Category Archives: Life

Agile Alliance 2012

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Hey everyone!

It’s been forever (or seems like it) since I’ve posted anything here. Sorry I’ve been MIA. I had good reason though. I was in Dallas last week for the Agile Alliance 2012 conference.

A group of us from the conference (6 in total) attended for a week long of sessions to learn new things with the agile manifesto, see what we could improve, network and have fun! It was a good way to get to know everyone in my group too. It was myself, another QA lead, a developer, head of development, UX lead and our scrum master. The company I work for, JSTOR, has been doing agile for well over three years, but that doesn’t mean we can’t learn new things!

The conference took place at the Gaylord Texan Hotel and Convention Center in Dallas, right outside of the airport. It was a huge resort complete with four restaurants inside, an indoor atrium so it was like you were outside, huge (and I mean HUGE) fitness center and spa, a vineyard, Paradise Springs (a water park w/ lazy river and slides), and of course, the convention center where the conference took place each day. It was a beautiful hotel, I will say that. As soon as we checked in and dumped our bags in our rooms, we met up at the bar (one of the restaurants) for drinks, appetizers and watch the Tigers game. Hey, we had our priorities straight ;)

Starting Monday of the week, we were all in our respective sessions. I had decided to sit in session primarily focused around QA, testing, being a leader, coach and mentoring. I was pleased to see that a lot of the workshops I attended, were things my company is already doing. It was nice to exchange ideas with others in the class and answer questions.

I’m not even going to talk about food because I was in Texas aka land of fried food, aka vegetarians worst nightmare. They served us lunch most days and it was the banquet-hall-style buffet. That meant no vegetarian main dishes, but a whole lotta salads, side dishes and potato. Potatoes all. the. time. I even asked one of the workers one day if they had a vegetarian option. The lady looked at me and said “There’s salmon.”

So there you have it folks. In Texas, if it ain’t cow, it ain’t meat :P

We did leave the compound one night and went to PF Changs (thank my coworker who had a car!) and I had my fill of tofu and veggies. Needless to say, I was ready to go home for real food after that week.

So anyway, when we were done with sessions for the day, we took full advantage of the evening fun they had. One night they had two happy hours (oy vey) and another they had some mechanical bull riding, a butt portrait sketch person (REB was happy about that one LOL). Our last night there they had a huge dinner, live music (they were so good!), and dancing. It was a lot of fun!

Aside from the six of us (upper right), we networked and met some great people who have easily become friends for us! Hi Peggy! :)

There was of course, drink tickets. Lots and lots of drink tickets…

It is safe to say I’m officially on detox this week and don’t plan on drinking or eating like that for a very long time. I’m so glad I went though! I learned so much, got closer with my coworkers, made new friends and brought back ideas to use here at work with my team! I hope to attend more conferences like this in the future to help improve my skills!

Have you attended conferences for work?
Did you learn a lot? 

Para-Para-Paradise

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Hi friends!

You might have seen some shots on Instragram, but we saw Coldplay last night! I’ve been wanting to see them live for the longest time. REB saw them about 6 years ago when Parachutes was first released, so it was a treat for him too. We all got to wear wristbands that lit up when the show started and started flashing during certain songs. They had balloons, big glowing balloons across the arena, confetti, black lights, singing happy birthday to Will the drummer, and of course, really good music. They put on a great show and you can tell they love their fans. They even did their encore in our section a few rows away from us! It was amazing. Here are some shots from the show (and dinner before ;)):

Gazpacho a la Kruse and Muer

 

Grilled veggie primavera...food won

 

So that and Radiohead earlier this summer marks the end of our big concert plans. After I go to a concert, I always seem to want to attend more! Maybe there are some peeps coming to smaller venues….

What is the best concert you’ve attended?

Just like riding a bike

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Question: how is it already Monday again?? This week is going to be the start of a very few busy weeks that I will have in August. There will be breaks here and there (Coldplay on Wednesday! Work conference in Dallas! Vacation w/ friends at the end of the month!)…but I have to make it through a few busy days and weeks before all that kind of fun can start!

In preparation for all the busy-ness that will soon ensue, I was adamant about having a fun weekend. And a fun weekend, I had! How about we take a moment to talk about it? :)

In the evening after work on Friday, I met Amber and got a much needed pedicure.

I wasn’t sure if a graphite color would look good on me since my skin is on the darker side, but I kind of dig it! I normally get greens and blues, so this was a fun change! Amber also introduced me to these flip flops…that I can’t remember the name of…but they’re so uber comfortable I’ve been wearing them all weekend. We got ‘em at Macy’s, that about all I do know.

She and I made plans to go to the farmers market on Saturday, so that’s exactly what we did. We got there about 8:30 and spent one good hour walking around the market, sipping on lattes and scoping out the goods.

