I really love being self-sufficient and living a car-free lifestyle. We've had rain for the last few days and I just can't bring myself to wake up my poor husband at 6:45 am to drive me to the train station.
Yesterday, I just got soaked - I really didn't realize how hard it was raining. Not that hard, actually, but riding for two miles I still got quite wet. Luckily I had packed an extra pair of pants, and made a mental note to buy a pair of rain pants.
Today it was raining again, and it suddenly occurred to me that I already have pants that are more or less water-proof (or water resistant) - my ski pants! They're not downhill ski pants, they're more like a stretchy water-resistant shell under which I normally wear long underwear. But for biking to the train, they're perfectly sufficient by themselves!
Of course, the train was 20 minutes late when I checked, and getting later by the minute, which foiled my plan. So I biked to the bus instead. And didn't totally embarrass myself by not being able to use the bike rack this time, too.
Ingenuity wins again!
My space to share my love of gardening, cooking, crafting, swim-bike-running, nature, hiking, climbing, and my kids.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Stuff never stops
Life around here has been interesting lately. Mostly I’m trying to just catch my breath and let things settle down after the holidays. Because things are still crazy, even though Christmas passed us by more than a month ago.
We live in a nice apartment, with a decent amount of closet space, and yet if we bring anything new into the house, we have a hard time finding space for it.
Our bedroom is the only room that I can justify, and it’s still not great. I have a lot of stuff in my closet that I never use, not to mention stacks of reading materials by the bed. What’s worse is that our closets have now become home to some of our sporting equipment, because … well, we just have a lot of sporting equipment.
The three closets in our hallway are stuffed. Two contain a lot of useful household stuff, like toilet paper, light bulbs, sheets, towels, candles, tools, etc. But the big one? That has a lot of stuff I should probably get rid of. Tons of yarn I want to make into a blanket (or two or three), my trombone that I never play anymore, gift-wrapping supplies even though I almost never wrap gifts, crafting supplies. Sure there are some useful things, like one entire shelf of blankets, much of our canned food supply, and suitcases.
The office – don’t even get me started. My cedar chest is full of stuff from my past. High school, college, my baby stuff, stuffed animals, stuff from my wedding. Bookshelves are full of old law books that I never use and probably will never look at. An armoire full of paper – mostly useless books, high school yearbooks, files for the work I do for my husband’s company, computer paper, photo paper, a drawer full of pictures that need to be organized, and two drawers of random computer stuff (cables, mice, keyboards, blank CDs, power cords, and I have no idea what else). And the closet in there – well, our chest freezer is responsible for taking up a lot of space, plus the skis, biking stuff, rock climbing stuff, a box of winter clothing, and the majority of the rest of our sports gear.
The worst part is our storage closet in the carport – that’s the worst and I absolutely dread clearing it out.
How do I even start getting rid of this stuff? And more importantly, what do I do with it? Who will want 6-9-year-old law books (and has it really been that long since I was in school)? What about all those leftover champagne glasses from our wedding (with our names on them)?
Help! I’m drowning in stuff.
We live in a nice apartment, with a decent amount of closet space, and yet if we bring anything new into the house, we have a hard time finding space for it.
Our bedroom is the only room that I can justify, and it’s still not great. I have a lot of stuff in my closet that I never use, not to mention stacks of reading materials by the bed. What’s worse is that our closets have now become home to some of our sporting equipment, because … well, we just have a lot of sporting equipment.
The three closets in our hallway are stuffed. Two contain a lot of useful household stuff, like toilet paper, light bulbs, sheets, towels, candles, tools, etc. But the big one? That has a lot of stuff I should probably get rid of. Tons of yarn I want to make into a blanket (or two or three), my trombone that I never play anymore, gift-wrapping supplies even though I almost never wrap gifts, crafting supplies. Sure there are some useful things, like one entire shelf of blankets, much of our canned food supply, and suitcases.
