Crock-Pot LOVE

I used my crock-pot TWICE last week, and in my world, that is blog worthy!

I had Thursday off, so I decided to breakout the crock-pot so dinner would be ready for Curt when he got home from work.  I found a recipe on Pinterest, and made pork tenderloin.

This is the image from the website, I don't think mine looked like this in the end.

The recipe was from allrecipes.com and was called 'Amazing Pork Tenderloin in the Slow Cooker' - seems like a winner, right!  And, it WAS!  I changed the recipe a little bit - it called for 3/4 cup of red wine, and although we had a bottle of red wine, I didn't bother opening it, I just used water.  And, although the recipe didn't call for it, I threw some potatoes and baby carrots in the pot too!

Curt ended up coming home from work early, and he commented on how good the house smelled when he walked in!  I had been smelling it all day, and hadn't had lunch, so we ended up having a late lunch/early dinner right then.  It.was.DELICIOUS!  I was so glad I had some before I went to skating.  And, we had some leftovers - now we don't usually do well with leftovers (as in, they tend to get thrown out), but not these!

And, after the great success on Thursday, I pulled the crock-pot out again on Sunday.  This time, I made Olive Garden Pasta E Fagioli Soup.  I don't really know what all of that means, but I know that the Olive Garden is a great restaurant, so I figured it was worth a try.  Plus, the picture looked delicious...

This was a recipe I had on one of my Pinterest boards, but you can find it here: http://www.favfamilyrecipes.com/2012/08/olive-garden-pasta-e-fagioli-soup.html

I want to point out that under the instructions, it says 'add beef and all ingredients except the pasta into a large crock pot' - what it should say is '...into a HUGE crock pot'.  By the time I added the spaghetti sauce, I was afraid the pot was going to overflow!  It didn't, but then I was sure that adding the pasta was going to be too much.  In the end, I managed to get the pasta in too...but, it was VERY FULL!  And, it made a HUGE batch!  So, again, we had lots of leftovers - I actually filled two tupperware containers and put them in the freezer.

Now this recipe was a lot more involved than the pork tenderloin, but I enjoyed making it.  The end result was pretty tasty, but nothing special.  It ended up being pretty thick, more like a stew than a soup, not that that's a bad thing...just not what I was expecting.

And now for two random thoughts that were part of these cooking experiences:

1. Honestly, I felt kinda fancy using oregano and parsley for this recipe!  Now, my sister-in-law grows her own herbs and spices, on the other hand, I turn to the handy spice rack that I received as a wedding gift (and haven't had to restock since!).  So, in reality, I'm not that fancy.

2. I wouldn't have been able to make either of these recipes without Google.  Why is it that the unit of measurement in the recipe NEVER matches the unit of measurement on the can?!?!  What did people do before Google???  Did everyone just know how to convert ounces to milliliters, because I certainly don't!

Countdown

It's that time of year again...time to start the countdown until Florida!  An almost annual trip to spend a week with my parents while they're in the Orlando area.

I made it official last weekend when I booked my flight to Orlando...thankfully, on Friday, my manager approved my vacation request - probably should have done that the other way around, right?!?!   

You may have noticed that I said 'I booked my flight'....not, 'we booked our flights'.  That's a big change for this year - Curt will not be coming, but only because he's got his own plans.  He's going to Myrtle Beach for a bachelor party...for a guy he doesn't even know...but he doesn't care, it's a golf trip to Myrtle Beach!  During the golf season here, Curt plays a lot of golf with his cousin Tim - the bachelor party is for Tim's brother-in-law - so, when they only had seven guys for the trip, Tim knew Curt would be up for it, bringing their group to an even eight! 

So, that's been in the works for about six weeks or so, and at first I figured I would just stay home and save the vacation time for later...but, the more Curt talked about his trip, the more I realized how hard that was going to be :)  So, I took another look at the calendar and made a lovely discovery...the week I was looking at going already had a stat holiday (Easter Monday) and another scheduled day off (my Condensed Work Week day)...so, I would only be using three vacation days!  Perfect, and too hard to resist!

For whatever reason, flights actually aren't that much cheaper out of Buffalo or Syracuse, so, for the first time in years, I'll be flying out of Toronto.  Ideally, I would have gone for a week - Saturday to Saturday - but, I have to stick around for the Tweed skating carnival on Saturday, so I don't leave until Sunday.  But, I have an early morning flight on Sunday, so I will have the full day in Florida.  And then I leave in the evening the following Saturday, so I still get six full days!

Our trips are staggered, so Curt leaves just a few days after me - better that he leaves after me, he'll handle that better than I would!

So, the countdown frame is up and proudly displaying '77 Days Until Florida' and '80 Days Until Myrtle Beach'.  Yes, I realize I might be a little premature with the sign, but I can't help it!