We were both pretty hesitant since the crops weren’t super great this year due to the hot weather and lack of rain, but I was BLOWN. AWAY. by the spread at the market this weekend! You probably already saw the beauties on my Instagram, but here they are again!
I got some awesome loot and a bunch of sunflowers and spent less than $20! I got a whole box of bell peppers (about 5-6 peppers), box of mini heirloom tomatoes, a box of eggplant (three huge eggplant), a bunch of colorful carrots and two ears of sweet corn.

If you see in the picture, I saw some beautiful squash blossoms. I’ve only ever had squash blossoms once during a 7-course vegetarian meal with wine pairing at this restaurant in town, and one of the meals had squash blossoms. It was so delicious! However, I have no idea how to prepare them otherwise I would have bought them :(
If anyone has a recipe they can share, please do! I might go back to the farmers market this weekend and maybe I’ll pick up another box!

By the time I got home, it was about 10 a.m., and I noticed REB was also up! We took full advantage of the beautiful morning by going to a local park and doing a long walk with Gryff. We went to Nichols Arboretum. We go here a lot: the peony festival in May, letting the dog swim in Huron River, sitting in the open field reading, chilling, whatever!


An awesome pre-workout of running through the woods, up and down hills!

I say pre-workout because when we got home, the dog was pooped but REB and I were pumped with adrenaline. He went on a long bike ride (he’s hardcore cyclist man) and I decided to do Jillian Michaels and planks while he was gone.
I moved up in weights and my arms are totally feeling it. Oy!

But it was so totally worth it! I felt so much better after and was more than ready for the delicious dinner we were about to prepare! I prepped all our veggies while REB heated up the charcoal and got the grill ready. I made a quick bruschetta with the mini heirloom tomatoes and then sliced up the veggeis and gathered them together so they could grill, baby, grill!


It was such a beautiful evening, so we dined al fresco on the deck, enjoyed the breeze and the delicious dinner we prepared thanks to locals and mother Earth! /end hippy comment ;) Hey, no wait. I’m not sorry. I love this place! And I love the stuff that comes out of the ground. Shout out and props to the peeps who help make that happen. Buy local! /end plug


Since the vegetables didn’t provide enough protein (for our preference) we just plated them on top of some steamed lentils from Trader Joe’s (now an official staple in our fridge). It was perfect.

After dinner and cleaning up, REB really wanted ice cream. We don’t really have that kind of stuff in our house (I did buy some low-cal fruit and cream bars from TJ’s…but we weren’t feeling it), so we decided to walk up to the Dairy Queen and bring the dog for yet another long walk! But by the time we got up there, I didn’t want ice cream, so I walked across the street to Caribou Coffee to get myself a small vanilla northern lite latte (sugarfree, nonfat) and it totally hit the spot.

We had made plans to get up early to hit up another park in town to do another long walk…but when we got up, the dog was SUPER tired and wouldn’t move. We kept joking that we broke our dog, but he isn’t used to walking 5 miles a day, so we decided to give him a rest. We instead took advantage of the early morning to get some breakfast and run some errands before he went on a bike ride.

We went to a place near campus and the hospital called Angelo’s and it’s supposedly the best breakfast place in town and worth the wait. Well, there wasn’t a line out the door, which was a plus, and we hadn’t been there before we gave it a shot. REB and I are big breakfast people. We have brinner (breakfast for dinner) at least once a week, so we made a deal to try out the places in A2 that are known for good breakfast.

The one thing I can say about Angelo’s is that I’m glad they had some vegetarian options. When I want to splurge, I always get eggs florentine or vegetarian eggs benedict. So when I saw portobello benedict on the menu, I knew I had to give it a shot. I have to say….I was kind of disappointed. You can see from the picture that it was overly doused in the hollaindaise sauce. Once you scraped all that off, the ‘bella was flavorful and full of meatiness and the eggs were poached perfectly! Instead of using English muffin, they used some homemade wheat toast, but it was just too filling, I didn’t even finish the one half of it!

Needless to say, it was good…but we probably won’t ever go back. It wasn’t the best breakfast I’ve ever had and I don’t think it’d be worth waiting in line during the fall when they get really busy, just to get something from there. Glad we went, though! Another check off the list ;)

After breakfast, we ran by Trader Joe’s and  to the bike store and tried out a few bikes! I’ve been wanting a bike for a long time. REB is a road cyclist (I call him hardcore cyclist man Lance), and he rides 30-45 miles as often as he can. He really should do a race, but he doesn’t do it for that purpose. He does it to zone out, work out and enjoy the outdoors. I love it! So we checked out a few bikes for me. I quickly realized I didn’t want a road bike. While that’s his thing, I knew it probably wouldn’t be mine. So we looked at some hybrids for me.

Confession: I haven’t ridden a bike since I was 7 years old. Read: 22 years. I was scared to test some of the ones I did. But I did it…and I remembered how it! The saying is true! Learning to ride a bike again is just like riding a bike ;)

We figured out that a medium frame was good for me, but I need a very low step up and a seat that’s pretty low. I wasn’t comfortable using the pedals to push off and get going. I felt much better sitting on the seat, getting the feet adjusted on the pedals and then pushing off. Maybe that’s how my dad taught me to ride all those years ago?? Oh well. So next step: find a bike and purchase it!

