Tuesday, January 17, 2012

New Reci-peas

One of my Christmas gifts I got from my parents this year was the cookbook "Peas and Thank You." It is written by Sarah Mathany who keeps a great food blog of the same name. It is a cook book full of great vegan recipes that look and taste like really good versions of your ol' favorites.

Obviously I'm not going to post up any of these recipes, but I am going to show you some tantalizing pictures.

Asian Salad

I will admit that due to ingredient availability and vegan-ism not being on top of my priorities right now some of these meals were downgraded to vegetarian in the process.

Home made pizza. Mmmm cheese.

I've been enjoying trying these new reci-peas as I attempt to eat a little more healthfully in the new year. So if you are looking for a little inspiration, or something new to inspire healthy eating as New Years Resolutions start to be tested, check into her extensive free recipies on her blog. Her Tofu and Mushroom Lettuce Cups are awesome. Even if you are not wild about Tofu.

~Claire Out.

P.S. Italian is going great. I just finished a mile marker that has me 3/4 of the way through my current program. I'm excited to finish up in the next month or so, and then go back and seriously master all of these concepts.

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Exciting News

Well my new year has started out even better than I had expected when my boyfriend Mike asked me to marry him. We're engaged!

I am so excited, it has taken me almost a week to trust myself to be able to write about it. I was so overwhelmed, shocked and excited that for several days afterwards I wasn't able to form full sentences. Not aloud, not in my mind, nothing. No a single clear thought could form before it was overwhelmed by my excitement.

First, let me tell you The Story of Our Engagement.

Mike and I went to Disneyland on Thursday in order to celebrate our four-year anniversary. Not only is Disneyland a fun (and magical) place to spend a day, but it is also were we met, working together in Tomorrowland.

Because Disneyland is a special place for us I totally bought Mike's story that we were going there to celebrate four years together and for no other reason. My first clue that something else was brewing was when we went to park. I offered to pay the (somewhat ludicrous) parking fee, and began to search the backpack for my wallet. Mike freaked out a little as I started randomly opening pockets, which made me think there might be something in there I wasn't supposed to see.

I put that in the back of my mind, assuming it was a little card or gift to celebrate our anniversary. I thought it couldn't possibly be a ring because Mike intended to talk to my parents before he proposed, and I knew they hadn't had that chat yet. Instead I focused on having a fun day at the park, not at all a challenging task.

Waiting for the Alice in Wonderland ride, one of my childhood favorites.

About to go on an Adventure in Adventureland

Looking oh-so-cool in my 3D glasses waiting for the new Star Tours

The Matterhorn!

Right around five o'clock we found ourselves in Tomorrowland, and Mike suggested we go on Astro Orbitor, the ride we used to work on together. This was Mike's first ride request of the day and I was happy to oblige.

Waiting in line Mike got quiet.

Those of you who know Mike know he isn't exactly a chatterbox anyway, but he started responding to my prompts of conversation with single syllables. I made a mental note that his blood sugar was probably low and we should grab a snack after the ride.

Mike lead us to a rocket on the opposite side of the control tower, then went to go 'drop off the backpack'. He was gone a long time, and I grew suspicious, something was up.

He did return and we flew around on a rocket ship for our alotted minute or so. The sun had just gone down and you could see all the lights making the park glow. It was beautiful. (The time of day was apparently carefully chosen by Mike).

We struggled out of our rocket ship and Mike said he wanted the cast member to take a picture of us. I followed him around to the place where our backpack had been left and prepared to be photographed.

Mike walked over to me and said something along the lines of, "Ever since I've met you four years ago I've been so happy." And honestly that is the last of the words that I remember because it was then that I realized what was happening. He got down on one knee, opened up a ring box and asked to marry me.


I said yes.


I cried, I shook, I smiled, I hugged him, people shouted congratulations, we posed for another picture, it is absolutely a blur of happiness and tears in my memory.

I had to find a place to sit down and get a grip. It turned out that he talked to my parents just after Christmas this year without me knowing about it at all. Good job sneaky parents! We talked about how happy we were, how different it felt and how odd it was that we were currently inside of a story that we were going to tell for the rest of our lives.

I called my parents and brother and giggle-cried into the phone. They congratulated me politely listened to my babbled happiness. We sat in front of the Sleeping Beauty's castle for a while as I collected myself. We were both emotionally drained and footsore from so much walking. We took it very easy, sitting, shopping for cookies, and enjoying being engaged until our dinner reservation at the Blue Bayou.


For those of you who do not know the blue bayou is a restaurant inside of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. (It is at the start of the ride, it isn't as if you are seated next to an animatronic Jonny Depp.) It is beautifully lit by colorful lanterns and you hear the water go flowing by. We got a table right next to the water because Mike mentioned when he made the reservation that we were getting engaged.

Please ignore the terrible sound.

Unfortunately, the staff of the restaurant thought that we were getting engaged there and were holding their breath the whole night until (after desert!!) I shared with our waitress that we had just gotten engaged. She told us she was so relieved, everyone was waiting and hoping that Mike hadn't gotten cold feet.

OOPS. Obviously we have a lot to learn about the etiquette of being engaged. She didn't even have the ring as a clue since I was wearing it on my pinky finger. (It is being resized now and I miss it. I can't wait to get to wear it!)


