No pickles, please

Summertime and the livin is easy.

2011-08-31T18:21:00.000-04:00

Next week mark's our one-year houseaversary. Unbelievable. It feels like just yesterday we were falling in love with our new little house, but life here is such a perfect fit that it feels like we've been here forever. I can hardly remember our house like this: one year ago.

And while we still likely have a handful of good beach days left, Labor Day is upon us, marking the official end of the summer season. I know I've been singing its praises for months now, but I can't tell you how much we've enjoyed our first summer here. Swimming, sanding, sunning, walking, biking, antiquing, drinks-with-friendsing, and, even, country clubbing. Until next year, summer, you'll never be far from my memory.

For nostalgia's sake, a few of my favorite summer scenes...

Beautiful aunties on the beach.

Beautiful toes with Melissa.

Lisa and Birgit visit for my bday. Birgit can't find a snowsuit, so towels suffice. ;)

Mr. Cool.

Birthday dingleberries with my princess.

Ferris wheel beach view.

My favorite onepointfive-year-old and my favorite five-year-old.

Baby's first beach.

World's cutest pooches.

Havin' the most fun.

Beachin' with my sweetie.

Saturday Brad and I head even farther west for a road trip on the Pacific Northwest. Stay tuned for tales of the road (assuming we don't get eaten by a bear!).

There will be weiners.

2011-08-03T17:26:00.001-04:00

So far, 33 feels much like 32. So that's good. And I have lots of fond birthday memories to reflect upon, so that's good, too.

I spent my actual birthday much like I spent my 32nd birthday. Last year, though, I was just here visiting Brad, who was already living here. He had to work, so I walked around town, window shopped, and had lunch at Tosi's. This year, we live here (yeah!) and I rode my birthday gift into town...

World's sweetest Schwinn cruiser.

After a quick polish change and an iced coffee, I sat on the bluff for a bit while I waited for Brad to join me.

Party girl purple.

Just like last year, I decided on Tosi's for lunch. I went with a different sandwich, though - pesto and mozzarella, and a Dang! soda instead of a Coke.

After lunch, I had some work-from-home work to do, then Brad and I headed south to have my second annual birthday dinner at Brewster's in New Buffalo.

I went with the same cocktail, an Old Fashioned (like me, hehe), but chose the pasta dish (last year I chose the seafood dish) - homemade tortellini and roasted tomatoes in oil. MMM. Unfortunately, it was way too heavy on the garlic so I tried not to eat too much (still got a stomachache - boo!), but it was super tasty (and the leftovers still tasted delicious, cold even). Brad got spaghetti and meatballs. I was secretly jealous.

Slurp.

On the way home, I convinced Brad to pull in to Warren Dunes State Park so we could peek at the setting sun and the dunes. And then a vicious attack bee flew at me and stung me right on the knuckle! Ass bee.

Side note: I have only ever been stung by a bee twice in my life. BOTH times were on my birthday. Luckily, this time it wasn't on my butt.

The weekend eventually rolled in, and in with it, some lovely ladies from the east! Birgit and Lisa S. both came to visit, and to celebrate, we ordered La Perla take out. Another side note: I know I've been away most of the summer, and La Perla is a recent discovery. It's a Mexican grocery store in Benton Harbor, and they have a little food counter that makes the most amazing Mexican. It is GOOD stuff.

After some eating and walking to town and ice creaming and sunset viewing, we hit the hay, waking up bright and early Saturday for some donuts and birthday beach time. Emily and her beau, Paul, eventually joined us, and a good time was had by all.

THEN, it was time for weiners. Veggie and Vienna dogs for everyone! And inappropriate music, most likely played too loud when one has such young little neighbors.... "Chopsticks, only!"

So we could stop annoying the neighbors, we made a short trip over to the Boat House, another recent discovery. It's a dirty little bar in town, but it's in the marina so it's right on the water, which I love. So we had a seat outside, drank a few drinks, and got harassed by Party Marty, who nearly plowed his boat right through the dock.

Thanks to everyone who sent so much love my way. xo

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes.

2011-07-27T19:35:00.000-04:00

Since I turned 32...

I left home for the first time.

I powered through world's worst summer (selling a house, buying a house, living apart from Brad).

I started eating peas.

I started drinking beer (a limited menu, but beer nonetheless).

I moved to the beach.

I bought a house I'm madly in love with.

I've remained in remission and have had little trouble with my guts.

I learned to live without Zingerman's.

I was reminded of how many super duper awesome friends I have.

I met a handful of super duper awesome new friends.

I said hello to a bundle of new babies.

I got to use my master's degree.

I celebrated my fifth year of marriage.

I ate at a Gordon Ramsay restaurant.

I (sort of) reentered the work force. I'm not entirely bitter about it.

I saw Scissor Sisters in concert and it was pretty dang sweet.

I got to introduce my family to my beach town and run around in the sand with my ever-growing nephew.

I bought my first automatic car, and welcomed power locks for the first time.

I celebrated my second year as a vegetarian.

I started riding my bike.

I went swimming with Heidi for the first time.

Not too shabby.

Here's looking at you, 33. You better be nice.

Garden of eden.

2011-07-25T20:52:00.000-04:00

I've grown basil for the past few years, but this year I decided it was finally time to try my hand at actual food. Earlier this spring, Hillary, Ceile, and I hit the Sawyer Garden Center, and we all loaded up on lots of goodies. I've been very patiently waiting, and things are finally starting to sprout. So far, I haven't killed anything. I may have veggies just yet!

Big Boy tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, red peppers; on the railing, banana peppers, basil, and mint.

How cute are these guys?

Hillary and I went back to Sawyer two weeks ago, a way to escape the heat, and I picked up these banana peppers for $0.39! That may be the score of the year. And they are the cutest ever.

I also had a little (well, huge) interloper on the deck last week, trying to get at my goodies...

Female stag beetle. Huge female stag beetle.

And one last quick image before I head off to watch Hoarders... World's prettiest fruit.

Pink currants! They look like little glass balls. And they were sweet and tasty, too.

Fun in the sun.

2011-07-14T18:38:00.000-04:00

It took a screwed-up Firefox and me thinking my blog got deleted for me to log in for the first time in almost two months. Normally I tend to slip away from blogging when times are tough, but this time I swear that's not the case.

I just really love my town. And we're really trying to make the very most of our first summer here. At the beach. In town. I feel like the luckiest girl in the world.

So what have I been doing, you might be wondering... ?? (Or maybe not! Ha!)

Going to Chicago.

Having awesome visitors.

Aunt Sandy from WV and cousin Alex and Aunt Karen from CA.

Birgy turns 30. I find this amusing.

Going to the beach.

Watching amazing sunsets and fireworks on the beach.

4th of July on the Bluff w/ Chris & Ceile.

Riding my bike. (Yes, you heard that right.) Walking (or biking) to town. Attending art fairs and watching fireworks. Going to the farmers market and getting iced lattes. Having romantic sushi picnics on the bluff.

Hanging out with my lovely St. Joe ladies.

Golfing with Bradford at the 'club. I even have golf clubs (purple!) and golf shoes (with rhinestones).

Oh yeah, and my in-laws moved in across the street.

Get off my yard, sonny.

2011-05-26T20:02:00.000-04:00

Georgie says, "Suck it, old yard!"

This picture is from last fall (spring hasn't sprung quite as fully just yet!), but it illustrates why exactly we needed to go and order ourselves an instalawn...

Gross!

So yesterday, despite the monsoon we were having here, the guys showed up and put in a whole new yard for us. And by the time I got home from work, it cleared up and we could actually stand back and enjoy the beauty. Sigh.

It looks like a furry Fraggle!

We can't walk on it just yet, and we definitely can't let the dogs loose on it (so it's back to the old leash/front yard/walk routine), but in a few weeks we can all roll around and revel in it.

In other new-around-here news, we FINALLY painted the LAST room in the house (and the second to last hallway left to do), the sun porch. Nothing drastic, but we went from dirty country yellow to fresh pale yellow (the same yellow we painted the kitchen).

Old. New.

It just looks that much nicer, feels that much better, and makes that much more sense with the rest of the house. (We also painted the downstairs hallway that leads to the two spare bedrooms and the guest bathroom.) All we have left to do is the staircase that leads upstairs. Eventually... For now, we will just enjoy our even brighter, beautifuller sun porch.

Don't you want to come lounge here with us?

Boys and beaches and ladies and balls.

2011-05-20T20:36:00.000-04:00

I guess spring springing (then unspringing and being all winter-like again) has really kept me occupied. But I'm here. Still good. Loving my house more and more every day, and loving living in such a lovely little town, eagerly anticipating warm-weather beaching. Needless to say, the past few weeks have passed pretty quickly, with visitors, trips to the garden center, and general enjoying-being-outside-ness.

Speaking of, I'm madly in love with my front porch. It faces due west, so it's brightly lit come late afternoon and it stays lit until the sun sets behind the house across the street (between 8:30 and 9 right now). I can sit on my chair, drink a glass of wine, and watch the town go by. It's also deeply set, so as long as there aren't hurricane-force winds, you can sit and watch a good thunderstorm there, too.

I say this all today, the first sunny and warm(ish) day after a week of cold nonsense (which followed a week of sun and heat). Brad's out golfing, so I've spent the evening reading and drinking out front, only taking a brief break for a delightfully French-inspired meal. Scrambled eggs, toast, sardines, asparagus, and, of course, wine. It was heavenly.

Here are some sights from recent goings ons...

My family visited for Mother's Day. Little man loves the beach.

...and smearing dandelions at parades.

Some special ladies visited. And we harassed the wine pourer guy.

The ladies loved the balls on the Bluff.

I bought a bat plant to attract hummingbirds. Cutest ever.

I also planted tomatoes and peppers. Fingers crossed.

And I got to "enjoy" some Red Lobster with my family during a quick trip home.

What more can a girl ask for?

Booky wooks.

2011-04-27T18:25:00.002-04:00

The spring babies have made a first appearance. A huge congrats to Liz, Aaron, and Sam on the newest edition to their family. Welcome, William! Can't wait to meet you! Still to come, Tabi, Marla, Jess, and Tracy. So many little ones joining the world in the near future. You know what that means... Baby knits! :)

In other news... an ode to the public library. Obviously, the St. Joe library has been at the center of my social life here. Book club (and hence all my friends), trivia, Iron Chef. But I had yet to really do a good library browse. We had weird weather today. It rained the majority of the day, and when I left work, the ground was warmer than the air, so there was steam rising everywhere like crazy (it was very The Fog). I was almost home when I decided I wanted to see how the steam was affecting the lake, so I zipped right. Then saw the library and thought, hey, I should go in there. And zipped left. And in I went.

Right in the entrance, they had a Michigan books display set up. And they were all shiny new hardcover books, for which I am a total sucker. First I grabbed a fiction novel about a couple in the 1940s. Then a bright red cover caught my eye. I picked it up and... it's a book written by the niece of one of the assumed victims of John Norman Collins (The Michigan Murders). Turns out, she was killed by someone else, and the book is about all of it. Woot!

Then I wandered over to the regular fiction section to grab the book I technically came in to get. Knit Two, a slightly chick litty sequel (to The Friday Night Knitting Club). Not usually my thing, but I have to confess the series has me hooked. Then that reminded me... I need a knitting project! So I wandered off to the knitting section, where I found a knitting book co-written by... Tracy Ullman! Whaaa?? I don't know that it'll yield any me-friendly patterns, but I figure it's at least worth a look.

Needless to say, I heart the library.

(...and the librarians are pretty sweet, too. Shout out to Alicia and Andrea!)

George and Heidi, on the other hand, are always suspicious of library books.

Ok, enough chitty chatty. Time to pour over my new books.

Pretty in purple.

2011-04-22T21:50:00.000-04:00

We've never been big on Easter. We typically forget about it until it's upon us, and we haven't done much of anything in years. But it's still fun to get in the spirit of spring and bunnies and chickies and pastels. And, of course, Cadbury eggs!!

Easter nearly slipped by me before I could purchase the requisite one egg for the year. I was in line buying hot dog buns yesterday when the woman behind me started clucking like the Cadbury bunny. I looked down and the highly desirable eggs were right there. I thanked her for reminding me and grabbed two.

Because of the holiday, Hillary was off work today, and somehow I convinced her to go see Scream 4 with me (thanks for being a trooper!). It was super fun, and since it was filmed in Ann Arbor, it felt like a little visit home. Afterward, we went for pre-Easter mani-pedis. $35. Seriously! Beautifying yourself in St. Joe is quite reasonable. Hillary went with powder blue, I went with a pastel purple.

I will be perfectly matchy with my new purple shawl. That I am wearing to Sunday brunch. With the in-laws, who arrive tomorrow.

For now, I am enjoying a delicious bottle of local wine. First Kiss, from Founder's. It is a sweet dessert wine, infused with raspberry and chocolate. And it is pure heaven. Swoon.

Pooper scooper.

2011-04-20T20:58:00.000-04:00

I'm finding that working makes me boring. I remember when I lost my job, I felt that the future of this blog was uncertain. Now that I have a "real" job again, I keep thinking to myself, wow, I'm really boring now. Hmm... But I have found that I'm enjoying having a routine, even if it does require me to wake up early. I haven't overslept yet, and I've even had time to make coffee and lunch in the morning, which is previously unheard of for me. Clearly, I am a much more mature businesswoman these days! ;) Anyway, I haven't found a rhythm yet for work + dinners... The first week I was super motivated in the kitchen, the second week not so much but then I hit my stride over the weekend. This week has been mixed. We had grocery store sushi for dinner tonight, for example. But last night, I went as far as de-veining shrimp.

For Christmas, my mom got me a subscription to Cooking Light. This month's issue was instantly inspiring. I mean, how good does this look?

So after work I popped into the store to get some shrimp. Honestly, I've only made shrimp at home a handful of times, and always pre-cooked, w/o shell. Well, my grocery store fish counter sucks. And the only shrimp not from Bangladesh or Vietnam were jumbo Gulf shrimp... fully intact (no heads). So I sucked it up. Anything for the good ole USA.

I wasn't really sure where to begin, but I didn't figure it could be that hard. I did a quick Google search, grabbed my knife, and started, well, ripping out the poo! Let me tell you... that was way grosser than expected. I'm mostly able to not think about fish as meat, but it was really hard manhandling the little buggers, ripping off their legs, their big squishy bodies... Plus, the poo. Yuck. And it's confusing! Some have giant intestines, some don't appear to have any at all. What gives? Either way, eventually I was done and into the pot they went. I sprinkled them with some paprika and pepper and cooked them two minutes on each side.

Meanwhile, I'd been hard boiling two eggs. I'm no expert at peeling eggs, so they don't look too pretty, but they were perfect to me.

Hello, pretty ladies.

I'd also whipped up the dressing, based on the CL recipe. I just squirted some mustard in a bowl, squeezed in a lemon, cranked in some pepper, and whisky whisk. To prepare the salad for our shrimp, I made a little bed of romaine, chopped up some cucumber and tomato, added an egg (no egg for Brad; wuss), and tossed it all around with the dressing. Two plops of guacamole. Then it was time for the shrimp.

Nothing too earth shattering, but it was a super yummy meal, and pretty healthy, I think (I didn't even use any oil in the dressing). Brad rightly pointed out that the whole thing would be pretty tasty in a wrap, as a sandwich. That's my guy!

Speaking of magazine recipes, I pulled out my binders this weekend (that I put together in 2008 and haven't updated since) and was reminded of lots of good recipes I've tried and not yet tried. Need to get cooking! I also pulled all the meat recipes and dropped in some that have been floating around for a while. My next big project will be to go through the past year's worth of food mags and get those earmarked recipes into the binders.

This weekend I was also reminded of how much I love to host dinner. Sunday afternoon, Ceile invited us to join her and her bf for dinner, and I in turn invited them to join us. Nothing crazy, just our favorite pumpkin mushroom Gorgonzola pasta. Which, I realized, was one of the first dishes I ever made (I was a late bloomer). Brad and I were hosting Jason and Krissy for dinner, and the recipe had just been in the most recent issue of Cooking Light. Anyway, Chris and Ceile joined us for dinner, and it was lovely.

George, ever the security guard.

I love having awesome neighbors.

On a totally unrelated note, I'm re-finding the ability to and the joy of working to music. For as much as I was home alone before, I spent most of my days in silence (other than the songs I sang about and to the dogs). In the past few weeks, however, I've been listening to music at work, and I like it. Minus the earbuds. Ow. So to celebrate (may the celebrating never end, right?), I just downloaded myself some new tunes. The Frames. The new Ray LaMontagne. And the new Adele song because I am obsessed with it. Something to look forward to tomorrow morning... Oh, and free lunch from the bossman. Score.

Spring released.

2011-04-13T19:49:00.000-04:00

First things first, a belated (bloggy) happy 30th birthday wish to Hillary. I hope she is enjoying her life as a 30something, and I'm happy to have her as a fellow member of the club.

