I am too old for this!

Last night my Community Group went to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2 at midnight. We decided to do this back in November after seeing part 1 and agreeing that this was an important cultural event. It is the Star Wars of this generation and this kids deserved to be a part of it (as well as us adults). The idea of doing a midnight movie always sounds great when it is months down the road but truth be told when the time came, I gulped as I purchased my ticket thinking of my 5:00 a.m. work shift the next day and anticipating the price I would have to pay for staying out past my 9:00 o'clock bedtime. I figured it would be worth it though... I mean, it is the epic finale of a 10 year journey!

*SPOILER ALERT* And worth it, it was! I just spent the last week re-reading book 7 so I could be fully prepared to complain about all of the parts that didn't do justice to the book (just kidding). But honestly, the movie was amazing! The only thing I would have liked to have seen was Snape's memory montage a bit more fleshed out. I feel like we missed some of the intensity of who he was and his love for Lily Potter that was presented in the book. But all in all, I left the theater feeling very satisfied. It was a great ending to a great series. *END SPOILER*

When the movie was over it was pumpkin time and I had to face reality. I got home at 3:15 and I usually wake up at 4:15 for work so I decided that getting one hour of sleep would render me useless and the alarm buzzing at 4:15 would be one of the most painful experiences of my life so I decided to just stay awake until I had to go to work. I didn't want to just sit around, though, because I was afraid I would get really sleepy, so I decided to run some errands. I had to go to Kinkos and Walmart, which are both places that I dread because it seems to take forever to get in and out of there! After 45 minutes of errand running I decided that I was brilliant because both of those places are MUCH more pleasant at 3:30 a.m. In fact, I think I will do all of my shopping in the middle of the night from now on, it is much more time efficient when you have the whole place to yourself!

Before I knew it, it was time to go to work. It was an interesting day to say the least. When I sat down at my desk, I discovered that the IT department upgaded my computer on my day off and neglected to leave me a new password to get on. I had to start working anyway, so I started doing consultations blindly without my computer. About a half an hour later they got me logged on only for me to discover that I was no longer connected to a printer, my email templates were gone (for good), I had lost a few Word documents that were pretty important, and all of my settings were messed up. Thanks, IT guys!

Every spare minute between my calls was spent trying to reclaim and recover my computer. It was stressful, aggravating, and BUSY. The silver lining is that while on any normal day, this situation would have really made me mad, today it gave me so much to do that I had no time to feel tired. I was good to go all day long! A blessing in disguise :)

Then... I came home and sat on the couch. Bad move, Tamara, bad move. I should never have stopped moving. Now, every molecule in my body is begging me to crawl up to my bed and slide under the covers. I won't succumb though, I won't! If I take a nap I will completely ruin the chances of a good night's sleep and I have to get up at 4:15 tomorrow as well so I want a solid night's sleep. I just need to power through until bed time.

I am left to wonder, though, how early can bedtime be? It is 4:00 now... is that too early? I think so, the sun is still in the middle of the sky. What about 6:00. Can that be bedtime? That would give me ten hours of sleep. Not unheard of, right? Yeah... 6:00 is a good bedtime. I just have to hold on for two more hours. To be honest, the whole reason for this loooong and detailed post about my last 24 hours is to keep me awake. I was slipping in and out of consciousness and was about to lose to this battle and give in to my bed. I must. stay. awake.

All nighters? What am I thinking, I am seriously too old for this.

I love me some curry!

Last night we had an Indian themed potluck and I brought some yellow chicken curry. We also had samosas, lentils, tikka masala, naan, and a coconut almond fudge dessert. It was delicious, I LOVE Indian food and curry is my favorite! I would like to try out some recipes for green or red curry, but so far, all I have tried is the yellow curry. I realized that I really need to invest in a crock pot designed for traveling with a lid that seals on because it was a long, slow ride down to Del Mar with constant fear that hot curry would overflow onto Ellie's legs and the car! But we did make it with only a minor spill. Success!

Anyway, here is the recipe for all of you cooks to enjoy! It makes a nice big pot, perfect for a crowd. It is pretty mild so if you like more of a kick, just add some more cayenne.

Yellow Chicken Curry

3 cloves garlic, crushed
1 large onion, ½ minced, ½ chopped into large pieces
¼ tsp. minced fresh ginger root
5 Tbs. curry powder
5 Tbs. water
2 Tbs. olive oil
2 cups plain yogurt
1 can coconut milk
3 large chicken breasts
1 large potato
½ small butternut squash
1 cup thickly sliced carrots
⅛ tsp. cayenne pepper
1 tsp. salt
½ tsp. pepper
1 bay leaf

In a small bowl, grind together garlic, onion, and ginger. In a separate small bowl, mix together curry powder and 5 tablespoons water.
Heat oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Sauté garlic, ginger and onion until browned; add curry paste and saute together until smell is strong and fragrant.
Add yogurt, coconut milk along with 1 cup of water, and stir all together. Then add potatoes, squash and chicken and bring to a boil; reduce heat and add the rest of veggies and spices. Simmer until potatoes are tender and chicken is cooked through, about 20-25 minutes.
Serve over jasmine rice.

