Home Project

I read Bonnie's post tonight: The Home Project. Go check it out, it's a great idea. It's easy to let time in a marriage just by so quickly, to take it for granted in these days of life with wee ones and all the craziness they bring. She plans to chronicle her marriage through photos, weekly, and I am thinking of playing along.



This is part of the mayhem on our bathroom counter right now as Josh packs for tomorrow's business trip that will keep him away from home for 5 days. HGe travels regularly, but the trips aren't usually this long. And on top of the general stress that comes along with him being away, Delma is sick, I am sick, and we are expecting a huge snow storm. Oy.

But, the glasses... After Josh and I got married, we went to Hawaii for our honeymoon. When we were flying out, I looked over at him at one point and he had fallen asleep reading, with his glasses on. I took his glasses off of his face and carefully stashed them. And then I was struck with that one small act. That this man and I would be doing big things and also these smallest things for each other for the rest of our lives. That there's someone to take my glasses off of me when I fall asleep reading. For people who have grown up feeling attended to and cared for, this may be nothing. To me, it is everything.

CEIMB: Mushroom Barley Soup

Today's Craving Ellie in my Belly recipe is Mushroom Barley Soup, hosted by Jennifer of The Rookie Baker.

The recipe as written is actually Beef Mushroom Barley Soup, but since we're veg I left out the beef. If I were going to make this again I'd replace the beef with a meat alternative or with beans, but this time around I just left it out altogether. It was good, it was hearty and satisfying. It was also super-easy to throw together. But it wasn't particularly exciting, probably because it was missing so much flavor that the beef would have provided.

I didn't take any pitures, because I made it so late the other night that it wasn't ready in time for dinner. So I just packed it up for lunches, and soup in a take-out container on my office desk does not make for an appealing photo.

Check out Jennifer's blog for the recipe.

CEIMB: White (Turkey) Chili

Today's Craving Ellie in my Belly recipe is White Turkey Chili, hosted by Leslie of Lethally Delicious.

As we're vegetarian, I replaced the turkey with TVP. I couldn't find poblano peppers, so since I wasn't sure what a good replacement would be, I just skipped the peppers altogether. And then when I was dishing it up tonight I forgot the sour cream. I liked this chili, and Josh liked it a lot. I think I'll like it more when I have it for lunch tomorrow and remember the sour cream.

For me, "real" chili is and always will be red with tomatos, since that's what I grew up on. But this really is a nice change from the norm, and came together quickly and easily (I chopped the onion and celery this morning so I could just throw it all together tonight). It would make a good winter weekend lunch, served up with some crusty bread. And hominy, hello? This was my first foray into the world of hominy and I would rate it a success.

Check out Leslie's blog for the recipe. In the timeless words of Yo Gabba Gabba, "Try it, you'll like it!" Thanks, for a great pick, Leslie!

Popover Morning

Oh, these Hattonettes. They wake up ready to GO and it is exhausting. They do not appreciate my need to ease into my morning.

Exhibit A. Picture taken around 6:45 this morning, after getting up at 6:30 and making a bee-line for the Halloween face paints. Do the math.



So, there's that. And 2 minutes later she demanded I take it off, and I had to rub her face raw with baby wipes to get (most of) it off.

Then I decided it was a popover morning, and thankfully I had printed out the recipe from the Parents Magazine web site ages ago, because now the link to it is dead. I do not get a dozen, as the recipe says, but they sure are tasty. They are very eggy, much more-so than I recall from making them before, and the girls did not dig them. But at least they tried them, which made me happy. And of course the best part was using the sifter to make the sugar snow on them.

Sufganiyot!

I decided to try my hand at sufganiyot (jelly doughnuts), and picked Martha Stewart's Glittered Sufganiyot. They're little, the size of D&D Munchkins. I didn't end up using all of the dough, because I knew we would not eat a kajillion of them. And mine do NOT look like Martha's, but, I'm not going to lie, they are delicious.

I filled half of them with strawberry jam, and left the other half empty. I'm glad I finally had the guts to try this, it will be a great Hanukkah tradition now that I know how easy they are.

Handmade Hanukkah

As usual, I went overboard on gifts for the girls. It's a good thing they're spread out over 8 nights. We mostly bought stuff, but I wanted to make sure to get some handmade gifts in, too.

Monogram pillows for the girls. I think they came out cute, the only think I don't like is that the spray adhesive I used to put the paper template onto the fabric when making the applique sort of stained the fabric and makes it look like there are wet spots. Oh well, we can live with that.