The office – don’t even get me started. My cedar chest is full of stuff from my past. High school, college, my baby stuff, stuffed animals, stuff from my wedding. Bookshelves are full of old law books that I never use and probably will never look at. An armoire full of paper – mostly useless books, high school yearbooks, files for the work I do for my husband’s company, computer paper, photo paper, a drawer full of pictures that need to be organized, and two drawers of random computer stuff (cables, mice, keyboards, blank CDs, power cords, and I have no idea what else). And the closet in there – well, our chest freezer is responsible for taking up a lot of space, plus the skis, biking stuff, rock climbing stuff, a box of winter clothing, and the majority of the rest of our sports gear.
The worst part is our storage closet in the carport – that’s the worst and I absolutely dread clearing it out.
How do I even start getting rid of this stuff? And more importantly, what do I do with it? Who will want 6-9-year-old law books (and has it really been that long since I was in school)? What about all those leftover champagne glasses from our wedding (with our names on them)?
Help! I’m drowning in stuff.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Roasted pepper and goat cheese appetizer
Twice in the past week I've made a roasted pepper appetizer. It's really quite simple, I got the basic recipe from my Williams Sonoma Entertaining book. You either buy roasted peppers, or roast and peel them yourself (quite easy to do).
The filling is essentially herbed goat cheese. The recipe calls for mixing in fresh herbs yourself, but I just bought herbed goat cheese. The first time, I used the cheese straight from the package, but it was pretty hard to spread, and the peppers can be kind of delicate. So the second time, I mixed in a little cream cheese and then enough milk to soften the mixture and make it spreadable.
Spread a thin layer of the cheese mixture on the peppers, and roll them up into logs. Refrigerate for about 4 hours (or however long you have), then slice them into bite-sized pieces.
Loris personalized them by adding a drizzle of olive oil and some fresh-cracked pepper, which was divine. I just ate the leftovers for lunch =)
The filling is essentially herbed goat cheese. The recipe calls for mixing in fresh herbs yourself, but I just bought herbed goat cheese. The first time, I used the cheese straight from the package, but it was pretty hard to spread, and the peppers can be kind of delicate. So the second time, I mixed in a little cream cheese and then enough milk to soften the mixture and make it spreadable.
Spread a thin layer of the cheese mixture on the peppers, and roll them up into logs. Refrigerate for about 4 hours (or however long you have), then slice them into bite-sized pieces.
Loris personalized them by adding a drizzle of olive oil and some fresh-cracked pepper, which was divine. I just ate the leftovers for lunch =)
Thursday, January 22, 2009
VERY late Christmas presents
I have so much to write about and never enough time or motivation to do it.
But I wanted to write a quick note about the Christmas gift I finished for my husband last night. I know, I know, it's a bit late but hey! It's not a MONTH late. Barely.
Anyway, I wanted to make him a tray because in the summer we eat outside and it takes forever to carry everything in and out of the house before and after meals. I saw a beautiful sunflower tile tray, but it was expensive, and I thought, I can make something as cool as that! No problem!
Well, I did get knocked down off my high horse by this project - it was tough. The first problem was to actually construct the tray. I decided to tile it using tile samples from my sister's office which would otherwise be thrown away (hooray for reusing perfectly good materials!). So I would need a solid base able to withstand some heavy tile and grout, and I would have to figure out a way to frame it and add handles.
I figured out my tile design, laid it out, and measured, so I knew how big the decorative surface had to be. Then I had to figure out the frame. This was hard. I wanted not only for the sides to be high enough to frame the tile, but also to form a bit of a lip to keep errant dishes and such from sliding off while being carried. A simple corner molding wasn’t tall enough – after tiling and grouting it would be flush with the tile rather than forming a lip. I ended up deciding on a bigger corner molding that would create a lip, and bought a long, skinny piece of wood and cut it down to act as a filler between the base and the molding, to create the height for the lip. That took some serious calculations, especially as my sister and I were deciding how to construct this “on the fly” at the hardware store.
