A WEEK IN REVIEW!

well this week has been a nice week. i capped it off by waking up saturday morning and taking mikey to run some errands. we went to this great lil farmer's market and there i bought these beautiful flowers and tons of fruits and veggies (don't mind the tampax box in the background ;)



i didn't mention it, but wednesday, i did get my box of goodies and i must say that it was better than i thought...everything fit! down to the shoes. i couldn't believe my luck. i was a lil nervous about the shoes, but it was all good.

then thursday i got my delivery of books. found was better than i thought it was going to be. it kept me quite occupied on friday.

so back to saturday. me and mikey go to the farmer's market and then we hit a couple of garage sales on the way to walmart. i got a couple of board games that will eventually be something crafty, i'm sure of it. mikey got an airplane and an abulance. at another one i picked up some fabric. now i know why people always went on and on about all the stuff that me and mom put out for our garage sales. the two that i went to hardly had anything at it. me and mom look like we could open up our own store (and have been told that by a few patrons). after that we went to walmart and once we came home i caught a lifetime movie or two. mike finally started to put down the floor in the kitchen. i think it is taking a lil bit longer and a lil bit more of a difficult project than we both thought (due to the island being an odd shape). then sat. evening after the kiddies were in bed, i made these "candies" that michele told me about that i have been dying to make. they turned out deeeelicious. here is the recipe:

1 bag of rolo candies
1 bag of mini pretzel twists
some pecans

turn the oven on 250'. line a baking sheet with foil and spray with pam. place pretzel twists on the baking sheet evenly spaced. next place a rolo candy on top of the pretzel. place in the oven for about 4 minutes. as soon as you take the pretzels out, place a pecan on top of the chocolate and press down so the rolo candy spreads out on top of the pretzel. once you have done this on all the pretzels/rolos on the cookie sheet, place on a plate and put in the fridge for about 10 minutes so they can cool! voila! a turtle!

i didn't put a number on the pretzels or rolos b/c what is so great about this recipe is that you can make as many as you want or as less as you want. michele got this recipe out of the taste of home magazine.

well now on to sunday. i decided to make some italian recipes that i had printed out after going to pasta italia on wednesday. so for dinner i made the following (sorry that the pictures are of some have eating dishes, but i didn't think of taking pictures until after we had already eaten..so at least ya know its good)

pasta with carbonara sauce


1/2 cup of proscuitto (lean bacon or ham can be substituted)
3 cloves of garlic
1/3 cup heavy cream
2 eggs
1/3 cup parmesan cheese, grated

saute' proscuitto and garlic in a pan until slightly crisp. drain fat and discard the garlic. add cream to the pan, stir to combine. remove from heat. in a bowl, whisk together the eggs and cheese. slowly add the cream mixture to the eggs and the cheese. return the mixture to the pan and cook just long enough to heat through. voila!

this turned out very good. now i used turkey bacon b/c i didn't have any proscuitto at the house. i also used minced garlic and regular ol kraft parmesan. now i know this is not the italian way, but i must say that this turned out so damn good, that i can only imagine how it is if i used the ingredients it called for.

for dessert i made:

cherry zabaglione tart


Zabaglione:

3 egg yolks


1/4 cup sugar

3 TB. Marsala

1/2 cup whipping cream

3 TB. mascarpone or sour cream

Tart:

9-inch ready-made graham cracker or vanilla cookie pie crust

1-1/2 cups pitted fresh cherries

3 TB. grated dark chocolate

To make zabaglione:
Put the egg yolks and sugar in the top section of a double boiler over simmering water.
Whip the mixture with a whisk for 3-4 minutes, until it is creamy and yellow.

Stir in the Marsala.

Continue whisking until the mixture begins to foam and swell in volume, 6-8 minutes.
Zabaglione is ready when it stands in soft peaks.

Remove from heat and set the top section of the double boiler over a bowl of ice water.
Allow to cool.

With an electric mixer, beat the whipping cream and mascarpone until stiff.