I'm a big girl now!

So, I work on commission which is no fun. Well, I take that back. It is really fun when times are good and not so much fun the other times. It's generally about half and half for me. Six months out of the year I do awesome and the other six, I really have to tighten the belt a little. I should probably be more adult about this and save my money when I do well for the times that are tighter but I haven't gotten there yet. Mainly because I have a list of things I would like to purchase and do so whenever extra funds come in. I have been working on my list ever since I finished school and got a job. It is not a huge list, in fact, I am almost done. (Then I will start being responsible, I promise!) My list is comprised mostly of furniture for my apartment.

I am 34 years old and I have never had proper furniture. I was a missionary for seven years and during that time you just took whatever anyone offered you. When I lived in Madison, we went "sidewalk shopping" every fall and spring. That was when the University students were moving out or in and they would put all of the stuff they didn't want on the sidewalk for anyone to pick up. I remember carrying a couch five blocks once. I also got my bed that way. (I cringe thinking about it now! I slept on a random mattress I found on the street? Ewww!!!)

Anyway, over the last few years I have gotten some great finds on Craigslist and my apartment was almost fully furnished. The only thing left were couches. They were hand-me-downs that were covered in slip covers and were just awful. So uncomfortable and every time you sat down the slip covers got all messed up. For someone with OCD tendencies that was a problem. Couch shopping was a bit of a challenge because most things these days are plush and oversized, which is super comfortable but way too big for my apartment. I finally found a set that I liked that fit well in my space and purchased them. They came last week and I am a happy little worker bee. (all of those days of overtime in June was worth it!)

Here are pictures. I know my new furniture isn't all that interesting to many of you, but a few people have asked to see them so I will go ahead and post. That is the fun thing about a blog, you can post whatever you want, no matter how mundane and people will read it! :)

Sometimes I write

I stumbled across a poem that I wrote a while ago and thought, "Hey, I have a blog. I should post it!" It is kind of melancholy but my thoughts don't tend toward rainbows and butterflies when I write.
So here it is, my poem, enjoy... (yet be appropriately melancholy)


She tries...

She sits and ponders who she is to be.
She has been told that she is too much...

“You’re too beautiful, cover up.
You’re too intelligent, dumb down.
You’re too outspoken, be quite.
You’re too complex, too mysterious.
You’re too emotional, too needy.
You require too much work to figure out.
You’re too much for me to handle.
You’re not worth the effort.”

She tries...
She hides her true feelings so as not to be “that needy, emotional girl”.
She hides her intelligence so as not to intimidate or emasculate those around her.
She tries to be sweet and soft spoken so that she appears appropriately feminine.
She tries to be that perfect woman. She wants to be worth the effort.
She tries...

She sits and ponders who she is to be.
She has been told that she is not enough...

“You’re not beautiful or sexy enough.
You’re not thin enough.
You’re not voluptuous enough.
You’re not feminine enough.
You’re not “Proverbs 31” enough.
You’re not enough to satisfy me.
You’re not worth the risk.”

She tries...
She spends hours on her hair and makeup trying to look like the cover of a magazine.
She spends hundreds of dollars on designer clothes in order to turn a head.
She starves or purges herself trying to attain that perfect figure.
She works herself until she is exhausted trying to keep up with Ms. Proverbs 31.
She tries to be that perfect woman. She wants to be worth the risk.
She tries...

Time and again her heart gets broken as she is continually told that
She is not worth the effort, she is not worth the risk.
This beautiful flower closes up and hides,
She withers and dies,
As she tries...

Patriotic Food

I am going to a 4th of July party today and since I am the "dessert girl" of my social circle, I am bringing cupcakes. I thought I would be festive and make red and blue velvet cupcakes. Red velvet can actually be any color so you can make cake for any occasion. I do have to say, though... red food is more appealing than blue food. I find that I am much more inclined to eat the red cupcakes. I leave the blue ones for the kids (and anyone else that doesn't mind having a blue mouth)


This recipe is really good. The cake is really moist and the marshmallow cream in the frosting keeps it from tasting too cream-cheesy. Here is the recipe:


Red Velvet Cupcakes:

Cake:

2 cups sugar

2 sticks of butter, at room temperature

2 eggs

2 Tbs. unsweetened cocoa powder

1 oz. red food coloring

2½ cups cake flour

1 tsp. salt

1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk w/ 1 Tbs. vinegar)

1 tsp. vanilla

½ tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. vinegar

Frosting:

8 oz. cream cheese

1 stick butter, softened

1 cup marshmallow cream

1 lb. powdered sugar

Cake:

Preheat oven to 325°F.

