I can count the number on my hands

This past Friday was a different day in my world here in Texas. First, I met with a great counselor who works out of a suburb about 40 minutes from us. She is connected with a nonprofit organization that provides counseling services for victims of violence. I am going to be able to do some counseling for this organization and get supervision from her. And I cannot express how excited I am!!!! One of my goals is to get licensed and this will help that happen. Plus, I'm excited to get back to work. The organization is very flexible and works essentially as a private practice - I will be assigned clients for the first meeting and then after that I do my own scheduling. I could not ask for a better experience right now!

So in meeting with this woman Friday, I explained how I just moved here and she asked me how many people I know. I said four and she quickly replied - "oh goodness, well now you know five and if you stay I can introduce you to some more people!" She was very happy to help me meet more people and at the end of the time with her, I had met an additional four people.

We went out Friday for a birthday celebration and met a few others, so alas, now I can no longer count the number of people I know here on two hands. :)  Friday was a big day for me!

Weekend Update:

• Ran errands to multiple places including Home Depot where we bought the plywood for the headboard project
• Baked yummy homemade cinnamon bread
• Made homemade bbq sauce
• Cleaned
• Caulked trim so we can finally paint it this coming weekend
• Made homemade curried coleslaw
• Sunday grilled a roadside chicken from Rick Bayless and made enchilada sauce for dinner tonight
• Grilled some amazing ribs for dinner last night - husband did a great job with them

We were actually busy although not really accomplishing anything big, except making yummy food. And just so you know - the husband did a lot of the cooking - he's pretty darn good at it!

Happy Monday!

More great cookbooks

I regularly shift between cookbooks to keep our meals more interesting. This past week I decided to go through a few cookbooks that haven't seen any action lately. And it so reminded me of how much I love them. Which ones am I talking about? Well I have a small collection (4 to be exact) of Donna Hay cookbooks. The husbands' family turned us onto these and they have been fabulous go-to cookbooks over the years. Who is Donna Hay you ask? She is an Australian food stylist, author, and magazine editor according to wikipedia. But seriously, her cookbooks are great. The recipes are simple - although occasionally she has an ingredient that isn't a regular around here. For example the chicken curry I made last week from her Flavors cookbook called for Kaffir lime leaves. I didn't have time to drive the almost hour to the nearest Asian market so I did without. Anyways, she fits 4 recipes to a page so you can imagine the compact ingredient lists. And everything turns out well - she knows her stuff.

We have these 4 of her cookbooks:

• Off the Shelf: Cooking from the pantry - recipes that attempt to use items you might normally stock in your kitchen and includes a list of items you should keep in your pantry
  
• Flavors - chapters are based on flavor profiles like vanilla, garlic + onion, basil + mint and our favorite chili
• The New Cook - goes over basics but its nice to have basic recipes for pastas, etc
• Modern Classics Book 2 - yummy sweets - one of my favorites!

Tonight we will be having sweet potato cakes with peppered beef over arugula, from Flavors - can't wait!

Mornings and such

While we were taking care of Kona I was getting up between 4:45 and 5:15 to take her out for her morning potty break. It didn't seem terrible to be up that early but each day I decided to go back to sleep, making it so much harder to get up before 8. I actually liked getting up and an even better perk was getting to exchange a few sentences with the husband before he left for work. I also don't really like starting my day so late and to be honest I'm most productive in the am and least productive in the early afternoon. After trying to nail down a dissertation timeline (eek) this weekend, I decided I should just bite the bullet. Getting up early would help me get more work done and I would be on a more similar time schedule as the husband. So today is day 2 of getting up at 5:30 and I'm liking it pretty well (except right at 5:30 when I'm trying to get my butt out of bed). Hopefully it lasts! :)

Weekend in Review

• Packed up the car with Gracie in tow and headed down to Galveston Saturday for some fun in the sun - it was nice and as usual Gracie loved it.
• Cleaned lots and lots - fun I know
• Drew out a template for a headboard and hung it on the bedroom wall to make sure we loved it - we did
• Grilled out with the husband - one of our go-to meals is Roadside Chicken from Rick Bayless - great flavors and awesome leftovers for whatever we feel like eating (homemade pizzas, enchiladas, salad, etc) over the next couple of days

Roadside Chicken

• Read the newspaper with the help of Gracie

 Oh and the fabric I ordered a few weeks ago arrived this weekend. Hopefully I'll get a ton of work done on the dissertation this week so I can spend some time over the weekend working on a few projects around here. Exciting!