Fold in the zabaglione. Cover and refrigerate until well chilled.

To make tart:

Arrange cherries in prepared pie crust. Spoon zabaglione mixture over. Smooth top.
Cover and refrigerate at least 1 hour.

When ready to serve, sprinkle top with grated chocolate


both of these recipes are courtesy of mangia benepasta

now that all of that is done, i am watching the wire and getting ready to enjoy six feet under.

cute things mikey said or done this week:

*after dinner tonight he told me it was the best dinner ever.
*today i was so proud of mikey...he tried some peaches and decided that he liked them (but only with the skin removed) and he loved the cherries in our dessert.

cute things bella said or done this week:

*this a.m. while we were watching sesame street together, they were talking about the letter "s" and the sound it makes. after they said that "s" sound a few times, bella took her thumb out of her mouth and said "sssss".
*if you said "where's isabella", she points to herself
*she now really knows what "yes" and "no" mean. if you ask her if something she is eating is good, she shakes her head yes.

so i can only hope that this coming week is as good as this past week. i am sure it is since next weekend is fourth of july and we have a three day weekend.

ME LUUUUV SOME JUJY FRUITS!

anyone who knows me knows i LOVE jujy fruits!!!! LOVE is not even a strong enough word. i could eat boxes of them. i have a certain way that i eat them. i pop them in my mouth, except for the ones that say heide on them. when i eat those, i put them in between my front teeth and split it in two,then i chew about three times and then swallow them. usually that means i definetely swallow them whole! i can not eat them fast enough. there is such a wonderful man at work who will buy me three boxes of jujy fruits at one time to pay me back for the candy he eats off of my desk. i love the flavors (esp. now that the green is lime and not mint (yuck!), i love the shapes, the bright yellow box, the lil girl on the front, every bit of em!

here are some lil known facts about jujy fruits

*jujy fruits began in production in 1920

*they became popular at the movie theaters

*the jujy fruit shapes are: asparagus, tomato, grape bunches, banana, pineapple, raspberry, & pea pod.

*the flavors are: raspberry, licorice, lime, & lemon

*in january 1999, farleys and sathers co, changed the green, mint flavor to lime due to its unpopularity.

MY FAVORITE BOWLS!!!

if there is one thing that i remember about going to grandma costello's, its the metal bowls she had. i have no idea where she got them from, but i remember always having snacks in them (i.e. pretzels, chips, candy, or whatever other junk she wanted to feed us with..but hey, she was a grandma). the bowls are all dented and scratched, but they were lovely. after she had passed away, i remember telling mom that i wanted those bowls. mom got them, but i think we both kind of have forgotten about them. until today. i had called mom earlier in the day to see if she had some of gma's recipes. she told me that she had two recipes books. one from grandma and one from great-grandpa arbino and muriel. so when i got to her house to pick up the kids, there were the cookbooks and the four bowls. i love those bowls so much. they have so many fond memories for me. they will always symbolize grandma and grandpa's house.




mikey's quote for the day: "you are driving faster than my hotwheels"-as we were driving home in the country with the windows down and his hand out the window and with his face as close to it as he could get.

ARE THOSE CORN DOGS OVER THERE???

after i picked up the kids from mom's, we went my way out of her subdivision. my way consists of a couple of turns and a redlight. after we make a few turns, mikey says to me "are those corn dogs over there?" my response "no mikey, they're not". now i have to admit, i didn't even know what what he was talking about. then i got to thinking. then it hit me like a ton of bricks and i realized what he was talking about and started cracking up with laughter. after one of our turns, there is a fenced in area where there are....cattails!!!! he saw the cattails and thought they were corn dogs. well take a look for yourself...they do look like corn dogs.



well my box of goodies has one more day until they make it to my doorstep. i am beside myself with anticipation. i cannot wait. so to fill the time tonight to make it go by faster, i made dinner (well i always make dinner) of bean and cheese enchiladas and for the adults, we had margaritas. yummy! then for dessert, i made homemade whip cream with cinnamon and sugar tortillas.

