Now that NaNoWriMo is over, I feel like I finally have some time to catch up on the blogging.  I know it’s been sparse over here, but I’m hoping that will change.  I’ve got some work to do in the coming weeks that will take some time, but hopefully I can come by a lot before the holidays to say hello and update about life.

So what’s up with me and mine?

Evi is doing really well.  She had her very first fever this past week.  I was nervous about it at first, but in the end she turned out just fine with some extra sleep, baby Tylenol, and lots of love.  The whole thing made me realize that I am a pretty good mom if I can just relax and trust my instincts, but why is that so hard?  Why can’t I just do what seems right and stop worrying about whether it matches up exactly with what the pediatrician or the magazines or parenting websites say I should be doing?  I know it’s because I adore that little girl, and I am just terrified of making a decision that could give her anything less than the best.

She was so adorable when she was sick.  Her Uncle Ryan was here to visit, and she was trying SO hard to smile at him even though she clearly felt awful.  She’s doing great now, eating lots of solids and still showing a markedly decreased interest in her bottles.  And based on the smell of formula, I SO don’t blame her.  Ew!

She’s giving “kisses” now too.  If you put your face right in hers and ask for a kiss, she opens her mouth and sort of licks your face.  It would be gross if it weren’t the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.

We think she’s teething right now.  Her drool amounts have, if possible, increased even more and she seems just a little cranky.  She always wants to be chewing on something too, so Sophie and some other teethers have become her new best friends.  She goes in on Thursday for her booster shot for the seasonal flu, at which point she will be fully vaccinated for that at least, and then she gets her H1N1 booster on the 14th, a full 3 days before we spend A WEEK IN FLORIDA!

We’re flying down to spend Christmas with my parents, and I am thrilled.  I have so missed having them close by.  Being there with them for the holidays is going to be amazing.  Especially since everyone might actually be there this year.  Ryan is flying down from Maryland two days after us, and even my brother Blake might be able to make it since he’ll be home for the holidays from his Army reserve MP training.  I can’t wait for us all to be together.  That’s what makes the holidays for me.  Plus, I am excited about Evi getting to hang out with everyone for a week.  It’s going to be the perfect start to the new year.

I am still working from home, thought the workload has slowed considerably and it has me worried about making ends meet through the end of the year.  It stops mattering in January, when my (hopefully) triumphant return to school will mean a break from paying my student loans and, as such, relieve us of a lot of financial debt.  Until then, I am looking around to see if I can take on some more home-based work to bring in some extra cash.  Sometimes I really struggle with feeling guilty that my choice to stay home has put us in such a tight financial situation.

That being said, I am SO happy to be staying home.  I love everything about it.  I love being here for every little thing Evi does or says.  I love knowing that I have a direct hand in shaping the child she is becoming.  I think I could do the same even if I were working away from home, but given my personality it would be a lot harder for me.  I do think I need to look for ways to build in more ME time though, because I can see how doing this long term might make it difficult for me to maintain a good sense of myself since I am always working and mothering and trying to maintain the house all at once.

I did finally manage to get out of the house to write on a Saturday morning, but I didn’t do it this past Saturday because it was my brother’s last day visiting with us before returning to college for the semester.  So I missed out this week, but I am hoping to make it a fairly regular pattern, since I can go to the local library for an hour or two without spending any money or feeling like I am abandoning my family.

I am back to practicing my Italian, thanks to the awesome Italian stuff I won!  I definitely let it fall by the wayside for a while there, but with these great tools I am doing much better again.  I am trying to start back at the beginning and reclaim a solid grasp on the basics, so right now I am breezing through the first couple of CDs about the alphabet and simple grammar.  I can tell the difficulty level is increasing, so I am hoping it won’t get too tough.  I do find that learning a  language via CD is much more difficult than doing so in a classroom, so I am hoping I won’t lose my motivation.

I am off to get some more work done on Book #3.  I’ve been feeling really good about my writing lately, so I am hoping to see some results from it in the coming months.  I don’t know what it means that there is so much talk about books falling by the wayside, but I am hoping that it’s not to late to be published.  I honestly think my stuff is good, and I am hoping to find some people (other than my awesome friends… preferably people who will pay me) who agree.

I hope everyone is having a fabulous Monday.  Help me get back to the blogging.  Send my questions, comments, whatever you’d like to see me blog about!

Since everyone’s asking the same questions again and again i thought i might as well post a frequently asked questions (FAQ) blog entry.

1. How’s married life?
not too bad really, we’re starting to discover what it’s like to live together and learning to make the necessary adjustments so that we’re not always tearing each other’s hair out.  But seriously it’s been good so far and we know that as we learn more of how to love one another daily it’ll only get better.

2. How was the [disgustingly long] honeymoon?
it was good. yes, we took lots of photos, yes we took lots of video, yes we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly, yes it was very long which is why we were resting for about a week when we came back. more on it in a separate post.

3. What’re you both up to at the moment?
now that we’re back from our ever so long honeymoon we have one purpose: to start earning a living again and find a house of our own to occupy and live in happily ever after. For the moment we’re living together with family and as can be expected it’s getting a bit claustraphobic.  However we lack a. funds* b. means to get our own little abode, hence the need to start working.

by God’s grace the job offers will start flooding in soon and we’ll be treading water comfortably and happily.

4. It’s been 2 months, where are your wedding photos?!
we are in the midst of getting our photos from our imported photographer.  once we’ve got them we’ll quickly upload them for display on www.freshlibaked.com . In the meantime keep checking out our website for more updates.

5. When are you going to have a baby?
the baby will come (God willing) when it wants to so you can stop asking, thank you very much.

————–

*if you would like to donate to the ‘freshlibaked get a home‘ fund you can always contact us at freshlibaked@gmail.com and open your hearts and wallets to us.

It is getting mighty cold in this part of the world, which means that our penchant for experimenting with comfort foods just gets more and more intense with every passing week. We had inteded to go hang out at a sports bar on Saturday night to watch the Bute/Andrade title fight (hooray for Bute! I love that kid), but after some late afternoon shivering at Montreal’s awesome homelessness-oriented arts festival, we opted to waddle back home and be wiener homebodies, and we snuggled under a blanket consuming hot chocolate (with Bailey and marshmallows, of course!) and G.’s perfect chocolate chip cookies (i.e. Martha Stewart’s legendary recipe). Oh, and we vegged out to Top Chef, which we only recently discovered, and which we hate ourselves for loving. (Seriously, could there be any more product placement on that show? Could it be any more contrived and schlocky American reality TV? And can we still not tear ourselves away from it, because the cooking they do is so darn cool? We are weak. Kevin for the win–he is exactly like my husband, only nicer!)

