Month: February 2011

Crazy colours in my hair? Check

Black nail polish? Check

Cutting my own bangs? DOUBLE CHECK.

I think I’m having some kind of mid-thirties crisis O___O

This morning the daycare kids helped me build a giant fort. I have 2 Crazy Forts kits now, which means 50 ball and 88 sticks, and we used almost all of them.

I always forget that the holes aren’t properly aligned in these to make a geodesic dome :/ Instead I made a weird dome/square house hybrid. At first it had seven sides, but that didn’t work so I made it eight, but I ran out of pieces before finishing the roof so I finally settled on a hexagonal design. After these pictures were taken I added an arched entranceway.

The best part of fort building is decorating it with my extensive collection of sari fabric! I used some of my put-a-bird-on-it clothes pins to hold the fabric to the fort frame.

Georgie wanted to watch what we were doing, but she also wanted and curl up in a dog bed. Hers is under my desk and doesn’t afford much of a view so she snuggled into Kichou’s instead.

Fort construction supervision is exhausting work!

It’s pretty grey and depressing out today; it’s mostly cloudy and all the snow is melting and it’s drippy and gross, but at least there’s a rainbow in our fort!

It was still snowy this morning when Taylor and I walked the dogs.

We met Lucy the pug in the backyard. Her owner Matt was very kindly shovelling the path, which let Taylor off the hook (he’s the best snow-shoveller I know).

I thought I was silly to buy snowboots at the end of winter but today I was SO HAPPY about it. So were my warm dry toes!

After dog-walking came brunch and bookstore browsing.

Taylor took all these pictures- I asked him if he wanted me to take some of him, and he said “sure” but then never gave me his camera? idk.

I rally love the peekaboo effect with my hair colour!

Guess what? It’s snowing today.

I KNOW, IT’S CRAZY. I was planning on going to Urban Outfitters to look for this dress I’ve been obsessing over, but in the cold and wind with snow particles blasting in my face? NO THANKS. Instead I spent the afternoon doing hair stuff with Sym.

Not so different, right? WRONG.

I basically feel like a My Little Pony. I haven’t had “unnatural” colours in my hair since like, 2002, so this is like, a Big Deal for me.

Sym wanted green in her hair, so I bleached some streaks for her.

(She’s working on a set of nesting dolls, they’re really cute.)

After I rinsed it out she decided she wanted to keep it blonde- in fact, she wants to go blonder! I wish I’d known, because I would have done a better job, but OH WELL. I have some purple shampoo & conditioner she can use that should hopefully tone down that yellow a little.

We were also going to paint our nails but it’s almost time for her to go to her dad’s, so we’re going to do it tomorrow. Instead, we had some quality photobooth time.

For our weekly Friday night Dance Central party I wanted a dinner that was easy, delicious and healthy, plus something I could trick kids into eating. I decided to go with a veggie shepherd’s pie, but I couldn’t; find a recipe I liked so I kind of winged it and made up my own. I was really worried it would be gross but it turned out SO delicious! I didn’t take any pictures of it looking pretty, but I did take a nice picture of it all mangled up.

The filling contains:
-1 yellow onion
-3 carrots
-3 celery stalks
-1 small green pepper
-1/2 cup of corn kernels
-1/2 cup shelled edamame
-1/2 pint cherry tomatoes
I cut everything that needed cutting fairly roughly, defrosted the corn & edamame, and sautéed it all in a pan with olive oil, soy sauce, a ton of pepper and a little paprika. It went into a 1½ quart casserole dish and topped it with fancy mashed potatoes, and topped those with grated parmesan. I baked it at 350°F for 30 minutes and THEN I DIED FROM YUMMINESS. I was particularly thrilled with the topping: I mixed russet, yukon gold and purple potatoes with a little butter and 4 cloves of garlic.

Does that not look amazing? It tasted amazing too, even Sym and her friend were on board and they hate green peppers (both), tomatoes (Sym’s friend) and onions (Sym).

In other news, I’m planning a crafternoon to make space clothes next weekend!

I think it’ll be really fun, hopefully it isn’t a bust! If it’s a success I might plan more crafternoons in the future.

It was so cold this morning, I had to wear long underwear when I took Georgie out for her walk. UNACCEPTABLE. I was all frosty when I got back so I made myself a nice breakfast to warm myself up.

When Taylor got back he was equally freezy so I simmered up some cinnamon apple cider for him. I broke up my cinnamon stick and had to strain all the little pieces with the half-teaball I use for sifting small amounts of icing sugar. I do NOT recommend doing this btw- the half-teaball has no handle so I had to pinch it between my fingers, which got thoroughly steamed. You (I) should definitely use a larger sieve for this.

The daycare kids almost always want the same thing for morning snack (which is really easy so I can’t complain): Cheerios and penguins!

