Thursday, September 29, 2011

Where Have I Been?!

I have been in a Twilight Zone for the past few days.  Seriously.  Last weekend we traveled to York, PA for a friend's bridal shower.  We were there Friday and Saturday and left Sunday morning.  When I got home on Sunday, I had to unpack, clean, and start my paper for grad school (which is due this evening).  See, I've had the assignment for some time, but you know how it is.  Well, I gathered all research, organized it, and wrote an outline on Sunday night.  Monday I went to school at 8, taught til 4, then started my new after-school program job from 4-6.  Then I came home, made dinner, actually started writing the paper, then had to continue reading my book for book club (Sarah's Key).  Tuesday was the exact same thing as Monday.  Except when I got home around 6, I got ready, went to the grocery store, made dinner, worked on my paper, then read for book club.  Wednesday: school, after-school, then Book Club.  I went to a friend's house for dinner and book-related discussion with a little gossip mixed in (it's a bunch of girls, what do you expect?!)

Today I went to school, came home (no after-school on Thursdays), started getting ready for dinner, continued writing my paper, wrote this post, then I am going to finish writing the paper and edit it quickly, finish dinner (will probably be featured on Tasty Tuesdays next week) and then take my class from 8-10 tonight and submit my paper.

Phew.    I get winded just typing all of that.

Thankfully today was a casual day and the kids were awesome.  Tomorrow is a professional day.  Boring and useless, yes.  But does it take much energy?  Nope.

This weekend I am: relaxing, yard sale-ing, doing some house projects, and going to see The President's Own on Saturday night with friends.

Hopefully life will slow down soon and I will get to post more often.  Have a great Friday :-)

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Tasty Tuesdays: Pasta Primavera


***Tasty Tuesdays is for sharing a meal/dessert/snack recipe that you made this week.  It doesn't have to be gourmet!  It just has to taste good! If you want to link up, let me know and I will link you to my Tuesday posts.  Use this^ button to link back to my page!  


Last night I made a version of pasta primavera.  I usually find recipes that look good and then alter them a bit.  This time it was completely inspired by all of the colorful veggies I had in the fridge.  I gathered my ingredients.


I decided on an onion, left over red pepper, orange pepper, zucchini, and asparagas.  I used thin spaghetti (usually the only kind I buy).  I always feel bad eating regular pasta, but don't like wheat as much, so I buy one box of each and mix them together.  I feel a bit healthier that way.  I also didn't have any garlic (BOO!) so I used garlic powder.  Not the same.  If I make this again, I will definitely make sure I have a clove of garlic.  Actually, I usually do.  Just not today.

I also think that peas, corn, carrots, mushrooms, or broccoli would go good in this meal, too.  

I started the boiling water. I usually add a TON of salt (I might die from that later, but it's soooo good!)  I also added a bit of olive oil.  It's not something I typically do when boiling pasta, but since I knew the sauce tonight was basically just oil anyway, I figured it couldn't hurt.  

I sliced the onion really thin and sauteed that with butter, salt, pepper, and a bit of olive oil for a few minutes.  Then I added very thin sliced peppers for a few minutes and then added the zuchinni and asparagus and garlic powder.  The only reason for this order is that we like soft onion, kind-of-soft cooked peppers with a little bit of crunch, and kind-of-crunchy fresh asparagus and zucchini.  (Who likes squishy zucchini? eww).  But you could definitely add them in whatever order suits you.

ooohhh how colorful and healthy!

At exactly the same time (yeah for great in-the-kitchen timing!), the pasta was ready.  I strained it in my tiny plastic baby strainer and mixed it all up in the big pan with some more olive oil and a bit more butter.  

baby strainer.

I also served it with a new wine we found that is actually very good for a $10 bottle of wine.  Red Rock Pinot Noir:


I added a bit of grated Parmesan and was happy with the flavor combination.  But Josh wanted a bit more, so he put a little Italian dressing on his.  We are so different.


I loved that it was pretty healthy and I loved all of the colorful veggies mixed up in there.  This is a go-to meal when you have lots of vegetables in the refrigerator that you don't want to go bad.  And I always have pasta, olive oil, onions, and Parmesan on hand.  And it was super easy and only took about 20 minutes.

Happy Tuesday!

