Elsja Down Under

Baking Madness November 29, 2007

Andrew and I thoroughly enjoyed the pumpkin muffins I made- as you can see here (I know we don’t look like we are enjoying them… but those are just grumpy faces because we were eating the last 2 muffins in the house):

 

We really planned on giving them away to people. But we gave away 6 and ate the rest (there were about 30 to start). Luckily I modified the recipe enough that we shouldn’t gain too much weight from eating 24 muffins in less than a week. Although I was sad to see them go, I was thankful deep down that I would stop binging on muffins every day.

But last night, after making Andrew some Jambalaya for dinner (that I didn’t eat because it had greasy snausages and shrimpies)- we were hungry for sweets. Sadly, since our pumpkin muffins were gone- we had nothing sugary in the house.

We sat and wished we had something yummy to munch on. So… I said “I’ll just bake some cookies.” I found a recipe online with ingredients that I knew I had on hand. I got up at around 8pm and started baking. By 8:45pm we were eating these:

 

 

Yummy sugar cookies made from scratch in less than an hour. These are delish and this recipe was super easy (but not modified)… so we HAVE to give some of these away or else I’ll be coming home a little with a little extra pudge. Any takers? Oh and thanks to Tess for the idea of putting jam in the middle. It was a little extra special touch that made the cookies even more delectable.

After the Jambalaya last night, the stuffed chicken breasts the night before and the cookies to top it all off- Andrew said “I’m more impressed with your cooking than I thought I would be”

I don’t know if I should be taking that as a compliment- or be sad that he thought I wouldn’t be able to cook!

In Loving Memory November 28, 2007

November 28th, 2007 would have been Brett Bailey’s 39th birthday. Ironically and sadly, this day also marks the one year anniversary of the day Brett was diagnosed with Cancer.

My brother-in-law, Brett lost his battle only 6 months after his diagnosis; however according to statistics, it was actually a long fight. He left behind a wife and two young sons who are now 5 and 2 years old.

• Pancreatic Cancer is the 4th leading cause of cancer death in the U.S.
• Approximately 33, 730 people will be diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer this year in the U.S.A and about 32,000 will die from it
• The 99% mortality rate for pancreatic cancer is the highest of any cancer. Only 4% of patients will survive beyond 5 years.
• The average life expectancy after diagnosis with metastatic disease is just 3-6 months.
• Despite the especially lethal nature of pancreatic cancer, the research spending per pancreatic cancer patient is the lowest of any leading cancer.

November is Pancreatic Cancer Awareness month. If you are in the giving spirit this holiday season, or just looking for a good cause, click the link image below to read more and donate to help fight the horrible disease that has taken so many lives.

 

Sunburn… Day 3 November 27, 2007

I would post pictures- but, they are a little too revealing for the web…

Just letting you all know that I’m almost out of my second bottle of aloe. Granted, they aren’t the biggest bottles in the world- but at 6 bucks each (and the high probability that I’ll need another one)- this is proving to be an expensive burn.

And I thought I was going for a nice cheap day at the beach – even brought my lunch to save money! So much for that plan.

Thank goodness for aloe, and the ability to walk around in undies all day- clothes are pretty much too painful at this time. I cant really bend my knees too much because when I do, the backs of my knees and legs just kinda crunch up into this horrible burning, aching misery

Putting “cooling aloe gel” on my body feels like I’m putting ben gay or icy hot all over. It’s cool- yet so hot at the same time. I even woke up at 2am and went into the bathroom to reapply the night I got the burn. Yes, it was that hot and that painful that I needed relief at 2am!

I’m wondering if this pain will go away anytime soon. Maybe day 4 of the burn will be a little better. Maybe less painful- maybe less red. I’m guessing from the looks (and feel) of my body at the current moment, I’ve got another few days of pain before the itching takes over and overwhelms me for another 4 days.

Ugh. Stupid hole in the ozone layer.

Happy Times, Sad Times November 25, 2007

I’m mixing up the whole “love/ (don’t) love” blog with my new rendition… Happy Times, Sad Times

Happy Times:

Walking to Balmoral Beach from my apartment is a pretty happy time. I found out I can walk to the beach in a mere 15 minutes! That’s nothing. Even walking back (up a huge hill) wasn’t that bad and only added 5 minutes to my time… making the entire round trip 35 mintues.

