Tuesday, December 29, 2009

So, Since I recieved my totally awesome stand mixer for christmas, I've spent the last 3 days trying to bake the perfect loaf of bread...getting closer. My 1st attempt was barely edible (once you chiseled through the 1/2 inch rock-hard exterior, the inside was pretty good lol). Next couple were better, but still a bit burned on the outside...we'll see how tonight's expiraments turn out. Bob helpfully bought me FIFTY pounds of bread flour.....I shall be baking bread till next christmas, it seems.

Today is Matt and my 10th anniversarry..wow where DOES time go? We wanted to go see the new Sherloc Holmes movie, but it is too freekin cold to go out tonight!

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Christmas was wonderful this year.

It was so nice to be able to see all the family, and not have to worry about driving back to PA in the snow, cramming all the gifts in the car, etc. Sara got a boatload of toys, which she has been happily playing with since yesterday morning. Santa brought our family a Wii, which Matt set up. It has a ton of multi-player games, so we spent a good deal of yesterday playing Wii Sports Resort...bowling, playing frisbee, swordfighting, golf...it was a lot of fun lol. Matt seemed happy with his presents, though I know he's really excited about the new computer he's building. He bought all the parts the day before yesterday, so he'll soon have a brand new toy to play with. Mom and Bob got me a brand new Kitchenaid Stand mixer..it is NICE! I can't wait to start cooking with it!

On the downside, my brother Joe (who was SUPPOSED to be on leave till January 6th) has been called back early. He's leaving to go back to his base today, and they're shipping out to Afganistan very, very soon. I'm glad he got SOME time at home, I know a lot of soldiers this year didn't even get that. We'll be heading over to see him off sometime today.

Friday, December 11, 2009

Christmasy-stuff

Lots and lots going on this past week! Since we moved, this (unfortunately) has been my book-storage system.

I call it "Piles of books everywhere" So as an early Christmas present, Matt built me a WONDERFUL set of bookshelves.




I know, it looks like a lot of shelves, but we own a disproportionally large amount of books (even given we got rid of approximately 1/2 of them in the move).




Only a couple free shelves, lol. I'll have to be careful about getting any new books, don't think Matt will build me more any time soon :-).

While working in the garage on the shelves, I scrounged around and found the materials to make myself a fairly nice workstation for my clay, too!






I have an old countertop for space, an old nightstand for storage, and a really nice large ceramic tile to actually work the clay on. Wednesday (while watching the finale of Top Chef (michael?? Really? I mean he's a very talented chef, but Bryan or Keven were MUCH better choices, in my opinion)) I actaully got to start on a new piece. The theme is "Dragonfly in Spring." We'll see how it turns out.


Last weekend we also got the all-important Christmas tree up! We watched a Christmas Story with mom and Bob, had a really nice dinner, and we all decorated the tree.



And to top off the Christmas season we have snow...ug. Actually the snow isn't so bad, it's the 40-50 mph winds...it's freekin cold! I'm half tempted to try and teach Ladybird to use the catbox, just so I don't have to go outside :-).

Tuesday, December 01, 2009

We've just gotten back from spending Thanksgiving in PA with Matt's family. While the holidays are a time of getting together with family, I really don't want to do that again unless I have large quantities of highly illegal narcotics. Going into detail would take pages and pages, but suffice to say that having 4 adults and 3 kids under 5 all living in very close quarters, none of whom agree on how to raise/discipline said children makes for very tense and confrontational times.

We got back Saturday and then did a small family Thanksgiving with Mom, Bob, Matt, Sara and myself. Everything came out great. I did a roast turkey (we will be eating it for DAYS), both vegetable and my apple-cashew stuffing, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, and apple/caramel and pear/vanilla/cinnamon tarts. Thank goodness Matt and Mom stayed home from church to help me! I had them chopping and peeling...without them it would have taken a LOT longer to get everything together. I want to try and do a goose for christmas (another one of those never tried it, but I want to be able to say I've done it at least once things).

I also need to work out better time management. I have SO many things I want (and have) to do. It seems everyday I wake up, and only a few hours later, it's time to go to bed..where has the time gone and what have I done with it??? I'm planning on sitting down and getting some sort of schedule down on paper. I need to set aside time for things like my clay, or it will just NEVER happen. Especially once I finish my class and get a "real" job I'm going to have even LESS time available.