Bigger, Better, Best

Wheel-ly? Like, for wheel?

2012-01-25T11:54:00.000-06:00

^ Yes. That is the worst pun title of all time. But, it pales in comparison to what I am about to share.

Last night, something really important was on TV. State of the Union? Puh-leeze. How about the single most horrifying episode of Wheel of Fortune of all time ever?

I think Hubs' and my hearts could be heard breaking for this poor woman at least two blocks away. We were hysterical ~~(-ly laughing at)~~ for her. And good job to the guy on her left! Congrats and aloha!

My advice to this poor gal: take this opportunity to run away to an island, change your name and become a bartender. That's my plan should I ever encounter this situation. Hubs' even said he'd come with, so we're all set there.

Prior proper planning prevents piss poor performance! I have an escape plan for doing a bad job on Wheel and I hope you all do, too. This is important stuff, friends!

In which I eat cookies in the name of proper blogging

2012-01-18T19:54:00.001-06:00

Yesterday, I came to you with cookies-in-progress. Today, we have cookies-eaten. Here are the stats:

Hours since dough-making: 24
Frozen dough yield: 5 dozen + four (-two, consumed frozen)
First bake yield: six cookies
Second bake yield: four cookies

Cookie ranking system:
1: Would not eat again, even if someone else baked for me. Cookie failure.
2: Would eat again, if baked for me. Would not have seconds.
3: Would ask half-hearted-ly for recipe if cooked for me. Would not actually bake.
4: Would bake for myself. Would probably screw the recipe up due to consumption of two glasses of red wine.
5: Would bake for myself. Would pay attention during baking process.
6: Would bake for myself. Would share leftovers with co-workers. (aka Threshold for Sharing << a pivotal point in this ranking system)
7: Would bake for a party. Would eagerly anticipate praise.
8: Would bake regularly, hoping the recipe became a signature dish.
9: Potential to over-bake this cookie. Over-baking in this case = baking these cookies like all the time, not baking until burnt.
10: Boo-yah. Cookie nirvana.

First bake cookies (the dough right after being refrigerator for 24 hours): 3 - cookies were dry, puffy and wicked lame.

Second bake cookies (after dough had been frozen for two hours): 7 - cookies were more melty, less puffy, mo' bettah.

Frozen dough: 10 - frozen cookies are available for on-the-spot consumption AND freshly-made 7s are available within 15 minutes.

Five hot cookies and two frozen cookies later, you're welcome.

Boatload of cookies

2012-01-17T19:48:00.000-06:00

Right now, chilling in my fridge, I have approximately five pounds of cookie dough. Per One Lovely Life, this lump of rawness will soon become the tastiest chocolate chip cookies this side of the Mississippi. Yep, I'm jumping on the bandwagon (thank you, Pinterest!) and making the New York Times chocolate chip cookies.

Here's my beef so far with this recipe: the dough has to sit for 24-72 hours! How is a cookie-loving gal such as myself supposed to wait it out like that?

Obviously, I'm only going to be able to hold out for the minimum 24 hours, but I'll report back as soon as I've done the proper research (aka, eaten a boatlod of cookies).

I'm also going to try rolling half of the dough into balls and freezing it, because as much as I'd love to OD on chocolate chip cookies, I think it's in my best interest to pace myself. Luckily, Pinterest supplied me with a how-to on that as well.

Dumplings Gone Wild

2012-01-16T12:33:00.000-06:00

Last Saturday, it was just barely snowing and we decided to make us of our giant steamer for only the third time since we bought it more than two years ago. Dumpling Mania 2012 was on!

But first, a sale on kale (did that make you as happy as it just made me?) led us to the least appetizing-looking appetizer of all time: kale chips. We just laid the pieces out, sprinkled with olive oil and Mural of Flavor from Penzey's spices and toasted them at 350 degrees for 10 minutes.

They tasted about 10 million times better than they looked.

For the dumplings, Hubs and I used a simple recipe based on a few different dumpling recipes we found online.

