Something smells

Mike: "Do you smell something?"

Me: "It's probably just the glue from the craft project I was working on."

Mike: "No, it smells like something's burning."

Me: "Nope, I don't smell that - I haven't turned the oven on all day."

Mike: "It really smells! It's really strong! What the heck is it?"

Me: "I donno, I don't smell it at all!"

Me: "You're eyelashes look funny, you've got a bunch of dust or something on them."

Mike: "Ohh! I know! I must have burned my eyelashes when I was working on the stove. As I was installing it I leaned over the top and accidentally turned on a burner and - I didn't realize it - that's what smells."

Me: "Bah! You're right! You only have half of your eyelashes on your right eye!!"

Mike's always been known for his long eyelashes - longer than mine even with seven billion coats of mascara (I've always hoped all our kiddos inherit his) and sure enough, Mike had singed his lashes as he was installing the stove over the weekend and when I stuck my nose right up to them, they smelled like burnt hair.

Problem solved.

And bonus, our stove's in! Small price to pay, wouldn't you say? (As long as they grow back.)

House projects - just double it

Does it bug anyone else how long it takes to do a house project? You do all your research - checking out five different internet sites, talking to a couple of "handy" friends and asking the guys at Home Depot what they think. After hearing all their opinions, you schedule off three hours to complete the project.

But no. It always ends up taking twice that much. Why in the world is that?

Homemade Granola

I've been making this recipe for as long as I can remember. My mom always made it in HUGE batches at home because our family gobbled it up so fast. She had this industrial-sized bowl and pan that she would make it in - I believe she doubled or maybe even tripled the recipe. The base recipe is already ginormous- it keeps Mike and I fed for a couple of weeks so that's A LOT of granola. 

Recently, I've been on a Greek yogurt kick - so I've been combining Greek yogurt, honey and this granola for a divine morning treat. It's great with a few blueberries or raspberries thrown in, but I've been trying to refrain until summer for that - berries are a lil spendy this time of year. Mike likes it best with just milk. To each their own.

I know there are a lot of granola recipes out there, with tons of different "healthy" variations in there, but I think this makes for a great base recipe and you can easily jazz it up with nuts, raisins or any kind of fruit. Try it out with any combination of the above and see how you like it best.

Homemade Granola

Ingredients:

6 cups old fashioned oats

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp. salt

2/3 cup honey

2/3 cup canola oil

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 300*F.

2. In large bowl combine oats, brown sugar, cinnamon and salt. In another bowl, combine honey and oil. Pour honey/oil mixture over the oat mixture and stir (or mix with your hands) until well-combined. 

3. Pour mixture into a large baking sheet and spread into an even layer.  Bake 40 minutes, stirring once halfway through. (Careful, this part can be messy!) Remove from oven and cool completely. You'll need to stir the mixture at least once while it cools -it hardens and will stick to the pan and be difficult to break up. 

Store in an air-tight container.

Still recuperating

Over the weekend my sisters (fine, sister-in-laws) came up to Minneapolis to spend a weekend with me. We did what girls do best: eat, talk and shop. Possibly in that order -- though we did get massages too -- and that might make the top of the list.

Although we had what you would call a "relaxing weekend," I'm still recuperating and nursing my tired eyes with a tall coffee. I'll be back later this week, but for now, I need a bit of time to snap back to reality.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

For a long time I was exactly 25 percent Irish. That is, until this past weekend. Mike, my mom, my sister-in-law and I went down to see my Grandma and as we were visiting, she showed us a bunch of photos of when she was young.

As she was going along, she casually pointed to a picture and said, "That's my dad, he was Irish, and there's my mom - the Dutch."

DUTCH?

"Wait Grandma, I thought you were 100 percent Irish. You always said you were Irish, talked how you love being Irish, and you even used to have a shamrock over your garage. You're Irish."

"That's because I've never told you I'm half Dutch. I just like to say I'm Irish."

My own mother was just as shocked as I was. How can someone just choose which nationalities they are?

But, I suppose when you're a Grandma, you can do anything you like.

Still, my entire heritage, my history, my world was flipped upside down last Saturday.

St. Patty's Day will never again be the same now that I'm only an eighth Irish.

It feels like I shouldn't even celebrate it any more. I need to go get some wood shoes and get in touch with my Dutch side instead.

Spring cleaning

Recently, I've just been feeling like I'm in need of a good spring cleaning. 

My body, mind and heart. I just feel like total yuck, you know?

I think all those winter doldrums are getting to me. I feel like a stuffed turkey, I haven't breathed fresh air in four months, I'm unmotivated to work on projects around the house and I'm addicted to The Bachelor. 