Ah painting

All the blogs - you know, the fancy well-known ones, say that painting is the easiest thing to change when you're getting your house all home-like. So I decided to take that advice to heart. To give you a back story - we love our house but it came with TERRIBLE paint colors in EVERY room. Of priority after moving in was to quickly cover up the family room color.

See why?

But making quick decisions about paint colors isn't easy especially when, as you can see, we had nothing in the room and really no design concept/theme/idea. And the husband swore off shades of white or lighter colors. So we chose this (please ignore mess).

I really like the color and it really doesn't work in the room for multiple reasons. The first - the room gets almost no natural light and the lighting in it isn't great so its super dark with this wall color.

Taken without flash, at sunniest part of the day for this room.

The second - the room, the very large room can be seen from 6 different rooms or areas in our home thus the color was dictating way too much about the house design and colors and I didn't like that.

So after thinking on it for awhile, painting 8 different color samples on poster pieces and leaving them in two places in the room for about two weeks, we took the plunge. The husband chose a darker shade of tan that I wasn't sure would work. I pondered over it and eventually vetoed him. I'm glad I did b/c the color is great - neutral and light like I wanted. Now we (really me) can add color in other fun ways and it won't feel like we're in a cave! We haven't put anything back in its place yet and I'm going to paint the trim (hopefully this weekend) so we'll post pictures once we get these things done!

The best way to get over a funky mood

Sugar. In order to move past the morning mood, I had myself a little slice of Banoffee Pie. Yep, I picked up this recipe from another blog (here) and made it Sunday. But with all that went on in our worlds this weekend and early week, we did not actually eat any until last night. Also partly due to the fact that I wasn't quite sure how this would taste with homemade whipped cream sans sugar. Hey, but it was good. And I couldn't imagine any other topping for it b/c store bought whipped cream would have been too much sweet for the already super sweet pie.

Here is a picture from the less-than-great camera. But you can still tell this pie is yummy goodness! That's bananas on bottom, with make-your-own toffee sauce (or dulce de leche) followed by a nice thick layer of whipped cream and some chocolate shavings!

(This is NOT the piece I ate but the piece the Mr. and I shared Tuesday pm)

I followed the recipe almost exactly - everything being from scratch including the crust (I love homemade pie crust) and the boiled sweetened condensed milk cans. I boiled two to save one for later. After boiling, they left a ring on the bottom of our nice calphalon pot so if you don't want a ring matching a can on the bottom of your nice pot I would use a crappy one!

Make it and eat it - you'll like it I promise!

Contemplations

The blog has been serious this week and this post is in line with that - sorry, hopefully cheerier times come soon.

This week three years ago I started a hellofa journey by delving into the world of PhDness. My BFF's husband, who is one of the smartest people I know (along with the BFF), said that he has yet to meet a person with a PhD that he actually likes. Hmmm - good thing he already sort of liked me and hopefully will still like me ok when I get done. But I don't know - my experiences in the program have affected me in more ways that I can even articulate at times. Suffice it to say it was hard, not intellectually harder than I could handle but emotionally hard - the kind of emotionally hard that is cold, distant, and isolating. And yet, after all of that crud over the last three years I can't help but feel weird being 1000 miles away from that world as the new school year begins. Why? Because I had GREAT people to share that with and those people are all 1000 miles away. I so desperately needed to get away from the crud of the program but moving to Texas has meant leaving behind a HUGE support system - the support system that helped me survive over the past three years. Which also brings me to the point that I left behind everything except the husband and Gracie. Its been hard - harder than I ever could have imagined. I am trying to remain positive, hopeful and upbeat but sometimes its really freakin depressing. The husband is great - he says things like "Why are you awake - go back to sleep" at 8:30 am. He says he needs to do more around the house b/c he knows I truly detest the idea of being a stay-at-home housewife. He is super supportive and encouraging. However, going from the crazy world I lived in for the past three years where I worked, supervised, taught, went to class, etc. to this, to nothing, STINKS sometimes.