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Before and Not-So-After: Guest Bedroom

Our guest bedroom is used for two things:  A place for guests to sleep when they come, and we use the closet to store stuff.  This is by far the most boring room in the house.  We have literally done nothing to this room yet, but we have big plans!  Here is a picture of our muddy yellow and brown guest room:


Ugh.  Gross.  It's a pretty small room, which can be good or bad.  We like that we don't have to use too much to furnish it, but we also can't fit a queen bed in there.  So when couples come, they have to snuggle :-)  We only have a few plans to make it more interesting so our guests don't wake up to this:



 Yeah, that is the wall opposite the bed.  How boring!  Here are some goals that we would really like to accomplish:

  • Paint this room in a bold color.  Just for fun.
  • Purchase new bedding for goodness sake so you don't feel like you are sleeping in mud.  (What was I thinking when I bought that bedspread?!)
  • Add fun, bold, colorful decorations.
That's about it.  We want it to be a fun room, so when our guests come they can feel comfortable and happy and want to come back!  I love having guests (as you've probably read before), so I want them to want to keep coming back to stay in the "cool" room!

 

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Tasty Tuesdays Premiere: Lazy Man's Stuffed Peppers

Well, Lizz, here it is!

***Tasty Tuesdays is for sharing a meal/dessert/snack recipe that you made this week.  It doesn't have to be gourmet!  It just has to taste good! If you want to link up, let me know and I will link you to my Tuesday posts.  Use this^ button to link back to my page!  


The first Tasty Tuesday post I will do is super simple.  Actually, most of the meals that I make us (me and hubby) are pretty simple.  I am not one for spending the whole day in the kitchen.  Although occasionally I do get the urge to make a more complex dinner.  This dinner was inspired by a recipe I found in Better Homes and Gardens.  Josh typically does not like stuffed peppers. I'm not exactly sure why he doesn't.  The worst part about cooking for us is that we have completely different tastes.  Most people would say that Josh is not a picky eater, but compared to me, he is.  I literally like everything and will try everything (except raw oysters).  But everything else, yep.  I have tried it and I like it.  It's probably one of the only aspects of my everyday life where I am diverse and risky.  

Anyway, I found the article in Better Homes and Gardens and the "stuffing" inside the pepper was made of ground chicken, herb stuffing, tomatoes, and celery, which was instead of the usual ground beef or sausage, rice, tomatoes, etc.  So I got thinking... hmmmm.  Josh likes peppers, he likes stuffing, he likes chicken.  I've got it!

Instead of herb stuffing, I bought chicken.  I used the leftover fried chicken from our The Red Roost dinner.  I just cut that up into chunks.  Josh doesn't like tomatoes or celery, so I didn't use those.  Here are my ingredients:


First, I preheated the oven to 350 degrees.  We decided on one yellow pepper and one green pepper.  I diced up half an onion and sauteed that.  I microwaved one tbsp of butter and 1 cup of water for one minute.  Then I added one cup of chicken stuffing mix and microwaved that for another minute.  Then I added the leftover sauteed onion.  Last, I cut the tops off the peppers and cored them:


I didn't want any of the chicken, so I added half of the stuffing mixture into my pepper, mixed the chicken in, then added that into Josh's pepper.  I replaced the tops of the peppers and put them inside a loaf pan so they wouldn't be wobbling around.


I placed them in the oven just like that for 50 minutes.  Then I took them out, added some shredded cheese (who doesn't like cheese?!) and put them back in on broil for about 5 minutes, uncovered.  They came out like this:


I also reheated some of the leftover broccoli from Josh's mom's dinner at The Red Roost and added that.  

It turned out pretty good and I can honestly say that Josh liked the stuffed peppers.  I know he was dreading it, but it wasn't so bad and it was a piece of cake to make.  Not to mention, it was a cheap-o dinner.  I bought the peppers for around $1.50, the cheese was only a few sprinkles from a large $2 bag, leftover chicken and broccoli ($0), the stuffing was about $1.50, but I only used a third of it and half an onion was probably around $.30.  So all in all, I would say that this dinner cost us around $3 tops.  Not bad, huh? 


Have a beautiful Tasty Tuesday!  

Monday, September 19, 2011

An Updated Ironing Board and Our Messy Pantry

On Saturday, the WVU game was on and while Josh and his parents were at a sports bar watching the game, I was at Home Depot picking up paint chips and Marshall's looking for who-knows-what.  I left Home Depot with a ton of paint chips (one of which we actually like) and left Marshall's with an awesome mirror (updates on that later) and a sa-weeeet new ironing board cover.

