Recipe Review: Ham and Cheese Sliders

10:10 PM Saturday, September 10, 2011

So I was looking over some recipes I had recently gathered and was trying to decide on something to fix for when the boys were up. I settled on this one that I found on The Girl Who Ate Everything, which is where I've been finding some seriously kick-ass recipes lately.

Just going to get right into it.

Ham and Cheese Slider

Photo by The Girl Who Ate Everything

24 good white dinner rolls
24 pieces good honey ham
24 small slices Swiss cheese
1/3 cup mayonnaise
1/3 cup miracle whip

Poppy seed sauce

1 T poppyseeds
1 1/2 T yellow mustard
1 stick butter, melted
1 T minced onion
1/2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

In a small bowl, mix together mayonnaise and miracle whip. Spread onto both sides of the center of each roll. Place a slice of ham and a slice of Swiss inside of each roll. Close rolls and place them into a large baking dish or heavy cookie sheet. Place very close together.

In a medium bowl, whisk together all of the poppy seed sauce ingredients. Pour evenly over all of the sandwiches. Let sit 10 minutes or until butter sets slightly. Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes or until cheese is melted. Uncover and cook for 2 additional minutes. Serve warm.

My variations went something like this: I used French Steak rolls since our store oddly didn't have any regular dinner rolls, used only Light Miracle Whip with no mayonnaise, used Honey Dijon mustard rather than yellow mustard (I hate yellow mustard), and onion powder rather than minced onion.

Also, since I halved the number of rolls, I halved the poppyseed sauce.

I knew my youngest, Frank, is not a condiment person so I didn't put anything on his. I debated whether or not to put his in the oven with the others but decided on it anyway. He only ate one of his two sliders. I'm not sure if that was because he's not a big eater or if that's because he didn't like the roll toasted.

On the other hand, Brad, Dweezil, and I all liked the sliders, although on Dweezil's last (read: 3rd) roll, he decided it was too mustardy and didn't finish it.

I think that's because he took the biggest slider and being the biggest, it had the most sauce.

I personally didn't think the mustard was overwhelming and I'm not really a huge fan of mustard. Overall, I think this recipe was very good and definitely worth making again some time.

Posted in cooking, dinner, food by Diana | 0 comments

Wordless Wednesday: Why Not You?

10:56 AM Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Posted in inspiration, self-esteem by Diana | 0 comments

Pie is Not a Swear Word

1:58 PM Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Yesterday, I was griping to Brad about my adult onset acne. It's very frustrating to me because I get worse break-outs now in my 40s than I got as a teenager.

In my frustration, I called myself a pie face rather than a pizza face.

Which would make sense if the pie was, oh, say pecan.

As I was getting ready for work, it suddenly occurred to me what I'd said. As I chuckled to myself about my dumbness, I was reminded me of something my mother had said one time when I was a kid.

My mother is one of these kinds of people who just does not swear. Like, ever. I think in all of my childhood, I heard her use the word "damn" maybe three times and you knew when she used actual, real swear words, it was serious business!

Normally, her swear words were things like "h-e-double-toothpicks", "pickled pig's feet", or "puddle jumpers". Once in a while, she'd even go so far as to use "bunnies".

As in, "Oh, bunnies!"

I don't know about you but bunnies hardly strike the kind of fear in my heart that would have been there if she'd used real swear words.

One day, my family was on the town, going out to eat. My brother, who is the oldest and was about 18 at the time, was driving. My mother was sitting by him in the passenger seat with me and my sisters in the back seat.

Seeing the place we were going on the other side of the road, my brother made a sudden u-turn in the car, throwing us all to one side and narrowly missing on-coming traffic. He pulled over to the curb, where we all tried to right ourselves and catch our breath.

My mother was so angry with him that she wanted to tell him off but was just not going to swear at him. She started to say, "You.....", but struggled to find the right thing to say to him without swearing at him or calling him a bad name.

You could see her mouth working and hear little mumbley sorts of noises as she struggled to come up with just the right thing to say.

Suddenly, she burst out with, "You pie face!"

There was about 5 seconds of stunned silence, then we all burst out laughing.

My poor mother was instantly deflated. She was not about to laugh because she was still so angry at him but there was just no way we were going to stop laughing long enough to allow her her very justified self-righteous anger.

To this day, that is absolutely my most favorite story of my childhood and I love to tell it to my kids. Once in a while, I will call them pie faces just for the utterly ridiculous nature of it.

And my mother? While she never used that insult again, it didn't do much to change the way she would swear. But I guess she learned her lesson to not make stuff up under a particularly stressful situation to avoid swearing because what you make up might just be more amusing than you intended it to be.

Posted in family, humor by Diana | 0 comments

Typical Weekends

11:55 AM Sunday, August 28, 2011

So here's the thing: I am baaaad at deciding on things to do on the weekends. It's particularly rough when my boys are up. For reasons unknown to me, they seem to want to be entertained on weekends they visit.

In the past, they wouldn't go out to play much because an authority figure said something to them that scared them about the neighborhoods I lived in, even though they were safe neighborhoods.

Now that I live in a very nice, family-friendly community, they still have not made friends.

We have a lake behind our house, which I know sounds all high-falutin' and hoity-toity but since we live in a rural area 30 miles west of Salt Lake, it's actually not as high-falutin' and hoity-toity as it sounds.

We have a paddleboat that came with the house. The kids were enthralled with it for all of 5 seconds and have rarely used it since.

