Some Like it Hot, Some Like it Cold

..I like it freezing. Period.

I have been receiving a lot of good natured slack lately because of my comments on Facebook or wherever on how I wish I was experiencing cooler temperatures. Most people are telling me "Oh you should take advantage of the sun" or "Enjoy it while it lasts" or "You're crazy" or "Why in the world do you want it 75 degrees?!"

While I am not against the occasional sunny, warm day to go to the beach or swim, I generally do not enjoy the sunlight or the hot. I just don't. I like being cold. I do not care if people think I'm crazy. I LOVE clouds, I LOVE breezes, I LOVE rain, I LOVE snow, and I LOVE LOVE LOVE being cold. I just do.

It's ridiculously hot here. And humid. And the sun is always shining. It started in March and won't end until November. For someone who does not do well with heat, and actually gets migraines from too much sun, it's just too much for too long. All you have to do is stand outside, doing nothing, and in 5 minutes your shirt is soaked through with sweat. I just don't like that. Sorry. It's just who I am. I want it to be cold so I can be outside in jeans and a sweatshirt, enjoying crisp air on my cheeks. Plus, with it cold, I can be outside, where I love to be. I can't go hiking in 95 degree weather. Sure, I COULD, if I want a headache later and to just be miserable the whole time. I can't even walk my dog in 95 degree weather without him and me getting overheated. I enjoy walking my dog, and my dog loves being walked, but not when it's hot outside.

I would love to be back in a place where I don't need AC. But until then, I will just stay holed up in my house, hiding from the sun. At least I should be able to get a lot of knitting projects done, right? Right.

Love Me, Love Me Not?

I'm pretty sure that what I'm about to post will make everyone's day. At the same time, I might just be opening Pandora's Box. That's what happened to me, so I thought I would share the wealth. Because I don't want to be the only person out there feeding my inner fat kid. That's just not fair.

So what is this amazing yummy food I am about to share with you? Chocolate cake... made in a coffee mug... microwaved for only a measly little minute. Why hello, yummy chocolate cake! IT'S SO DELICIOUS!

I have made it as is, but I liked sweeter desserts, so I use 3 tsp of sugar instead of the 2. Also, I do like peanut butter, but it's not my favorite, so I have replaced that before with chocolate syrup and caramel syrup. So these are easy to personalize! I LOVE it with the caramel sauce, it keeps the cake nice and moist.

They're so yummy... and the perfect serving size... and so easy to make... and fast to make... you're welcome. :)

Happy eating!

Weekly Menu

Y'all know I love to cook. Sometimes, though, I'm just too lazy. This comes from the fact that I don't want to do all the dishes from cooking, and Matt comes home at different times everyday, so it's hard to even guess when I should have dinner ready. That I also usually had a work shift, walked the dog, and went to the gym. Some days I'm just too tired. However, I don't want to start buying a whole bunch of frozen foods ladled with preservatives and sodium and who knows what else. I still want to have the pride that I cooked it, I just don't want to do it ;)

This past week, I decided to make my whole menu for the week on Sunday. Or at least do most of the prep work, so I had minimal effort on the day of. I left a few menu items not done, so if I decided I actually wanted to cook, I had a few options to choose from. :) Here's what Matt and I have been/will be eating this week:

Pot Roast: I found this recipe on Pinterest. I would copyright it here, but the link was just a picture. So please note this isn't my recipe. All you do is buy a pot roast (I bought beef, but you could use pork I'm sure) and packets of Ranch, Zesty Italian, and Brown Gravy. Mix those with 1/2 water. Place pot roast in the crock pot. I added chopped onions and celery to the bottom for extra flavor. Pour the liquid mixture over the pot roast and cook on low for about 8 hours. BEST POT ROAST EVER. Seriously. It was perfectly cooked and very moist. And for all you beginner cooks out there, it's really hard to overcook a pot roast on low heat in a crock pot, so don't be scared!

