Home improvement... sort of

Let me just say this. My husband and I are not gifted when it comes to home improvement projects.

And that's putting it mildly. A more truthful statement would be: We are AWFUL at home improvement projects.

Case in point: When we moved into our townhouse, there was no ceiling fan in the master bedroom. That was simply not going to fly, since I despise sleeping when it's hot. And my husband knew he'd probably be pretty miserable if I couldn't sleep, so off to Lowe's we went.

Since we had no clue what we needed to purchase, we came home with the cheapest ceiling fan we could find. It was a little rinky-dink $15 fan, but I figured, hey, aren't all ceiling fans the same? We didn't need a super-posh one with metal accents, or stained glass, or cool-looking leaf-shaped propellers. We just needed something basic that would do the trick.

We looked at hooking it up for about five minutes, and quickly realized we were screwed.

Luckily, a college friend of his, who by himself gutted his own kitchen and built new cabinets, came to the rescue.

I think it took Bob about five seconds to look at our purchase and announce we had gotten the wrong kind of fan. I couldn't tell you why; I think it had something to do with the fact that our bedroom has an angled ceiling.

I wasn't home during the installation, but once the correct fan was purchased, I think he had it operating in 20 minutes.

We haven't done any other projects like that (and you can probably see why) until I decided we HAD to have a mail rack with hooks next to our front door. See, we both lose our keys daily, and we can't ever find that one piece of mail, or the dog leash. So I thought that would be the answer.

Problem was, we had to hang it.

I decided to tackle this one on my own, and in hindsight, I don't know what I was thinking. I can't even hang a picture without either denting the wall or ending up with a very crooked piece of decor.

So I went at it.

Of course, I hit a stud. And then, that little plastic piece you're supposed to insert before the screw broke in half. IN THE WALL.

After digging it out with a screwdriver (and pieces of wall falling to the floor), I started a new hole for the screw, and said heck with the plastic thing. My husband did intervene, especially when I started threatening to chuck the hammer through the front window.

I think it's crooked, but it's up, and surprisingly functional.

And at least now we know where our keys are. 

Good food and a good friend? Yes, please.

I was happy this weekend. Not only did I take a little road trip (the first one since I got married), but I ate some G-R-E-A-T food.

My dear friend Whitney lives in Georgia with her husband and their son, who is almost 2. This was the first time I got to meet the little guy, and that alone made it a wonderful trip.

Whitney shares my love for Pinterest, and she's always liked to cook. So she told me to pick out a recipe for Friday night, which we tackled together.

I will also point out that Whitney shares my love for mushrooms, as well.

I chose this mushroom and ricotta pasta, and Whit made some additions that made the dish TO DIE FOR.

She added spinach (YUM) and heavy cream to the sauce, plus a little more butter. This might have decreased the healthy factor, but man, was it worth it.

The next day, Whitney took me to the Ritz at Reynolds Plantation for lunch. It was right on the lake, apparently where Carrie Underwood got married. 

We decided to cook again that night, and made a chicken dish with a sauce made from golden mushroom soup. With that, Whit whipped up some risotto with... what else? Mushrooms. :)

While that was cooking, I made an appetizer that used to be the only thing I knew how to cook. Stuffed mushrooms with spinach and Parmesan cheese. I don't measure anything, but you just buy a packet of grocery store mushrooms, remove the stems, and stuff it with a spinach mixture. That's basically a package of Stouffer's creamed spinach, bread crumbs, a little butter and Parmesan cheese. Then you bake them on 350-375 for about 10 minutes. 

We weren't really hungry since we had a big lunch, but it was all delicious. 

It was so great to see my friend and her husband, finally meet her precious little boy, eat good food and stay up late talking, just like we used to do. 

Tonight I made a Parmesan baked chicken, but it didn't hold a candle to all the fabulous mushroom dishes I enjoyed over the weekend. 

And in case anyone is wondering how the dog is doing, while I've been writing this post she found a jacket of mine that had a dog biscuit in it, and has proceeded to chew the thing to pieces IN the pocket. So now there's dog biscuit crumbs everywhere. Although if I know my dog, she'll take care of cleaning that up for me. 

Anyone want a beagle?

She's really cute. But take this warning: Whenever you think you've succeeded at the whole house training thing, she'll pee in puppy class and embarrass you.

Seriously. This dog did GREAT for the first 40 minutes of class last night. The teacher had her doing agility drills, so she was running through tunnels, leaping through hoops (well, she was scared of the hoop so I don't think she ever mastered that) and jumping up onto a platform with a pillow on top. I mean, I was even thinking we should start looking into dog shows.

Well, then my husband excuses himself to go to the restroom. He hadn't been gone five seconds when Cooper looked at me, jumped up on the pillow and peed. It was like Niagara Falls. I couldn't believe it since she'd gone to the bathroom THREE TIMES before class! Sigh.

I looked at Betsy, and without a word she handed me a roll of paper towels. So then I got to clean up an ocean of pee.

