End over End... again

Happy Monday!!!

I can't believe that it's Monday already... the weekend was jam packed with lots of stuff but it makes the weekend go faster. The extra busy time started last week. I was able to rent a rototiller from Home Depot. The guy working at the store helped me get it in the car and tried to help tie my trunk down, but he didn't do a good job and before I even got out of the parking lot I had to pull over and re-tie it down. I got it home, got it out and then spent a good 15 minutes trying to figure out how to put the wheel up to prepare the machine to till. It was not as difficult as I thought it may be, but it was not exactly easy. By the end of tilling I was dripping sweat. The ivy and pachysandra roots got stuck around the tiller tines and I had to stop a few times, shut down the machine, and pull off the roots. But it accomplished the ultimate goal: get rid of as many roots as possible.

Today I was able to find a company that could deliver fill dirt (the good kind that is supposed to help grow good trees and veggies and stuff) today. So I paid and they supplied. I didn't know what time they'd be out here and I had to run a few errands (including returning a half-assembled wheelbarrow... wheelbarrel? save ten dollars to self assemble? well, you don't realize that it's a poor quality wheelbarrow if you have to assemble it... ugh... thanks home depot for taking it back without a receipt) I weeded the side bed and brought some of the lawn bags out to the curb to prep for garbage day tomorrow (our garbage man probably... no definitely hates us). The reason for the post title is that I was moving one of the uprooted bushes to make room for the dirt and the branch broke and I went tumbling backwards... I tried to catch my balance but I was running backwards and downhill and finally I ended up doing somersaults backwards. Well, I think I'm going to be sore tomorrow... I should probably take a tylenol... oh well.

Well, my mom and dad were here this weekend... they love reebok and I have a few photos to show...

Dad doesn't do much and puppies love him... Mom just loves Reebok and I think wanted to take her home...

Bread, bird, and house.

Hi. Happy Thursday. I really wish it was Friday. This week has been packed with stuff, however, it seems to be dragging by. It felt like Friday on Tuesday, again on Wednesday, and even today on Thursday. I hope tomorrow won't feel like Monday.





There's lots going on right now because this weekend is my bridal shower, and that means my parents are coming up tomorrow to spend Friday and Saturday night here. Gotta clean house. Gotta keep dog from biting. Gotta keep cat from eating dog food (and then barfing). Gotta clean myself and laundry and stuff.



Yesterday I was making dinner (turkey sausage baked in pepper sauce over red beans and rice) and I decided to throw in some cookies (chocolate chip right out of the refrigerator pre-made dough container) when I heard a large vehicle noise coming from the front of the house. I thought one of our neighbors was mowing their lawn, but the noise sounded like it was coming right from our house. I walked outside to find our across the street neighbor and his tractor and chain pulling up our shrubs from the front of the house. Sweet! I threw my shoes on but there was no need because K did everything on his own. We had 5 or 6 trees and he had the majority of them out in less than 2 minutes each. He put the chain around the tree, got on the tractor, and put it in forward... and as a great beautiful scene, the roots underground rumbled and then broke free from the earth! Only one caused a problem but K didn't give up... and it took a grand total of 7 or 8 minutes to get that one out. So the front of the house looks like butt, but it will look better shortly. I'm going to move the trees and roots and then rent a rototiller then till the dirt then bring in some fill dirt then expand the beds a little then plant some new trees and plants and flowers and then mulch and then start work at the hospital?



Because K helped us out I decided to make both he and his wife a thank you baked good... I thought about cookies but I didn't want cookies... I wanted bread. And so bread it is...



WHOLE WHEAT RAISIN-APPLE BREAD













2 PKG YEAST






1 BEATEN EGG






1 C WARM MILK






1/4 C HONEY






1C RAISINS/ CRANBERRIES OR NUTS, SEEDS.. APRICOTS.. DRIED WHATEVER FIGS!!!






