Sunday Breakfast

I grated a lot of things for this particular breakfast.

I never made Apple Cinnamon pancakes before, so I went for it by using the basic pancake recipe with one grated apple and cinnamon to taste. Then I grated zucchini and potato to make a hash brown type of thing.


Sure, it looks fine there, but the reality was that the hash was a huge mess. Because of limited space, I don't have many pots and pans. I had to use my grilling pan to do the hash, but things got stuck and messy and well, not good. I guess it tasted fine, but it wasn't pretty. Brian likes his eggs scrambled, so I just got some of the hash mess and scrambled them in with his eggs. Not too bad.

Pretty good for a Sunday morning.

The Wheels On The Bus

This entire week I have taken the bus to school. Sure, people take the bus all the time, but it's the first time I've mananged to do it for the entire week. I'm really proud of myself. I've saved what would have been about $25-30 in gas and done my little part to help the environment. I did witness a fair amount of verbal abuse, drunkeness, bloody sores on people, coughing without covering the mouth, etc, etc.. but all in all, I managed to survive. Better yet, I think I will start taking the bus to work on a regular basis now too! Eventually, I will dig out my old bike from my parent's garage, give the tires some air and start taking mini rides around town.

Coupon Pouch: Part Two

I never really used the first coupon pouch that I made, so I made another.


I might eventually embroider something on the outside, but I'm not sure yet.

Peanut Butter And Jelly

This has been my dinner lately. Today it will be lunch. I hear a lot of people look down on Goober style pb&j, but it's my absolute favorite!

Cookies For Crystal

This past weekend, my dear friend Crystal got married. Per her request, I made chocolate chip cookies for the wedding.



I made a million of them.

Our Exotic Dinner

I apologize for the lack of posts lately, things have been hectic. I have been consistently crafting, just not posting. Last night Brian and I had ourselves quite a meal.

Crab legs were the main course, but we also had some steak and corn on the cob as well. I gave Brian garlic duty, since I started school today and did not want to alienate my fellow classmates with garlic smelling hands.

We cut some of the cloves in half and smashed them, then threw them in a pot of boiling water for the crab legs and the corn on the cob. We kept the other half of the garlic, sliced, for our butter mix.

By the time we got to dessert, we noticed a shell cracking theme happening, which was a complete accident, but kept dinner exciting.

I almost forgot how good fresh coconut tastes.

Put The Books Back On The Shelf

It's been super hot here in LA. It's been hard to move in the heat, but I didn't let that stop me. I've been very active in getting my room together before I start school.

Lately, I've been installing new shelves. My biggest challenge has always been that I have too much stuff. Stuff that I unfortunately can not get rid of. I think at this point I would get rid of a lot, but I'm not looking forward to the process that is involved with getting rid of junk. So, I build shelves instead. Storage for my bad pack-rat habits.
To my surprise, my Ikea Expedit bookcase has really taken care of it all. After installing my 2 shelves, I've been scrambling for ideas what to put on them. After looking through my Domino, Blueprint, Readymade, and Martha Stewart magazines, I think I have a few ideas.. but it may be a while since it all comes together.

Apple Tart

When you have apples and puff pastry on hand, this is the simplest little snack to make.

I cut the apples nice and small then added melted butter, splenda (I was all out of sugar, but the splenda mix-up wasn't even noticeable), nutmeg, cinnamon, chamboard liqueur, and I think that's it? I may never be able to replicate this exact recipe.
I then spread a layer of apples onto the puff pastry.

I continued on to make 2 layers, with a layer of stars on top.

I may have added too much butter, because the pastry was a bit transparent.

Luckily, butter makes things taste good! I added some vanilla ice cream and it became our new favorite!

Cheese Boereg

We had a little potluck at work today and I decided to let my Armenian roots take over. I called my mom and got her recipe for Cheese Boereg. For some reason, I haven't made any Armenian dishes before, probably because my grandmother and mom keep me fully supplied. It was time to give it a go.
It's a simple recipe with 2 simple parts, phyllo dough and cheese.

The cheese mix is 3/4 lb. Mozzarella, 3/4 lb. Feta, 1/4 cup (or less, to taste) parsley, and 2 eggs.
After rolling out the phyllo, cut it in half lengthwise. Use half of the phyllo now and keep the other half for later. In a pan (glass Pyrex is ideal), put down 2 layers of phyllo, brushing melted butter in between. After those two layers, begin scrunching the phyllo and brushing it with melted butter in between each layer.

When the entire half of the phyllo runs out, spread all of the cheese mixture on top, then the other half of the phyllo.

Keep the phyllo layers scrunchy, until you get to the last 2 layers, allow those to be straight and neat. Refrigerate for a few hours, or overnight, this way the melted butter hardens and is easy to cut. It's better to pre-cut the boereg, because once the phyllo bakes, it can get flaky and hard to cut.

Preheat oven to 350 and prepare a mix of eggs and milk. Beat 2 eggs (3 if small eggs), add a cup of milk, then beat mixture more. pour mix onto the boereg.

Bake for about 40-55 minutes, until golden brown. A glass pyrex is good in the case, because you can see if all the layers are properly cooked.



Tasted just like my mom's!

Organize

I haven't posted much lately, but it's only because I've been organizing everything. Now that I have a few weeks off from school, I can concentrate on my bedroom project, which is coming along. I've also been trying to tidy up on all the small details.

I love my new floss organizer! Still have a lot left to go, but it's something fun to do while watching mind numbing television.

Possibly Finished Quilt

The quilt tag is finished.

But the quilt top, might need some work. I'm a bit scared of overdoing it, but I might want to add some embroidery on the flowers.

