Diversions

When we decided to pull up stakes and move, we left a very comfortable and profitable lifestyle. We both had federal civil service jobs, very good paying, very secure. I was set to get a pretty big promotion in February, and hubby was set to progress pretty quickly too. We lived in a decent house that we bought 13 years ago, with very low payments. We still had quite a few debts to pay off left over from our previous free-spending early 20's. We had quite a few friends, a great church and I had tons of hobbies to keep me busy. I came to realize though, that as good as my job was it wasn't what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. My husband had the same realization.

Skip to now, I am in my fourth week on the new job. There have been times where it felt like a perfect fit, and times when I wondered what the hell I was thinking. Living in our spiffy new house with all of our debts paid off except a vehicle payment and the mortgage makes the whole thing seem more appealing. The downside of work is that I'm having to put in lots of hours at work, where we are straightening out a section that has been neglected for a long time. I'm up at 4:45 am and often don't come home until around 6:00 pm. I am constantly frustrated with myself because I'm not learning as fast as I want to.....I don't give myself much of a learning curve. ;) It's been very challenging, and is definately using all of my skills. If I can survive these first couple of months I'll be okay. :)

DIY Sucks

I have sworn many times in my life that I will NEVER buy another piece of put-it-together-yourself furniture. Throughout our married life we have built bookshelves, computer desks, tables, chairs, microwave carts and each time has left us nearly strangling each other. We needed to replace my computer desk since my old one was left in North Carolina. So we picked up a new one at Office Depot, and put it together today. I swear whoever designed it must have been smoking crack. The desk itself is very sturdy and looks very nice, but I have never put anything together that was such a pain in the arse.

On to good things! The picture above is my new kitchen, and I am in love with it. I can't wait to start cooking stuff, I can get in a lot of trouble in here. We did a stocking up trip to the grocery store today, and aside from cardiac arrest from the grocery bill we didn't do too bad. As soon as I unpack my cookbooks I will be in business!

Home Sweet Home

Yay! We're here, we moved into our new house yesterday. It still seems very surreal to me, almost like we're staying in a hotel. After staying with our friends and their teenage kids for the last month, being alone in our big new house made us feel like kids whose parents were out on vacation. We had a very busy day today, we went and bought blinds for the windows, and got most of them put up. We found the grocery store by the house, and also bought a new computer desk for me. We made our first supper in the new house, heated up frozen lasagna. Cheesy (literally) I know, but it was better than fast food. Tomorrow we're going to get the last of our boxes, a few household items and a couple of sets of curtains. Our DSL box came today, and our washer and dryer were delivered. So tomorrow will be laundry day, and our stock-up trip to the grocery store. Should be fun. :)

P.S. One of my favorite things about Alabama so far are the cotton fields. This is a picture of one that is right behind our house. It makes it look like snow drifts in September. ;)

Sunday Mornings

I got up this morning after sleeping in to 6:30 (hey, it's better than the 4:45 that I normally wake up now). I made some breakfast for everyone, the Spicy Autumn Hash recipe I posted earlier and some Tomato Gravy. My friends had really liked what I made for them a couple of nights ago, and said it would be good for breakfast so I made them some. Tomato gravy is now one of my absolute favorites, it's a really pretty one and it has a great flavor but isn't overwhelmingly tomato-ey. Here's the recipe:

Tomato Gravy
1 Tomato, diced
4 c. stock of your choosing (I use Maggi Vegetable Bouillon cubes)
2 Tbs. canola oil
4 Tbs. flour
Salt and Pepper to taste

Bring tomato and stock to a boil in a saucepan, reduce heat and simmer for about 20 minutes. In a seperate saucepan, heat the oil at medium temperature and then add the flour. Stir the flour well to eliminate any lumps, and cook for a few minutes, stirring to make sure that it doesn't burn. Add the tomato/broth mixture and whisk vigorously to make sure that lumps don't form. Continue stirring until gravy thickens to desired consistency. Taste and see if more salt is required, and add some black pepper.