1 C FINELY CHOPPED APPLES






1 1/2C WH WH FLOUR






2 1/2C FLOUR






1/2 C CRACKED WHEAT FLOUR OT WHEAT GERM






1 1/2 TSP SALT






1 BEATEN EGG YOLK( I ADDED A LITTLE OIL AND MOLASSES)













SOFTEN YEAST IN 1/2 C WARM WATER. IN BOWL, COMBINE EGG, MOO,HONEY AND 1 1/2 TSP SALT; ADD YEAST AND WATER MIXTURE, RAISINS OR CRANBERRIES AND THE APPLES. iN LARGE BOWL, STIR TOGETHER WH WH FLOUR,& WHITE FLOUR... ADD MILK MIXTURE... MIXING WELL. STIR IN CRACKED WHEAT. TURN OUT ONTO FLOURED SURFACE, KNEAD IN REMAINING 1 C WH WH FLOUR. KNEAD 3-5 MINUTES UNTIL SMOOTH AND ELASTIC. TURN INTO A GREASED BOWL, TURNING ONCE SO THAT THE DOUGH IS COATED WITH OIL. COVER WITH PLASTIC AND A TOWEL. LET RISE 1 HR OR TIL DOUBLE. PUNCH DOWN AND LET REST 5-7 MINUTES. SHAPE INTO 3 LOAVES. PLACE INTO 3 GREASED PANS... 7 1/2" X 3 1/2" X 2"PANS. cOVER AND LET RISE 30-45 MINUTES. bEAT TOGETHER EGG YOLK AND A LITTLE WATER. bRUSH ON LOAVES. SPRINKEL WITH A LITTLE CRACKED WHEAT... OR SPRINKLE WITH GRANOLA AND SPRINKLE WITH SUGAR AND CINNAMON. BAKE AT PREHEATED 375 DEGREES FOR 30 MINUTES COVERING WITH FOIL IF AFTER THE FIRST 25 MINS THE LOAF IS GETTING TOOOO BROWN. REMOVE FROM OVEN WHEN DONE.. REMOVE FROM PANS .. LET COOL AND THEN EAT.

This is my version... I didn't actually have any whole wheat flour on hand (oops) and I forgot the egg wash at the end. Whatever, it tastes great and I believe it is a great thank you for ripping up shrubery from our house.

Oh, and we had a dead bird on our driveway today. Second dead bird of the house. Please no more, I don't enjoy picking them up. Gross.

Until later... I'm going to eat some bread.

Will you like my sheep?

I forgot to talk about this yesterday, so here I am, with opportunity to talk about things today:

I was given the book "Dear John" last week by a friend. As you may know, it is written by Nicholas Sparks. I find no need to lie, I have read a few and enjoyed at least one of his other books... but you can't read too many of them one right after the other because... well... they're all the same. So anyways, I get "Dear John" and I start reading it and the only reason I finished it was because I had nothing else to do. But the reality of the situation is that you knew how it was going to turn out halfway through the book. You could easily skip paragraphs (if not pages) and still be fine. You know that Mr. Sparks is obsessed with the Carolinas and girls in summer dresses and sweet tea. You know that you're supposed to cry when one of the characters dies. In this book he pulls out the current "hot illness": asperger's. Really? Did you have to go there? He did. This book blew. I did not enjoy it. I need another book to read stat so that I can not hate myself anymore.

Moving on...

J and I are currently working on planning our post-wedding trip. Not your typical honeymoon because we're saving that trip for later in intern year... for this trip we are now heavily leaning towards Boston. Lots of stuff to see and do there. I haven't been there since Freshman year of college when a few of my friends and I drove up in a rickety van to watch teammates race in the Head of the Charles. I think this would be an all-together different experience. We had tossed around the idea of going to Toronto... but we have yet to get our passport applications turned in. We thought about renting a cabin somewhere and taking time with each other and the pup, but we're not sure that is exactly what we want to do... so we think Boston is going to be it...

Now for the fun part of today's post: Reebok!

A quick video for your viewing pleasure: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ky63OS45z-I

Reebok likes to play bocce, and it's one of the only things she seems interested in these days that tires her out.

And now a picture series:

1) Ah, I see you have brought me a gift.

2) Yes, would you like to smell or lick it?

3) What do you think of the quality of the 3-legged stuffed sheep?

4) It is good, you may continue to play with it and entertain me.

BLOG

It's been a few days since I last blogged. Lots of stuff has had to be done, none that seems quite exciting enough to blog about... more importantly I guess, is the fact that I've been too exhausted to blog.



