Oops, I Did It Again

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice...

why, santa, why?

...I'm a moron.

There's obviously a story as to how we got to this place (again). As usual, I'm going to need a little time to compose myself. If you're new around these parts or just want to relive a good old fashioned Christmas nightmare, you can do so here, here and here. 

If you're looking for me, I'll be the girl crying on the floor, covered in pine needles.

~L

Nobody Loves You Like Your Mum

There are all kinds of mom. Fun ones, crazy ones, fun crazy ones, and million more. But one thing they have in common is that they would do anything for their children. Now, not all of these things they do are right (see Tanning Mom), but deep down they want what's best for their kids (even if it's not the best for their skin/self esteem/social development). So in honor of Mother's Day, I have compiled a list of some of my favorite moms.

Claire Dunphy (Julie Bowen) on Modern Family:

The thing I love about Claire is she is just a hair away from crazy, which is how I can picture myself being as a mother someday. While she wants to give her kids the world, she also wants to be right always and is never okay with losing. Somehow Julie Bowen makes a character that could be super naggy and annoying really endearing, especially when she looks like this:

Holly from Dance Moms:

So yes, the majority of these ladies fall under the "Worst Moms Ever" category, and should probably stop paying Abby Lee Miller so much because they're going to need to save some dinero for all the hours of therapy that their kids are going to need later, but Holly is just one step above the rest. First of all, she's educated, which seems to be one skill that many of the Moms are lacking in. Second, she has an actual job, and although that puts her last on the pyramid in Abby's eyes, I give her credit for showing her daughter Nia what it's like to have a job outside of watching children dance for eight hours a day and Sewing Rhinestones 101. Third, she's one of the few that actually brings up to Abby that 90% of her dances are inappropriate. Of course, there's no follow through as Nia always ends up dancing in them anyway, but at least she's not afraid to throw raspy-throated Abby a curveball every once in a while. 

Amanda from MODG:

There's an abundance of "mom blogs" on the Internet. I don't frequent a lot of them because I don't have a kid or anything, and do not yet need to educate myself about all of the benefits of cloth diapering. However I came across MODG (short for Martinis or Diaper Genies) a while ago and was immediately hooked, going all the way back to her first blogs and reading every entry in order. One of the things I liked about her was that she started her blog when she was trying to decide whether or not it was time she and her husband had a baby. But she also wrote about Suri Cruise, the importance of putting together a good Halloween costume, and all the wonderful things the Bravo channel has to offer. She's one of the non-schmultzy blogs that is very real about what it's like to be a half-hippie, half-J. Crew obsessed mother in 2012. And she's damn funny.

Rosie Pope from Pregnant in Heels:

As mentioned before, I will eat anything Bravo serves me on a big old silver platter. Basically if you have a profession, Bravo will give you an hour long series and I will watch it. I love Rosie purely because she is so ridiculous. Her title is "maternity concierge," which sounds like her job is to deliver babies in hotel lobbies. She caters only to the wealthiest of preggos and indulges them by performing such important tasks as hiring an entire focus group to help a set of overzealous parents choose the perfect name to ensure the success of their spawn. Also I find her speech impediment... I mean British accent... totally adorable.

And of course, some real people made the list as well:

My Grandma:

Unfortunately, growing up in New Hampshire with all of my grandparents living quite a long distance away, I didn't really get to know as many of them as I would have liked. But based on the memories I have and bits of information pieced together from other family members, I feel actually more of a connection to them now that I'm older than I did when I was a kid. My mom's mother was kind of your ideal 50's housewife, except she was also an artist. Just for fun, of course, although she originally wanted to be a fashion designer but thought it was too serious. I now have paper dolls that she drew of my sister and I framed in my apartment, and she unknowingly designed my wedding shower invite as well. My mother always described her as having a Lucy-like clumbsy-ness, which anyone who knows me knows that I definitely inherited that. 

My Nana:

Everyone who has ever seen the picture below tells me that I get my looks from my dad's mother. She was your typical Italian woman, who valued family more than anything, and also, feeding them. When I was a kid I was a really picky eater, and my least favorite food was lasagna, which of course was one of her specialties. I remember her being offended that I wouldn't eat it, and my father talked in circles trying to explain to her that it wasn't personal, but I was just an odd child (okay, well he probably didn't say that in so many words). Everyone whom I've ever talked to that had met her speaks of her grace, elegance and style. In the photo of her and my father from his prom people questioned if she was his date instead of his mother. For some reason, she always reminded me of Audrey Hepburn, which is weird because Audrey Hepburn is from like, Belgium or something and my Nana was an Italian from Boston. I felt like they had similar inflections in their voices, and whenever I watch Breakfast at Tiffany's I feel like I can remember exactly how she spoke. 