We ended our Sunday with a delicious dinner of leftovers! We had roasted the corn the night before, shucked it and stored it in the fridge. I added some black beans, avocado, lime, red onion and peppers, s&p = easy peasy black bean and corn salsa! It was pretty delicious with some veggie & flaxseed tortilla chips from TJ’s!

For dinner we just took one of the loaves REB bought, sliced it in half, spread some herb goat cheese on half, layered leftover grilled veggies, then used the panini press to make a most delicious sammich!

Ended the night with the Olympics and getting ready for another week!
Like I said, a most relaxing weekend and just what I needed to get ready for the busy days ahead of me. Small goal: make it to Wednesday for the concert! Woo!

Did you have a good weekend? What did you do?

Windy City – Wildcats – Wine – Beach

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Happy Sunday everyone!

Did everyone have a good weekend? I most definitely did. We had our friends come over on Friday night and we had a fun night of drinking wine, board games and sitting outside eating delicious foods.

I had promised to share the photos from the weekend REB and I were in Chicago for my sister’s graduation, so here it is! A week late, but the idea is still there ;) Hey, it’s been a busy week!

We started our journey last Thursday June 14 and it actually went quite smoothly. Gryff actually did really good in the car ride. I don’t think we’ve taken the dog on a long car ride before, but he slept pretty much the entire time. We made a pit stop at the Indiana border (at their welcome center) so the dog could TCB and REB and I could eat the light dinner I had packed for us :)

We got into Chicago kind of late and checked into our hotel (allowed dogs!) and went to sleep. We were exhausted! The next day, we had to get ready for my sister’s graduation. She got her bachelors 10 years ago, but decided to go back and get her masters in Engineering Product Development and Design. REB and I got dressed and headed over to Northwestern’s campus, parked the car, then met my sister, brother-in-law and my sister’s team mates (who she was graduating with!) for brunch and a pre-celebratory drink!

Words can’t express how proud I am of my sister. She has worked so hard and she’s so incredibly smart! She had a hard three years studying while working full time and tackling everything else going on in her life, and she managed graduating from school with flying colors! I’m so proud of her. She just continues to do things that make her an even bigger inspiration to me!

My sister and her teammates!

 

The proud hubby :)

After her graduation, there was a reception with open bar and appetizers, but we ate light because we were going out later in the night. REB and I stopped back at the hotel in Skokie to check on the pups and hang out for a bit before we drove to my sister’s house. From there, we went to this bar called Lush where one of her teammates had reserved an event for all of us! It was an unlimited wine bar w/ heavy appetizers! Holy crap was it so much fun!

Progression of sloppiness

There were so many great wines we got to try, a board full of cheese, fig, jelly; bowls of bread and tall breadsticks; boards of meat (we steered clear of that one ;)); they also served us a yummy shaved brussel sprout coleslaw. It was unbelievable and even though it was just heavy appetizers, we were stuffed! In all honesty though, I could eat tapas any day.

From Lush we walked to this weird little bar called Beauty Bar. It looked like an old salon-turned-bar. You walk in and if you paid enough in drinks, you got your nails done for free. They also had those old hairdryers set up every where. By the time we got to this bar, I was feeling miiiiighty good so I opted to dance around like a weirdo before we made our very fun, drunkard cab ride back to my sisters.

Thank goodness REB was not as hammered as me so he could drive us back to our hotel. I don’t remember the end of that evening, but apparently I was pretty amusing trying to put on shoes on the way out. I deny everything :) haha.

Saturday was super fun! We spent the day at the beach! My sister’s friends birthday was that day, so we went North Shore Beach near their apartment, and spent an evening on the beach barbecuing and hanging out. It was such a beautiful afternoon!

We couldn’t stay long though, since Gryff’s eyes were getting really irritated with the sand blowing :( We didn’t have any of his drops either, so we had to leave, but it was still a lot of fun! And we did have fun at my sister’s with her friends who also came out for her graduation, so it was all in all, a really good day :)

It’s always sad to leave Chicago but it was one of the most fun weekends. I know I say that every time when I leave the city, but it’s true. I’ve never had an awful time in Chicago and I don’t think I ever will. I’m so glad I was able to be there for my sister’s graduation, too! :)

Until next time, Chicago!! <3 <3

What’s your favorite city you’ve visited?

More Weekend Please

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Hello hello!!

What a fun weekend I had last week. I will most definitely post the pictures and a post with the details from the fun weekend REB and I had in Chicago! I wish there was more of that weekend. I also think I had a little too much fun. Is that even possible though? Really? Probably not.

So for now, how about I give you a look at what I ate earlier this week?

Be sure to join the party at Jenn’s Blog over at Peas and Crayons to have some fun with us! And don’t forget the theme for June: Sensible Snacking!

 

And I can proudly say I have been snacking pretty well so far this month :)

This weeks pictures brought to you by Monday. Monday: You usually have a bad case of them lying around.