All that to say, that it was pretty much my ideal Saturday evening.

So yes, warming comfort food is definitely the name of the game right now, especially relatively simple stuff that is easy to prepare, because I only have so much patience these days. This week we ate lots of tasty but simple stuff, such as:

Chocolate and cranberry bread, courtesy of Premiere Moisson, a chain of French bakeries in Montreal. G. always marvels at the idea that Montreal is the kind of town where a gourmet French bakery could be one of the more successful chains, and the kind of place where folks buy their everyday bread.

Premiere Moisson always has a “bread of the month” which tends to be more of a cake masquerading as bread (that means you can eat it for breakfast!) and I always wait impatiently for December, when their “bread” of the month is a big ball of cranberry and chocolate deliciousness. It is my favourite, and a “loaf” never lasts longer than 24 hours in our piggy household. How excited was I when I stopped in last week to find it already on sale? There are no words–I was something like 5th in line and there was only one bread left, and I thought the suspense might kill me. But lo and behold, I snatched it up, and if my calculations are correct, it lasted a total of 20 hours. I guess we’re a bit slow, this year.

Simple but flavourful Trinidadian stewed butternut squash, a recipe that I tried out from what I would rate as my second favourite vegetarian cookbook ever, and something that both veggies and meat eaters must, must, must own. I love Madhur Jaffrey almost as much as I love Claudia Roden.

Lately I have been having a lot of fun experimenting with new squash recipes; I am enjoying finding new ways to work with my favourite fall foods that make them a bit more exciting. I would say that the best best best squash recipe that I tried recently was on (Canadian!) thanksgiving–I made this beautiful acorn squash from Smitten Kitchen. It was almost shockingly tasty; I think the trick was roasting it at such a high heat. It made it extra flavourful and sweet. I cannot recommend that recipe enough!

Sweet potato biscuits from this month’s issue of Bon Appetit. I made some for breakfast yesterday, and as was suggested by the recipe, we devoured them with butter and thick cut ham. Oh, man. The recipe was a bit weird and required some messing around, but it turned out beautifully and the biscuits were light and perfect and it was a decadent Sunday morning.

We later ate more biscuits with this unbelievably simple butter bean and bacon soup, found here (only I substituted bacon for pancetta because that’s what I had in our freezer). I was feeling unbelievably lazy, but we were both in need of something hearty, and I had bookmarked this soup some time ago. It whipped up quicker than any good meal should, and was awesome. We stuck some sour cream in as well, because I am a Pole at heart, and stick sour cream in all soups.

One more thing: G. and I never give each other huge Christmas gifts because: a) we are poor; b) our anniversary has always been in early December, and both our birthdays are in January, so this time of year can get a little over the top with the gifts; c) consumerism is silly. So we have, in the past couple of years, gotten into the habit of each buying each other a cookbook for Christmas. We are both mildly obsessed with having an authoritative and awesome cookbook collection, and so we have a lot of fun picking the perfect thing out. Last year, he got me this book, that I already mentioned LOVING in this post, and I got him this book and this one (I couldn’t choose!) and he had particular love for the former, which thoroughly satisfies his meat geekiness.

We’ve both just started thinking about this year’s gifts, and so I ask you folks: are there any cookbooks you’d suggest for a mister who is a fantastic cook, loves meat and slow food politics, is snooty about following recipes, and thus prefers cookbooks that can also serve as references and not just instructions? Lately he’s also really interested in Latin American and French cooking (i.e. he knows little about either but is intrigued by them). I have a couple of ideas already, but I would love to benefit from your collective wisdom.

Oh! Which gives me another idea–since I imagine that y’all are beginning to think of your Christmas shopping as well, would you be interested if I posted a bunch of must-have cookbook recommendations that I think would make fabulous gifts? As I may have already made clear, I have a slight obsession with cookbooks, and would love to share the gems that I’ve been lucky enough to accumulate over the years. If there’s interest, I will try to do this within the week.

Happy eating, friends! Stay warm. (And if anyone wants recipes for stuff I posted about that I couldn’t link to, just comment and I will try to type them up.)

We’re not really 3am doorbuster deal shopping maniacs, so you probably won’t find me and Ric camped out at Walmart in the wee hours of the morning on Black Friday. We took our time this morning enjoying breakfast and then headed out the door for Sears, Walmart and Target. Our mission…a vacuum cleaner. I was thinking we should have gotten an earlier start, but Ricardo assured me, “Honey, there won’t be people rushing through the doors for vacuum cleaners…I think we’ll be okay.” He was right…there were plenty to choose from. Our vacuum just died and a Dyson sure sounded dreamy…but realistically…a Hoover would do the work just fine so that’s exactly what we ended up with:

We also picked up some Christmas gift toys…until I started to get a mini-headache at Walmart and Ricardo felt dizzy. We’re obviously not good crowd shoppers so we took a stroll down 2nd street in Long Beach to get some fresh air….and then called it a day.

Off to feast on leftovers from yesterday I can’t believe we still have the weekend to look forward to…I can get use to this 3 day work week.

First of all, I’d like to thank you all for the kind comments that you left on my last post. I felt kind of self-conscious posting about such personal, not very nice, stuff, but this community never disappoints; your words were so encouraging and it was helpful to hear about how you’ve all dealt with your own stuff (although I’m sorry to hear about just how many of us struggle with chronic health issues; that sucks). I’m wishing us all an easier time with things.

Anyway, today I want to talk about how my life kind of blows my mind sometimes, and how that’s what being married feels like.

It’s odd–our day to day lives have been shockingly boring as of late, so the whole “being married” thing has just been part of the mundane; a feature of how we organize the petty details of our household; this thing that just is. We still have a lot of trouble saying “husband” or “wife” in reference to each other in public (it is so weird!) but mostly being married is about as interesting as doing laundry right now. It’s just…there. (I’ve written before about how marriage has created a lot of good will in our relationship, which I still really believe, so I do think it improves the mundane, but still, mundane is mundane.)