now there is a chocolate amaretti cake in the oven to bring with me to pasta italia tomorrow.

well, i am off to make a bracelet to fill up that time :)

STARTING ALL OVER (WELL ALMOST)

well due to a virus, i had to redo some of my blog. those of you that are reading and are asking "so?" lemme fill ya in on something....i know NOTHING about html. and of course the only thing that got erased on the template was mostly lincs and such. so i had to try and remember how i did all of that...well after about an hour and a half, i got it figured it out (well some of it ;)

enough of that though...all afternoon though, i have been left to ponder the thought..."why is it that i think i am so crafty and clever, to just surf the web and discover that i am not as crafty and clever as i think i am?" i mean i am very crafty and clever person...but damn, there are some people out there make me say WOW!

so i am making a goal for myself: GET ONE CRAFTY THING DONE THIS WEEK!!!

(and make it fabbbbuuuulous dawling!)

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY! (ORIGINALLY TO BE POSTED ON 6-20-04)

**well due to a problem with my space here, i am posting sunday's post today (monday)!

well happy father's day!!! today, we decided to hop in the car and drive to mobile so mike could go to gamestop over there and get a computer game that he wanted (i mean it is his day after all). once we got over there we did a lil shopping and i got to go to target (for those of you viewing that don't know...we don't have a damn target over here. i have to drive 45 minutes to get to one $!?*#$!!!!

we got home just in time to have our "father's day feast". mike had to in the bedroom with the door shut until we called for him to come out. me and mikey (while isabella watched) prepared the feast. we had the following:

*POPcorn
*MIKE and ikes
*our HERO sandwich
*POP (what us southerner's call soda)
*jello POPs



once he got to the table, he could see his father's day gift. mike and bella put there thumbprint on a piece of paper. i drew lil faces on them, matted them, and then framed them. i also made a card for him. he immediately brought the pictures to work.



all and all it was a great day!

A THRIFT SCORE!!!!

well, today as me and mikey were out and about, i decided to stop by the goodwill. i have only been in there one other time and didn't really see anything i had liked (plus, it had been quite a while since i had been thrifting).

well today was a total score. i got the most gorgeous bed skirt that matches my bed perfectly for $3.99 (pics to be posted at a later time). i prayed the whole way home that it was the size i needed (i couldn't tell since it was on a hanger and pinned). and it was! what luck.

i also got a couple of clothes, a few more curtains/sheets that are going to be purses one day (i swear...they will be), and then i got two records. one of leif garret & the other rick springfield. i also swear that i am going to learn how to make album cover purses and that is what i am going to use.

so needless to see, my first (well in a long time) thrift adventure was a grrrreat one!

ok...so i decided to not be lazy and post the pics. it looks perfect with the whi bedspread and the sage/tan pillows.

ATC'S?!?!?!?!

i just found out that there are atc's out there. what are atc's you ask? artist trading cards. you design your own cards that are about the shape of a baseball card. they you make enough that you can trade with other crafty folk! is this not the coolest thing ever. i had seen threads on my various msg. boards mentioning this, but i didn't even bother to look b/c i didn't know what it was. well thanks to a glitterati who post a link to this fabulous site, i was able to find out about it and many other cool crafts that are right up my alley. my head is swimming with so many ideas after looking around there. is it going to be a crafty weekend????

okay, off to bed (after i get my daily dose of mahjong that is)

BRUSHA, BRUSHA, BRUSHA....

today, while i was googling these cards that mike brought home from milwaukee i found a fabulous website called victorian halloween.

while there i found another great website that sells plus sized clothing (however, i don't understand why a size 12 and 14 is considered plus size when that is the average american woman size). torrid has some fabulous clothing along with some fabulous accessories. i have to say though, my favorite is a "grease" tshirt that i got.