In a mixing bowl, cream the sugar and butter, beat until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time and mix well after each addition. Mix cocoa and food coloring together and then add to sugar mixture; mix well. Sift together flour and salt. Add flour mixture to the creamed mixture alternately with buttermilk. Blend in vanilla. In a small bowl, combine baking soda and vinegar and add to mixture. Pour batter into cupcake tins. Bake for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Remove from heat and cool completely before frosting.

Frosting:

Blend cream cheese and butter together in a mixing bowl. Add marshmallow cream and sugar and blend.

And there you have it: red, white, and blue deliciousness!

Cake Tasting Party

*Warning! - This post will make you hungry and jealous and you will get mad at me for not being invited to the cake tasting party so do us both a favor and go eat something... get nice and full, then come back and read this blog.*

Are you back? Ok, read on...

I am making the wedding cake for my friends, Dave and Ellie's wedding in September. It will be my first wedding cake so it won't be super glamorous or anything but I just finished twelve weeks of cake decorating classes so I am feeling somewhat competent. My last cake decorating class was Tuesday night and for the finale we had to make a stacked cake. I decided to take advantage of the fact that I was going to make a couple of cakes and do a cake tasting party so the bride and groom to be can taste a few different flavor options for their cake.

One idea that I got off of Pinterest (my newest addiction) was using a slice of a tree trunk as a wedding cake stand. I love the idea of combining rustic elements with elegant ones and since Dave and Ellie want to get married under an old oak tree I thought it would be fitting. When I went to Idaho last weekend I made the stand. This was something that would be very difficult to do down here but very easy to do up there, so the timing of my bright idea worked out perfectly! Here is what I made:

I figured that if they didn't love it, I could still use it myself for entertaining. It would make a great cheese platter! In fact, I got to use it right away for the party. We had some cheese and crackers and fruit to start off the evening before getting to the grand finale of CAKE! And, I was right, it looked pretty cool.

Dave and Ellie actually do like it though, so it looks like we have a cake stand. As for the cakes, we tried four flavors: chocolate with raspberry mousse, red velvet, lemon with lemon cream filling, and vanilla bean.

The chocolate was the ultimate winner. It is my mom's signature chocolate cake recipe and it is so good. It is dense and fudgy and moist and mmmmmmm... The raspberry mousse was a nice filling as well, I loved the flavor combination of chocolate and raspberry. The red velvet was a close runner up. There is something about red velvet... it doesn't taste like anything in particular, just sweet nothing, but it is good. We eat with our eyes so I think a lot of its appeal is in its beauty, red cake is pretty. The lemon cake was unimpressive, it was a bit dry but I have made it before and thought it was really good, so I think this time I just baked it a bit too long. The vanilla was also kind of a let down. I keep trying to get vanilla to be really good. I scraped a whole vanilla bean and used some gourmet vanilla bean paste and everything! But no matter how much I try to "gourmet" it, at the end of the day, vanilla is just vanilla, plain and boring. Tyler really liked the vanilla cake, though. It wasn't bad, just wasn't anything to write home about. Vanilla got its boring reputation for a reason.

My cake decorating class was focussing on fondant so I covered one of the cakes in fondant and did the other in buttercream. Fondant is known for being kind of disgusting. I decided to make a homemade marshmallow fondant instead of using the pre-made stuff from the store. I hoped that might make it taste better because fondant can make a cake look really pretty. Well, homemade or not, the fondant was gross! I am nixing that idea because I want my cake to be remembered as tasting good, not covered in thick, sweet, play dough that people have to eat around. Anyway, here is my fondant cake with some gum paste roses on the top. I brushed the cake with pearl dust which makes it sparkle which is kind of fun:

The other cake I did square, just for variety. I used buttercream and wrapped a ribbon around each layer. You can do a lot of things with ribbons on cake and it is super easy! I put gum paste calla lilies on the top just because I had them from my class:

So anyway, there you have it, the cake tasting party was a success and I think we have some good flavors picked for the wedding. Now we just have to get together and nail down the design. Now, if you will excuse me, I saved myself a piece of red velvet cake and I think I will go have that for dinner!

Home, home on the range...

I just returned from a whirlwind trip home to Idaho. I went for my niece, Ashton's, fourth birthday. I was only there for two days but it was a wonderful two days! When I flew in to Sun Valley, I wondered why on earth I don't live there. It is SO beautiful. Growing up there I took it for granted but now whenever I go home I am in awe at how pretty it is. Here are a couple of pics of where I am from:

Not only is it beautiful but it actually smells different up there! I took a big breath of fresh mountain air and was in heaven. It was like water to my thirsty soul! I am so glad I got to go. I feel refreshed.
Oh, and I have the cutest four year old niece in the world!