Today we are planning on running down to Best Buy to pick me up my new digital camera, and maybe stopping by for a bookstore wallow. I'm making some mashed taters for supper tonight, and I needed to pick up what I need to make my other favorite gravy. Four days until we can move into our new house, I probably won't be able to sleep soon. ;)

Shopping

I was really glad for the weekend to get here, it seemed to be a very long week. We have been going out to get stuff so we'll be ready to move in on Friday. We had to get the oil changed in the car, and then went for breakfast at Denny's. We stopped at Pier 1 and I picked up a new rug for the kitchen, a gray rag rug. I also got a neat candle with a holder. Next stop was Lowe's, where we stood and argued for a while over what blinds we wanted to get, and then gave up and decided that we could agree on curtains earlier. We went to look at some furniture stores for a nice bookcase and were gasping from sticker shock. Bath and Beyond yielded a set of curtains for the master bedroom, along with the rods that match the bathroom hardware, and a bamboo silverware holder. Next stop was Nothing but Noodles, a restaurant that specializes in pasta dishes. The final stop was Wal-Mart where I picked up a new cutting board and some bedsheets.

So the shopping list is getting shorter, we're getting very impatient to get moved in. The boys are out with another moving box bonfire, which is nice to do since it's getting chillier out now at night. I hang out for a little while, and then come back in. I get sleepy really early now that I get up so early, so I don't last too long. Other than that, I'm making more potato hash for breakfast tomorrow and probably some tomato gravy too. We need to get to Best Buy tomorrow so that I can get a new digital camera, and we're probably going to hit the bookstore. Definately a fun day, but also very tiring.

Homeless

So for a bit of an update, the house in North Carolina closed. I have been so worried that something would happen and the buyer would back out, and we wouldn't be able to get our new house. So now I am very relieved and can finally let myself get excited about our new home-to-be. We went out to eat last night to celebrate at TGI Fridays and unfortunately had a very mediocre meal with an unpleasant server. We did go to Best Buy and Linens and Things so that made up for it. I officially bought the first items for our new house, a couple of sets of kitchen towels and a painting. The original color in the new kitchen was a rust-red color, not really what I wanted. So one of the things that we wanted was for them to repaint it a color of our choosing. We picked out a moss green-gray color that I really liked. I think that it was a good choice because it made the room look lighter and more airy than it was before. So the kitchen towels and painting go with the moss-green look.

We have lots of things to get ready for next Friday, when the new house closes. We will be busy this weekend doing some shopping. We had a big bonfire at our friend's house tonight, burning the boxes from their move. My little firebug had a lot of fun setting them on fire of course. I made some supper for them tonight, some potato hash and tomato gravy, which was a big hit. Other than that, I'm kind of a drag to be around I guess, because my new pumpkin time is around 8 or 9 at night. Since I get up at 4:45 am every morning, I'm already starting to nod off around 8. The new job is going well, changes are slowly happening. It's hard to try to make changes and improve stuff when you have to keep the place going. On the downside, my digital camera seems to have crapped itself, so no new pictures until I get another one. Other than that, not much to report, looks like it will be a good weekend. :)

Back in the Salt Mines

So I started my new job yesterday, my vacation has ended. :) Our house in NC is still set to close next week, and our new house the week after that. Work is pretty interesting, definately different than what I was doing before. I hadn't really looked forward to being a supervisor, it was my least favorite thing when I was in the USMC. But I'm actually enjoying it more than I thought I would. Except for today when I got someone fired, but I digress. ;) Showtime is very early, and I will be working some Saturdays. But at least I get paid well for it.

So I probably won't be updating that regularly until we get into our new house and settled in, but I'll try to keep some updates going when possible. :)

Sweet Home Alabama

So we finally got back on the internet, I have been sitting with my eyelid twitching for the last week. We made it and are staying with friends while we wait for our old and new homes to close, in that order. It was very nice of our friends to let us stay with them, saved us from worrying about timing leases, making deposits etc. But I am going nuts...hard to be living with someone else and not have control over what goes on. I start my new job tomorrow, I haven't gotten too nervous yet but I'm sure it will come later tonight.