But while most of the time it’s just this thing floating around in the background, every time I take a minute to stop and look around at my life: my messy apartment, our million cats, this man that I share a bed with, my mind is blown.

Who knew? Who knew that on that winter afternoon, many years ago, when I met a friend for coffee and he brought his roommate along, this mysterious bearded guy who I thought was cute but kind of pretentious, that we would end up deciding to share our lives so intimately? Why is there not some sort of neon sign that lights up above the head of a person when you first meet them, to warn you that this will happen? It should have read: “Pay Attention! This man seems like a casual acquaintance, but in a few short years, he will become the most important person in your life.” Because I cannot get over how random, how fateful, how insane the whole thing seems. I meet this guy. We play video games. He’s alright. We started chatting when he moves to the UK because he doesn’t know anyone else. We get drunk and do it. We start dating very hesitantly. We spend whisky-filled evenings in his freezing apartment in Glasgow. We travel together. We finally admit that we are in love. And so on and so on. We then marry. Now we are each other’s firsts. How did video games lead to this? Like, I can intellectually trace the trajectory of our relationship, but I am still incapable of “getting it”. I don’t understand how it is that all of this resulted in me choosing this person with whom I will spend my entire life. It is nothing short of mind blowing.

It was the idea that in just a few years we had gone from video game buddies to life partners that started my stream of tears when we were walking back down the aisle following our wedding ceremony. How does that happen? Even though I have been processing all of this for a few months now, I still fundamentally do not understand how that happens.

Even as a child, I never thought I would marry. It seemed inconceivable to me that I might find a person that I wanted to see day in and day out, and that I would, gasp, even want to share a bed with. When I met G., I still felt that way. And now, being married just feels so natural, so mundane, so “this is how things are; this is our life”. And even that is overwhelming to me–when did I become that person? The kind of person who has a husband? And for whom having a husband is normal? How did it turn into this?

I most often bring up this sense of “holy shit” to G. either right before bed, or when we’re waking up. Sometimes it makes me want to cry again, like I did at the wedding, because that combination of it feeling so natural but also so huge and unwieldly overwhelms me so much. We have the same conversation about how “isn’t it so crazy that we ended up married?” over and over, like some kind of recital, but I still can’t get over it. I’m not sure when I ever will.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone. As I’m cooking up a storm in the kitchen…I thought I’d stop by to say hello!

With Ricardo’s parents in Mexico for the last month and us visiting my parents next weekend…we decided to skip the travel hoopla and spend Thanksgiving at home this year. My dad doesn’t really like Turkey so he usually made a delicious prime rib roast when we were growing up. This year…I’ll be attempting to cook us a special dinner without Turkey….eek, a little nervous? Ricardo keeps talking about a grease fire. I think it starts off looking like this…

And ends up like this:

He was a little nervous about us doing so much cooking, but rest assured…there will be no grease fire…I hope.

Wishing you all a Happy Thanksgiving Day! Gobble gobble….

Buying an amplifier for an acoustic guitar is not as simple as I had imagined.