I broke my fast (a little Game of Thrones for ya :)) with my usual coffee with sugar free creamer and Splenda and also had a bagel thin with 1/2 serving of light garden veggie cream cheese.

Decided to change it up from the usual Nutrigrain bar and/or oatmeal and have some carbs and deliciousness for a change. It’s just what I needed to wake me up!

For my mid-morning snack, I WAS going to have yogurt, but my butter fingers decided it’d be more fun to drop it on the ground thereby making it a not-so-mid-morning snack. Troll.

I had a two hour meeting that went on during lunch on Monday. These types of meetings have their perks: the company usually orders in lunch. The con? It’s usually something kind of unhealthy, though probably delicious. They ordered some noodle bowls from Noodles & Co., but I opted to eat what I brought and get back on track from the uber fun weekend. Healthy choice, people!

I realized halfway through my lunch I forgot to snap a picture, so I apologize. I had a bagel thin with mustard and three slices of Peppered Tofurkey. I’ve never been a big tofurkey fan, but I do remember loving cajun or peppered turkey when I ate meat. So I decided to give this flavor a try, and I’m pleasantly surprised at how yummy it is! Good to have on hand to throw on sandwiches or salads! Alongside, I had 1/2 cup of low sodium, 2% cottage cheese and a whole lotta black pepper. Yum!

My afternoon snacks lately have been in the form of fruit.

Not just any fruit though.

I don’t know if it’s just a good season for them, or luck, but I keep getting the best-tasting bunches of grapes lately! They’re so crunchy, firm and pop in your mouth. So sweet and delicious! Thanks to Sarah, I’ve furthered the obsession by freezing them. Mind. Blown.

So for dinner on Monday, REB and I wanted some Thai food so we headed to Lotus Thai. I love this place. They have an entire section of the menu for vegetarian apps, soups and entrees! WIN. We weren’t terribly hungry and had furniture shopping on the agenda, so we decided to do something quick. We got some tofu spring rolls to start and then split an entree with brown rice.

But the real winner of the meal were the soups we got. I got the Tom yum poh tak tofu, which is this uber vegetarian spicy broth with tofu, lime, mushrooms, lemongrass and rhizome.

Holy hell. My lips were burning, it was so spicy! It was already spicy, but then I ordered the spice level to be medium, which probably not the best idea. Nonetheless: it was one of the most delicious soups I’ve had!

So there you have it: a look at eats from Monday!

As I said, I will have a post about the Chicago trip up soon! I mostly need time to download the images from the fancy cam to computer, edit photos, blah blah blah. Y’all know the drill.

Hope you have a great rest of the week!’

Do you like Thai food?
What’s your favorite thing to order?
Do you order it spicy? 


Domestication, Good Eats and Radiohead

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Well hello there my lovelies! How is everyone’s week going?

Mine has been busy! And it’s only going to get busier. Of course, I’m never too busy to give you a peek at a week of eats!

As always, you can join the party at Jenn’s blog and have fun with all of us! The theme of this month is sensible snacking, and although I didn’t do that every day this past week, I did have some good snacking episodes!

 

But first! Here’s an update on the new hizzy! Over the weekend my brother- and sister-in-law came down to help REB and I move into the house! Since we had started moving some of our boxes, all that was really left was the furniture. We rented a U-Haul, had help from those two and we were done in a matter of two hours! It was a good thing REB and I actually got rid of a lot of our junk furniture so we can 1). not clutter the new house thereby allowing us to 2). buy new furniture to make it look nice! Is this what it means to be a grown up? (o_O)

We still have our apartment paid up until the end of the month – that’s when we have to turn in the keys – so for the time being we’re still cleaning it out and moving the last of the boxes over to the new place. We don’t have our washer/dryer over here yet either, so our apartment has become our laundromat for the next two weeks. Not a big deal since we moved within 5 miles of the old place. CONVENIENT.

I know I keep saying I’m going to post pictures of the new house, but honestly, the only part of the house that’s complete is the kitchen since that was unpacked first. We really need to buy some furniture and then maybe I’ll make a video to share with all of you! The fun part is looking at furniture and figuring out what kind of theme our house will have. REB likes modern/contemporary/traditional type decor and I’m more the French country or country-home traditional. Luckily when we both think of a home, we think of cozy and something that screams “us”. And so far, from the things we’ve picked out, I think we’ll accomplish that perfectly :)

Here’s the kitchen so far:

We’re not crazy about those cabinet door handles as I’ve mentioned before, so keeping with the French country/Country home feel, we’ll add some modern hardware to give it an updated look. Compromise peeps!

So we celebrated the first night in the house with a bottle of bubbly. I busted out our wedding flutes for the occasion. I love them so I find any excuse to use them. They’re Kate Spade and one says “Mr.” and the other “Mrs.”. Cute, right? :-D

Also, can I just express my love for Home Goods? I seem to be going in there all the time. Whether it be for cute dishes, things for the kitchen and now for the rest of the house! The best find over the weekend was the Alice in Wonderland teapot! One of the ears on the rabbit is broken, but that didn’t stop me. Anyone who knows me knows it’s a necessity ;)

Anyway! Now onto the food!