Last night I made chicken enchiladas (http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/rachael-ray/chicken-enchiladas-recipe/index.html). The looked good. Sounded easy. Smelled totally odd. The recipe stuffing called for straight up chicken... I thought that was boring so I added black beans and a can of chopped green chiles. The real issue I have with the dish was the sauce. I used a jar of Prego Mushrooms. The recipe calls for adding some cinnamon... I think that was the killer. I decided though to try it and ultimately they taste better than they smell. I will probably make the recipe again but will modify it more. I will keep the filling with chicken, beans, and chiles. For the sauce I will omit the cinnamon (or quite honestly, just buy a jar of enchilada sauce).



I also made a pan of corn bread. I added corn kernels from a leftover ear of corn we had grilled 2 days prior. Deeeelicious! Best right out of the oven with honey drizzled over it.



In other news, the puppy is in a fantstically bitey mood. Awesome, except that it's not awesome at all. She's gotten me pretty good a few times... it's a mix of why she bites. Sometimes she's hungry. Other times she just wants to play or she's bored. I gave her a little peanutbutter in her Kong today and that seems to help and we're working on being consistent with our training style. I hope it helps.

We continue to make good progress with the front yard. The shrubs are ready and prepared for our neighbor to come and pull them up with his tractor. Oh, and we got a riding lawnmower! Awesome! Pictures of the mower to come soon, it's cute :)

Whoopie!

Not much exciting to say today. It was unbelievably wet and rainy here so there was a lot of attempts to tire the pup out inside. Not sure how, but it worked.

I did a lot inside today. Cleaning. Laundry. Unpacking a few more boxes. Vacuuming.

I guess today I can talk about recipes...

Dinner was pasta tossed in a homemade garlic and basil white wine sauce with grilled chicken on top.

Sauce:

Sautee onions and garlic in olive oil (salt and pepper... duh). Add chopped parsley and basil (from garden deck is the best). Add 2 chopped tomatoes. Add some white wine. Add mushrooms and spinach. Take out some of the juice, throw in some flour to make a nice roux, put it back in and cook.

I don't have pictures because I just don't but it got rave reviews from J.

Dessert was whoopie pies. It's my mom's recipe, but I am not sure if I'm thrilled with the recipe this time, it just wasn't chocolately enough. So I'm not going to post the recipe, but if I find one that I like more I will post it. At least they look pretty...

The cats have been exploring more. I think Jiffy got into the crazy juice again and was lounging on the "Hi, I'm Mat" mat. Cute.

8.4

What to talk about today...

Reebok went into the new vet's office for a little bit of an introduction.

(http://www.creeksideanimalclinic.vetsuite.com/Templates/BLOCKS.aspx) Needless to say, she had everyone in the paw of her fluffy self within 3 seconds. No surprises from the visit. The vet said she looks great and has a great disposition (we knew that). We were even able to show off a little bit with our "sit". The vet said that within a few more weeks Reebok should be sleeping through the night too, great news for me and J. The pup and I have to head back in a few weeks, but it won't be quite as fun as today... time for her next round of shots then.

I apparantly didn't mention much about our recent garage sale adventures. I thought I had talked about our fun, but my bad. Things that we have recently purchased at garage sales:

1) Brand new gas can. (Purchase at home improvement store... 20ish dollars. Purchase at garage sale... 5 dollars)

2) Shovel and yard rake: 8 dollars total

3) File cabinet: 10 dollars (nice metal with key)

4) Dog crate and cushion used under 5 times: 30 dollars

5) Patio furniture: Table and 6 chairs... 125 dollars.

I think we've gotten a few other things, but I can't currently remember what they are.

Finally, I'm still attacking the yard with a vengence. We are making great progress, but there is still much to do. I called 8-1-1 today to get someone to come out and mark out the electric lines so I don't cut them in the process. Apparantly I will also have to call them again when I want to plant something. Their markings are only valid for 10 days. If you cut the lines on day 11 you are the one responsible for paying for repairs.

As you can see here:

This is what I'm starting with... it's not pretty.

And here you can see a picture half cleaned and half needing attention. It is pretty dramatic I think :)

"Those" Neighbors

Today is the day that I realized 2 things.