Just 'cause you turn 30 doesn't mean weird old men are

going to stop buying you shots!

In addition to Hillary's birthday celebration Saturday night, much awesomeness ensued this past weekend. We had a brief glimpse at what the summer has in store for us, enjoying a 60-degree Saturday and an 80-degree Sunday. To celebrate, first, we did some yard work (and I also did some yard sitting - I even got a sunburn!). Brad planted some grass seed...

While I planted some herbs (and lavender).

I am thrilled to report that my basil babies are already sprouting!! No sign yet of any mint babies.

Second, we had a bbq, of course.

The first bbq of the year always reminds me of me, Brad, and

Birgit, shivering, but enjoying dogs and mac salad for our first bbq

at the Ann Arbor house...

This was our first bbq in possibly two years, as Brad was spending most of his time in St. Joe (without me!) this time last year (crazy!! time flies). The boss-field-trip-fancy-brats for Brad, veggie dogs for me.

I've found I actually quite like this brand of fake wieners.

I also whipped up a giant batch of macaroni salad, which we're still working our way through. Nothing great, but it did the trick. Just some noodles, some mayo, some mustard, some celery, some carrots, paprika, salt, and pepper.

By the time the food was done, it started to rain (of course). So we had an indoor picnic.

In other news, I just finished my latest knitting project - a triangle shawl, just for me. I used bulky cotton yarn and size 13 needles, so it knit up nice and quick (well, 2 or 3 weeks). The pattern was suuuuper boraphil, but I'm so in love with the end result that it was definitely worth it. I am wearing it right now. And I can't wait to wear it all summer. In fact, I kind of want another.

Officially an old lady.

An education.

2011-04-07T21:04:00.000-04:00

Today was probably the coolest 3rd day of a job I've ever had. I promise I won't detail every day, but today was notably amusing, I promise. It started at 8:15 am when my boss pulled up in his black caddy. We were headed to Schaumburg for the American Foundry Society's conference for a mini "education" for me on one of my new company's industries (they are involved in four or five related industries). I have to say that although I'm still 99.5% clueless, I am very grateful that my boss, the company's president, took a whole day to do this with me (more "education" than I ever received in two years at my last job job). I also have to say that there are a LOT of men in the foundry industry (I was one of maybe 5 women in the whole joint). And I ALSO have to say men do NOT know how to shake a woman's hand. I'm not weak. I won't break. Don't give me the limp wrist, sheesh! Anyway....

After an hour and a half or so at the show, we'd seen most of what there was to see, so we headed out for lunch. Sushi. Swoon. Obviously, my new boss already knows the way to my heart. We pulled into a sketchy-looking strip mall and up to a sketchy-looking sushi joint, and we were both pleasantly surprised to find a bustling little sushi bar. Upon looking at the menu, I thought there had to be a catch. I ordered Sushi Lunch B. It was a spicy tuna roll, a California roll, half a tuna roll, and half a cucumber roll. Plus soup. And it was TEN BUCKS! Wft?! That's less than my (don't judge) grocery store sushi!

I am very happy to report that the sushi was... delicious. Seriously. (Including world's most powerful wasabi, which I thought was going to kill me. I had a moment of panic.) Best deal evs.

After sushi, we headed home. But our conversations led my boss on a few detours. Into Three Oaks, in search of liversausage and '50s collectables. Around the corner to look at an old corset-making factory and to peek into a super cool theater. Then into Stevensville to point out some local hole-in-the-walls. Through St. Joe to point out where the delicious fries are. Now on my radar (or a reminder of previous Rachel suggestions):

The Acorn Theater: Small music venue, similar to the Ark. I would be happy to see the entire April lineup. Trying to convince my mom to come see Peter Yarrow (of Peter, Paul, & Mary) next Thursday with me, and she would in turn stay to see Jefferson Starship with me on Friday.

Stevensville Station: Looks like a grungy little bar, but according to bossman, has a super tasty $7 fish dinner on Fridays.

Mr. Gyros: Small family owned diner, much like a Coney (we have no Coneys!).

Cafe Gulistan: Kurdish/Turkish food, which I know nothing about, but we've heard lots of good things about this place.

Swedish breakfast, yum: It doesn't look like there are too many Swedish entrees here, but I am happy to add any and all breakfast places to our repertoire.

Tabor Hill: I'm a teeny bit skeptical about this one, but we've heard a handful of good things about this place, so worth a try.

And one that Brad found this week --

Salt of the Earth: Looks very Ann Arbor!

Oh, and remember that liversausage I mentioned? Well, my boss was telling me about this amazing meat place and mentioned their liversausage and I got a little swoony and said that I used to love it (which is true). So thinking he could sway me to eat some (his logic is amusing... "You're a vegetarian by choice. Not because you can't eat it. So if you like it, eat it!" haha), we popped into Drier's Meat Market, which actually wasn't scheduled to open for the season until tomorrow, but the door was unlocked and they just happened to be "ready." J. R. Ewing is a fan (in real life, for realz!), and if J. R. is a fan, I'm a fan! ;)

Not my pic.

The shop was super duper cute. Even though I don't eat it, I'm mostly still fascinated by meat, so it was fun to look. After going round and round about how I wasn't going to eat liversausage, my boss finally gave up and sighed and bought some for himself. I decided on two brats for Brad. I almost got some "tub cheese" because it sounds funny, but I held off for now.

All in all, I have to call my first week of work a grand success. I haven't really gotten much into the nitty gritty of the work, but I feel comfortable enough with my boss, my co-workers, and with the company that I am certain I can handle whatever gets thrown my way.

Btw, I'm pretty sure my boss (and/or his family) owns or at one time owned 50% of St. Joe. Just sayin.

She works hard for the money.

2011-04-06T19:39:00.000-04:00

I have officially reentered the workforce. Well, the outside-the-home workforce. All in all, it isn't so bad. And while at home I search antique stores for the perfect retro-modern objects, at work I'm now surrounded by authentic 1950s design. Literally. I'm sure that's when the office was decorated. It's not at all trendy or ironic. It's just old. I hope to sneak some more pics in the near future, but for now, trust me, it's like stepping back in time.

My particular cube is very modern in comparison, pieces of leftover office furniture from when Zenith (how '80s!) closed an office in the area.

Please pardon the crappy cell phone picture.

I started my work week Tuesday, in my new work pants (LOVE THEM) with my bag lunch.

Fiber One bar, pb&j (with Michigan cherry preserves), apple, carrots, mini brownies.

As I said, so far, so good. Everyone is SUPER nice. It's a small manufacturing company, so there is a shop on site, which, as best I can guess, employs anywhere from between 10 and 20 men (and 1 woman). There are also 3 or 4 men that work desk jobs in the shop area. Up front in the office area are the other 2 women, my boss (the president), my boss' son, and the engineer (a young guy from Poland; other than me, the only person there under 50). See a theme? Lots of men (mostly old). The three women lunch together every day at Judy's house, my over-the-cube neighbor who lives across the street. A standing invitation to join was offered. I thought that was pretty nice.

There's also an alligator.

You thought I was kidding!

(He's just a temporary visitor, as are the two geckos.)

My boss is quite the character. He's got lots of stories. Most pretty amusing. I'm sure I'll have great tales to tell over time. And I even have business cards and an email address. This job is officially official! And my first official order of business is to market random office space the company owns on the other side of town. I fully intend to target Whole Foods and Trader Joe's. I may even beg.

Due to some now-postponed-for-potential-root-canal dental work this afternoon, I had a few free hours. What better to do than hit Target? Remember how I said my office is very OLD? Well, I'm not going anywhere near the water there (or the ancient coffee maker that doesn't get used), so I needed some provisions. First up, a coffee thermos and a water bottle. "I'm picking out a thermos for you..."

Why yes, that does say "Caution: Extreme Awesomeness."

And notebooks! I heart office supplies.

And, of course, a new lamp.

Tomorrow is technically my "office" Friday, and I'm headed to Chicago with my boss for a trade show. Then it's time for my "home job" Monday on Friday. Keeping busy! I think it's good for my brain.

Stumped.

2011-04-04T15:07:00.000-04:00

Once upon a time, we had two big trees in our front yard. Turns out, those trees were dead. So one day last fall, the city showed up and chopped them down. They left the stumps.

Last week, they finally started attending to the scraps they left behind.

Hillary asked me if an asteroid had landed in my front yard. That made me laugh a lot.

Later in the week, the city came back.

Now it looks like we have two bodies buried in our front yard. Sheesh. Here's hoping the city gets our new trees in before next spring.

Meanwhile, I was very excited to finally get to use my whole-nut spice store nutmeg last night. Get in my belly, nut!

A quick grate...

...and time to eat pimento mac and cheese.

It was the cheater version. I felt lazy. To make the cheater version, just boil your noodles and drain. Noodles back in the pot, then dump in your pimentos. I poured in a little milk and a tablespoon of flour, then mixed that up before slowly adding in two cups of sharp cheddar. Mix and heat, sprinkle with paprika (and nutmeg!), and you're done. Yum.

Tomorrow I go to work. Hmm.

You've been chopped.

2011-03-28T23:38:00.000-04:00

It is most decidedly NOT spring. It is cold. Biting cold. But it's sunny. This March has been very sneaky. So despite being so very much still winter, my brain is in spring mode, and Sunday I decided to make a very spring treat in honor of Chopped: All Stars night at our house. Lemon lime bars! And because I love this old recipe the best, I used it again. AND (and no and then!) my new apron is perfectly lemon-limey!

Because we were hosting guests, I made a double batch, so lots of citrus to squeeze. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I still get such silly joy out of using my antique juicer. I just love it to death.

This round of lemon-lime bars marked my first time making the crust with my processor. I always hem and haw about actually using it because it's so many pieces to clean up afterward, but I need to remember how much easier it makes everything. My crust mixed up in seconds. And it smelled oh so lovely, with all the lemon zest mixed in.

And just 'cause my apron matches so perfectly...

Into the oven to set, then it was time to mix up the lemon-lime filling. Which leads me to my latest exciting discovery: I made these on a Sunday. The little vitamin store where I buy my happy eggs is closed on Sunday. I needed eggs. I was feeling egg guilt all morning knowing I was going to have to buy store eggs. So I went into Martin's and pouted as I walked to the egg aisle. And look what I found!

Happy chickies!!!!!

Now. I'm always suspicious of grocery marketing. But I came home and did some research, and as far as I can tell, this is legit. I'll still buy my super local happy eggs, but I'm excited to know I have access to other happy, still slightly local eggs. Phew!

And guess what? The bars turned out great, and looked adorable in my fancy Pyrex. A random side note: This recipe, and the blog post I snagged it from, is what sparked my Pyrex obsession.

With and without coconut.

They went nicely with the fourth installment of the All Stars round. Even though annoying "aye-ron" won.

Little dutch girl.

2011-03-27T19:39:00.000-04:00

This weekend, I was lucky enough to catch up with Sara, who was on the west side for business. Saturday morning, I ventured up to Holland to meet her for brunch and general catching up. It was my first time in Holland, so the trip was a double whammy for me (it's just under an hour from here).

We met at the Windmill Restaurant in downtown Holland, what appears to be a local favorite. A pretty tiny diner, they serve breakfast all day as well as lunch items and pie.

(not my pic)

I love breakfast, so I knew I was sticking with that, but some sweet items caught my eye - I almost never venture from savory breakfast (even though I love French toast). A pancake roll-up? Neither of us had ever heard of such a thing. So, of course, I had to get two. The fruit-filled one, cherry, was just ok. It tasted like a pancake, with cherry pie filling in the middle. The regular roll-up, with butter and powdered sugar, was amazing (Sara agreed). You wouldn't think it would be anything special, but the way the melted butter mixed with the powdered sugar on the inside was unexpectedly delicious.

After food we wandered around downtown for a bit, spending the longest amount of time in the Seasoned Home, which was mostly bulk spices and bulk tea. Once we decided we were curious enough about the nutmeg (neither of us have ever seen the full nut in the store before), we were grabbing things left and right.

I could have easily brought home a ton more, but I narrowed my selections to a key lime seasoning (for fish) that smells crazy awesome, a chimichurri blend for Brad, 1/2 oz. of nutmeg, and pink peppercorns (pink!).

After exhausting downtown, we went for a little driving tour of the area (seriously, who lives there that can afford the mansions along the water [not even Lake Michigan! so random]), eventually landing at world's. coolest. vintage. store - Second Chance Design. I think Sara and I let out a collective swoon when we walked into the first room of stuff.

It's technically an antique store, but it's mostly stuff from the '50s, '60s, and '70s and everything is super affordable, so it doesn't feel like a traditional antique store. Sara lives in a super cool mid-century modern condo in Detroit, so this store was particularly awesome for her. And it shows. She bought a new bed and a dresser!

...and a teapot.

I didn't get any new furniture, but I found two pieces I'm currently in the process of harassing Brad about.

Polka dot chair, wooden cupboard. Gimmie.

That's not to say I didn't make a few small purchases...

A lovely vase that inspired me to pick up some tulips today. It was a dollar. ONE dollar.

And a few bar items that inspired me to reorg my bookshelf o' booze.

A lovely green pitcher ($11):

It's screaming "sangria! sangria!"

And two sparkly crystal appetizer plates ($2/each):

What a day! Sara, pancake roll-ups, and sparkly retro items? Perfection.

Working girl.

2011-03-25T22:00:00.000-04:00

Sick of me yet? ;) I'm taking advantage of all my free time now because in just over a week, I'll have a little bit less time because... I got a job! Like, a go-into-the-office, not-just-a-temporary-contract job. After working from home for 5-1/2 years, and not having consistent work for over 2 years, it'll be interesting, to say the least, but I think it'll be good for me. And when I'm not stressing about leaving the pooches or failing miserably, I'm mostly excited to get back into the real world. I'll be doing "marketing" (I hate saying that because I have no true marketing experience - why can't he just make me happy and call it "communications"?) for a small, family-owned manufacturing company in Benton Harbor. Will keep you posted on any exciting adventures.

To celebrate, today I treated myself to a $13 manicure (thanks for the tip, Hillary!), also my reward for not biting my nails for three whole weeks (a habit I rekindled last spring when we started trying to sell the house). I feel so fancy with my party girl pink nails.

And, of course, no celebration is worthy of being called a celebration without some delicious food. Tonight I convinced Brad to take me to the Bistro. We've been here several times and it's the nicest place in St. Joe. But after having found places we love in Benton Harbor and other neighboring towns, we've concluded the entrees are just not worth the $$. That being said, we LOVE the appetizers. Seriously, best fries ever. So tonight we ordered some drinks (my new favorite, Smithwick's, which is BEER!), apps, and salads. To start, tuna tartare with an amazing wasabi sauce. This was so good - I could have eaten two, all on my own. The tuna's got a bite to it, then with the wasabi... nice and spicy. Then pan fried crab cakes, which were fluffy and light. And, of course, our true love, the pomme frittes. A Caesar salad for Brad and a mixed greens salad (with blue cheese, please!) for me. The perfect meal.

It's freezing outside, but it's sunny and the lake looks beautiful, so I convinced Brad to go for a little drive after dinner (we ate at 6:30 so there was plenty of light left when we were done [early bird special!]). We drove by my new office, around the boonies a bit, through St. Joe's swankiest neighborhood, making a final pit stop at the Liquor Cabinet, which is right at the end of our road. I thought the Wine Castle in Ann Arbor was impressive. This place, there are almost no words. There are rows and rows of Michigan wine, including a ton of wineries I've never even seen. Rows and rows and rows of Michigan beer, including Ann Arbor Brewing Company (aww, home!) beer. And Sex! And Fizz! And Wet! I didn't even make my way through the booze! I just kept grabbing. And I'm not even thirsty! But I got a few bottles to have on hand, and I can't wait to go back again soon and explore some more. And, of course, I got a bottle of Fizz, just cause I could.

The celebration continues this weekend, as Brad and I head to the outlet mall to buy... gulp... work clothes!

There's no place like home.

2011-03-24T16:51:00.000-04:00

I'm so excited about our new kitchen art. Even though it required me doing math to get most of it up. The good news is no one was injured in my struggle (except one of my frames, which I dropped and cracked the wood and need to replace eventually... shhh, don't tell Brad).

The little guys above my window are my London souvenirs. On our last day of vacation, Brad and I visited the Churchill War Rooms, which, to my delight, had the most amazing gift shop (kind of an odd spot for a gift shop, but who am I to argue?). Side note: I've JUST discovered they have an online gift shop, too. Uh-oh! ;) Anyway, the gift shop highlighted wartime propaganda, and I nearly squealed with delight when I discovered the very extensive postcard display. I picked out my favorites and have been saving them for the right spot (which reminds me, I have two off-size ones yet to frame and hang!). And considering my house was built in the late 1930s, they are the perfect addition.

Turn a new leaf: Eat vegetables daily to enjoy good health.

Save kitchen scraps to feed the hens.