We have a community pool that charges up the wazoo to use, which seems really ridiculous to me because, hello! It's situated right next to a lake! Why charge so much to use the pool when there's a lake kids can get into for free?

But when I was a teen? I spent ALL my time during the summer at the pool. These boys? They never do.

What kind of kid doesn't use a pool or lake that's at their disposal???

Our weekends typically go something like this:

Them: So what are we gonna do this weekend?

Me: What would you like to do?

Them: I dunno.

Jesus doesn't know what to do with you guys. Seriously..

There's a part of me that screams inside every time. How can you not know what you want to do?

Here's what we have in our little town to do: ride your bike, use the lake, go swimming, use the skatepark, use the basketball court, go see a movie, go bowling. I admit, that's not a ton of stuff to do but it should be enough for the boys to entertain themselves on a weekend, right?

Right?????

And I admit, I'm not good at coming up with things for them to do because I was never a teenage boy (shocking but true) so I don't know what teen and pre-teen boys do.

And I'm not sure that Brad was ever a teenage boy, either, in spite of the evidence to the contrary. Brad is much better with girls than boys.

So we struggle to come up with things for them to do.

Maybe we're just not imaginative.

Maybe we're boring.

Maybe we're succumbing to the burden the boys have placed on us to entertain them when they should be capable of doing it themselves.

And honestly? I want them to enjoy their time with me so that maybe, eventually, at some point, they'll decide they want to live with me instead of their dad.

*gasp*

Oh dear lord! A self-discovery moment! I hate it when that happens in public.

Hmm. I guess the burden that's been placed on us to entertain them wasn't put on us entirely by them. It's a burden I placed on us as well. Which is a topic for a different post.

In the meantime, I guess it's always going to be a matter of figuring out what to do to entertain them. Or to help them find things to do on their own.

And releasing us from the stress of trying to be the popular parents. Coz there's no burden more overwhelming than trying to be the popular parent.

Believe me, I know!

Posted in family by Diana | 0 comments

New Recipe: Oven Roasted Garlic Brussels Sprouts

6:53 PM Thursday, August 25, 2011

I have seen this recipe posted over and over again on Pinterest.

Well, technically, I have seen the photo and the link to the recipe posted over and over on Pinterest but that's just semantics.

Brad, being the freak he is, bought some brussels sprouts one day, randomly, out of the blue, at the grocery store. When I asked why, he said, "Because I like them."

I know, right? Who does that?

To me, when I think of brussels sprouts, I think of this:

Brussels Sprouts, aka little green balls of death

Death Balls

Which, I'll admit, is not totally fair because I'd never had brussels sprouts before. But they look like tiny cabbages and I hate cabbages. So why would I want tiny cabbages?

A couple friends insisted that roasted brussels sprouts were actually quite good.

I scoffed.

But then I saw this posted all over Pinterest and so, being the good wife that I am, I decided to give this recipe a try.

Oven Roasted Garlic Brussels Sprouts

2 lb Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved (quartered if large)
5 cloves garlic, minced fine or pressed through a garlic press
1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Move oven rack to the upper third and preheat to 425 degrees.

In a 9x13 inch baking dish, toss together Brussels sprouts, garlic, water, oil, salt and pepper and spread out in a single layer.

Bake for 40-50 minutes until caramelized to taste, tossing once about 25 minutes into cooking time. Remove from oven and toss Brussels sprouts in the pan scraping up brown bits into the sprouts.

My only revision to this recipe was that I halved the recipe. I mean, it's just me and Brad so even 1 lb of brussels sprouts was a bit much.

Before my review, I must state that I am not a veggie lover. In fact, for the most part, there are very few veggies that I can tolerate. Anything that is sweet or mild, I will eat. And as we all know, the more pungent the taste, the better the veggie is for us.

So keep in mind that this review is biased by a person who has a general dislike for veggies.

Now, getting that out of the way, I have to say this recipe was not bad. It wasn't great for this veggie non-eater but it wasn't terrible, either. My take on this was that the roasting most likely made the taste milder. This was confirmed by Brad, who is the veggie eater in this relationship.

Were I to change anything on this recipe, I would probably use garlic powder rather than minced garlic because I really couldn't even taste the garlic at all. I don't know if using fresh garlic gives it the best flavor because I'm too cheap and lazy to buy fresh garlic and mince or press it myself.

This recipe will definitely not help sprouts make their way up to the top of my favorite foods. And if I never ate sprouts again, I'd be absolutely fine with that. However, if I cook them again, I will definitely be using this recipe.

How's that for a mediocre review? I'm sure if you like brussels sprouts, you will love these. It's just veggies are not my cup of tea. So to speak.

Posted in cooking, dinner, food by Diana | 1 comments

Mind Control

12:39 PM Sunday, August 21, 2011

Yesterday, I was reading an article about Fat Talk. Essentially, fat talk is when a woman talks negatively about her body, about how fat she perceives herself to be. According to the article, 93% of women engage in fat talk and a good number of women who engage in fat talk are actually not fat at all but are of a healthy and normal weight.

I'm not going to discuss this article. I linked to it above so go read it. I think it's an important issue to discuss and perhaps at another point in time, I may bring this up again.

What I want to talk about is how easily we believe things we tell ourselves that we know, deep down inside, or should know deep down inside, is not true.