We spent the first few days looking at houses with the realtor, had a couple picked out and then we walked into one that "felt" like home. I haven't taken a camera with me yet when we've gone, but when I do I'll post a picture. I don't think I've ever had somewhere feel so right, even our house that we lived in for 10 years. So we'll see how it all goes, hopefully everything will go smoothly. Since we had so much trouble with our old house since we've had it, I'm somehow convinced that everything is still going to screw up somehow. But I'm trying not to invest too much emotion in it until the old house closes. Anyway, we are off this afternoon to go get some catfish at a restaurant by Lake Guntersville in NE Alabama. Sounds like fun :) We are looking forward to getting to know this area, seems like a neat place.

Signing off...

Things are beginning to move a bit more quickly now, and I haven't really had much new to say. I've just been switching between really looking forward to the move, and moping around all sad and stuff. So rather than try to come up with witty interesting things to say, I'm stopping with the blog update until we get set up in Alabama. See you guys then. :)

Reading

So I'm bored with moving news myself, and can't imagine anyone else is that interested. So today I'm going to talk about one of my major passions - reading. I've added a new feature to my sidebar of the book(s) that I am currently reading. I found Cultivating Delight by Diane Ackerman in the bargain book section of Barnes & Noble, and being unable to resist cheap gardening essay books I bought it. I've actually had it for a while now and have been reading it off and on, usually whenever I want to soak in the bathtub. The book is broken down into different essays in short chapters, so it makes a good one to dip in and out of without losing track of what you were reading.

I like the book quite a bit, although I do agree with some of the Amazon reviewers that think she gets to enamored with her prose. But overall the book is very readable and I'm enjoying it. I don't ask much of this sort of writing, but sometimes authors get in the way of what they are writing and I don't enjoy it very much. I read some of Bern Heinrich's nature books, and I kept feeling like he was trying to prove that he's a new Thoreau and it just got really annoying. Anway, I'm just enjoying the light reading because I am expecting another book that I ordered from Amazon tomorrow, and it's going to be a boring work related book. This one is on Inventory Management and is to study up for my new job, to have an idea of what I'm doing. ;) Hopefully it won't put me to sleep.

I've also added my Now Hear This section, that shows my favorite music finds. :)

Itchy Feet

No, I didn't get into poison ivy in the backyard, just getting tired of being in a holding pattern and waiting. We are waiting for our house to close, waiting for the last week of work to be over, and waiting before we can really get anything started down in AL. I am not a very patient person and it drives me nuts.

Our buyer came by with his wife today, and he mowed the yard (he has a lawnmowing business), while I visited with his wife. We are two kindred spirits, we spent a long time talking about gardening and other things. Since they are going to be using our house as a rental, they are planning on taking some of my (their) plants to their house. Other than that, nothing new to report on the homefront.

The way that I have been dealing with stress and worry lately is to bake stuff, so tonight I baked some blackberry muffins to help use up some stuff in the freezer. I wanted to make them eggless, and try using some milled flaxseed as an egg replacer (it would also add some fiber and make it even healthier) but I seem to have misplaced my flaxseed. It makes me nuts when I can't find things that I know should be there. Anyway, the muffins turned out very good. I am usually not that crazy about cooked blackberries, like in a cobbler. Their taste is very strong and overwhelming. It turned out just right in these muffins though. I've gotten hooked on mini-muffins, it is really so much better than the bigger muffins. You can really notice the texture of them, which would be lost in a bigger muffin. So the baking itch was scratched, and I've been munching on mini-muffins all evening. At least it isn't candy bars. ;)

Sad

I think that today more than any other day the realization finally set in that we are leaving. As in not going to be living here any more, and I won't see the people that I have gotten so close to. One would think that would have occured to me when we decided that we were going to move, but somehow even the trip to Alabama and signing with the realtor to sell the house didn't have that impact. McCrankypants and some of my co-workers set up a potlock luncheon for me today, seperate from the more elaborate luncheon at the Mexican restaurant next week. It was very touching, and really made me realize that I wouldn't be working with them anymore. Thanks again M, for arranging that. :)