1 pound of ground pork
1 1/2 tablespoons light soy sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 table spoon apple cider vinegar (because we realized too late we were out of rice wine vinegar)
2 cloves of garlic, minced

2 inches of ginger, smushed
NO hoisin sauce, though I was a big proponent of this
8 scallions, chopped

We mixed all that together and filled up dumpling wrappers. Into the steamer they went for about 15-20 minutes.

While they steamed, we got rolling on two sauces: a peanut butter chili sauce and soy-based sauce.

The peanut butter sauce was just 1 cup warmed peanut butter (use a double boiler!) and chili oil (3 table spoons). It made WAY more than we needed.

Our soy sauce was also simple, soy and scallions, with a little apple cider vinegar and sesame oil.

We also steamed a sweet potato, so we could feel just a smidge healthier about all this pork and salt.

It was delightful!

In general, Hubs and I aren't great Asian cooks, but we can do dumplings. It doesn't hurt that it's one of the all-time easiest dishes to make ever.

Pardon our less-than-chic dinner ware, the good old divided plate just made for the most utilitarian choice for our two dips. What can I say, we are not fancy folks.

Have you tried making dumplings at home? What the heck else should we be using this steamer for?

What we're up to

2012-01-10T18:13:00.000-06:00

Ignoring the 60 degree weather.

Enjoying my favorite chair.

Lookin' mad thug in a hoodie from the Target dollah aisle.

You?

Birthday bupkis

2012-01-09T21:07:00.001-06:00

Loyal readers may recall my annual tradition of whipping up something disastrous for Hubs' birthday. Obviously, I don't mean to eff things up so much, but I think the pressure of birthday baking just makes me crack.

This year, I went for a key lime cake. Hubs recently discovered a love of key lime pie, but you know, a birthday pie sounds less than thrilling. I Googled until I found a recipe that sounded about right and set about gathering my mise en place.

(Totally. Like using the phrase mise en place makes me sound like I know what the hell I'm doing, which, in case you lost track - I do not.)

Fancy French words ~~that I learned from Bravo shows~~ notwithstanding, I effed the shizzle (pardon my French) outta that poor cake.

I also did not use key limes because the store didn't have any. So there. The whole truth.

A rare sight, me (in profile no less!) looking seven kinds of domestic! Have I told you how much I love our new camera? It makes me look as good in pictures as I do striking a pose in front of the bathroom mirror.

The glaze was a simple lime juice plus powdered sugar. It had a heck of a tangy punch.

And the finished product. It sure looks purdy, and I was proud enough to force a parade of well-wishers to have a piece and toast to mon mari (more! French!). This proved a mistake.

The cake was dense and barely cooked, even though the damn toothpick came out cleanly. Our friends were polite and finished their slices, bless their hearts.

At least some palettes are better suited to super tart undercooked cake:

For those of you playing along at home, that's birthday baking: 3, Alexson: 1. Here's to 2013!

Knitja unmasked

2012-01-07T17:17:00.000-06:00

A while back, I had the delusion that I could whip up two ruched, West Elm knock-off blankets in time for Christmas. I ordered 26 skeins of worsted mushroom colored yarn and got to knitting.

100 hours and at least one million stitches later, I finally had one blanket that a full-sized human could properly snuggle beneath. I can reveal it to you now because no one got these for Christmas. I only finished one and it became a birthday present for my mom whose birthday is conveniently two weeks after Christmas (Happy birthday! I hope mail-arrival time is prior to blog-reading time, Mom. If not, well then - surprise!), which is perfect for harried, hand-crafting daughters.

Poor Hubs' mom won't be getting hers until March, assuming I can stay on top of my game. But, I think it's totally worth the wait. I mean, look how pretty!

So, my first blanket is in the books. It took a LOT longer than I had anticipated, but it was a good and simple pattern so I only collapsed in frustration once.