The ironing board that we currently have is as old as dirt.  That's something my grandfather would have said.  But seriously, it is.  Josh's mom gave it to us about a year ago when she bought a new one.  It was so old and to be honest, pretty ugly, so she didn't mind getting rid of it.  However, she was shocked to find that her new ironing board, which was made of plastic, was wayyy less sturdy and definitely not made well.  This ironing board is practically made of steel!

 

Yeah, it's big.  And heavy.  And old.  And ugly.  But it works like a charm! I found out this weekend while Josh's mom was visiting that it was actually HER mom's ironing board first.  So, this thing is probably older than me.  And I'm pretty sure that the fabric is original.


So, I found the ironing board cover I liked best at Marshall's, purchased it for $9.99, and got inspired.  I couldn't leave those green legs, though, right?  So I decided to spray paint them.  I took the old cover off, threw it in the trash, flipped it upside down, and went to town.


I flipped it because it would be easier to paint the legs this way, and I ended up painting the underside of the board as well.  It went from that puke-green to this beautiful, clean white:


I had to paint in the garage because it was raining.  And I had to do it immediately after I got home, rain or shine, because I was so excited.  I know, it's the little things.

I let it dry/cure for about 24 hours and then brought it inside, put the new cover on and our ironing board went from this:

 

to this:


Ahhhh... feels so much better.  And I love the pretty cover.



And I put it back in our very cramped pantry/laundry room.  


I LOVED this room when we first moved.  It was right off the kitchen with easy access.  I had never had a pantry before, so I was psyched to put our dry goods somewhere else than the cupboards.  And the laundry room was in a convenient, but out of sight place.  But guess what?  The door doesn't even close because the washer and dryer are too big.  Darn.  So it's always open, like this:


See all of those appliances and things at the top?  I am happy to have them out of the way and nothing on my kitchen counters, but I am sad to be looking at them all the time.  I am thinking of putting something over that area, like maybe a curtain or bamboo blinds or something.  And our pantry is very big and happy on the opposite side of the washer and dryer:


Since the door to this room doesn't shut, Josh and I were thinking of putting a different kind of door there, but lately I have been thinking that a really long, subtle curtain would look good, too.  We will see.  So there you have it.  Our updated ironing board and our messy pantry.  Have a beautiful Monday!

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Crabby Weekend Recap

This weekend my in-laws were here.  We went to our favorite all-you-can-eat crab house, The Red Roost.  It is officially the best crab house I have ever been to and if you are ever on the Eastern Shore, you should probably go (if you like crabs).  It's about 30 minutes away from where we live and pretty much in the middle of nowhere.  You drive and drive and drive in woods and fields and back roads until it appears.  



Yes, it's right there down by the "Chesapeake Forest Lands".  It also happens to be about a quarter of a mile from the Chesapeake Bay, where they catch the crabs.

It's one of those places where they give you tons of stuff to fill up on before they throw a pile of crabs on your table.  But, it's okay because the stuff they give you to fill up on is delicious, too.  We eat it all and it's worth every penny.


From the left: french fries, fried shrimp, clam strips, hush puppies.  In the containers: vinegar, Old Bay, cocktail sauce.  In the top left you can see the beers.  They also serve local microbrews, which is awesome.  

While you are eating those things, they bring out fried chicken (the best you will ever have), and an ear of local sweet corn.  Below is a picture of Josh's dad's excited-ness to see his fried chicken.  By the way, all of this is "all-you-can-eat".  If you want more clam strips, they will bring you as many as you can eat.


Next up is the real reason why we come.  The Maryland blue crabs.  Yeah!


I like to keep a tally on the paper on the table of how many I eat.  I am known to have eating competitions with my boss.  I always win.

So, how was your weekend?!

Saturday, September 17, 2011

Before and Oh-So-After!

Thank goodness I did something about this crazy office.  In the last post I told you that I painted one of our small bookshelves, but didn't give you the final product yet.  Well, I am happy to announce that our office went from this:


to this!: 


A little better, right?  The other day, Josh was at band practice (he is the percussion instructor for a local high school marching band) and while he was away I totally re-did the office in two hours and then surprised him when he came home.  He was shocked that I did it all on my own (especially moving the heavy stuff).  I moved the desk from the left wall to the wall with the window so I could look outside while I worked.  It has, of course, proven a distraction.  Especially when the neighbors are playing football.  I added a small table we already had with a lamp we already had in the corner.  I kept the filing cabinet out, even though I hate it.  This "oh-so-after" room is really just an "in-progress-but-way-better-than-it-was" room.  And where the desk used to be:


The new bookshelf!  Well, it's actually an old bookshelf, but it's freshly painted, so it's kind of new.  