But it has helped me realize how much I loved working at the hospital, teaching, and supervising. Hopefully someday real soon I'll get the opportunity to do one or more of those things again. Until then, I'll keep working on the house and dissertation and job hunting.

Rough end to the week

There's really no way to say this except to simply share what happened. Friday after taking the Mr to the airport for a weekend with the guys, I came home and started some work on the house. For whatever reason I started feeling less and less good about Kona's health despite no real significant changes. I thought I was probably just being a little too worrisome but as the night continued I decided I needed to take Kona to the Humane Society Saturday am to have her checked out. Unfortunately Saturday I left the humane society without her. She did not have pneumonia like they thought; apparently distemper mimics all kinds of things including respiratory illnesses and she had to be humanely euthanized. She left such a mark on us even after only a week in our lives. We'll miss her dearly.

Exciting stuff

Since getting Kona on Sunday we really haven't been doing much around here. She's super cute but still really low on energy. We finally got her to eat more than a few bites of bread yesterday so hopefully this means she will put on some weight and start feeling better. And only 6 more days of medication!

On the home front, I painted a shelf and brackets that I got at Ikea - hopefully that will soon be up on the wall in the master bathroom. I also spent some time looking into several other projects including a chalkboard for the kitchen. I put up some paint tape to see how I like it in the space I'm considering and since its a relatively inexpensive project it might appear soon. Other than that, I have this weird desire to make something - so today I looked into how to make a farmhouse table for your dining room and found Ana Wood's Knock-Off Wood blog. She has plans for making your own farmhouse table here. Amazing and it totally makes me think that I can do it! So who knows but maybe one day. Check out a few farmhouse table images to get an idea of what I'm thinking about.

Image from Restoration Hardware

Image from the Bella Cottage

Image from Decor Pad

Image from Decor Pad

Meet Kona

We are officially fostering Kona until she is over the pneumonia and then we will hopefully adopt her. What we know about her - she was probably born in March, she is not spayed, she was given to a person as a gift and that person did not want to pay the apartment fee for having a dog, and that's it. She is super cute but I have to admit its strange having a dog around who does nothing but sleep. She is a totally worn out sick little puppy. She did venture outside a few times yesterday and met two of the neighborhood boys. The first noted that it was weird how so many people were getting two dogs and the other, after I explained she had a doggie cold, told me he didn't think she would die. Kids are funny.

We picked her up from the Humane Society yesterday and learned a few fun facts since.

1. Adopted doggies can be VERY dirty and thus washing them can be quite the complex task
2. Doggie coughs are kind of intense and resemble the sound of retching
3. Some doggies (not Gracie) will learn that yummy treats and food are hiding pills and will not help you by eating the yummy treat or food and pill
4. Administering two pills twice a day for 10 days thus becomes no fun for everyone
5. "Look at those paws - that dog is going to be BIG" - according to three people at the humane society and one neighbor so far
6. Keeping two dogs in the same house from interacting (pneumonia is contagious) is like orchestrating a series of successful downs in football - each time we move Kona, we have to come up with a game plan for how to keep her away from Gracie

So its been a fun and interesting 18 hours. We did make a pretty awesome dinner yesterday in the midst of all of that. Roast pork shoulder braised in apple sauce with fennel, onion, and apples, and onion and bacon gratin. Gratins are our new favorite food - so yummy.

Doggie woes and other updates

I'm a big fan of supporting charities and such and thus the little Gracie was adopted from a rescue group local to the area in NC I was living. So when we decided to adopt another furry gal, we looked at both the SPCA and Houston Humane Society and settled on a cute girl who was yet to be spayed. Now, I'm not trying to complain but seriously, we have no idea when we're going to be able to get our dog. The Humane Society has no idea when they'll be able to spay her and keep telling us it should be soon but I don't know. I'm not trying to complain - it just stinks picking out a dog, thinking we're going to pick her up two days later only to get a call that she's not ready and who knows when she'll be ready. Can you tell I'm getting a little antsy to have our new dog home?