It's interesting and scary to think how easily we convince ourselves of things that are not true: we think we're fat, we think we're ugly, we think that we're useless or pointless or not important.

Sometimes, we even tell ourselves that there is nothing we can do about it. We tell ourselves we are helpless to do anything about this.

I have found myself engaging in this type of helpless behavior. As I have mentioned previously, I struggle with my weight and have been trying for years to do something about it. But I always fail and I always fall off the wagon and pack weight back on until I'm miserably uncomfortable in my own body and then I start all over again.

It's a horrible, vicious cycle to get stuck in.

After that previous post I wrote regarding making yourself proud, I stopped to evaluate myself. It's taken the last several weeks to realize something vitally important: I have become a victim of my own negative thoughts.

Let me be crystal clear for a moment: my self-worth is not wrapped up in my body. I am easily 40 lbs over my ideal weight. I admit that I frequently tell myself that I'm ridiculously overweight and that I don't look as good as I should, and sometimes I have days where I really feel bad about myself because I'm 43 years old and 40 lbs overweight and oh my god! I'm just a fat, old, ridiculous woman.

But outside of that? I like me.

It's been a struggle to find my self-worth, to not wrap my identity in my weight or my lack of talents or anything like that. I am who I am and whether I'm 40 lbs overweight or 20 lbs underweight, I am me and I'm worthy of friendship, I'm worthy of love. I'm a good person who is smart enough, fun enough, and good enough, gosh darn it!

But I have allowed myself to be victimized by my own thoughts. I tell myself that I am trying really hard to lose weight. I tell myself that I'm doing the best I can but it's just not working!!!! I have convinced myself that my body will never change no matter what I do.

And then, as I thought about making myself proud and how that affects what I'm doing every day, I had to ask myself, "Am I really trying my hardest? Am I really doing everything I can? Am I giving it my all? My best?"

Yes, I'm eating better than I have probably in my entire life.

Yes, I exercise regularly and probably more often than I have in my entire life.

But am I really doing my best? Is eating two pieces of gooey butter cake really doing my best?

The answer is a resounding, "No!" I am not doing my best. I'm doing better but I'm not doing my best.

And really? I don't want to be one of those stick-skinny women who wears a size 2 and who has six-pack abs. In fact, I'd be pretty content to drop another 20 lbs and be a size 10.

What I want is to gain control of myself. I want to gain control of my mind. I want to stop believing things about myself that aren't true.

I want to stop being a victim of my own thoughts.

What my brain tells me I am in my bleakest hours is not who I am. And I need to quit believing it when it tells me negative things.

There's a group of women, the Tri Delta sorority at Northwestern University, who started the national campaign for Fat Talk Free Week. They want to change the conversation. I want to change the conversation.

You should, too.

Posted in beauty, self-esteem by Diana | 3 comments

New Recipe: Gooey Butter Cake

10:06 PM Saturday, August 20, 2011

So I've heard that Paula Deen is a fan of butter. I don't know that because until today, I've never made any of her recipes. But this one sounded interesting and involves a lot of butter. So I thought I'd give it a try.

Gooey Butter Cake

Cake:

1 18 1/4-ounce package yellow cake mix
1 egg
8 tablespoons butter, melted

Filling:

1 8-ounce package cream cheese, softened
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
8 tablespoons butter, melted
1 16-ounce box powdered sugar

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Combine the cake mix, egg, and butter and mix well with an electric mixer. Pat the mixture into the bottom of a lightly greased 13 by 9-inch baking pan.

In a large bowl, beat the cream cheese until smooth. Add the eggs, vanilla, and butter and beat together.

Next, add the powdered sugar and mix well. Spread over cake batter and bake for 40 to 50 minutes. Make sure not to over bake as the center should be a little gooey.

On the length of time it takes to cook, my recommendation would be to aim for 40 unless you know for sure that your oven runs cool. I split the difference on this and cooked it for 45 and wish I'd done it for 40 because the edges were slightly over-cooked.

However, that said, this cake was... DIVINE! Seriously. All of us except my youngest, Frank, went back for seconds on this. I would have gone back for 3rds only I was a bit concerned I would get sick due to how rich this is.

This totally does not need any frosting but if you feel it needs something, I might use some powdered sugar sprinkled lightly on top.

And if you'd like a lighter version, Paula's son Bobby makes a lighter version of this recipe. Obviously I haven't tried it yet but am looking forward to giving this a try to see if it's as good.

Posted in cooking, food by Diana | 0 comments

New Recipe: Chicken and Cheese Quesadilla

6:02 PM Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Monday, I tried a new recipe, courtesy of Weight Watchers.

Yes, I had it Monday and yes, I'm only posting about it now. I had other things to talk about, man!

Chicken and Cheese Quesadillas

2 cups Chicken breast without skin, roasted, chopped or shredded (chopped)
1 tsp fresh lime juice, or to taste
1/4 tsp Durkee ground cumin, or other brand
1/4 tsp table salt 8 medium whole wheat tortillas, about 6-inches each
1/2 cup fat-free black bean dip, spicy-variety
6 Tbsp low-fat shredded cheddar cheese, sharp-variety
2 medium scallions, green parts only, diced
4 sprays cooking spray
1/2 cup salsa
2 Tbsp reduced-fat sour cream

In a small bowl, combine chicken, lime juice, cumin and salt; toss well to combine.