Taco Soup: One of the recipes I did not prep for the week, but soup is generally really fast and easy to make. Who doesn't love taco soup?

Tandoori Chicken Bites with Cucumber Raita: My first attempt at Indian food. It was pretty good, I thought the chicken came out a little dry, though. This was super easy. On Sunday I cut all the chicken up, made the marinate, and just froze it. The night before I took it out of the freezer, so by dinner the next day I could just pop them in the oven and make the raita while they cooked. Yum yum! Matt really liked them, too. And he even used the raita instead of his usual ranch.

Sunday Chicken: Also found on Pinterest, also just a picture. You take chicken tenders, wrap them in bacon (YUM!), cover the dish with foil and bake on 225 for 4 hours. Remove the foil, turn the oven up to 350 and cook for 15 more minutes. HOW CAN THIS POSSIBLY BE BAD!? BACON! Also very easy, which I like for this week.

Burritos: I made my own frozen burritos this week! I found the recipe on my favorite blog, Budget Bytes. I just put refried beans, jalapenos, and cheese on a tortilla, wrapped it up, wrapped in plastic wrap, and froze them! That way Matt couldn't complain about "having nothing to eat in this house." Just pop it in the microwave for 4 minutes and yummy! And you control the ingredients! I will probably be doing this quite regularly now. Endless possibilities!

These last recipes came from this blog. I made the Oh So Easy Pork Chops, Marinated and Baked Pork Chops, Sesame Chicken, and Chicken with Honey Sauce. You make all the sauces, cut all the meat, then place them in freezer bags. When you want to make them, just throw them in the crockpot and you have only one dish to clean up! But you still made dinner! Fantastic.

Man I am so excited. I'm looking forward to this week and being able to spend more time with Matt when he comes home, instead of being in the kitchen for a half hour cooking. Even though I love doing it, sometimes it just feels more of a chore than stress relief. Especially after a hard day of work, only to come home to a hyper dog and still need to fit in time to go to the gym and play with said hyper dog. Yay for being strategically lazy!

Happy cooking!

Husband Quotes

So the other day, my husband, cat, and dog disappeared, so I went to find where they went. I found my husband in the hallway, holding the cat above the dog's head, with the dog super excited. I gave him "the look," and the husband replied,

"What? We're playing fetch!"

and then proceeded to toss the cat down the hallway, while my dog happily chased after him.

Silly boys.

Good Reads

You would think by now I would know not to read more than one book at a time. But alas, I love reading so much that I find myself reading up to about 4 books sometimes. So in the spirit of "it's too hot to do anything outside, and if you do go outside the only thing you can do without sweating is reading," I thought I would share some of the books that I am currently reading, just finished reading, or will start reading. 

Here is a picture of them stacked up (with a tired dog to boot in the background!). I felt this blog needed some more pictures, so here you go, a picture of books. I'm that nerdy.

Starting from a not pictured book:

The Princess Bride: I have been reading this book for awhile now. If you LOVE the movie, then read the book. I find it slow, but I think that's only because I'm still "meh" about the author's style. He will write an entire paragraph with only one sentence, and I hate long sentences like that. But I do love the story. If you don't like the movie, I doubt you'll like the book. 

Wicked: I'm borrowing this book from Nicole. I love the musical, which I have seen in full thanks to Youtube, so I thought I would read the book. Man, the book goes into MUCH more detail than the musical. That makes total sense, but man, I didn't think it would be THIS slow. So it's taking me longer than I expected to read this book. I do love the character Galinda in the book WAY more than in the musical. 

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet: I loved this book. LOVED IT. It takes place during WWII. Henry, a Chinese boy, is growing up in Seattle and attends a white school, where he meets the only other non-white student: a Japanese girl names Keiko. They form a strong friendship before she gets sent off to the Japanese prison camps. The story is bitter sweet (guess you couldn't have guessed that :) and focuses on them finding each other after she leaves. It's happy, sad, and warm and fuzzy without being a chick flick. My cousin Danny recommended it to me, so even boys like it. Highly, highly recommend. 