The water at the beach is actually clean and you can see your feet when you are in up to your thighs. You probably could see more than that too, but I wouldn’t know since I didn’t go in past my knees. Too cold. Not quite ready for that yet.

Sad Times:

That whole idea about the hole in the ozone layer being directly over Australia- yup… it’s true. My body is not enjoying the outcome of lying underneath a hole in the ozone layer.I feel like pieces of my skin are just going to crack off when I move. I’m THAT crispy….. EVERYWHERE! Stupid stupid Elsja. Too much sun for me!

Happy Times:

Making pumpkin cream cheese “muffins” is definitely a happy time. Eating them is a WAY happier time! Baking something from scratch… even using real fresh pumpkin… was very satisfying. I wasn’t sure how they would turn out because I modified the recipe quite a bit… but they are delish and I’m very proud of my first baking accomplishment. That yummy muffin part on the bottom- that’s more of a gooey pumpkin bar texture when you bite into it- not really muffin-ish. Then that yellowish top- thats a dreamy creamy cheese mixture toped with a crumbly buttery, spicey sugar blend.

very… happy… times.

 

More Happy Times:

Realizing that the kookaburras really aren’t so bad compared to loud trash trucks. It is especially cool when I see them on my balcony fence:

It’s also cool when I get to see lorikeets in the trees outside. They are so pretty.

Sad Times:

5:50am on Monday and Thursday is a very very sad time. It is the time the recycle trash man comes to our apartment. Mondays aren’t so bad… they just come to our apartment. But Thursdays they stop at every place on the street. It’s horrible.

That’s all from Down Under. More updates- and a blog with Apartment pics soon!

What’s Happening to Me? November 23, 2007

A list of some of the things I’ve done this week in my new life as a real adult:

1. Vacuumed. Nothing so special here- except the fact that I hardly ever cared about vacuuming before- and this week (or in the last 1 1/2 weeks) I did it twice AND had Andrew do it a 3rd time before our guests came over last night. Obsessive?

2. Ironed. Again, nothing special about ironing- except for the fact that I was ironing napkins and dish towels. Who irons dish towels?? That’s almost as pointless and freaky as ironing underwear.

3. Decided to make a pumpkin dessert. Jen inspired me with her stories of her fabulous pumpkin bar things- so I decided I’d make a dessert. So the weird part? I just steamed and mashed up a real pumpkin. I’m not using canned pumpkin (only because they don’t sell it here)… but seriously, steaming pumpkin and mashing it was so easy! I’m sure it will make my pumpkin dessert even that much more yummy. I just have to decide what I’m making- that’s another thing I did today- sat for hours trying to find recipes online. I think I may go with these.

4. Reupholstered 5 chairs. Yes 5… we do have 6 that were FINALLY delivered- but I only felt like doing 5. 

5. Made mashed potatoes for the first time in my life. Not that they are hard, I’ve just never needed to because I had my mom to make them for me and hers were the best anyways. Well I must say I am pretty proud of my first attempt and we have plenty of them (and some green bean/corn casserole that I also made) left over that we’ve frozen for future feasting. Oooh… alliteration.

That’s all for my nerdy update. Jen, I think you have a new Susie Homemaker friend. Let’s start sharing recipes and cleaning secrets!

I Love the Internet November 20, 2007

Maybe I’m just slow- but I just discovered igoogle.

This is the best thing ever!!! I’ve always kinda wished there was something like this and now there is- in fact, there probably has been for a long time, but I just didn’t pay any attention. Needless to say, I stumbled upon igoogle today and I’m hooked. For those of you who don’t know, it’s a customizable page (I make it my home page) where you can add calendars, mapquest, weather, and news. But that’s not all- for those of you who have facebook- you will be familiar with adding applications to your page. Well with igoogle, it is very similar. You can add gidgets or gadgets or something and so you can have all these fun tools on your homepage and you can lay it out however you want. I’ve added a few things to my home page that I use every day- like my bookmarks, a currency converter, recipe finders, etc.

You can also customize the skin/theme of the page. I selected some China background and after I selected it it asked me where I am located. Evidently, the sun will dynamically set on the theme as the sun sets in my own backyard! Fancy stuff!

I also added a link on my page to the video feeds from my other new favorite site:

Start Cooking

Now this website is exciting as well. I can cook, but I never really learned “the basics.” I can create fancy pasta and stir fry dishes nearly from scratch, yet I find myself asking my mom stupid questions like- how long do you bake a potato?