Housewives! Please finish traveling by 4 'o clock (and leave the trams, buses, and trains free for war workers).

Feed right to feel right.

To the left, we have my new French chickie, which I am madly in love with. And I must sing the praises of Allposters.com again - the best friend of any new homeowner. So many great prints to choose from, and so many great sales almost daily. I think I got French chickie for 30% off.

My french is pretty rudimentary, so I haven't completely translated the message. Something about a brave chicken? (Hopefully it's nothing like "chicken is delicious!!!") Either way, I'm happy to have my new poultry friend to keep me company in the kitchen.

Finally, the ultimate message.

This is actually a housewarming card from Sara and Matt. I've had it out for months and it just occurred to me last week that it would look perfect in our mudroom, where we enter the house 95% of the time. So I framed it, did some more math, and hung it up. I think it's just right.

Loosey goosey.

2011-03-23T20:41:00.000-04:00

Remember yesterday when I said I was going to attempt to re-create my Goose Island meal tonight? Well, I'm halfway through! I even started earlier this afternoon so my side salad would be nice and cool to serve with the burgers. So first up, dealing with the couscous, my version of the pumpkin chevre salad.

I was very excited to find a package of giant pearl couscous (little couscous is no fun), which I cooked according to the package directions (saute couscous on medium in a saucepan with a tablespoon of oil for about five minutes; slowly stir in two cups of boiling water; simmer for 12 minutes).

Cousy.

*Note, be careful when pouring bowling water into a super hot, oiled pan. The steam burned my thumb. Owie.

Mixed in about 2 tablespoons of canned pumpkin. Then I threw it in the fridge to cool. Once cool, I tossed in a handful or two of pumpkin seeds (or pepitas as they are apparently also called), a drizzle of olive oil, a squirt of lemon juice, and a very generous palmful of dried parsley. Make that a couple squirts of lemon juice - probably about a tablespoon-plus. Then... the goat cheese. Yum. I crumbled in about a 1/4 of a small block of goat cheese and stirred it all around. Nibble nibble, then back in the fridge.

Next up, I made the burger sauce, based on Goose Island's chipotle aioli. I combined 1/2 cup of Miracle Whip (would be better with regular mayo); 1 tablespoon of spicy mustard; sprinkles of cayenne pepper, paprika, and pepper; and a few squirts of lemon juice. Whisk whisk whisk. Tastes pretty close... It's thicker but I wasn't sure what to add to thin it out but keep the taste (other than another squirt of lemon juice). The Miracle Whip is definitely what you taste most here, but that's not all bad. This sauce will definitely do. In the fridge to chill.

Now it's time to make black bean burgers, copied from here. I'll keep ya posted....

Black bean burgers made and eaten. But let me backtrack. I followed the burger recipe as instructed, adding some hot sauce, red pepper flakes, salt, and pepper for taste.

Time to get mashy...

Screw the fork. I got my potato masher out.

Then it was onto the skillet.

The recipe called for 1/3 cup of beans per burger. I must say, this made for some teeny tiny burgers. I would use at least 1/2 a cup, if not more, per burger next time. As the burgers finished up, I melted some cheese on top, then got to assembling.

Bun, sauce, lettuce (hydroponic!), spicy salsa, burger, cheddar. Put the burger and the salad together, and how do you think I did??

Well, I think I did pretty darn good re-creating my Goose Island meal. And Brad seemed pretty enthused, too. The burger was near identical in taste. The pasta, despite looking a little oranger (due to canned pumpkin puree vs. chunks of fresh pumpkin), tasted nearly identical, too. I'm pretty pleased with myself. Pretty pleased indeed.

Bright lights big city.

2011-03-22T21:20:00.000-04:00

Sometimes I don't post for awhile because something's going on. When there is life drama, as I've evidenced many times over the years, I get grumpy and don't feel like writing. The good news is that this time, I didn't post for a while because I was too busy having a super awesome week. Between visits, trips, oodles of food, knitting dates, team Stachel work projects, and book club, I feel like I haven't sat down in over a week. It is a gray and rainy day, and my teeth are throbbing from this afternoon's dental work, so I'm sitting down, darn it, and I'm going to reminisce about everything.

The excitement began two Saturdays ago when Lisa S. came to town. We spent a quiet night in with some homemade pimento mac, then woke up bright and early Sunday morning to head to Chicago, where we were meeting her sister, Jenny, and super awesome nieces, Megan and Brooke (who were taking the train [yes, train!] from Texas). Unfortunately, the train was delayed, but Lisa and I took advantage of the down time and grabbed brunch at the Gage.

We kind of just stumbled upon it, but the Gage ended up being the perfect brunch spot. Housed in a 1920s hat-making office building, the restaurant had a ton of history and was decorated perfectly to its art deco past. And the food was super tasty and super affordable (although the $11 skinny skinny mimosa was a little overpriced).

Perhaps the most delicious smoked salmon I've ever eaten. It made me make oooey ahhey noises.

A few hours and some missing luggage later (luckily it turned up for the girls the next afternoon), the group was finally together and we headed out for dinner. Sushi at Japonais. I'm grateful for world's coolest teenage girls that like sushi. I HAD to have sushi. I don't have sushi here. Mmm sushi.

I still stand by my hometown Godaiko as the most delicious sushi around. The spicy is spicy, the rolls are big. I could never get enough. But the specialty rolls at Japonais are almost indescribable. If you're in Chicago and looking for a hip swanky night of sushi, I don't know that you can beat it. Brad and I went a few years ago and I've been dreaming of the tuna tuna salmon roll ever since.

The top roll in the boat, the tuna tuna salmon is salmon tartare topped with sliced tuna, avocado sauce, and wasabi tobiko sauce. It is melt-in-your-mouth delicious. I could have eaten five of these rolls. Unfortunately, at $17, just one tuna tuna salmon for me. Luckily, there were delicious cocktails for me to drown my sorrow in.

Jenny drinks her MUCH earned floating orchid.

After some ice skating up high...

Up top the Hancock building.

And some sleepy sleep at our awesome hotel...

It was Monday morning and time to go to the aquarium. Here fishy fishy fishy!

I see you, Brad.

I could go to Shedd over and over again. It's one of my favorite places. I love fishes.

And I love the big city with my Lisa!

We'd basically planned our day around a final stop at Franks 'n Dawgs for Chicago-style hot dogs for the girls. We drive over there, park, walk up, yank on the door.... and it's closed on Mondays! What is this, St. Joe? Sheesh! We were short on time and had already paid for parking, so we wandered over to Goose Island, which, honestly, was way better for me!

Black bean burger with spicy cheese, chipotle aioli, and salsa. And a side of cous cous with pumpkin and goat cheese. YUM. Seriously. Yum. My plan for tomorrow is to re-create this meal for dinner. If I could ever make it to the store....

Then it was time to head back to Michigan. Since the girls missed out earlier, we decided to make our own Chicago hot dogs. Surprisingly, our local grocery store had everything we needed, including sport peppers and a very strangely colored pickle relish.

Funny-looking relish, pickle spear, sport peppers,

tomato hunk, yellow mustard, onions, celery salt, hot dog.

I didn't have a Chicago-style dog... Relish? Pickle? Ugh! But I did eat a delicious veggie dog. With cheese. And everyone seemed to enjoy their fancy dawgs.

As much as I enjoyed our time in the big city, I loved having everyone at our house for two days, and I loved showing them our beach and our little town. Who doesn't love sand dunes and the five and dime store?

We really loved having everyone here... Even Georgie eventually made friends. And the house has seemed a little empty ever since.

Lep in the hood.

2011-03-17T22:27:00.000-04:00

Happy St. Patrick's Day, everyone!

This day last year, Brad and I were discussing his interview with Whirlpool, which he'd had in the morning. Who'd of honestly thunk that a year later, we'd actually BE here, celebrating the holiday with our new St. Joe friends? Definitely not us, but now that we're here, I wouldn't change it for the world.

Chomp.

2011-03-11T19:42:00.001-05:00

Obviously, I've been playing around with my blog today. Hope you like the new look! Really just posting, though, to say that my new title font is called "homemade apple." How appropriate. Happy weekend!

PS. Thanks to Meg for helping me out when I screwed the pooch with my new header!!

Meet me in the blue room.

2011-03-11T16:07:00.001-05:00

We are almost done with all the house re-do. So close. As of right now, we have one room (well, porch), three hallways, and four ceilings left to paint. Because.... we finished our mini living room upstairs this past week. Here she is in her bare-bones glory when we first moved in.

Ew.

Since then, we've bought the faux fireplace and a handful of other do-dads to make the space more enjoyable. But the color was horrible and the haphazard art was really starting to drive me crazy. So last weekend we buckled down and tackled the main part of the project - painting. To tie the upstairs in with the downstairs (and because we had a whole gallon of it in the basement), we painted the room the same color ("luna") as the dining room. And, of course, we had our little helpers.

Yes, George is actually sitting ON Brad's lap.

After having to do two coats in the kitchen, I was so relieved at how well the blue went over the brown - just one coat. Phew!

Heidi finds painting very tiring.

She was snoring her head off.

Anyway, so after painting, and a trip to Pier One (the matching frames below, on sale for $25 for both. Score!) for some finishing touches, we now have a very cozy, perfectly put together 2nd tv room. Woo! (The color is actually more blue-green in person. It's so hard to accurately capture color!)

Mr. Fox was happy to still have a place in the new room.

Next up, repainting the ugly yellow sun porch a much prettier yellow. What on earth will we do with ourselves once there is nothing left to paint???

Apron strings.

2011-03-07T23:44:00.000-05:00

I love mail. I've always loved getting mail. Even though it's mostly garbage these days, I still get a little twinge of excitement every day when the mail lady comes (now I also get a little twinge of guilt because George barks his head off every single day [and our front window is right on top of the mailbox]). I have such fond memories of exchanging oodles of snail mail letters with my Jess growing up (and even occasionally with Sara, who I saw every day - ha!)... and I actually still have every single one. Anyway, on Saturday I had a very exciting surprise in the mail - a package from Lisa S. A very very nice card (yes, you made me tear up, jerk! he he!) and... da da da... a most beauteous apron that perfectly matches my kitchen AND dining room.

Btw, I HATE that the good-for-the-environment light bulbs cast such a yucky hue!

It came just in time, as Saturday night was time to cook the homemade noodles from Emily's Italian grandmother.

I was so excited when Emily passed these along. I've never had homemade noodles. And from a real-life grandma no less! I wanted to really taste the noodles, so I didn't do anything too fancy. Cooked them for about five minutes, dropping some fresh spinach in at the last minute.

Steamy noodles.

Then I just mixed in a few spoonfuls of (store-bought) pesto and topped it with some Parmesan.

This was SO. GOOD. I can't even explain why. But it's all I've thought about come every mealtime since. I'm so pleased I have another two servings or so of the noodles to make again soon.

For dessert, we headed over to Ceile's for a little snacky snacky drinky drinky time. She whipped up some homemade strawberry ice cream, which topped homemade chocolate waffles. Between this and Lisa Z. and her new ice cream maker, I'm kind of having ice cream envy... Hmm... Wonder if Whirlpool makes an ice cream maker?

I was in such a yum haze, I gave in and played some games. Although I held strong in my euchre boycott. ;)

Other than the pesto noodles, we've pretty much been living on takeout the past week or so. Heading to the store and hoping to actually eat something healthy tomorrow!

Knitpicky.

2011-03-05T19:35:00.000-05:00

Since Jessica taught me to knit almost two years ago now, I've had the pleasure of passing the love along here and there. And while I can't take full credit, Hillary finished her first ever hat today. Major props to her for teaching herself the basics, which I think is super hard to do. I just provided the framework. But it sure was fun.

Stitchin' and bitchin' in St. Joe!

Who knows... Maybe we'll even start up our own Stitch and Bitch, west side style?!

I love lamp.

2011-03-04T12:43:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week, Brad issued a demand. "Buy new glasses!" Much like he did this fall, when he demanded I buy new sheets. He is SUCH a mean husband! ;)

As everyone in the universe knows, you cannot go to Target and get only what you go in intending to buy. I've mentioned before how in love I am with all their new simple, modern pattern home products, and it seems there are more every time I wander in. And while most of this stuff is cheap (as in cheap to buy and cheaply made), I love it now and know it doesn't much matter if in a year I don't love it quite so much because I only spent $5 on it.

I've also been on the hunt for a duvet for months now, unable to find just the right one. Imagine my delight when I stumbled upon the perfect one hanging out in the sale aisle. One I've never seen before, not even when it was full price. And the sale price was an awesome $19.99, including two shams. Score. It looks great, and I love how warm and fluffy our comforter feels now, all encased in our lovely stripey cover.

And finally... My new true love(s). A matching pair of lamps, mini and regular size. They are the perfect fit for our house and look much better than the cracked and stained, respectively, lights they are replacing.

Now that we have the perfect lamp for our upstairs sitting space, we must finish the room. Pronto! On the docket for this weekend... Paint! Yes, more paint.

Oh yeah, and I got a new set of glasses, too.

Take your mama out.

2011-03-03T15:49:00.002-05:00

The only downside to having such awesome friends is how much you miss them, especially after you get to see them in person and smoosh them. I suppose the having outweighs the missing.... ;) This past weekend I made a quick trip to the D for some concert going and general friend smooshing and it was a whirlwind visit of awesomeness for sure.

Saturday night I headed to Detroit proper for a slumber party with Matt, Sara, and Kaia. We spent our evening in the northern suburbs listening to a variety of bands rock out for cancer (well, rather, against cancer!), and while some was questionable (let's just say "Amy Grant covers with boom box backing track"), some was super fun (hello '90s cover bands!) and all was for a good cause.

Mmm. PBR.

And Sara and I always appreciate the chance to dress like twins.

Before heading off for the next musical installment, we swung by Tabi's for some brunch and baby talk.

Can't wait to meet you, Lucia.

Next it was off to Lisa's to prepare for the much anticipated Scissor Sisters show. Love love love them. You should, too. First, though, we needed to fill our bellies to ensure plenty of energy for said show. Waiter harassment ensued. As did some pretzels with cheese and many mini desserts.

Then it was time to dance, dance, dance! If you don't shake your booty to this, there is definitely something wrong with you. We strong-armed our way right up front and got to enjoy, up close, the pleather-based costume changes. * swoon *

Desperately wishing I was a redhead right now....

And now I'm back home. Torturing Brad constantly with this song. And missing everyone something fierce. (Special shout-out to my sushi princesses!)

Baking for dummies.

2011-02-23T20:34:00.000-05:00

Today's post is brought to you by the letter E. For Eminem, of course. I cannot stop listening to this: Eminem + Village People = Sheer Genius. Thanks to Matt for sending this along!

So the big news is that I made cookies yesterday that were neither burnt nor hard. I don't usually mind my hard cookies - I love a good crunch. But it would be nice to know I could properly cook cookies should the need arise. I went for simple and just followed the recipe on the back of the Toll House chocolate chips bag. Ok, I didn't totally follow it. I couldn't bring myself to use all that butter and I subbed half of it out for applesauce.

Someone, please tell me: Are cookies supposed to still be smooshy when you take them out? It drives me crazy that cookie recipes give a cooking time range (which is it? 9 or 11 minutes?!) then don't say what to look for other than "golden brown." My cookies were golden brown but also smooshy, so I took them out. Maybe I'm an idiot, but no one ever taught me to cook. Anyway, they were super thin (perhaps due to the butter/applesauce sub) but hardened up a bit and in the end were super chewy and crumbly and delicious.

I finally went to the grocery store yesterday (procrastinated Sunday due to rain, Monday due to snow) so today I had the fixins to make tzatziki, which I've been craving for ages. I think I've mentioned a few times that the two things I really miss are gyros and reubens, but when it comes down to it, it's the accoutrement that I miss, not the meat. So I woke up this morning and put together this tzatziki, using fat free Greek yogurt. I didn't think I needed an entire 16 oz so I only used 8 oz of yogurt, but I used the full amounts of everything else (except garlic, duh!). I planned to make veggie gyros for lunch, but Brad wasn't able to come home so I pushed it to dinner.

After some debate, Brad and I decided I should cook the peppers and warm up the pitas for half hot, half cold gyros. I sauteed green peppers for Brad, red for me, and threw in a few handfuls of black olives at the end. Into the pitas went feta, cucumbers, and romaine. The hot peppers and olives. Slather oodles of tzatziki, grab a heaping spoonful of rice with lemon and butter, and you've got a super yummy and filling fakie Greek dinner.

I could not, however, convince Brad to do Ouzo shots with me. Wuss.

Unrelatedly, I keep forgetting to show you the most hilarious thing I antiqued while Lisa was here a few weeks ago.

Oh will you??

Luckily it was only $4 because that was going home w/ me no matter what the cost. And... it totally works!

Thanks for holding my tea bag.

Giggle.

Today's secret ingredient is...