when we were younger, me and stose would watch grease until we knew all the words. our favorite part was when the girls were staying the night at frenchy's house after the football game and a toothpaste commercial came on and the girl with the pigtails starts singing with the commerical. she sings "brusha, brusha, brusha. bucky beaver toothpaste..." and then one of the girls throws a pillow at her and she falls over and you hear her say "uggggh". me and stose would laugh and laugh and then rewind and rewatch. we would do it ten times. well check out the shirt i can not WAIT to get this and wear it to work so stose can see it. i'm not even going to tell her that i got it until she sees me wearing it.

i also bought a few books on amazon. sweets, found magazine the book, and common phrases and where they come from. i cannot wait to get these in the mail. these are going to be some great reads for work.

so all and all, i must say it has been a fabbbbbuuuuulicious day for shopping.

THIS IS THE BEST IDEA!

well since mom had to take amy and her hubby to the airport, i picked up the kids around 2ish. we stopped at the radio station to pick up the 50 bucks that i won (whoo hoo!) and then stopped by michael's. bella had so much fun sitting in the back of the cart. once we got home, we kinda sat around and played (well the kids played and i watched instyle's celebrity weddings which made me cry and made me wish i had the wedding of my dreams). then after my bella boo went to bed, me and mikey plopped on the couch under a woobie and shared a bowl of icecream. one bowl of fudget brownie nut and two spoons. after we said "salute" with our spoons, mikey said "this is the best idea ever!"

i have to say that was the perfect ending to my day!



Fudge Brownie Nut – Gold Rim
Dark chocolate ice cream with chewy fudge brownie pieces and tasty pecans.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY!

well, friday was michael's bday. he got the northern exposure first season on dvd, a war tv show on dvd, a game that hooks up to the tv and has 5 atari games on it and a rocket (that mikey and him have already used twice and then went to walmart to get another engine or something for it and have fun for the third time). then we ordered pizza (since we are not allowed to go out to eat in fear that i may have the employees sing happy birthday to him again) and we weren't allowed to sing happy birthday when we gave him the cake. how fun is he?!?!? but i guess it is his birthday.

sat. we ran around and got some curtains for the dining room and some blinds for the windows by the front door.

today, we went to mom's and we finally got to meet cousin amy (i will explain all of that situation at a later time). she is so cute and so fun. i wished that she lived closer so we could hang out and i wish that i had the opportunity to know her my whole life.

so now, i am waiting for six feet under to start and to attack that blue bunny fudge brownie ice cream in the freezer.

more tomorrow.

HUNTER ON DVD...HELL YA!

i got an email today from tv shows on dvd letting me know that hunter will be released on dvd at the end of this year or the beginning of next year. do you know how long i have been waiting for this ?!?!?!?! only since they took hunter off of tbs at noon on weekdays and tv shows have been released on dvd. i mean i have only loooooved hunter forever (esp. since i found out that he was in an interview once and he said that he went commando when he wore jeans ;)




i also got the best compliment on my hair cut yesterday (thanks "t"). he said that i looked like a sexy flapper from the 20's. besides what my kids have told me, that is the best thing i have every heard. *smooch tommy*

1 PICKLE, 2 PICKLE, 3 PICKLE, FOUR

well today i finally made some pickles. greta has been begging me since...oh last summer when i made some and since i was able to stop and get some cucumbers at such a great price (6 for $1.19!) at the farmer's market, i decided that now would be a good time. i ended up making a dozen and i am giving about 7-9 jars away and of course keeping some for ourselves. so here's the pickles and the recipe:



refrigerator pickles

2-4 good sized cucumbers, sliced
6 cups of water
2 cups of vinegar
1/4 cup of salt

heat the water, vinegar, and salt in a pot until salt is dissolved. let cool.

3 cloves of garlic per jar (i used the minced stuff and about 1/2 t. of it)
1/2 tsp. dill seed per jar

put the above in a canning jar, and then stack the cucumber slices in jar. next you will fill the jar with the vinegar/water/salt to the neck of the jar. i usually eyeball at this point to decide if i should put in more garlic and/or dill seed. wipe the rim of the jar clean with a towel and then screw on the lid.

i used pint size jars, but in the past i have also used larger jars. after you are through, i shake em up a lil bit to get the dill and garlic all over and then stick in the fridge.

they need to stay in the fridge for about 5-7 days.

then enjoy!!!

these make the yummies pickles. of course you can get more cucumbers or even the pickling size cukes and slice lengh ways. i usually triple or quadruple this recipe.

