Kicked off the month with visiting friends and Chowderfest.
She cooked lots of great food, and he enjoyed every second of it.
They finally started planning that trip to Italy they have been talking about for years. It’s so exciting!
She took a trip with her mom and sister to the big apple while he and his father had a satisfying day of tackling house projects.
The learned some important lessons in planning bigger projects like kitchen renovations. Who knew he cared about color?
I like doing these posts, it gives me a chance to show our family and friends everything we are up to, and they love it too. Sorry for those of you who only come around for recipes you can just skip right past these.
Since winter has kind of had a slow start we were able to get a few more things done outside, like finally adding steps to the new slider. The slider was a project that Chuck and his dad tackled the first weekend in November. There are still some things to touch up (obviously) but it’s functional so that’s what matters. I’m completely in love with it. The dining room is at least 10x brighter than it was before, and check out the decor! My mom found us this unfinished wood table for $25 at a garage sale. It will be getting a face lift at some point in the future to extend its lifespan. We also started to put together my beloved gallery wall, it (like everything else) is still a work in progress. I love the challenge of filling it with handmade and found things, it’s beautiful and cheap. Now we just have to do something about getting some chairs and a new light fixture. Sorry powder blue is just not my style.
In the living room we got the TV positioned above the fireplace. This was an interesting project because TV’s are expensive and we were kind of nervous about hanging it, but it ended up only taking a couple hours and being super easy. We used this bracket
. It had great instructions and Chuck pretty much did this while I hid in the office, attempting to clean. Having the TV over the fireplace makes the room flow so much better, plus we don’t have to worry about our neighbors catching inappropriate scenes on our TV through the big bay window.
I was able to pick up a few other pieces around the house as hand me downs from relatives. Free furniture is my favorite. It’s nice to finally have a place to put down my tea cup while I sit on the couch.
There is still a long way to go with this place and we are hoping to do a lot of that this summer. I’ll try to keep you updated as we go.
Have a good weekend!
This is a meal plan based on the the typical meals that I actually cook on a regular basis. It is not an exact diary of what we eat, but it’s pretty darn close. Enjoy!
Monday – Roast Chicken with Mashed potatoes & Veggies
Tuesday – Irish Vegetable Soup with salad
Wednesday – White Chicken Chili with leftover Chicken
Thursday – Venison Stir Fry with Quinoa
Friday – Pistachio Crusted Cod with French Lentil & Arugula Salad
This is a lifestyle that I can aspire to. Now I just need to get all of my friends to buy houses within walking distance, and a breakfast shop to come in down the street, we have everything else we need within biking distance, and I’m working on the gardens. Whose in with me?
This might be my new favorite show. and this video…
I’m also finding this diet challenge super interesting.
Quote of the week: “When we buy anything beyond the most basic ingredients for life, we are just buying feelings.” – From this post.
800 year old squash. This is amazing, and it makes me want to save seeds from my garden this year.
Daily drinking trumps weekend benders, so says science.
Favorite pins this week from my Food Love Board:
Indian cuisine and I are not really friends. Aside from a few select recipes (that really resemble the worst of Americanized regional food) I cannot for the life of me make an Indian style dish that actually tastes good.
When Royal contacted me about their Basmati Rice I knew I had to give it another shot. I’m really excited to announce that I was finally about to concoct a pretty delicious Indian style dish. I think keeping it fairly simple was the key here, just basic ingredients and a focus on flavor.
I’m really proud to say that this dish will probably make it into our routine fairly regularly. Since it’s delicious, easy and totally different from my usual meals.
This post was sponsored by Royal® Basmati Rice.