Full disclosure

So in contrast to the last photo of our tidy dining room and kitchen, I’ll share with you the spare bedroom, which currently houses the majority of our miscellaneous belongings. You can barely see the true level of messiness here but you get a general idea.

Much can be hidden in a spare bedroom closet.

I am going through every box as I unpack to weed out stuff we don’t need anymore. 

And amazingly, I found a gift card from one of our wedding showers…over a year and a half ago. It was tucked into the top of a box of Pyrex dishes that we didn’t open because we didn’t have room for them in our old place. I knew we lost the gift card all those months ago and finding it felt victorious. Until we spent it in less than 2.5 seconds on a new Brita water pitcher after work tonight.

We turned in our keys to the old place today. And after spending the past 3 nights here we are starting to feel settled. The drive to work this morning was at least 10 minutes quicker than our previous drive. And although we didn’t drive straight home tonight, we think our drive home will be about 20 minutes quicker.

Not too shabby.

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Home sweet new apartment

We moved this weekend. Here’s a picture of my favorite room at our new place. I’ll share more later.

I’m posting from my phone because we haven’t figured out the internet yet. Well actually we have but only have the netflix and xbox set up for internet.
We love our new place but of course are still settling in. Mom and dad came to help us and there is no way we could have done it without them. We started loading the truck around 8am and by 2pm we we’re mostly done.

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Valentines Day Dinner – Trout

To get to our Valentine’s dinner I need to take you back a little bit.

 

So, a few weeks ago we decided we were going to try eating more fish, and saw some steelhead trout in the fish section (seafood department?? whatever it’s called??) so we bought some.

 

Anyhow, I’m not a fan of salmon (too oily/fishy) though Taylor likes it. The steelhead trout is an orange color similar to salmon, but not anywhere near as oily. And it’s got a great flavor when cooked. I can’t remember how I found the inspiration recipe, but I tweaked it a little bit and came up with a winner. I think you’ll like it too.

 

But, before you get started, you’ll need a secret weapon ingredient.

 

Sunny Paris.

 

 

This spice mix from Penzey’s Spices  is a wee bit expensive ($10 for a half cup), but trust me, you won’t regret the purchase. And if you do, just send me the leftovers. And if you’re not a big fan of any of the individual ingredients, just try it. Trust me. Seriously.

 

So where was I before I started waxing poetic about the virtues of Sunny Paris….oh yes, the trout recipe.

 

1 large piece of trout (1 pound; ours came with the skin on)
3 slices of yellow onion (roughly half of a medium-sized onion)
3 tbsp. soft butter (not melted)
2 tbsp. flour
2 tbsp Sunny Paris Seasoning

1/2 c. panko bread crumbs

Salt and pepper to season

Olive oil

1. Heat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Spray a baking sheet with a little olive oil. Or better yet, to reduce the amount of dishes you need to clean, make a tiny pan out of foil to fit the fish and spray that with olive oil.
3. Place slices of onion in the pan.
4. Put the trout (skin side down) on top of the onion slices. Salt and pepper fish.
5. Mix softened butter with flour and Sunny Paris. Spread on fish.
6. Sprinkle butter mixture with crumbs.
7. Bake 45 minutes or until the crumb mixture is golden and fish is done.

Makes about 4 servings (or 2 servings for hungry adults).  Other light tasting kinds of fish could be used.

Here’s the final product.

 

Served up with some asparagus and a salad, it was a perfect low-key, but fancy enough dinner for our Valentine’s Day.

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Packing and Moving Sucks

Oh, hi there. Wanna see what I’ve been up to?

I am nowhere near being finished yet either.

I don’t know how I’m going to get everything done by Saturday morning when we pick up the moving truck.

Just a few of the things I’ve still go to do:

• wash a couple loads of laundry before the people we’re selling the washer and dryer to come to pick them up
• pack up towels
• pack shoes and dresser clothes
• pack up the pantry
• pack up plates, cups, utensils etc.
• finish gathering the essentials for our first night at the new apartment
• shop for a couple things (water and snacks for our moving helpers)

I’m feeling very overwhelmed.

Taylor’s been helping but he’s just not a worrier like I am. And I’ve accepted the fact that he’ll be doing a lot of the heavy lifting, so I’m ok doing most of the packing (and worrying).

I also am feeling like some of the people on hoarders. I have some things that are relegated to a give away pile. They are perfectly good things (coffee cups, dish drainer, silver ware, vases, just to name a few) that we just don’t need anymore and haven’t used in a long time. But still, I feel attached to those things. Dumb right? I hate the idea of just giving them away, but I don’t have the time or space to sell them. And frankly, if I’m being honest with myself, these are probably things people would only pay a $1 or $2 MAX for at a garage sale so it’s not really worth my time even if I did have the space. So, I’ll gather everything up and bring it to Goodwill and I won’t even give it a second thought after I drop the stuff off. That’s how I know I don’t have a real hoarding problem.

Anyhow. I know it’ll all come together.

I just need to take a few deep breaths. And maybe some wine.

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Dreaming

I’m dreaming of Italy today.

This was taken in Ravello.

And Florence from the Duomo Bell Tower.

The summer can’t come soon enough.

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Blog Share!

I interrupt my not so regularly scheduled posting to share my blog with another lovely blogger.  

That’s right. It’s blog share time!

As you may already know, Blog Share gives bloggers a chance to share something anonymously on someone else’s blog (genious idea!) Thanks a million to the lovely -R- at And You Know What Else for organizing the Blog Share! 

So without further delay, show some love to today’s anonymous Blog Share blogger. (And be sure to check out the other Blog Share posts which I’ve linked at the end of the post.)

______________________________________________________________________________________________________

I hate my job. Maybe hate is too strong a word. I really dislike my job most days. I mean, I mostly like my coworkers, and my boss is ok (even good sometimes) and it’s pretty flexible, which is great when you have kids. But I don’t like what I do for a living. It’s not what I thought I would be doing when I graduated college, and it’s not what I want to do long term. The problem I’m having is that I don’t know what I DO want to do long-term.
 
Ok, if this is anonymous let’s be truthful. I don’t especially like my boss very much these days either. He makes comments about what I eat (“[My name here] always has food around!” said in a condescending tone), and it drives me crazy. First of all, it’s none of your business, and second of all, IT’S NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS. I don’t make comments about what you eat, and I would appreciate it if you would show the same courtesy. Grr. Of course, he seems oblivious to the fact that this bothers me.
 
Also, the industry I work in isn’t exactly one that people are happy to discuss. I used to work in a chocolate store. Now THAT was a happy place to work, even if it was retail. People were always happy when they came in to see you. At my work they are not happy. They don’t come to see me pretty much ever (they call), and they are mad about spending money on something that they don’t see an immediate benefit from. In reality, they don’t WANT to see the benefit from it, because that would mean something bad has happened.
 
It drags on a person, having to work somewhere like this. I used to be a much happier person.
 
I have plans to meet with my aunt, who is going to help me figure out what kinds of jobs I might be good at or like doing. Of course that is just the beginning. Once I figure that out, then I actually need to GET a job doing something like that. But at least it would be a step forward. And one step at a time is how everyone has to get there, right?

————————————————–
The Time for Change
Bright Yellow World
Reflections in the Snow-Covered Hills
Totally Serial
Daily Tannenbaum
Andrea Unplugged
Malfeasance
From Kim’s Desk
Rediscovering Me
Mama Bub
Being Five
Nothing Is Easier Than Self-Deceit
Molly’s Musings
Heidikins
Snarke
Did I Say That Outloud?
Reluctant Grownup Blog
And You Know What Else
Bwildered
Thinking Some More

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