2011-02-22T01:25:00.000-05:00

I think it goes without saying that I have the most amazing people in my life. I feel like I got a great big bloggy hug (as well as a very nice talking to from the mister), and I'm mind-hugging you all in return. I never doubted your support for a minute; just doubted myself a little. Still unsure about that whole me thing (who isn't, right?), but for now, I'm trying to settle into the fact that I can be an ok cook, a moderately (un?)motivated housewife, and that's fine. Perhaps for now I should focus on my unwavering ability to stay up late like a champ and sleep in like nobody's business. :)

And Liz, that I've turned you on to the amazing world of tuna noddle casserole? That is the best compliment a girl could get. Love it, and love that you are loving it. The world of tuna noodle... the options are just endless. I could eat tuna noodle every day. And I do sometimes. Last time I made it I ate it three days in a row.

Anyway, back to that secret ingredient business... On Saturday, a fellow book club co-hort and I were lucky enough to be guest judges for the library's first Teen Iron Chef competition, and I have to say, this is one of the coolest things I've done in a long time. It was just like the show - same rules, same judging categories. And the secret ingredient was SUGAR COOKIES.

My fellow judge, I think Rowan made a few little teen hearts melt that day...

The girls hard at work.

While the contestants didn't bake the cookies, they created some pretty interesting entries with a multitude of ingredients... marshmallows, bananas, chocolate syrup, baby food, licorice, lemons, chocolate syrup, nuts, frosting, did I mention chocolate syrup? Maybe I happened to mention that I loved cherries and maybe one of the girls immediately went and grabbed the can of cherries and maybe I gave her an extra point because I'm a sucker for kissing up.

I've been second guessing my scores since Saturday. The girls were so sweet and tried so hard (and who doesn't love high school kids that care about food and watch cooking shows and have the balls to squirt lemon and lime on top of a licorice-covered cookie) and I took my duty very seriously. The cookie above was my favorite cookie of them all - chocolate frosting, peanut butter, pretzels, and small chunks of chocolate mint. It was delicious. But her other cookie, I kind of hated. And they looked a little messy (presentation presentation!). I wish I had that cookie in front of me right now. I hated that she came in second to last. Hated that anyone had to lose, actually. But I'm also all about winning, so I'm glad for the girls that did get to win.

Hats off for total concentration.

Did I mention chocolate syrup?

The coolest kids in St. Joe.

Props to the two awesomest librarians I know for spearheading something so fun and great for the local kiddos.

Handing out the prizes. Cookies, AND prizes!

Postscript to this little sugar cookie event.... It made me SO SICK. And I hardly even ate many cookies, just nibbles. But between the chocolate syrup, the marshmallows (which I shouldn't even be admitting to eating - pig hooves and all), the frosting, let's just say I felt a little like this:

Then a little like this:

I was definitely down for the count for the night. (Which was ok... got a ton of knitting done!) And it was totally worth it.

PS. This is what the beach looked like two weeks ago:

PSS. This is what the beach looked like last week:

And..... Now it's snowing again.

I love witnessing all these crazy changes. I hope it continues to amaze and inspire me year after year.

Pickle pontifications.

2011-02-18T17:32:00.000-05:00

So I've been pontificating for a while now. About stuff. This space. This past week, I'd actually been planning to call it quits, but after some encouragement (thanks Matt and Birgit), I'm rethinking things. Here's where my head's been...

I started writing this three and half years ago to document my cooking - what I was learning, what I was creating, what I was experimenting with. My discoveries with organic food and farmer's markets and local ingredients. I really wanted to share my excitement and hopefully excite some folks about what I was learning/doing. As time went by, it evolved to my desire to be world's best sort-of homemaker. Cleaning, decorating, taking care of my little family.

But here's the thing(s):

I love food. I like to eat. I like to read about food. I like to have dinner parties. I like to watch cooking shows. I like to go to restaurants. I adore kitchen items and I collect antique bakeware. But do I LOVE to cook? No, I don't think I really do. I like to experiment and giggle when something sciency happens in the kitchen. I go through spurts where I want to bake every day. But do I cook every day? Not even close. Do I want to cook every day? Absolutely not. I like simple recipes, I take shortcuts, and I make a LOT of pasta dishes (where I am most creative, I think).

I'm a neat freak at heart. I hate germs, I hate messes, and the dog hair tumbleweeds floating around my house are bound to give me an aneurysm one of these days. I don't think I'm alone in my hatred of cleaning, but I really hate it. Hate hate hate it. I'm home all day, every day, and you'd think it would just work itself into my regular schedule. There are things I have to do every day, like vacuum, but bathrooms? Laundry (or rather, putting away clean laundry)? These tasks pile up and up and up until I can't take it anymore and go on a cleaning rampage. I am, however, proud of our new house. Proud of all the work we've done on it. And proud of myself for making a lot of the decorating choices I really love. But there's always more to be done, and I find myself constantly dreading it rather than eager to get to work.

So I've been feeling like a fraud for a while. Who am I to act like some sort of domestic expert? Does anyone even care? And it's been stressing me out. To the point, and this is weird, that I think it's actually been stunting my desire to do much of anything. Why cook if I can't be the best? What will people say if they know how terrible something turned out? And, honestly, why write if I don't have 100s of followers and oodles of comments every day (call it blog envy, I suppose)? I know, dumb, right? So that's why I thought I would stop doing this.

But I really like to write. Maybe that means I really just like to listen to myself talk, maybe not (I hope not!). And I really hate to quit something that I've worked pretty hard on for nearly four years. So I think I will just make this my space. My anything space. About food, about my pups, my family, my house, my life as I continue to adjust to my new surroundings.

If you read this, you may have thought that's what this was all along. And in actuality, you're mostly right. But in my head, it was trying to be something else. You might not notice anything different, but I think my brain will be a little freer. Unconstrained to any self-defined boundaries. Just me being me. And if you're still reading this, after all these years, I suppose that's why you've stuck around. You must like me at least a little bit, right? :)

Afternoon delight.

2011-02-11T15:25:00.000-05:00

Today is my dear hubby's birthday. The big three three. How crazy to think that I was there when he celebrated the big two two, too. Time sure does fly, especially when you have someone so awesome to spend it with. * swoon *

As I've mentioned, one of my favorite things about living here is that Brad works two minutes away. Meaning he comes home for lunch most every day. Including today. Birthday lunch (EVOL burrito with fancy chips and guacamole, yum!)! I didn't let him dip into his DQ ice cream cake yet, but I did let him open his presents (ok, pressured him... I love presents!).

Awkward Family Photos. The book.

There's lots more birthday fun in store, but for now, back to work for Brad. In the meantime, I got started on some birthday cupcakes for Lisa, who will be arriving later this evening to celebrate her birthday, which is tomorrow. The ice cream cake is chocolate, so I went with lemon (although I will be topping them with chocolate frosting when they cool enough). Plus, I always love an excuse to use my juicer.

A full report on those soon, but I did sneak half of one and I'm not super impressed... I've yet to have great success with cake/cupcakes from scratch -- I need to just get over it and go back to box mixes! In the meantime, HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my hubby, and HAPPY PRE-BDAY to my Lisa!

So cheesy.

2011-02-10T20:03:00.000-05:00

Tonight when I was reheating last night's tuna nuna, I reached for my cheese grater, and it was dirty. Again. Nothing earth shattering, but I took a moment to note that my cheese graters are probably the number one most used item in my kitchen.

Both get equal play, with mini grater perhaps taking a small lead for it's usefulness when grating Parmesan. On my wish list is a fancy grater with box/measuring insert, as I so often grate cheddar for mac and cheese.

I believe KitchenAid makes one... Hint hint, hubby. You out there... Tell me, what's your most valuable kitchen item??

Right on target.

2011-02-09T20:16:00.000-05:00

A few fun Target alerts for the bargain-minded. I've had "silicon whisk" on my mental to-get list for ages now (I remember this every time I use my beautiful Calphalon pots), and today I finally wrote it down on my actual shopping list. I searched up and down the kitchen aisles to no avail. No silicon whisk. I wandered across the way to the other house aisles, and there on a Valentine's day end cap was the most perfect silicon whisk.

How cute is that? I need to make scrambled eggs, stat. And it was only like $4.

That reminds me...

Still LOVING my yellow kitchen that feels oodles bigger.

Back to Target, I found these great window panels...

Far away...

Up close.

I'm really enjoying all the new products Target is launching with these great simple prints (e.g, the candles I got a few weeks ago). They have rugs, pillows, shower curtains. Today was the first time I saw these panels, though, and I grabbed FIVE immediately. Three for one of the guest rooms, two for our upstairs sitting room. Love them. Love love.

To celebrate my great finds, I whipped up a classy tuna nuna. In my new Pyrex, so extra classy. Orecchiette noodles, olive oil, pepper, artichokes, capers, two cans of tuna; sprinkled with sharp cheddar and Parmesan and into the oven to get all melty and oozy. I could eat an entire casserole of this. I didn't. But close.

In other news, this week we had a beady-eyed, long-tailed visitor. That dang sneaky possum I saw peeking out from underneath our shed earlier this winter. I'd hoped he was long gone, but one night this week he far overstayed his visit in the backyard. For a while, the dogs couldn't flush him from his cozy little throne in the snow. Eventually, though, he retreated up a tree and we let the dogs out to check him out.

Much more looking forward to our visitors for this weekend... Lisa and Digby! Hooray!

And finally... I got a new car! Hoooray! I have finally entered the 21st century -- power locks, power windows, Sync system... It feels like Christmas.

Who wants to come take a ride?

Around the way girl.

2011-02-06T20:02:00.000-05:00

I know I haven't lived here very long, but after a certain point, I accepted that I wasn't going to meet anyone in St. Joe. I just didn't see any way for me to even encounter new people. Brad wasn't bringing anyone home for me to befriend (the nerve!) and it's not like the downtown scene is a hot bed of activity. Then one day in November, I stumbled upon something very intriguing... A posting on our library's website about a book club. A book club for people in their 20s and 30s. And they had a meeting the following week. So I went, and, not to be dramatic, Not Your Mother's Book Club changed my life in St. Joe.

I haven't enjoyed any of the book selections yet, and I've actually only finished one of them. But every other Monday, I know I've got something to do, at some place (at least relatively) fun, with a handful of pretty awesome people. And, as luck would have it, four of us live within steps of each other. I can't get over how cool that is.

This week while Brad was away, I spent a ton of time with these ladies, making my solo week at home not so empty. Friday I hosted them here for my first official dinner party (or any party) in the new house. On tap, Rachael Ray's pimento mac and cheese, which is always a crowd pleaser. And drinks. Too many drinks... Anyway, world, meet the ladies of downtown St. Joe!

On the left, we have Emily, aka 29er chick, aka Awesome Badass, aka our wine pusherman. In the middle we have Hillary, who lives across the street and is totally stalking me (jk Hillary hehe), and on the right, newest of the new, Ceile (kay-lee) from Chicago. These ladies make me laugh and make me feel at home in a town that is still so new to me.

So how do I repay them? I make them drink absinthe.

Bottom's up, ladies. Cheers to new friends!

Mellow yellow.

2011-02-03T22:44:00.000-05:00

I am hopefully picking up my new car tomorrow. This meant that today, I had to spring my car from the snow-buried garage. If the snow itself wasn't bad enough, the plow that clears our alley piled a lovely ice boulder barrier at the base of my garage. Thanks, plow man. I gave him a good scowl when he did it yesterday.

Well, snow, you cannot best me! I am the queen of the alley!

Let me just take a moment here to say that this coat and these boots are thus far the best investments I have ever made. And yes, my pj pants are tres sexy.

After wrenching my old-lady hip, I decided to take the dogs for walks (two dogs, two walks) so they would be sleepy and leave me alone for my next project for the day. I forgot my camera for Heidi's walk, but I remembered it for George's. I am permanently a) thrilled that the city has a mini plow for our sidewalks and b) giggly over walking through the snow tunnels.

Snow tunnels make Georgie giggle, too.

I'm slightly embarrassed to admit how pooped I was at this point. But it was only 1 pm, and I was on a mission! I WOULD have a yellow kitchen by the end of the week.

Sunwashed. Not sunwash. That's a totally different color, duh.

I stupidly thought this would be a quick project. I got primer in the paint, but I forgot that sometimes you still need two coats, even with primer. There are also a lot of nooks. And crannies. And obstacles (I'm looking at you, fridge!). Five hours later, I had a yellow kitchen. And then I kept going. Now I have a yellow mudroom, too.

Heidi and I got a little paint on us, too.

"I'm sorry I sat on the wall. Really!"

Did I mention that I'm totally pooped? Time for poochie snuggles. After pictures to come soon...

Digging out.

2011-02-02T12:58:00.001-05:00

Greetings from Blizzard Twenty Eleven. Snowpocalypse. Snotorious B.I.G. (I seriously can't get enough of this joke.)

It was predicted to get 18 inches here. According to the South Bend news (or Chicago? We can't get any local news here), Benton Harbor got 12.5 inches, which I assume means we did as well. So not really that much, but we already had several inches, and the wind was blowing like crazy, so I've got drifts in the backyard that are pushing 3 ft tall. Seems like reason enough to me to officially take a snow day.

Did I mention that Brad is in Florida?

Come home and play in the snow with us!

The art of wheeling.

2011-01-30T19:28:00.000-05:00

...and just like that, our living room is complete. Thanks to an awesome sale at AllPosters.com, we got a living room's worth of new prints at 20% off. I do love a good sale! Some scrounging in the basement, a trip to Michael's, and some wicked math on Brad's part... and we have framed and hung art. Woo!

At this point, I think all the art in our house is a vintage '20s (or '30s?) print (other than photographs that I've taken). We just love it, and luckily it fits right in with the style of the house and the theme we've gone with. Some of our other prints have been with me since college, including a giant champagne print that I still can't believe I spent $70 on when I was 21 - ha! (The price tag is still on it - double ha!) And my little fat man that Lisa S. got me for my birthday when we were roomies, which is still my most favoritest print.

On the business of prints and frames, we finally got some other prints framed and hung and we now have a fully complete guest bathroom, too.

I got all of these prints a while ago (except for the Southshore print, which I got at our local antique store) from AllPosters, too, also on sale -- each was between $2 and $6. Double triple score! Also love how the bathroom came together. And still in love with the blue, that is so just not me!

After a few week's break, I think we're really on a roll now. We spent this afternoon painting all the white trim in the kitchen in preparation for what will hopefully be a yellow kitchen by the end of next week...

Handy tip, if you aren't already in the know... Lowe's will make paint samples for you, if you don't trust the paint chip (don't trust the paint chip!). And they're only $2. More than worth the agony of hating the color you buy and having to live with it. Plus, if you've just got a small space to attend to, the sample actually goes a long way. We painted our upstairs bathroom with just one sample (remember, we only painted half of each wall). Anyway, it pains me slightly to think of how much total we've spent over the months on paint samples, but again, really worth every penny.

PS, it hasn't snowed in TWO WHOLE DAYS. That being said... there is a warning for Mon-Wed that predicts 21 inches and actually specifies roads that will close for hours. Hmm... (And a little foreboding for Brad's flight that is scheduled to leave Grand Rapids Wednesday morning. Keep your fingers crossed he gets out safely and on time.)

Frankenstein lagasna.

2011-01-27T19:31:00.000-05:00

I just ate oatmeal and crumpets with jam for dinner. Was it delicious? Of course. But it's a pretty good indicator of how inspired I am this winter to cook much. (Brad had a big lunch and opted for a chicken noodle soup for dinner.) That being said, on Saturday, I was immediately inspired by my new Pyrex to make lasagna.

I didn't have a lot in the fridge and it was snowing so I was too lazy to go out to the store, but I threw some stuff together and said a little prayer... As always, I had plenty of help in the kitchen.

Dogsitting makes for a full house!

I had exactly enough leftover lasagna noodles for two layers of noodlage in my new, smaller-sized lasagna dish. I had maybe a cup of ricotta, which I mixed with 1/2 cup or so of grated Parmesan. I lined the bottom of the dish with a few spoonfuls of tomato-basil sauce. Then I layered some noodles. I topped that with a 1/2 cup or so of canned pumpkin, a handful of fresh spinach, half of the ricotta mixture, a handful of shredded mozzarella, a spoonful or two of canned tomatoes, salt, pepper, and some dried basil. Times two. Of course, I forgot I actually needed three levels of noodles to do two layers of filling, but I left the top "open face" and crossed my fingers. On top? Homemade bechamel. The fancy bechamel I made over Xmas from the Mainstreet Ventures cookbook. So decadent. So delicious. I covered it up and baked it in the oven for 50 minutes. Out, cover off, sprinkled some Parmesan and some basil, back in for 15 minutes. Out, and time for the grand reveal.

It looked so good I couldn't stop giggling. You're supposed to let it set for 15 minutes, but forget that! We dug right in.