My Mother-in-Law:

The term MIL seems to have kind of a negative connotation to it, but I have known nothing but niceness since I married my husband a little over a year ago. She's a dance teacher, and the first time I met her was in college the day before her huge Christmas recital, so clearly, I was terrified. My MIL has a very strong personality, and she's the type of person that gets things done. I like to think of her as a Coordinator of Chaos. When I first started at my job, I was commuting over an hour and I would often stay at Steve's parents house. They always welcomed me like I was part of the family and not just eating their food, doing my laundry and just generally taking up space. This was all while she was going through her breast cancer treatment, and not once did I feel like a burden. In fact, when we found out she was sick, I remember my mother actually said, "I feel bad for the cancer!" We knew that she was that tough and would get through whatever life threw at her, and she did. 

And of course, My Mom:

My mother and I have never ever been told that we looked alike. Some moms would be offended by this, but my mom always told me she was okay with it, because I have her personality and that's what really counts. When I was a kid she tried to teach me fractions with measuring cups. While that method didn't actually end up helping me as I am still terrible at math, she kept at it by trying to get me to use real life scenarios to figure things out, like making me figure out how much a top at the mall would be if it was 40% off. I know everyone says this, but she literally makes the best chocolate chip cookies in the entire world. She understands the importance of a good theme, like when she helped me throw a Sex & the City premiere party complete with "Mr. Big Shrimp" and "Chicken Carrie-aki." She also followed me out of the movie theater when she saw that the police had escorted me out under suspicion of illegally videotaping the film (but that's a story for another day). She spends about as much time online as I do, and has almost as much of a presence on Facebook as yours truly:

Don't get me wrong- we also spend a lot of time discussing very important world issues:

But mainly she's just easy to talk to and we always have fun together. 

But of course, we can't talk about our favorite moms without mentioning our not so favorites either:

- See previously mentioned Tanning Mom

- Also Octomom, Toddlers and Tiaras Mom(s) and any moms in general that pull major publicity stunts and prevent their kids from having a normal existence

- Kris Jenner 

- Dina Lohan 

- Basically any "Momager"

- Snooki (I know she's not technically a mom yet, but really, it's time to start coming to terms with this)

- Everyone on 16 & Pregnant (unless they carry over to Teen Mom, and then I'm obsessed)

So Happy Mother's Day to my mom and all the other moms out there. The cool ones especially, but also the crazy ones too. 

good moms force their kids to have memories to look back on, no matter how traumatizing

~L

Shake It Like Like a Salt and Pepper Shaker

I've been married for a little over a year now and one thing I've learned is that compromise is the key to any successful relationship. Also, cutting up one of your husband's socks for your sock bun is one of the fastest ways to make him not trust you and possibly lock up your laptop.

So a couple weeks ago ago when Steve prepared spaghetti and meatball dinner that I thought could stand to use a hint more salt, we got into one of our teensy marital spats when he ruthlessly accused me of spilling salt all over the clean baking pans on the counter. Ordinarily, I would be hurt by such an accusation, but it was partially true because only minutes before had I sprinkled an accidental hefty helping from one of those giant Morton salt containers out of the cabinet.

It was only after this that he once again reminded me that we still don't have an actual set of salt and pepper shakers. I don't know how this got overlooked in the process of moving in together and registering for gifts, but somehow we just never got around to it.

So what's the hold up? Well, like anything else in life, I don't want to be boring. I'd rather die than put out a set of those white cardboard shakers adorned with random vegetables on them. With that, I set out to find the perfect set of salt and pepper shakers that would represent our taste, style and personality as a couple. This is obviously an essential task, and unfortunately I had to put my search for World Peace on hold to tend to such a pressing issue.

In the past, this task may have been daunting. It might have taken me years of magazine clipping to even find one set of fun shakers, and probably would have taken me another year to locate the said clipping among my massive collection (and that's just in the Decor section). But not anymore. Thanks to my trusty Pinterest, within ten minutes I had not only created an entire board dedicated to this crucial life decision, but had also posted a link on Facebook asking for opinions from my loyal followers who happen not to be sick of my constant barrage of Kardashian-related status updates.

So here's a brief montage of what I deemed to be the most promising candidates to be Our First Shakers. Yes, it's that important that the title needs to be capitalized.