I used this pattern and was really happy with the simplicity of it. It was definitely an easy project to do while carrying on conversations, watching TV or flying. Some projects are so complex with the counting and the intricate stitches that I need near silence to make progress, but this was just garter, garter, garter, knit, pearl, knit and voila!

What's the biggest DIY present you've ever given? Was it on time? Teach me your secrets!

Happy birthday, Hubster!

2012-01-06T09:00:00.000-06:00

The most cat-lovingest, beer brewing, DIY maniac of a Hubs is celebrating his birthday this very day!

I love when birthdays fall on Fridays, don't you?

Pimp My Office: Chalk Hearts are for the Birds (plus glitter!)

2012-01-05T18:30:00.000-06:00

Last Christmas break, I spent hours tearing down heinous 80s wallpaper and painting the tiny room where I spend 40+ hours a week. But, I wasn't done pimpin' this little home away from home, no siree!

So, me and two office mates spent one afternoon over break at the office - not futzing with spreadsheets and Hootsuite bulk uploads - but getting our Martha on.

Behold: our masterpiece (my co-workers have similar branded office art now, too).

Yeah, it's a chalkboard heart and torch (the logo 89% of you can positively associate with the American Heart Association) - surrounded by RED GLITTER PAINT!

Do you have any idea how much red glitter paint can make a crafty Heart Association employee squeal? A lot.

I also added some functional art in the form of a magnetic bird that Hubs' parents picked up for me as a Christmas present. It sits over my desk, along with my handy (and free!) deadline clothesline and the amazing Ork heart poster I fell in love with last spring.

Clearly, this office is not short on personality.

Do you get to snazz up your workspace? How have you incorporated glitter into your professional life?

Twelve Tidys: Basement Workshop

2012-01-04T18:01:00.000-06:00

Get crazy, wicked excited, please: I'm starting a new monthly series on this silly little blog called the Twelve Tidys (ba da ba BAH!). Every month, I'll be tackling one hideous, horrible, very bad mess and whipping it into shape using only my very fragile sense of organization (and Hubs for brute strength and lots of mismatching tupperware).

First up, our junk-filled workshop in the basement. It was crammed with all the left-overs of the basement project because after we finished, we couldn't bring ourselves to do much of anything, especially clear away the debris. So, we worked around it. Hubs brewed his beer and I just kept digging through the mess to find screws, goggles and other random supplies for DIY projects. It was bad.

We needed to find a home for all the tools, materials and brewing supplies. In a fit of domesticity and gender-normative behavior, I told Hubs that he needed to keep all that stuff on his side (the side with the unpainted floor), while laundry and pantry items, plus anything hidden in an old oak armoir we had, was welcome on my side.

That blue shelf and all the coupon-bought things it holds is my pride and joy. Judge not.

Seedy-underbelly no more!

Not only is it clean as a whistle, but that five gallon white bucket? That's full of homemade wine, suckas! We live in heaven!

A surprisingly small amount of all that clutter was actual trash or Goodwill-able, so I'd say about 80% of it is still here, though you'd never know it.

Want to hop on the neurotic organization wagon with me? Share a link in the comments.

All the trimmings

2012-01-03T16:30:00.000-06:00

Our little living and dining rooms had suffered for too long with unsightly trim. Mismatched and unloved, the trim wasn't doing much to help our admittedly neglected upstairs. And so it was that Hubs and I pulled our painting clothes out and set to beautifying the badness.

As if an ugly stain wasn't enough, this poor slice of baseboard got all dripped on by myself, way back when I didn't even know to to edge without one of those horrible plastic slider things.

Believe it or not, Hubs and I actually applied the lighter stain and declared it good. Oh, we were such DIY punks in 2009.

Again, we applied the lighter stain and felt OK with that. We must have been drunk.

We decided to pull up the quarter-round and replace it because trying to paint around it seemed like a lot more work than making a few cuts and spending $20 at Menards.

After two coats of primer and three of paint (and two meatball subs and one costume change), we had afters that we could finally be proud of!

The whole shebang.

How bright and happy!