Place 4 tortillas on a flat surface and spread each one with 2 tablespoons of bean dip. Top each with about 1/3 cup of chicken and then sprinkle each with 1 tablespoon of cheese; divide scallions over top. Cover with remaining tortillas and gently press down on each one.

Coat a very large nonstick skillet with cooking spray; place over medium heat. Cook quesadillas in a single layer until golden brown on bottom, about 2 minutes. Flip quesadillas and press down on them with a spatula; cook until golden brown on second side, about 2 to 3 minutes more. Remove to a serving plate and cover to keep warm (or place in oven); repeat with remaining quesadillas.

Slice each quesadilla into 4 pieces; serve with salsa and sour cream. Yields 1 quesadilla, 2 tablespoons of salsa and 1 teaspoon of sour cream per serving.

As before, I had a couple variations on this recipe. I used 2 tsps lime juice (which I guess is technically "to taste"), Rosarita No Fat Refried Beans with Green Chile and Lime rather than the black bean dip, and I didn't have any whole wheat tortillas so used regular Mission Flour Tortillas.

One of the problems I've had with some Weight Watcher's recipes in the past is that they tend to be a bit bland and I find myself adding spices as I go to add some zest.

Which is why I added an extra teaspoon of lime juice, coz I'm just wild and crazy that way.

I totally did not have that problem with this recipe. I wouldn't call it spicy by any stretch of the imagination but I really enjoyed this recipe and I have to say that cooking the quesadilla* like this, with cooking spray on a skillet, gave that tortilla a really nice taste and texture.

Overall, I give this meal a two-thumbs up and will definitely be having this again.

I have no idea what the calories and other nutritional content of this meal is, although Weight Watchers gives it a PointsPlus value of 9, but I'm sure that if you really need to know, you can do the math on the ingredients and divide by number of servings to get your ballpark range.

*Apparently, Firefox doesn't like the word "quesadilla", as it underlines it as a spelling error. When right-clicking to see the spelling suggestion, I get "quadrille", which is a type of square dance. I'm pretty sure that quadrilles are not related to quesadillas, although I suppose you could eat quesadillas at a quadrille, which would be even more fun if you had them at a quay. "I went to a quadrille at the quay and ate quesadillas." People will think you're fancy.

Posted in cooking, food, recipe by Diana | 0 comments

7 Years: What a Strange and Wonderful Trip it's Been

8:34 PM Sunday, August 14, 2011

Seven years ago today, I met my future husband.

We were both using Yahoo! personals. I'd had a few dates but nothing that lasted very long or turned out well. Some I left feeling kinda creeped out afterwards.

That's not entirely true. I did date one guy for quite a while but obviously, that turned into nothing. We are still friends, though.

Then I got a message from this guy.

My totally photogenic husband

And I was this girl

Totally bitchin' beauty queen, amirite?

who was thinking, "Uh, whatever."

But... that guy in that picture was really super nice in the few messages we exchanged and he was very interesting.

And when he finally asked me out, I thought, "Why not?" I didn't expect much to come of it but figured maybe I'd have a good night out.

He was not easy to talk to. He didn't say a whole lot and I felt like I was dragging words out of him. It didn't help that I wasn't much of a talker, either. We went to a movie, I went home, and thought, "Well, that wasn't bad but I'm not sure I'll go out with him again."

But I did.

Every time I went on a date with Brad, I'd get home and think, "That was nice/fun but I'm not sure I'll go out with him again."

I don't know how things would have turned out if I hadn't been dating the other guy, Shane, at the same time but I don't know that things would have turned out so well. After all, dating both slowed things down quite a bit and made me keep things in a better perspective.

Six months later, I was sitting in Brad's living room next to him, our relationship still wasn't super serious. I looked over at him and it occurred to me that I had stopped thinking, "I'm not sure I'll go out with him again," and was now thinking, "I can't see this ever ending."

And when that thought hit me, I realized that I had something special there.

It took about 2 more years before I was able to get Brad's brothers to move out of Brad's house so I could move in. And it took another year after that before we got married.

Aww, what a cute couple we are!

The road with Brad has rarely been easy. We have had traumas (the loss of a pregnancy and the strain of a foster child we'd hoped to adopt coming into our home, turning it upside down, and having to be removed) and we've had our struggles (mostly financial over the last several years) and we've had to start therapy to learn how to talk to each other better and listen to each other better and work better together as a couple.

The one thing about Brad that I have been so grateful for is that he's just allowed me to be me. No real expectations as to who he thought I should be. No unreasonable demands for me to be something I'm not. He doesn't ask me to be anyone other than I am. He's allowed me to figure out who I am, which has been a real struggle.

But I'm finally becoming the person I have always been meant to be.

This dork, right here.

There is no one else I've had as much fun with, either.

We spend many nights at bedtime, lying in bed talking and laughing and being generally just silly. Brad has a wonderful sense of humor and he lets me poke fun at him without getting upset. His general lack of defensiveness has made it much easier for me to take myself less seriously, too.

Believe me, he does a pretty good job of making fun of me, too.

Wow, 7 years. It's a record length for him and almost a record length for me. And yet it doesn't feel like it's been that long.

When you spend a lot of time laughing and enjoying yourself with the person you love most in the world, time doesn't really even exist.

This man was made for me.

I wouldn't trade him for anything in the world.