Let me share with you how it all began …
This week I am off from work in what is supposed to be my vacation time.
I decided to don’t go anywhere because of various reasons one of them maybe the most important one is that I don’t particularly enjoy traveling alone, other reasons are that I am always out and about , I don’t really spend quality time at my place fixing the stuff that has been there pending,  always in a rush from one place to another . Economic reasons played an important factor in my decision to stay at home etc.
I decided to make the most of my holiday  time and make it a time for self discovery and maybe try to find once and for all what is that I am suppose dot do with my life .
This is the first time in many years I am all alone, for 10 days no husband , no friends no nothing well  internet and food yeah  but not social gatherings or couples time only time for me  and my projects .
I have been reading many sites in this quest for my inner discovery and meditating etc , I am trying really hard but nothing so far , I am not the kind of person who can focus for too much time in one thing so I read about the things I can do to help me but I get bored and start to do something else . So I learnt that with me the best is to do it by cycles of time my make time I can be focused is about 2 hours , after that my mind waders and is pointless to keep trying until I can get back to be focused , in any case in one of those breaks from been focused while browsing the net it hit me  like a thunder light, wouldn’t it be such a good surprise if I buy the amplifier my husband always wanted while he is away so when he comes back he can use it ?
My husband is a very skilled self learner guitar player , he plays on the weekends in our housie although he doesn’t play as much and with the regularity he would like to , I suppose that work , chores wife take a lot of his time and even when he enjoys very much playing , as the years goes by I can see that been a married man is not easy , the responsibilities man carry over their shoulder can be overwhelming .
When we go out to walk around the city if we pass by a music instrument store he would ask me to stop and he will stand and contemplate the instruments like a kind in front of a candy store.
When this happens I try to push him to go inside ask for prices or buy the amplifier, but he never does he would just t look and he would just deeply sigh  and then will continue our walk , sometimes breaks my heart to see how he contains himself of buying something he really wants because he will put always the needs of the house , or practical stuff we need first . An amplifier isn’t really a necessity so why to buy it.
Is admirable how can be so dedicated and always put in second place his needs, I think I am very lucky to be married with such an exceptional man and although I consider that is good to have financial plans I also think life is about enjoying and  that is why I decided to surprise him buying the amplifier.
When the idea  stroke me I was excited and right away I started the research about amps, I didn’t know what was the best and which one I should get so I started google best amps for acoustic guitars , oh boy amps for electric guitars are everywhere but reviews for acoustic guitars is not so simple all the sites I visited had recommendations for electric and the ones that were for acoustic were more professional not for a practice at home in your bedroom .
I don’t know how many hours I spent reading and trying to find suggestions but from the time invested something was clear for me THERE ARE NOT MANY SITES WITH REVIEWS OF AMPS FOR ACOUSTIC GUITARS almost all are for ELECTRIC guitars.
My requirements are simple: an affordable amp (around 250 bucks) that is for acoustic guitar, compact but with enough power that fits in our bedroom.
After visiting many sistes and learning more about the different types of amps I learned in a very helpful site Ehow that actually what could be closer to my needs is something called Combo-Amp , a combo amp is a more versatile product than just the amp, it’s equipped  with more functions plus the amp integrated all in once !
Combo-amp sounded like exactly what I was looking for , so I ventured myself again in the enterprise of finding what could be a good combo-amp  , affordable , compact size but with fair sound volume .But once again the same challenge , al the sites recommend combo-amps that are more suitable for electric not for acoustic guitar…
After hours of what it seemed endless futile research I wrote down a bunch of potential suggestions that met my requirements and decided to try my luck at the shop.
Before hitting the fist music store I made sure I copied all the necessary info, prices, and translated the names and key words I needed to explain the shop attendant what I was looking for etc;  also tried to research for more music stores here besides of the ones I know ,  but  it seems that  the ones I know are quite famous and after them there are not so many in town .
At this point you might be guessing 1.Where I am located that are not many music stores around ? and 2  why do I need to translate combo amplifier  for acoustic guitar to kombo zesilovač pro akustickou kytaru?  Well I happen to be in a country that was part of the ex communist bloc, to be more precise I am in Czech Republic, in Prague city.
Prague is a vibrant city located in the central Europe . the city is gaining rapidly a international status with more foreign investment and foreigners coming for vacation or to live here , although for the day to day stuff if you don’t speak Czech well let’s say that it can be challenging .
I was a bit disappointed of not being able to locate more shops to visit besides the 2 I knew, although I found many online the sites are in cestina only, I was unable to manage to find out if they were only e shops or also regular stores.
Armed with my list of kombo-zesilovač suggestions, I decided to finally hit the 2 shops I knew. Both shops are located close by my house so is the perfect excuse to get some fresh air and stretch my legs that after sitting all day they really needed it.
On my way to the fisrt shop I came across a third one a new shop that happened to be only 2  blocks from my house , the shop is very well hidden and the sign of hudba stroe  doesn’t ring a bell! Just now after all my research I know that it means music store! Otherwise you can easily dismiss the little sign.
The entrance is quite dark and the store as I mentioned well hidden in the back of a parking lot , I wasn’t sure if I should follow the sign and go in to the back of the building and find the store , usually I am very cautious coming from a dangerous city I try to avoid places that seem dark/dangerous and isolated .
The difference is that I am not in a big city Prague is super safe and after living 4 years here with not even one dangerous experience I am becoming a little bit more trustful and relaxed . after a bit of thinking I deced to go in, there was a bald guy smoking a cigarette close to the entrance of the building I passed by giving the classic dobry den ( good day ) expression and walked towards the end of the corridor and to the parking lot followed the sign and finanly found a black door with hudba stroe and some flyers etc , I opened the door the store was empty only the shop attendant that greeted me with the classic dobry den .
I walked around the shop with the list I written before in my hand trying to identify familiar names and looking at the price tags I recognized some combos form what I saw online , for example the Vox Pathfinder or the Peavey Rage 258 were among my price range;  the Fender Frontman 212R way out of my budget , there were others like Ibanez and Crate also a bit out my budget .
The shop attendant asked me if I was looking for something in particular I showed him the list not sure if he would speak English , luckily for me he did speak English and he told me that the lsit I had of potential combos were more suitable for a electric guitar , Vox, or Peavey Rage are more for an electric guitar as they have something like a hole in the back of the amp to create a different kind of sounds more heavy metal kind of style , not very recommendable for an acoustic guitar clear sound .
The only combos he had in stock for acoustic guitar  were not known for me, couldn’t recall them from my previous research and way out fo my budget around of 7000 Czech crowns  around of 420 buck the cheapest .
With mixed emotions I left the store, for one side I was grateful to be so lucky to meet such a nice shop attendant that spoke English and explained me in a more detailed way the differences between combos the bad part is that I realized that this purchase wasn’t going to be so easy as I thought, and that I needed to realize that maybe I wouldn’t be able to find one that would meet my price range expectations.
I walked towards the second shop, this shop I knew and is in a passage close to the centre.
The shop is very very small , a few guitars and some amps and some accessories but nothing else , I came inside and showed my list to the attendant , he didn’t speak English and he started to talk to me in Czech and I think he was trying to tell me they didn’t have those form my list , he pointed out the amps they had and from what I could see that they were more for electric and not for akustická kytara .
The visit was very brief and decided to leave and  go directly  to what I thought would be the one the store that would have what I needed .
The last shop is in the center of the city, this hudební obchod is quite a big shop, with signs outside etc; plus  I have been there before and remember seeing  various amps of many kind . Once inside , is always kind of weird to go these kind of places , what I mean is that the people in music shops (at least here in Europe) is not common to see women alone going to see guitars and stuff  that is more for man.. you know what I mean ,is more like a man sanctuary rather than a girls shopping spot , anyway I walked around the store pretending that I knew a bit of what I was looking for I mean I kind of knew.. or at least had an idea.
After looking at all the amps I asked one of the shop attendants if he had amps for acoustic guitars, he pointed his finger to the part of the room where the acoustic guitars were close by and behind them were a few combos for acoustic , I recognized there the Crate , Ibanez and some others none of them were among my price range  the rest all electric only 5  acoustic guitar amps and all seemed to be more for professionals rather than for home practice .I asked him if he knew any other shops and he tld me only the other 2 I have just been and besides of them one that is quite faraway , so nothing helpful really .
At this point I am bummed, couldn’t find any amp that I could afford and my surprise is ruined! what is worst is that when my husband called me, a day before I assumed that will be so easy to get an amp, with this wrong assumption I told him I had a surprise for him , of course he asked me what and couldn’t resist to tell him that I had bought him already the amp , he sounded super happy and I was excited for the idea of getting it the following day as I was sure that after  all the time and work I spent investigating and learning about amps ,it would be easy , I definitely was not expecting  this setback of not finding one.
That afternoon after my unsuccessful visit to the shops I came back home to try to do some research there must be a combo for acoustic guitar affordable and ok of quality, I just needed to figure out the name , once again futile search in the guitar sites as all are for electric so I went directly to a site I know they would have some user reviews Amazon.com of course !
I typed acoustic combo and one interesting prospect came up : the Behringer AT108 it had 1135 user ratings , 4 and half star punctuation , the comments were great plus the price is perfect .
Excited with the new prospect I searched for it in the local sites and found that they actually have it too ! only in the e shops but is at least a progress , that evening I decided that the following day I would go again to the first shop I visited  because the shop attendant was very friendly and he told me that in their shop there is a possibility to order any amp I wanted and that they would get it for me .
So today I went to the shop, he initially advice that I should get the Roland Micro Cube, they had it in the shop for a super price and is listed as one of the top 5 amps for electric , unsure of what to do  I told him about the Behringer AT108 and he said why don’t we try the amps right here and now so you can listen to the sound and make your decision I think this act of actually listening to the different types of amps was more educative that all the research I could have made .
Personally, I didn’t understand why the fuzz of getting one combo-amp that is designed for acoustic guitar only ,  I figured that is a top 5 best amps even if is for electric should work fine in the acoustic no ?
Well , NO after we tried the Peavey , and the Roland and then he plugged the guitar in one amp that was desinged for acoustic WOW big difference!
The combo-amp for acoustic guitar is focused more in the clarity and quality of the sound , electric combo guitar are not so clear and the quality for the sound from an acoustic guitar can be greatly diminished , listening to the sound of the guitar with the different amp types made a big difference even for someone not experienced  like me .
At this point I told him I really wanted to get the Behringer AT108, is a good price amp , has very good reviews and is made for acoustic guitar only! They didn’t have it on stock but he checked and he can order it and have it for me in 3 days,  so I can have it at home before my husband is back ! Plus I get it for a cheaper price than what I found online and super close home !
I am excited to see how good it will work , I haven’t heard it yet, but after all seems to be the best option.