Seriously, I spent the better part of the next day just staring at the match-y-ness of this section.

I'm so jazzed to finally have paid some attention to this room. It hadn't seen any major updates since we painted it about two weeks after moving in. Now, with our crisp white trim, I'm ready to get crack-a-lackin' on making this, the most used room in our house, a little more punchy and rad.

What was your final DIY of 2011?

Droppin outta high school, straight into the pros

2012-01-02T16:42:00.002-06:00

It's entirely possible that Nelly was not talking about cameras in this song.

Happy 2012, friends! I'm coming off a most glorious 11-day weekend which was at once productive and highly relaxing. One of the highlights: being gifted this sweet little Canon T3i by my ma 'n pa. I have absolutely zero idea how to use it aside from the point-and-shoot settings, but I'm sure it will be just a matter of time before I catch on.

I think I need more mirrors in my house and fewer self-portraits in the powder room.

It's my goal to play along with these fabulous tutorials, even though the 12 weeks are long gone. Just putzing around can only take a gal so far.

So, the real question is: how many pictures of cats can I take before it gets weird?

Just kidding. Anyone else get a snazzy camera for the holidays? What tips and tricks should I be reading up on?

Happy holidays, from my blog to yours!

2011-12-13T17:11:00.000-06:00

I can't even lie, y'all. I am checked out of blogging this Christmas. Work is busy gearing up for Heart Month in February (because I think January lasts maybe three hours and then BAM! Busiest time of the year) and I'm spending every spare second soaking up all the festivness one gal can (festiveness does equal that marshmallow-flavored vodka, right?). Plus, I've got my eyes on the prize: nine succulent days off between the holidays in which I'll be staying up late, eating lots of pizza and playing more (active) video games than any 9 year old on my street. And painting the trim in the living room, which is sure to be a par-tay and a half.

I haven't been posting much because honestly, the holidays are SO MUCH about tradition for me. We decorated the same and baked the same cookies and watched the same movies so it hardly seems worth it to rehash it all on this poor blog. If you want to see how I'm rollin' this Christmas, just check out last year's posts (minus all the body-wracking-sob-inducing stories of the basement reno (from Hell!)) and that about sums up not only this Christmas, but many before and many after.

One new thing I have this year is a gift to all of you.

Here it is:

And that my friends is what I call the beauty of the flippin' season.

Finally not a redneck

2011-12-01T12:24:00.000-06:00

Here we are: December 2011. My Christmas lights have been up on my house for one full year and it's officially not awkward anymore if anyone sees them during the day.

It wasn't even that painful, but I do fear this is the start of a very slippery slope. What's next for us lazybones? Leaving the blow-up pool out all winter? Rotting pumpkins on the doorstep until they biodegrade back to the land? Trucks with horns on the grill? ~~Gold teeth? Ill-conceived tattoos? A growing propensity for High Life Lites when cutting the grass or baking cookies?~~

Damn it.

Please keep an eye on us.

Beer for dinner

2011-11-21T20:46:00.001-06:00

Being the loyal Bigger, Better, Best reader that I know you are, you've born witness to the culinary creations made my Hubs, me and our friend Guy. We're the proud creators of Oktoberfest pizza, Thanksgiving pizza and the home version of Chopped. We're bloomin' food geniuses up in here, friends.

This past weekend, we got a hankerin' for kitchen tinkerin'. The theme for this one was a three-course beer dinner. Here's what we came up with:

Round One:
The booze? Crispin cider
The dish? Ok, so, you know chicken fries at BK? Well, these are pork fries in a tempura/Crispin batter, covered in: cumin gouda, green onions, dried cranberries and a sauce containing the following effed up shizzle: horseradish, cinnamon applesauce, more Crispin, dijon mustard and curry powder.

Did you just gag a little? Well, seriously guys, gag not. This was amazing. It all worked somehow and we were quite taken with this dish. It was like nachos, but classed up and on meat overdrive. Which sounds really appetizing, right?

