Painting The Winter Away

The weather has left me with a lot of time at home, so I figured I may as well start a project. The wallpaper in the kitchen has somehow survived a decade living with me and I decided it was time for it to go. Plus, there is no cheaper way to update your house than a coat of paint.

Belle and I went to pick out the color and I finally caved and let her get the “toffee butter” color that she picked. We left Lowe’s carrying two gallons with the intent to paint the kitchen and adjoining den, which since the addition of a pool table should really be referred to as the billiard room.  I told Belle I hoped the color wasn’t a mistake because we had a lot of paint. She said, “Maybe we should’ve got a sample first”.

OK, maybe we should have. The thing is in all my years of painting, I have never found a color I like from a sample. When I paint, I prefer to just pick and pray.

I painted a part of the wall to see how the color looked. I was a little nervous after it dried. It looked very…orange. I decided to finish the wall anyway and the color started to grow on me. I have been working every day a little at a time since Friday and I am finally finished painting. Here is how it came out:

Now that everything is painted I really like the color. Robert also likes it because he says it looks “western”. Belle likes it because she picked the color. AJ says it looks like a “villa”.

I still have to install the baseboard and trim around the windows and doors. For now, I am just happy to have the painting done.

 

Life With Dogs

Having one dog in the house is a challenge. When you get a friend for your dog and end up with two, it is even more work. For those crazy enough (myself included) to get a third dog, having a clean house becomes a distant memory. Here are some of the things I have learned about having dogs in the house:

1. Dogs and Leather Don’t Mix
We have had our leather couches for a long time. They made it though both kids being young and still looked brand new. Unfortunately, leather doesn’t have the same magical powers over dogs. Our cushions have tears in the corners and have been scratched thanks to Bogey who loves to do the “scratch and spin in circles” thing.

2. Carpet is Not Okay Either
We have no carpets or rugs in the main area of our house. The dogs don’t go in our bedrooms. We used to have carpet and I vacuumed every day. I was disgusted with how much dust and hair came flying out of the carpet when we finally pulled it out. No matter how clean you may be, if you have pets in your house, your carpet is gross. I promise.

3. Learn To Love Your Vacuum and Mop
I have to clean my floors. Every day. Really.

4. Pray that Ingesting Dog Hair Isn’t Deadly
When I cook, I keep everything as clean as I can. I constantly wash my hands and wipe down counters. Unfortunately, there is nothing you can do to stop the occasional dog hair from finding it’s way into your food. Every time I pick one out, I can’t help but wonder how many we don’t find.

5. Forget About Black
You will NEVER wear black again (unless maybe your dog is black).

6. It Is Still Worth It
There are so many reasons not to have pets in the house, but it sure is nice to have them here anyway. There is always a dog to pet, cuddle with, laugh at and the house always feels so full of life with them here.

Meal Planning

Over the past couple of weeks we have been experimenting with meal plans from The Fresh 20. We got a yearly subscription for $24 with a groupon. Each week they provide a new menu with 5 dinners. One meal is seafood and one meal is vegetarian.

What I love about the menu is you are provided a grocery list of 20 items (plus pantry staples), so there is no list to make for the grocery store. They also provide a list of things that can be made ahead for the week. That means over the weekend I can get vegetables cut, rice cooked, meat prepared and have less to do on the nights I am too busy. They also utilize all of the vegetables you buy, so there is no waste. Last week we used one head of cabbage in 3 of the meals. I love that!

In addition to the weekly menus, you receive access to their archives. This worked out great this week when I received their current menu and knew I would have a hard time with the kids eating most of the items.

Instead of the menu they provided, I selected another menu, which consisted of Chicken Milanese, Shrimp Scampi, Chicken and Broccoli Casserole, Tuscan Bean and Chicken Stew and Potato Frittata.

My favorite of the week was the Shrimp Scampi. I broke out my pasta maker for the meal.

This machine makes quick work of turning sheets into pasta shapes:

I thought the addition of baby arugula would be a problem for the kids, but everyone ate everything on their plate.

The broccoli and cheese casserole would have been so simple if I had everything prepped ahead. I had the chicken cooked and broccoli chopped from the night we ate the Milanese, but we did the rest of the prep on cooking night.

Belle has gotten very good at cutting veggies. She loves doing this right now because no one else in her class is allowed to use big knives (or so she tells me).

I thought the chicken and broccoli casserole was pretty good, but not very flavorful. AJ picked through the rice and broccoli and only ate the chicken. Belle said it was alright.

The only downside so far is the meals seem a little uneven. Sometimes there is a lot of food and others there isn’t anything left for lunch the next day. We had fish sticks last week, and it just wasn’t enough food. We were all still hungry.

So far I feel like The Fresh 20 was worth the money for us. We were in a major meal rut and now we are eating something brand new every night. There are so many veggies in their meals and they always seem to find the healthiest way to prepare the food.

Today is Friday, so the latest menu will be hitting my inbox at any minute. I can’t wait to see what we’ll be eating next week!

Where does the time go?

It is so hard to believe that it has been almost a month since my last post. If you remember I mentioned that Robert got sick right before Christmas, and he is still having issues. The doctor has ordered no work or lifting, which has been frustrating for him. That also means I have been working even more to keep up with the house, the kids and going over our budget to figure out the best way to handle the incoming medical bills. We keep on saying it could be worse, but then it seems to get worse anyway.

A few weeks ago I dented my Subaru after sliding down a road covered in black ice. When you live in the mountains, that can be a very dangerous situation. In my case, the left side of the road was yards and the other was a cliff. My car ended up ultimately sliding to the left and hitting a light post. Since the alternative was certain death, I tried to look on the bright side. After all, you all know how much I love my car, but it could be worse. Right?

Then last week Belle got sent home with lice. I had to do a million loads of laundry, clean the house like a nut, and spend hours (seriously, hours) combing her hair to get rid of all the nits. Luckily, no one else had lice but her, although I couldn’t help telling AJ he had it too when we checked his hair. Sometimes you have to get your laughs where you can. Belle having lice has left me thinking that saying things could be worse might not be the way to go. Instead, I’d like to think things could be better and cross my fingers that they will be.

It hasn’t all been awful over the last few weeks. I did celebrate my birthday. Robert and Belle bought me a bunch of kitchen stuff.

They got me new cookie sheets by USA pans. I am absolutely in love with USA pans. I bought a few of their bread pans a month ago and they are fantastic. I also got a new set of measuring cups and some bamboo utensils. Something about cooking with the bamboo makes me feel like a damn professional. I love them.

AJ made me a painting.

The rain is made from crayons that he melted.

My dad and his wife Lisa also took me out for breakfast, bowling and shopping where I bought a few more kitchen items. Lisa made me a cake with candles (the only birthday cake I got). While we were all talking,  AJ went over and took of the candles out of the cake and started cutting it. Um, really? I don’t know what that kid thinks sometimes.

Daisy also celebrated her first birthday on Valentine’s Day.

Belle has been asking for a pool table for a while and her wish finally came true. My dad decided to invest in a slate table and gave his old one to us.

We have been having such a good time playing. Belle always cracks me up when she shoots because she always looks so serious.

So that is it for now. A little bad, and some good too. I guess that is kind of how life goes and even though it seems like just a little more of the bad right now, it can always get better!