1:

We are "those" neighbors. I know this picture may be kind of hard to see, but I hope you get the point. We have sooooooo much trash for trash day tomorrow it is kind of obscene. Wait, I don't want you to get the completely wrong idea. It's not actually all trash. About 1/4 of it are recyclables. Mostly cardboard and paper and boxes from the move. About 1/2 of it are tree limbs and lawn trash from hours of back-breaking (and near shovel breaking) labor. (PS- I got a new shovel the other day for edging and a new one today to take the place of the one I keep almost breaking... will keep you updated). The remainder of the pile is actually trash.

Dear mailman, I hope you can deliver our mail.

Dear trashman, please don't hate us.

2:

We have "those" neighbors. The couple across the street and their grandson were setting off fireworks and firecrackers. Needless to say, Reebok was flipping her shit and I asked them not to set our house on fire (no, really... I did). We live in the country. I'm pretty sure it is illegal to set them off, but hell, out here, let's let our grandkids play with explosives... it's cool. Welcome to our home.

As a follow up to the last post, here is a picture of our deck... all decked out with our garage/yard sale furniture... (deck decked out... hahaha... I amuse myself at least)

Chopped Toad

As we know, I don't like mowing the lawn... last week was not a fun adventure in homeownership... and 2 and a half hours of misery left me not wanting more. J was able to get in the front mowed earlier this week after work, but there just wasn't enough daylight to get in the back. Of course it has been rainy and wet all week, therefore no chance to get the back done. I looked at the forecast and it's supposed to rain for the next like 5 or 6 days... whee! I had one chance to get it done today, even though I didn't want to, I decided I'd rather do it than spend another 50 bucks having someone do it.

I got the back done, and it only took a bit over an hour. There were a few tricks employed. First, fill gas can ENTIRELY so there is no need to stop and refill. Second, remove bag and allow mower to mulch. Third, and most importantly, when mower starts to slow and wants to stall, tip mower back on back wheels to allow mower to spit out any wet heavy grass. IT WORKED!!! I got the entire back mowed without it stalling out once... Sweet!!!!

Check it out... not too bad, eh?

About 1/3 of the way through, I saw a lump of "dried grass" towards the house. As the mower and I approached, the "grass" hopped. I shrieked at the realization that it was a toad. It only hopped 1 mower width away, so I had to nudge it with my shoe before I ran it over and had chopped toad. A few shoe nudges and it decided to make itself safe by hiding under the deck. Chopped toad would have been gross.

In other news, puppers is doing well. Still no major problems with accidents in the house. We are feeling out whether we want to keep Reebok in a crate or in our small bathroom while we are out. I had her in the bathroom while I mowed and no major incidents. She did find the TP roll, but there was only a few sheets on it anyways and she just ripped it off onto the ground.

We are going to meet our new vet on Tuesday just to check in and more of a "get to know you" before she has to have her next round of shots later this month.

Plan for tonight... grill steak. Make sauteed mushrooms and onions. Roast some potatoes. Eat. Ice cream sandwiches for dessert perhaps?

Isn't a Reebok a shoe?

Well, clearly it has been a few days since the last post. My appologies. As mentioned in the last post, the wedding was great. Now I can finally post a picture of the bedazzled wedding flip flops. They came out really nicely and Kraffles wore them for longer than she probably would have worn any other pair of shoes. The bedazzles stood the test of time... well, 20 minutes or so. I may actually wear them at my wedding... Maybe the reception. Undecided yet, but it would be a shame to put them away for good.

While in Cincy for the wedding I was talking with my parents about "my dog" that they have been kindly watching for the past 2 years. Unfortunately for me, we all agree that Charlotte (the dog) would not do well if J and I tried to bring her back with us. She has a darn good life with them... another doggy to play with, a large fenced in backyard, not to mention the fact that she has been with them for 2 years. So as J and I were driving back up north we decided to start looking into getting a dog of our own.

