Peace & Joy

Merry Christmas.

A Lazy Saturday and an Early Christmas

Exactly one week ago I had the laziest day of my life - and I hated it.  Bryce loved it and it was probably by far one of his favorite days in the last month.  I guess that's a good illustration of our different personalities. :)

After being busy all the time Bryce wants to sleep in, kick back in the recliner, watch Hulu, eat, and nap occasionally.  Not once having to clean or do any sort of physical activity, and especially not having to leave the house (which means he can chill in his underwears or sweats all day) last Saturday was such a day.

After being busy you'd think a nice lazy day would be welcome.  No.  I had a free day all to myself to do whatever I wanted, to get things done around the house that had been neglected, and to waste time ripping pages from magazines and dreaming up ideas for the unpainted rooms in my house.

I did none of this.

Today was different.  I realize it's a Friday not a Saturday, but I wasn't about to let the day go by and not get things done.  I had a list in my head last night and I woke up and got out of bed at 8 this morning.  Dusted, vacuumed, swept, mopped, cleaned counters and the oven, cleaned all the bathrooms, cleared clutter and sorted clutter, completed 3 loads of laundry, loaded and unloaded the dishwasher and was done in time for lunch.  Now that's what I'm talking about.  

So, for the remainder of the day I will be lazy with my husband who was lucky and was able to work half a day today.  I will read blogs, and dream dreams of divine homes.  And I will enjoy it.  

I can't post this with out defending one part of last Saturday.  I did cook a full meal.  I received a gift box from Gullah Gourmet, Inc. out of Charleston, SC.  I received bags of mix for Gullah Gullah Gumbo and Aunt Maggie's Sweet Cornbread.  It came with Peppa Jam.  Pretty good if I say so myself.

Bryce and I were not raised on southern cuisine and neither of us have had gumbo, so we thought we'd give it a try, so I went to cookin'.  I had rice and da gumbo sauce a cookin' while I mixed da cornbread badda up good fashion and cooked dem cornbread muffins.  MMmm.  Shrimp would've been delicious had we had some, but alas, we did not.  

The packaging is super cool and I loved the directions although I had to read a sentence and translate it so I knew what to do.   :)

When husband came home early today he had with him two surprise gifts for me for an early Christmas and, as always, he did the best wrapping job.  He has some serious skills people.

 Bet you can't guess what it is!

When Bryce tells me he has a surprise for me I usually, immediately, get a little apprehensive because this one thinks he's a jokester.  But once I know it's a real, actual, good surprise I get excited after feeling bad that I don't have something for him.  I worry less now because he knows I don't like glitter and that everything should not be pink, just because I'm a girl and girls should like pink, glittery things. :)  Also, I've learned, that when he announces he is getting or has a surprise for me, not to start guessing because I ruined a couple and it makes him very sad.

Today's surprise is from Z Gallerie and the man had to literally hunt for this ceramic taxidermy.  He knew I had seen some in a store that I liked and that I told him I wanted to find some heads for our bedroom.  He couldn't remember where it was, but he googled it and eventually found his way to Z Gallerie and located 1 of the 3 stores in Georgia (luckily it was 15 minutes from his work) and braved the crowds and people to get it for me.  He also asked for the moose head, but they were out so he went with a Rhino head.  While the box said Rhino head, it was really a 19" long full rhino ceramic figure.  So, Bryce got a surprise of his own with that one.  We may return for a head or we may keep it...still debating.

Past surprises:
A purse I wanted at TJ Maxx but did not buy at the time.

similar sweet wrapping job - this my first birthday after we were married.

A Christmas Tree for our first Christmas
An iPod ready with music downloads - I guessed this one and ruined it.
A new digital camera when my other one's battery wouldn't keep a charge very long.  Let the record show that he bought it soon after he had to use my failing camera for engine pictures and it frustrated him.

There are others, but like the good wife I am, I can't remember them all right now.