So arrangements for our house are proceeding, and still waiting to hear what's going on with my job in AL. We came home today, ate supper and then headed over to Lowe's to check out the cost of trailers. We'd priced renting a moving truck from UHaul or Penske, and it was going to be pretty darned expensive. So we are thinking that we will just buy a trailer and hook it to the truck and we won't be throwing our money away. We had a town meeting at church so that the pastor and elders could solicit input on future plans for the church. Even though we're leaving, they asked us to attend and participate. So we stopped by expecting to spend maybe a half hour or an hour at the outside, and then head to Dunkin' Donuts for coffee and donuts. TWO HOURS LATER, we rolled out of there and then had to come straight home to get ready for bed. Oh well, will have to get the donuts later I guess. :)

Quilt Guild

Today was a home day, we didn't really go anywhere. I spent the afternoon getting the laundry room emptied of all of the recyclables that have been waiting to be taken to the recycling center. We are going to have a bunch of stuff to get rid of. I have been debating the idea of having a yard sale, but I'm really not interested. I don't really like them, but I would like the money. :)

We went to get Mexican for supper tonight, and then went to my quilt guild meeting. This is going to be the last one for me. It's the Croatan Quilter's Guild, and it's a great bunch of ladies. The guild symbol is the Pine Tree Quilt Block, see my poorly executed Powerpoint example above. The bad part about moving is that you have to say goodbye to so many people, it really sucks. This is my mom's last night here, she'll be flying back tomorrow. Sans water bottles and drinks of course, we don't want her to get tackled going through the security checkpoints.

Sightseeing

Today was a sightseeing day and the weather was perfect for it. Mama and I woke up pretty early (for me on vacation anyway), and headed out. Stop #1 for us today was the historic waterfront in Beaufort, NC. We stopped in at some of the shops and galleries, and enjoyed the atmosphere. We were going to get lunch there, but alas none of the restaurants were serving yet, so we headed over to Atlantic Beach.

We ate lunch at the 4-Corners Diner, and then headed over to Fort Macon. Fort Macon is a Civil War era fort that has been renovated. It's a really neat place, and the scenery in the area is fantastic. After puffing up and down the stairs and being in the sun for a while, it was time to go somewhere with air conditioning.

The next stop was the North Carolina Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores, NC. It has been closed for renovation for a while, and it's the first time I have been back since then. They did a really nice job on it, and they had lots of cool stuff. There is a huge display tank with a replica of a sunken submarine and some pretty big sharks in it. They do a live diving show that would have been fun if we weren't packed in like sardines with the other 100 people trying to watch the show. The girl who was doing the talking had a voice like a perky chipmunk and I couldn't sit around and listen for too long. So we headed out to view the nature trail.

The weather was still nice, though it was a bit humid and buggy. The nature trail takes you through woods and the salt marsh areas. It was a nice shady walk, and the bugs weren't too bad. We saw some herons and dragonflies, but not many other animals. We didn't make it over the whole nature trail because it was getting on into the afternoon and both of us were ready to go home.

So that was our day, I'm thinking tomorrow might be a home day, I need some rest. :)

A Quiet Day at Home

It was a bit overcast today, and rained a little bit. We had originally planned on going to the Outer Banks today, but we decided to stay home instead. We rolled lumpia today to take to our pastor and to a friend. My mom had fun learning how to make them, and now our house smells like a lumpia. :)

For dinner tonight, I created a new recipe to use up some butternut squash that a neighbor gave to us. I haven't ever been a huge squash fan, but I figured I could come up with something pretty good. So I settled on trying to make some ravioli. As a disclaimer, I haven't ever made real ravioli so there might be a better way than the way that I did it. End of disclaimer!

