Cauliflower Cheese Soup

I checked out Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution cookbook from the library and found this soup recipe. Hoping that it would rival Zupas, I gave it a try tonight. Yum!

Ingredients
2 carrots
2 sticks celery
2 medium onions
2 garlic cloves
8 cups cauliflower (this ended up being a whole head)
2 tablespoons olive oil
8 oz. cheddar cheese, grated (the sharper the better for this recipe)
7 3/4 cups chicken stock
sea salt
black pepper, freshly ground
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

Directions
Peel and roughly chop the carrots. Slice the celery. Peel and roughly chop the onions. Peel and slice the garlic. Cut the cauliflower into 1 inch slices.

Put a large pot or Dutch oven on medium heat and add 2 Tb olive oil. Add all your chopped and sliced ingredients and mix together with a wooden spoon. Cook for around 10 minutes with the lid askew, until the carrots have softened but are still holding their shape, and the onion is lightly golden.

Bring the chicken stock to a boil separately, then pour over the vegetables. Give it a good stir and bring back to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes with the lid on.

Remove the pan from the heat. Season with salt and pepper and add the cheese and mustard. Using an immersion blender, or working in batches with a regular blender, pulse the soup until silky smooth. If you want to dress it up a bit, top it with some lightly fried crispy bacon.

Online Shower

Hey Jenny,

Pretend I'm attending a shower for your baby boy. Open your present below...

My new lovelies

For Christmas I treated myself to a little Amazon delight in the form of these clothe covered classic books by Penguin. Who doesn't want to rediscover great literature when it just looks so...appealing?

What better to keep them as my own than these sweet library labels? None, I daresay.

hey sexy

Hello my fellow sisters. I will be arriving in less than 3 weeks, wax pot in tow. Feel free to steal some sex appeal tips from this french lady and throw out those razors!

DVD Storage Alternative

So it's definitely been a while since I've updated you on my latest projects, mostly because all of my projects revolved around the Sundance festivities. Now I'm all moved into the new place and I'm trying to make it "home." I've been debating what to do about our dvd storage now that we have the new tv. I definitely don't want one of those boring dvd towers and we don't have tons of room for a bookshelf. The moment I laid eyes on this framed shelf idea I knew that is what we needed in our family room, especially because I already had my $5 garage sale frame begging for a new look. So I'll let you know how it turns out but this is my inspiration:

Ken Genes

Livy was rocking the ken gap this past week with some nutella in her front teeth.

Mother's Day BBQ

Soccer with LaLa

3 Things I love about this video:
1. The sing song way Charlie says "corner kick"
2. The fact that I had to get that excited about my ONE AND ONLY goal/my heavy breathing
3. The usage of the word "vertex" by Tommy at the end (it was his second time using it that day-he had used it earlier in our scintillating game of I-Spy). What, Angie, you're having him study SAT words already?!

Wicked

Jon surprised us last night with four tickets to Wicked. We squeaked in just before the end of the run here in Utah. He used "funny money" from winning the NCAA basketball pool. Otherwise I'd be sickened at what he paid for back row seats. They actually worked to our advantage because the boys could get up as high as they wanted to see over people, without worrying about blocking people behind us.

The boys loved it, woke up this morning talking about it, and decided they thought Glinda was cute. They've been singing the songs all day - in the tub, during lunch - it's so fun! They were just discussing with each other over dinner that they wish they could see it over and over again because they wouldn't get tired of it. Yes! The Lion King is coming to the Capitol Theater this summer so we'll take them to that next. "If you train up a child in the way he should go, he will never depart from it." This applies to musical theater, too, yes?

busybusy

Call me cheesy that I am doing stuff for my own shower, but I always feel guilty having other people work for me. I actually put work into the baby banner cause I plan on keeping it.

I don't have any tape, so use your imagination.

The dishcloth favors so far.

I feel like from far away, this looks good, but do you think I should use a different colored thread so it doesn't show my imperfections as easily? Taft thinks it adds character, but what do you guys think?