Monday (Memorial Day) we met up with a lady even further north who had an ad posted on Petfinder.com about an 8 week old puppy. When we got there and met the puppy we fell in love. (We had already met with another puppy the day before who just didn't fit the bill... we weren't looking for any ol' dog, we were looking for our dog). Needless to say, we took her home that day. We now have a new addition to the family, our 8 week old half golden retriever half border collie baby: Reebok. (it was the name from the animal rescue and we actually liked it :-P)

She's been a great pup so far... only one accident in the house. It's been pretty comical to see how she interacts with the cats. She is clearly curious, Jiffy is clearly angry, and Lucy doesn't care about much except that she gets to eat dog food again (she found Reebok's bowl and has been helping herself...). Currently Reebok is asleep in J's closet between his gym bag and a pair of shoes...

pepto bismol shots?

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! It seems as though everyone survived Kraffle's wedding! It was a lovely day overall. Woke up at the parents house, got to chopping Veggs and cutting cheese and making bruscetta (sp?) Rounds. Then people start showing up. Then everyone was there. THen we had a wedding! Bread (kraffle's husband) had his roommate D officiating and he did a bread and kraffle special speed version. The proper ceremony took under 2 minutes...for real. And good thing too because 1) it was melt hot outside and 2) Kraffle's started to giggle and then I did and that could have been bad.

After the wedding came EtOH, food, and general celebration for the 30 or so guests. I think everyone had a good time. People started to leave around 7 or 8, with the final hotel-staying guests departing a little after 9. J, karrie, and I were staying at hotel parents... they charge less there and breakfast is included.

We went to bed around 11 and then I woke up feeling like nauseous butt. Awesome. After mulling things over I decided to get up, go to the bathroom and get my barf on... on problem was that I couldn't yak. After dry heaving for a bit and then lying helpless on the floor for a while, I heard my mom awake in the next room. I don't care if I am 26 years old dragged my barfy Ass to the next room, started crying, and told my mom I didnt feel well.

35 minutes later and 2 shots of pepto bismol down the hatch I think I'm finally better.

Congrats kraffle and bread. Next time I will figure a better way to share my happy emotions than with gastrointestinal acrobatics.

Free Kittens

Today we talk about the great (mother effing) outdoors. We have about 3/4 of an acre of land. Everyone in our neighborhood has a riding lawnmower, except us. I now understand why. When we moved here the grass had already grown so much that we had to call in professionals with their big-time mowers to do the first cut. It was very fun to watch them, but also out of our budget (53 dollars for the cut and weed whacking). It's only been 3 days but the grass was starting to get too tall for comfort. If we let the grass grow too much then our mower won't cut it and then we'd have to hire the 53$ guys... no thank you.

Today's schedule:

8:30- wake up

until 10:15- clean up a bit around the house and eat breakfast

10:30: go buy salt for the water softener (7$ for fifty pounds of iron remover plus salt)

11: grab ipod and mowing shoes, attempt to pour gasoline into mower... most gets in

11:03ish: mower starts on first try... I think I'm a rockstar

blah blah blah...

I got through the entire front lawn and decide to stop the mower to empty the bag. That was all good until it didn't restart. After much cursing, a cut finger, 1/2 liter of blue gatorade, and 10 minutes to rest, it restarted. 20 or so minutes later, it ran out of gas... replay me trying not to spill gas, replay me trying to start the stupid thing again, much more cursing, and it's off to more mowing. It got me all the way to the point where I had about 5 rows worth of mowing left when it stopped... why me??? Ok... again, much much much more cursing, more gatorade, more time and it's working one more time. Sweet! the home stretch! or so I thought. It does well until I have 8 feet left to mow... 8 freaking feet... and it dies. I'm sweating. I'm tired. I'm pissed. I walk around the house a few times and I consider just leaving the 8 feet... however, I'm OCD and to pigheaded... top off the gatorade and get it going again.

I WON! The lawn is now mowed. My shoulder and entire right arm is exhausted. I can't wait to do this again... NOT.

Finally... to round things out... we got lawn furniture... found it last night while out to get gas. It was 20 dollars for 3 pieces (we had to go out and get new cushions). They also had kittens there... anyone want a kitten? They were cute.

PS... I finished kreffles shoes. They're awesome. Pictures to come.