He's good at wrapping and he's good with gifts.  And I like receiving his gifts.  That's why we're so good together.  :)

Sunsets

I saw one of the most beautiful sunsets (at least that I can remember and Hawaii is out of this competition) last night.  Unfortunately I was driving and unable to stop and take a picture.  A few nights earlier I was able to capture some of the neat color combinations...of course the blurry iphone picture is never as good as seeing it in person, but you can pretend. :)

Books

I checked out Tina Fey's Bossypants and I'm excited to read it.

Also on my list of books to read is Mindy Kaling's, Is Everyone Hanging out Without Me? and The Help by Kathryn Stockett.

Two books I wouldn't mind owning:  Sewing in a Straight Line by Brett Bara and The Perfectly Imperfect Home: How to Decorate and Live Well by Deborah Needleman, founding editor of Domino Magazine.

These will be a nice ch ange from the more work related books I've been reading...

Well, at least they didn't put me in charge of the turkey...

Last night (really only about 7 hours ago) I finished my worst night of cooking probably.  Not that I cook a lot, but I've made a few pumpkin pies and none have been so ridiculous as this.  I'm actually writing this at 3:00 in the morning because I've startled myself awake 5 times since 10:00 with nightmares of burning my house down....stupid pies! You'll understand how these are connected.  It is worth noting here that I am this wide awake because Bryce is waiting for the Android tablets to go on sale online through Best Buy.  It's such a good deal that it's worth refreshing the page between spats of Battlefield 3.  I know you're interested so I'll tell you - that yes, the price has changed, but they're still not available for purchase...hence the waiting.  continue.

First, I thought I'd make a dinner with some sauted greens, pasta, and garbanzo beans.  While we were at Wal-Mart for tomorrow's (today's) rolls we grabbed some garlic bread to accompany.  The pan we spread it out on had small holes - ok it's some sort of pizza pan Bryce had from his Bachelor days for his frozen pizzas, so it's not like we didn't know the holes were there. Some of the garlic juices managed to drip on the bottom of my oven and as I'm finishing up the pasta I see smoke rolling out the top of my oven.  We open it up and it rolls out filling our house. 

Bryce took his station waving the broom under the smoke detector so it didn't go off and we opened windows and doors and turned on the fan. (totally brings back memories of this broiling experience)

I threw salt and on it and we continued on in a slighty more smokey atmosphere.

After dinner was cleaned up I jumped right into my pies.  Everything was going fine - the filling smelled declicious! - until I started pouring the filling into the crusts.  I probably went wrong with the store-bought crusts, but I just wasn't in the mood for making the crusts after slaving over dinner. :)  and at this point it's too late anyway.

One seemed a bit more lopsided than the other and I attributed it to the pan balancing on my oven funny.  No, the cookiesheet was warped and my crust defective...

I put the pies in the oven again, smoke started appearing again and I opened my oven - face right in the door for all the smoke to sting - to find the said defective crust disinteigrating.  It was just melting off in a systematic way like it was supposed to do that.  I don't know how many pumpkin pie's you've made in your life folks, but I'd say I've make at least close to 10, and this is not supposed to happen. Is bad. 

I decide to beat the crust at its own game and took a spatulat to stick in my 450 degree oven (seriously it's only been in the oven for like 5 minutes out of the 10 at this degree to set the crust.  We're not even at the real baking yet!) to knock of any more of it that wanted to go and pushed it down a hole at the bottom of my oven. I was not feeding it something else to burn. 

As the cooking time moved along the pan was not enough to catch the drips, so I put in some aluminum foil to catch anything else before it hit the bottom.  Idea previously utilized with the dripping garlic bread.

That makes me, what, 0-2.  Losing to food on Thanksgiving.  What is wrong with this picture?

Now, usually I put aluminum foil on the edges of the crust after the initial 10 minute crisping session so that they DON'T look so bar-b-qued as they do in the picture.  However, my  time was being spent on drip and melting crust control and I said, "Forget it Pie.  Bring it - I don't care if your crust is burnt and I'm still going to share if you're ugly.  Guess what, I don't want to deal with the hassle of putting aluminun foil on your crust.  You don't deserve to be a pretty pie.  Take that, Pie."  I think this pie learned its lesson - next pie will behave much better.

So, my short nightmares are due to these dripping-causing-serious-smoke experiences.