Posted in family, love, relationships by Diana | 2 comments

Telescopes: Nothing at All Like Binoculars

5:37 PM Saturday, August 13, 2011

It's Perseids season and I have never witnessed the display. We live in a fairly rural area, with few lights to disrupt the night sky, so I thought I'd go out last night and take a look, see what I could see, y'know?

Brad has a telescope that I have frequently asked him to set up for me that he has frequently (read: always) failed to set up for me.

So I asked him about it last night.

Brad: The telescope won't help you see the meteors.

Me: But I can still see the rest of the night sky, right? So where is everything?

He points me in the direction of where everything is. I wander into the bedroom, grab the telescope, which is nothing at all like this

Normal looking telescope

And everything like this:

What even is this???

I know, right?

So I pick it up, it doesn't have the tripod attached, and I haul it out into the living room. I know he's not going to volunteer to help me but will help me only if I make myself out to be a completely inept doofus who might break his expensive contraption that he hasn't used in the 7 years I've known him but is still precious to him.

This is not hard to do because I am a completely inept doofus who would probably break his expensive contraption without his assistance.

Me: So, where's the tripod?

Brad: In the garage by the... over by... uh... *rolls his eyes violently* ... I'll go get it.

Me, in an annoying perky voice: Cool, thanks!

He goes off to get the tripod and I wait patiently while he fiddles around, setting up the tripod, attaching the telescope to said tripod, turning this knob and that knob and the other lever and moving it and adjusting it and looking through the eyepiece and generally taking for-freaking-ever to finish setting this up.

But, you know, he's doing it all for me, so I sit quietly and wait.

Brad, with telescope pointing off into what he hopes is a northern direction: Okay, so the telescope should point to the north star and then this gizmo here will follow the rotation of the sky as the night goes on and you can set your camera up here and then this thing will do that thing and then you can follow it using this other doodad of some technical variety there.

I might be paraphrasing him a bit.

Me, looking in the direction he has the telescope pointed: Umm... honey? That's not the north star. Those are trees.

Brad: mumbles something incoherent about the north star and tracking it across the universe and stuff like that.

Me: Uh... what if I don't want to do that? What if I want to just look at the sky?

Brad, looking at me as if I'm an alien of some sort: You can do that. Just step up here and look through the viewfinder.

Me, stepping over to the telescope that he has set up to his height, which is about 6 inches taller than my height: Umm... this is a little too tall for me. I can't reach the viewfinder.

Brad: mumbles something about short people that the Society for Little People* would find very offensive.

Me, watching him lower the legs of the tripod, then grabbing the telescope as it starts to tip over: Be careful! That's going to fall over on top of you.

Brad: That's okay, my head's right underneath it.

Me: Well, your head is soft enough to cushion the fall.

After it's all set at the height proper for a shorter person, I look through the viewfinder and see.... nothing. At all.

You would think with a sky full of stars and planets and moons and stuff, I'd see something when I looked through the telescope. Hell, I can see it all with my bare eyes. But noooo, nothing through the telescope.

I tell Brad this.

He looks at me as if he thinks I might be lying. Then he steps up to the telescope and proceeds to spend another eternity fiddling with this knob and that switch, and I watch the birth of a star, watch it grow up, have baby stars of its own, and then go supernova in the time it takes him to figure out the telescope.

Brad, with the telescope pointing at the moon: Okay, come here! Hurry, come look!

Me: Hurry? That's the moon. I don't think it's going anywhere.

I look through the telescope at the moon, which is full and therefore very bright. It's very cool. I look at it a couple minutes and then I ask if I can look at other things.

He again tells me to point it in the direction of things I want to look at. So I do. And see nothing again.

Me: Here I thought looking through the telescope would be like looking through binoculars, only stronger, so I could see further away. There's a load of stuff out there I can see with my eyes but I can't see anything through this telescope!

And he goes into this lengthy explanation of why I can't actually see anything through this telescope besides the moon, even though looking at things in the night sky that are very far away are exactly the reason one uses a telescope in the first place. None of the explanations makes even the least bit of sense to me.

Disappointed, I sit down on our chaise swing and look up at the sky and see one falling star shoot by. A lifetime of interest in the planets and stars and I can't even see them through the telescope that I've waited 7 years for him to set up for me.

Let this be a lesson to you, kids. If you need fancy-pants contraptions to even look at things you're interested in, make sure that you know exactly how to use that contraption before you even try.

Or at least, have someone set it up who knows what they're doing. Unlike my husband.

*Totally made up society. Probably.

Posted in hobbies by Diana | 1 comments

Happy Furday!

8:40 AM Friday, August 12, 2011

New foster dog. They say Dakota's a 1 year old red heeler mix.

Red Heeler?

Brad thinks he's a baby deer.

Baby deer?

I say he's a coyote.

Coyote?

Maybe he's really a baby deer/heeler/coyote mix. What would that make him? A coyodeeler? A deelote? A heeledote?

The world may never know.

Posted in dogs, puppies by Diana | 0 comments

New Recipe: Curried Chicken Salad

6:06 PM Wednesday, August 10, 2011

In my efforts to try to eat more healthy, I do a lot of searching online, mostly at Eating Well and Cooking Light, for some tasty recipes to use. It's not always easy to know what to make, though, because if it's something you've never had before, you don't know if you'll like it.

Obviously.

So I thought it might be helpful if I posted recipes that I've tried and give my own personal review of said recipe.

Today, we're starting with this recipe I found for Curried Chicken Salad.

