- RT @wilw: I made a Mitt Romney Venn Diagram: http://t.co/esspoq7p
- RT @wired: 33 Geeky Insults You Can Use Almost Anywhere http://t.co/FXzvcq18
- God I am so totally okay with that man.
Baking Makes Me Angry
Published November 1, 2008 | 
I have a cookie craving right now. I have flour, sugar (white granulated, brown, and icing varieties), cocoa powder, cream of tartar, baking powder, almond & vanilla extracts, and time on my hands. But, because you can’t fake baking, I need to find a recipe — I can’t just throw the things that sound yummy together into a bowl and end up with edible cookies. This drives me apeshit. By the time I find a recipe that calls only for ingredients I have on hand, I’ll have given up and made the 1-1-1 peanut butter cookies.
Quickie Random Thoughts
Published October 27, 2008 | - My belly is so big that it makes my ass look small. And like, I have serious badonkadonk going on — here’s a pre-pregnancy pic:
- My dogs are supposed to be on a diet of 1/3 cup of kibble per day. They have thus far otuwitted me by gnawing a hole in the side of their bag of food, which I put out of their reach at 9am, yet have not been interested in food that I try to give them all day long, which leads me to believe that they have more squirreled away somewhere.
- I really wanted roasted chicken tonight, but since I won’t leave my oven on while I’m not home (blame the whole “house burning down when I was younger” thing) and we’re going to the gym tonight, frozen pizza it is. I’ll put extra spinach on mine.
- I can’t wait for this election to be done and over with. I haven’t watched Wolf Blitzer in weeks and I don’t miss him at all anymore — my addiction to THE SITUATION ROOM has been broken successfully.
- Maia is not moving much today. So I was lying on the couch with Buffy and poking at my belly, when I hit a spot that felt … funny. Like resistant. I think I found her head. Sorry for poking your eyeball, honey.
- I typed this post totally in the nude, cause I just got out of the shower. Shaving my legs was … fun. It feels really nice to have a breeze coming in through the window. Sorry if this makes you feel a little funny, I’m going to get dressed now.
Groceries
Published October 27, 2008 | Now that I am suddenly, blatantly pregnant, I worry about what’s in my cart when I go grocery shopping. Do people look at those packets of Ramen and think “SHE SHOULD BE EATING BETTER”? I can’t help that I have an unabashed love for spicy chicken noodles, okay? I wonder if they see the beautiful leaves of swiss chard covering the two pomegranates, nestled beside the mushrooms and apples.
But really, this all comes in second to what I didn’t buy at the grocery store today: a coffee cake cheese danish. I don’t know what brilliant mind decided to combine those two desserts, but it was a genius idea. Chris likes neither coffee cake nor danishes (wtf?) so I could not convince him that this item NEEDED to find its way into our cart, but I got my revenge by refusing to let him pick up the pumpkin pie sitting right beside it. WE COULD HAVE COMPROMISED AND GOTTEN BOTH, CHRIS!
Today was the first time I noticed the price of groceries having gone up. When it comes to meat, I only eat poultry and seafood; I’ve been this way for a long while now. We’re out of chicken, so we were checking it out… and for the generic stuff, it’s $9 for two measly little breasts with tender removed that I might be able to make a meal out of if I mixed it with lots of other stuff. I mean, seriously. That’s just stupid. We bought an entire roasting chicken for $9 that I’ll be cooking up tomorrow, and then I’ll use the remains for soup — that’s reasonable, at least.
Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure that if a pregnant woman were walking around with a coffee cake cheese danish in her hands, people would be really understanding. And women would stop me to ask where I got that delicious thing!
Fried Eggplant
Published October 18, 2008 | Fried eggplant for lunch. Cause I’m pregnant, and I can do that if I want to!
White chicken chili for dinner tonight… going to make a HUGE pot to get us through the weekend without going shopping.
NomNoms for To-Be Moms
Published October 17, 2008 | 
iGourmet’s Expecting Mother Survival Kit
I thought this was really cute 
Sort of an indulgence with the $99.99 price tag, but, definitely an idea to borrow and par down for pregnant friends! Feel free to share anything similar you might have come across!
Also, swing by the Honey section … some of those descriptions are just amazing:
- The weeping pines of Evia cry sweetly, secreting a sugary sap from which the bees make an amber honey. An insect called “the worker” by the beekeepers, lives symbiotically with the pines and causes them to produce this sap. This honey is spicy and woody with a stimulating pine aroma that complements toast, teas, and sauces.
- A dark amber honey, Mango Blossom reveals smoke, butter, black cherries and high notes of passion fruit to provide a truly sensual experience.
- Thick and juicy, Savannah Bee’s Orange Blossom honey is an explosion of citrus on the palate, followed by hints of toffee and almonds. The Crusaders had to fight a series of wars in the Holy Land to bring the orange tree to the West so you could have this experience. All you have to do is wake up some sunny morning, open a bottle of Savannah Bee Orange Blossom honey, slather it on a buttered scone, and say thanks to the Medieval warriors, workaholic bees, and skillful bee-wranglers that make it all possible.
I mean, SERIOUSLY! How do I get a job writing that kind of stuff?
How Mama Spoils herself, part 4
Published October 14, 2008 | 
Made this for dinner — risotto with brocolli, mushrooms, and red onions. Since I wasn’t sure how the roasted red peppers would taste mixed in, I topped it with a mess of them instead. Chris fondly referred to the blob of red peppers as “a crab” (and they were SUPER tasty). I’m not big on creamy risottos that flow all over the plate on their own, hence this one having enough cheese (parmesan & asiago mix) to let it keep a shape. Chris insisted that he wanted ROASTED POTATOES with the risotto, so, I did those too. I don’t think two starches belong on the same plate, but he figures that since they’re both things he likes, he might as well eat them together, I guess :]
And this was gooooood. I so love risotto. It’s total comfort food.