A Hopeful Heart: This story kind of reminds me of a non musical version of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. So if you like that movie, read this book! It's about a older woman who opens up a school for young girls out on the prairie, to teach them how to be a good rancher's wife. The story focuses on Tressa, a girl of good city breeding who gets sent out by her ungrateful aunt and uncle. It's definitely a chick flick, warm and fuzzy and has Christian themes (the author, Kim Vogel Sawyer, is a well known Christian author). I love this book. I just finished rereading it. And I will continue to read it. 

Divergent: My friend Cari recommended this book to me. I don't even really know what it's about. Cari said it's a lot like The Hunger Games, which I loved, so I thought I would give it a try. I'll let you know how I like it. 

The Hunger Games: I will be rereading this book as soon as I get started/finished on some of these others! While the themes in this book can be hard to digest for some people, I love how the series ends and it definitely makes you  think. 

The Omnivore's Dilemma: Here is what the back of the book says: "Today, buffeted by one food fad after another, America is suffering from what can only be described as a national eating disorder. Will it be fast food tonight, or something organic? Or perhaps something we grew ourselves? The question of what to have for dinner has confronted us since man discovered fire. But as Michael Pollan explains in this revolutionary book, how we answer it now, at the dawn of the twenty-first century, may determine our survival as a species. Packed with profound surprises, The Omnivore's Dilemma is changing the way Americans think about the politics, perils, and pleasures of eating." I have not read this book before, but I have read one of the other author's books, In Defense of Food. If you are at all interested in the basic science behind food, processed vs. organic, I would pick up this book or the other one I mentioned. It will definitely make you think about how and what you eat. 

Battle Royale the Novel: I haven't read this yet. I discovered this by reading some reviews of The Hunger Games. A few reviews mentioned that THG was a rip off of this book, written by a Japanese author and translated into English. All the reviews said BR was really good, so I thought I would pick it up. Apparently it is more graphic, though, so if THG was too rough for you, this might not be the book for you. 

Happy Reading!

Oncorhynchus nerka

I love seafood. I just do. And because I grew up in Seattle, I kind of got spoiled with it. Gladly. I will pretty much eat everything: calamari, clams, muscles, crab, lobster, fish, shrimp, etc. I just love seafood. Especially salmon. I love me some salmon!

Being from the wonderful PNW, I have never been without fresh seafood. I have even eaten it as fresh as you can get it. I have devoured clams that I myself dug up. I have even gobbled up crab that I helped bait and measure. FRESH SEAFOOD IS THE BEST. Why buy frozen stuff when there is plenty of yummy fresh stuff to behold? (I do, however make an exception with shrimp. I don't know why, but I'm ok with frozen shrimp). Well, I finally gave in. I had to buy frozen.

There are 3 grocery stores that I shop at here: the commissary, WalMart (very rarely, mind you), and Kroger. Of these 3, Kroger is the only one with fresh seafood. SAY WHAT? Ugh. Anyways, all they have is farm raised catfish, farm raised Atlantic salmon, and the occasional wild caught cod from Chile. Really? That's it? Yup, my friends, that's it. And since I just can't get myself to eat catfish (I love seafood, but white fish is only ok, I MUCH prefer salmon), and I am against farm raised fish, I can only buy fresh cod. It's an ok fish, but nothing compared to my Pacific Salmon.


A few days ago I just finally gave in and bought the only frozen Pacific Salmon Kroger had: sockeye salmon. I'm not going to pretend that I can tell the difference of taste between all the different salmon, because I really can't. So nothing against sockeye salmon, I was just sad that it was the only choice. And it only comes with 2 fillets. Why oh why? I WANT MY SALMON DARN IT!


