Daydreaming...

 

 

About meat pies, sausage rolls, lamingtons, and Tim Tams... It's almost Australia Day! And no matter how long we live in the US, we'll always celebrate in our own little way :D

 

Love this sausage roll recipe... Unless I'm feeling too lazy. In which case I'll pick up some frozen sausage rolls and meat pies - they have pretty legit ones here. And lamingtons, I usually buy an angel food cake at the grocery store and modify this recipe. I'll get my Aussie treats, one way or another.

Gnocchi fail...

Gnocchi - starts off like this...

I love being home from work! Love the luxury of time to do things you have been needing/wanting to do for months. Like sweep up all the lint dust bunnies that cover my laundry floor. (Check!) Or make gnocchi from scratch and revel in my success. There are few things in life I adore as much as gnocchi - it is absolute perfection, the way I see it.

And ends up like this... ideally!

Well, not the way I made it. I will probably try again. As soon as the disappointment of watching my little dumplings dissolve into floating lumps of potato lessens slightly. At least I can say I've tried it! Here's how it went:

Me: They might not work. I've never done this before.
Hubby: They will. Everything you make works. Except for that one time.

NOTE: There were actually two times - the time he forgot, I cooked a delicious steak with the BBQ closed (hazard of being raised by practically vegetarians, no idea how to cook red meat!), and it shriveled into a tiny, jerky-esque piece of crispiness, so we went out for dinner. And another time, I tried some spanish lemon chicken recipe I found online and it honestly tasted like poison. Either there was a typo in the recipe or I misread it, but it was hilarious becaue we'd been arguing and it was completely feasible that I'd be trying to poison him - we laugh about it to this day.

Anyway, the water boils, the gnocchi are plopped in and...

Me: It didn't work :( We should get take out!
Hubby: What do you mean it didn't work? I mean, can we still eat it? What would it taste like?
Me: Really soggy, lumpy mashed potatoes
Hubby: Yum!
Me: We are NOT eating that.

A bag of penne saved the day, sauced with the sauteed mushrooms in brown butter sauce that I'd made for the gnocchi. I'm not quite ready to try again yet!

Home and cozy...

On a cold, rainy night - and I am SO thankful! For cozy socks, comfy PJs and rainy, wintery weather!!

Thankful for my house...

I know I haven't post pics of my house, and I will eventually get around to it, but I am SO grateful for it! It still blows my mind that for less than $100 more a month, we have three times the space we had in our apartment. And we are buying it! I am so grateful that it's ours, for all the doors God opened to help us get in here, and for every morning I wake up with the sunlight streaming in through the skylight about my bed.

A million reasons to be thankful!

On Thanksgiving, we all meet at my Mum's house for lunch. My sister and I bring various side dishes, we help my Mum set the table beautifully, and decorate the turkey platter. The boys sit around and eat shrimp cocktail. We all eat. And then we just hang out. All day. Until it's really late. Sometimes we play games, other times we make little clay figurines or balloon animals, or we sing and chat... We just hang out. And more than once, every year, it crosses my mind that there is NOWHERE else I'd rather be, NO ONE else I'd rather be with, and NOTHING else I'd rather be doing. Surrounded by the people I love most, who love me back, I KNOW I am blessed. So thankful for my amazing family ♥ 

Baking it up as we go...

Somewhere out there in other parts of the world, people are enjoying views like this. I just know it. While we are still seeing temperature forecasts up in the 80s this week. So no chocolate candy for trick or treaters coz it will probably just MELT. Sigh.

Well, I spent a lovely weekend with a few fun house guests, stayed up late (waaaaaaaaaay too late), laughed and chatted the whole time and we BAKED. Yeah, it wasn't cold or raining, but we pretended the weather was baking appropriate and had a GREAT time! Two of my FAVORITE easy recipes to share with a crowd:

Apple Crisp ~ the simplest, most deliciousest (word invention!) creation that evokes the happiest, homiest smells. Mmmmm. No picture (SORRY!) - but imagine... If you have a bunch of apples you need to use (or that you happen to buy at the store with the very intent of baking this!), it's the perfect thing to make!

And Aunt Holly's Banana Bread ~ yummmmmm! Yeah, I know, pictures!!! Sorry! Neither of these treats were around long enough to take a pic, the apple crisp was whisked straight from the oven and out the door to church!

These two recipes are so super quick and easy to throw together, completely forgiving if you get a little 'creative' with the ingredients, and perfect for you to try if baking isn't really your thing. Trust me. You will SUCCEED. And nothing emboldens a baker like SUCCESS!!!

