Blog friends/cake in a cup

Some people get freaked out by "online friends."

I get it. Really. I do.

But I reserve that for certain situations.

There are several "friends" I've made/met through other friends' blogs. And it doesn't freak me out.

Monica found me through our mutual friend, Erin's blog. I'm guessing the same goes for her sister, Michelle? I sort of know them in the abstract, but we have never met.

It's sort of funny b/c I've watched their kids grow up and feel like a member of the extended family (even though we've never met). I can hardly wait to see what G will say. (Really, I need a life).

I've even had friends of mine connect w/ these awesome ladies and expand the friend network/web. It's pretty cool. I might not be explaining well. Oh well.

Anyhow, the purpose of today's post is to direct you to this totally yummie chocolate cake recipe that you can make in a cup in the microwave that Michelle blogged about. I honestly think it's a little genius and am thinking about giving it a shot. Soon.

EDIT: I could only hold off for 40 minutes after posting this before giving it a try. Um, yes. Life-altering. The thing I like is that it makes a nice portion. Not too much (w/ only 2 of us in the house, I hesitate to make big desserts b/c I don't want it sitting around all week). SUPER TASTY! Thank you Michelle for posting this. I made 1 alteration. I had broken Andes mint pieces and used that in place of chocolate chips. Still tasty!

Milestone birthday(s)

In a few months, I'll hit the big 3-0 mark on my birthday-ometer.

Some people approach "milestone" birthdays with a sense of trepidation or angst, but honestly, it's not freaking me out (maybe it should?). A good handful of my friends turned 30 in the last calendar year and there were lots of surprise parties. I told Erik under no circumstance should something as such go on for me. It'll be close to the end of a marathon of weddings, and there's no telling how presentable for general consumption I might be. ;)

Rewind 10 years and if I wrote any prediction down, I am decidedly NOT where I thought I'd be professionally, I thought I'd have been married longer and I didn't think my little sis would pop out a kid before me. In the big picture, however, I know I am EXACTLY where I'm meant to be. So it'd be silly to lament where I "could have been" or that I have "fallen short" of any expectation. My path is so different than I expected, there is really no comparison!

Honestly, since November, when people ask, I'm more prone to say 30 than 29. Not that I'm chomping on the bit. Mostly because when I'm at the gym, looking at the exercise exertion chart, there's not an option for 25 or even 29. It's 30. Which is how I gauge my heart rate. No big deal, really.

But fear not, we will celebrate! Later in the month of my birth. We'll have a social with family, friends and you friends can bring the kids along. It'll be good times, I promise. :)

Sort of a rambly post, but in conclusion, if you're not precisely where you thought you'd be, SO WHAT? Life is rich. Reach out and enjoy it!

Happy Friday.

Homemade laundry soap?

Hey blog peeps,

Over the weekend, I went to a seminar at the library about how to make your own laundry soap. It was for liquid soap, which is what we use. But in looking at the finished product, it's glumpy and not really something I want to use. Besides, the minimum amount made = 2.5 gallons of it. I don't want to store that much and also it'd take forever to go through it!

So I asked about powder soap. The guy didn't know anything about powder .... so I went online. And THIS RECIPE looks good to me.

Anyone have experience/words of wisdom on this? Seems pretty simple, just mix. From what I could tell on reading other sites, use 2 Tbsp/full load. Seems pretty easy to me. Anything I should know before I give it a whirl?

Garden, 2011 style

This year, the baby plants are upstairs. I was concerned it was too chilly downstairs.

There's another change, too. I am using old muffin tins to hold the baby plant pots. It's working surprisingly well. When it's time to harden some of them off, I can just take the tin out, and all good! And if I need to twist them to help them grow more straight, same goes. Working like a charm (so far!).


These are cucumbers or melons. We'll see. The packet says cucumbers, but melons grew last year. So we'll see if they were voluntary melons, or if the packet was mislabeled.


I'm attempting to keep track of what is what. Some might work well. Others not. We'll see.

How the morning starts around here

I admit, there is a perk or two to having a dog (but not more than that!) ;)

We taught her to get the morning paper.



The paper fetching was a combined effort. I started her fetching it from across the room. Erik started her on the porch. Go team!

Speaking of "go team!" .... Erik was poking through online videos, and thinks teaching Bailey to get a beer is a pretty good trick.


I'm not sure it'll be anytime soon, but we'll see. Evidently this is a popular trick, because searching for "dog getting a beer" videos yields more results than I would have imagined.

Standoff

They both want out.

It wasn't happening. :)

A little more closet organizing

Common picture, eh?

Things can be a bit pell-mel in the closet.


Recently we banished all of the wire hangers from the place and things have been a bit easier. :) I'm just trying to figure out what to do with all of those wretched metal hangers.