This is another one of those times where I really have to just pat myself on the back a little. I was ooh-ing and aah-ing through this whole meal (Brad liked it too!). It was so creamy and flavorful and I'm just so madly in love with this bechamel. And, good news, the un-noodle-topped 2nd layer was actually perfect -- you get a super creamy top w/o having to go cheese crazy on top of an extra layer of noodles. So it's totally healthy, right? Always extra pleasing when something you just throw together ends up tasting even better than something you may follow step by step from a fancy recipe.

Come and knock on our door.

2011-01-22T15:52:00.001-05:00

We <3 visitors. Seriously. We are so blessed to have so many friends willing to make the trek to visit us in our new digs. Last night, our friend Alison came to visit, and we had a super awesome time. And it worked out perfectly that we found the Ideal Place last week, too, because it turned out to be the ideal place to take visitors. Did I mention it's also still snowing? Just sayin.

Dinner definitely didn't disappoint, even considering the rolls were just regular old rolls and not rosemary rolls (they were still super tasty). Alison and I started with martinis (pomegranate for her, cosmo for me [discovered they have $5 martini nights every T, W, and Th, if you feel like visiting on a weeknight]), Brad a beer (note, they carry beer made next door at the Livery). Then salads. Then delicious, delicious food. Alison went with the pork tenderloin special, which came with a pesto-blue cheese sauce on top... um... YUM!!!! Note to self: find reason to make and eat pesto-blue cheese sauce. Brad got the three-cheese tortellini (the giant homemade pastas I got last week but in a creamy red sauce). I got the... wait for it... ideal pasta - ha! Oodles of noodles, basil cream sauce, mushrooms, and, yes, peas, which I also ate again this week (perhaps peas are becoming less and less offensive?). I opted for the small portion this week, and it was still more than enough -- although it was so good I definitely could have eaten more. Finally, we three split the cheesecake of the night, a toffee cheesecake that was, of course, perfect. Say it with me... this meal was... ideal! ha ha ha!

Today we have a visitor of a very different sort. The furry and four-legged sort. We're dogsitting Jackson, who is very big, very furry, and very sweet. And we're also breaking the rules and letting him on the couch. Sorry, Chase and Angie. :)

Before our furry friend arrived, I ventured out in the snow (always, me deciding I need to run errands during the heaviest of snows, and today also when I'm sick. Sheesh!) to pick up one thing (a book) and came home with several other things, too.

I am officially old. Or officially a west sider. I'm not sure which is the more appropriate label. But I'm officially whatever finally made me realize that staying warm and dry is much more important than, well, anything. Poofy coat? Check. Furry, waterproof mittens? Check. Furry hat? Check. Waterproof, warm, and cozy boots?

Hello, new Bogs.

I popped into the bootery downtown, and they happened to be having a sale. Because, well, they only had like 20 pairs of any and all boots left at all. Normally, that is the kiss of death. No one ever has 10s, and never ever when there is a sale. Well, there were THREE pairs of boots in size 10. Crazy. When this pair fit, matched my coat, and promised to keep my toes warm and dry in the snow, I figured it was a sign. AND they were on sale. CHECK.

Because my boots were so warm and cozy, I thought I'd walk down the street to my favorite antique store, just to see. Was I sad to find a new, must-have Pyrex? Of course not.

It's the perfect size for a two-person lasagna. And it matches the new decor. It had to be mine. I also stumbled upon something very strange but cute and I knew I had to have it or I would be so sad. Luckily it was only $6.

"What the heck is it?"

Why, it's a turquoise deer vase!

And I can't live without it.

He's already BFF w/ Mr. Fox.

Could this weekend possibly get any better?!

Sweet pig.

2011-01-21T11:47:00.000-05:00

Today, let's celebrate the amazing life of our number one piggy friend, Petunia.

Always fun.

Always good company.

And always just plain cute.

My heart goes out to Rachel and Don, who said goodbye to their Petunia today. She was a good old girl with a little body of steel. Hope she's enjoying that daisy field in the sky and squealing to her little heart's content... xoxo

Footnotes.

2011-01-20T00:45:00.000-05:00

I feel guilty when I disappear for too long. Not that anyone probably notices, but I know how eagerly I anticipate new posts on everyone else's blogs, so I'm conscious of absences. My brain's just been in a little bit of a haze, I think... We haven't seen the sun in weeks, it's still snowing (which I love), and the cold is really kicking in. Most nights I've been buried in my corner on the couch, snuggled under my fuzzy blanket, not wanting to expose my hands for typing. :) But I've been backing up my thoughts, so I offer you a thoughts-of-late list!

Dammit!!! I didn't download my pics. Now I have to do that... Please hold!

Ok, thanks. As I was saying...

1. I haven't been as diligent about documenting dinners, but I made another batch of mushroom-pumpkin-gorgonzola pasta and it was just to die for. If I had a signature dish, I think this would be in the running to be it. Brad would probably agree. And he doesn't even like mushrooms normally. If I haven't convinced you yet to make this, what is your deal? Sheesh! I also made a fish pie, following this nicely converted Jamie Oliver recipe. (I skipped the egg step, though, because Brad doesn't like hard-boiled eggs, so it wasn't worth the effort.) I made this with two whitefish fillets I had in the freezer from our local fish guy. Not the right choice. This really needs cod (or another thick fish). It wasn't bad, but there was hardly any fish, so it was underwhelming. I'll try again some other time...

2. I discovered the lake is constantly in flux. I'm sure it already looks different today (especially since it's so cold!), but the wind picked up over the weekend and the crashing waves did a number on the frozen shore. It hammered away at least half of what was ice when I fell on my butt last week. If you look closely in the pic below, you can see a giant wave crashing against the shore; it was like watching a bunch of blowholes in the ocean.

3. Target has a super cute new line of candles. At $6 each, they are a pretty good deal, and the patterns are perfectly perfect for the vision I have for our house. There was also a red one and I feel like another, but I can't think of what it was...

*Teeny shout out to the SO CUTE little white creamer I picked up when I was in Ann Arbor in December.

4. It's amazing the difference small details make sometimes. I love our little bathroom upstairs, and I loved the shower curtain we had. But it's vinyl, and it's lifespan isn't so good (I am NOT cleaning a shower curtain... so not worth the effort). So in preparation for its eventual demise, I snatched up this fantastic fabric shower curtain when I saw it, also from Target. I love it, and it makes the room feel surprisingly more complete (and more adult... we are mature now!). We also finally hung some towel hooks where previously there was just one towel bar, which I let Brad take (I hung my towels on hooks in our closet). I can't tell you how happy I am to dry off post-shower with towels that are actually dry! Woo!

5. Smoothies! I'm so in love with my new blender. I broke her in this past weekend, making green smoothies for breakfast. A banana, a handful of frozen strawberries, a no-fat Greek yogurt, a handful of fresh spinach, and a few splashes of orange juice. I waited for Brad to give me the thumb's up before I told him there was spinach in it.

6. New food! I didn't take pics, but Brad and I made a great find. The Ideal Place (how ideal!) in downtown Benton Harbor. We felt immediately at home when we walked in and enjoyed our experience from beginning to end. Perhaps it's coincidence, but it's the first place in town where the water didn't taste weird to me, so that was an extra bonus (I'm weird about water, what can I say?). Anyway, Brad and I both ordered off the specials list, which was pretty extensive (but the regular menu had many exciting entrees to look forward to trying later). We started with some homemade rosemary rolls and salads (and wine, of course!); I was SO excited to get a beet salad, which I ordered with goat cheese and balsamic. It was also topped with nuts and mandarin oranges. Yum. My main course (which was offered in small and large size -- guess which I ordered) was a smoked salmon pasta. GIANT homemade cheese tortellini in a gorgonzola sauce with peas (which I even ate a few of), dill, and smoked salmon. How do you think I liked it? ;) Can't wait to go back for dinner and plan to hit $5 martini night with the book club ladies soon. We also are SO pleased to have found a local Greek diner. With what Brad calls "even better than Parthenon" gyros. And that's saying a LOT for us. Had breakfast there twice.

7. No number 7. Just goodnight! :)

The better to eat you with.

2011-01-13T11:14:00.000-05:00

Our house is surrounded in giant icicles. It looks like there's a giant monster chomping down on us.

I'm gonna eatchoo.

PS Blogger friends... My photo problem persists. Every time I add a caption to a photo, it throws the centering off. How are you all avoiding this???

Lake. Big lake.

2011-01-12T14:14:00.000-05:00

Here's what it looks like outside right now:

Mr. Church comes home for lunch.

More on that later... First, house updates (sick of these yet?!)!

With the exception of some much-needed artwork, the living room has really come together.

Adios, hideous fan (and yellow ceiling).

Hello beautiful fan with remote and dimmer option!

And a lovely rug to tie it all together (and to catch some of the fur tumbleweeds).

Next up, the kitchen. But, in the meantime, I have new kitchen toys to play with. I think I mentioned that Brad ordered me new KitchenAid blender and toaster for me for Christmas. Well, they FINALLY came. And they are so fanceeeee! Ha!

Tangerine... tangerine...

Why yes, that IS a "keep warm" function. And a digital screen.

I haven't tested out the blender yet (but I did buy smoothie fixins!), but the toaster is hilarious. You hit the "toast" button, and it very slowly lowers the bread down like a spaceship. The digital screen has a little countdown while it toasts. And then when it's done, the bread very slowly comes back up while the toaster alerts you with a "beep... beep... beep." I giggled a lot.

Back to the snow. Same as house updates, these will eventually stop, but I'm so in awe of my new surroundings that I just assume everyone is as interested as I am.

I went down to our main beach (Silver Beach) on Monday and was totally surprised by what I saw. The beach, which is pretty flat, was covered in giant rolling hills of snow. Well, guess what? Those weren't hills of snow. And they weren't on the beach. When I fell on my butt, then stepped into a giant crevasse, I realized I was actually ON the lake and promptly high tailed it out of there before I killed myself on enormous frozen waves.

This should have been my first clue.

The first row of frozen waves. You can't even see the water over these beasts!

Finally, a huge CONGRATS to Melissa and Shawn on their new bouncing baby boy!!! I think they should get some sort of prize for kicking off babypalooza '11. :)

Snow globe.

2011-01-09T20:03:00.000-05:00

We're snow covered out here on the west side again! Just south of us, they got three feet. We weren't quite that lucky, but we certainly had some heavy, heavy snow yesterday. It started in the morning, so we woke up and headed right to the dog park, knowing the pooches love to run around in the snow.

We thought that was it, but later in the afternoon it started up again. And it didn't stop until well after we went to bed. I'm not just talking flurries, either. This was a heavy snow -- the way snow looks in movies where it's so fake that someone is clearly just dumping buckets of fake snow over the camera. From outside our upstairs front window, it looked like we were inside a snow globe.

"Mooooooom! I'm pooooping!"

When we woke up this morning, the sun was shining and everything looked like a fantasy snow land. This may have been the most perfect, beautiful snow.

That nose is always buried in the snow.

The lake even froze last night. Alas, we had Brad's first work post-Christmas party to attend in Indiana today, so we couldn't do any exploring (hopefully it's still frozen tomorrow -- I can't wait to see it up close). But the pooches did get to make one last romp around when we got home... and something about the snow brings out the bunnies. The very brave bunnies. And stupid. Fingers crossed they continue to outsmart these two.


Everything makes George happy.

Stay warm, friends!

Life is grand.

2011-01-07T19:47:00.000-05:00

Today we took a chance on a new restaurant, and it actually paid off, despite my initial reservations. While I was of course amused and intrigued by the "Cranberry Bog Bar" (come on, that's hilarious), the Grand Mere Inn looks super old fogey and very meat and potatoes. Not helping things was the fact that we went at 5:30 pm (I was hungry!), so we were already setting ourselves up for the early bird special. And while it definitely is on the old-school side, with checkered vinyl tablecloths and pastel paintings on the wall, it has a certain charm to it that's enhanced by the wall of windows that overlooks the lake (which we could have seen if it weren't for the blizzard-level snow). Initially the first few people in for dinner, we got the best seat in the house and got to watch the yes, old, patrons filter in. But let me tell you, these were some jolly folks. With tales of "well... today... I had breakfast... then I went home. Then I did my Friday exercises. I didn't eat lunch, just a few pieces of celery" and bellows of belly laughter coming from all angles of the room, we couldn't help but smile and enjoy ourselves. And the food was pretty delicious to boot. While I couldn't eat it, they served a liver pate with the bread and butter, which I thought was pretty unique... and it smelled DELICIOUS. I strong-armed Brad into trying it, and he had to admit it was pretty good. For dinner, I opted for the salmon special -- I never order salmon, but it came with a Bearnaise and king crab sauce -- and a side of au gratin cauliflower. Oh, and a starter salad with blue cheese that had fresh, crunchy lettuce and chopped veggies, not from a bag. Brad went with the steak and potatoes (which he liked but gave the typical "It's no Outback" response). I loved my dinner. The sauce was light and tangy, the crab was excellent, and the salmon was pretty darn tasty. The portions weren't crazy, so I even had plenty of room for a fluffy piece of coconut cream pie. In and out with plenty of time left in the night to come home and tell you all about it before movie time. That's my kind of Friday.

On a different note, we've wrapped up a few of the house projects I've hinted at lately. Last Wednesday, we tackled our dining room.

"Come on! Let us help! We'll do so good!"

The Ghost of Ceilings Sanded

Brad tackles the new chandelier. In the dark.

Our dingy country yellow dining room is now a glorious shade of... "luna!" Aka super light green-gray-blue. (Seriously, whose job is it to name paint? I want that job.)

Sunday, we tackled the living room, which was a dark green. Not so good for a room that gets little light. We went with one shade darker than the dining room, a more gray green-blue called "clothesline."

All I could think was that Heidi was getting ready for her first victim, a la American Psycho.

It's hard to capture exact color via photo, but this is pretty close (and unless it's a super sunny day, there's so little natural light). The important thing is that the rooms are so much lighter, and cleaner. And the colors make more sense with the changes we've made upstairs. Once we paint the remaining rooms, everything will feel much more put together, and lighter. More and more, this home is feeling like home.

Best meal of the year.

2011-01-03T17:41:00.000-05:00

After two weeks of sort-of meals, nights out, and lots of Quiznos (hey, they sent us a bunch of coupons!), I decided to make a real meal for us last night. After making arepas two years ago and declaring them easy and destined to be oft made, I didn't even really think about doing so again until something sparked a memory the other night. So in between house projects (paint paint and more paint -- pics to come soon!), I whipped up a batch, following the recipe I used in April 08. I did, however, add a scoop of creamed corn as past me advised future me to do. I'm not sure the corn made a difference, but any excuse to eat leftover creamed corn is fine with me.

First I chopped up some tomatoes using the fancy tomato (and cheese) knife my mom got me for Xmas. I was skeptical -- it seemed like a marketing ploy to me -- but it worked like a charm. This little knife is amazing. I highly recommend it.

Next I de-pitted an avocado and prepped it for arepa smearing. Out came the goat cheese, and my assembly line was ready to go. I mixed up my batter and ladled out my cakes.

I made eight total -- four each for two sets. (Sets? ha!)

Pretty pancakes.

Worth noting, in addition to painting, we installed (while, Brad installed) a new light fixture in the dining room, which provides real light. That, combined with the no-more-dingy-yellow walls, provides for much more pleasant pictures.

While these were good... it made me miss Cafe Habana, which I've forgotten about every time I've been back to AA. Friends, help me remember to go there when I come visit next time! Mmm sangria.

Welcome, eleven.

2011-01-01T16:15:00.000-05:00

Happy new years, friends. We rang in 2011 quietly, with a game of dominoes, some champagne, and a midnight pooch pile on the couch.

Some hometown pride for good luck.


Winning is fun. Brad wouldn't know.

Champagne wishes to everyone as we begin this new year.

And here's hoping our (very appropriate) new years fortunes come true.

Pale blue eyes.

2010-12-28T22:58:00.000-05:00

Time for a very Churchy bathroom reveal...

We have a blue bathroom! I'm not necessarily anti-blue, but it's never been my thing. Something strange has come over me since moving into my antique beach house and I'm finding I like all new things, like blue. I guess it really just comes down to the feel of the house, and this house feels blue. We also have this amazing original tile, which is shades of blue and gray. So when Brad said "let's go blue," I actually agreed. And guess what? I love it! I have plans to buy vintage beach prints for the wall and have a very special retro towel rack on order, which I'll of course share as soon as it arrives. Alas, our work is never done, and it's time to start on our next project...

What could it be?

In between Christmasing and redecorating, our dear Birgit came for a quick holiday visit. We took a nice winter dune beach walk, then warmed ourselves with delicious martinis (while also stuffing our faces full of food at our one "nice" restaurant [it has fancy fries!]). Visits are never long enough, but I would take even just a minute of Birgy. :D

Cheers!

Stay tuned for more house reveals!

You'll shoot your eye out.