*Update to the update - just got a call from the Humane Society and we are in fact going to pick up the dog tomorrow. However, she hasn't been spayed and instead we are technically "fostering" her b/c she has pneumonia. Once she gets well she will go back to be spayed. And on another bright note - without too much of a hassle, we are going to be approved for fostering animals tomorrow - I'm excited! For those of you wondering what the Mr. thinks - he's napping so he missed his chance to comment.

Anywho - I ordered fabric today b/c Joann's Fabric is having a big sale this weekend. Here's a picture. I'll update you on where its going later! (And they also have a coupon for free shipping over $35 if you want to order something too.)

DIY dog bed

I'm usually not a fan of spending tons of money on things that I need but aren't made in an appealing way. Dog beds definitely fall into this category as they are usually some ugly green or blue, or in a masculine print like a plaid. Don't get me wrong about plaids - I like them when they're done well but usually this doesn't apply to affordable dog beds. So since people don't seem to manufacture inexpensive, attractive dog beds, I've made my own. I got this hairbrained idea when I adopted Gracie a few years back and came up with a somewhat-stylish and a bit lopsided round bed with a fun brown and white fabric.

Gracie and the original DIY bed

Of course then, I had to enlist my mom to do the sewing b/c I had no sewing machine and didn't know how to use a sewing machine. But that is not the case today! My dad, being the oh-so-thoughtful man he is, gave me a sewing machine for Christmas and I have been looking forward to using it. I finally used it for the first time this week on a DIY dog bed. Because this was my first attempt at sewing with the machine, I used a set of old brown curtains (Chip insisted on black-out style curtains in our apartment bedroom in a previous life) to make the bed. I had some leftover fabric from Gracie's first bed and added a stripe to make it less blah.

The most recent DIY bed

But now that I'm feeling pretty good about the sewing machine and the bed-making, I'm going to use this fabric to make a cover for the new and original dog beds. Very exciting.

Cooking like a (the) pioneer woman

If you watch the Today show, which I do not, you would know that the Pioneer Woman or Ree Drummond was on the show this morning. I only know b/c I follow her blog. Since we moved to Texas I think its only fitting to follow her blog - she lives on a ranch in OK, with a pretty cool family (she refers to her husband as Marlboro man), raising cows and cooking up some yummy food. Also, I follow her blog b/c I've always had a fascination with farms, ranches, cows, horses, etc. Do you know the best part about where we live now? Just behind our neighborhood, on our walk route around the canals is a farm with two horses, two goats, various other animals and a real STEER. Yes, with huge horns and everything. Its pretty awesome. So as you can see, its only natural that I would like the Pioneer Woman's blog b/c it combines something I love doing with ranch life! We've tried a few of Pioneer Woman's recipes and they have all turned out well. This week we tried her raspberry cream pie and last week we tried the grilled chicken with lemon basil pasta. Both were quite good and I'm sure we will continue using her yummy recipes. An added bonus is that she takes lovely photos of the cooking process! (We didn't take any pictures but here are some from the Pioneer Woman herself).

Pioneer Woman

Pioneer Woman

Furry family member update

The Houston Humane Society has been down a vet for a day or so and are not sure when they will be able to get the new furry family member spayed. So, hopefully we'll pick her up tomorrow, but it might be as late as next week. Hopefully its soon! We'll keep you updated!

Around our house

Upcoming projects:

1. Deciding on fabric for our headboard but likely getting the materials in the next week or so to start that project.
2. Working on a DIY dog bed and dog bed covers for our existing slew of beds. Thought it would be an easy way of introducing the sewing machine into my life.
3. Finalizing a few colors for various rooms in our house including our half bath and then hopefully doing some painting.
4. And last but not least - bringing home our new furry family member!!

We have spent a good deal of the last three days searching out the perfect addition to our little family. And when I say searching, we had multiple trips to the SPCA and the Houston Humane Society. Who knew it would be so difficult to find another family member. But we were successful (or at least we hope). A yet-to-be-named doggie will be joining us tomorrow! :) She is being spayed today (poor thing) and we are going to pick her up tomorrow. So keep your eyes peeled for pictures, hopefully at least one without her cone.