symmetrical egg arrangements...wait, is that thunder? in your living room?

so..tuesday was day 1 of our state test and i was monitoring for 4th grade. i'm glad the air was on-i was worried that it would get super hot for the people upstairs. unfortunately, there may have been over-compensation. i was so cold...(EVERYBODY): how cold WERE you? 
-if it had been any colder, my blood would've coagulated
-if i accidentally knocked my hand against a table, a digit probably would've fallen off
i was actually imagining all of the things in the room i could use to build a small fire in the middle of the room: base-boards, tables, shelving, books, paper..and then my mind wandered and i began to calculate how long i could survive if i depended on the fire provided by the consumable products in the room..brrr.

yes, testing will do strange things to you.

i decided to be prepared today when i walked in. i had my space heater, jacket, coffee...and to make my morning complete, someone brought in special edition dunkin donuts-spring edition!! crowned with a peep! straight up, i should've just eaten bowl of sugar cubes...but this was much prettier!

cute...but not on my diet...i shouldn't have, but i did! and i don't feel that bad about it.

 peeps..Easter..eggs...

i do like my eggs. please tell me that there are those of you who do the same thing i do; i'm not ocd, but i do like to leave my eggs balanced...symmetrical if possible. sometimes if there is an uneven number (because i usually eat one egg), i either scramble an egg to mix into the boys' food-which they love, or i pull out a quantity and boil them so i have an even number...anyone? no? hmm..me neither...

yes, i play around until i get the right combo

 i couldn't refrain, i had to get basil plantlings because i didn't want to wait for the seeds to sprout! and i decided to plant them today-i'm so excited!

fresh pesto!!

 today i made a little detour to the store to get some colorful planters for the garden. and while i was there, i was planning to get a fan to cut down on the air-conditioning, and i found the perfect one-it's more of a blower than a fan-i loved it! but there wasn't another in stock-only the display. the lady with purple hair said they ordered 3 more and she expected them in 3 days (apparently 3 was the magic number). while i was at walmart, i saw one of the downstairs neighbors (the one whose twin fell out of the window awhile back...)..she had also come up to borrow my phone one time when hers was not charged and she had to reach her boss because her husband was late (you're welcome for all the background info)..so i saw her with the twins, and i smiled and gave a small wave and she looked at me like i was a complete stranger (maybe it's the hair cut)...and of course, it never fails, i saw them around every turn there-after. ugh. i think sometimes she doesn't recognize me even here at the apt complex when i see them in the parking lot.very odd.

i must have some type of invisible sign or something, because she came up to borrow my phone, the neighbor next door(who has since moved) asked to borrow baking soda once to make carrot cake, the guy neighbor across the hall-strange one-asked to borrow one tomato, and the new girls across the hall, one sister knocked to borrow a charger for her iphone because her sisters had locked her out (when i met her sister a couple weeks later, she said that was strange 'because we usually leave an extra key under the mat.' i found it alarming that she told me that...they probably tell everyone that, and then have a nanny cam set up somewhere in the breezeway to see who looks under their mat for a key) is it just me? it kinda' makes me laugh, but at the same time, it makes me wonder if i'm just overly cautious and independent, because i don't think i would knock on any of their doors for any of those reasons.

i cannot get to sleep without some background noise. i have a great cd with ocean waves that i fall asleep to every night, and lately it has been skipping a little, so i knew i needed to get a noise machine-which i had written down on my hand (so that i wouldn't forget or lose the note). i had seen one before--so while i was there, i asked the kid in the electronics dept and he said no, maybe in the camping dept...he asked a lady and said i was looking for a machine that makes animal noises; i don't think i explained very clearly exactly what i was looking for....well, needless to say it was not in the camping dept, so i set out toward the potpourri and music scapes easy listening- i didn't see it, but the young man caught up with me at the end of the aisle and said, "there you are! good!! here's the machine!" exactly what i was looking for!

i'm so excited...i kinda want to take it with me everywhere!

 it may or may not be raining in my living room right now...with a little thunderstorm....then it stops and all of a sudden i'm on the beach. then as i'm walking along the beach i find a small tributary which as i follow it becomes a bubbling brook. finally the boys and i lay on our backs and stare at the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling and listened to the crickets- it's been an adventurous, evening in my living room!

 g'night!
julie

thank you watermelon, you are a superstar

i would like to begin this post by giving a special shout out to the watermelon!  your performance today has been spectacular!

pulled out the dehydrator again last night! raisins in the making (i didn't realize that raisins take 36 hours until after i bought the grapes...apples and watermelon. so, i find myself longing to eat more and more of the dehydrated watermelon, but what if it reconstituted in my body after i drink a lot of water? i also threw in some tomatoes, and they are like watermelon's right hand man, they are delicious as well! if they could be a superhero duo of the world of dehydration, they would be unstoppable!!

i spent a lot of time today in the wanna-be kitchen of mine. i decided that i wanted to make pupusas and tortilla chips. so i had to go to the store to buy tortillas, masa and mexican cheese. somehow i got lured into purchasing 5 lbs of top round-so when i got home i portioned it out and i now have 15 steaks. (the reason i got the bulk size is because it was priced at $23.00 and $10.00 off-you can beat that! that's 15 steaks for less than a buck a piece. yep...grill baby grill!

i know, raw meat gross-don't worry, i washed my hands

i also finished portioning out the soup and vac-sealing it. then i decided to try to make powdered eggs. so i scrambled them all up and now i have to put them in the oven tonight after the game because they have to cook for 10 hours. then i'll grind them into powder (i want to see if it really works or not).

does anyone else do this? i like my eggs to be balanced, so whenever i take one from one side, i balance it out...so they don't fall? idk

i also took the pulled pork and added my bbq and a bit of ken's honey mustard (the secret!) best honey mustard EVER! the first time i was introduced to honey mustard was in college at applebee's i was a-ddicted to fries w/ hm!
anyway, i took the bbq pork and froze it in muffin tins (found the tip on the internet) and then i portioned them and sealed them-perfect portions for sandwiches! thanks lady on the internet!!

bbq muffins!check out THOSE muffin tops, jenna!

and then i cut up the tortillas and fried them into chips for the game! i didn't get around to the pupusas-tomorrow's a new day!

ready!

obviously i was watching master chef last night. 

and as i came in to sit down, i let the boys out onto the balcony, and bruno paws at the glass to get back in. chaco licks it (which is a little harder to hear). good thing he's got bruno!!

if you go to visit someone, either knock on the door, or ring the doorbell, don't lick the door-you don't know where it's been!
julies