I am SO GLAD I gave in! I had forgotten how much I loved the taste of good quality fish, even if it was frozen. My husband even complimented me, "It feels so good to finally eat something and not feel like a fat a**." (Is that a compliment, even? I'm not sure, but we'll go with it). Here's how I served it:


Mix together in a bowl:
about 2 tbls dijon mustard
about 1/3 cup sour cream (I just kept tasting until I liked the contrast)
extra virgin olive oil to taste
dried dill (didn't have fresh) to taste
dried parsley (didn't have fresh) to taste
salt and pepper


Cook the salmon, ON HIGH HEAT. It's been so long since I've cooked fish, I forgot how important that is. If you cook it on medium or medium high, you will get sashimi in the middle :)  It only takes about 3 minutes on each side (That's another reason I like fish, it cooks mighty quickly!).


I served the salmon with the sauce poured over the top and an artisan salad with cranberries, pine nuts, chopped bacon, and chopped mozzarella (didn't have feta or a similar cheese). It was a really good dinner! Super fast, super light, and super yummy! 


I love salmon :)

"I Know I'm Who I Am Today Because I Knew You"

Even though I have been struggling with a migraine ever since I first woke up this morning at 0300, I had this feeling that I just had to write all my thoughts down this morning. Hopefully the Excedrin and the coffee start cooperating for me.

On Wednesday night, my good friend Nicole and her husband got their assignment: C-130s to Little Rock! I'm so happy for them! But that also sent me a reality check: in one short month, I will be losing my other two good friends, Erin and Jaime, to C-130s also, and Nicole will probably leave in about 4 months. I have no idea what I'm going to do. It sucked when my college friend, Cari, left in Septmeber.

The hardest part about being a military wife (at least in my experience thus far), isn't necessarily moving to horribly small bases in the middle of nowhere in the hot Southern weather, but the fact that you lose friends just as quickly as you make them. Never underestimate the importance of good friends. Friends are the family that you get lucky enough to choose (although please note that I love all my family and won't replace them for anything, especially my sister and my cousins :), and they can make any place feel almost like home. I hated living here until I made friends. Ok, well I still hate living here, but it has become more bearable with friends. Our good friend Bryan from Portland and Cari from Idaho will never know how much of a live safer they were when we moved out here right before Matt left for Colorado for 3 weeks. Good friends make everything worthwhile.

With good friends, even the toughest situations can be made just a little easier. Even though I have gone through my fair share of horrible experiences, I can't say that I have ever had "the worst year of my life." As many of you know, in December of '98, when I was 11 years old, my seven year old brother Evan passed away from a nearly 5 year battle with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. That absolutely sucked, especially since it was 4 days before Christmas. As horrible as it was, we still celebrated Christmas- and while the numbness and pain was still there, surrounded by family, it was a little better than it could have been. I still remember having fun with my cousins that day. Even four months later, my parents, my sister and I traveled to Rhode Island during Spring Break just to get away. (Apparently it was funded by both sets of grandparents, they felt we needed a break and vacation). We stayed with my mom's second cousin there. I remember, even though the pain of my brother was still strong, that we had a fun time sightseeing . So even through the most horrible experience of my life, I still managed to smile and have fun after that. Because good friends and family can make any situation just a little bit better.

I'm so glad I had that experience when I was young. Of course I wish it had never happened, but I'm glad it happened then, and not know. Children are so resilient, my sister and I are living proof of that. We are well adjusted 20 somethings with college degrees, no major issues, and a husband a piece to boot :) It taught me how to adapt to horrible situations and be an optimist. Sometimes I take that a little far, I do admit, but mostly it's a good thing. Situations could always be worse. Take my current situation. I'm stuck down here in this horrid Southern heat and humidity. But I have so many things to be thankful for. I have a house, not an apartment. Sure, it's falling apart, but I have a lot of space and I get to leave it sooner rather than later (thank God for that!). My husband comes home every night. Sure, the time changes, and usually he has studying to do, or he had a bad flight so he's cranky, but he still comes home. I have a dog and a cat who are never short on cuddles. I have wonderful friends, among them Bryan, Nicole, Erin, Jaime, Jill, and Jessica. They  bake cupcakes with me, get coffee with me, have my dog's best friends, pick me up from places when the car breaks down, and generally just talk and hang out with me.