Ugh. That last one took a lot of effort to admit to all of you. 

Anyway, do you ever feel like this after winter? Like you, yourself, needs a full revamp? 

My mom's always called it "out of sorts" and I love that term. It's how you feel when well, you don't know how you feel. You just feel like you're in a funk. You're not unhappy, depressed or anything like that. You just feel like you're in a constant state of -

Drrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...

See? Nothing comes to mind. You're just kinda funky feeling. 

That's where I'm at. I'll snap out of it I'm sure, but it always takes a bit of work. Mostly, it starts with getting back on track with my faith, and everything flows from there. It's weird, because usually I just get to this breaking point, where I'm just sick of feeling like my thighs won't fit in my car, my brain will burst if I read another blog and my house is in such disarray I can't find my kitchen table. It's then that I actually start getting excited about getting back on track. I get motivated to get motivated and then somehow, someway, I'm back to being me. 

I realize this is a pretty candid post - but I also realize I can't be the only one that feels like this every once in a while. What tricks do you use to give yourself a "spring cleaning?"

Everything in moderation

The other night I ate my weight in Frito's. 

I don't even know why. But I didn't feel guilty for one second of it. I absolutely, hands down, over-the-moon loved eating each and every one. 

Do you ever have those days where you don't  care what the nutritional value is of what you eat? You literally just want - no need - to eat something horrible for you? Women, I know you're with me. Men, stop judging me - you'll never understand the female mind (and body) when it comes to food. Just stop reading here. 

Typically with junk food, I'll feel a little bit bad as I'm contemplating eating it, and really bad after eating it. But no, this time, I weighed out whether or not I really needed it and how I felt about it. 

I quickly decided that I did, and that it would feel good. 

So, I promptly pulled off the interstate on my way home from work to pick up a bag of Frito's from the closest gas station.

It was just one of those days. I was stressed out, I had a headache, it had been a long day, I hadn't even had a drip of coffee touch my lips, I had a busy night ahead, and I knew I wasn't going to be eating until at least 7:30 p.m. (justifying my "snack").

That night, Frito's made everything better.  I didn't even feel guilt about it the day after. 

Well, maybe I did. That's the only thing that could explain why I stuffed the bag in the trash as soon as I got home, taking care to make sure it was covered up by an old coffee filter. Deep down I think I didn't want Mike to find out that if his wife keeps having days like this, she's going to blow up like a balloon. 

 But everything in moderation, right? 

Ugh. Judging by last night, I don't do "moderation" well

Photo shoot part II

It's up! Wing, from CanaryGrey Photography put up the full post of Mike and I's photo shoot on her blog, right here. If you didn't catch this post on OA, earlier this week, I found out I won a photo shoot on the blog Eat Drink Pretty from CanaryGrey Photography. 

I about passed out on the spot.

I had no idea what to do, so I just started shaking my hands around, flapping them like a little bird to release my excitement. Once I calmed down enough to type, I emailed Jenna from Eat Drink Pretty and the rest was One. Huge. Whirlwind. 

Early last week, I connected with Wing, owner of CanaryGrey, and within five minutes we were talking like old friends, swapping stories on everything from cute scarves to our recent weddings. As Wing asked me about my "vision" for the shoot, I knew I wanted a cozy winter shoot, but that meant we had to move fast - we may live in Minnesota, home of old man winter for six months out of the year, but we were nearing the end of our "six month window" and with busy schedules, last Sunday was the only time we had to do it.

Once that was decided, Wing started whipping out one amazing idea after another and as we talked, I saw Mike's eyes get bigger and bigger. 

"Cuddling!" 

"Coffee!" 

"Fire!" 

"Take our orange chair into the SNOWY, DIRTY, WET WOODS! Yay!"

Yeah, even I'm surprised he held it together when I offered up our chair. 

Tom & Elyse

Last summer, two of our dearest friends up here in The Cities, Tom and Elyse, gave us two Koi for our backyard pond as a housewarming gift. 

After promptly naming them after the gifters, Tom and Elyse, we released them into their new home. 

They were our very first pets. I adored Tom and Elyse. They greeted me every night when I came home and we loved that we never had to feed them because they just ate algae right off the bottom of the pond. The perfect pet in my opinion - no feeding or cleaning required. 

Last fall, before the pond froze over, we moved them into a Styrofoam cooler in our laundry room for the winter. We fed them Cheerios twice a week and Mike cleaned their cooler about once a month. 

I showed those fish off to everyone. I would ask, "Have you met Tom and Elyse? They live in the laundry room." (Quite confusing if you've actually met the human Tom and Elyse.) I was always sure to comment on how much they've grown - Elyse was about two times as big as Tom (poor guy) but they had both grown quite a bit since we were given them. I always loved to talk about their endearing personalities too - how Tom liked to swim in circles and bang into the sides of the cooler when I would come down to do laundry. 