Even though we need storage for all of our books, I really didn't want to crowd our clean bookshelf and once again make this room feel tight and over-stuffed.  So I opted for a few books and other random stuff.  Josh doesn't understand why we would have a book shelf if we aren't going to have books on it, but I totally get it. And in the future, I will probably either paint the other bookshelf and add it in here, or get something bigger or put shelves on the walls for storage for office-type-stuff, books, and school work stuff.  But here are some close ups of my happy, neat, and clean bookshelf:






Some things to note: 
  1. On the top shelf, there is a stack of books.  That stack of books is so random that it includes: "The Purpose Driven Life", a Lewis Black book called "Me of Little Faith" (I know, ironic), a book titled "Stumbling on Happiness" (also ironic), "Catch-22" and "Day Trips in Delmarva".  I swear that was an accident.
  2. The big round vase on the top is awesome.  It is by far my best vase.  And I have a lot.
  3. The art hung above the shelf is only there because it is the 2-D version of the teal vase in the shelf.  I made that art with a bunch of paint chips.  I cut them up into same size squares and glued them on a thick piece of paper and then framed it.  My inspiration came from this DIY art from paint chips.  It didn't come out perfect (you can see the imperfections in the picture) but I don't think it's too horrid.  Josh, however, was not happy that it was on our wall.  He called it "kindergarten art".  He is lucky I love him.
Speaking of paint chips, I went to (almost) all of the local paint stores and picked up some paint chips for our living room.  And by some I mean a lot:




And we couldn't really find one that we like!  AHHH!  So we picked up more:


And still haven't found one.  Shucks.  So, the in-laws are here today visiting for the weekend.  Josh and his dad are going to a sports bar to watch the Mountaineers game shortly since we won't get it on cable today.  I think that while they are gone, Josh's mom and I will go to the only paint stores left on the Eastern Shore (Home Depot and Sherwin Williams) and pick up the rest of the teal-ish paint chips left in the world and hopefully find one we like.  

Then the plan is to go out for crabs for dinner before it's winter and we can't get them anymore.  We go to a local crab house right on the Chesapeake Bay.  They say that Maryland crabs are best in the fall, so we will see!  

Have an awesome weekend!

Friday, September 16, 2011

Office. Office. Office.

Ryan:Did this happen on company property?
Michael Scott:It was on company property, with company property. So, double jeopardy, we're fine.
Ryan:I don't think-- I don't think you understand how jeopardy works.
Michael Scott:Oh, I'm sorry. What is, 'we're fine'?

Do you watch The Office?  Because you should.  Season Premiere next Thursday.  Do it.

Speaking of the office, I decided to get right on it.  I mentioned in the last post how our office should be clean, organized, and a place to do work effectively.


The first step was to add a few more places for storage by painting the old ugly bookshelf and using it.  This bookshelf may be temporary, but this room needs it for sure.  We have two of these laminate bookshelves:


There is one more shelf to go in there.  But I had (temporarily) lost the pegs that hold the shelf up.  I later found out that they were in a ziploc in Josh's car.  Don't ask me why.  Anyway, this bookshelf, even though I can't exactly remember where it came from, certainly is not worth a fortune.  And it certainly isn't a fine piece of furniture.  It's made of laminate wood or particle board (whatever they call it).  So I was a little worried about painting it because I didn't really know where to start.  But I did a bit of research online and found that these steps would be the best for success:
  1. Clean the crap out of it.
  2. Sand it.  I mostly read that others would sand it with a really fine grit sandpaper. 
  3. Wipe it clean again.
  4. Prime then paint.  (Or purchase a paint with primer in it).
So I cleaned.  Then I filled the extra peg holes that I didn't need with spackle.



I spackled, then sanded the whole shelf with 320 grit sandpaper, which is very fine.  After I cleaned it off again, I started the painting process.  I had a good paintbrush and I had a small "trimming" roller.  I painted part of a corner of the inside of the shelf and immediately knew it wasn't going to work.  The paint literally wasn't sticking AT ALL.  I would paint over a spot and immediately it would stick together and form holes where I could see the shelf.  Yikes.  So I decided I hadn't sanded it enough.  I got out the 120 grit sandpaper.    Sanded the whole thing.  By now my arm was soooo numb and tired.  Tried again.  It was a no-go.  90 grit?  Try again.  I learned my lesson this time.  I didn't sand the whole friggin' thing.  I sanded a small spot and tried it out.  It was better but not perfect.  FINALLY: 60 grit sandpaper worked.  Once again, I sanded the entire bookshelf, this time successfully!  It just goes to show that the internet isn't always the best resource.  Or as Josh always tells me, "Maria, you can't believe everything you hear".  Except he is usually talking about the news.  I am a sucker for believing ANYTHING I see on the news.  Except FOX.