Disclaimer: These pictures are clearly all from Pinterest as stated before. So don't sue me. Trust me, I don't have anything.

So for some reason, there are certain motifs that seem to be recurring when searching for salt and pepper shakers. Half of the ones I found were elephants:

$12.99 modcloth

$48 jonathan adler

Or birds:

$8 west elm

$9 z gallerie

Actually, animals are apparently HUGE in the shaker world. I don't even like pugs, yet I still thought this set was totes adorbs:

$7 modcloth

Despite my utter discomfort in any woodsy our outdoor situation, I do sometimes like the look of nature-esque things, but only in small doses when appropriately mixed with modern pieces. Hence why I love this silver pinecone set. Also it reminds me of our wedding:

$18 west elm

These ones are uber nature-y, but yet I like them. Probably wouldn't go with my Ralph Lauren Silk Ribbon Slate china set though. These are more of a basket-paper-plate-holder style set:

$13 modcloth

This set doesn't match anything in our apartment, except for our bedroom and my half of the closet. Since we don't eat dinner in there, this isn't the most practical option, but I had to include it just because:

$64 takae

As much as I wanted my salt and pepper shakers to be cute and quirky and adorned, I also found something I liked in just a simple spherical design like these:

$32 etsy

$6 west elm

Which is weird, because I don't even like eggs.

Obviously, if I was a movie star/didn't live with a boy I would have these. I don't care how ridiculous they are, I just love them:

$23 z gallerie

I really was searching for a set to appeal to both of us, although I guess you wouldn't know it by all the jewels and tiny animals. This seemed like a good neutral pair, but there's just something so manly and industrial about them. Also, they seem like they're made of lead, and I would like to be able to have children someday:

$19 pottery barn

Somehow in this process I discovered this site called Godinger.com. I've never heard of this, and immediately it looked like a bunch of overly fancy stuffy things that I could not afford. But after looking around, it seems like stuff that just looks fancy and is actually kind of inexpensive for what the stuff is. Anyway, their shaker section is ENORMOUS and I loved everything and pinned five of them immediately. They were just the perfect mix of fancy and interesting. Kind of like me. I mean, us.

$25 godinger

$20 godinger

$30 godinger

$30 godiner

$20 godinger

After doing all this research, I basically discovered that Jonathan Adler salt and pepper shakers are the BMW of condiment holders. Meaning that they are way overpriced and Steve is probably starting to break out in hives, because deep down something inside him knows that I looked at a pair of $48 shakers even for a second.

But seriously. I know these are ludicrous, and clearly I am not going to purchase them... but how GORGEOUS are these?!

$48 jonathan adler

So what do you think? Other than that I have clearly gone of the deep end if I have devoted this much time to finding the perfect set of salt and pepper shakers instead of seeking professional help for my bargain jewelry addiction. Does anyone else have fun shakers or am I the only person that deemed this to be a determining factor for the success all dinners to be had as a couple forevermore?

Also I haven't shown any of these to Steve yet. If I'm lucky, I'll be able to figure out a way to record his reaction to each of my very well researched suggestions. And if you don't hear anything... well then I guess it means we got divorced over $48 elephant shakers.

~L

Cookies in the Morning, Cookies in the Evening, Cookies at Suppertime...

Guess what I did today...

I MADE SOMETHING!

Not just something, food! I made something that people can eat. It was outrageous.

Well, it was outrageous for me. I am not a cook. I guess I'm what you'd call a microwaver. Which is like cooking, but faster. That's the real thing I hate about cooking: it takes FOREVER. Maybe not for normal people, but for me, I literally cannot prepare a meal unless I have the entire day off, because the process of cooking is so foreign to me that it consumes my whole day.

Obviously, my husband is the cook. But this morning as I was doing my daily Pinterest cruise, I discovered a recipe that my friend Amy had pinned Easter themed cookies featuring Cadbury Mini Eggs (the chocolate ones with the shell, not miniature versions of the Creme variety). And I don't know why, but all of a sudden I was like "hey, I can do that," which is completely the opposite of the reaction I normally have to a recipe.

I checked the ingredients, and miraculously we had all of them. Well, except for the most important one:

Since I was heading to Walmart anyway to pick up a few other things, I figured I would just grab a bag of these while I was there. Unfortunately, Walmart had other plans for me and decided to carry every other Cadbury product on the market except for these. Not a good start.