What's that? 

No, he wasn't scared of me - he was excited to see me. Duh.  

Or that Elyse was really brave and would go up and eat the biggest Cheerio pieces - Tom kinda lingered, but he nabbed a few here and there - he was a bit more stealth than Elyse. I loved talking about my fish. I was a proud mama and thought they were the best two fish a girl could ever have. 

I won!

I enter blog contests all the time.

If there's a contest, I enter it. That's all there is to it. I love it because it takes about five seconds and I can do it right from my super comfy couch at home.

But then, holy crap I won.

I never, EVER thought I would actually win one.

What did I win? Great question - I won a free photoshoot from an amazing photographer,Wing, from CanaryGrey Photography on the blog Eat Drink Pretty. (If you haven't checked out Eat Drink Pretty, you should - Jenna has great entertaining ideas and her recipes are delicious!)

First things first. If you're in the market for a photographer, hire her now. Wing takes phenomenal shots and even better - she's friendly, kind, creative and went above and beyond for our shoot.

She posted a sneak peek of our shoot on her blog, http://www.canarygrey.com/blog/ and I've reposted them below. I can't wait to see the rest of the photos! Later this week, I'll share the full details of how the shoot went down. It was an absolute blast.

And yes, that's my beloved orange chair you see sitting in the snow with a fire burning right next to it.

Oh the things we do in the name of great photography...

CanaryGrey Photography

CanaryGrey Photography

The chair hunt is over

I few months ago, I did the unthinkable. I sold our brand new dining room chairs on Craigslist.

Mike and I are still sitting on folding chairs around our dining room table, but we are thisclose to having real chairs! A few weeks ago, I finally settled on what chairs we wanted and two of them came in the mail! I only ordered two, because they were online only - if it turned out we didn't like them or they weren't well made or I suddenly changed my mind again (a very real possibility) we'd have to pay to ship all eight of them back. So I decided to go with only two for the first shipment.

I LOVE them. No way are these baby's being shipped back, I've already ordered the other six! I know I should wait to show the chairs with you once I have all of them, but I just couldn't wait to share. Here's the lowdown.

After I sold our original chairs, my plan was to purchase chairs that didn't necessarily look like typical "dining room chairs" (that's what bugged me so much about the first ones). Mike and I have a small dining room, that seats six comfortably, but we love to entertain - so we purchased a table with a leaf to seat eight. Since the table is typically in the six-seater mode, I needed chairs that I could repurpose throughout the house and could stand on their own four legs (just crack a smile, it was clever).

So the search  was on. I looked at clear chairs, metal chairs, leather (and pleather) chairs but nothing seemed right. Then I stumbled across these from Remodelista:

Source

But the $400 price tag kinda blew my budget. 

Ready for the weekend

Sorry the blogging has been so light this week. It's been crazy-insane around here - I'm super excited to share why with all of you, but I'm not quite able to yet.

No. I'm not pregnant.

In the meantime (because I have no clue what else to share) here's a photo that I've been loving lately:

Design Sponge

How great would that entryway be to come home to every night?

Have a great weekend!

No more dishes!

Over the weekend this was our kitchen:

I closed my eyes and turned my head every time I walked by.

But it was all for a good cause - we were installing our new dishwasher! Buh bye raisin fingers, see ya sore arms (though they have been looking quite toned recently) and farewell to stacks of dishes up to my ears. It is beautiful. Check it out:

The first time we turned it on, both Mike and I held our breaths. Mike was laying on the floor checking for leaks and I was snapping photos of the monumental moment. But after 15 minutes of staring at it, the dishwasher lost it's luster a bit - and we figured if it was going to leak it would have by then.

Talk about anticlimactic.

But, I've already ran it three times and I'm crazy about it. It's quite the accomplishment for us first-time homeowners - listen to me - I'm talking like I actually helped! I didn't. Mike did everything.

I made a microwave dinner for us though.

Chalk that up for a productive Saturday.

Design Appreciation

Mike and I have already made most of our major purchases for OA, which is another way of saying - we can't redecorate. And even though I LOVE how it's all turning out (I need to give you all an update soon!) I still can't help but drool a bit when I come across photos on some of the design blogs I read. Lately, instead of being jealous, or wishing I had done this or that, I'm learning to just appreciate other people's designs and then turn around and look at my own living room and pat myself on the back.

So, let's appreciate together, shall we? Then, right after this - go look at your house and tell yourself, "Well done."

Via

Via