Petits Fours

After a lovely brunch at the Aroma Cafe, Brian and I went to The Gelato Bar and treated ourselves to there delectable little treats.

Pistachio and Apricot, and Raspberry flavored petits fours. YUM.

Root Beer Float

It's been way too hot in the valley for food. Instead, I've been eating this for dinner for the past 3 nights.

When I was a little girl, I hated root beer floats. Something about the creamy ice cream mixed with carbonated fizzy drink didn't do it for me. A few months ago, it was a hot day in San Diego. Brian and I had tickets to go see Morrissey, but were so sleepy from our drive over, we decided to get some coffee. Well, I'm not really a coffee drinker, and it was hot, and they had a root beer float on the menu! For some reason, all of the things that turned me off about root beer floats before (the creamy mixed with the fuzzy) sounded super good at that moment, so I ordered a root beer float. After ordering, I discovered it cost $10(!), so I kindly declined and asked for an iced tea instead. I snuck away to the bathroom while Brian's coffee was being made, and to my surprise he bought me my $10 root beer float! It was wonderful! And that would be the day that I re-discovered and fell in love with root beer floats.

The Hard Boiled Egg That Could

Third times a charm! Actually, I think this was my fourth time, but never the less, a charm!

I love this egg. The color, the texture, the taste... it's about time I got it right! I brought the water to a rolling boil, then slowly added the eggs and turned the heat down slightly. I left the eggs in for 20 minutes, with the water at a rolling simmer/boil. After draining, I let them soak in cold water. Now I can make deviled eggs and tuna salad, without embarrassment! Hooray!

Anabelle Quilt Tag

It's all ready to go on.

I didn't end up following any of the pencil marks I originally drew on, so those will have to be erased. I'm really happy with it. I feel so much more comfortable with embroidery now, I can't wait to start my next project! No idea what it will be yet, but I'm still happy!

Egg Progress

I can't explain it.

After 17 minutes in simmering water, my egg was still raw. I then added an extra 4-5 minutes of boiling to it, and what you get is pictured above. It was better, and tasted good, but I think I still need to let them boil a little more. Maybe next time I'll give them about 7-8 minutes. Sometimes it's the simple things that are the hardest to do.

Old School

Grilled Cheese a la 6th grade lunch ladies. Only thing missing was me in a hairnet.



This brings back memories of lunch trays and private school uniforms.
Speaking of school, only 2 days left!

Progress On Anabelle Embroidery

It's coming along quickly. I learned 2 new stitches with this one so far, the Split Stitch and the French Knot. On my last quilt tag, I did Couching, which was nice, but seemed like it took forever. I'll probably do Couching when attaching the tag onto the quilt.

On a side note, this is the last week of my statistics class. Only 4 days left to freedom. Let the countdown begin.

Weekend Wrap-Up

Chocolate Covered Cupcakes, at a Mexican Chocolate shop in Universal City Walk.

That's right, we went to city walk and Universal Studios too! It was a fun day/night and we got to meet Richard Blade, who was the nicest guy ever! It's been a hot weekend here in Los Angeles, luckily we remembered to bring our spf 90 with us for our Universal Studios trip. Unfortunately, we were a bit more forgetful with the sunblock today at the Rose Bowl Flea Market.

I didn't get much, except a dress and a sunburn.

Bad Auntie

I'm horrible. I've been spelling my niece's name wrong all along, Annabelle is really Anabelle. I'm so glad I double checked on that one, because I would be really sad if I finished the hand embroidered tag, spelling her name wrong. Not good.

So far I have only started drawing things in, but it is going to have a baby rattle and going to read, "to Anabelle, Love, Auntie Annette". This is going to take possibly forever, but my goal is to have it ready in time for Christmas. I want to make 2 more for Julia and Andrew (my other niece and nephew), but they might have to wait for their birthdays next June and July.

Bad Egg

Somehow, I just can't get it right. Last time, I boiled it too much, this time not enough.

Will the third time be just right? Let's hope so. On the bright side, at least there's no green film!

Am I Done Yet?

Not yet. I kept having the feeling like something was missing on this quilt, and this morning it came to me! The tag!

I originally wanted the binding to be blue, but Joann fabrics and I both ran out of the blue, so I went with green, and I'm pretty happy with it. I might use some of the green for the tag to tie it all in.

When I first decided on making this quilt, I said it's either going to be "really simple or kinda complicated", and it became both. It's still a simple quilt, but I added complicated touches, that were new to me.
Applique' wasn't too hard to do. All I did was buy a quilting magazine that had some instructions in it, talk a bit to the woman at Joann's, then figure it out.
A scalloped edge wasn't as hard either. I found instructions for that online! Sure, my scalloped edges are a mess, but so are my applique', so I just figure it goes together. Plus, it's all about handmade! Quilts should look a little messy sometimes, being too exact would take all the fun out for me. Plus, if I want it to look like a machine did it, I'll just buy a machine quilt instead. Though, I highly respect quilters who have the patience and talent to make their work looks so perfect. Maybe someday I'll have the patience for it, but until then, crooked edges for me.

Farmer's Market Lunch

I'm loving the Getty Farmer's Market. Today for lunch, I had French bread with heirloom tomatoes and fresh cheese.

For dessert I sprinkled some orange-infused honey on the bread with pistachios. I also got to sample some Dry Soda, which was interesting. I think I like the concept more than the taste though.

Squiggly Appliqué

The appliqué is on. I couldn't get the stitching perfectly, so I made it intentionally squiggly. I like it. Basting and quilting to come soon!

I Love Todd

And I love his book.

I'm not sure I can make half the stuff in here, because I lack the tools and the space to build them, but I'm still super inspired by the projects. I think I just want Todd Oldham to come and makeover my place instead though. Of course, I'd help and make him cookies.