Gosh I want to go apple picking. I've never been, it sounds like SUCH good fun. Of course if I were to go apple picking in Southern California, I'd probably pass out from the heat right now. Exaggeration? Maybe... just a tad :P

Lovely lavender

You might remember when I went a little nuts and bought four bunches of dried lavender at Trader Joe's... I can't help it, I LOVE lavender, and it's gotten to that point in the summer where all my plants are requiring more frequent watering, and cut flowers hardly last more than a few days before wilting because it is TOO DARN HOT! So buying a bunch of dried lavender seemed the perfect solution for my little table centerpiece container that's been holding a languishing little lavender for a few months now. I kind of squished it into the little container, and that may or may not have caused the languishing... But dried lavender is already dead - so PERFECT solution! :) Well, the lavender didn't quite stand up the way I wanted them to, probably coz the vase has a wide opening, so I needed to get some floral foam to stabilize them a bit. I finally got around to it this weekend, and it took all of 15 minutes (aside from the lovely aisle browsing at Michael's!), so here's how I did it:

You will need:

Dried flowers (or silk if that's what you like)

Floral foam

A knife

To start, use a knife to cut the floral foam to size - you want it to fit snugly into the vase or container you will be using.

Next, lay out the dried flowers on your counter/table/workspace. Begin to add the flowers, a few stems at a time, cutting them to the height you'd like the arrangement to be, as you go. If some stems break, put them aside and save them in case you can use them at the end.

As you begin to fill the container, turn it every now and then, to make sure that the arrangement is full and balanced from all sides (especially important for me as I planned to use this as a table centerpiece. When you are almost done, shake the container a little, and fix any stems that fall or lean over. I was very happy with how my new table centerpiece turned out - it is fragrant, simple and doesn't wilt in the heat! And I ended up with an extra bunch of lavender left over, to give to a friend :)  

Summer nights!

Starry sky, country music and a chiminea fire! Last night was one of those perfect summer nights that make you feel like a little kid again. And laying down on the little outdoor rug with a pillow, next to the fire, all I could see was the stars... and I could have been anywhere else in the world.

Or just ten years old, laying on the trampoline in my backyard. :D

Rooftop garden ~ Panzanella!

My rooftop garden is yet to produce a zucchini, but the tomatoes are doing very well! I've already had several, and I found three more juicy ones ready to eat when I watered on Monday morning. And there was a sad, neglected, stale baguette that didn't get eaten this weekend. So I made this yummy salad for dinner last night, and it was delicious!

Bread, cut into 1 inch cubes (stale or fresh, I used about half a baguette)
3 tomatoes, cut into large dice
Roasted red peppers (to taste)
Kalamata olives (to taste)
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil
one clove of garlic, minced
Sea salt and pepper to taste
Optional: fresh basil, chopped, and/or sliced cucumber

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Brush the bread cubes with olive oil, then toast in the oven for 5-10 minutes, until golden. Combine olive oil, vinegar and garlic in a bowl, and whisk (or put it all in a container with a lid and shake :P). Allow bread cubes to cool a little, then put them into a bowl and pour the dressing over them. Add diced tomatoes, roasted red pepper slices, olives, and other optional ingredients if using, and toss. Let the salad sit and marinate in the dressing for 30 minutes, tossing several times to distribute the dressing evenly. Add sea salt and black pepper to taste. Yum!

We had this for dinner with an assortment of tapas and it was the perfect recipe to use my homegrown tomatoes in - tastes like summer!

Weekend whirlwind

Well, it was another one of those weekends where you wake up on Monday morning and wonder where on earth those days went :) But it was well spent, I think!!! Here's some of what we got up to:

- new tires (skidding on slick roads has a way of making you PRIORITIZE things you have been procrastinating over!) - free oil change with two new tires at Pep Boys at the moment :) 
- super late nights
- finished the four canvas painting I've been working on (I think...)
- concert in the park
- babysitting the most well-behaved kids I know - playing in tents at REI
- laughing a lot because those kids are HILARIOUS!
- hanging out with friends
- finally hung up some art around our house!
- impromptu birthday gathering
- first attempt at chiminea fire!
- S'mores!!!

So it was fun. And I went to bed super late on Sunday night, but happy. And grateful. For friends and family, and for a house big enough to comfortably fit everyone after many, many years in our tiny apartment.

My car smells like Provence...