I finally bought a jar of Biscoff (creamy) and one of my breakfasts last week was putting that on a whole wheat English muffin with some sliced bananas. ZOMg. Delicious. A huge coffee to go with it too, of course. Then I put the rest of the banana on some oats with granola and chia! Yum!

And to keep with the monthly theme, let’s talk snacks!

Also not pictured: grapes, grapes and more grapes. They’re super tasty these days!

Martinis count as a snack right? How about olives? That counts, right? Right?? …Well we thought so. You can’t turn down a classic dirty martini (extra dirty) on a beautiful spring evening downtown. You just can’t!

Dinners included going to Jazzy Veggie: vegetarian crab cakes and their hoagie special. Zingermans Roadhouse: mac and cheese and donut sundae (hey, we needed a refuel after the move!). Then on Monday night we went to see Radiohead so we went to eat at one of my favorite restaurants, Stir Crazy Cafe, since we never head up that way that often. Tofu lettuce wraps and make-your-own stir fry…it’s better than any BD’s Mongolian BBQ could give!

So let’s talk about Radiohead. They haven’t been in Detroit in 15 YEARS. You’re reading that right. 15 years. So we had to go see them. It’s one of REB’s favorite groups and I while they aren’t my #1 favorite group, I know enough of their songs to appreciate what they do. Their show was a-ma-zing. It was probably one of the best shows I’ve been to. No joke! They played for like 2 1/2 hours straight (two encores too!) and had the coolest lights to go with the show. They also put a lot of electronic beats to their songs and remixed their songs in a way I’d never heard before. It made me love it even more!

The opening band was called Caribou from some where in Ontario, Canada. They were awesome!! I’ve been scouring the Interwebs to find their music. The entire night was just great. We didn’t get home until after 1 a.m…waaaay past my usual bed time and the lack of sleep and having to get up early for work did not mix with me very well. I was sporting some hot bags under my eyes all day Tuesday. Sexy.

Anyway I digress. This week is a busy one for me! I’m out the rest of the week starting Thursday. Heading to Chicago for my sister’s masters graduation!! So proud of her. So I’ll be in the Chi this weekend. Stay tuned next week for some pics and posts about that :) We have a fun weekend lined up to celebrate!

Hope the rest of you have a great Wednesday and great rest of the week!

What is one of, or the best, concert you’ve been to?

Busy Bee Weekend

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Well hello everyone and a very happy Wednesday to all of you!

It’s time for another edition of What I Ate Wednesday…but in my case, it’s what I ate on Saturday of this past weekend.

OMG. Can I just tell you about this past weekend? It felt like one of the busiest but I think it’s just because it felt like all REB and I did was drive around the mitten. And we did.

The “fun” started on Friday night while REB and I were downtown having a mini-date night. We went to our favorite vegetarian restaurant, Seva, and then on our way back to the parking garage, decided to stop and get some coffee. It was there that REB realized he didn’t have his wallet.

Oh crap.

So we retraced our steps. I called up the restaurant, they said it wasn’t there but took our number down. We decided to just go to the restaurant and the people who were at the table we sat at were kind enough to let us look on the ground and helped us look around the table for it – no sign. So then he had the horrid thought that it fell off his lap as he was getting out of the car in the parking garage after he got the ticket to enter and park. Never a good sign. That thing was probably picked up by a student and was long gone. Luckily he only had a dollar in there, but he still spent the rest of the evening calling up places to cancel cards, etc. Not fun.

So if you don’t have a wallet, then you don’t have a license. If you don’t have a license, you shouldn’t be driving. And that’s hard to do when you  commute to and from work 30 minutes each day. So up and at ‘em we were early on Saturday morning to drive to one of the ONLY Secretary of State offices in the state of Michigan that’s open on Saturdays. Thanks to the horrible Terry Lynn Land, she closed many of them down. Hag. The line was atrocious but it was a 2 hour wait, and we were out of there with a temporary license for him.

After that fiasco and dealing with Michigan construction the entire drive there and back (orange is our state’s official color in the summer months – gross), I treated him to a much needed brunch pick-me-up. We went to our favorite place that does brunch, Cafe Zola. No surprise what we each ordered.

A nice half pot of chai accompanied the meal and he was instantly feeling better :) Hey, I’ll do anything to bring the smile back on my husbands face! We decided to walk around a little bit on our way back to the car and realized how peaceful and pretty the morning was.

But our thoughts were still leading to one thing: let’s get more done at the house! So a quick stop at home to change into painting clothes, and we headed to the house to finish up the second coats. We finished the second coat on our family room wall – just an accent wall in the most AMAZING color blue!

Just needs to be trimmed where the tape is covering up, and this room is good to go! We also finished up the trim on the main/formal/front room of the house (formal living and dining space) and now that room is complete!