2010-12-27T15:14:00.000-05:00

I hope everyone had a lovely Christmas, celebrated with loved ones... and delicious treats! Things were quiet over here, as it was just us and the pooches -- so we celebrated exactly how we wanted to. Starting with a lunchtime Christmas eve reunion with Rachel and Don at our favorite place, Fitzgerald's (which, of course, Rachel introduced us to).

PS Love the 1960s function on Picnik.

Mulled wine, mashed potatoes, delicious shrimpy croque sandwiches, and two of our favorite people... What could be better?

Next up, a walk on our favorite dog-walking beach, hopefully the start of a new tradition: Christmas eve beach walk. We were both bundled up in our new winter coats, and while overcast, the beach was beautiful, with the water a crazy shade of blue-green and the shoreline covered in frozen waves. Heidi even took a quick dip.

Back home, it was time for Christmas Vacation and A Christmas Story, and snacky dinner. Inspired by the quince "for cheese" jam I picked up in London.

Also included -- a handful of cold cheeses (blue, cheddar, parm, Havarti), half a round of baked brie, chunks of sourdough, buttery crackers, sliced apples, cherry tomatoes, and shrimp and cocktail sauce. Oh yeah, and some bourbon-spiked eggnog.

Sourdough + quince + brie = Xmas YUM.

After some more holiday tv time, we headed to bed, hoping Santa would be good to us in the morning. The benefit of Christmas home, alone, is sleeping in. Our Christmas morning started at 10:30.

Santa didn't pass us by.

Our favorite part of Christmas morning is treating the kiddos. This year, a mini tomato/carrot trail led them to their treat tree, some giant bones, and new squeaky balls.

Santa was good to us, as well, with highlights including yet-to-be-delivered KitchenAid blenders and toasters, polar bear PJ pants, and a fancy remote for easy Netflix via PS3 navigation. Then it was time for a Christmas breakfast, also a luxury of home-alone-holiday-time. Earlier in the week we'd watched Gordon Ramsay make some very fancy, very decadent scrambled eggs, and I was set on making them. And eating them, despite my stomach's issues with scrambled eggs. What makes these eggs so special?

Butter!!

I cracked five eggs in my cool pan, dropped in two tablespoons of butter (Gordon was much more free with the butter), and then placed the pan on a medium flame to melt the butter. I lightly mixed the eggs at this point. Once the butter was melted, I pulled the pan off the heat and added... cream! Probably about a tablespoon (again, Gordon was more generous). Lightly mix, back on the heat. Just a short time on the heat, lightly mixing the eggs as they heated and scrambled. Grate in some extra sharp cheddar. Done.

These eggs were as amazing as I assumed they would be. I guess the key to my stomach handling scrambled eggs is butter, butter, and more butter! Or perhaps it was the coating of...

Three mimosas!

We spent the remainder of the day in our PJs.

Can't forget Christmas dinner, and by 6 or so we were ready for dinner. Pimento mac and cheese, no shortcuts! It's one of our favorites, and always delicious. And we ate almost the entire thing. It's Christmas, right?

While we missed our friends and family, it seemed a fitting celebration for our first big holiday in our new beach house. Cozy and cuddly, and perfectly delicious. Hope yours was a holly jolly one as well!

Santa baby.

2010-12-24T11:34:00.000-05:00

See you after Christmas with tales of Christmas cheer, Christmas treats, and, as always, Christmas pooches!

Bring me some figgy pudding.

2010-12-22T22:01:00.000-05:00

Treat time! What better to make when you have oodles of extra bananas and apples, right? First, you melt butter. Lots of butter.

Melty.

What's the butter for, you ask? Caramelizing apples!

Steamy.

These combined nicely for two giant loaves of apple banana bread.

Loafy.

The bread wasn't anything too crazy -- banana bread's the easiest thing ever. But it's moist, tasty, not too overly sweet... A great morning snack, and a few slices went nicely in the treat tin I prepared for our awesome neighbors (rumor has it, the bread was a big hit!). Because, of course, I made cookies, too. I really wanted to make these pecan puffs I found, but, if I'm remembering correctly, it called for pulverizing the pecans in the food processor... and I was feeling lazy after working on the bread (ha!). I settled on chocolate chip oat cookies. I got the recipe from a cookie book my mom bought me long before I ever started cooking or baking, and it's served me well over the years. Unfortunately, I don't remember the title... and it's WAY OVER THERE.

Luckily I remembered to mix the dry ingredients in just as I was about to drop the cookies on the baking sheet. Oops! :) Behold... oodles of mini cookies.

I have yet to make a moist cookie. I even undercooked these by a minute and they are still crunchy. I don't mind -- I like crunchy cookies... but I know my technique is seriously flawed. No one complains too much, though, because cookies are still cookies!

Meanwhile, we have many o' house projects looming in our new future, including a spare bathroom redo. Painting ensued today... Stay tuned!

Smile like you mean it.

2010-12-20T13:02:00.001-05:00

My mom's birthday is on Christmas day. Because she's the mom, she's gotten the birthday shaft for most of my life (and probably hers, too). Having to get up early, fuss over kids, make big dinners, have guests over... As an adult, my goal each year is to try to make my mom's birthday a little more special. I can't always take over on Christmas day for her, but I do try to giver her at least a little reprieve and get her to relax and enjoy some holiday and birthday cheer -- especially this year, when she turns the big six oh.

Heidi helped me hang balloons.

It's hard to "host" a party at someone else's house, so luckily I was able to convince my mom (and Larry and Jordan) to come here for (early) Christmas this year. It was also the first time they've all seen the house, so I was extra excited for their visit. They arrived early Saturday afternoon, leaving me all day Friday to prepare. I hit the kitchen with Julia Child.

First up, Julia's reine de saba for my mom's birthday cake.

Sarah E. made this for Frenchie supper club so I knew it would be delicious, but I didn't know if I'd pull it off as well as she did! I decided I better just follow instructions, too, so everything was very butterlicious. I also took the rum option, in both the cake and the frosting. I was super nervous following these instructions, but at least with the cake, everything was pretty straightforward. I love watching the magic happen, so I was excited to watch the egg whites slowly beat into soft peaks. Unfortunately, soft peaks is as far as I could get them, even when I gave in and pulled out the hand mixer (me have little muscles!). I don't know if/how this affected the cake, but I just couldn't get the whites to harden.

Note the adorable cake stand. Thanks, Lisa S.!

Next up was Julia's apple custard tart, with homemade dough. Frustration set in with this recipe, as I could not for the life of me figure out the proportions for the recommended dough (why not just do the math for me, Julia?!). I finally gave up and just made Martha Stewart's dough, discovering for the first time how easy dough is with a food processor. Woo!

Georgie wants to help roll out the dough.

I also just accepted that I don't like how Julia's recipes are laid out. I love to read them... her style is so captivating. But in terms of working through them, they are awfully convoluted, with lots of "turn to page X for instruction," which drove me crazy. That being said, this recipe, other than the dough, whipped up pretty quickly and without any drama.

I had a whole ball of dough left over, so I decided to make some mini men. I sprinkled them with sugar and cinnamon, baked them for 10 or 15 minutes, then sprinkled them with some more cinnamon and lots of powdered sugar.

I also decided to make breakfast muffins (for Sunday morning), as I could not resist the recipe for cranberry eggnog muffins in the new Food Network Magazine. Luckily, I had rum leftover from cake making, as the recipe calls for boozy cranberries. I figured I'd lighten the recipe up a bit, too, since I knew we'd all have a sugar hangover after all the Julia desserts -- I split the butter up, using half butter and half applesauce, and I baked them sans crumble topping (plus, by this point, I was POOPED and couldn't mix up a single other thing). Easy recipe, although I was a little paranoid that I was going to burn the house down cooking booze on the stove top.

These smelled so good while baking... Very holiday-ey! All in all, I think I turned out quite the spread.

Everyone finally arrived on Saturday.

Eagerly awaiting in their holiday best...

After some antiquing (me and mom) and Lowes-ing (the boys), it was time to make dinner. I'd decided on spinach and three cheese cannelloni, baked in a bechamel sauce and topped with a little tomato basil sauce. I found this recipe in the Ann Arbor-based Mainstreet Ventures cookbook Brad got me for my birthday, and I believe this particular recipe is from Palio. Unfortunately, I can't get fresh noodles here (and I don't have a pasta maker), so I had to make do with dried manicotti noodles. I also had jar tomato basil sauce on hand and already open in the fridge, so I didn't make that from scratch. But I followed the stuffing recipe exactly (minus garlic) and the bechamel recipe, which, again, was so exciting -- it took forever (my bad, heat was too low), but watching that sauce thicken gives me the giggles (Brad, too, as he'd helped in the early whisking stages). I put together a nice fresh salad and cooked a loaf of good old Cole brand garlic bread (always a big hit), and it was time to start the birthday/Xmas festivities.

I don't like to toot my own horn (toot toot!), but this was.... amazing. :D It was even a big hit with the "where's the meat?" contingent. I wasn't sure about the sauce... there was no cheese mixed in, just PILES of butter and milk... But it was to die for. And the stuffing was so good and cheesy. It all combined to make one hell of a holiday dinner. I was super bummed we ate it all -- no leftovers! (Birgit will be interested to know it was paired perfectly with a bottle of Round Barn dry red.) I need to make this again asap. And you definitely should, too.

After dinner it was time for presents, before poor Jordan had a little heart attack.

Brad and I got some fuzzy hats!

And then.. finally... DESSERT!

Everything was a big hit, which makes me so darn happy. The cake is so rich and chocolately (in a good way, not a "ugh! This is too rich to eat" way), and you can actually really taste that sneaky rum. I think it was a little overcooked, so it wasn't at all doughy like the recipe describes, but it was absolutely delicious and the perfect birthday cake. The apple tart was super tasty, too, but less impressive (to me at least) as it tasted almost exactly like the apple cheesecake I made for Thanksgiving. My mom did compliment me on my flaky dough, though, so that made me smile. I consider this party an enormous success. Oh, and while the little dough men were long gone by Saturday evening, my mom and Larry liked them a lot, even though I found them way not sugary enough. It was a good use for the leftover dough, but I wouldn't set out to make them again. I'll call this one at 2.5 for 3!

Sunday morning it was time for coffee and muffins, but first, a little balloon animal fun.

Rub rub rub.

Heidi was less amused by her static than we were.

As for those muffins... They tasted as good as they smelled (mom and Larry even had two). Even without the extra sugar crumble topping. I figure the true test is Brad, who doesn't even like eggnog. Guess what? He liked them, too. Sweet, tart, with a hint of holiday. I think I should make these again for actual Christmas morning.

Overall, a grand success, I do believe. I think we celebrated my mom in style, and smiles were definitely aplenty. And, before he got bored of me, Jordan gave me world's best hugs. Definitely a (early) Christmas to remember.

Do not enter.

2010-12-16T12:08:00.000-05:00

We have a few new additions to our kitchen this week. First, the positives. Art! I love our local artist co-op shop, Chartreuse. For the past several weeks, one of the artists has had his stuff on sale, so I decided to pick up this lovely vase for my mom:

Because all his stuff was on sale, I decided to snag one of his vases for myself. And, since I've been fantasizing about it for weeks, I think it's a safe purchase (I tend to have buyer's remorse about non-essential home items) -- besides, at $18, it was a total steal. It reminds me of asparagus stalks, so its home will likely remain the kitchen.

E. girls: you'll remember me being cornered by this artist when we popped in when you were here - ha!

I've been planning on picking up a coffee maker since we moved in, but it just hadn't happened yet. When my coffee-obsessed father discovered I didn't have one, he decided that would make the perfect xmas gift. And it did! Thanks, dad!

We call it... Mister Coffee!

There was an incident a few years ago. Involving coffee OD. It was ugly. That's why I haven't had a coffee pot in the house. Hopefully I can keep things under control this time. I even followed directions...

Time to enjoy my first cup...

Hopefully I don't end up like Cornholio this time!

The outcome? Eh. I controlled the portions and only made around 3 cups, so no coffee shakes yet. But I need to perfect my proportions. And perhaps splurge on some fancy coffee. For now, it will do. Yeah coffee!

And now... Our final addition...

What'd I do?

A door.

For whatever reason (age of the home, previous use as apartments), our house is full of door-ready doorways. Nearly every doorway once held a door, and these doors are all in a pile in the basement. Why do we need an extra door in the kitchen, you ask? Our little maniac Heidi, of course.

For the past several weeks, Heidi has eaten/destroyed/terrorized numerous items in the house when we were out. So this past week or so, we decided to start sequestering the dogs in one of our spare bedrooms when we had to leave. It took a few tries (and a few eaten books) to get the room puppy-proofed, but it seemed to work. Unfortunately, I can't STAND having my super cute winter-themed spare bedroom such a disaster area, so we needed a new solution. * lightbulb * another door! The placement of this door allows the dogs full access to the upstairs den (with the office, master bedroom, and master bath doors SHUT) as well as the ability to run up and down the stairs, leaving them access to the mudroom for water drinking and backyard-window-looking-out. As long as we remember to turn the garbage can backward (extendo arms can get her paws in there), it should be pretty safe. Until they realize the door doesn't latch fully and if they push hard enough it will open....

Of course, the mismatched wood immediately drove Brad crazy, and he's currently painting the backside now while home on his lunch break.

Seriously, what'd I do?

It also makes me laugh because it has...

I see you.

A peep hole! Ha ha ha! Keep your fingers crossed that this plan is finally the plan to work!

Friends, family, and ice.

2010-12-14T18:08:00.001-05:00

I had a whirlwind weekend, squeezing as much into a two-day trip "home" as I could. Coincidentally, the Zs were in town for the weekend, too, so I got to even see my NYC friend! Thursday I headed into the D to meet with my new boss about my new job (yes, you heard that right!). It's only a 8-month project, but it's part time, from home, and it's for the C D C. AND it's in my field. AND I get to use my fancy MA skills. I feel very brainy for the first time in a long time, project manager and all! Afterward, I headed down to Northville to visit Lisa S. and Digby and see her very beautiful house for the first time since she's moved in. Delicious Deadwood followed, followed by Holiday Inn and some L. Mawby Detroit sparkling wine (my new favorite).

Friday it was up early and down to Ann Arbor to meet my Rachel at Whole Foods for some coffee and catching up. Then it was time for SUSHI, my most favoritest sushi in the world -- Godaiko, of course (although I was annoyed I had forgotten Friday is not a good buy-one-get-one-free day. Oh well!). Sarah, Mike, and Birgit met me for the gorge fest, and I think I was quite impressive in my three-roll push. Then it was downtown for some shopping and Lisa Z.ing! Can't believe it's been four months since we all moved away and four months since we've seen each other... Let's hope we don't have to wait another four months for a visit! Then it was dinner time, and Melissa S. drove down to dine with Birgit and me at Jolly Pumpkin, where we flirted our way into a free dessert. Finally, Saturday morning I met Kristal and LZ for coffee and chit chat. Phew! Then... it was back home... with my dad!

We're staying in St. Joe for Christmas (alone!), so we decided to celebrate early with my dad. He hasn't left Ann Arbor since he moved there, either, so I figured it was a good time for a mini road trip for him. Our actual celebration took place Sunday night, and I whipped up some veggie lasagna for the occasion (after a long discussion with my dad about how chicken, even skinless, is still meat). I even picked up a Christmas tree for the event...

Now the pickle has a more authentic home.

We're still eating the leftovers.

The true star of the weekend, though, was the crazy weather. As I've mentioned (over and over again), it snowed for a week straight here. But the roads to Ann Arbor were fine, and by the time I returned to St. Joe, it was raining (gross) and most of the snow melted (boo). Come Sunday afternoon, the blizzard rolled in.

"Let us in! It's cold out here!"

My dad and I ran some errands Sunday, and Brad's anti-lock breaks were working overtime. The snow was so heavy it was hard to see, and we even saw a full-on spin out... Scary. When there was no sign of the snow letting up, and snow was predicted for, well, pretty much everywhere, I started to panic about driving my dad home (and then me driving back here) the next day. So we decided to throw my dad on the train out of New Buffalo (and Rachel was so kind to pick him up at the train station and cart him home), and I'm so glad we made that decision because the drive to NB was a total white out and terrifying. Of course, the train was late, but eventually my dad was on his way home, I was back home, and I could start enjoying the snow again. And guess what? It's still snowing. As always, the kiddos love to play in it, and I love to scope stuff out...


That's pure ice, from one end to the other (including a very iced-over mini lighthouse).


See?

BTW... I just had to PURCHASE photo storage. Infuriating. But I'm that devoted to making you look at my life... :D
Also btw... The one thing I still can't figure out how to do with the new blogger is to re-center pictures when some weird format gets mysteriously dropped in and shifts them. Double infuriating.

A little pickle flare.