Since my dad’s tools are rusty and under mounds of crap in my mom’s garage, I had to cut the molding with my trusty hand saw and miter box. THAT was a royal pain – I’ve never used it to cut molding, which I wanted to line up perfectly at the corners to form a frame. Luckily, everything fit beautifully, and in a relatively short time, I had glued the filler and the frame together around my base. Whew!
Next, I had to attach some handles. I bought some cabinet handles that I really liked, only to realize that they were a bit small to comfortably carry a heavy tray with a heavy load – and that was for my hands. It would probably be even harder for a man. Finding large enough, stylish handles was a neat trick, and it was expensive. Drilling holes through my frame in exactly the right spot was an even harder trick, which took me several days of attempts, several moments of almost-swearing, and one episode of me nearly crying. I won’t go into details. Let’s just say it was really difficult.
Finally, I glued down the tile. I didn’t actually mosaic it – just picked a random pattern of colored tile with two large terra cotta stripes, and I also didn’t realize that it would be so hard to line up the square tiles so that they were all even. I didn’t worry about it too much, and in fact you can see that they’re not in perfectly straight lines, but I think that just adds to the charm. It looks handmade.
Last night I grouted it. I got some grout on the frame, so I’ll have to lightly sand it, but it’s DONE. HOLY COW!
Pictures to come. I hope.
Whoops, did I say "quick note?"
But I wanted to write a quick note about the Christmas gift I finished for my husband last night. I know, I know, it's a bit late but hey! It's not a MONTH late. Barely.
Anyway, I wanted to make him a tray because in the summer we eat outside and it takes forever to carry everything in and out of the house before and after meals. I saw a beautiful sunflower tile tray, but it was expensive, and I thought, I can make something as cool as that! No problem!
Well, I did get knocked down off my high horse by this project - it was tough. The first problem was to actually construct the tray. I decided to tile it using tile samples from my sister's office which would otherwise be thrown away (hooray for reusing perfectly good materials!). So I would need a solid base able to withstand some heavy tile and grout, and I would have to figure out a way to frame it and add handles.
I figured out my tile design, laid it out, and measured, so I knew how big the decorative surface had to be. Then I had to figure out the frame. This was hard. I wanted not only for the sides to be high enough to frame the tile, but also to form a bit of a lip to keep errant dishes and such from sliding off while being carried. A simple corner molding wasn’t tall enough – after tiling and grouting it would be flush with the tile rather than forming a lip. I ended up deciding on a bigger corner molding that would create a lip, and bought a long, skinny piece of wood and cut it down to act as a filler between the base and the molding, to create the height for the lip. That took some serious calculations, especially as my sister and I were deciding how to construct this “on the fly” at the hardware store.
Since my dad’s tools are rusty and under mounds of crap in my mom’s garage, I had to cut the molding with my trusty hand saw and miter box. THAT was a royal pain – I’ve never used it to cut molding, which I wanted to line up perfectly at the corners to form a frame. Luckily, everything fit beautifully, and in a relatively short time, I had glued the filler and the frame together around my base. Whew!
Next, I had to attach some handles. I bought some cabinet handles that I really liked, only to realize that they were a bit small to comfortably carry a heavy tray with a heavy load – and that was for my hands. It would probably be even harder for a man. Finding large enough, stylish handles was a neat trick, and it was expensive. Drilling holes through my frame in exactly the right spot was an even harder trick, which took me several days of attempts, several moments of almost-swearing, and one episode of me nearly crying. I won’t go into details. Let’s just say it was really difficult.
Finally, I glued down the tile. I didn’t actually mosaic it – just picked a random pattern of colored tile with two large terra cotta stripes, and I also didn’t realize that it would be so hard to line up the square tiles so that they were all even. I didn’t worry about it too much, and in fact you can see that they’re not in perfectly straight lines, but I think that just adds to the charm. It looks handmade.
Last night I grouted it. I got some grout on the frame, so I’ll have to lightly sand it, but it’s DONE. HOLY COW!
Pictures to come. I hope.
Whoops, did I say "quick note?"