Product review: Degree Motion Sense Deoderant

I bought some deodorant yesterday. I didn't pay too much attention because quite honestly, I don't stress over my deodorant, as long as it keeps me cool and dry, I am good. When I got home I realized that I got the new Motion Sense kind that gets activated by your arm movement. Sounds like a total gimmick, right? Well, all day today, every time I reached to type something on my computer or pick up the phone I definitely got a whiff of "spring fresh" or whatever scent I ended up with. In fact, right now, I just reached to take a sip of my water and *BAM* spring fresh all up in my nose!

Now, spring fresh isn't a bad smell or anything, but I thought the point of deodorant was... anti-smell. I just want to smell like me, without the B.O. I don't want to feel like someone is spraying Fabreeze in my face every time I move my arms. Honestly, it was quite distracting. But I guess it works, it is about 3:30 in the afternoon and I put it on at 4:00 this morning and my pits are still quite springy and freshy! That is pretty impressive!

And, I have to say the cute cashier at Trader Joe's today was unusually friendly. He asked how my day was going and what I was up to for the rest of the day, then he told me that he was getting off of work in an hour. I don't usually have such conversations with cute cashiers so I can only assume that having "spring fresh" shooting from my armpits while I whipped out my wallet gave me a bit of an edge. I felt a little smug knowing about my secret deodorant power.

So, all in all, I give this product a thumbs up. Yes, it is distracting to have bursts of scent attacking my nostrils every few minutes all day long and I am a little concerned that my sense of smell might be desensitized to the point of losing it all together, but it seems to attracts the men-folk and well, a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do!

P.S. I Googled the deodorant to make sure I got the name of it right and stumbled upon this blog. It is way funnier than mine and almost made me delete this whole blog post but instead I will just attach this other guy's blog so if you want to read a funnier review on this deodorant, click here.

The things we do for money!

I don't like animals. I really don't. I mean, I don't hate them. I wouldn't kick a puppy or anything but I just don't have the desire to run up and pet a dog or become enamored by it's cuteness. I am usually pretty quiet about that fact. Admitting that you don't like animals is kind of like saying that you think babies are ugly. People are kind of horrified and you come off looking like a terrible, heartless person. But nonetheless, I am letting the world know via blog post that I really don't care for animals. There, I said it.

I do, however, like money. Which brings me to my current situation. I have a reoccurring dog-sitting gig which is pretty lucrative and relatively easy. Well, I take that back. Dog-sitting is easy in theory. If there are one or two dogs that do normal things like eat regular dog food and go on walks and hang out outside, then sure, it is easy. This job is a bit more involved. There are eight (yes, I said EIGHT!) Golden Retrievers here, two of them are puppies. The lady I sit for breeds the dogs and they regularly compete in dog competitions so these dogs eat organic vegetable mush, raw meat, eggs, and yogurt. Meal time twice a day for eight dogs who eat raw, organic, homemade food is a very long, and complicated ordeal.

Know what else is fun? Poop! Eight dogs in two large yards depositing their stuff all over. I spend about an hour a day poop-scooping. Oh, and dog hair is everywhere! When I go home I have to wash everything that I brought with me which is one of the reasons I don't like animals in the first place - they are hairy and smelly and I am a little on the OCD side so hairy and smelly don't go over well with me (which, I just realized, may also be why I am still single).

Hanging out with dogs is definitely not my favorite way to spend my weekend but I have to admit, it is an easier way to make money than putting in 12 hour shifts at work (5 a.m. to 5 p.m.) which is another thing I have been doing lately! In a couple of weeks I am hoping life will settle down a bit. June has been a whirlwind of work. And instead of being an adult and saving all of this extra cash for a rainy day I treated myself to a new love seat and sofa which I will get in about three weeks. That will make all of the overtime worth it! The interior designer in me has been cringing for the last six years at my hand-me-down furniture. So... yay for me! Now off to go make dinner for eight hungry dogs!

S'mores follow up

Homemade marshmallows are great! They taste fresher and fluffier than the store bought version. There are a number of great uses for homemade marshmallows. You can use them to dip in fondue:

You can make homemade Peeps for Easter:

You can cut them into cute shapes and give them as gifts with some homemade hot chocolate mix:

You can dip them in chocolate and make Christmas candy:

But the one thing you should never do to a homemade marshmallow is try to roast it over a campfire! This was a lesson learned last night. Yesterday I was all excited about my Martha Stewartness but I discovered that homemade s'mores were much better in theory. The graham crackers were great. I will definitely make those again. But the marshmallows WOULD NOT ROAST! They just melted and dripped into the fire. It was the weirdest thing. Apparently the chemicals and preservatives are essential for the roasting process. So, I encourage marshmallow making for many things but when it comes to s'mores, cheap and unoriginal seems to be the ticket! Oh well, good to know...