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups chopped cooked chicken breast (about 8 ounces)
1/2 cup halved seedless red grapes
1/2 cup diced peeled apple
2 tablespoons diced pineapple
1 tablespoon dried currants
3 tablespoons low-fat mayonnaise
1 teaspoon honey
1/2 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon sliced almonds, toasted

Preparation

Combine first 5 ingredients in a large bowl. Combine mayonnaise and next 5 ingredients (through pepper), stirring with a whisk. Pour mayonnaise mixture over chicken mixture; toss gently to coat. Sprinkle with almonds. Cover and chill. Serves 2, 1-1/4 cups.

Before I give my review, I should mention that I had some variations on this recipe. First, because I'm dumb and can't read, I bought dried pineapple rather than diced pineapple. I don't expect that the difference between the two would be very substantial but you never know.

Second, as I wasn't sure about finding currants in the grocery store in our small town, I decided to use raisins instead because honestly, raisins and currants are not substantially different fruits. However, once again due to not being able to read, I accidentally bought yogurt-covered raisins instead of regular raisins.

Believe me, I make myself groan at my dumbness sometimes.

Next, I used light Miracle Whip rather than light mayonnaise because a) I don't have any mayonnaise in the house and b) I didn't want to buy mayonnaise just for this recipe (as I'm not really a fan of mayonnaise).

And last, I cooked up some brown rice and mixed it in before chilling. I had already decided I wanted brown rice to go with it and figured it would taste best mixed in with the salad.

Even with my variations, I have to say this recipe is fantastic. I often worry that the recipe I'm trying is going to be too bland, which is often the case, but this recipe did not disappoint at all. Personally? I think using the Miracle Whip instead of mayonnaise gave the recipe a bit more kick than it might have had otherwise.

This is by no means a very strongly flavored meal, if you're one who tends towards blander flavors. The half teaspoon of curry is just right. But throw in all the fruits and the lemon juice and you have a wonderful combination of flavors and textures that make eating this a delight. Plus, it's filling without it being even remotely heavy.

I think next time I make this, I will probably double the recipe. It was enough for me and Brad but it didn't leave any leftovers and it would be nice to have leftovers for lunch the next day.

Nutritional info: Calories: 303, Calories from fat: 21, Fat: 7.2, Saturated fat: 1.3g, Monounsaturated fat: 2.3g, Polyunsaturated fat: 1.3g, Protein: 33.8g, Carbohydrate: 25.7g, Fiber: 1.9g, Cholesterol: 89mg, Iron: 1.7mg, Sodium: 435mg, Calcium: 37mg

Posted in cooking, recipe by Diana | 1 comments

Make Yourself Proud

5:08 PM Saturday, August 6, 2011

I've been spending a lot of time on Pinterest lately. It's been fun because there's a mix of all kinds of great things to look at: food, fashion, travel, design, crafts, etc. Even just funny stuff that people want to share.

My favorite is obviously food. No real surprise to anyone who knows me, I'm sure.

As I was browsing yesterday, I kept seeing a picture over and over again that people were repinning.

That's kind of the thing about Pinterest. You share the things that speak for who you are and what you like or are into and then other people see it and if they like it, they repin.

The picture kinda bugged me because at first, it struck me as one of those hot-chick-with-tight-abs pictures that makes you feel kinda bad about yourself when you see it.

And god knows, I hate stuff that makes me feel bad about myself.

Shut up, chick with hard abs!

This stuff makes me mad.

What's with these chicks half-dressed?

Because honestly?

That's right. We teach them to hate their bodies and hate themselves with stuff like this:

Shut up and put some pants on.

Stuff that makes them feel if they eat something they enjoy, they should feel bad about it.

But then I went back and looked at this particular picture again.

And I realized, I like this picture.

Yes, it's still a hot chick with tight abs. But it's got a different message. A message that could very easily have been delivered like this:

Or this:

And the only reason it wasn't delivered like these others is because it's a Nike ad, not an ad for University of Phoenix or Golden Books or Behr paints.

The message is what's important: Do what makes you proud.

Don't buy into the hype that you can't enjoy eating.

Don't buy into the hype that the only attractive woman is an anorexic woman.

Don't buy into the hype that you need to look like a human lollipop with a washboard strapped to your middle to be a good person.

Don't buy into all the woman-hating garbage that gets posted out there as so-called "motivation".

There is nothing wrong with you!

Do what makes you proud, whether it's running a marathon or painting a picture or making a fabulous meal for your family.

No one else is going to be able to make you as happy or as proud as you can make yourself. Be proud of you for what you can do and for who you are.

That's what being a strong woman is all about.

Posted in beauty, self-esteem by Diana | 0 comments

I See Dead Flies

6:28 PM Monday, August 1, 2011

We have a fly problem in our house.

That's really putting it mildly. Imagine Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds", only with flies instead of birds. It's just like that.

We have a doggie door insert in our dining room that sits between the door jam and the door. Only it doesn't sit flush so there's a gap at the bottom of the door.

This has, in the past, been filled with foam weather stripping. Only Logan, our lard bucket extraordinaire, has torn the weather stripping out in chunks on the the nights that the doggie door is closed and he desperately wants to get out.

This is not a particularly good look for our dining room.

Then again, Logan is not exactly a good look for our dining room.

Logan, giving up on life

I had asked Brad for several weeks to put up plastic weather stripping around the door because we were getting a bunch of flies in the house but you know how men are: Whatever you ask them to do is the last thing on their list of priorities.