I will update you after hubby tries it, wish me good luck .
What an adventure!
Love
X.

This is our first Thanksgiving as a married couple, so of course it’s bound to be an exciting day! We faced the age-old question of whose family we would spend the holiday with. This year, we opted to have Thanksgiving dinner with E’s family since his sister, her husband and kids are traveling from South Carolina to be here. Although I’m sad that I won’t be spending Turkey Day with my family, I am happy to have a family that is flexible and understanding about our new married situation. I’m going to have Saturday dinner with my folks so I get a chance to see my sister who is home from college for the holiday. It’s been so exciting preparing for Thanksgiving- we even offered to make a couple of dishes for the feast today! Here’s what’s on the menu:

Monkey Bread
{click title for recipe}

E’s sister, hubby, and kids are coming over to see our new place this morning so I am making this delicious classic, Monkey Bread. If you haven’t had it before, it’s basically like a cinnamon roll in bundt cake form. Talk about heaven. This only gets consumed by me like once a year, if that. But it’s darn good… Super easy recipe as well.

Martha’s Perfect Macaroni & Cheese
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This sinfully delicious recipe has been referenced in the blogosphere as “Crack and cheese” so I’m expecting it to be amazing. I mean, it’s Martha… who am I kidding? It’s gonna be flippin’ delectable.

Sweet Potato Casserole
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We are adding marshmallows to the linked recipe. Cuz that’s how we roll. You can’t have a southern Thanksgiving feast without some sweet potatoes, y’all.

Also I’m super excited to use my servingware, our lovely Wilton Armetale and our nice Emma Pottery Barn Platters.

I hope you all have a safe and happy thanksgiving! Here’s some things I’m thankful for:

I am thankful for my wonderful family who supports me and loves me so much.

I am thankful for friends both near and far, and the joy they have brought to my life.

I am thankful for my dear husband- I’m so happy I married my best friend!

I am thankful for our new home where we will make many happy memories.

I am thankful that E’s parents let us live with them for 5 whole months so we could save enough money to buy this lovely home.

I am thankful for my parents and all that they have helped us do regarding the move and setting things up.

I am thankful for E’s sister and am so happy that we are friends.

I am thankful that we have food to eat (even if it’s often Red Baron frozen pizza), clothes to wear (even if they came off the sale rack), and a car to drive (even if it’s the same one I’ve had since I was 16.) I am so very lucky to have the things that I have.

I am thankful for my current job situation, that I get to work on so many different projects and that my schedule is flexible. Working from home is pretty sweet, I can’t lie.

I am happy for my health. My small problems here and there are nothing compared to what some others have gone through.

I am thankful for the opportunities, friendships, and community that this blog has brought into my life.

I am thankful for God’s unceasing love and endless grace and all the blessings He has bestowed upon my life. I would have none of these things without Him.

Thanks for stopping by.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

So I haven’t been feeling very well lately. Some of you may remember that I started getting really bad stomach pains before the wedding, which I assumed to be stress-related. It went away for a little while, but for the past couple of months, it has been back with a vengeance. My stomach is extremely sensitive and most meals make me sick. This happens particularly in the morning–I am basically screwed if I need to leave the house within about four hours of waking up, because my stomach is so unsettled that I sometimes have trouble making even the 20 minute commute to my university. I feel pretty constantly stressed out about it, and it has made me very self-conscious in social settings, and particularly in meetings and the like when it would seem like a faux pas to run out of the room in pain. Long car rides freak me out.

It is not very fun. My mom is a doctor, which is invaluable for quick medical feedback, although it also means that I’m pretty lazy and rarely make it out to see my GP. We’ve bounced a few ideas around about what it could be: some kind of bacterial infection, a dairy or wheat allergy (which was my suspicion, but I have been paying attention to when the pain happens, and it seems pretty inconsistent re: what I’ve eaten), or a stress-related illness. This morning I’m headed to finally get a blood test done (I have literally been putting this off for months,which…I know, I know) to see if it’s the former, which would be ideal as it would just take some antibiotics to solve. If the tests reveal nothing, then we’ll start looking at the food allergy possibilities. I am scared as hell of having some kind of super restrictive food allergy. But that would still be better, in my mind than just finding out that it’s “stress”, the hardest thing to actually, you know, solve, but very real and painful nonetheless. I don’t want to keep living like this.