*edited due to not being clear on whether or not you cook the pickles (which you don't) thanks pretending sanity :)

A NEEEEEWWW DO!

well i got my hair cut today and i must say it is pretty darn cute! i remembered to call the hair place today in the a.m. and thought it was going to take a couple of weeks (like last time) but i was able to get at 4pm. so i left work at 3, hauled butt to the mall and...shhhh...bought some mac makeup. that's a secret though. then i hauled butt to the salon. the girl that did my hair was great and i just love the environment of that place! anyway...my hair is in a cute lil bob and hopefully it will stay cute and i an style it in the a.m.

she said to make my hair grow, i need to give myself scalp massages. too bad there's no one here to give me one on a daily basis!

so i can't wait to get up in the a.m. and play with my hair and new makeup. how girly~girly!

AHHH...A NEW WEEK

well this weekend pretty much stunk! fri. night we went running around and took care of some errands. stopped at michael's and used my 40% off coupon for some resin. so that pretty much summed up the end of that horrific week.

sat. i woke up and felt completely icky. i could tell that i was trying to fight something. so me and the couch and my good friend lifetime hung out together. i slept on and off and stayed up pretty late.

sunday when i woke up, i pretty much felt the same and decided that we weren't going to go to our lil sopranos get together. i felt really bad b/c we really wanted to go, however, i can't afford to miss any work right now so i needed to make sure that i didn't get sick enough to miss any work.

now there's monday. the beginning of a new week filled with hope that it will be nothing like last week. that horrible week (did i mention that already?)

well i guess that it is it for today. came home and got some stuff done, mike mowed the lawn. got the flags outside on part of the driveway, i need to get more though.

pretty boring day!

GRRRRR....

okay, so it has been a while since i have posted anything and oh boy has there been a lot going on here.

well first, lemme start with where i left off....the weekend was great. i got a lot of craftin' done, which i was really happy with. it has been a while since i have been able to devote a lot of time to my crafiness (maybe i should get my butt out from in front of the tele). then tues. when i came back to work, well it was okay. i got a telephone call to set up an interview for that job i put in for. i was a excited about that but nervouse at the same time b/c i have never had an interview in front of a board.

so wednesday morning, i said "God, give me a sign that i am supposed to take this job". and guess what...right before i was supposed to go over to my interview, all hell broke loose. it stormed as if a hurricane was coming. i managed to get over (early of course). so once i get called in, the interview went great. now before you give a sigh of relief for me, i haven't told the whole story. towards the end, i am given the opportunity to ask some questions. i wanted to make sure that if chosen for the job, i would be able to give the major a two week notice. i was explained whether or not i would be able to and then i started to talk about how good he is to me and i started to cry!!!! can you believe it, in the middle of an interview i started to cry b/c i would hate to leave the major! i was so mortified!!!! everyone there was nice about it, but i couldn't stop harboring it in my mind all day yesterday. so much then when i went home, i had a headache that made me want to scream. damn migranes.

so if you think that is so bad...i go to work on thurs. and get yelled out by a fellow employee and started crying again! now this person is not just someone i work with, they are someone who has some power and whom i was just starting to really get along with.

so that has been my week so far. lots of tears. side effect of being a pisces. i hate that i am so sensitive and that i let other people effect my emotions the way i do. why is that?? i feel so out of control when i do that. usually i start to stutter and can't get anything out. at least i was able to maintain that. whoo hoo for me right?!?!?

oh brother. well at least this week ends with the season finally with the sopranos and a lil sopranos gathering with my fello soprano junkies.

well, maybe the night will get better...i mean pizza is on it's way ;)