The kitchen is also completed! A beautiful gray color in there (to match my red and white theme I have going), but I totally forgot to take a picture of the finished product. I’ll make sure I do that soon for all you lovelies :)

Once all the painting and cleaning was done at the house, we were exhausted! We headed back to the apartment, fed the dog, showered and then ventured downtown again for some good eats. Gah. It seems like we’ve been eating out so much — I can’t wait to be in the house so I can start cooking again! We went to one of the Indian places in town that also serves South Indian food. I was having a mad craving for some dosa and totally cured that craving.

More than half of this monstrosity went home with me.

Food definitely won that night. I had two pieces of the dosa, and was done. Kind of sucks too because dosa is delicious but tastes like rubbery cardboard the next day, even when warmed up again :\ Oh well.

We walked down to the gelato place after dinner and split gelato of pistachio and chocolate frangelico.

Gelato makes me miss Italy like whoa :(

 Sunday was my father-in-law’s 60th birthday so REB and I went up to the in-laws house. My brother-in-law and sister-in-law were also there. My FIL is getting his kitchen completely remodeled so we helped out and cleaned out the cabinets and moved things around so the contractors will have an easy time ripping everything out! With all of us helping, we were done in a few hours!

REB and I were even able to make it back to A2 for Sunday Funday with our favorite people! It was also the Game of Thrones Season 2 Finale (OMG! I hate cliffhangers!) After all the work we did this weekend, REB and I needed a much needed drink.

I can’t think of a better way to end the crazy-busy-but-fun-nonetheless weekend!

As always a big hug, love and thanks to the gorgeous Jenn for hosting these WIAW parties! Click on over to her site to find out to join the fun! And if you do participate, don’t forget to go to her site to link up! :)

Have you ever lost your wallet?
What fun things did you do over the weekend? 

 

May Foodie Pen Pals

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Happy End-of-May friends.

End of May. Can you even believe it?! I know it seems like I always say this year is going by so fast…but this year is going by so fast! It’s already June and it’s just weird for me to think that we’re already halfway through the year.

Anyway! Today is a good day though, because it’s Foodie Pen Pal reveal day!! This is only the second month I’ve participated, but it was just as fun as April. Something tells me it will always be fun.

This month my package came to me from the very sweet reader Rachel all the way in Kentucky!

She was very thorough in asking questions of what I liked and didn’t like and was aware that I liked locally-grown or locally-made products! She didn’t disappoint!

She gave me two homemade treats:

One was this amazing Apple Pie Jam!

I didn’t even know such a jam could exist, but I am ridiculously happy it does and there is someone out there who can make it, and make it well! I don’t need to explain how it tastes: apple pie in a jar…then spread on toast, bagel thins, apples…whatever! The possibilities are endless!

She also made me a jar of peach salsa! I haven’t had a chance to try this yet, but given it’s so hot out these days and chips and salsa are my all-time FAVORITE snack ever…I’m pretty sure eating this is in the cards.

In addition to those homemade treats, she also got me two products that are made in Kentucky only.

One of them was a can of Ale 8 One (“A Late One”) Gingerale.

I’ve actually had this soda before! When I was at my previous job that had me traveling all over the place, it took me to Kentucky three or four times (in various locations), and one of the editors at a paper I was at, told me to try Ale 8 One. So I did. And it’s GOOD! Not quite as fizzy or intense as Vernors here in Michigan, but it’s still delicious and refreshing. Since I’d already had this soda before, I let REB try it and he absolutely loved it!

The other Kentucky-made product she sent me was a bag of Grippos BBQ chips!

I’ve also had these before, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love them any less. They are delicious and taste smokey and mesquite. SO good! Some of them got a little smooshed in travel, but that’s totally OK.

And last but not least, she read my mind and added to my stock pile of…:

TEA!

I can never have too much and this is another flavor I haven’t yet tried, so I’m pretty stoked to have received it.

Rachel also included the sweetest message to me and the poor girl was sick during the beginning stages of this, but she kept me updated on when she was mailing the package and when I should expect it. I am more than happy with the package!

Thank you Rachel for sending me such a thoughtful, fun Foodie Pen Pals package this month! :)

Oh! And the person I sent to was another reader named Seema out of Illionis. I sent her a whole box of goodies, which included: roasted banana chips, cinnamon almonds, cocoa almond butter, various individual nut butter packets and some individual servings of dark chocolate!

Here’s what she wrote to me:

Hi Aparna!

Thank you so much for your foodie pen pal package, I absolutely love it!! The banana chips were the first thing I opened and my mom has already claimed that they are hers lol…I managed to snag a few before she snagged the bag away though. The Cocoa almond butter is so much better than nutella! I haven’t put it on anything besides my fingers yet but I’m excited to slather it on a piece of toast. The cinnamon almonds are delicious and very addictive haha – I will definitely need to portion out that bag into some smaller containers so I don’t keep grabbing handfuls – any good almond recipes by any chance? I’m thinking of possibly baking them into something? The trader joe’s dark chocolate bars are planned to be my go to lunch box dessert item and the card you chose was really cute :) thank you so much for putting together such a thoughtful package, I really appreciate it!

take care :)

It’s getting messages like this that make it all worth it. I love getting to know new people, talking to new people and receiving fun, delicious packages from new friends!