Round Two:

The beers? Widmer IPA and Murphy's Stout

The dish? We poached orange roughy in the IPA and made a risotto with the stout and some mushrooms. The sauce is a lemon and caper mayonnaise. It was good, but not very photogenic.

Round Three:

The beer? Bell's Porter

The dish? A hodge podge. Now, it is important to remember that we were obviously having healthy samples of all these beers as we dined and so by the time we were ready to make dessert, I was feeling a tad impish. I took a chocolate cake mix, subbed in porter for water and dumped in a boat load of hot cinnamon and cayenne. Hubs tried to scoop some of the cayenne out, but I just put it back in. I'm a sneaky chef.

We topped it with a porter and chocolate ganache and served it up with some Ben and Jerry's Cinnamon Buns. The cake was more warm and roasty tasting than spicy and I can attest to it's deliciousness as I took the leftovers to work today and received hundreds of glowing compliments.

Plus, this might be the single most enticing food picture I have ever taken.

We did decide in the course of this dinner that we desperately need a fourth food-minded person to attend these loopy dinner parties because no one, even you dear reader, ever believes us when we recant the wonders of the tastiness of our meals.

We're taking applications.

Benched

2011-11-14T20:44:00.000-06:00

A few weeks ago, I snagged this darling little stool from my aunt's basement. It used to my part of my Grandma's vanity, but it has clearly seen better days.

I had big plans to slap a fresh coat of crisp white paint on the wood and do the top in a bold, modern green, but the prospect of painting and sanding all those curves frankly exhausted me. Finding a snazzy burlap print on sale for $6/yard didn't help.

And so, Hubs and I headed outside on our anniversary weekend to take up a past time long forgotten around these parts: I stand around in inappropriate footwear, hold the giant T-square and lean on things so the circular saw doesn't slip and Hubs does the measuring.

Typical.

We used a nice cushy memory foam from Hancock ($7 for a giant rectangle - thank you, friends and family sale!) and spent about 20 minutes stapling fabric to the plywood.

So, for about an hour's worth of shopping, cutting and waxing + $15 = we had a bench. Perfect for thuggish cats to perch on and affect the facial position of those weird little kids dressed like adults in portraits from the 1700s.

Seriously. Don't you see the resemblance between crazy Niles and that little creepster on her lap?

Bad at math, good at champagne drinking

2011-11-10T14:19:00.001-06:00

This about sums up our three-day anniversary weekend, I'd say. This particular pour was from a bottle we bought on our first anniversary trip to Napa last fall. Ain't we a classy pair? (as demonstrated by my artful use of black and white on my camera phone)

So, I have this handy countdown/countup app on my phone that tells me how many days it's been since our lovely wedding (also! It tells me exactly how many days I must wait before I'm strolling French side streets, eating macaroons and coveting French girls' boots) and I'm constantly wishing Hubs a happy 481st or 667 or 715 day-a-versary.

You might see my strategy in this. If every day is a something-versary, there is always a reason to celebrate, no? What can be said? I like to keep a good party going.

So, imagine my surprise when our two-year anniversary also landed on our 730 day-a-versary! How fun is that, I thought. How magical.

Until I came to my senses and realized that - like duh-oy - 365+365=730. Goodbye, magic.

Here's what is magical:

A random turret plopped in Winterset, Iowa in 1926 to commemorate the Clark family, who were among the first crazies to live way out here.

Having the turret to ourselves and ending up with a photo that somehow looks like we were in Scotland in 1974.

Things worth celebrating are everywhere these days!

Knitja

2011-11-06T14:18:00.000-06:00

Living out of town from all my family is good for one thing: stealthy holiday knitting projects. I imagine that if my mom lived 20 minutes away, she'd be apt to stop by and more likely than not, she would catch a glimpse of my top-secret holiday knitting. With her safely a 16-hour drive away, I'm free to leave my yarn and needles scattered throughout the house with not a care in the world.

(Note to family: am I knitting you something? Or is this a giant ploy to steer you in the wrong direction? Only time will tell.)