After finally finding them at Target, I was able to take out my frustrations on eggs:

In retrospect, I probably should have gone about this a different way. The instructions said to coarsely chop them or something like that. How the hell do you chop a Cadbury Mini Egg? The shells are harder than actual eggs! Plus that sounded like it would take way too long, and my time is precious. So I figured I would just take a meat pounder to the bag. Unfortunately, I didn't count on the fact that beating it with the sharp pointy side would puncture tiny holes in it, releasing the cracked shell dust all over my kitchen. Oh, well. Lesson learned.

Despite my incessant beating, I opened the bag and was horrified to the eggs had barely even broken! I couldn't put those whole pieces in a cookie- someone would end up suing me for chipping their tooth or something.

So I grabbed my chopping board and cut those mini eggs like the pioneers used to do: with a knife. It took FOREVER.

I did realize that once the shells were broken a little bit, it was much easier to sink the knife into the chocolate to cut them in half.

Oh, did I mention while I was doing this, I was also cooking dough?! Well, not cooking it. Preparing it. Mixing it? Ah, whatever, it was being made.

This process was kind of a bitch because it turns out it's very hard to pack 3/4 of a cup of brown sugar when it has somehow taking the form a millions of tiny brown sugar rocks even though you bought the stay fresh container from The Container Store to help it... stay fresh. Fortunately, Domino assumes that idiots like me will run into this predicament and printed special instructions on the bag of the bag on how to soften it. I had to heat it up in the microwave at 30 second intervals with two damp paper towels covering it, wrapped in cling wrap. In between these intervals, I had to take it out and break up the chunks with a fork, and repeat. And repeat. And... repeat. Eventually I decided that it was enough and just tossed it it. By the way, this is the first time I've ever used our KitchenAid. In case you were wondering what color it is if only to make sure you didn't register for it by accident, it's Persimmon.

While Persimmon did most of the heavy lifting, the recipe told me that I had to mix the chopped egg pieces in by hand. I don't know why, maybe they assume that the recipe only tastes good if it has a tiny amount of sweat in it, but regardless, I'm glad I didn't go to the gym today.

Next it was time to make the little dough balls (yes, I can hear you laughing because you just read "balls." Get your mind out of the gutter please, I'm being domestic here). This is the hardest part for me because I always always ALWAYS make them too big and the cookies meld into each other to become a giant cookie blob. Which unless you're going for a large cookie, is a fail.

I made like, four pans of these. All different sizes, just for good measure.

Also, cooking generally takes longer if you have to stop to take artsy photos in between every step. Just an FYI.

I have to say, my favorite part of the cooking process is watching stuff cook. I know, that sounds really weird because of my complaint about waisting time making food. But my favorite thing to do if I do happen to ever put anything in the oven is to turn on the oven light and watch it cook. It makes me feel like I accomplished something more than actually eating it. I don't know why. Back in the olden days when we didn't have an oven light, my mom used to yell at me for opening the oven too much. Apparently it's counterproductive.

This is the part where I get nervous that they look terrible and not like cookies at all. But once I took them out of the oven (ten minutes for the first batch, nine for the second two), the little doughy pillows settled down a bit and started to look like something that people would eat.

So I ended up with a billion cookies. Well it seemed like it, because there are way more than what's in a Girl Scout box. And even though I was really full from the tortellini salad I treated myself to for lunch, I ate one just to make sure they weren't poisonous or anything.

And they were pretty good! Although I have to say, I think I chopped the eggs so small that they almost just taste like regular chocolate chips. And the shell dust I think had pretty much baked in. I mean you could have practically snorted it out of that bag.

But all in all, a very successful experience in the kitchen.

And then I remembered why I really hate cooking:

ugh.

Living In A Winter Nightmare-land

I had no idea when I composed my first tree post that it would be my most read blog entry EVER. Seeing as I am still relatively new to the (consistent) blogging world, I am hoping that this is just the beginning of a beautiful friendship with you, the readers. However, I am also faced with the fear that all my posts must now feature my arch rival, because that seems to be the thing that people really care about. Which means that I probably will have to live with this thing longer than I had hoped. Which is my Christmas nightmare realized.

I have gotten many request for "after" photos of the tree, so here they are. Better late then never, but there was a slight hold up, as my people had to work out an arrangement with The Tree's legal team in order to be able to publish this post.