Three years ago, I went through another spell where I felt really unwell. I was always tired and depressed, as well as cold, fuzzy-headed, and unmotivated. Something was wrong, but it was all such a vague sense of “wrong” that I did not in any way realise that I might actually be sick. I went to a counselor, told her I was struggling, and she told me I was just experiencing the normal stresses of a grad student. It did not feel normal. A few months into this funk, I had a freakout, and on a whim I booked tickets home to see my family for ten days and decompress. My mother took one look at me and said, “there is something wrong.” “I know,” I replied, and told her I was stressed out. “No,” she explained, “there is really something wrong”. And off we went to get my blood tested. I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism, a chronic illness which basically means that my metabolism is incapable of functioning by itself, thus slowing down virtually everything your body does (from digesting food to heating your body to sending you seratonin), within days. My hormone levels were nuts. I was totally shocked–I had never once thought to attribute my state to a physical illness, and I never would have gone to a doctor myself. Thank goodness my mom picked up on what was going on as soon as she saw me. I’ve been medicated ever since, and once we found the right dose, I was fine.

It took a lot of adjusting mentally to the idea that I was now a person with a “chronic illness” and that I would have to take a pill every day for the rest of my life, but hypothyroidism is at least fairly mild and easy to treat. And I cannot possibly describe how liberating it was to be diagnosed–to know that I was not crazy, or imagining what I was feeling, or whatever. And to be diagnosed with something that was so easily treatable…wow. About a month into my meds, I woke up one morning and felt actually awake for the first time in months, like my head had emerged from a cloud and everything was so clear, all of a sudden. It wasn’t until I felt ok again that I realised just how bad things had gotten previously. It was like night and day.

All that to say that I feel shaky about the often blurry line between feeling unwell due to stress and feeling unwell due to physical illness. So often the two are interlinked, of course, but it’s so hard to know when you’re just feeling “down” or “out of it” and when something is really wrong. I know that I tend not to act on these things for fear of being a whiner or hypochondriac; I have been blessed with pretty decent health my whole life thus far (knock on wood!) and I don’t want to complain. I also think this stance is a very gendered one. But I was given a real shock with my hypothyroidism diagnosis, and the reality that had I not had a perceptive doctor mom, I may have gone undiagnosed for years, totally miserable. So I am trying to be more conscious of these things. But I also worry so much that it will turn out to all be “in my head”. I just hope that I find a way to feel better soon.

Do any of you feel conflicted about how you handle your health?

I can’t believe we’ve been in this house almost three years.  The only major catastrophe (knock on wood) has been the air conditioning breaking this past summer.  I’m sure you remember me whining about that incessantly.

Other than that, we’ve (successfully) done a lot to this place.  We’ve painted the whole house, laid tile and laminate floors throughout the downstairs, installed an over-the-range microwave, put in a few ceiling fans, and landscaped a lot.  When I say we really, I mean Joe.  He is the brains behind it all.  I’m just the whiny free labor that begs for constant breaks and pizza delivery.

Here is a little visual for the before and after of the floors in the half bath.

So, after we (and by we, again, I mean Joe) turned off the shower yesterday morning, I heard the ceiling peeing somewhere downstairs.  I ran down to find the entire half bath covered in warm shower water from the drain that runs just above the ceiling.  It was coming out of the fan at a steady clip and mocking me as it dripped, Chinese water torture style.

Me: [panicked and frantic] There’s water EVERYWHERE!

Joe: [totally calm, like a first grade teacher talking to a hysterical student that just lost their pants] Must be from where I fixed the shower drain.  It was running really slow.

Me: It doesn’t look fixed to me!!!

I ran down to the basement to grab some dirty towels to mop everything up and there was MORE water coming out of the basement ceiling.  I couldn’t stop thinking about how hard we worked to make this place look nice and that it could all be ruined in a waterlogged instant.

We (Joe) dug out the dehumidifier and mopped up everything he could.  He re-sealed the drain with some strange putty stuff and cleaned it all up.  If we hadn’t met, I’d be a condo girl well into my 80s.  So far, there is no lasting damage.  The half bath ceiling is going to be opened up this weekend and the pitch of the drain fixed so that (hopefully) we don’t have to keep cleaning it out and compromising the seal.  Keep your fingers crossed for my sanity.  (As if you couldn’t tell already, I don’t do well with home improvement stuff.)

Surprisingly for us, it was really relaxing!!  In the midst of end of semester projects and exams, we just took a time out and spent good quality time together.  On Friday, we went to the movies to finally watch “Precious”.  We didn’t get to see it last week, the website I checked mistakenly had the wrong date up (I was so upset lol).  It was a great movie, I’m reading the book “Push” by Sapphire now to fill in all the missing parts that Yin informed me that the movie missed.

 On Saturday, we relaxed in bed until early afternoon when I had a hair appointment at the salon in the mall.  Yin decided to go shopping while I was getting my hair done.  She ended up in Old Navy and picked us up some cute winter scarves, gloves, and hats on SALE!!  She also got us these cute New York t-shirts since we absolutely fell in love with NYC after our trip over Labor Day weekend.  We miss NYC!  After the mall, we went home and relaxed some more, spent the rest of the day watching TV together and having good convos.  Saturday night, we learned something new about Yin (that I won’t share ) but she’s part of a special club that only 10-40% of women have this experience…EVER.  That was very exciting to find out, that kept us up all night! LOL.

 On Sunday, we lounged around in bed again, watching the marathon of Snapped episodes on the Oxygen channel.  Once we watch one, we’re hooked until the last episode!  Yin spoke with her family that day about Thanksgiving plans, her mother and sister are coming over to our apartment, her mom is going to do most of the cooking :)  Yin is making her famous crockpot mac n cheese (it sounds weird, but it’s absolutely delicious!  Maybe I can get her to post the recipe on here, I don’t know, she might want to keep it to herself lol)  For Christmas, my mother and my little 5 year old cousin (who she has custody of, so she’s kinda like my little sister) are coming down from Jacksonville.  We got Twinkie (my cousin’s nickname) some clothes and a lot of little girly things that she’ll love!  I’m looking forward to seeing her, I miss her a lot since I basically took care of her when she was a baby until I moved.  Anyway, Sunday afternoon/evening included a trip to Wal-Mart to pick up a few groceries and things for around the house, a load of laundry, and a few homework assignments being done.

 All in all, this past weekend was the most relaxing weekend it seems like we’ve had in a long time!  I just really enjoyed spending quality time with the wife without running around like a chicken with its head cut off getting assignments done!  Am I looking forward to the holidays???  Um…I don’t know, I’m pretty indifferent this year.  As long as Yin is by my side, it doesn’t really matter what else is going on

 Okay, we’ll let you know how our Thanksgiving goes, hope you all have a happy and safe holiday!!  Don’t eat too much turkey…and make sure to ration your pumpkins…there’s a shortage lol.