And I love it. Some things just put the biggest smile on my face, and a whiff of lavender is one of those things. I always keep an eye out for the bundles of dried lavender that make a mid-summer appearance at Trader Joe's each year, and when I stopped by on Monday, they didn't have any yet. But today - oh, today I left with a smile on my face and car that smells like Provence. Can't wait to go home and make a simple, beautiful table centerpiece that will last longer than my bi-weekly flower bouquets have been lately in the summer heat. The fact that is was sprinkling rain, glorious rain, when I woke up today, coupled with the bundles in my front seat makes this the best Friday the 13th I can remember. :D

My new favorite 'room' in the house!

Well, not everything went the way I'd thought it would this long weekend, but that's okay! I had plenty of time to relax, and be at home, and loved EVERY second of it! But I did get to cross one very big 'to do' off my list. We finally set up our patio!! And I love it! I spent all day Friday reading out there, while trying to dodge a persistent wasp that seems to love my lavender plant! We haven't lit the chiminea yet, but that's coming soon! And for now, I love knowing that we have created the perfect little retreat with the space available to us - my new favorite 'room' in the house!!

Organization, retail therapy and other things that make me happy :D

I love organization. Not necessarily the process of doing it, but that amazing, accomplished feeling when I'm done, knowing that you could ask me where to find anything and I could easily and effortlessly find it. So needless to say, I LOVE the Container Store. It takes SO much restraint not to spend all the money in the world in that store, it just seems like there are SO many things I could organize and SO many things I need to buy in order to start :P Well, yesterday felt like day 15 of this week, which has been slowly plodding by, and when I got off work a little earlier than usual, I thought some retail therapy might help. So I stopped by Cost Plus World Market and bought some lovely paper lanterns for our balcony (which is sloooooooooooowly coming together, but I am already enjoyed in it's unfinished state). As a bonus, they were on sale!

Then, much to my delight, I made my inaugural visit to the new Container Store that just opened this month, less than 10 minutes from my house. Sigh. True happiness. And in my quest for organization, I purchased a gift wrap organizer. I put everything in it when I got home, and sighed with pure happiness and contentment! I will have to post a pic of it later, since the one I bought isn't on their website, but I went to bed a very happy girl, knowing my gift wrap, gift bags, tissue paper and ribbons finally had a compact, convenient place to call home. Retail therapy works! :)

Sonos ~ the sweeeeeeeet sound of success!!

Now I'm not techno-genius, but I'm pretty proficient with setting up computers and wireless technology. We have wireless internet and a wireless printer hooked up at our house, and I have been wanting to set up some kind of wireless, Airplay music system for a while now. After a lot of research, I have come to the conclusion that the ideal system just doesn't exist yet, and that every wireless music system has some limitations, since this is a relatively new concept, so we took a little leap and bought an iHome iW2 about two weeks ago. I tried for hours to set this thing up and make it work, called tech support and had them walk me through the set up (which was pointless, as they just told me over and over 'No, the light should be green, not red and flashing' and I just replied 'I KNOW what it should be, but it's NOT'!!!), and finally gave up. I figured anything so difficult to set up would probably also be difficult to use. So I returned it and purchased the necessary components to set up the Sonos system in my house. Only to discover I needed a newer operating system on my computer in order to use the Sonos controller. Sooooo I ordered the system upgrade, backed up my files (in case the computer crashed during the upgrade), installed the upgrade (without incident - phew!), and set up Sonos. Which was a BREEZE - honestly, a child could do it. Well maybe not a child, but an adult capable of reading and following simple directions. It works like a dream, sounds so crisp and makes me feel clever since I was able to handle set up without calling in the geek squad. Seems easy to add other components too, so we'll have to figure out what else we need for the rest of the house! But for now, my little Sonos system doesn't just play music to my ears... It sounds like the sweet, sweet sound of SUCCESS!!!

Epiphany!

Well, I've had an epiphany! It's funny how waking up in the same room, every day, you eventually get a sense for exactly what should go where... Our house has the feel of an art gallery or museum, with high ceilings and good light, something we both loved when we first saw it, but having tripled our space has given us much more room to decorate. So rather than banging holes in the walls over and over and moving things around by trial and error, we've been waiting for inspiration. I found the perfect mirror for our master bedroom dresser this weekend, we'll finally put up the things we've brought with us from our apartment now that I've decided where they'll go, and I'm going to get busy working on some of these amazing projects I found on Pinterest.

Aren't these just Pinspirational?! :)

DIY Velvet lamp shades

I woke up on Saturday morning to a spectacular squall! Gosh I love rainy days!! I really should live somewhere other than Southern California, where I could enjoy a few more rainy days a year! But anyway... I spent most of the day relaxing, lazing around the house, but by the afternoon I was ready for a craft project. I have been on the hunt for new lamp shades for our bedroom for a few months now, and bought same plain, off-white shades thinking I would get fancy and customize them :) I had some success a few months ago making my variation of this lamp shade for our living room:

So I have been on the lookout for the perfect fabric for covering my bedroom lamp shades - I knew I wanted something elegant, and something cozy, like velvet, but nothing more specific than that. While I've been trying to decide on a fabric, I had noticed that the plain shades seemed to let a yellowish light through, which I didn't love, so I decided to spray paint them black, to block some of the light. Looking at my spray painted shades, I realized that while I would NEVER have guessed it, what I really wanted was black velvet lamp shades. Since we've recently moved into a much bigger space from a tiny apartment (where our bedroom was one of two rooms in the 'house'), we kind of have a blank canvas to work with, so I feel like these black lamp shades will help guide our other decorating choices, from art to pillows to paint(eventually, one day) and I love them. Here's how I did it:

I started by finding my trusty glue gun (the hardest part of this project actually!) and cutting a piece of fabric a little larger than the lamp shade. Then I glued the fabric around the outside of the shade, working quickly and burning myself once in the process :S

Then I flipped the shade over and glued the fabric under the top and bottom edges, and trimmed the excess fabric. To give a more finished look, I trimmed the shades with black grosgrain ribbon.

Here's the finished product (please excuse our mess):

I love them - and every time I bump my tiny little blister and it hurts like crazy, I remind myself of these lovely shades :)

DIY art for Mr. & Mrs ~ AKA The Dylan Installment

The Dylan Installment :P And an abstract piece we both liked in the background

One of the things we both loved when we first saw our new house was the fact that it felt like an art gallery. Big white walls, high ceilings in several rooms, lots of natural light coming in through the giant glass block window next to the stairs, and just a general airy feeling that made us both excited to think about the possibilities. The thing is art is completely subjective, and one man's idea of something he'd like to hang the wall is likely to differ greatly from one woman's vision for the house in general. For example, when my hubby said he wanted to get a huge picture of Bob Dylan to put on the wall, I took a few deep breaths and started to think of a way to use his idea to make something that I would enjoy looking at every day. And then I had an epiphany. I love black and white photography, and I have an obsession with trios of things - not sure why, but this something we've noticed about me - trios and diagonals. But anyway... Then there's the matter of our budget. Since we're still working on paying off our appliances (which I am SO THANKFUL for, it actually doesn't bother me to pay the bill, I just make myself think of laundromats and how many Sunday afternoons of my life were spent there, and then I click 'Pay Now' with GLEE!!), and there are other things around the house we want or need to spend money on, we are trying to stick to a budget when it comes to art. And since our old apartment was only 500 square feet, we didn't bring a lot with us :) So I came up with a DIY budget art project that my wonderful hubby hung up last night. Here's what we did:

The poster I ordered online

First, I ordered a black and white Bob Dylan poster from here - it was about $3.00 plus shipping on Amazon. When the poster arrived (like a day later - the return mailing label showed they shipped it from less than a mile away - kinda funny), we rolled it out and decided on three small areas of the poster that we both liked and thought had interesting contrast and detail. Then we bought some simple, big frames and matting. We got these from Aaron Brothers (and kicked ourselves for missing their penny sale by two days - ugh!!), but Ikea is great for inexpensive frames too. Then I cut out and framed the three areas we'd selected and voila - beautiful, simple art for our empty wall, Bob Dylan like the hubby wanted, but a little more subtle. I took a few quick snaps of how our little weekend project turned out this morning:

The pics don't quite do it justice, and I need to upload a front on pic of all three together (there are still pencil lines on the wall from the very complicated process of hanging them - our house is crooked, we're ok with that, but it makes simple things like this tricky!), but it was such an easy, inexpensive way to create art for our walls that we both love :)

The rooftop veggie garden...

