My Life as a Second-Rate Baker

Once upon a time while Steve and I were dating, I made a loaf of banana bread that Steve deemed unfavorable. Upon tasting the slightly dry loaf he declared, "You should leave the baking up to me." Granted, he inherited insane roll-making skills from his heritage, but that doesn't crown him king of all baking. And surely one slip-up doesn't merit removing the whole of my female baking prowess?

Sadly, that one slip-up has turned into several--every chocolate chip cookie attempt, in fact. Somewhere along the line I lost the basic "Every Girl Should Know How to Do" skill of baking chocolate chip cookies. It's nearly devastating since the only advice I remember from Dr. Laura's book The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands a couple of years ago was that sometimes a man just needs some chocolate chip cookies. Obviously I can't provide what Dr. Laura identifies as a basic need of my husband. Every attempt...all different recipes...turns out weirdo flat wafers. Just ask Amy and Mark, or Adam and Rebecca.

Steve decided to take baking matters into his own hands, so for our FHE treat tonight he made these exquisite little numbers. Same recipe I used last week for my latest wafer thins. He sure showed me up. Look at that smug face.

For the record, I won a blue ribbon in 4-H for my snickerdoodles when I was 8. I've concluded I've got a Benjamin Button thing going on with my baking--it degrades over time.

For a very small person

Since Steve is out at a work dinner I thought I'd take this opportunity to update my crafter's guidebook...hee hee. I took my first shot at machine applique to make these for a tiny new little boy. I almost cried when I opened the package of onesies (for real) and marveled at how small they are. Steve's reaction was non-similar: "They look like they're made for a kitty or something."

Viva La Henderson

Although my husband affectionately refers to our blog as a "crafter's guidebook", today it's playing the role of travel log. We flew out of town last weekend, destination: Nevada. We went out to see one of Steve's college roommates living in Henderson, just outside of Las Vegas. Tyler, Nicole, and Madison were very gracious hosts--they even referred to me as "Princess Kalina", courtesy of Madison.


In just over 48 hours we dined at Serendipity on the strip, had ice cream at 1 am at Ghirardelli, wakeboarded on Lake Mead, watched Fast & the Furious, ate Otis Spunkmeyer, went to church, visited Steve's friends from Tallahassee, strolled around the golf course, and had a cupcake social.

We had such a good time visiting, thanks to our wonderful hosts!

Look Who's Back

Ain't nothin' floppy about this bag now that it's undergone major reconstructive surgery. I beefed it up by adding medium weight fusible interfacing to all the outer pieces and reinforced the lining with heavy duty pellon #70. (Thanks, Mom, for the suggestion.) Take that, limp pile of fabric! My favorite part of Small Green Bag, v2 is that it doesn't fall over from the weight of the snap anymore. Boo-yah!

p.s. Steve's comment was "The other [bag--version 1] looks tired out."

I Can

Once upon a time there was a .99/lb sale...and if you've read any of my blog you already know what happened. For us these sales seem to be the pièce de résistance of grocery shopping. This time: cherries. 12 pounds. There are only so many cherry desserts you can make (like Martha's Cherry Frangipane Galette which I was inspired to make after seeing Julie and Julia) before your dinner guests and you get sick of them.

In my blog travels I came across a cherry pie filling recipe on http://www.pickyourown.org/ and kept surfing since it required canning, which I don't know how to do, nor was I interested. A few days later, thinking of the aging cherries, I changed my mind and purchased a water bath canner and tools.

Steve and I set out to transform those bags of cherries into pie filling. Steve pitted all the cherries, except the handful I ate, then I took it from there.

Since we got a late start, the batch wasn't done processing until 12:30. Sleep is a big sacrifice in the name of pie filling, but I'm happy that my first canning experience was a success!

My thoughts on the experience: Steve is a gem; there's a lot of water involved, and most of it is boiling; the biggest setbacks were waiting for said water to boil even though I planned far ahead for each step; good thing we have lots of big bowls and pots; and this pie filling better be flippin good.

A Sea of Softness

Thank you, overstock.com. You've made my husband very happy.

Expecting Growth

On Monday Steve and I invested further into our garden that so far has produced 2 miniscule peppers, and 1.5 miniature tomatoes. The missing .5 apparently fell victim to creepy crawly tomato eaters. Given the evidence, one can conclude that our crafty little plants have managed to consume more of us than we have of them. But that's beside the point--we're gaining valuable experience. Our peppers have decided to spontaneously explode with fruit so we we decided they'll need some supports. Our search for tomato cages was not as straightforward as planned since everywhere we went we only found 54" monstrosities. Who's growing tomatoes that big anyway?! We ran across some 42" contraptions and that's what we settled on. A bit oversized for our pots, wouldn't you say? Or maybe we just have high expectations for our little balcony peppers.

I hope that's enough of a garden update for you, Buddy.

Bag to the Beginning

Remember that time I said I was in a fight with my bag?


Well, I won. Next time this bag is featured on my blog, its functionality will match its cuteness.

Wishing for Weight

Today I found myself really wishing I had gotten heavier...fabric...after I made this:

because now I'm in a fight with this bag.

For the record, the House of Broadbent does not recommend using quilting weight fabric with this bag pattern. For the lining, sure, but not for the outside. I've sewed enough to have figured that out before I started, but I guess I was thinking that it would magically get sturdier when it was finished. And surprise! It didn't. Boo. So instead of a cute functional bag, I have a wussy shapeless pile of fabric with a limp noodle for a handle.

But hey! It has a magnetic snap. Super!

Keeping Up Appearances

Living in a townhome we don't have a yard, but we do yardwork anyway. (Logical, I know.) Basically that entails weeding the dirt strip that's part of the modern look of our property. We have a few trees and some foilage we groom at least weekly to keep things looking tidy. 


Here's Steve earlier this evening, handily taking care of all the morning glories creeping over the fence.

Bordering on Asleep

Okay, so I'm embarrassed to admit that sometimes I fall asleep while praying (as in the one saying the prayer) with Steve in the mornings. Today I got a real kick out of what a groggier version of me said: "We're thankful for our bodies--please help us to find joy in exercising." ????!!! That's the only part I can remember, but I think that adequately expresses my subconscious opinions on going to the gym.

Love-Flavored

This is what love looks like:


A carefully crafted sandwich your husband made for you this morning [with plenty of mustard] because you didn't have leftovers from yesterday, and your increasing aversion to rising early would probably have precluded you from making a lunch as you're rushing out the door, leaving you to have to traipse over to the store on your lunch break to pick up a lean cuisine or other frozen 'delight.'

Thanks, honey! I love you!!

Life in an Inferno

Remember how we have a garden on our balcony? I thought I'd take a minute to give a progress report: A few weeks ago, we determined that the garden had "stalled out" so with the expert advice from my master gardener brother we got some fertilizer--Dynamite, in fact--and things look like they've perked up. Steve consistently works hard to keep everything alive and growing, but it's summer in Houston and our plants are fighting to endure the fiery furnace we call "outdoors." Some plants are faring better than others in this heat, like the chives and peppers--they're rocking it. Tomatoes and parsley are not as roast-hardy so they're getting some intensive care. I love having fresh herbs on hand all the time and can't wait to have peppers and tomatoes coming out our ears.