This recipe is using tofu in place of the ricotta cheese and eggs that the original recipes that I modified used (please don't let that scare you off, you can't tell its there). I actually merged together a couple of different ones to come up with my own. I served this with a bottled primavera sauce from the store. I had originally planned on making a creamy tomato sauce with this one but got lazy in the end. And we do need to use up some of the food from our pantry. ;) If you don't have the smoked spanish paprika, you could get the smoky flavor by adding some bacon or ham to the filling. If you like eating pigs anyway. :) Okay, enough disclaimers, here's the recipe:

Butternut Squash Ravioli

1 small butternut squash (about 1 ½ lb.)
½ c. water
1 box firm silken tofu (12.3 oz)
Juice from 1 lemon
Salt and pepper to taste
2 Tbs. olive oil
½ c. chopped onion
1 sprig rosemary
1 Tbs. minced sage
½ tsp. smoked Spanish paprika

Wonton wrappers

2 Tbs. olive oil
Salt and Pepper

To cook butternut squash, cut squash in half lengthwise; remove seeds and pulp. Place squash cut sides down in a baking dish, and add water. Bake at 375 degrees for 45 minutes or until tender when pierced with a fork, set aside to cool. Scoop out the pulp and set aside.

Put tofu and the lemon juice in a blender, process until smooth. Heat olive oil in a skillet, and sauté onion, rosemary, and sage until onion begins to brown. Combine tofu, onion mixture, squash and paprika in a small mixing bowl. Lay a wonton wrapper on a plate. Add a spoonful of squash mixture in the middle of the wrapper. Wet down the edges of the wrapper, and place a second wrapper on top. Press edges to seal, trying to get out air bubbles as much as possible. Try to make sure that the squash mixture doesn’t get out to the edge.

When you are ready to cook the ravioli, heat a pot of water on the stove and bring it to a simmer. Do not boil. You can salt the water at this point if you want to. Add ravioli 4 or 5 at a time, and cook for about 3 minutes. Remove from the water and drain. When ravioli are done, heat olive oil in a skillet, and sauté the ravioli for a minute or two on each side until they start to brown. Remove from the skillet and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Yadda, yadda, yadda

Did more packing, did more cleaning, yadda yadda yadda. It's easy to fall into monotony with that part. :) I was working on getting the house straightened up for a realtor stopping by to check the place out. I got Box #2 packed and it is full of books, I'm either going to have to get a crane to move it or repack it to make it lighter. One or the other. ;) I used my home-repairwoman skeelz today and replaced the stopper in the bathroom sink. Go figure that I finally fix the annoying lack of a sink stopper when we are moving. Funny how you wait to fix things until you are selling to someone else. Okay, you may not but I do.

So I needed to cook something for breakfast this morning, and I decided to do a refrigerator cleaning out. It was kind of overcast and rainy today, so it put me in the mood for something fall-like. It would be pretty flexible, and you could add whatever you needed to use up. Here's what I came up with:

Spicy Autumn Hash

2 veggie sausage patties (I used Morningstar Farms, you could use regular pork sausage if you'd prefer)
1-2 Tbs. olive oil
1 carrot, peeled, washed and chopped
2 potatoes, peeled, washed and chopped
1/2 c. chopped onion
Salt and Pepper to taste
1 c. chopped cabbage
1 poblano pepper, seeded, and diced
1 tsp. smoked spanish paprika (adds a nice smoky taste, optional)
1/2 tsp. dried sage
1/2 tsp. dried thyme

Fry sausage patties in a non-stick skillet according to package instructions. Remove patties and chop up, set aside. Add 1-2 Tbs of olive oil into the skillet, and add carrot, potatoes, onion, salt and pepper. Toss to coat, turn the heat down a bit, and cover. Cook for about 10 minutes, or until the vegetables just start to soften up. Add the remaining ingredients, toss to combine. Re-cover and cook for about five more minutes. Remove cover and continue to cook until vegetables reach the desired level of tenderness. Add the sausage crumbles in the last few minutes of cooking.