2010-12-08T16:52:00.000-05:00

Guess what? It's still snowing! Well, not this particular moment, but it's still been snowing on and off. I have no idea how we're not covered in 10 feet of snow, but we probably only have maybe 6 or 7 inches now? I must say, I will be pretty ticked if I go back to Ann Arbor this week and come home to find the snow melted here, but Brad says that's pretty unlikely. I've got my heart set on a white Christmas (which, I might add, is showing at the theater here in two weeks -- Brad said he'd go with me... We shall see!). Yesterday I took a quick break with the dogs to play in the snow. It's hilarious to watch them hop around like bunnies (and, eat sticks, in Heidi's case).

To warm us all up, I made a batch of cheese potatoes, following the recipe in the new issue of Food Network Magazine. It's a lightened-up version, using a mix of half low-fat milk and half full-fat milk. I used almost all skim milk and some heavy cream, so not sure how the healthy ratio works out. They were topped with delicious Gruyere cheese -- the most expensive kind of cheese in St. Joe, I think, as the hunk Brad brought home was $11. Eek! It was worth it, of course.

Finally, today called for a quick trip to the Sawyer Garden Center, as I needed a few xmas gift items. Of course, I could hardly resist the holiday items, all of which were 25% off. I did cave and bring home a real wreath, just so we could have some sort of greenery in the house for the holidays. It smells lovely and looks perfect on our inner door.

And last but not least, I almost forgot to give the Christmas pickle its due shout out. No tree for it to hang from this year, but it certainly wouldn't be Christmas without it.

Fake pickles are a-ok.

Party at the bluff.

2010-12-06T19:57:00.000-05:00

Apparently when you live in a small town, every event is an event. This past Friday, there was a tree-lighting ceremony for the big Christmas tree on the bluff. Not only did they light the tree, they finally turned on the lights display that spans the 1/4-mile-long bluff boardwalk. And not only did they turn the lights on, there was a light show, wherein lights flashed and music played. And I'm pretty sure everyone in town turned out for it. Including us, of course. But it was cold, and the pooches wanted to see, so we drove up and down the length twice.

George and Heidi were enthralled. By the lights, the music, the crowd. And it made me smile to see people in the crowd see these two totally entranced and smile and point. Yes, I recognize the enormous cheese factor. I still love it, though. If this is small-town living at it's best, maybe I've found the right home for me.

This whole weekend really turned out to be quite the winter spectacle. First the lights, then the snow started sometime late Friday night... and still hasn't really stopped. And more visitors to top it off! Sara and Tabi, my Saline girls, drove in late Friday evening and Saturday we headed off to Chicago to visit another friend from home. And guess what? It was snowing like crazy there, too!

We grabbed some brunch at Ann Sather, shopped in Wicker Park (Sara led us to a super cool all-handcrafted goods store [Renegade Handmade Store] where I got my fox fix), and got some much-needed sushi at Sushi Mon, my first BYOB restaurant experience. Sara and I also got our sexy on, ordering the delicious Sexy Roll (salmon, spicy crab, and avocado wrapped in cucumber with mint leaf and ponzu sauce -- mmm). I must point out that Sushi Mon is one of maybe three sushi places I've ever eaten at that had really spicy spicy stuff. We had the spicy tuna and it took my breath away. And I loved it.

It was a lovely visit and I can't wait to spend many more weekends with these girls, now that everyone lives in the same region for the first time in a decade. It was also super cool to really see how close we live to Chicago. Door to door in an hour and 40 minutes or so. Jealous much? :)

Like I said, it's been snowing for days. Lake effect warnings. Funny that more hasn't accumulated -- we probably have five or six inches -- but it doesn't show any signs of letting up. And I'm thrilled. Who am I? Ha ha! But I kind of hope it never stops.

Daytime white out.

Nighttime white out.

I ventured out in the snow again today like an idiot, had some shopping to do. But the snow inspired me to pick up some new holiday cheer for Georgie. He loves it, of course.

Mr. Handsome

Frankenchurch.

2010-12-02T23:37:00.001-05:00

Halloween is my thing. But Christmas... I just really love Christmas. I'm sure I say this every year, but I really just do. And it pains me to say it, but we've decided not to get a Christmas tree this year. Our old one was a mess, so we tossed it in the move. While shopping for a new tree this weekend, we came home with the previously mentioned (and still super awesome) faux fireplace instead. And there's the whole issue of Heidi being on a major terror of late (eating breads, fruits, plastic bags, bills, and, today's latest, a dozen or so wine corks and a plastic glitter snowflake) -- we have no "safe" rooms to barricade her in when we're not home, and I just know I'd come home to a knocked over, half-eaten tree if we had one. So we decided this year we'd go without, saving the new tree for next year when Heidi has hopefully matured a little (don't be fooled, though... there were cork crumbs all over George's bed, too). I finally got around to finishing my decorations today, and I love them so much, Brad and I decided we'd just leave them up all year, like Frankenmuth. Our very own Frankenchurch!

While I was out picking up some last-minute decorations today, I snagged some early Christmas presents for the pooches. Two $5 (score!) new suck blankets!

A suck blanket power struggle immediately ensued.

Guess who won? (For now....)

George was happy enough to snuggle with me and my new blanket (not for sucking).

Anyway, back to the Frankenchurch... My mom and co. are coming here for Christmas (a week early), so I have a reason to fully decorate (sans tree). Take a peek into our little holiday wonderland... I think it's pretty cozy. :) Lots of my three favorite things: poinsettia garland, snowflakes, and colored lights.

The pooches can never resist a photo bomb.

I love the peek-a-boo view from the spare bedroom to the sun porch.

That snowman has been around since at least 1980.

And the good news is that by the time I'd finished decorating, George got his blankie back.

Now... If I can just continue to resist the holiday aisles for the rest of the year...

Winter wonderland.

2010-12-01T16:48:00.000-05:00

Who's up for a beach vacation??

Sand AND snow on my boots!

It's been snowing pretty consistently since sometime last night, so I'm actually surprised there's not more snow, but we've got about an inch or so accumulated in our backyard. Somehow, I looked out, saw my car covered in snow, and thought, "I should go to the beach." Dummy. But I'm glad I did... So pretty! I am really loving the wintertime beach. Who'da thunk? I just love seeing the waves all angry and crashing against the lighthouse... Good thing we have the best thing ever to warm us up back at home...

Why yes, it IS a faux fireplace!

Gobble gobble mother effer.

2010-11-30T17:30:00.000-05:00

This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for...

ThanksKilling!!

It's like an early Christmas present, gift wrapped just for me. Props to Sarah and Mike for spreading the word. And knowing me so well.

On a less foul-mouthed-turkey level, this year I am most thankful for our little family being together. You wouldn't think it, but four months of strictly weekend visitations is hard. Way hard. Now that me and the pooches have our Bradford back full time, we're never letting him go again. Even if he mocks the ThanksKilling.

This year we spent Thanksgiving together, and with special friends. What do special friends require? Treats! The Wednesday before, I spent the afternoon whipping up an apple cheesecake and some pumpkin-spiced gingersnap truffles. Heidi helped.

First up, the cheesecake, for Thanksgiving-night-Rachel's-dad's-taking. I searched for authentic Russian recipes and came across one for a baked apple cheesecake. It was in weird measurements and used ricotta (weird), so I searched for something similar and found this autumn cheesecake. I used 1/3 fat cream cheese, but otherwise I followed the recipe as is. First I made the crust.

Then I made the cake, using three gala apples and three, um, yellow apples (golden delicious?), all from nearby Berrien Springs (home of the weird fake meat).

I'm pretty sure this is my first cheesecake. It was really easy, actually -- the hardest part being knowing when it's done (the recipe gave a 10-minute either-way window for baking. Not helpful!), especially because the apple layer covered the cheesecake layer. I winged it (wung it?) and hoped for the best. And mostly the best it was, although I couldn't get the stupid pan to release and I had to take it as is over to Rachel's dad's house. Not to toot my own horn, but I really liked this and felt comfortable sharing it with my Rachel and her awesome family, who so graciously took us in. I hope this is the first of many visits with the lovely S. family. (And the first of many cheesecakes!)

Next up, truffles. Melting chocolate is fun. And strangely satisfying. Like watching heavy cream turn into whipped cream.

This recipe was also super simple. Mostly just melt chocolate, smash 'snaps, stir together, freeze, roll in 'snaps.

Rollin with the homies.

Voila! Truffles.

It was really that simple. These I served up Friday evening for our latest round of guests, the E. girls and some other dudes and a pooch. It was a full house and we got to utilize all of our spare sleeping quarters (even the office, where Meg got stuck {perhaps my secret plan to keep her close to me!}) for the first time. I love this whole crew and having them all buzzing around always makes me feel like part of the family.

Loving on George.

Doing the poop dance.

Hopefully the truffles showed my love, as, again, horn tooting -- they are amazing! Seriously. Chocolately, creamy, crunchy, snappy... You should definitely make these.

On a final food note, the girls introduced me to Food Dance, a very Roadhouse-type place in Kalamazoo (where we'd traveled for the bride-to-be to try on beautiful dresses). Because it was a special celebration, we ordered up some pomegranate mimosas, which were as delicious as they look.

I can't tell you how exciting it was to see this menu. I didn't look too closely beyond breakfast because I didn't want to get tempted away from (happy!) eggs -- there are NO good breakfast places in town, boo! BUT everything I even just glanced at sounded amazing, and I will have to take Brad back there sometime soon for a nice dinner out. I mean, they serve Zingerman's bread! Come on! They even have a gift shop. I love gift shops. * swoon *

So to sum things up, I am thankful for all the wonderful people in my life (that means you, too, hubby!) who make me feel so loved, even when I'm so (not that) far away. And for cheese. And chocolate. Yum.

Welcome to the hotel St. Joe.

2010-11-22T17:33:00.000-05:00

It's official... There are no disaster area rooms left in the house!! Every room is usable and recognizable for its intended purpose. There are still a ton of details to attend to at some point, but, for the most part, we're content to take our time finishing those up. Consider Hotel Church open for business and ready for more visitors.

We have a lovely spare bedroom with cable tv.

The beach room.

We have a second spare bedroom without cable but with lots of lovely reading materials.

The winter room.

We have an office for, well, officing.

This room needs the most work, mostly because there is no closet and I have nowhere to shove all my stuff.

So we need some cabinets, some shelves, and the like. But we're getting there. Next up, fancifying our master bath.

And, speaking of guests, hugs and kisses to Lisa and Digby for another lovely visit. Shopping, lunching, dinnering, after dinner drinking, and, of course, pooch piles. Oodles of fun as always.

This food is sneaky.

2010-11-19T17:44:00.000-05:00

After last week's field trip to Apple Valley and my subsequent purchase of the disgusting-looking "corned beef," we had to have reubens this week, right?

Looks... "yummy"?

I picked up some regular corned beef for Brad (I'm not that mean!), some Swiss cheese, sauerkraut, 1000 Island dressing, and a few sandwich rolls (I don't do rye... pickles! Yuck.) and got to making our sandwiches. I also whipped up some oven fries, which I'd forgotten how much we love. I toasted the rolls, then heated the full sandwiches in the oven for the last few minutes while the fries were cooking.

Looks like a reuben.

I have to confess... I give this two thumbs up! Seriously. I'm not just saying that to justify the purchase. Does the corned beef taste just like corned beef? No. It even has a fake-bologna-y taste to it. And it's bright pink. BUT I really liked it and it totally quenched the mad-reuben-desire I've been having for months. I will say I was not a huge fan of the Vlassic sauerkraut, though. I like my sauerkraut super sour, and this was just hardly tangy. Otherwise, I'll make this again. And I did -- for lunch the next day. (Brad also enjoyed his reuben with real corned beef [at least, corned beef made out of real meat; I just got cheater lunch meat from the deli]).

Last night I took another risk and snuck anchovies into our dinner. Actually, anchovy paste. I picked that up when we first moved -- had no plans for it, was just so surprised to see it at our little grocery store that I had to have it. Last month's Rachael Ray had a recipe for Sicilian spaghetti with anchovies, and last night I had a craving for some spicy spaghetti. Of course, I didn't mention the anchovies to Brad until he'd already said he liked it!

The recipe called for a ton of stuff I didn't have, so I did what I could with what I had. The sauce I whipped up had: a can of diced tomatoes, probably 6 teaspoons of anchovy paste, a few squirts of tomato paste, two bay leaves, a palmful or so of crushed red pepper, regular pepper, a few sprinkles of salt, probably two palmfuls of dried parsley, a few dashes of veggie broth, and about half a cup of diced onions, which I sauteed first.

I let it simmer for about 20 minutes or so, then I mixed it with some spaghetti. I know noodles all taste the same, but I always forget how happy simple spaghetti noodles make me.

This meal was another success. I was worried I'd over-red-peppered it, but it actually had just the right amount of spice. I'm glad I continued to taste it and adjust while it simmered (same with the anchovy paste). I had no idea what effect the anchovies would have, but that worked out well, too. Mostly just salty with the slightest slightest hint of fishy (in a way that wasn't fishy at all, if that makes sense). Will definitely make this one again, too -- and maybe next time I'll even have all the actual ingredients!

This house is not for sale.

2010-11-15T15:59:00.000-05:00

It's been nearly seven months, but the moving saga ended today. We sold our house. Officially. Papers are signed, money was exchanged -- they can't back out now! It's been quite the learning experience, and, sadly, I have to say I don't know that our faith in real estate will ever be restored. In the end, we came out ok... But if you spent any time with me this past summer, it wasn't easy. So I am popping a virtual bottle of champagne in my head right now, and I hope you'll join me in a toast. To Abigail Way, you were good to us and we made a lot of memories in you... but feel free to break somewhere so you can tick off the stupid buyers who have been royal pains for two months. :)

On to the next chapter....

Pooches and pumpkins.

2010-11-13T16:54:00.000-05:00

The five-year anniversary issue of Rachael Ray came this week, and there was a "staff favorite recipes" article that reintroduced me to cheesecake-filled pumpkin cupcakes. I knew I had to have them. A few days later, I had the perfect excuse: a Rachel visit!

I hate when recipes require this many dishes, but I had a Rachel to feed -- I wasn't backing down!

First I made the cheesecake filling, using fat free cream cheese. In terms of cooking, I don't think I can really taste the difference... Can you? Then I made the pumpkin cupcake batter, substituting applesauce for the oil. Then I layered them.

Plop.

While they were in the oven, I mixed up some frosting. The frosting in the actual recipe looked like a real pain, so I found a simpler recipe with fewer ingredients. I knew I wasn't going to put much frosting on the cupcakes anyway, so why waste the effort? I made this vanilla icing, but I used real butter, not butter substitute.

I had to add two additional tablespoons of milk to make it creamy, but otherwise, super easy. A little sweet for my personal taste, but no complaints from the peanut gallery.

They cooked a little funny -- they never flattened out any and came out looking much the same as when they went in.

I couldn't serve our special guest untested treats, so Brad and I broke into them last night.

The cheesecake filling wasn't as creamy as I thought it probably would have been. Perhaps I mis-thought, perhaps I overcooked by a minute or two. But the taste was there, and that's what matters, right? Deliciously pumpkiny, deliciously cheesecakey, with a light coat of sugary frosting on top. I felt safe serving them up today when Rachel and Keith stopped by.

The whole gang.

Georgie loves his Auntie Rachel.

What a perfect way to spend a Saturday afternoon. A million hugs from all of us to Rachel for a lovely visit. We miss you already!

Beef-flavored chunks.

2010-11-11T17:42:00.000-05:00

So you know how in scary movies the grocery stores are all very 1950s, with really bad 1950s muzak, in little teeny towns... and you just know something is lurking around the corner? Well, I had a very Stephen King-type experience today when I ventured to nearby Berrien Springs to check out Apple Valley Natural Foods. In a conversation recently with the clerk at the bookstore, she mentioned that there are a lot of Seventh Day Adventists in Berrien Springs and apparently they don't eat meat, thus their grocery store has lots of vegetarian options. Turns out, the store has quite the history as well (see link above). I'm totally sold, even though I felt a little weird and creepy in the actual store.

The store is actually two stores in one. The main part is a pretty typical, small-town Spartan store (the aforementioned 1950s), but more on that later. First I wandered through the "health food" area, and even though it was freezing and gloomy and also a little 1950s, they have everything. Not that I use a lot of exotic ingredients or grains or flours even really, BUT, should I need anything beyond what my local grocery store has (which isn't much), I am not totally out of luck. In the midst of the awesome, however, was one very strange food aisle... CANNED FAKE MEATS. Very generic looking, with pictures that looked SO GROSS. I actually kept saying "ew!" out loud. Fake steak meat, fake hot dogs... In cans. I mean, I guess ok, that's nice of them to offer (I didn't even know that stuff existed), but seriously, no way in hell.

That being said, over on the regular side of the store, they also had an entire frozen aisle of veggie options, including the expected Boca and Morningstar products. The majority, though, was this Cedar Lake brand of everything, just like the cans. Also not very appealing looking, with really generic-looking packaging. But lo and behold...

