take a little longer than driving, but he'll be able to run around a lot.

[piqaboo]

Tan, I want to check about your recipe:
In the US, coconut milk is the liquid squeezed from grated coconut. Coconut cream is the same stuff but heavily sweetened and is solid at room temperature.
Would we want to use coconut cream as noted, or should we use coconut milk? Thanks.

Im looking forward to the cooking this summer (in part because if it happens on a barbecue, its OT's responsibility! )

Schmeelkie - Hooray!

<small>[ 06-16-2005, 01:33 PM: Message edited by: piqaboo ]</small>

[Shapley]

tan,

Thanks! I'll have to give it a try.

V/R
Shapley

[Shapley]

tan,

You didn't kill the thread. Often, over the weekend, no one posts. Unfortunately, that means the threads that were idle for more than 24 hours don't show up in the "recent topics", so I miss them. I didn't notice that the recipe had been posted until today, when Schmeelkie brought it back to the forefront by posting (Thanks, Schmeelkie!)

I don't know how many others use the "recent topics" button to navigate, but it saves me from re-reading old posts to find out what's going on. Unfortunately, it also means I miss messages directed my way until I scan through the whole board, which I usually do when the activity slows down a bit.

V/R
Shapley

[piqaboo]

After long weekends, I search for anything inthe last 5 days. It would be GREAT to be able to search "the last 3 days "to capture changes over the weekend. Hint HINT, Nicole Marie

[tan]

thanks, Shapley,
as you can see, i'm still a beginner on the internet- did not have any for the last six years..and am of the self taught push buttons till it works computer school...

dear Piquaboo,
in asian receipes one finds oten sweet and hot and hearty mixed together.
Making cokonutmilk with grated coconut is an awful job, also jou would need a fresh green one, not the dried ones you find in stores. ( even the khmers, poor as they are try to avoid this job...)
coconut cream, as i remember it from my days in amsterdam was sweet, but not sickeningly so.Yet i do remember that when i lived in americaa lots of products were sweeter than the same brand names would be in europe.
What i would do, use only half the amount of cocnut cream and add some water or peanutoil and some fresh lime or lemon to the marinade, and maybe a drop more fishsauce. that should do the job.
have fun, tanja

talking about coconuts: a few weeks ago we were having a drink in the 'corner bar' on victory hill, enjoying the sunset . a friend was just about to go home when the sunset was followed by a raging monsoon storm. so -he and we stayed- for quite a while, ok, it got late. when my friend got home and walked to his bed a coconut had fallen straight through his roof right on to his pillow. .. talking about deadly aim.
take care tanja

[mmichaelson]

OK guys! I made it back safely from my trip - will be posting extensive travel logs soon! (maybe sending select pics -since I took more than 600- to piq and ot for posting in case they would like to post a few for me. . .)

Hope everyone is a-okay. Up to my eyeballs right now, and trying to adopt a boxer dog to boot, so will catch up on trip postings soon!!!

[Schmeelkie]

Well, Pumpkin loved his train ride. Got up this morning and said, "Choo-choo?" Of course, we were supposed to get in at 10:45 last night and got in at 1:30am!! Pumpkin mostly slept all the way from Albany to Rochester (about 4 hours), but sometimes had a hard time getting comfy on Mommy. My husband and I didn't sleep at all - the train was really rocking. We were so late because all the trains had to run slow yesterday due to the heat (I think Albany had a high of 100), then they really booked once the sun went down - making it hard to walk around or sleep.

Otherwise the trip went well. Pumpkin made lots of friends on the train, wore himself and two other boys out running around the station in Albany last night. Got to see tons of relatives, although, we found out that large parties are not his thing. Went to a wedding reception in CT (the wedding was a couple of months ago in Florida) - outside at the bride's parents house. Pumpkin spent most of his time away from the crowd wandering around the large yard. Fun for him, and my husband got to talk to his relatives, but I didn't get to socialize much. Other parents of toddlers were in the same boat so I did talk to some of them.

Pumpkin also enjoyed pools - one in the hotel we stayed at for the reception (he even let a relative he and I just met spin him around in the water and play since I forgot my bathing suit - something he would never have agreed to 6 months ago), and another at my aunt's house. Had a hard time getting him out of the water both times. At breakfast at the hotel - which was near the pool -he kept going by the pool and saying, 'wa-wa?' Unfortunately, the hotel kept losing power and was mostly running off a generator, so they didn't open the pool.

Also, as we drove by Hartford, we tuned in B.com on the radio!