Box #1

Today is a milestone in our move, I got Box #1 packed. :) We got up pretty early this morning, and went to Lowe's to get packing boxes/papers and got some groceries. I started packing up the kitchen and living room decorations, and got the first one out of the way. I've been taking my time and dusting and cleaning everything off before I pack it so that I don't have to do it at the other end. I also did some cleaning on windows and the kitchen area too. I have some repairs to start working on - replacing the stopper in the bathroom sink, touching up the master bathroom walls and doing some painting, but I'm more worried about getting the rooms emptied of stuff before I start in on all of that. We have a realtor coming by to take a look at the place tomorrow, to give us an idea of the things that we are going to need to do. It's pretty busy, but it's also been a lot of fun. My mom and I have been hanging out, the visit has been going well.

For dinner tonight, I made a quinoa salad, which turned out really good. Basically I just make a pasta salad and substitute the quinoa for pasta. The smoked paprika gives it a nice smoky flavor. The vinaigrette is one that I just eyeballed the measurements, but any of your favorite dressings will work. Here's the recipe:

Quinoa Salad

1 c. quinoa
2 c. vegetable stock (or water)
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 bell pepper, seeded and diced
1 cucumber, seeds removed and diced
1 small container cherry tomatoes, quartered
6-7 green onions, rinsed and thinly sliced
1 Tbs. fresh cilantro, finely chopped
Juice of one lime
2 Tbs. olive oil
1 Tbs. white wine vinegar
Salt & Pepper to taste
Sugar to taste (about 1 tsp or so is right for me)
1/4 tsp. smoked spanish paprika

In a medium-sized saucepan, add quinoa and stock. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer covered for 15 minutes. Check quinoa to make sure that it is done, it may need to be cooked slightly longer. Add the next 5 ingredients (black beans through green onions) into a large mixing bowl. Whisk the remaining ingredients in a small bowl. Add quinoa to the vegetables, cover with dressing and toss to combine. Can either be served chilled or at room temperature.

Scrubbing and Laundry and Dishes, oh My!

Today was a pretty busy day, I actually got up early (for me on a vacation day). I spent some quality time scrubbing down bathroom walls and removing mineral buildup. I also caught up on the laundry that I didn't get done while we were gone this weekend. What a great way to spend vacation time! My mom got here today for her visit, it was the first time that she has flown. She really enjoyed it, and made it through the flight just fine. The flight was delayed by 45 minutes and I was positive that she had gone nuts on the plane and they had to turn around to drop her off. But she made it through. :) Wasn't a very productive afternoon otherwise, but I have a full schedule planned for tomorrow. Lots of cleaning and starting to pack, should be interesting.

A Weekend with Jack Benny

We made it back in from Alabama this afternoon, just in time for the home inspectors to come. Results are still unknown, we're hoping to hear something by tomorrow on it. The trip was pretty fun, it was perfect driving weather for the most part. Northeastern Alabama is very beautiful, it reminds me very much of where I am from in Arkansas. Hills, lots of green and a nice big lake. Our friends had recently closed on their own house, and it adjoins a neighbors lot where Mr. Benny above grazes with a horse named Strawberry. The two of them provided lots of entertainment to watch.

So we are pretty pooped today, I wanted nothing more than to take a nap when we got home, but demands from the real world called. Looks like it is going to be an early night. :)

On the Road Again

It's been a pretty busy day today, I was down in Jacksonville and didn't get home until late (1 hour drive from home). We had to finish with the bathroom plumbing repairs, which had me crawling around under the house again. It really isn't too bad since we had the plastic vapor barrier put down underneath and don't have to crawl on the dirt. If it weren't for all of the dead bugs it wouldn't be too bad. :P Yummy chinese take-out tonight, we were both feeling pretty lazy with the heat and all.

We have been getting the house in order for our scouting trip to AL this weekend. McCrankypants is going to be kind enough to check in and feed my boys while we are gone. We are straightening up in case the home inspector comes while we are gone. When we get back Tuesday, my mom will be here for her visit the next day, so it'll be a busy time. Hopefully all will go well. Pictures forthcoming. :)