 -The Yang

I so enjoyed chatting with y’all about foodstuffs last week that I am thinking of making it a weekly occurence. Let’s be honest here: there is little that I love to talk about more than food. The mister and I used to have a food blog, but it lapsed once we moved back to Canada and found it difficult to maintain. Back in the UK, we also used to run our own little stall at a teeny local community-run farmers’ market, where we would sell homemade mostly organic baked goods. It was a very wholesome (pun intended!) phase of our lives. I had the pleasure of introducing the British to a proper bagel. So I kind of miss blathering on about food. Since I find Mondays depressing and difficult to manage, I thought that maybe it might cheer me up to start each Monday off with a post about my food thoughts for the week. Would you guys be into that?

This past week, we:

Prepared our duck prosciutto (see original food post for info), which is currently curing in our fridge. This involved dousing it in salt, then letting it sit for 24 hours, and then rinsing it, rubbing it in a mix of herbs, spices and sugar, and wrapping it tightly in a tea towel to sit for 3-4 weeks, all of which is made considerably more challenging when done while one’s persistent kittens try to steal the tasty duck breasts for themselves:

We are hoping that it will be ready in time for the as yet unplanned Hanukkah party that we are hoping to throw before we leave town for Christmas. I feel like duck is fatty enough to qualify for Hanukkah food!

Then this weekend, I baked 7 dozen of my favourite cupcakes (ginger with ginger cream cheese frosting – see recipe here), for Cupcake Camp, a delicious charity event that took place yesterday. I had actually set out to make 5 dozen cupcakes, but somehow in adjusting the recipe, the damn cupcakes just wouldn’t stop coming! It was intense. I then went to the event with two friends, all macho and ready to gorge ourselves like never before, and we all maxed out at 2 cupcakes each. Pathetic. We went home with takeout boxes and tummy aches, but not before checking out the awesomeness:

There is no greater way to bring a smile to my face than through the glory of poutine cupcakes.

My own modest little contribution is in the bottom right corner!

I came home with the following spoils of war:

I would be embarrassed to admit how obsessed I was with that pancake cupcake. Let’s just say that it made me very happy. I mean come on: it’s a cupcake that looks like a PANCAKE! Amazing. (I also love the blue-topped rainbow cupcake in the back there; so clearly baked up by a little kid, and man, little kids baking is one of my favourite things ever because I am a sap.)

Finally, I want to talk about meatloaf. I realise that most people find meatloaf disgusting. I didn’t even know what I thought of meatloaf, as I do believe that I had not tasted a bite of the stuff since I became a vegetarian at the tender age of 9 (a habit which was driven out of me in Bosnia, at the tender age of 24). But as the mister has been working nights, I’ve been looking for nice comfort food to cook for dinner to make him feel better about his shitty zombie schedule. And so last week, I decided to try this recipe based on how emphatically people raved about it in the comments. Neither the mister nor I could remember the last time we’d eaten meatloaf or if we had enjoyed it or not, but I swear to you people–this stuff is so flavourful and delicious it will blow your mind. We scarfed it down with mashed potatoes and then made sandwiches out of it for days. It will convert even the most virulent meatlof skeptic. Crazy as it may sound, it is all about the prunes and bacon.

I should also mention that on Friday night we tried out a new burger joint and ate fresh and ridiculously tasty burgers for $3.50. Seriously. Hell yeah.

What have y’all been eating lately?

Last night, Steve, SMS, SDS and I were at dinner last night and somehow the topic of insurance came up.
We mentioned that ours was pretty good.

“Yeah, my crazy pills were only $10 and my not-having-babies was $30 a
month… so awesome!”
And she looks to me, “Oh, I thought you were stopping those.”
“Excuse me?”
“I thought you were going to stop taking those.”
“Who told you that?”
“I thought you did.”, she remarking, looking very disappointed.

Meanwhile, the voice in the back of my head is laughing hysterically, “Right, because I’d totally tell YOU that.”

But I said, “Uh. No.”

Don’t flush popsicle sticks down the toilet. It never leads to anything good.

Real men like The Bridges of Madison County and aren’t afraid to admit it.

Life is more fun when it’s not planned to the hilt. Give yourself some leeway to smell the roses and expect the unexpected.

Always pay your debts in a timely fashion. They will come back to bite you at the worst possible times … like when you’re trying to get that mortgage approved.

Obey posted speed limits, especially when you drive a bright yellow crotch rocket.

A long road trip involving lots of tent camping is quite possibly the most fun two people can have together.

Try every new thing you have the opportunity to try. This includes food, even if it kind of freaks you out.

It’s way easier to be nice than bitchy.

Don’t be so quick to judge people. Give them the benefit of the doubt. But don’t let them jerk you around either.

Do what you love.

Be honest with the people you care about. Say what you feel. It is the best way to maintain the integrity of your relationships.

Don’t wait until the last minute to do everything.

It’s way better to be on time than 20 minutes early or 20 minutes late.

You don’t have to wear a lot of makeup to look pretty. In fact, you often look better without it.

It’s OK to tell someone they have bad breath if it’s done with love. Same goes for that piece of spinach stuck in their teeth.

Vegetables are good for you.

Hugs, kisses and spooning are the best inventions ever.

The less you try to control the person you are with, the better your relationship will be.

Turns out, the person with the most stuff at the end of their life doesn’t win. They’re just dead. Don’t focus so much on the material junk.

Andrew Zimmern is a pretty gross guy.  

Some of the best food available comes from the sketchiest-looking restaurants.

Don’t forget how to be childlike. Remind yourself by hanging out with kids as much as possible.

What lessons have you learned from your spouse or SO?

Money is one of those things I think about quite often. It’s pretty much unavoidable since it affects just about every area of my life. And truthfully, I’m pretty good with the stuff. I put a little bit into both a savings and a Roth IRA every month. I pay all our bills on time. I don’t have any credit card debt. Et cetera.

But I really, really, really, really, really hate the stuff. I don’t believe it’s the root of all evil, as the cliche goes, but I believe it’s the root of a lot of evil given the right situation.