I made the pillow cases with an envelope closure, so I can easily take them off for washing and can swap them out when I eventually get off my butt and make them different covers for holidays. I used chenille for the back, and instead of just hemming it on the side that overlaps, I used pieces of the front fabric to bind it.




And I made them the set of Patty Young Potty Girls, and dresses for them.



I don't know if it's because I have a low-end machine or what, but I could NOT hem these dresses. The knit fabric with the tiny hem would literally just get sucked down into the machine by my feed dogs every time, no matter what I did. I could have tried the serger, but didn't bother. I just sewed them at the shoulders and up the sides and left all the hems unfinished. I'm sure after a while they'll get ratty looking though, so I'll have to figure something out.

The girls are really into their baby dolls these days, so I wasn't sure whether they'd be very impressed with these dolls. Well, they were, and the whole sharing situation got a bit hairy. But this year they're getting quite a few gifts that are for both of them together, so they'll just have to learn to deal with it.

I got each of the girls a gift to give to each other, baby doll-related paraphenalia, and they were very sweet about thanking each other and telling each other how much they liked their gifts. So precious. They are such good little sisters. Last week Delma did something to upset Mimi, and Mimi said, "Delma is not my friend!" Delly just shrugged it off and said, "Well, I'm always going to be your sister." Heart.

Hanukkah Sameach!

First night of Hanukkah! It's been hard to get into the spirit of the wintery festivities when we just had Thanksgiving and some days it's still warm enough to be outside without a jacket. That freaking lunar calender is whack. Anyhoo! Hanukkah is here, ready or not.

We had a lovely first night, complete with light and music and gifts and good food and tantrums and unwillingness to share aforementioned gifts. Sigh.

Also since we interrupted a coloring session with dinner, there was lots of "Put down the crayons and eat your dinner." Again, sigh.





That there husband of mine is all about the latkes, we try different recipes every year. Tonight were some potato and onion ones with mustard seeds, and a batch of some apple and potato latkes. Both vegan (we're not vegan, it just worked out that way), and both DELISH. Of couse, I'm sure just about anything would be delicious if you fried it up and drowned it in sour cream and apple sauce.



Nom nom nom.



Happy Hanukkah!

30 Days of Happy: Day 16

How the hell is it 9:30? Crap, I need some sleep. I wanted to start sewing together the sweet patchwork baby blanket I'm making, but the night got away from me. After the girls went to bed tonight I had some un-fun chores to do, and my time just got sucked into some black hole.

I also have spent far too much time searching online for Snoopy stuffed animals, books, various accessories. Did you know it's like impossible to just find a cute, reasonably priced stuffed Snoopy? What gives? The girls have just discovered SNoopy this year and both love him. We pretend to cry like Snoopy, and it cracks them up. But, we are certainly well past his hay-day. I had a stuffed Snoopy when I was little, and they used to make outfits for him and stuff... But no more. Hmpf. The search continues.

30 Days of Happy: Day 15

Josh is out of town for a few days, so between the morning hustle, craziness at work, and the evening hustle, I am pooped. Tonight I decided to pull out the past few years' worth of MS Living and special supplemental issues. I don't have tons of people to do gifts for, but I really do need to buckle down and make a plan. Plus, Hanukkah is quite literally right around the corner, which is totally messing with my head. So many great recipes and projects, I need to narrow down the list.

Oy, my commitment to this NaBloPoMo is so lame. Oh well. Though I may not be reporting much here, and may not have an awful lot to show for myself, this idea of doing or focusing on something that makes me happy every day has been really good for me. It's forcing me out of my usual slump of just parking myself on the couch until bedtime every night. I'm still doing quite a bit of that, frankly, but I'm also a bit more alert and engaged at night, spending some time on projects etc. So maybe this month isn't shaping up to be a particularly successful month of blogging per se, but it is helping me personally. So, hurray! But, I still have another half a month to go. Stay tuned.

30 Days of Happy: Day 14

Delly and I have been talking about making a gingerbread house, and I intended to make one from scratch, but then I saw pre-made Wilton houses for $9 and figured we could just do that. Delma is only interested in decorating it anyway, so who cares. And it was just staring at her this morning, taunting her with it's potential fun and mess, and she HAD to make it. So I was frosting a gingerbread house before 8 am. Oy. It did come out pretty cute, though.