Up close and personal with my growing tomato

I am the child of hippies - I grew up eating alfalfa home grown on the kitchen counter in a jar - and have recently been entertaining the idea of trying to sprout quinoa in my kitchen, although I haven't tried it yet. I also have the world's MOST amazing MUM ever! She raised us with a curiosity about the world around us and the confidence that inspires us to believe we can do anything, which probably explains why my first thought, upon moving into our house with a balcony last September, was ooh, I can plant a rooftop veggie garden. A little research made me realize that it wasn't the ideal season for planting much of anything (which I kind of assumed - butternut squash doesn't seem like it would stay contained in a little planter, but who knows, I might try it next fall!), but I figured what the heck, I'll buy a few veggies, stay on a budget in case they all die because it is winter, and see what happens. Here's what happened:

Crowded little windowbox with tomatoes, sage, garlic, green beans and strawberries

Now granted, it's been one of the warmest winters I can remember since moving to California, so that probably helped. But the truth is, I am a forgetful (and busy!) farmer who doesn't always remember to water my little 'crop', and with little more than an occasional watering, my veggie window box has thrived! I like to joke with my hubby that we will be able to make a little green bean caprese salad when our tomatoes are ready :) My little experiment turned out so well, I've decided to invest a little time in expanding my veggie garden this weekend. I bought two more pots, one to transplant the giant (non-fruit bearing!) tomato plant that's threatening to take over the window box, and the other for my new zucchini plants, which I hope will do well. I have wanted to try making stuffed squash blossoms like these for so long, and I can never find them so I figured this year, I'll grow my own :) I also got another strawberry plant, to fill in the windowbox and keep the other one company.


The first of two lovely green beans so far

 Our little rooftop veggie garden is a long way from becoming our sole source for fruit and veggies, and possibly will never become that, but it's fun to watch it grow and I can't wait to try a caprese salad with my homegrown cherry tomatoes! It all started with an inexpensive windowbox from Home Depot, a bag of organic potting mix, a few seedlings brave enough to weather the winter, and a little green watering can.

Love a good deal!



Well, there are few things in life I love more than a good deal, and this Living Social deal is amazing!!! A 16x20 gallery wrapped canvas print for $29, plus shipping, is a such great price, and the only problem I think I"ll have is trying to pick which picture to use! Getting some unique art up on our many walls is one of our big new house 'to dos', and this is an inexpensive way to take a photo I really love and make it wall-worthy :) The deal is offered through Fabness, which is a pretty great website for ordering these kinds of products, so check it out too! I immediately started browsing through my shutterfly and found these two pics from trips we took ages ago ~ they are just snapshots, taken with my trusty little point and shoot, but maybe if I mess with the contrast in photoshop, I will end up with a great image for a piece of art that reminds us of adventures we've taken together.  



Golden Gate Bridge ~ there are a million pics like this in the world, but this one would be a constant reminder of the day we walked the entire city on foot, taking this and so many other pictures and wondering why we didn't wear sneakers :)






Love this pic from Yosemite

  ***UPDATE: Sadly, this deal is sold out. However, for those who missed it, check out this website - their prices seem really great!



The best laid plans...





Well, as nice as my plans for baking up a storm and enjoying the chilly weather sounded, this weekend did not quite unfold that way. I am still dying to try making the coconut white chocolate cupcakes, and as luck would have it, a friend is celebrating her birthday next Friday, so that might be the perfect occasion to try this recipe out, if I can wait that long! I wasn't feeling great for most of the weekend, so wasn't really in the mood to be on my feet and baking... And yesterday, regardless of how I was feeling, we had to go pick up some free furniture from my friend's place, so rather than sleeping in on our day off, we rented a U-haul truck and my daring husband (who is quite the driver by the way!) maneuvered his way through the (horribly potholed) streets of Los Angeles and heroically loaded up the truck with our acquisitions. As much as it would have been nice to lay in bed and be lazy, I am NOT complaining. My friend, who is moving out of state, gave us a bed for our unfurnished guest room, and a lovely chaise which will go in the office, at least for now! It was so exciting to see these rooms furnished that I was inspired to unpack the last remaining box from our move last September, and to organize and sort all of the piles of things that have been waiting to be put away. The office has been our 'holding area' for things we haven't had time to organize and put away yet, but not anymore! So while the weekend didn't go exactly the way I'd thought, I am grateful for the extra day off, the organization we achieved because of it, and for free furniture! On a side note, the bed was missing two screws (my fault - I took it apart in a hurry as we were double parked :P)... We took a little side trip to Ikea, went to customer service and showed them one of the screws, and they willingly gave as two more, no questions asked! You've gotta love great customer service! Anyway, we did get to hang out with friends (and meet their new puppy!), and I had a lovely afternoon with my Mum on Saturday as well, so it wasn't an 'all work and no play' kind of weekend. And I completed a DIY art project for our house, which I will post about soon. Waiting until the hubby hangs them up so I can take a good pic! So it was a good weekend, even if it wasn't quite what I'd planned in my mind :)



A chaise like the lovely one we brought home yesterday ~ I have always wanted one!!