Lazy Susan

Today's adventure involved unpacking some more boxes in the kitchen/dining room. We'd done a lot of unpacking but there were still 5 or so miscellaneous boxes remaining. One of my finds was a third lazy susan. I had my spices on 2 lazy susans already, but lazy susans are best when they actually work... duh. Now the one that was missing the bottom spinny part is in the garbage... see: lazy susan into the garbage!

One more exciting thing that was done today was hang the paper towel roll dispenser. This paper towel dispenser originally came from Marc's and was under 4 dollars. J. has a random rule that only applies to some purchases some of the time. For example, he was only willing to spend 4 dollars or under on a paper towel dispenser. So I found this one at Marc's and we used it at our old apartment. Finally, it has an official home. Who knew that a 4 dollar paper towel dispenser would look so nice...

No yardwork for me today. I'm over ivy for the day. Not to mention it's like a bazillion degrees and humid outside and nice and cool inside.

As a random aside, I get to go try on my wedding dress today, but don't expect any pictures. Speaking of weddings, I have to finish bedazzling some shoes for Kraffles, she's getting married this weekend. Pictures will follow after the wedding.

Hungry Beaster in the houuuuuuuse!

Welcome to Hungry Beaster's Homeowner Humor. I realized today that being a new homeowner is pretty funny. Not only that, but being in a house with a nice kitchen provides the opportunity to make lots of good food.

Anyways, I'm Beaster... (nickname, of course, given to me by my sister a long time ago). My fiance and I purchased our first house in northeastern Ohio. We moved in 6 days ago and have been working to exhaust ourselves since then. I guess I should have taken a bunch of pictures of all the house stuff before we did anything, but eh, that didn't happen.

Let's talk a little about the house:
It's a lovely ranch, 3 bedroom 2 full bathroom. All you reallly need to know is that the kitchen is big. Lots of cook prep room, standard gas stovetop (big plus), standard other stuff like fridge and microwave. The house is otherwise awesome. Everything is updated and clean which means that the heavy work to do is outside, and believe me... there is work to be done.

In addition to talking about the work to be done outside, I will be sharing some of the successes and failures of food. Especially focused right now on summer appropriate items (read GRILL and yummy cool desserts).

Night 1 of having the grill was such a standard grill meal:
Steak, marinated vidalia onion, asparagus. And then baked potatoes. Omm nomm, delicious.

Grill night 2:
This was like... the best ever! This recipe came from my friend K, provider of many recipes and also inspiration for food... and inspiration for house things.

Greek Burgers with cucumber sauce

1 pack ground turkey
1 small container of regular feta cheese
1 small container of sliced black olives
black pepper to taste
a few shakes of dried basil

before turning on your grill, take off the grates and spray with non-stick spray. heat grill and throw the burgers on. try and grill one side well before flipping, turkey burgers don't take to frequent flipping.

while the burgers are cooking you can make the sauce:

1 container reduced fat sour cream
a few shakes of dried dill
salt
pepper
1/2 tsp white sugar
1 cucumber (peeled, seeds removed, chopped)
1T white vinegar

mix everything together... and avoid consuming all of it before the burgers are done.

throw the burgers on some buns, throw some sauce on the burgers, and you're done.


my plan for tonight is to take the leftover 2 burgers and chop them up, make some greek-ish pasta meat sauce and put it on top of some whole wheat pasta. side that with garlic bread and a fresh salad and dinner is served.

dessert is one of my simple favorites: pre-made graham cracker crust, filled with cook-and-serve chocolate pudding, whipped creme on top. Today I added some orange zest as I was cooking the pudding. Once the pudding was in the crust, I threw some pecans and sliced almonds on top. It's in the fridge right now, will keep you updated.



That's enough on the hungry beaster right now, now for the quick homeowner humor... I am trying to rip out ivy groundcover that has clearly not been tamed since before I was born. Anyways, as I was trying to rip some of it off one of the evergreen trees it is smothering, the ivy broke and I ended up on my ass nearly doing a backward somersault. Awesome.

Any recipes? I will try them and share.

Any good ideas for memorial day? We're having people over... I'm thinking about faux-cheesecake (recipe provided by Kraffles... aka, my sister) and easy key lime pie (found one the back of the pie shell, inspired by watching too much Dexter season 3)