So without further ado, I give you... The Tree! And some other holiday decor from yours truly.

enough lights to guide the wise men

So after getting the tree in an upright position finally inside our apartment, I was so... shall we say, peeved, at what a monstrosity it was, that I spent the first few days of our relationship in a bitter standoff. I tried to avoid looking at it, but it was impossible seeing as you can see it no matter where you stand in our apartment. So instead, I avoided decorating it. However, Steve was nice enough to put the lights on so I could spend as minimal amount of time on it as possible. However, this process lasted for many days because every time it seemed like there were enough lights, he ended up right back at Walmart in need of additional strands. I think we ended up with like 4 total.

Finally, it was time to start decorating. Steve wanted to do the honors of placing the first ornament, so we had a small ceremony:

like raising the banner, only smaller. and with less toothless canadians

oh christmas b's, oh christmas b's

After that, we spent the next 4 hours trimming the rest of the tree. Fortunately, between the two of us, we have a plethora of ornaments. Steve's mom gave him at least one Christmas ornament every year of his life, and I have a shopping problem/snowflake obsession that has resulted in my purchasing many ornaments as well as receiving every possible snowflake ornament that exists. Also, I inherited my grandmother's precious Barbie collection, so we have a very random mix of things happening on The Tree. However, this was one time that my love of oversized decor came in handy, as I have many things like this:

not going to lie, i was a little worried the tree would think this was a triscuit

Like I said, hours later we finally had a (semi) covered tree.

i know, i'm worried about the open flames too

Now I realize that upon looking at this photo, this seems like a perfectly normal, nice, unsuspecting Christmas tree. Before you start to think that I am making a big deal about nothing, here's another pic that helps to put everything in perspective:

the leaning tower of tree-sa

If we break this down into a numbers thing, you can clearly see that The Tree takes up ONE THIRD of the entire apartment. I had to stand on a chair in our makeshift "dining area" just to even capture this photo.

I think the thing that bothers me the most is not just that The Tree is genetically enhanced and taking over our home. Okay, that's exactly what it is. You see, last year we had a very small, very chic purple couch from my single girl days (well not really "single," just not living with a boy) and post-wedding, we upgraded to a larger, more comfortable but less fashionable sectional. Unfortunately, this is now how much room you have to get into our supposed dining area. If you can't tell from this photo, it's approximately 6 inches.

let the corner wearing on the couch begin. who needs children to ruin furniture?

Luckily, I eat all my meals at the coffee table anyway due to its proximity to my only friend in the apartment now, my television.

This is how much space there is when you enter the apartment to get to the living room. Not as bad as the latter, but not really anything to write home about either.

even the nativity scene looks miniature in comparison

This tree made me realize many things.

1. I hate trees.

2. We need a bigger tree topper.

sometimes, size does matter

I used to love my glittery snowflake topper that I scored at Walmart five years ago for $4. Sure, it's not an heirloom or anything but it's better than a giant lit up star or a scary angel (no offense to any of your tree toppers, religious or otherwise. I just think a lot of those angels resemble creepy porcelain dolls whose eyes are following you around the room). This thing is just so dinky now in comparison to Andre the Giant and I every time I look at it, I feel like I am being mocked by it's small-ness.

Like I said, we have quite the mixed bag when it comes to ornaments. But unless your super rich or are dead inside, your Christmas tree is supposed to be a mix of things you collect over the years that mean something to you. And this is coming from me, who is so obsessed with things matching that I only let white hangers live in my closet, where they are concealed by a door... that is shut.

Last year, I gave Steve this gem in his stocking. Luckily, John is never lonely as he has many lovely ladies to hang out with around with.

the duke & the barbie. a forbidden love story

As for the rest of the apartment, I waited until Steve went to work before I really dug into my bag of Christmas tricks. As far as I'm concerned, this tree is his fault, so I get to decorate with as many silvery, pointed objects as I want.

oh deer

I am also taking advantage of the season and pretending that the red chairs/green wall combo in my dining area was on purpose, and not that I have been forbidden to buy my own chairs so we borrowed chairs from Uncle Peter that happen to be red and everything else in our place is green and purple. So basically it's Christmas, all year long. But we're going to say it's intentional.

oh christmas chairs, oh christmas chairs?

this reindeer has been hanging for a month. steve noticed it today.

notice on the left, the tree trying to eek into the picture. sneaky tree

So there you have it. We've survived a month so far, and thankfully, The Tree is coming down before we leave for our 1st anniversary trip next week. I am sure the takedown alone will warrant it's own post, so stay tuned. Eventually, I will triumph over this thing and get my life back. And then we can talk more about 2012 and resolutions and things of that nature. First on my list? Not to lose my longstanding battle with the flora of New England.