I had to go buy a fly swatter as our fly problem was getting out of hand. And I kept bugging (no pun intended) Brad to put up the plastic stripping. It finally took me threatening to put dead flies on his dinner before he finally put the stripping in place.

But now there are flies EVERYWHERE in our house. And I'm swatting and swatting and swatting.

I've swatted so many flies, I swear I see fly carcasses where there aren't any.

So many flies!

That little crumb of burnt toast looks like a fly. That piece of black lint on the floor looks like a fly. That raisin and that pebble look like flies.

Every speck and glob and crumb MUST be a fly!

I'm lying. Our kitchen is not that messy. (I may be lying about that, too.)

Tonight, I was washing dishes and I saw a fly buzzing about so I swatted it. And the carcass landed in the sink. On top of the flatware that needed to be washed.

Ugh! Great, I thought. Couldn't it have landed elsewhere? But I was determined not to be thwarted by fly carcass. I turned on the water, figuring I'd wash the body down the drain and I could continue to load the flatware into the dishwasher. I saw no fly body so I picked up a handful of flatware and as I was putting them in the dishwasher, I felt something on my finger.

Oh! My! God! I have a fly carcass on my finger!

Terrifies face is terrified

And I instantly panicked! I could feel all the typical fight or flight responses: my field of vision narrowed, my heart rate increased, my mouth went dry, I felt tingly all over.

Dead fly! On my finger!

I almost screamed.

I furtively looked down at my finger as I was getting ready to shake it in a jerky, frightened fashion, not daring to look at what I inevitably knew was there.d
Kind of like a bad car accident, where you don't really want to see it and yet you can't help but look anyway.

I looked and saw....

....a small piece of gooey wet egg on my finger.

Thank god I didn't pass out. It would have been highly embarrassing to admit that I passed out over fear of egg.

I think it's time to put Brad on fly swatting duty. Let him worry about fly carcasses on his fingers for a change.

Posted in cleaning by Diana | 0 comments

Escaping

11:03 AM Sunday, July 31, 2011

There's just something about watching planes taking off.

I work near the Salt Lake airport. It's about a 5 minute drive away.

The same freeway that takes me to work is the freeway I take to pick up or drop off my boys with their dad. Same freeway I take to get into Salt Lake.

Almost every day, I see planes coming in or taking off.

Every time I see a plane taking off, my heart goes off with it.

I wonder where the passengers are going, if they're going some place fun, exciting, exotic. If they're going to a favorite place they've been to multiple times or some place they've never been before. Whether they'll be seeing loved ones: their friends and family.

I know that not every airplane trip is for a happy reason. I also know that many people on a plane taking off from an airport are actually going home rather than going on vacation, or perhaps are going away on a business trip.

But that doesn't factor into my dreams.

After all, the planes I'm watching are taking off from Salt Lake.

My heart tells me they're going some place fun, like Disney World. Or they're going to the beach in the Bahamas. Or they're heading for a long trip to Europe. Or a cruise around the Caribbean.

My heart tells me this because that's what I want to be doing.

I long to get away from the drudgery of life, of working 40 hours a week making barely enough money to pay down my debts, buy groceries, and take the boys to a movie once a month.

I long to be on a plane, heading to a destination far away where the sun in shining, experiencing the world around me, seeing new things or enjoying favorite activities with loved ones.

It's really about escaping. I sometimes just feel bogged down by every day life. When I see a plane taking off, my heart is going with it, flying away from the cares of the world to a place where, for a short time, I can be care-free.

Posted in flying, vacation by Diana | 0 comments

Please Just Leave the Electricity Alone

2:04 PM Sunday, July 24, 2011

Brad has a hobby. Well, he has a hobby besides computer programming. This hobby, however, is something that makes me insane.

When I first met Brad, he had a motion sensor in the bedroom so that when you walked into the bedroom, a light turned on automatically. It didn't turn on during the day and it didn't turn on in the middle of the night, so I believe it was programmed for evening use.

I thought this was pretty cool.

I asked him, when we moved into our new house, if he could set that up again.

He didn't.

What he did was worse.

He set up some automatic functions for some of the lights in our house. Only, I don't know what half of these functions are and I don't know how to use them. I know some of the lights switch on at a certain time in the evening. Which sounds cool when you put it that way. But with the changes of the seasons and what-not, the lights don't always come on at the best time.

And most of our light switches don't actually work like normal light switches anymore.

This is what our old switches looked like. And honestly, we do still have a few that look like this.

Weird but mostly understadable

Normal looking switches, for the most part. Up is on, down is off.

The switches that operated our living room lights were identical to this.

Now, they look like this.

Wait, what?

Yes, two light switches have now been replaced with 5 switches. Why do we need 5 light switches to operate what two used to do?

I don't know!

It used to be when I came into the living room, I could push the light switch and the light would come on. Instantly. When I left, I would push the switch again and the light would go off. Instantly.

Now, I push a switch and.... nothing happens! *grumble grumble*

Me: Brad! The light won't come on!

Brad: Use the remote.

Me: Ugh. What number is it on the remote?

Brad: Number 5.

I look at the remote.

Oh, right, sure. Push button 5. Okay.

Do you see numbers on this remote, excluding the number on the Schwan's sticker? No?

That's because there aren't any!

Me: Uh... there are no numbers on here! Which one is number 5?

Brad: The fifth one.