Soooo this site has tons of super fun and easy tips for beginers and a lot of useful ideas and hints just for every day cooking needs. Thanks to my friend’s sister Megan for turning me on to this site. Jen’s probably been aware of it for months since she’s a big blog reader- but I’m a little slower at these things!

Yay for fun geeky internet finds.

Happy Birthday Jen!

This is the first time in about 10 years that I won’t be with my best friend on her birthday. So… while I can’t be in California to celebrate Jen turning 27- I will pretend she is here in Australia again, chillen with the roos.

I miss California this week. First it’s Jen’s birthday, then Thanksgiving. I bet people are starting to decorate for Christmas. Here- I feel like we’re entering the month of June. Oh well.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JEN!

My Favorite Things November 19, 2007

So I swear I’ll post some apartment pictures soon. Just waiting for a few more things to be accomplished in this place- including receiving our chairs for our dining table- so as soon as that’s all done- I’ll get to it. Probably by next weekend. If you are really impatient, I do have a few “unfinished” pics I can send- but I won’t post them for the world (and by world I mean my 10 friends that read this) to see because I am a perfectionist and I need the place to look as good as possible before I start showing anyone.

Until then I thought I would comment on my 5 favorite things that arrived last week.

5. Pots and Pans- never had used these new ones before- but I did last night and they were a breeze to cook in and clean up! I can’t wait to use them more often!

4. Chopper- Oh chopper, I love you so! Thank you for making the experience of chopping an onion 100 times easier! And thank you for sparing me from all the tears.

3. Knives- Again, hadn’t used these new knives before. I knew they would be good- but last night i was cutting raw chicken to make my dinner and the knife was cutting the chicken like butter! yippee for sharp knives!

2.The wine bar. It’s just so pretty and holds all of our 25 bottles of wine and glasses and I just love it!

1. My pillow. I had been sleeping on Andrew’s crappy pillow for a month and a half and I’d wake up with my ear hurting any time i tried to sleep on my side. I ended up sleeping on my back all the time which was very restricting. It was miserable and now with my soft, fluffy pillow… I am now able to sleep in a multitude of positions. YAY

I think Andrew is also enjoying all the new tools and gadgets that have arrived. Today he used an olive spoon. Who would have ever guessed that I would need an olive spoon? I don’t even like olives! But thankfully my mom bought it for me a few years back because today, when andrew needed to get olives out of a jar- it came in very handy!

It’s HERE November 13, 2007

YAYAYYAYAYAY!

All my stuff is here! It got here yesterday after 2 1/2 months of being away. Only a few items were’nt tough enough to make the long journey! A couple of snapped table legs are no fun, but they are not the end of the world. I’m happy that my wine bar and all my dishes made it in one piece!

I’ve got a good start on putting everything away, but I’m nowhere near being finished! Still dodging boxes and trying not to step on screwdrivers that are all over the floor. I’m hanging pictures- but not in necessarily the places i WANT to hang them in. You see- all the walls in this place are concrete… soooo in order to hang things- you need special GIANT hanging things that are really ugly. We’re avoiding adding any more of those to the walls- we’re just trying to make use of the ones already installed.

I promise to send pictures as soon as this places looks semi-decent. right now it looks ridiculous so there’s no way I’ll be sending anything yet!

Stay tuned!

Oh and for all of you concerned about the power in my TV/dvd not working with Australian plugs… my step-down transformer worked and it’s all functioning!! Now we just have to wait for the cable to be installed in early Dec. That means it’ll be DVDs only for a few weeks!!

This is so exciting.

Worst Poem Ever November 9, 2007

Oh lovely Tuesday is the day

My stuff will be here… YAY! YAY! YAY!

I sure do love me some lemon sorbet…

and it’s 10 times better with raspberry puree!

The never ending rain here can please freaking go AWAY!

I drove by myself tonight- (in the dark) hip hip hooray!

I will end my crappy poem now because it is gay.

All Grown Up November 7, 2007

So finally at the ever-so-young age of 27, I have moved into my very first apartment. Ok you can all laugh. I know plenty of people do this 8-9 years before I made my first move- but I was just waiting for the right time

Andrew and I moved in to our apartment in Mosman on Sunday. We’re about 15 minutes outside of the downtown area of Sydney. So in the spirit of moving out, I’ve created a “love/ (don’t) love” list, Apartment Edition.