I'm super jazzed about my next stealthy, yarn-fueled endeavor. I found an awesome (and free! and easy!) pattern on Ravelry and can't wait to get my knit on, yo. I'm hoping these are easy to crank out because I really, very much would like one for myself.

I'm considering your interest to be piqued, readers. As such, I will share details and the pattern post-holidays. Unless you are a knitter and looking for a simple but face-meltingly awesome gift to give, in which case, leave your email in the comments and I will pass this pattern your way, too.

Also, can we just take a moment and admire the post title here? I'm bizarrely proud of it. (What do you call a sneaky knitter? A knitja. A knitting ninja. Hiiiiii-yaaaa!)

Family holiday

2011-11-04T16:03:00.000-05:00

Next Monday, Hubs and I will celebrate two whole years of marriage. We decided way back when we were new at this married gig that we'd treat November 7 like a family holiday, which basically means we take the day off work and do whatever we want. This year, it's shaping up to look a lot like this:

Best day of the ye-ar!

Over our long weekend, we're hitting up a preview of a local cheese shop (also, I believe Des Moines' first cheese shop and a place I plan on frequenting like all the damn time), having a game night at a friend's place, getting massages (treat yo self!), having fires, possibly reupholstering a tiny bench (because nothing says romance in this house quite like some primer and a staple gun) and capping the whole extravaganza off with dinner at the best (also, only!) French restaurant in Windsor Heights.

This family holiday is all about celebrating the ups and being grateful we were there for each other in the downs of the past two years and looking forward to a very upp-y third year of rocking at life as husband and wife.

So, Hubs: here's to us! And to many, many more happy years. May they be filled with love, joy, gratitude, and like everything else good in this world, cheese.

Cheers!

Halloween let down

2011-10-31T17:28:00.000-05:00

Halloween in Des Moines is straight up bizarre. There are very set times for trick or treating and they almost never fall on actual Halloween. They call it Beggars' Night and it looks like this:

It's almost never on actual Halloween, which is a definite buzzkill. For us, it was last night.
Sanctioned trick or treating lasts from 6-8pm ONLY. No surprise high schoolers in masks at 10:00 'round these parts.
Kids expect to tell jokes. (Really, this one doesn't bother me because I remember always having a joke ready for those few stubborn old folks who wouldn't give me a Reese's without hearing a lame knock-knock joke first)

No matter how long I've been here or how much I flat-out love this place, nothing about Beggars' Night will ever make sense to me.

Add to this cultural conundrum the fact that I live on what I can only assume is the least fun street in the entire city. It's a long, long block and I can see about seven houses in either direction. You know how many had our lights on last night? Three. Three measly little houses catering to just seven groups of kids.

Bah humbug, Des Moines!

Here at Bigger, Better, Best, we refuse to go down without a fight and we shall keep our Halloween humor til the last.

28.5% of the kids who came to out door declared a definite desire to say hi to the kitties, which was not met with matched enthusiasm by the cats.

Our jacks!

We made spooky scene with a giant spider and paper bats that flew around on fishing line. They looked pretty awesome in the wind, but where tough to capture in pictures.

Dracula showing off his teeth.

I've got to know: Is your Des Moines neighborhood so lonely at Halloween? Out-of-towners: can I sell you 7 lbs of candy for real cheap?

Cookies you make when it's autumnal out-of-doors

2011-10-26T18:19:00.000-05:00

First off, thank you readers for your thoughtful words on my last post. You are just the sweetest.

Second off, and speaking of sweets, I need to share with you this recipe, which came my way via Pinterest, which is the source of far too many outlandishly amazing fusion dessert ideas for this gal.

For instance: caramel apple cookies. Oh!

I tried unsuccessfully with three cookies to take photos beautiful enough to show you how delectable these gems are. My low success rate is due in part to my heavy reliance on a camera phone as well as the fact that, in actual life, these cookies looked too good to be merely admired and so I showed them the proper respect and ate them post haste.