Unfortunately, because of the move and all with the new house, I won’t be able to participate in Foodie Pen Pals for the month of June. But you can be sure I’ll be back in July for more fun!

As always, a big thanks to Lindsay for putting together the party! If you want to join in the fun, head over to her site and find out how! Or, below are some deets! If you did participate make sure you link up on her site!

-On the 5th of the month, you will receive your penpal pairing via email. It will be your responsibility to contact your penpal and get their mailing address and any other information you might need like allergies or dietary restrictions.

-You will have until the 15th of the month to put your box of goodies in the mail. On the last day of the month, you will post about the goodies you received from your penpal!
-The boxes are to be filled with fun foodie things, local food items or even homemade treats! The spending limit is $15. The box must also include something written. This can be anything from a note explaining what’s in the box, to a fun recipe…use your imagination!
-You are responsible for figuring out the best way to ship your items depending on their size and how fragile they are. (Don’t forget about flat rate boxes!)
-Foodie Penpals is open to blog readers as well as bloggers. If you’re a reader and you get paired with a blogger, you can choose to write a short guest post for your penpal to post on their blog about what you received. If two readers are paired together, neither needs to worry about writing a post for that month.

- Foodie Penpals is open to US, Canadian residents & UK residents. Please note, Canadian Residents will be paired with other Canadians only. We’ve determined things might get too slow and backed up if we’re trying to send foods through customs across the border from US to Canada and vice versa. So, I’m going to keep two separate lists and match US w/ US and Canada w/ Canada!

***If you’re in the UK, please contact Carol Anne from This Is Rock Salt at rocksalt@thisisrocksalt.com to get involved!

The Lean Green Bean

New Homeowners

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17

 

Hi Everyone!

You read the title right: REB and I are new homeowners!!

Not official until you have the key!

It’s the most exciting feeling ever! We closed on Thursday of last week and we took great advantage of the long weekend to move items into the new house and start painting!

But first, let’s do a quick round up for What I Ate Wednesday! Remember to head over to Jenn’s blog if you want to join the party!


Here are the highlights:

Clockwise we have: a vegetarian version of bagel and lox (no lox) – tomato, cream cheese, capers, red onion no toasted whole wheat bagel (YUM!); a yummy veggie pita packed full with sprouts, sunflower seeds and veggies;  Thai for lunch on closing day: tofu, veggies, spring roll; and celebrating the new house with mojitos and yummy Mexican food! Not a bad week of eats!

So onto the fun part: Updates and some pics of the new digs!
Our house is located within Ann Arbor city limits, close enough to a highway for REB to commute to Dearborn, and still on the same bus line I take to work downtown – WIN. It’s located in a cute neighborhood!

Pretty and ours for the next 30 years! lolz

We met some of our neighbors over the weekend and they’re all so nice and welcoming. Turns out one of them golfs with a few people I work with here, so that’s kind of cool :)

Since our apartment was remodeled (kitchen and bathrooms) not long ago, all our kitchen stuff was already packed in boxes. And since we weren’t going to be painting cabinets or anything, we decided to go ahead and move and unpack the kitchen first – glad we did!

Kitchen before - we put on a first coat of paint over the weekend!

A gas range! SQUEE!! All the appliances are relatively new, too! Double SQUEE! We want to re-do the counters and the cabinets down the road. In the mean time, we might just update the hardware on the cabinets to give it a new look for a lower cost. We did start painting the kitchen, too! I’ll post a pic once it’s all done. The nice thing is that we were finally able to unpack all the wedding stuff we got and throw out the old stuff. Now all the new stuff is packed away in the kitchen. And I also get one of these:

I’m a nerd and get a little cabinet for all my blogging dishes and stuff! I’m pretty thankful I have a hubby who understands my weirdness for taking food photos.

The one thing I love about our house is the backyard. The previous owners did a beautiful job with the landscaping and kept it pretty low maintenance. Luckily, my brother-in-law studied landscape architecture, so he’s going to come visit us and give us the 4-1-1 on everything that’s growing and how to take care of it. We also negotiated patio furniture into the contract, which is beautiful!

Ants helping the peonies open up in the backyard

One of the first days there, our friend came over and we enjoyed some bubbly on the deck!

Happy hubby :)

One thing I wasn’t prepared for, was the amount of time we’d spend in Lowes. I think we made about 5 or 6 trips there in two days over the weekend. We wanted to get a head start on the painting though!

Cart of fun!

I’ve never painted before. Well, I’ve painted in art class as a kid, but I’ve never painted as far as homes go. I didn’t realize the amount of work that goes into it! But it is sort of fun just because we get to make it entirely our own!

Taped off, tarps down!

And it seemed no matter what precautions I took, I couldn’t keep paint off me.

I think the color suits me, don’t you? ;)

Well, we have a long way to go before it’s all complete, but I just can’t wait to start decorating and making it a home! It’s a big step, and we’ve been looking for a long time, and we’re both just so thrilled and excited to finally have a house! Gryff will finally get a yard!

I’ll be sure to keep updates on here as we’re moving, unpacking, painting and decorating!

Any homeowners out there who have tips for us newbs?
Would love to hear from you! 

What A Week

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12

 

Hi everyone!

So it’s been about a month since my last post. A MONTH. How horrible. Things have been so ridiculously busy that I guess the bloggy just went into the back of the fridge with the baking soda :\ Sorry friends.

I’m glad to participate in What I Ate Wednesday though and you can join the party too by heading over to Jenn’s blog!

 


But I’m back! And let me tell you, this past week has been one of the craziest!

So here’s a highlight from the past week.

REB and I enjoyed the outdoors at our favorite vegetarian restaurant in town, Seva. We sat outside and enjoyed the beautiful sun and spring weather!

Mojito for her, Solar Blast juice for him

We started with an appetizer that was on their specials menu, called the Mediterranean black bean dip. We were intrigued.

It was delicious! It had kalamata olives, black beans, tomatoes, herbs (cilantro and parsley I think), yellow peppers and onions and then a yummy citrus-like dressing. It was so light and refreshing!

Whenever we go to Seva, it’s for their weekly specials menu. It changes every week and it could really be anything! So this time, I opted for the lentil burger. Delicious.

It was so good! It had some crisped kale on it and a yummy homemade ketchup that had a kick. I hope this is something they’ll return to their menu this summer :)

So let’s fast forward to Friday. My favorite day of this past week. Not.

Most of you know that I work downtown, so I have the luxury (and yes, I call it a luxury) to take the bus. That said, I don’t drive my car that often. I use it mostly for running errands after work or on the weekends, or alternating which car we drive when REB and I go some where, or to drop/pick up the dog from Petsmart’s day camp. So I was out on Friday minding my own business in the turn lane, about to turn into a business, and then some jack hole comes out from the left into my turn lane (to use it as a stopping point before merging into the other two lanes no doubt) and runs right into my car, head on.

I was not a happy camper. I was an even more unhappy camper when I saw the damage done to my car.

Sad car is sad

His Mercury Cougar was hardly damaged (externally anyway). Luckily there weren’t any injuries (I had a little neck pain the next day but it’s totes fine now), and he didn’t drive off thankfully. The police came, took down all our info and he was ticketed and found at fault, and then he was allowed to leave. I, however, had to have my little go-kart Cavalier taken to a shop and now we’re in the process of hearing from insurance if it’s repairable. I don’t think it is though. I never take it as a good sign with a collision shop “suggests” that I clean out my car of its personal items and also gives me my license plate. Poor car. It had less than 100K miles on it (only 81K!), and aside from that horrible front-end, everything else was fine. I should hopefully get something for it so we can get a new car at least. I hope!

I’ve never been in an accident EVER, so needless to say, I was a bit shook up and scared. But after all that escapade and a wonderful hug from my husband, I was in need of a drink. So we headed downtown to the rooftop of an Italian place in town, Palio. They have a completely different menu if you sit on the roof than if you sit downstairs or on the sidewalk. But why do we go there?

Sangria. Enough said. It was just the thing I needed after a day like that one. Plus, Friday was nearing a close and I was getting pumped for the weekend.

My friends and I do something we called Family Sunday Funday. It started with just us and another married couple and we’d meet on Sundays to eat dinner and watch Game of Thrones. Then it turned into alternating Sundays and the hosting couple would cook, and then we’d watch Game of Thrones. Then it turned into inviting another friend, alternating dinners, playing Rock Band and watching Game of Thrones. And now it’s included another married couple and has become a family fun night for us – something we’ll most likely continue even after Game of Thrones is finished with it season. So this past weekend it was our turn to host for the Sunday Funday 7 (there are 7 of us after all ;)).

I made an Indian feast.

Yes, feast.

I cooked two of the curries on Saturday so that all I had to do was warm them up on the stove on Sunday. And I made the third one on Sunday. I opted for simple north Indian dishes that I can make off the top of my head, so I wouldn’t have to cook for two days straight.

On the menu: channa masala, aloo mattar, mattar paneer, naan and rice. The first two I made the night before, the paneer I made on Sunday because I wanted to grill the paneer.

Grilling paneer - WIN

I think everyone was pleased with the dinner :)

4 of the Sunday Funday 7

 

This photo courtesy of Amber E. at Adventures of Amberherself

To end the week on a light note, I started taking pictures of how Starbucks has been spelling my name on the cup. It always amazes me that people can’t say or spell my name and don’t even make an attempt to try!

I even spelled it for them and they still put a "T" in there. WTF.

Anyway, hope you all have a pleasant week and I’ll try to not take a month hiatus again ;) <3

What was the best thing you ate or made this past week?