This, too, looks so gross, but I MISS REUBENS! So I will try it out. Seriously, though, the options are just pure craziness. They have an online store -- go there and select "vegetarian meats." There are six pages of options. Nuti loaf? Vegan scallops? Swiss steak with gravy? Choplets? Beef-flavored chunks? GROSS! Ha ha ha! I don't want to eat anything simply labeled "chunk." But... A for effort, Apple Valley!

Snowflakes and sunshines.

2010-11-10T20:26:00.000-05:00

This time two weeks ago, I was drinking Cokes and Gingerales in England.

This time last week, we were "enjoying" our first snow at home.

Today, I was walking on the beach in a teeshirt.

Life is weird.

PS. We got curtains! I can't believe what a difference they make in a space. It's like a whole new room. I feel classy now. (And a snowflake pillow. Yeah Christmas!)

My parents went to London and all I got was this lousy beer.

2010-11-07T15:04:00.000-05:00

I have a ton to do, but it's chilly and my spot on the couch is all lit up and sunny and warm... Will just sit for a short spell...

Still more London tales to tell, but quickly I thought I'd share the pooch souvenirs we brought home. We first spotted dog beer at a pub in Manchester, which was voted "Manchester's Most Dog-Friendly Pub." Alas, it was brewed in Holland. Not a true England souvenir. Back in London, however, we discovered a new "dog shop and spa" at Harrods. It is unlike anything we have ever seen before. Designer dog accessories (we saw several-hundred-dollar collars), designer dog clothes (Juicy Couture for pups!), a very posh-looking spa, and even pug puppies (which they claim come from actual breeders). Obviously, we weren't buying a $500 tweed suit for George (tempting!), but we DID find some authentic, England-brewed dog beer. Hilarious.

It's basically water with some beef bouillon and a few random other things, but hey, it says "good for joints." So totally reasonable, right? We waited for the right moment, then introduced our pooches to their first pooch beer. Honestly, we had no idea what to expect. Would they sniff it and walk away, take a sip and be over it? We should know our guys better than that by now. Of course they gobbled it all up in just a few slurps.

Beer. Beer. Beer. Mmmm.

Looks good. (Or not.)

Of course, then Heidi had to go sleep off her bender.

I'm so wasted.

Still at Harrods, we also couldn't resist this little coaster, as anything that reminds us of George and his gigantic ears makes us giggle like crazy. George appears to be a fan as well.

Stephanie says.

2010-11-05T19:29:00.000-04:00

For your reading pleasure, I present the "Stephanie Loves You Best London Food Awards." As always, my opinions are highly scientific, unbiased, and based on much research. he he he jk ;) I like what I like cause I like it, darn it.

No. 5: Anchor and Hope

We grabbed lunch here on our first full day in London, post-St. Paul's Cathedral, pre-Tate Modern. It's on the other side of the river, like Tate, and this was our first time over there. Fun fact: not right here, but on our walking travels on this side of the river, we wandered along the old stomping grounds of lots o' ladies of the night (visiting the Clink Museum, where many of them were imprisoned). I'll admit, when we sat down, I wasn't that thrilled with the menu. There was one fish dish and one full-on veggie dish (boring), and the rest was meat. My eyes went to "shrimp" on the small plates menu, but I wasn't sure what "potted shrimp" meant. I asked the server, and apparently he thought I was crazy to just not know, and his description led me to believe I was getting a mini shrimp cocktail. Imagine my surprise when this appeared before me:

I giggled in delight by my little plate of maggots. ("Maggots, Michael, you're eating maggots. How do they taste?") So, of course, I smooshed them to get a closer look.

I didn't know what the heck I was eating at the time, but Andrew was nice enough to fill me in after the fact. Apparently, this is a very traditional Lancashire dish, made with teeny shrimps from local waters. They are seasoned with mace (nutmeg, I guess) and cooked in LOTS of butter. I still can't believe all of that substance with the shrimp is butter, but who I am to argue with the expert? On their own, the taste was a little overwhelming, but spread on toast, with a slice of cucumber, and with a little lemon squeezed on top? Yum yum! To round out my meal, I also had a salad with cod roe (yum) and a very English-tasting dressing of yogurt and goat's curd (kind of like lemony mayo). Luckily I didn't get the fish -- Brad got it, and it was delicious (if a bit of a chore -- it was a full hunk of fish, not filleted): it came with some very very garlicky spinach.

No. 4: The Wolseley

On our last full day in London, we decided to get a nice, sit-down breakfast, which, of course, was very exciting for me, as breakfast and brunch are my favorites. This grand old restaurant was in the very posh St. James neighborhood (home of St. James Palace, home [former, perhaps?] of Prince Charles and the boys) and it was just beautiful.

Not my picture.

We'd previously had crumpets in Manchester with Marla and Andrew, and they are our new obsession. SO good. So we ordered some up, with jam (then we ordered up some more for dessert). I got some coffee and Brad some fresh-squeezed orange juice. I nearly broke the cardinal rule and got scrambled eggs (my guts will not tolerate scrambled eggs) because they came with smoked salmon, but the lovely waitress assured me I could get eggs Benedict with smoked salmon instead of ham. My hero.

They allow you to order a small version, which is just one egg, and, honestly, all I really need, if I am to avoid stomach issues (always a consideration on vacation, especially). Now, I've ordered this a handful of times, and while I like it, I've always felt I could do without the hollandaise sauce. This was a whole different story. Without a doubt, hands down, the most delicious breakfast ever. I could have eaten a bowl of this sauce on its own -- I don't know what the difference was, perhaps it was more subtle? Less... something? I don't know, but I never wanted it to end. The smoked salmon was amazing, too -- much better than the salmon I've been getting over here lately (theirs is more salty, mmm). Meanwhile, Brad munched on a very fluffy, very eggy, very Gruyere-y omelet. We both licked our plates. (Ok, maybe not literally.)

No. 3: The Orangery

This was more of an experience than a meal. In a good way -- definitely one of my favorite things we did the whole trip. Traditional high tea, of course! Because we are so fancy like that, you know. Located in the gardens of Kensington Palace, the Orangery is in a garden pavilion built by Queen Anne in 1704.

We both decided to get the "Orange Tea," which is served with a pot of orange tea (deeeelicious, and I've never even been a huge tea fan), a tray of finger sandwiches (Smoked salmon and butter? Cheese and marmalade? Yes, please!), a giant orange scone with jam and butter (SO SOFT and SO delicious; I've been fantasizing about this scone ever since), and two mini desserts (a banana cream tart and an orange tart).

I give two giant thumbs up to high tea. Rather, I give one pinky up!

No. 2: Arbutus

Our first (very sleepy) night in London, very conveniently approximately 20 steps away from our hotel. I started with a prosecco with pear puree.

We weren't going to get a starter, mainly because the one I wanted made Brad make the yuck face. But upon urging from the waiter, that's exactly the starter we got: the squid and mackerel burger. It was basically just a patty of very finely chopped seafood, with a side of razor clams, and it was super duper yummy. Guess who loved it? Brad! I still couldn't get him to try a clam though (wuss). Brad decided on the "bavette" (??) of beef (very much like a roast beef-type cut), which came with some very tasty cheesy potatoes, and I decided on the bouillabaisse. Very tasty, very fishy, and quite the meal "experience."

For dessert, we decided on the chocolate fondant (basically mousse with a crispy top and bottom) and salted caramel ice cream. This was so good I begged Brad to take me back the next night just for dessert (he didn't). Salty caramel ice cream may be my new favorite, too.

No. 1: DUH. Gordon Ramsay's Maze

What a night. We went here the evening of our fifth wedding anniversary, and it was the perfect celebration restaurant. We felt fancy, but it was more trendy and laid back than his better-known, namesake place (we peeked in earlier in the week... it was very "I wear suits and ties everyday!"). Did we really have a choice but to go with the tasting menus? (Imagine my joy to find a vegetarian tasting menu!)

The first course, the soft-cooked duck egg in a foamy broth, might be the most amazing thing I've ever eaten. I'm pretty sure it's my first soft-cooked egg, and I need to figure out how to do this (Brad's first course was the same but with a meaty broth, and he even loved it, too).

The second course was the only disappointment of the evening, a cold potato/artichoke dish. It just tasted super bland to me, and, surprisingly, I didn't like the truffle, either (my first truffle). The third course was also amazing, basically three beet and cheese sandwiches with a wine drizzle. This may sound strange, but something in the cheese or dressing (I think the cheese) tasted like a little zap in your mouth, like licking a battery. But in a good way. The fourth course was a risotto (which Gordon always makes on Hell's Kitchen!), butternut squash with pumpkin seeds. This was exciting for two reasons: it was veggie, so I know they weren't sneaking in chicken broth, and it was SOOO fluffy and delicious. Then a cheese plate, always good. And finally, dessert. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich of sorts. You had me and peanut butter and jelly.

I don't remember what any of this was really, technical terms and whatnot, but it was heaven. The filling is a peanut butter ice cream, and the "sandwich" was some sort of crispy thin cookies. Some jam drizzle. Some cream. Whatevs. It was the perfect way to end a perfect meal. Meanwhile, Brad was ending his meal with a panna cotta with... a mini muffin!

For LZ.

Honorable mention: Wagamama, and I don't normally even like this stuff. But my seafood ramen was to DIE for and even allowed me to try Gordon's famous fish, John Dory. Mmm noodles.

Notable side dish: Mushy peas, and I hate peas! I've never tried these before because, well, I HATE PEAS! But I was feeling adventurous and, guess what? Mushy peas don't even taste like peas! They're made with some sort of broad pea bean thing and they have tons of mint. I ate almost my whole serving.

Drink of choice: Aspall's organic sparkling hard cider. Do I even need to say more?

Peas and cider courtesy of Dog and Duck (aw, pooches).

I hope you've enjoyed this tour of London via my stomach. More London tales to come!

America F yeah.

2010-11-04T18:09:00.000-04:00

Well, my first attempt back to blogging and the OBNOXIOUS formatting issues have already turned me off! That is... an entire paragraph of text just got deleted. I'm almost as ticked off about that as I am sad that we are home from vacation. As I was saying... we are finally home! Back to the land of Yankee accents, driving on the right side of the road, Cokes that don't cost $3, and TVs that have more than five channels. I'm happy to be home -- I missed my pooches SO MUCH -- but sad that the most amazing vacation is over, and super sad that Brad has to go back to work and I don't get him all to myself every day! And what can I say, I love the crap out of England. Just love it to death.

So like I said, most perfectest vacation. The weather cooperated (well, mostly. It IS England), we ate lots of good food (and even stumbled upon some authentic dishes), visited with some good friends, walked through lots of beautiful parks, slept in amazing hotels, and, of course, barfed on a train (it IS me). That being said, I'm still overwhelmed thinking about where to even begin. So for now, I shall finish organizing my pics -- you know I took oodles of them -- and leave you with a few of our favorite sights.

The gang in Manchester.

The candyman (@ Harrods).

Westminster view from St. James park.

Kensington Palace.

More soon!

It's a marvelous night for a moondance.

2010-10-22T13:10:00.004-04:00

Hello fellow Americans and Halloween enthusiasts! This weekend, the hubby and I are headed off to celebrate our five-year wedding anniversary in Jolly Old England, land of, well, not much Halloween.

Happy anniversary, honey bunny!

While I am so super duper excited for our trip, part of me mourns the loss of a full-on Halloween celebration. Perhaps it's better this way, seeing as how I have no friends here with which to celebrate anyway... :) While I'm gone, should you find yourself in the mood for some, well, mood entertainment, I thought I'd post a list of some of my most favoritest scary movies (that are actually scary!).

Poltergeist: my first horror movie, still my favorite, and still dang creepy. Stay away from the light!


The scene that changed my life. You think I'm kidding.

Prince of Darkness: end of the world scary stuff. And Alice Cooper.
The Fog (thee original, duh!): fog is scary. Also my favorite horror score.
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane/Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte/Straight-Jacket: might I suggest a old-school crazy Bette Davis/Joan Crawford triple feature? I do believe all three are on Netflix instant view...

The Blair Witch Project: still scary, I don't care.
Silence of the Lambs: also still scary, and still good, all these years later, even when it's diluted for basic cable. I love that my mom took me to see this at the theater when I was 12. Admittedly, a few parts stumped me for years.
Suspiria: crazy Italian witches. With disco lighting.

Candyman: certainly doesn't help my fear of mirrors. If I ran into Tony Todd on the street, I would run away. You can't convince me he's not really Candyman.
Fire in the Sky: this movie scares the living daylights out of me. Those aliens are a-holes! Just thinking about the looks on their faces... starring at me... UGH!

I absolutely am going to have nightmares tonight.

Paranormal Activity: don't listen to the naysayers, this movie is crazy scary. At least, once it's over, and you're trying to sleep, and you have attic access in your bedroom...
The Entity: ghost raper, heavy metal score... You might never shower alone again. AND... It's TRUE.
Amityville Horror II: I think this one is scarier than the original, plus it has brother-sister love. Ew!

Brother's don't shake hands. Brothers gotta... hug...

The Last Exorcism: this one might be in between theater and dvd, but if you can find it, holy scary.
The Devil's Backbone: I never want to watch subtitled movies, but I'm always so glad when I do -- this one is totally worth it. Spooky Spanish.
Uzumaki: more subtitles, but again, totally worth it for the CRAZY that is this movie. One of the most bizarre movies I've seen.

Should you be looking for a Halloween-centric film, might I suggest Trick r Treat, rather than the more obvious (and, honestly, boring) Halloween? We enjoyed this one last Halloween (along with the sweet stylings of Slumber Party Massacre!).

Finally, if you're just looking for super duper monster fun, any time is a good time for a little American Werewolf in... LONDON! I'll be keeping my eye out for any nude men in the zoo...

There are no words. Pure love.

Happy watching, and whoop it up a little extra for me. Good luck sleeping with the lights off....!

Everything, please.

2010-10-21T15:35:00.000-04:00

If Heidi were a person, and if she had a blog, it would be called Everything, please. Every day, she would post about all the nonsense she ate. For example, today's post would be:

This afternoon while my mom was in the shower, I leaned up against the kitchen counter and extended my go-go gadget arms. She has no idea. She is such a sucker. With my go-go gadget arms, I was able to secure myself a lovely snack of nine homemade banana nut muffins, cupcake tins included. For dessert, I ate the saran wrap covering the muffins. I decided against eating the Tupperware container holding the muffins. A lady must know when to say enough is enough.

See how innocent I look? Humans are suckers.

Later, she took me for a walk. We walked through an old graveyard. I pooped in that graveyard. Then I ate a wood chip.

Fruit surplus.

2010-10-20T17:26:00.000-04:00

I was stuck home today, waiting for the tub guy to come fix the tub he didn't reglaze properly (he never showed -- these St. Joe people!), so I decided to take advantage of the situation and get my bake on. Also inspiring me were the oodles of apples and bananas quickly over-ripening in my kitchen. Maybe I tend to overbuy produce. What's it to ya? Of course, first, to set the mood -- Halloween playlist!

1, 2, Freddy's coming for you.

For today's treats, I decided to turn to Joy of Cooking. While browsing, I was reminded of my grandma's apple cake and decided that was that. As for the bananas, I went simple -- banana nut muffins. The recipes don't appear to be online as they appear in the book, but if you are interested, and don't have Joy, I'll be more than happy to send you the recipes. I will say that both were super easy -- just how I like it -- and whipped up pretty quickly. I was a little surprised at how few apples the apple cake took: just 1 cup chopped (so much for helping much with that apple surplus...).

Before.


After.

After after.

As per usual, Heidi was on hand to, um, offer her support.

Bark bark. Gimmie treats.

Also, as is typical, she stomped off and pouted when she didn't get any cake.

Our little pouter.

Sadly, everything is still cooling, so I haven't been able to dig in yet, but I'll keep you posted on the deliciousness. For now, it just smells super duper good in here. I suppose it makes sense that it's driving Heidi crazy! For dinner, we've got some lake fish as well as a new Gordon recipe -- roasted pepper and feta gratin. I should go get that started right now, actually. In the treat frenzy, I forgot to eat lunch!

Getting my Gordon on.

Long and short of it.

2010-10-20T11:01:00.000-04:00

My head's been feeling a little heavy lately.

I have a lot of hair.

I decided to take swift action pre-London trip. Besides, I want to be sure to look cute in my new knitted London hat, and can't do that with a ponytail!

Ponies and hats don't mix.

So I trusted my local connection, Angie, and headed off to her hairdresser yesterday and... chop chop!

Why do I look like a man from behind? Weird!

First, before we even discuss the work... This haircut was TWENTY-FIVE dollars. Total. $25!!! I don't think you can even get a haircut in AA at Fantastic Sam's for $25. And this wasn't just a trim, either. The best part (ok, no, $25 is the best part) is that I love it. She did a great job, and I liked her a lot. I will definitely go back. And in the meantime, I will enjoy my new head that doesn't weigh 20 pounds. I feel very London fashionable -- he he he!