To the pie in the background - I'm sorry you had to suffer extra crispy crust because of your fellow pie's actions and decision to not cooperate. 

**You bet Pie is going to be delicious -just cut off the most outter crust and feed the birds.**

Happy Thanksgiving.  I'm thankful they didn't put me in the charge of the turkey.

"I need a new suitcase definitely"

I have recordings from the Ellen Show dating back a year...I've slowly been working my way through them and I found some clips I had to share - you've probably seen them, but they make me laugh every time.

Then the shopping spree Nicki sent them on:

...and Ellen brings them back for more:

Ellen does have the funniest kids on her show.  I thought about one from a long time ago and wanted to see if I could find a clip of him - and I did!

Not on The Ellen Show but awesome.  Anne Hathaway rapping "In the style of lil' Wayne."

Bathroom: The revealing

It's been a long time coming. We bought our framed mirror today along with floating shelves, a TP holder, towel holder, waste basket, and baskets (to hold extra towels, soap, and TP) and hand towels.

We got home and Bryce went straight to work on hanging the TP and towel holders and mirror.  He placed the brackets for the shelves and was ready for the shelves by the time I was done painting them the color of the molding and walls.

Looked great - ready for pictures.  I went up stairs to switch a load of laundry and Bryce started putting away a few tools and trash when we hear an awful crash with a following of clinks and clangs and bangs.

Jamba thought the shelves looked nice too.  A nice place to sit...but it didn't hold her jumping on it.

So, we made sure nothing was broken and the walls didn't have holes in them.  Jamba was fine, but the shelf would not hang up again.  So, here goes another adventure with this bathroom.

We decided to pull the shelves off and rehang them with serious anchors.  Those suckers are study.  I might be able to sit on them on and I guess we don't have to worry about them falling on some one's head while using the bathroom.

The shelf that fell had a pretty good gouge in it so we filled that, sanded and repainted before it went back up.

Here's the (mostly) final bathroom.  I say mostly only because I want to get a cool terrarium or chia pet thing to put on the shelf for a touch of color.  Gotta have my color. :)  I wanted to put a fun colored towel in there but Target was not cooperating with their color choices...neon or neutral.  Really?  No buttery yellows and no soft greens or fun mauve/purples?  Nope.

neat texture on the mirror frame

sturdy shelves with the wainscotting (sp?)
and obviously the builders weren't concerned with centering the toilet.

see the crown molding? ;)

We decided this was a great place for Grandpa's rabbits. 

Maybe that's what Jamba wanted.  She was hunting...

White Lightning

Bryce washed his car today and since you haven't seen pictures (I know you've been dying) we thought we'd be considerate and share the beauty with you.

I guess I'll share the secret of what's in the FedEx box we're (still) waiting for.  The package is a Hypertech tuner (+67 horsepower, yes please!).  He's super excited because he's been wanting one and got it for a steal.  He already installed the intake from his old car, so this will just make it moar fast! 

Little Bits of Fall

Thought I'd share the other little bits of fall I have around my house.

 I love my "BOO" Ghosts and so does Awzker.  They keep him company during his afternoon naps.

I love his giant nose.  Maybe I'll make more him, out of 2-littler bottles and then have a grouping in all sizes.

I messed up RIP so I used CHILD instead

I saw some DIY foam tombstones and wanted to make some for our Trunk or Treat since the YW are running it up and we're trying to decorate around each game since big rooms with high ceilings are hard to decorate.  One of the games is Ring around the Graveyard (ring toss) so we were going to put some tombstones by it. 

I found two small pieces of gray foam at work and brought them home to carve.  I have no skills in this I've found, but they're fine for what we're using them for...however, on the first one I was going to put RIP and I centered the I in the middle, then wrote the first line of the P to figure the spacing and then moved to the R and drew a line...at the wrong side of the R...so it was too close to form the rest of the R.  But I did a good job of drawing three lines the same distance apart...go Cec. 

I had to think of something that was spelled with the same amount of letters on each side of an I. I thought maybe I could do a last name so the first one I thought of that met the criteria was CHILD...please don't judge.