In my personal life, I’ve never cared about having a lot of money. Sure, it would probably have its advantages, but so long as I have enough to keep a roof over my head, food on my table and the cable and Internet turned on, I’m OK with that. I don’t make a lot working in magazine publishing. The first few years that Brian and I dated, he had given up a lucrative career to do what he loved, so he wasn’t pulling in much. No matter what our salaries have been, we’ve always loved each other just the same.

My main issue with money is that certain people use it as a control mechanism. They give you money as a gift. Or maybe one of your parents pays for your schooling. Or they buy you a car. Or they cover the cost of something else that you can’t afford. And then they spend the rest of their natural lives throwing their “generosity” back in your face. How nice they were. How they could have done something else with the money, but didn’t because they are so awesome.

Since I was very young, I have shied away from asking for anything — money or other assistance — because I absolutely loathe being indebted to anyone for any reason. I hate the feeling of believing life is going along fine and dandy and then, out of nowhere, you have a chat with someone who once gave you something and they make you feel like a total piece of shit. That feeling is multiplied by 1,000 when it’s family, someone who probably does really love you, but would rather assert their imagined control over you at that moment instead.

I’m definitely bitter and jaded about this kind of thing, but I also know there are people out there who don’t conduct themselves like that. Thank goodness. What they do, what I wish and hope everyone would learn to do, is give because they want to, because they can, with no strings attached. Give because it makes you happy. Give because it will undoubtedly help out the person or people you’re giving to. And then move the fuck on.

This is me right after I got married.

Summer ‘09

I have decided to do something rather unlike me.  I have complained a lot on my blog about stress, missing my husband, etc.  I have also complained to myself how I am not getting enough sleep, eating right, or losing weight.  Most military wives want to look phenomenal when their husbands get home, either for R&R or permanently.  That was, and is my goal.  I started off great but I let stress take over my life and I lost balance between work and me.  So, here is what I am going to do.  I am going to post my weight loss on my blog until I get to my goal weight of 145 pounds.  Currently, I am at 178.5 pounds.

A LITTLE HISTORY

I used to weigh over 250 pounds so the weight above doesn’t seem so bad.  I also used to weigh 150 pounds (after I lost my first 100 pounds).  I was at my happiest, healthiest, and most confident.  I want that back so bad!  I have until March when Joey gets back for his R&R.  That means I need to lose 33.5 pounds in 4 months.  Wow!  Putting that in writing seems extremely daunting with the holidays coming up and all, but I started my original journey, several years ago, around Halloween!  I made it through the holidays that time and even managed to lose weight. 

So keep an eye on my blog and check out my progress.  I think pictures are in order, too, so I am attaching the most current one I have since I don’t really like taking them.  I could use encouragement and would love to hear your stories of weight loss as well.

I will be updating each Saturday after I weigh in.  I will also discuss if my eating/working out/sleeping habits have had any effect on my progress. 

SEE YA NEXT WEEK!

So we survived Thanksgiving yay! I have to say this Thanksgiving went rather well considering it was the first time our parents met. I originally was super stressed but it wasn’t as stressful as I anticipated which actually brought alot of relief. Thanksgiving down now only Christmas to go! Our moms were supposed to meet at Christmas but I’m not so sure that’s going to happen. We invited my mom to dinner but she’s now hosting as well and invited us over but I don’t think we’ll be attending since Yang’s mom has offered to come down from J-ville and cook for us. Of the the almost 4 and a half years Yang and I have been together we have only spent one holiday (our 2nd Thanksgiving) with her mom, so it’s only fair that we spend this Christmas with her. Spending time with her mom is nice other than her lack of acknowledgement of our relationship. Yang and I both know if she was in a hetero relationship her mom would be the best mother-in-law.

I’m not as close to my family mainly my mom as I would like to be so it would be nice if I could form a bond with the family I’ve married into. Things with Yang’s mom are complicated she’s nice in person and we all have alot of fun when she’s around as long as there is no mention of my and Yang’s relationship. Things are alot different with Yang’s family than with mine well as far as parents are concerned. Her parents actually like to get out and do things movies, parks, bball games ect. mine on the other hand are fine sitting home with a beer in front of the television. My parents acknowledge us as a couple and my mom even refers to Yang as my wife and her daughter-in-law those are two things we would never ever hear come from Yang’s mother’s lips. Maybe the difference in our parents approval for our relationship is because of the time that they have known about our sexuality. I came out to my parents about 10 years ago when I was 16, Yang didn’t do so until about 4 years ago. Possibly my parents have had more time to adjust and realize I’m not going through a phase since they have seen me go through other relationships always with females. Our relationship is not Yang’s first but is the first gay relationship her parents are aware of, so that being said partially I feel that they look at me as the “evil gay” girl who corrupted their innocent daughter which is so far from the truth. We hope eventually they’ll come around but only time will tell.
~yin

On this day 80 years ago, my grandfather was born.

On this day 10 years ago, he celebrated his last birthday here on earth.

I was on a street corner in Paris when I learned of his death in March 2000.  The trip had been planned for more than six months, before he even got sick, and I had said my goodbyes three days and one long plane flight earlier knowing they’d be my last moments with him.  He did not have 10 days left.  The brain cancer that originated in his lungs from years of smoking left him blind and barely there.

His last request was me to bring him back genuine Parisian beret, which I still have.  I got irrationally pissed at a college boyfriend for trying to wear it one day (much like now I get angry at anyone that smokes around me).  No one had worn it — ever.  No one should wear it.  It’s his.

Grandpa’s birthday always falls around Thanksgiving, which reminds me to be thankful for the nearly 16 years we had together.  Also, my wedding anniversary is just before the calendar marker of our last day together, which is somewhat by design.  For a long time I hated St Patrick’s Day because of what it forced me to leave behind.  Now I have a husband to celebrate with and the day reminds me of the new man I admire in my life rather than being angry about the role model I lost.  My uncle has said more than once grandpa would appreciate Joe’s sense of humor.  I hate the adage that girls marry their fathers — I’d much prefer the saying was grandfathers.

I gave his plant some extra water this evening.  Since I took pictures in August, it’s now touching the floor.

Today, I’m thankful (in many ways) for growth.  The last 10 years have been hard, but so blessed.