This was the third consecutive week that she's peed in class. 

After that, we walked around the store (the class meets in PetSmart) with Cooper on the leash, so we could prove to Betsy that walking her in our neighborhood is a nightmare since she drags us the entire time. I lost interest when we passed by the cats up for adoption, and let the others go ahead while I cooed at a 4-month old named Thumper.

I pretty much ignored Cooper for the rest of the class. Even when she did a few tricks in front of the goldfish. I acted like I didn't care.

But then on the way home, she fell asleep on my lap, and all was forgiven.

So no, you can't really have my dog.

A plate full of goodness

I feel like I haven't really cooked in awhile, so last night I went a little crazy at the grocery store. Not only did I purchase ingredients for TWO different dishes for last night's dinner, I went ahead and bought everything needed for a crockpot recipe for tonight (and almost forgot to start cooking it this morning).

So last night was the garlic and brown sugar baked chicken, which I served with Parmesan baked zucchini slices and a box of Publix-brand chicken-flavored rice (hey, the box of rice was 89 cents).

It. Was. Delicious.

I wasn't sure about the zucchini, since it looked more crispy in the photo from the recipe. And when I pulled the pan out of the oven, my slices looked rather flimsy. But they tasted amazing.

The chicken was also good, although I didn't want to take a picture of my baking dish since it looked like a bomb exploded. You're supposed to cook it for 15-30 minutes, which is a pretty big range, and I opted for the longest possible cooking time since the massive chicken breasts I was dealing with seemed to come from some very healthy chickens.

And the rice... I mean, you can't go wrong with boxed rice. Especially when it's 89 cents.

My husband, who is not usually a fan of leftovers, took the remaining chicken and rice to work today. And, I've received confirmation that he actually ate it, so that's got to be a good sign.

Today's attempt is another Pinterest find that doesn't really have a title. It's some kind of cream cheese/chicken/rotel crockpot creation, and you can find the recipe here. The good news is, the author calls it "the easiest dinner ever." Sounds good to me.

Y to the UM

Ok, so my husband and I have been doing pretty good on Weight Watchers. At least, we're good during the week. On the weekends we tend to fall apart and indulge a little more than the plan allows. But our Friday night binge was soooooo worth it.

I can't even remember what we had for dinner, because all that sticks out in my mind is dessert. Now, we rarely eat dessert, and if we do, it's like, a Weight Watchers 2-point cake (which is seriously like a tiny cube of cake). Well, I decided to explore a new culinary masterpiece that looked easy and quick, which are two words to live by in the kitchen as far as I'm concerned.

I found a recipe for grilled banana s'mores, where you slit a banana, fill it with chocolate chips, marshmallows and cinnamon toast crunch, wrap it up in tinfoil and throw it on the grill. (Find the original recipe here.)

I altered it a little.

First of all, I ruled out the grill. We have a little tiny Weber charcoal grill that I'm pretty sure was designed for camping. Since I doubt either one of us would survive a night in the wild, we just put it on our back porch at our condo.

And let me just tell you how funny it looks next to all of the big gas grills owned by just about every neighbor we have.

Anyway, so I ruled out the ghetto grill, and preheated the oven.

I still slit the banana and wrapped it in foil, but I put my own favorite fillings: chocolate chips and... wait for it... PEANUT BUTTER CHIPS.

If you know me, you know I have somewhat of a problem with peanut butter. The problem being, I can't stop eating it once I start. So I will plead the fifth if anyone asks how many mouthfuls of peanut butter chips I scarfed down while waiting for the bananas to cook.

After only eight minutes, we dug in. The photo doesn't do it justice.

Actually, it looks sort of gross in the picture. But trust me, it was like a big, gooey slice of heaven. But next time I will definitely put more peanut butter chips in there, and possible top it off with cool whip.

Delish. But now I'm out of peanut butter chips. And, come to think of it, peanut butter...

"At least she's not baying..."

Before last night, I didn't know what the word "baying" meant. In fact, I'd never heard the term. Apparently, it's the annoyingly high-pitched howl of a hound dog.

Let's rewind. After two incident-free puppy classes, me and the husband hopped in the car (giving her the command, "Load up!") for our third private session with Betsy. Betsy is the animal trainer who initially said beagles were nearly impossible to train, then changed her tune to saying Cooper was the smartest, most mellow beagle she'd ever worked with. And it was true.

For the first two weeks, we watched in amazement as she learned to sit, lay down, shake, stay and leave it. My husband and I locked eyes during the second session, and I know we were thinking the same thing. "This is easier than I thought! She's practically trained!"

Well, now let us fast-forward to last Friday. Her third class. When we got there she marched in the room and promptly peed on the floor. It was pretty much all downhill from there. For the next hour, we watched as Cooper refused to do ANYTHING. She wouldn't even sit. I was ready to dropkick her right out of PetSmart when Betsy announced the reason for her misbehavior.

It was a full moon.