Me: The fifth from the top? The fifth from the bottom? Left? Right?

Brad: *condescendingly* The fifth from the top on the left. Left is on. Right is off.

Me: *thinking of different ways to murder my husband*

Once in a while, I forget that I have to use a freakin' remote to turn on the damned lights in my living room. I flip the switch. Nothing happens. *grumble grumble*

Me: Which one of these stupid switches turns on the light?

Brad: That first one.

Me: I flipped it and nothing happened!

Brad: You have to give it a few seconds.

Somehow, multiple switches which take several seconds to respond to being turned on or off and a remote control is supposed to have simplified our control of the light switches.

Somehow. I'm not sure how.

Yes, I like the fact that a lamp will turn on automatically in the evening. But when I want to switch on a light manually, by Jove, I want it to turn on! Instantly! I don't want to need an owner's manual to figure out how to operate the light switches in my house!

Brad: Well, if you'd take 10 seconds to learn how to use it right...

And he wants to do this to more of the lights in our house and won't take no for an answer.

I'm pretty sure if this happens, no jury in the world would convict me of his murder.

Posted in hobbies, home automation by Diana | 0 comments

Pelicans

9:17 PM Wednesday, July 20, 2011

This is directly behind our house. We don't get to see the pelicans too often, just a few weeks a year.

I love these dudes!

Super cool pelicans

Used Picnik to play with the picture a bit.

Posted in beauty, nature, spring, Utah by Diana | 0 comments

Food Obsessed

6:56 PM Tuesday, July 19, 2011

A few years back, I was listening to some young female relatives talking about food. They were talking about the nutritional value of certain organic foods they purchased, which brands were better than others, the best kinds of supplements to take and which ones and how many they were taking, and which whole foods-type stores to go to for the best values and on and on.

I swear to god, they talked about this for several hours.

I remember thinking to myself that while yes, they looked fabulous, they seemed to be obsessed with food. I couldn't help but find myself feeling relieved that I didn't spend that much time obsessing over food and supplements.

A lot has changed in a couple of years.

In my quest to eat healthier and lose weight, I have discovered that I, too, have started to become obsessed with food. Oh, not to the point that I'll have half day discussions with people regarding organic foods and the benefits of supplements.

I'm not even going to pretend I know anything at all on those topics.

But I have searched the internet for healthy food recipes. I've read articles about how to reduce my sodium intake. I've tried to figure out how to increase my protein without increasing my carbs. I've looked for foods that increase the amount of fiber I ingest on a daily basis, comparing one brand against other brands.

And I realize, I'm making myself crazy with this crap.

I spend way more time thinking about healthy food and how to improve my food choices than I spend actually eating food.

This is so not me.

Well, I do like the picture of the cat and think it's very cute and maybe if I were a cat, that would be me. But that's something all together different.

Honestly, I don't like to spend a lot of time thinking about food choices. I don't like scouring the internet for healthy food recipes. I don't like spending a lot of time comparing my food choices to determine which is healthier for me. I don't like creating menus and shopping lists.

It's too much like work!

I spend more than enough time working, what with my job and cooking dinner and getting cleaning done and trying to exercise and taking care of animals and kids and pleasuring the husband....

Sorry, I think I may have said too much.

*ahem* Anyway, I think this is why I've started to dislike cooking. I spend too much time thinking about food. I want to spend less time thinking and more time eating!

That attitude is probably the reason I have so much weight to lose.

I don't want to have to think about it and if I pick up anything to eat that requires less thinking, the worse the food seems to be.

I don't know how to strike a balance between eating healthier and not spending all my time thinking about eating healthier. Is that even possible?

Are you food obsessed, too? What do you do to eat healthier?

Posted in cooking, dinner by Diana | 4 comments

I Know This Woman

8:33 PM Friday, July 15, 2011

So there's this woman I work with who is one of those kinds of people.

You know what kind I'm talking about.

The kind who is lazy and will do minimal amounts of work and try to pass duties off on other people.

The kind who seems really nice and friendly but you can't help wondering if they're really talking smack about you behind your back.

The kind that always needs to know what's going on behind closed doors all the time.

Yeah, that kind.

So anyway, she is very sick. She has discovered this recently. She makes it to work every day but she has appointments and stuff that she has to go to once a week.

And the really horrible thing that is going on in my mind, and thankfully in my boss' mind as well so I know I'm not the only one who is having these evil thoughts, is that I seriously believe that she is using her sickness as an excuse to get out of doing things she doesn't want to do.

Yes, I really believe that. Yes, I'll probably go to hell for that.

I want to feel sorry for her. I do feel sorry for her. I'm sorry she's sick. What she's going through is just not fair because she has had to deal with a lot of rough stuff.

But?

It's wrong to use your sickness as an excuse to get out of doing things you don't want to do. It's wrong to put the burden of work on others because you can't be bothered to do it yourself and then use your sickness as an excuse.

And of course, no one can say anything about it because.... she's sick. You can't complain about it not being fair that she dumps her work on you because it's not fair she's sick. And how dare you complain?

So you just pick up the slack because life isn't fair. Not fair for her for being sick. Not fair for you because you find yourself having to pick up her slack more frequently now that she's sick.

*sigh*

Yes, I know this is not nice of me. I fully expect this to be what happens to me some day, although I'll hopefully be a lot older and will probably look less pleased.

Posted in sickness, work by Diana | 0 comments