Thanksgiving 2008
Published October 12, 2008 | 
Happy Canadian Thanksgiving! We’re heading out in a few hours to visit family, show off the baby bump, and let people tell me how gorgeous the ultrasound picture is 
And I will be bringing Alanna’s World’s Best Green Bean Casserole, which has been a blast to make thus far. It looks and smells phenomenal too! Chris keeps saying “I can’t wait to eat that” and I haven’t even baked the topping on yet!
How Mama Spoils Herself, part 3
Published October 2, 2008 | Last week, I bought bananas on special at the grocery store. When we got home, Chris put them on top of the fridge, out of my line of sight (see what I mean about him putting stuff in stupid places?), and I didn’t realize this until two days ago. I tried to eat one of them, but it was just mushy and gross, so I realized that these bananas were born to be made into bread.
So, in preparation for my Thanksgiving baking, I present to you — banana bread (I added dried cranberries and about half a teaspoon of cinnamon to that recipe):
I wanted to provide a pic of a slice, but since I fail at cutting in straight lines, I will spare myself the embarassment
Thanksgiving Dishes
Published October 1, 2008 | Thanksgiving is October 13th in Canada this year. We’ll be heading to visit family on the 12th. I’ve been debating what dishes I wanted to bring — green bean casserole? yams with marshmallows? But we’re going to see both sides of Chris’ family, and what if I don’t want to make those dishes twice? So I’ve been looking for new recipes that really hit the spot.
Today, Alanna over at A Veggie Venture (which is a phenomenal resource when you see veggies on sale but just don’t know what you’d do with them if you bought them) posted a recipe for One Skillet Cauliflower with Cheese Sauce that I will definitely be bringing to one of the family dinners, along with the aforementioned yams. To the other, I’ll bring green bean casserole and Spiced Honey Cake with Carmelized Apples from Baking and Books. I’m terrified of making this cake. Seriously. Baking scares me, but I’ll do it.
I can’t wait for Thanksgiving… oh dear lord… all that food!
Welcome Wagon
Published September 22, 2008 | 
It’s the first day of Fall! This could be any road where I grew up… gorgeous!
So I’m lounging around yesterday afternoon in my undies at my computer, talking to my mom online, a glass of Nestea at my side (I love this stuff… I drink it all the time, then tell my trainer I’m drinking “water with lemon”. What? I squeeze fresh lemon into it, and it’s made with WATERandpowder, so technically I’m just omitting that it’s full of sugar), and my dogs being perfectly quiet on their loveseat. Is that sad, that we’ve basically let the dogs take over the loveseat? They have their own down comforter and wool sweater. We actually bought the sweater for Chris and he, being the way he is, tossed it on top of the couch when we got it home — then as soon as we turned our backs, Buffy pulled it off the couch and made it HER SWEATER WHICH NO ONE CAN TOUCH.
That reminds me of this cute video I took of Buffy & Joss fighting when Buffy got her head stuck in a hole in her sweater (sorry about the crappy lighting):
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2kO9auwilA]
ANYHOW, I’m sitting at my computer. The phone rings. It’s not a long-distance ring, which means it isn’t Chris; the name on Caller ID is “Janet” something. I answer, and turns out this Janet is a member of my city’s Welcome Wagon — she’s in the area, she heard I just moved in (who told her?), and would I like her to stop by? I’m hesitant; then she mentions that she has free stuff from local businesses, and I tell her SURE! COME SEE ME!
The next ten minutes are filled with frantic straightening up (thank goodness I swept & mopped yesterday) and a distraught stare at my sink full of dirty dishes. Usually I do the dishes before I go to bed, but yesterday I cut the pad of my thumb on the lid of bottle of olive oil (no, seriously… second time I’ve done this) and it stung too damned much for me to fuck with hot soapy water.
But check it out, I got some sweet stuff from this lady:
- 2 toothbrushes from local dentists; the third gave me some floss
- a free haircut at a local stylist (score! remember how I was telling you I wanted to get bangs, mom?)
- $15 gift certificate to a spa, which I will totally put towards that pedicure I’ve been wanting
- free appetizer at one restaurant, free lunch at another
- free oil change & a keychain from a Ford dealership
- pampering session (aka sales pitch) from a Mary Kay dealer
- 2 pens from various financial firms
- notepad from a private school (or I guess an “independent school”) where tuition is $12000 a year
But most pleasing to me was the tidbit of information that there is a farmer’s market at one of the local malls three days a week. Sadly, it only runs through the end of September, but that doesn’t mean I won’t make out like a bandit this coming week when my darling husband and I get there FIRST THING IN THE MORNING to pick out all the good stuff. And, I got a map of all the “pick your own produce” farms in the county, which I am totally thrilled about (although I will point out that http://www.pickyourown.org is an excellent resource for this as well).
I love this city so much more than where we used to live. I mean seriously, a Welcome Wagon? Most importantly, SHE ASKED ME if I was expecting, with an understanding gesture towards my little baby bump. I could have cried and hugged her. Then I told her yes, then she told me that they do a “Baby Shower” Welcome Wagon to welcome my baby to the community too.
How adorable is that?
On a more solemn note — I love you dearly, Nana, and I will always miss you; all of my memories of you are inspiring and warm. May you rest in peace.