Monday, January 12, 2009
Beautiful San Diego Sunshine
I just got back from a conference in San Diego, where I had to present a session in front of about 120 people. I did a great job of not stressing, and everything went really well. The best part about the conference was a few nights of good sleep (sorry to my kitty, but sleeping on me is going to have to stop!) and a few mornings of running in fantastic weather along the San Diego Bay.
All the running was inspiring me to start getting in shape for 2009. I may start riding my bike to work again, once a week or so. I hope to make a running date with a friend once or twice a week in the evenings after work. My husband and I will (hopefully) start rock climbing once or twice a week again, and running stairs once a week. And on the weekends, we’ll continue to go ski mountaineering.
My hope for this year is to do at least one of the following (if not more – listed mostly in order of likelihood) : 1) run a half-marathon; 2) compete in at least one Olympic distance triathlon ; 3) compete and place in a sprint distance triathlon; 4) run a marathon – probably the California International Marathon in December; 5) consider a Half Ironman.
In the meantime, I also want to improve my health by eating more nutritiously. After 4 days of eating out, conference food, and heavy hotel breakfasts, I’m really appreciating coming home to my organic vegetable garden. We’ve been feasting on broccoli, cauliflower, fennel, and turnips. The lettuce has gone into hibernation, but already I can see promise for fava beans, spring peas, onions, and carrots.
After a fall and winter of slacking off and eating a lot of junk food, it’s time to get serious about being healthy. I’m looking forward to it.
All the running was inspiring me to start getting in shape for 2009. I may start riding my bike to work again, once a week or so. I hope to make a running date with a friend once or twice a week in the evenings after work. My husband and I will (hopefully) start rock climbing once or twice a week again, and running stairs once a week. And on the weekends, we’ll continue to go ski mountaineering.
My hope for this year is to do at least one of the following (if not more – listed mostly in order of likelihood) : 1) run a half-marathon; 2) compete in at least one Olympic distance triathlon ; 3) compete and place in a sprint distance triathlon; 4) run a marathon – probably the California International Marathon in December; 5) consider a Half Ironman.
In the meantime, I also want to improve my health by eating more nutritiously. After 4 days of eating out, conference food, and heavy hotel breakfasts, I’m really appreciating coming home to my organic vegetable garden. We’ve been feasting on broccoli, cauliflower, fennel, and turnips. The lettuce has gone into hibernation, but already I can see promise for fava beans, spring peas, onions, and carrots.
After a fall and winter of slacking off and eating a lot of junk food, it’s time to get serious about being healthy. I’m looking forward to it.
Monday, January 5, 2009
Mosaic
Finally! Pictures of my mosaic.
After the first phase - the tree is finished, and I've started on the background:
In this one, the tiling is done, and I only have to grout it. I'll have a picture with the grout soon.
And here is the awesome mosaic bowl I made for my sister for Christmas. The moon is a large bead made of - mother of pearl? The stars are small, clear beads. The mountains are grey and pale purple, with snowy caps.
After the first phase - the tree is finished, and I've started on the background:
In this one, the tiling is done, and I only have to grout it. I'll have a picture with the grout soon.
And here is the awesome mosaic bowl I made for my sister for Christmas. The moon is a large bead made of - mother of pearl? The stars are small, clear beads. The mountains are grey and pale purple, with snowy caps.
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Winter
Went to the garden today for the first time in a while. The poor peppers that are left are looking pretty sad, but overall the garden looks good. I picked a head of broccoli and a head of cauliflower, both of which had been out there too long, a fennel bulb, and 5 or 6 huge turnips. I'm going to make cauliflower soup tonight. Yum!
My sweetheart husband bought me a composter for Christmas. We set it up in the house, and the cat quickly decided it was her new home. I think she was pretty disappointed when I moved it outside, and I've already started filling it up with onion skins, cauliflower and turnip leaves.
My sweetheart husband bought me a composter for Christmas. We set it up in the house, and the cat quickly decided it was her new home. I think she was pretty disappointed when I moved it outside, and I've already started filling it up with onion skins, cauliflower and turnip leaves.
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