For a more accurate visual account, please refer to the original recipe post, linked above in Paragraph Two.

For a more accurate digestive account, please make these cookies, microwave them for 8 seconds before consuming and report back.

Your urgency in this matter is appreciated.

A life well satisfied

2011-10-23T13:22:00.000-05:00

Last weekend, my family gathered in a hospital room to be with our Nana, who had been sick for a while and late last week, took a turn for the worst. We sat with her, ate pizza, played Sequence and told stories. Sunday afternoon, Hubs and I began the drive from St. Louis back to Des Moines. About half way there, my sister called and asked me to turn around. I did and about 30 minutes after I got back in the hospital room and just one inning shy of the Cardinals securing their spot in the World Series, Nana passed away peacefully.

It's been a hard week with lots of little logistical frustrations made worse by our raw grief and coming to terms with what happened that night. But, through the sadness, we've been able to see the small signs and signals which remind us that someone is most definitely looking out for our family. It began with me spotting a billboard on my drive down for a podunk little airline - the same one that would later fly me over the hospital and return me to my family at the exact right time. It continued with a "Welcome" balloon given to Nana when she moved into a nursing home a few weeks ago rushing out of the car and sailing away as my Mom arrived at the church for the funeral. It happened again at the cemetery, where we arrived early, allowing my sister to be near her phone when, at the originally scheduled burial time, she got a phone call with good news about a potential job.

Small though these are, they have given me and my family the peace we need to move forward. We'd known this was coming for a while; Nana was diagnosed with cancer about 18 months ago. Thanks to her medicine and the care my Mom gave her, she was able to enjoy much of that time. If you look at her obituary, you'll see we asked for donations for the Chronic Disease Fund in lieu of flowers. That's the non-profit that paid for her meds, which was one of the greatest gifts we could have received. They help with medical costs for all kinds of chronic diseases: cancer, MS, heart failure, ALS and more. The treatments for these diseases can be incredibly expensive and can wipe out savings in just a few months in some cases.

Now, go send your Nana a letter. If she's anything like mine, she'll stash it away with all the others. Nanas are excellent stashers, as well as superb readers, skilled free-drink-getters, perfect knowers of current events, really good salad connosuiers and irreplaceable encouragers.

Wherein smartphones save my basement

2011-10-04T21:49:00.000-05:00

I've lived in a different town from my parents for the past ten years. In that decade, I've taken up residence in four different places in Des Moines and it seems like every time they visit, we take on some tiny project that invariably requires a trip to Ace Hardware. From fixing a broken futon sophomore year to getting nails to hand pictures in our first house, family time is also fixin' time.

(Fun Fact: I'd totally forgotten that Hubs clued my dad into his plans to ask me to marry him at our neighborhood Ace. If our life was a movie, that scene would have had some definite foreshadowing music.)

This time, we were hellbent on hanging our TV on the swivel mount we bought back in February, when a finished basement was but a distant dream. The mount itself weighs about 80 pounds since we wanted the fully swivle-able kind, so we had to do some serious drilling.

The sight of all these half inch holes in the drywall I had so lovingly hung, mudded and sanded broke my poor little heart.

It was here that we first ran into problems. Having wired the basement on our own, we kind of knew where wires were. We had placed them behind thick metal stoppers under studs so we wouldn't do something stupid like drill a half inch hole into a wire and have to re-electrify the entire basement and heavily self-medicate for the next six months.

So when that middle hole was blocked by metal, we got nervous. We knew the metal plates where much larger than the area where there was actual wire (or in this case, cable), so we needed to figure out if the wire was truly behind where the hole needed to be or if we were good to just bust through the metal since that particular half inch wasn't protecting anything.

Problem was, it was really hard to see through the tiny cable box opening to see down inside the wall.

Luckily, Dad saved the day with his idea to angle his phone in the cable opening and snap a few photos.

Just so you know, we tried all four of our phones, hoping for better angles and it seems my Mom's Motorola was the skinniest and therefore best suited to getting the perfect shot. Just in case you ever find yourself in this exact same situation, which I'm sure you will.

Here is the inside of our basement wall in all its glory.

We were safe! The hole missed the cable by about an inch and a half, so we kept on keepin' on.

Good job, guys!

Once we got that figured out, it was a group effort to get the bracket mounted and then place the TV, but now we have a bar-worthy TV set up.

The entertainment stand is now looking pretty naked without that honkin' TV sitting on it, so I'm on the prowl for something cute to jazz it up. I'm thinking seasonal crafty-things would be good, but I haven't seen anything that slays me just yet.

Agree or disagree: hanging TVs is a terrifying experience?

The $5 fix

2011-09-29T21:24:00.000-05:00

With my dear and darling Ma and Pa visiting us this weekend, I decided to get my tookus in gear and fix up the woebegone wall I shared last week. The fact that I scored three $1.47 frames from a Target clearance rack also helped.

Better, right? I'm no professional, but I see vast improvement and the darker frames add good balance and I'm pretty sold on them because they required no painting and were ca-ra-ra-ra-zy cheap. This is what we in the decorating world call "justifying."

We've got a nice shot from our first anniversary outing to Russian River Brewery.

The best fortune ever written, placed on some scrapbooking paper from the Hob Lob.

It says "You are the greatest in the world!" and it makes me quite happy.

I learned while we were engaged that if you send the President a wedding invite, he will send you a nice congratulatory card. I framed ours because it seems so quaint and like something grannies would do.

Yes, these are all camera-phone pictures taken in the dead of night. I not only never claimed to be a decorator, I also never claimed to be a photographer or person with enough patience to find the camera and wait for daylight.

Not bad for a $5 project, right?

Dirty Little Secret

2011-09-22T21:23:00.000-05:00

For as much as I blather on and on about doing awesome kitchen things like making my own cheese and stockpiling homemade cinnamon rolls, I'm actually a sad little mess when it comes to making main dishes on my own. That's Hubs' job. I'll help here and there, but the concept and execution is just not my gift.

True fact: I have ruined the following dishes in my culinary lifetime (in chronological order): Pop Tarts, Kraft mac and cheese, instant mashed potatoes, couscous, all manner of chicken dishes, tuna salad,breakfast-for-dinner, etc. My epic kitchen failures far out way my triumphs, but I choose to think those who love me find this endearing and good for their waist-lines.

This week, Hubs decided to play soccer with fellow science folk after work, which meant I was - at the last minute - left to my own devices in the kitchen.

Here's how it went down, internal monologue style:

(looking through pantry and fridge, calm as all get out) Hmm. Seems like Hubs won't be home for a while. It'd be so nice of me to have something at least started so he can finish cooking this dinner. Because surely he'll be home soon and I won't have to actually think up and make an entire dinner. Surely!

(I find a giant bag of rice) Oh! We never make rice, even though we buy rice like hoarders. I'll start some rice.

Rice and (look in the fridge) green onions? carrots? frozen veggies? bacon? No, That doesn't even sound right. Let's try the old freezer and see what happens.

(sneaky peeky in the freezer) Chicken! Rice and chicken - that's a real thing. Hmm. Rice and chicken and bacon? No. No. Get off the bacon train. Rice and garden tomatoes? Perhappppps. Oh, but self! How's about some kind of southwestern chicken bake! We have gross condensed cream of chicken soup in the back of the pantry. This sounds familiar! This might become food!

(Google how to thaw a chicken, make sure I use the USDA regulations and not some shady blogger's tips)

(Google "southwestern chicken and rice bake" because if that doesn't sound like real food real people in real kitchens make, I don't know what does. Find this.) Get crackin'!

And so I followed the recipe and made dinner. And it was ready right as Hubs got home. And everyone liked it and it was officially added to the list of things we can eat for dinner. And I spent the rest of the night basking in the glow of main dish success.

And that is the story of how I made my very first dinner for poor old Hubs since we got married in 2009.

The end.