November 11

I have not let these night shifts kick my butt. Not yet anyway. I've had an awesome partner the last two nights which makes all the difference in the world.

I came home this morning and went for a walk with the dog. Then I took a shower and went to bed. I woke up about 2:45 from the damn dog barking, that's two days in a row.

All I wanted to do was bake today. So I made a few items off my ever growing To Bake list. I made spices nuts and peanut butter and chocolate pudding.

I've been wanting to make pudding for a while now, I even had a caramel pudding in my browser for a while, but it was the peanut butter and chocolate that really did it. I'm so glad I did to because it was so good! Really easy too. The peanut butter layer I cooked for just long enough and then chocolate layer just a little to long. Live and learn. I added a little unsweetened whipped cream to the top which made it look really nice. The chocolate layer was just sweet enough, with a nice full flavour and the pb layer was really nice.

I baked a squash for a while and then cooked up some bacon and added goat cheese. Healthy? I haven't decided.

Today I put out there on the internet (facebook to be exact) a link to my food blog. It was really scary for me. I want it to be good and I'm afraid the pressure of other's expectaions would make me hasty and careless or just to scared to keep putting myself out there. It went well so far. Careoline loved it and linked it on her profile and natasha too. So we will see what happens. A little praise isn't unwarented it is?

I've not been able to stop thinking about europe. I want to start a history project about it but am a little overwhelmed with how big it is.

Dinner is served

Bread, old balsamic, garden tomatoes, qualicum bay fresh cheese, hard boiled egg

August 14

I'm bad at this journal thing.

I aim one day for it to be easy, but right now it is not.

I always forget to update and then I forget what happened.

Today I worked, bright and early but it was such an amazing morning I couldn't believe it. After work I came home and hung out with my husband a little while until he left for work. Then I went to the library...to Shane at work...and back to the library. I ordered all the books I want to read (7 of them) and borrowed a few until they come in. I'm real sorry to say that I got mad at Shane for having my library card, it was a real nasty way for me to be to the man I love. I'm sorry now of course. I wrote him a note explaining myself and made a i heart u out of cherry blasters. I hope that he understands. It must have been the heat, 37 degrees it came to, I was dripping sweat in the car, no wonder I was cranky.

I went to mom's for dinner and then steph and I saw eat pray love in theatres. What a wonderful movie!

Here is what I learned.

1) Love yourself first

2) Find balance

3)Forgive yourself

Now if I could only really understand it all. I can't wait to mature. But I love where I am now don't get me wrong.

After the movie tonight Butter and I went for a walk in the steamy hot dark where I could only think of the intoxicating smell for blackberries permeating the thickness. Late August evening are so wonderful!

Last night I had Erin over for dinner.

I was so proud to show off my space, it feels so great to be proud of my work. What impressed me even more it that it is a basement I'm proud of.

I made local heirloom tomato bruschetta with basil from my planter and crostinis from the loaf of bread I baked that morning finished off with some pepper goats cheese. So yum.

For dinner we had buttermilk marinated chicken, spaghetti noodles with homemade pesto and shavedparmesan. and crap corn we don't need to talk about.

For dessert I had made plum crumbles to go with the vanilla ice cream we made, but I also made a decadent chocolate mousse which is the option we ended with. (My favourite recipe if from the Chocolate cookbook)

Now I best get to sleep before my eyes close on the page

Aug 5&6

Well

Yesterday sure was nice.

I went over to moms to make eggs benedict for everyone. All I did was make hollandaise, total fail. I tried to do blender hollandaise, which doesn't work and i tried it with margarine. God it was lame, we ate it anyway though HAHA.

I went home around 11 and tided a little. Went for a walk with butter...and jelly, he would not stop following us! and on the way back he kept telling us to wait for him and panting his ass off. A cat! panting!

After this I took some pictures of my garden progress.

I have the largest list of things to make right now! it is crazy! I don't even know where to start.

Today I bought Mulan, Beauty and the Beast, Cinderella, Toy Story and the Lion King for $50 on ebay, I'm a little nervous about this whole thing...never mind, I am a LOT nervous!

Work yesterday, work today. Can't wait for our mini vacation! 10 days!

So hey.

The coffee cake turned out alright, as shane puts it "it's like one of the doughnuts you get with the sour cream glaze"

It's true it did have a doughnut consistency and there was a glaze. He puts it on the make again list, i do not.

We ate it for breakfast with some coffee on the patio.

A little later we left for maia's farm and stopped on the

way at honeyview farms (YUM!)

We played a lot of monopoly deal, ate an awesome! lunch, found some incredible beef jerky, took ducks to the pond, get slobbered on by a pooch, and fed the ducks blackberries. It was a great afternoon.

Lunch was marinated broccoli and peppers, salmon on the grill, cold noodles with sesame salt and BBQ cake. Yum yum yum yum yum!

We left there and went home to change, visited shane's parents and then dad. Had a great day! Loved every minute of it.

Today I made peanut butter granola bars. They fall apart...a lot. It kinda sucks but tastes really good.

I bought this pretty dress for $17 if you can believe it. Stores are starting their fall stuff and summer stuff is on massive sale!

Last I pickled beans Tash brought over. 7 500s of them! Awesome, saved me a whole bunch of money

Yesterday:

$6 beef jerky

Today:

$10 liquidation world clothes and hand towel

$ 4.50 dollar store, pad of paper, clipboard, clothespins

$29 suzy, dress and a shirt

$1.50 coles books, real art of lost cooking

$3.25 superstore, picture frame

$13 husky truck stop

July 31, fireworks and rain

Hey there

So yesterday we went to the Celebration of Light Finale for 2010. A Tribute to China.

It was so neat! Very well done. But lets back up

We left Chilliwack after work around 4. Tash Shane and I. We got to the city at a reasonable time and dropped Shane off to get his ipod exchanged. Tash and I drove around for half an hour looking for parking and getting really upset. We finally decided to try and buy dinner first from whole foods (they were supposed to have sweet picnic baskets) and parked there for the night. They didn't know what we were talking about and we ended up foodless and hungry. We went to the beach and met up with Shane and he went and got us food while we played too many games of monopoly deal. As soon as shane brought dinner it started to pour down rain for 10 minutes, getting everything ourselves included soaked! We were wet for the rest of the night. The fireworks started at 10 and we enjoyed them thoroughly. We hopped in our car at 10:45 and got home at 12:30. Shane and I both worked early, Shane at 5:30 me at 6. We were happy to be home. Dean finally started working on the trim in the dining room thank goodness.

Today I made scallion ginger sauce from ramen noodles we ate with roasted cauliflower, chicken and poached eggs with siracha. Yum!

I attempted a cake for breakfast tomorrow morning. We'll see how it works out.

Tired now, going to bed!

Hi Friday July 30

Hi Friday July 30th before a long weekend.

And what a productive day you were.

Thank goodness it was payday.

I tried to get canning label stickers printed but that pretty much won't work. I went to the bank and bought dog food at buy one get one 50% off! So that was $130.

I went to Hofsteads and bought peaches to can and beans to pickle. I wanted to roast red peppers but they were all hot house darn it.

I canned 4-500s of peaches and 3 quarts of pickles.

I also finised by apron today. I made it about as hard as I possibly could, this one took me about 4 hours, if i do it again i think i could do it in one.

For dinner I made grilled pizza with homemade pesto, mozzerella, fresh local tomatoes, and chili peppers. Declicous!

Shane and I went for a walk after dinner in the beautiful warm summer air, it was a beautiful night.

I spent $25 a Hofsteads and $35 at Pricemart. and $4 at decades for frozen lemonades on our walk