After a delicious dinner, and an all around wonderful day we headed home. Mike had a bottle of wine chilling in the fridge that had had chosen for this occasion. We had time for one small toast before we said goodnight. (The bottle was tackled with more gusto the following day with dinner.)

I have been so touched by the congratulations of friends and family as news of our engagement has gotten out. We have been basking in phone calls, texts, Facebook posts and hugs. I am so grateful for all the people in our lives.


Basically I am thrilled to be engaged. I'm amazed at how different it feels thinking about wanting to marry Mike to having the question asked and answered. I am constantly astounded at my good luck for having been in exactly the right place at the right time to have met him. I am so thankful for all of our years together so far, and am looking forward to many many more.

~Claire Out.


Wednesday, January 4, 2012

New Coat of Paint

Happy New Year everyone!

Before I get to far ahead of myself talking about the new year ahead (which I suspect will be a great one), I want to take a moment to write about a recent home improvement project I worked on and share a few lessons I learned.

It wasn't my own home I improved this time, but my parents'. You see, as a young woman on a budget I was thinking of things I could give as gifts that maybe made use of my time instead of my wallet. One of those gifts this year was for my Mom.

Though I haven’t lived at home for many years my old bedroom looked pretty much exactly as it had when I was going to high school. My mom has begun using it as an at-home office, but she worked at my old desk and surrounded by Claire stuff. Including (but not limited to) a decoupage wall of magazines and posters.


My parents had to sleep in there during a recent renovation, and my father complained about all of the eyes watching him sleep. Yikes.

My mom is a busy woman and therefore the functional (all be it teenage-claire-tainted) bedroom remained unchanged. So my gift to my dear old mum for Christmas this year was to proved her with a much more aesthetically pleasing guest bedroom and office space.

My plan:

1. To remove the poster wall (my parents wisely had me hang up boards before I started decoupage-ing an entire wall of my bedroom)

2. To fill in any holes left by screws, or push pins.

3. To paint the room.

My Mom and I picked out some colors we liked at Thanksgiving. She decided on the bottom one, “Sierra Monkey Flower” by Dutch Boy. I liked it because it is a pretty neutral yellow and looked great in the sample picture with all of those wood tones, also it has the word Monkey in the name…

(The one on the bottom)

I ended up getting a Low VOC, primer included, eggshell finish, Dutch Boy paint that was color matched to the sample. Which brings me to lesson one.

LESSON 1: Most rooms need a single gallon of paint.

I seriously overbought on paint. I went with three gallons based on some weird internet equation. Seriously overkill.

One of the problems with the room is that it has so much furniture. After moving some of it into another room, we were tapped out of space. So, I decided to push the corner desk and bed into the middle of the room and work around the edges.

LESSON 2: If at all possible remove all the furniture from the room.

Some of the edges were almost too small for me to open up the step stool (sideways). And I had to walk all the way around the edge to get more paint. It was pretty frustrating.

Once the furniture was moved into position, I started taking down the wall. The boards were attached with simple wood screws. I removed them easily and took down one board at a time. Here it is halfway removed.

(Yes that is a Star Wars: Episode One poster you see, thank-you-very-much. I’ll argue with anyone that it is the best of the prequels.)

Once all the boards were down I also removed all the light switch and outlet covers from the walls. Then, I went around the room and patched up the holes with DAP spackle. I got the cool kind that changes from pink to white when it dries.

I even removed the old intercom (that has never worked in my memory) and patched that hole. You can see the intercom in the far left of this picture.

All of this patching, and spackling was done the day before to allow plenty of time to dry before I applied paint.

The next day I began actually painting! This bedroom had not been painted since before I was born. The light yellow color was chosen because they didn’t know if I was going to be a boy or a girl. There were crayon markings in one corner. Needless to say, it was time for an update.

So I prepped the room with painters tape and drop cloths, which leads me to my next point,

LESSON 3: Painter’s tape is for the weak.

Long before my first coat of paint was done, the painters tape had come unstuck. It was difficult to put back on now that wet paint had become part of the equation. I used a small brush to ‘cut in’ around the ceiling, doorway and windows and should have done the same for the bottom moldings too. (I learned to cut in at YHL by watching this video.)

Here is a picture of my progress. On the right you can see the wall with a single coat of paint, and on the right you can see a patched, but unpainted original wall color.

So as you can see the paint was a wee bit brighter than I imagined. I suspect our color matching was a bit off. The color did mellowed out a little when everything dried, and the important thing is that my mom likes the color.

Lesson 4: Check the color match.

I don’t really know how to do this, but I am certain there is a way. Something could probably have been fixed at the hardware store.

After almost a full day spent painting, I had finished.

Lesson 5: Entertainment.

I played “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” on audio book while I was painting. It was a great way to stay entertained without being tempted to look at anything like you would with a movie. (The book is brutal, but very good by the way.)

Here are some pictures of the completed room. Taken at night, because, like I said, the painting took all day.

Ta-Da, poster free!

The room looks pretty good overall. Much more grown up and put-together. With the huge desk sold, and a new one on it’s way in, this room is heading towards being a much more functional bedroom and office. I think the new paint revealed how shabby the ceiling looked. So a fresh coat of paint on the ceiling may be on my to-do list next time I visit. Also there are discussions of new closet doors and perhaps fresh moldings? Oh-ho-ho dare to dream.

Have you tackled any home improvement projects lately? Have you ever tried to tackle anyone else’s home?

~Claire Out.