Pinterest Muffins

I'm sure that everyone here has heard about Pinterest...right?  If not, you should check it out at www.pinterest.com.  I wasn't sure how to describe it for those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, so I went to the website and found a page titled 'Pinning 101' that had this explanation: Pinterest is a virtual pinboard. Pinterest allows you to organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. You can browse boards created by other people to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.  Let me warn you, be prepared to waste spend a lot of time looking, and looking, and looking, etc. at all the different pins!  It's ADDICTIVE! 

Anyway, I've been on Pinterest for awhile now, and have made use of many of my pins, including recipes and crafts.  Since I seem to struggle to find things to post about from time to time, I thought I would start writing 'reviews' of the pinterest inspired stuff I do.

So, on Sunday evening I decided to make some muffins - so, I went to Pinterest and searched for 'chocolate chip muffins'.  The recipe I ended up going with (because I had all the required ingredients) was Graham Cracker & Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffins.

Picture from the website bakerstreet.tv

Things came together really well, and the end result - very tasty!  I said earlier that I decided to make these because I had all the ingredients, well, almost...it called for peanut butter chips, which I didn't have...but, I had butterscotch chips, so I used those instead.  They still taste great, but they would probably be even better with peanut butter chips!  Also, the recipe said it would make a dozen muffins and I ended up with two dozen?  Mind you, the last six or eight were pretty small :)  Curt and I sampled them that evening, and Curt had the following to say: 'they seem kind of gourmet because all the different stuff going on'. 

So, this Pinterest recipe gets a stamp of approval and I will definitely be making these again!  Copy and paste this link to go directly to the website for the recipe - http://bakerstreet.tv/2012/09/muffinmonday-graham-cracker-and-peanut-butter-chocolate-chip-muffin - or, if you're on Pinterest, you could follow me and find it on my 'Recipes to Try' board.

Favourites from 2012

One of my favourite things to do with a little spare time is to read.  Unfortunately, I often let other things get in the way - watching TV and surfing the internet to name a few - and find myself taking a little longer than it should to get through a book.  I usually spend at least 15 - 20 minutes reading before I go to bed, and, by doing that, I managed to read 20 books last year.  Not as many as I've read in previous years, but not too bad.  This year, I want to make an effort to turn the TV off and read more...we'll see how that goes!

For now, I thought I would share my 3 favourite reads from 2012...

1. The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh

This book was recommended to me by my boss.  We seem to have a similar taste in novels, so when she first mentioned it, I added it to my list of books to read.  But, she also recommended it to a summer student working in our office, and she read it over a weekend and came back and told me not to wait - that I should read it right away.  They were right, this was an amazing book!

2. Moloka'i by Alan Brennert

I first saw this book on the shelves at a Target, as one of their 'Recommended Reads'; I've always enjoyed these suggestions, so I made note of it and bought it for my eReader a few weeks later.  I enjoyed this book so much, I ended up recommending it to my boss - and she was really impressed with it as well.

3. The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom

This book was the most recent read for a book club that I'm part of.  I had the date for our book club meeting mixed up (I thought I had an extra week to read), so the day of the book club arrived and I was only about a third of the way through the book....oooops!  But, I sat down after church on a Sunday and figured I would read as much as I could.  I ended up staying on the couch all afternoon and evening because once I got into it, I couldn't put it down.  I ended up finishing the book about 20 minutes before I had to leave for book club; the discussion at book club was great, and the other 8 girls all really enjoyed the book too!

I didn't want to try to summarize these books for you, that's what GoodReads or Amazon are for, but I did want to give you the titles and authors so you could check them out for yourself!  If you end up reading any of these books, let me know what you think.

A Year in Review - Pictures

January

Tweed skaters at Shooting Stars Interclub, the first competition of the year.

February

Time for some home improvements - our tenant moved out of our basement apartment in January, and we decided to stop renting and use the space for ourselves.  First step, repaint the bathroom.

March

Enjoying our trip to Orlando.

April

With some of my skaters at the Tweed Awards Banquet.

May

Celebrating Abby's 2nd Birthday.

June

Celebrating Father's Day in Acton - Abby helps Papa open his gifts.

July

Volunteered at the Canadian Open - we were both Standard Bearers.

August

A boat ride on the Bay of Quinte during the Robertson's visit to Belleville.

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September

One week at Barefoot Resort, Myrtle Beach!

October

Picking a pumpkin on our annual trip to the pumpkin patch, Thanksgiving weekend.

November

 Tweed's first test day of the skating season.

December

Abby and I on Christmas Eve.

Some of these pictures may be familiar from previous posts, I tried to pick new ones, but that wasn't always an option.  I enjoyed looking through all my picture folders from 2012...there were definitely a few months where it was hard to pick just one picture!  Here's to more great memories in 2013.