I wasn't really aware that the moon phases had any affect on dog behavior, but whatever. I'll take it.

We tried to practice with her at home that weekend, and she did ok, but not as good as in the beginning. So you can understand my dread when it came to going back to class last night. Only last night marked our first class with another dog.

The other dog is a rottweiler named Georgia, and a family with three kids just adopted her a week ago. Her owner said since she joined the family, she's been skiddish, shy and especially scared of the man of the house. We got to class first, and Cooper waltzed in (Betsy wasn't in the room and husband was buying something) so it was just me and our little prized pupil. Right when I let her off the leash, she looked at me, turned around, and squatted.

I almost grabbed the keys and hightailed it right out of there. My dog was NOT going to embarrass me for a second straight week. But my better half came in the room, calmed me down, and helped me clean it up.

Cooper and Georgia got along well, and she actually did just about everything Betsy commanded her to do. Betsy says they'll be able to help each other, and if Cooper can morph into a calm dog like Georgia, I'll throw a party.

 Here she is with her new "Bear Bear" that we were advised to purchase:

So back to the baying... when she and Georgia were playing, Cooper kept letting out the most annoying... well, squeaks. But they sounded... ridiculous. She squeaks quite a bit at home but nothing like this. So I ask Betsy, "Is there any way to stop THAT?!" And she said, "At least she's not baying." I looked at her with a blank expression and then she demonstrated for me.

Point taken.

SO I can't figure out how to add this to my actual blog. But here's the link to follow me on Pinterest, where you can see all of my lovely recipe findings!

Happy V Day!

So, our first Valentine's Day as a married couple is going to to something like this:

My husband is working an event at 7 p.m. I have to work a different event at 6 p.m. And we're not even in the food and beverage industry!

So long, romance.

Nah, instead of whining and moaning and stuffing my face with chocolate, I'm trying to come up with a plan to celebrate a different day. Well, I guess I can still stuff my face with chocolate.

Last night, I surprised him with a card and some candy, and a bottle of bubbly that who knows when we will get to pop open. And today, he sent me flowers at work. After my dad sent me a bouquet yesterday, I'm really feeling the love, people!

And my husband gets brownie points for writing in the card: Every day with you is Valentine's Day. Awww.

(Wait, did someone say brownies?)

Happy Valentine's Day to you!

Hits and misses

Well, I've still been cooking up a storm. And for the most part, I've been pretty successful.

Let's take the crockpot buffalo chicken recipe. While it was good (and HOT), I think the quantity called for in the recipe was for a little more than two people. Seriously, I could have fed a party of eight.

We ate it on bread. We ate it in tortillas. We dipped chips in it. And I STILL have a container of leftovers sitting in my freezer. Not that I'm complaining.

My husband (SO sweet) said he really liked it, but after three straight days of buffalo chicken he was like umm... can we maybe have something else tonight? :)

Find the buffalo crockpot chicken recipe here.

My next recipe, I must say, was a home run. Hubby and I are TRYING to do Weight Watchers, and I found this concoction that only has 4.5 points per serving (a small serving, but still). WW chicken pot pie... made with chicken, cream of mushroom soup, skim milk, frozen vegetables, egg substitute and Bisquick. Now, that's my kind of shopping list.

It only took about 30 minutes, thanks in part to the fact that I purchased a plain rotisserie chicken to save time. My man got home, took a picture of the meal, and devoured it. Then he told me that chicken pot pie was his favorite meal growing up.

We had a moment. :)

So I'll DEFINITELY be making this one again.

 

Other attempted recipes include the peanut butter yogurt pie (bust) and, FINALLY, I made the peanut butter cheese ball that I've been fantasizing about for weeks. With my slightly serious addiction to PB, I didn't trust myself to keep the ball (made with cream cheese, sugar and chocolate and peanut butter chips) in the house. So I sent it to work with my husband. 

The yogurt pie wasn't bad, it just seemed kind of... plain. Probably because I couldn't find an oreo cookie crust and had to opt for graham cracker. It's still sitting in my fridge though... I'm finishing it off one bite at a time ;)

Sock monster?

Ok. This is an issue that has plagued me since the day I started doing my own laundry.

I lose socks.

I know I'm not the only one. Everyone talks about the "sock monster" who must be a heat-resistant creature, reaching into the dryer and stealing random socks, causing victims to be plagued with an infuriating number of mismatched socks.

And now that I'm married, the missing sock issue has doubled.

This is our current collection. While the husband was out of town, I worked my butt off to get our massive heap of laundry done. I figured by doing so, I'd solve the missing sock problem because everything would finally be clean at once.

Nope. This is what we came up with.

I mean, I've searched under the bed, behind the dryer and even in random cabinets in the bathroom. Nothing.

I guess we either A. need to turn our house completely upside down; B., buy new socks; or C., sit in the laundry room and stare at the dryer for the entire drying cycle. Although if I saw any kind of monster come out of my dryer I'd just let him have the socks and run for the hills.