The penguins are cheese crackers, like goldfish but not as expensive, and the kids are OBSESSED with them. I use whole wheat crackers & multi grain Cheerios to make this a little more nutritional. I mix them together and keep a jar of them in the kitchen, which usually lasts all week, until Friday afternoons when Sym and her friends eat everything in the house.

This picture is from last night, but here’s another of my two favorite warming items, they are both very fuzzy and warm.

I can’t get over how much fluffier Georgie gets each day. She’s starting to look like a real little pom!

Last spring I made a post aaaaaall about how I wanted nothing more than to move out of the city, get a house with a yard and have a baby and a bunch of fuzzy little dogs. You know, live the dream!

At least I accomplished one thing off my list. Oh and yes, she’s licking my teeth in this picture.

Part of my dream-life plan was fuelled by the two cute houses I’d found, but of course they eventually both sold and it was a very sad day for everyone. I still like to browse real estate websites, but I’ve never found anything I really loved. UNTIL TODAY.

WHAT EVEN IS THIS WONDROUS MARVEL???

I love this, I love the huge open plan big windows vaulted ceiling everything. Oh, and did I mention it comes with a stream?

I DIE. I absolutely die. I’m creepy so I looked it up on google maps and here it is from space:

Look at all the trees and nature! And yet amazingly, it’s only 20 minutes from where I’m sitting now, in the middle of downtown. Basically it’s stunning gorgeous flawless etc and if anyone has a spare $900,000 lying around they’d like to give me so I can make this dream a reality, I wouldn’t be mad. Orrrrrr I could get this one:

Which is a little less expensive. The interior is really hideous so I won’t show it to you, but it also has a lot of awesomeness to it. No stream though :/

Before dinner, Sym painting stars and comets on her space shirt.

Chocolate chips were on sale the other week so I stocked up on a bunch of different varieties. I rediscovered them in the cupboard yesterday and started eating them, which is why I decided to bake cookies- if I was going to eat chocolate chips I’d have to work for it!

I’m getting pretty good at making cookies that are uniform in size and shape, and don’t all flatten and spread out so they stick together. These actually came out kind of weird- pale and kind of puffy, crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside, like chocolate chip macaron halves. I think they came out so pale because ALL THREE bags of brown sugar I have were totally rock hard and solidified, so I had to grind it into usability, which made it into a light brown sugar. I do not recommend this, btw, it was a total hassle! After I made the cookies I dumped of it into a big ziploc bag with some apple so hopefully it’ll soften up.

After rolling out all the cookie dough balls to fill two baking sheets I still had some dough left over, so I made this giant heart cookie for Taylor. Why yes, I am that adorable.

As usual I used the Olive Oil Chocolate Chip Cookies recipe from The Crepes of Wrath.

Just a few pics & stuff from the weekend!

On Friday night we put down the new rug in the living room.

It’s a ~better than sisal~ rug from Urban Barn, and was pretty cost-effective for the size. It’s much nicer and more living room-y than just having the crummy old linoleum down! Also, when we were picking it up (on Thursday night) I discovered that they have some new counter stools that are really similar to the ones I want but can’t have because they’re from Crate & Barrel. I can’t afford them right now, but it’s good to know they’re there! Sometimes I think I should just get my clients to send their fees directly to that store, it’d probably be more efficient.

We had two of Sym’s friends over for Dance Central that night, and they are all picky in different ways, so it was a bit of a struggle to get them to all eat the same dinner. Eventually we settled on good old spaghetti.

To make it more nutritious I bought whole wheat noodles for once and added a ton of vegetables to the roasted garlic sauce I bought (while tempted, I ended up not buying the weed sauce)

Saturday was gorgeous and sunny, so I really didn’t want to spent all of it cooped up in the house. Sym and I went out to take some pictures of ~whimsical vignettes~ using my micro bunting, but I stupidly forgot to bring my chopsticks (LONG STORY) so instead we just went for a walk around the Seawall from English Bay to Sunset Beach.

When we got hom she helped me with lunch I made ham & cheese pitas and she mad a salad with cucumbers, tomatoes and pea shoots, but I unfortunately forgot to photograph it.

After lunch was our trip to buy supplies and then we started making our SPACE SHIRTS! In between steps on the shirts I had some quality play time with Georgie. She’s getting so puffy now, I can’t even believe it! Her paws are all feathery, it’s so cute.

Sunday was another beautiful day, so after finishing my shirt I decided we should go out with the dogs. First we stopped at Coo Coo Coffee for americanos and breakfast sandwiches, and then went to the dog park in Emery Barnes Park. Georgie ran around with all the other dogs having tons of puppy fun, but Kichou was his usual grumpy old man dog self and mostly stay in Taylor’s lap.

After leaving the park we went over to the seawall and walked from Yaletown to Sunset Beach, meeting this funny cat along the way. He was the size of about four Georgies, I swear! His paws were enormous.

It was a super fun and relaxing weekend, and I’m glad I spent so much time outside in the sun, since I just looked out my window and it’s SNOWING right now. WHAT.