See? Life has it's definite downs, but it's friends and family that provide the ups. So cherish your friends and family, and never underestimate the awesomeness of having wonderful people surrounding you. I still don't know what I'll do when everyone leaves, but I know the other friends that I have that aren't leaving will still be there for support.

So thank you, friends and family, for all the love and comfort you have provided for me! I truly appreciate everything.

Tip-toeing Through the Tulips

So I actually don't have any tulips in my yard, but let's just pretend I do. For alliteration's sake.

Well, a storm be a brewin' on the home front, so I am inside, watching the thunderstorm, and blogging. Go me. I thought I would take some pictures of my flower garden today and share them, since my blog has been severely lacking in pictures as of late. 

It's hard to believe I took these pictures 3 hours ago. Currently, it's pitch black outside and pouring down rain.

Here I have vinca and petunias in one pot, marigolds that are busy puilding some blooms, and cilantro in the brown pot. If you are a beginner gardener, like myself, definitely try growing some vinca. At least down here in Mississippi, it grows like a weed and you don't have to do anything to it. Just plant it and watch it grow! It does like lots of water, though. They grow so much, along with the petunias, the vinca choked out the marigolds I also planted in the pot. 

You must excuse the fogginess. It's so humid here that the camera lens fogs up when you take it outside. Since I'm impatient, and had a 75 pound dog in the other hand, I didn't wait for the lens to adjust. So foggy it is. 

My beloved purple pot, with vinca and petunias, and thyme growing in a smaller purple striped pot

Jack had to sneak in

It's my dog's best side, really :)

Strategically placed on either side of the garage door, under the eaves so Southern storms such as the one we're experiencing now don't destroy them. 

Walkway to the front door. These are dark purple petunias and marigolds, with a struggling vinca up front

My "corner garden." I planted some snow pea seeds. The green pot has a purple calla lily, and I have some green onions, some basil, and mustard greens trying to grow in pots

My purple calla. The flowers don't open up very much, unfortunately

These little seedlings popped up from the potting soil from last year! When they get a little bigger I'll move them around so they're not random. They were a nice surprise!

The corner right by the front door. I have some day lilies, mint growing in the purple pot, and more vinca. And a dog. 

Jack always cleans up the sticks for me :)

Vinca!

Poor Huey is still not allowed outside. Sad day for him. 

Fuzzy fuzzy

He always goes for the dirt. Always. 

Hey bud!

Shrimp Fried Rice

Let me start off by saying that I am no expert in Asian cooking. I'm no expert in any cooking, really, but I'm definitely not an expert with the Asian cuisine. But I love to cook Thai food. Tonight I needed something fast and easy to make, so I came up with Shrimp Fried Rice. The rice cooker could do the rice, shrimp defrosts fast and cooks all in about 10 minutes, and I just chopped up all the leftover veggies in my fridge.

Here's what I did:

While the rice is cooking,

-Saute onions in vegetable oil until translucent. Then add the veggies you want. I added garlic (DUH!), green pepper, portabella mushrooms, and peas. Set aside.

-Scramble 3 eggs. Set aside.

-Salt and pepper the shrimp, then cook until done, about 4 or 5 minutes. Set aside.

-Add the rice to the saute pan. Add the sauce: 1 teaspoon chili powder, 3 tablespoons brown sugar, 2 tablespoons fish sauce, and 2 tablespoons soy sauce. Mix to combine. Then add all other ingredients. Sprinkle with green onions. Enjoy!