Erik refuses to do this, but I read somewhere that if you hang your clothes in the closet backwards all at one time, then turn the hanger around when you wear the item, it'll give you a good idea of what you don't wear. The theory is that in 3-6-9-12 months (whatever you choose), the stuff that's still hung backwards gets taken to the Goodwill.

I like the idea, and am giving it a whirl. We'll see how it goes.

The making of a "man cave"

BEFORE:

(please excuse the cobwebs ... no excuse, but please excuse them).

AFTER:

Erik didn't ask for this, but for his birthday, I got a few shadow boxes and scrounged up some sports goodies from ebay. The '77 AL champs poster? Found it while cleaning out a closet. Score! :)

The trouble is now Erik thinks he needs a full-fledged "man cave" which includes a beer fridge and bathroom downstairs. Sweetie, you've got 2 hands, the same as me. Get your build on. ;)

Oops. Doggone it.

BEFORE:


AFTER:

Any questions?

(In Bailey's defense, it was a one-time offense. And there was a chicken carcass in the bottom of it. For a few days. So it smelled ripe.)

A little kitchen organizing

Even though there are only 2 bipeds in our house, we do a lot of recycling. See that green bucket below? We have 2 of those we fill on a weekly basis.


They won't both fit in the kitchen, though, so we have other containers. And the dog food on the left. It was a bit crowded. And see where the semi-hole in the floor is (lower right side of the frame)? We used to have a wall there.

It was getting crowded/outta control, so we had to make some changes.


Ta-Da!!!! Oh happy day it was when it arrived. The dog food goes on the bottom (notice the lid) and the recycling is on top. A MUCH better arrangement.

I admit, they ARE a little bulky, but about the size of the green monsters, so it seems to be working.

Bye bye blonde

In case you don't remember, I'm awfully loyal to my hairdresser.

In the fall, Nikki said to me "How do you feel about going brunette?" I'd never considered it, but we were a few weeks away from family pix, and making big changes before portraits is a no-no.

But the next time I was in for a cut, we went for it. :)


The change hasn't been too drastic. The biggest difference is I can't make blonde references to myself b/c I'd look awfully silly/dumb doing so. ;)

Honestly, the bulk of my friends, after spending a day with me are like "did you do something to your hair?" .... suggesting the change is natural enough for people to think it's always been this color. I take that as a job well done.

This change happened at the end of December, and I have yet to download my camera from mid-January to present. But once I do, there will be lots to share!

Sweet Potato + Chicken Croquette

A few months ago in the newspaper, I saw THIS RECIPE. I remember thinking it sounded good, so I tore it out and last night finally got around to cooking it up.


YUMMIE!!!!!

It takes awhile to make/put together, but it's uber tasty. Seriously FULL of amazing flavors!

One thing, though. It might be the way I made it, but they didn't hold together very well. I'm considering using an entire egg, not just the whites next time I make these, which will be soon. They were tasty + we love eating sweet potatoes around our house! I'm only sad it took me so long to make it (I was trying to figure out what to substitute for bread crumbs, but now that I make soda bread, situation solved!).

(Side note: I did not make the sauce/relish, so I can't speak to that at all).

Irish Soda Bread

Several months ago, I was throwing myself a pity party, commenting on how much I missed eating bread (it has yeast in it, which is a no-no). My friend, Mary, made the comment "Can you have soda bread?"


I thought it was like beer bread, and said as much.

No, she said. It uses baking soda as leavening. Or a little leavening. ;) Oh how I love thee, Mary!

About a week ago, I made soda bread using THIS RECIPE. Since I'm supposed to have no sugar, I researched a bit and decided to just leave the sugar out.

I made 2 loaves, and they're not 100% perfect (yet), but it's a darn good start on this adventure.


I even went a little liberal and made one loaf with raisins in it. But I soaked the raisins in water first to get them nice and plump. It's a great morning treat. And because I used a mix of white flour and whole wheat flour, I feel pretty guiltless about eating it.

Feta stuffed chicken goodness!

Oh goodness. I took inspiration from THIS RECIPE and made it my own.

Ok, I'll confess, I was lazy and didn't do anything fancy with it. I just mixed some feta cheese with a few tablespoons of plain yogurt and stuffed them into the chicken and cooked it on the stove. Oh my .... this is my new favorite fancy recipe! ;)

I think this is a great starting-off point and think I'll try adding some crumbled bacon next time!

One thing, though. I did have to hold the chicken together with toothpicks while I cooked it.

Seriously, and EASY recipe, and it TASTES really fancy. Give it a whirl! (for those of you with kids, I'm not sure if it's a "kid" meal, but if you have a "date night" at home, it'd be perfection on a plate).