Back on track:  The 60 grit worked fine and I pulled a few muscles in my forearm.  You think I'm kidding, don't you?  I figured you would.  

Then I painted the first coat.  I bought Glidden eggshell plain white paint with primer.  I painted the corners and edges with a brush and then the rest with my roller.  Here is a peek of the first coat:


I chose white because it feels so clean and fresh all the time.  I forgot to take an "after-the-second-coat" picture, but plan on doing that when I put it in the office and get things organized a little better in there.  We are currently broke as a joke (my favorite saying) so purchasing a new desk isn't in the near future, but hopefully won't be too far away.  By the way, we aren't broke as a "joke" per say.  We would just rather spend our dough on my tuition and food and paint for the living room right now.

On a side note: my dad had surgery earlier this week.  He had an artificial disc placed into his spine up towards his neck.  His surgery was successful, but he could use your thoughts/prayers for a speedy and non-painful recovery.

And for the best news ever: It's the weekend!!!!!  Yippee!  In-laws are coming tonight and even though I plan to do nothing but grad school work tomorrow and Sunday, I still like having visitors.  Have an excellent weekend!

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Before and Not-So-After: Office!

I haven't shown a picture of our upstairs third bedroom/office yet.  (And I only use the words "third bedroom" because when we have more than a few guests, we blow up the air mattress in the office).  Part of the reason why I haven't shown you the office is because we have essentially neglected it.  We threw a bunch of stuff in there and only use that room when Josh is working on chorus/piano/guitar stuff for school or when I am blogging or doing grad school work.  It also happens to be the tiniest room in the house, so it is difficult to photograph. Well, that and our camera is no longer "fancy".  It's on the list of things to buy when we win the lottery.  Anywho. Without further ado, I present the most embarrassing room in my house:


Ok, so it's not that bad, right?  It's just a wreck.  That is an old, old computer chair that is literally falling apart at the seams.  And what about that $20 Wal-Mart excuse of a desk, you ask?  Well I bought it for college in 2006 mainly because it hid my cords and wires so well.


Ouch.  That is very disturbing to a very organized person (me).  We also have a random assortment of instruments and junk in this room, like a horn and a mallet bag...


And an electric guitar, a guitar case, a guitar stand, a synthesizer, a box to a keyboard case, the keyboard case, two speakers, and two amplifiers...


Slowly but surely we are going to clean this mess up and make it look and feel like an organized space to work and study and play music.  Oh!  And I bet you were wondering why I don't just put all this stuff in the closet.  It's because the closet looks like this:



Yeah, it's a mess.  The short-term goals are:
  1. Purchase a new desk.
  2. Paint a bookshelf or two that we have and put them in the room for storage for books and other things.  
  3. Get rid of that ugly black filing cabinet by either purchasing a pretty one or permanently moving it to the closet.
  4. Get some awesome lamps.
  5. Paint.
Long-term goals:
  1. Create a space with TONS of organized storage.
  2. Find a way to creatively make the smallest room in our house feel much larger.
  3. Replace the stupid old giant office chair that I am sitting on to something more modern and MUCH smaller.
And SUPER-DUPER Long-term goals:
  1. Ditch the whole office and make it a nursery.
I have been doing a lot of thinking about the mood I want to create in the office.  I want it to feel open and organized and clean and full of light.  That's about it.  I am most productive and efficient in that kind of environment and since this room is where I will literally earn my master's degree, I think that's pretty important.  Now that I mention it, I think I might move this room up on the list of needs-to-be-done.  

I did find some amazing inspiration photos that I will share.  For some reason, I am really into white, ivory, light yellows, light pinks, and light purples.  They feel the cleanest and freshest to me. Maybe a little teal, too, because who could go wrong with teal?

This is WAY too girly, but I like the white furniture, clean lines, and magazine racks.


And my all-time favorite:
I love the simple white desk, the ivory and pale pink storage, the light purple chair, the braided bamboo baskets, the yellow walls and the white lamp.  If I could have this room, I would in a heartbeat!
By the way, it's almost FRIDAY and it's PAY-DAY!!!!

Check out the rest of the Before And Not-So-After Rooms: