Slice of Life

Me: Sitting at the computer as Bee washes out his buckets in the tub so that he can brew another batch of my favorite beer: “Bee!  Let’s get a trampoline!  We have a backyard; we can do it!”

(Actually, it was more like, “BEE!Let’sgetatrampoLINE!WehaveabackYARD;wecanDOit!”)

Bee: Sweat dripping from his brow, shouting over rushing water from a couple rooms over: “What?!?!“

Me: “Let’s get a trampoline!!!  We have the yard for it!”

Bee: ….  “Get off Craigslist.”

Then we both laughed and half-heartedly chatted pros and cons.  (Cons won.)

Still Here!

Are you?  haha

We have been bad at blogging lately.  I think now that my schoolyear has begun (and actually this was true about a month ago) and Bee has been so busy around here during the day, we’ve been lazy together in the evenings.  But we miss updating our friends and family, taking photos, etc.  Our yard is taking off like crazy, Bee has gotten a lot done around the house, and we’ve had fun with family and friends.

So life is good; we plan to share more again soon.

-Me and Bee

Harvesting

It’s been a weird mix of rain, sunshine and heat for the past week or two. As you can see below (through the rain) it’s helped push everything we planted a month or two behind schedule finally set root, flower and fruit. In this bed we have a mix of flowers, perennials and vegetables.

About a week ago I took this photo of our first squash producing fruit. The leaves in the foreground are our sweetcorn that are now sporting ears.

While weeding along the side of the house today I noticed this squash had doubled in size from two days ago and picked it. Everything in the garden seems to be at this pace now. Before we know it jars of tomatoes and other goodies will be lining our pantry. I have some great new canning recipes from Well Preserved, so we’ll be eating well this winter. Below is our first squash, with a cat for scale. We have tons more on the way and in a couple days I’m planting another round of cold weather veggies in any available locations. I’m excited.

-Bee

Work in Progress

Phew…”Me” and I both had long and productive work days today. Among other work, “Me” sent off a potential publication and I tackled the floor in our large hallway. I did other work in there over the past week that I’ll also show when everything is done. This morning I rented a floor sander and got to work. Like most renovation projects I could write a few paragraphs about the trials and tribulations that have ensued, but I’ll just say I quickly learned I needed to strip the floors before sanding (they had been stained originally then painted and finally covered with wood tiles which I removed last week) and that due to the dozen painful chemical burns from the paint stripper I’ll be wearing gloves and a pair of pants when I strip the front porch. That being said, the floor is coming along well and I’ll be done by noon tomorrow when the sander is due.

-Bee

Wet Paint

I’ve been a very lazy blogger, but productive home owner lately. The paint brushes barely have had time to dry before moving on to the next room or coat. First up below is our bedroom. Like nearly every room in our house, it was painted multiple colors (one purple wall, three green walls, yellow ceiling, blue stair risers). We primed the one purple wall on Memorial Day weekend and later in the attic thought we found the correct can of green paint to match the other walls. After the green paint dried we discovered it was an odd color green that wasn’t anywhere to be found in the house. We liked the original green so I recently painted all of the walls and stairs a similar shade followed a few coats of white over the yellow ceiling.

It was actually much faster and cleaner to take off the treads of the stairs. Olivia made it up the stairs as pictured once to come see me upstairs, but I then was barely able to balance and carry her down as she was panicking when she realized she couldn’t get back down.

Here are the freshly painted stairs, walls, and ceiling. The photo below is a little dark, but you get a sense of the colors.

Another room I painted recently is our back family room. We liked the previous terra cotta color, but thought we would like it yellow better. We were right. It looks more contemporary now as well as better matches with the kitchen and blonde wood furniture. This photo is also a little dark, but you get a sense of the color.

Here is another view from in the kitchen. We wanted to keep the color “sunset friendly” as the sunset transforms this room every evening. It also makes it look bigger.

I need to pick up a few light switch plate covers to replace the three zany ones previously in that room, but otherwise that project is complete. I also took down the curtain rods and hangers as we’re still not sure about window treatments in this room. We plan on swapping out the hanging light at some point too, but are still looking at replacement options for that too. I’m off to wrap up some more painting now. Everything is looking good, but I’ll be glad to say something other than “painting” when someone asks me what I’ve been up to.

-Bee

Things We Made This Week

Thanks to our garden, our farmers market, and my colleague, we made a few things this past week.

Bee made me (ok, us) a microbrew pale ale, which is my favorite beer on this earth.

I made a basil salad dressing, with basil and tomatoes from our garden.

The end result wasn’t nearly as pretty, so no photo, but it tasted great!

We also made jalapeno corn bread.

And thanks to a great cast iron mold we got from Bee’s family…

We had some shaped like corn!

We also got some beautiful purple potatoes from the farmers market.

They were amazing.  It was like they were glowing when they were wet!

Once cooked, they turned a brilliant blue, which made a great contrast with the curry I made them in.