A Change in Plans

Curt and I had a little trip planned over the Christmas holidays - we were planning on spending a few days in New York City!  We were going to leave on December 27th and return on December 30th - unfortunately, we had quite a snow storm overnight on the 26th and roads weren't looking good for that kind of drive.  We left Acton with the GPS set to our hotel in New Jersey, but about 20 minutes into our drive, we decided to head home instead.  The roads weren't really that bad at that point, but we just didn't feel great about what may lie ahead; and, we figured that if NYC had been hit with the same snow, it would be a little awkward getting around the city.

After our usual 3 hour drive home turned out to be closer to 5 hours, we were pretty sure we made the right decision!  Our drive to NYC was supposed to be about 8.5 hours, but at that rate, it would have been closer to 10 hours!  That's a long drive for only two and half days to actually take in the sites of the city.  Like I said, we had a hotel booked in New Jersey, but were able to cancel our reservation without penalty, so there was nothing lost when we changed our mind.

Now of course we knew that when we woke on Friday morning, the roads would be clear...so, as I got to work unpacking, Curt started researching other options.  And, by the end of the night, we had decided on a different trip, one that made the snow an advantage, rather than a disadvantage.  We went to upstate New York to go skiing!

We left early Friday morning and drove straight to Snow Ridge Ski Resort, in Turin, New York (about 45 minutes outside of Watertown, which is just across the border).  We've actually been here before, back before we were married we went with another couple, but we were snowboarding on that trip.  I'm not really sure how we ever ended up at this place because it's really in the middle of nowhere!  On the way there, the gas stations and two or three restaurants we passed, had more snowmobiles in the parking lot than they did cars!  Apparently it's a good area for snowmobiling.

I've never actually been skiing before, so I was a little nervous going in!  I've tried snowboarding a few times, and each time was HORRIBLE!  I was pretty confident that skiing would be better, after all, the motions required are a lot more natural (and not totally opposite to figure skating, which I find snowboarding to be)...but, I still had visions of big falls and broken bones :)

We started out on the bunny hill, and after the first two turns I knew I was going to be fine...

When we bought our lift passes, the lady mentioned that the hills were 'ungroomed'...I didn't really know what that meant at the time, so I didn't think much of it.  But, once we left the bunny hill and started down one of the bigger hills, I realized that it meant we would be skiing through a lot of powdery snow....sounds nice, but it actually makes it a lot harder!  Well, for a rookie anyway.

Midway through the day, they opened a new run that had been groomed, and that's when I realized the difference!  Needless to say, I spent the rest of the afternoon on that hill!

Our second day was a beautiful day to be on the slopes, it snowed ALL DAY!  It made for some beautiful scenery.

Curt at the top of South Slope...

Curt thought he would try venturing off the beaten path...he discovered, the hard way, that he didn't have enough speed to make it through the deep fluffy stuff!

On the chair lift, looking a little chilly...

By the second half of Day 2, there was no holding me back.  Here I am leaving Curt in my dust ;)

Even after Day 1, I never thought I would be comfortable enough to ride the chair lift alone.  But, Curt decided to spend the last hour on Day 2 doing some snowboarding, so, while he changed his equipment, I did a few runs by myself.  Eventually we met up at the top, and Curt took this picture of me coming off the lift...

We only skied for about 4 hours each day, but that was enough for both Curt and I.  It left me a little sore, but nothing like snowboarding did in the past.  Our hotel had a hot tub, so we made good use of that, and I think our evening soaks helped ease our sore and tired muscles!

Going into this trip, I figured that even if I hated skiing as much as I hate snowboarding, at least we would get the chance to do some shopping in Watertown!  It was a win-win in the end, I ended up enjoying myself on the slopes...AND, found some great deals at some of my favourite American stores.

So, we had a great few days away and have no regrets about changing our plans - we've just moved our plans to go to NYC to the summer! 

Happy New Year!

Welcome 2013!

Curt and I spent last night ringing in the New Year with friends.  Our friend Maria had a group of people over, it wasn't anything too exciting, but it was still a fun night!

Maria hosted a good little party - good food, great friends and an intense foosball tournament!  Teams were picked randomly, two pools were formed and the game was ON!

Curt and Jeanette on their way to an early victory...

Kevin and Susannah, trying to hold Curt and Jeanette back :)...

As luck would have it, the final game was Curt and Jeanette vs. Ike and Maria...this is where it got INTENSE, and even drew some onlookers...

Slightly blurry picture, but worth sharing because it shows the genuine excitement when Ike and Maria won...

After such an exciting night, it's been a pretty quiet New Years Day - after sleeping in, we've been relaxing and watching movies...and, in case you haven't noticed, I've been using the day off as an opportunity to catch up here too!

I hope everyone had a great New Years Eve and all the best for 2013!