Calling for Creativity

Okay sisters, I need your help. As I sit here spending hours writing a letter to a birth parent, I've come to the conclusion that it is time to start a blog. It will be so much easier (I hope) to post updates on the kids in snippets rather than do a huge one every so often and try to remember everything I want to include. So here's where you come in. I'd like suggestions for a good blog name. I'm sure your brains aren't as tired as mine and can come up with something. C'mon. Ideas. Throw 'em at me.

Star Sighting

Lest you think we are super virtuous for having attended church while on vacation, I'll add this story. After church, while driving to Jon's sister's house, we decided we didn't want to get there and make her scrounge up lunch for us. So we stopped keeping the Sabbath day holy at a Brentwood Chipotle for lunch. While we were eating, Lizzie looked at a man ordering and started trying to get his attention. "Grandpa! Grandpa! Hi, Grandpa!" I looked up to see who it was that so closely resembled Dad from behind. Although I "know" him, it turns out we are not related. And no, Lizzie doesn't stay up to watch Law & Order: SVU with me.

Merry Christmas to Me

Anthropologie was having a huge Christmas sale on the kitchenware. It was perfect timing because I had been wanting to make Robyn a plate clock for Christmas (then she could just take it home instead of me having to try to ship it out there). So I found an adorable red clock for her and I just happened to find this adorable tea cup. I've been wanting to make some candles out of vintage tea cups and this was perfect! It turned into a perfect Christmas present to myself.

Homemade Wall Art

I've been drooling over these wall vinyls forever but don't want to pay $40 for them. So I printed an image out and decided to make my own "renter friendly" version out of fabric. Otherwise I'd have to sacrifice it to the next tenants or sweat my body weight trying to peel it off intact.





I had flashbacks to middle school art classes when I enlarged the image manually using the classic proportion grid. Not going to lie people I was pretty proud of the way it turned out.




Here is the semi-finished product (I didn't actually paste the fabric to the wall as I was moving out of that apartment a week later, and I was too impatient to see the effect on the wall so I just pinned it up)!

Saturday is a Special Day...

While in California last week, we decided to spend Sunday visiting Jon's sister and her family. So we looked online and found the closest ward to her house - the Manhattan Beach ward. Church started at 9:00. We left Anaheim on time and found our way there with the GPS. As we were weaving through the neighborhood area by the chapel, we passed a ball field filled with teams and families of some little league sport or another. The boys expressed surprise that there was an event happening on a Sunday. I explained that in a lot of places, Sunday was just like another Saturday for people so they did things all weekend that we are used to only doing on Saturday. A few blocks later we pulled up to the chapel. It was just minutes before 9:00 but the parking lot was empty, the gates closed. We sat there stumped for a minute (cue the chirping crickets), when Tommy broke the silence. "Well, I guess Sunday really is just another Saturday here."

Getting Soaked in Sewing

Now playing: Meg & Dia - Indiana
via FoxyTunes

Like entering the swimming pool, when people start a new hobby or learn a new skill there are some who are toe-dippers, others graceful divers, and yet there some who are cannon-ballers. When faced with a brand new sewing machine and the stitching world before my eyes I decided, like a fat kid who loves cake, to be a cannon-baller. Instead of taking on an easier project- I don't know, let's say one with an actual pattern-I volunteered to make a hanging puppet theater for Claire and Elise to compliment their new, adorable puppets. Of course my complete ignorance left me confident, overly so. It had not crossed my mind the back spasms, pricked fingers, and lost weekends such an undertaking would cost me. For your entertainment I have chronicled my experience, not just eating a piece of humble pie, but hoovering the entire pie.

Left: Up until this point I had been up at Mom's still, under her tutelage. After that I was on my own except for a few frustrated phone consultations.
Right:
It's pathetic/funny to think of how close I was at this point to being done with the thing. Little did I know I had just gotten started!




With the pretty yellow fabric I was totally picture Belle's dress from Beauty and the Beast so I definitely wanted the ruched look with vertically raising curtains. 2 dowels, some roman blind tape, and a LOT of creativity were all it took to achieve it.












Ta Da! I ended up finishing up at 12:30 am the night before Mom and Dad left to drive to California. They delivered the curtain for me, even though I would have loved to see the girls' reaction.