 It’s a long one- but it will give you all an idea about where we are living and all the fun things we are doingÂ

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I love not having roommates (other than Andrew of course).

I love our little balcony. It may be small, but when it is sunny I look forward to sitting out there and eating dinner with my love…(when we buy patio furniture). Oh yeah- p.s.- for all of you who keep saying “must be nice, it’s almost summer there”- it has been raining since Friday. That’s 6 days straight!!! But God was good to us and the only time the sun came out for more than an hour was the day we moved. Luckily we didn’t have to move in the rain!

I (don’t) love the fact that we are on the 2nd floor and the lady below us already came and told us that the eliptical machine we got makes a lot of noise. She was nice, but I need my exercise and the free eliptical we got from Andrew’s dad REALLY would save me tons of money in gym fees.

I (don’t) love the stupid light on the apartment pathway that just happens to be outside our window that shines in like the sun at 3:00am (and every other hour of the night).

I love our new super comfy (and giant) couch.

I love our new vacuum we bought yesterday that sucked all the nasty dirt and possible pet hair from the corners of the carpet. Evidently the professional steam cleaner they hired before we moved in didn’t actually vacuum anything after he “cleaned” the carpets.

I (don’t love) that there is NO storage space inside the apartment, causing us to have to store towels and toilet paper in the kitchen.

which is why:

I love our spacious kitchen with tons of cabinet space.

I (don’t) love the moth problem in this place. I keep killing them and they keep appearing again and again.

I love that we have a washer and dryer in this place- and that the repair man who came today was finally able to get the washer to run with HOT water. Maybe now the towels will actually stop smelling like mildew even after we clean them (yeah - I DON’T love that!!)

I (don’t) love that every time we turn on the hot water- this box under the sink goes “CLUNK CLUNK” – (imagine how it is for me at 4:30am when Andrew gets up for work and needs to fill up the sink with warm water to shave… and then a few minutes later he turns on his hot shower). CLUNK, CLUNK, CLUNK, CLUNK. So annoying.

I (don’t) love that we don’t have a TV

which is why:

I WILL REALLY LOVE when all my stuff gets here… although I do worry that I will have so much stuff and not enough room to fit it all.

AND… I REALLY love that Andrew’s dad gets us any TV shows we want and puts them on our computers. I just watched the first 2 episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and I’m tempted to watch the next two but I need to space it out. It’s like a goldmine because otherwise I’d have to wait a million more years for the season to start here.

I (don’t) love that the 2nd bedroom is so tiny that it will pretty much fit a twin bed and a small desk- that’s it. I dont even know how we’ll have room to pull out the trundle… but I guess I’ll figure that out when my stuff gets here. I’m just happy we even have a 2nd bedroom at all!!

Ok that’s enough!

Oh- this has nothing to do with the apartment, but… I also LOVE the canned raspberries Andrew discovered at the store. They are FABULOUS on lemon sorbet and would be wonderful in lemonade or some kind of fancy cocktails! (I couldn’t have a love/ (don’t) love list that didn’t at least include ONE food item now could I)??

And lastly, I’d like to point out that last night- Andrew said “we’re doing mum and dad things… buying a couch, buying a vacuum…” it was cute, and oh so true. Dang- the day you buy a vacuum- and actually CARE immensly about the quality of suction is the day you have really grown up

Packing, Packing and More Packing November 1, 2007

SO OVER the packing.

I feel like I’ve been packing for 5 months straight. Slowly I acquired new things in about June-ish and started organizing them bit by bit.

Next… as the shipping date came closer in August I really had to start cleaning out my room and ALL my belongings and I started packing some things up in boxes.

Then, on moving day, more all day packing when the movers arrived.

Finally… I had to start packing up the rest of my crap to bring in my suitcases when I came here.

And now for the last week we’ve been packing up all of Andrew’s stuff to take with us to the new apartment.

WHEN DOES IT END?? I just want to get our keys… bring in our boxes… do some major cleaning of the place- I mean every drawer, nook and shelf. Then, I want all my fabulous belongings to arrive so I can organize the place and live happily ever after!

p.s. I don’t want to hear any “welcome to the wonderful world of moving” – I know this is how it is… but that still doesn’t mean I like it. And besides that, I don’t think the process usually lasts THIS long!