Oreo Cupcakes

Since I posted a picture of the Oreo cupcakes I made on Facebook, several people have asked for the recipe. Before I go on to the recipe, let us behold the wonderfulness again:

YUMMY IN MY TUMMY!

Ok, all seriousness, now. This is the recipe I used, with some slight changes. So no, it was not my own recipe. Unfortunately. Here is what I did differently:

-I used buttermilk instead of milk, only because I didn't have enough milk. While the cake was still good, I didn't like the hint of sourness the buttermilk adds (my taste tester pilots didn't even seem to care, though). So use real milk. I suggest the fattest milk you feel comfortable using (yummy yummy whole milk!), usually baking needs that extra fat in there to hold the cake together. 

-I also didn't have 24 Oreos in the batter. I only had 12. Only because the package didn't have 48 cookies in it (or maybe it did, I just ate some...). But to prevent that glutonous deadly sin from kicking in, I did not buy a second package. I thought the end result was fine, though. That's still a lot of quartered Oreos in the cupcake. 

-When it came to the frosting, I put the scrunched up Oreos IN the frosting, not sprinkled on top. It definitely takes away points for presentation (gray frosting is just not appealing), but I think it made the frosting taste like a crunched up Oreo. The boys didn't seem to mind, anyway. 

-Don't frost these cupcakes until you are ready to serve them. Because of the butter and cream cheese, the frosting needs to be refrigerated. I found that putting these cupcakes in the fridge made them rather dense. That might be from the buttermilk, but I'm not entirely sure. So I waited to frost them until right before I left to deliver them.

So, if you're looking to impress anyone, make these cupcakes. I walked into the flight room with about 15 pilots sitting around. I'm not kidding you, within 10 seconds of the cupcake container opened, 15 pilots were on their feet, each with a cupcake in their mouth. If that's not an indication that these cupcakes are delicious, I don't know what is. 

Happy baking!

It's Pina Colada Time!

Ok, seriously y'all, I have found Heaven on Earth. No, I haven't left Columbus, but I sure am if I drink enough of these here pina coladas, I can probably forget I'm in Columbus. But I'm only going to have 1, so sorry. I know it would entertain quite a few of you if I went on a drunken rant, but I have never done that, nor do I plan to start. I'm boring.

Anyways, the other day I came up with the idea that since Matt and I don't have too many financial strains on us and no small children, we should once a week pick a new drink to make, to give us something fun and creative to do. Yes, I mean the alcoholic type. Yumm-o. I mostly came up with this idea because we have yet to use our ice shaker. FOR SHAME.

I decided our first drink should be a Pina Colada. I have been craving these lately. Mostly because it's so dang hot. But I also thought it was appropriate, since our anniversary is coming upon us and we loved the pina coladas we drank in Vegas. We only had them twice by the pool, since we didn't have any money to spend, but I sure did enjoy those drinks. We have tried to recreate them, but have failed miserably.

NOT TONIGHT.

Paula Deen has triumphed in the making of the pina coladas! I only very slightly altered her recipe, so all copyright and kudos go to her. Thanks, Paula! These are super delicious. And as far as alcoholic beverages go, fairly cheap. You only need one type of alcohol (score one for the budget!), but I know a lot of people wouldn't use up the extra ingredients (unless you cook a lot with coconut milk, fortunately I do), so those might go to waste. Or you can just make a whole bunch of pina coladas. Yeah, do that. Don't store the leftovers. Just make more pina coladas.

Ingredients:

Ice
1/2 cup rum (here's my change: Matt and I used coconut rum: delish!)
1/2 cup coconut cream (look for this in the Mexican aisle of your grocery store. You will have to whisk this to make it all the same consistency)
1/4 coconut milk (yes, those are two different things, this one is found in the Asian section. I like the Thai Kitchen brand, since you don't have to stir it)
1/4 cup pineapple chunks (I used crushed pineapple, but same thing, really)

Add everything to the blender and puree! YUMMY! Garnish with pineapple slices and/or a maraschino cherry.