The end result didn’t look much different than usual…

…but it was fun and tasted great!

In other things made this week, I made it into my office at school!  Here are some photos as I was cleaning and prepping to move things in:

And in just about 36 hours I am making it all the way to San Francisco for a conference!  Then I have to make the most of the 1.5 weeks of summer I will have left when I return…

-Me

Wednesday BBQ’s

For the past three Wednesdays in a row, Bee and I have been grilling for dinner.  This, of course, now means Wednesday = BBQ Night.  We’ve been preparing a lot of food, which is great for leftovers.  Last night’s menu was jalapeno cornbread, coleslaw, salad with homemade basil dressing, grilled corn, grilled purple peppers, baked beans stewed on the grill, and BBQ tofu. Oh, and of course s’mores.  It’s fun.  We sit outside with a beer, putz around in the yard, and eat until we’re stuffed.  I didn’t take photos last night, but here is last week’s BBQ:

Perhaps most significantly, we finally did cut and eat the lettuce we had grown in the yard, as well as a couple little yellow cherry tomatoes:

That alone wasn’t quite enough, so I added a spinach mix,  carrots, and some nuts and cheese.

I made my go-to ginger soy dressing and it was wonderful.

I should note that we are not the only ones interested in eating from our garden.  This one cracked me up, as devistated as I was to lose the tomato:

I call it Nightmare Before BBQ.

OK, so what else did we have?

We had Bee’s great little grilling setup.

And Bee.  And grill.

And our very last summer lily, reaching toward the sunset.

Oh!  And we had more food!

Grilled corn, from the farmers market.

Grilled new potatoes, also from the farmers market.

Beans, which I didn’t take a photo of because I was stuffing my face, and of course grilled tofu slathered with Sweet Baby Ray’s BBQ sauce:

I kid you not, it tasted like chicken.  Better.

And of course, no BBQ is complete without roasting marshmallows over the coals and making s’mores:

Next week we’re going to try grilled polenta, to shake things up a bit.

Cheers to Wednesday night BBQ!

-Me

Summer Plans

When we moved down here, we felt sure that we’d be back up to Chicago at least once this summer, and vowed (to ourselves) a long weekend in Michigan.

Now, with classes starting in less than a month, neither seems likely.  And that’s a bummer because we have all the time in the world.  Other than my trip to San Francisco for a conference in a couple weeks, the calendar is, and has been, wide open, which makes it a bit more frustrating.

The problem is that with Bee applying for several good jobs, a call could come at any time for an interview.  So there goes even a short-term trip, especially during the week. We sort of need to stick around should Bee get any calls on the applications he has out, many of which are for jobs that are still posted, so ostensibly are not yet filled.  Add to that the difficulty of planning anything out into the future, given the hope that Bee will then be working. It’s a waiting game.

Bee’s non-jobness also makes us more conscious of our spending.  So the cost to travel and the inevitable food and stuff  puts an extra burden on what could otherwise be an easy trip to Chicago or MI.

Plus there is the desire to see all our parents on this hypothetical trip to MI, so factor in their schedules this summer, and it turns out the perfect weekend to visit everyone was two weeks ago.  Oops.  From here until school something is going on every weekend, either here or there.  And once school starts, it gets harder.  That 4.5 hour drive seems tough when there’s not a long weekend to invite it.

We do know we’ll be in Chicago the weekend of September 25.  One of my favorite bands is playing a show that Friday night and then we’ll probably make our rounds to see Chicago pals that weekend.  And MI is lovely in the fall, so if we can swing that, we will.

But for now, we’re sorta stuck…. waiting….  And all I wanna do is catch a Cubs game, hang out in Edgewater and Rogers Park, take a dip in my parents’ pool, visit Ballard Park, be in Grandma Shirley’s yard, work on the car at John’s, go to Founders, go to the cabin, etc.

Perhaps this is just a kick in my own pants to appreciate what we have, which is a great yard with all sorts of fun stuff growing, time to get more done around the house, time to explore our new city a bit more, and a quiet rest before what is sure to be an active fall.

But still….

-Me

Hazy Walk-Through

I took this video today, when we finally hung the red shelves above the couch.  (Long, boring story about the dozens of things that delayed that but many kudos to Bee for figuring it all out.)

It’s hazy and odd, not quite what I hoped it would look like.  But for folks who have never been here, and for folks who haven’t seen it this extra degree of done, here is a look.

Still lots to do, but this is some of our house today.

-Me

Bittman on Dressing

I mentioned homemade salad dressings a while back, and I have been meaning to do a follow-up post for a while.  Well, today Bittman made it easy for me.  Check this out!

I’ve made a variation of all three dressings before, and will certainly be making one this week (today?) when we eat the lettuce in our yard.

I hated salad for years, but I wonder if the store-produced dressings were partly what were keeping me away.  Homemade dressings are so tasty, and they’re cheaper, to boot!

-Me