i went and bought a salton yogurt maker yesterday (only $15 at bed bath and beyond!) and as i was walking across the parking lot, this view of the sky is what i saw. it was sooo clear today, i could see downtown l.a. from the hill where i live. it was shining on the horizon, all twinkly and clean.

so i got my yogurt going and set to work making a "30-minute meal" courtesy of that morning's rachael ray show. unfortunately (for me) it was more like an hour and a half meal but next time i make it, it'll take 30 minutes since i have the hang of it now. it was absolutely INCREDIBLE. i think she called it a 'fake bake' and that it might be posted on her website. you cook all the ingredients: the rigatoni, pepper/onion/garlic/tomatoes, and chicken sausage separately, then you dump some ricotta, basil and parsley into the cooked/drained pasta and layer the veggie/sausage mixture with the pasta in a glass dish. top with a bunch of fresh parmesan, broil, and oh. my. goodness. it is seriously GOOD.

had the yogurt and fresh applesauce for breakfast this morning...it was awesome! now i'm working on my second batch (to be finished this afternoon.) :)

happy plants...

the clouds are rolling in. this morning i walked out to my car and lo and behold, it was covered with droplets of water. did it rain? did we have a heavy dew? did a cloud come down in the night and kiss my car? who knows? after last winter's deluge, we've had the warmest (knock on wood) winter in the whole world. i read ads in the l.a. times' travel section that shout, "escape the cold! come to mexico!" and wonder at the advertising manager's copyediting team (or person, whatever it is.)

anyway.

this week has been really interesting. for one, i've accomplished a TON at work. the things i usually procrastinate on have been finished and filed away (which has in turn been shockingly thrilling.) check. the marathon training has been excellent. biked 26.2 miles on sunday, ran 13 miles on monday. check. and my eyes have popped wide open every morning at 5 so there's been time to sit and journal and read and sip coffee/eat breakfast without the rush that happens when i sleep in. check.

but with all those happy checks on my To Do list has come a TIREDNESS that i can't shake. last night i couldn't keep my eyes open past 9 p.m.. today I went home at lunch and SLEPT (though I feel much better now, thanks to that nap.) working this hard at work is gratifying but it's only wednesday afternoon and i'm ready to high-five everyone and wish them all a happy weekend.

i'm not sure why i shared all that b/c in the great scheme of things it hardly matters, but no matter. there it is. that's what is going on in my piece of the world.

some inspirational, encouraging, fun, and creative sites:
camp indigo
yarnstorm

well, to start off, here is my new favorite website: orangette. i was wondering if oranges could be cooked (or made into something other than orange juice) because we have a tree filled with 8 million oranges, not to mention the bags which keep on showing up on the counter at the office. so i googled something about cooking oranges or orange recipes or something and molly's blog popped up (haha, i say, 'molly' like we're old friends...) anyway, i started reading and seconds into her first entry, i was getting hungry. oh, yum! i highly recommend it. and she has so many intriguing recipes that i want to try!

the felt kitty picture above is a bit grainy so sorry about that. they're coming right along but admittedly, i didn't really work on them this weekend. all of saturday was consumed with cooking and cleaning (how martha of me!) and sunday was spent recovering (and eating up all that i had cooked, of course.) they do have faces, though, thanks to two workday lunches so far this week, and i'll stuff them and see if i can sew them tonight.

now i'm off to check my email to see if my niece is going to be a valentine's baby. come on, emma! think of all the pink and red and heart-themed birthday parties you will have if you stop procrastinating!

Wonderful Applesauce

This is exactly like the incredible, but expensive applesauce you can buy at Trader Joe's

10 ripe Fuji apples--peeled, cored, and chopped into pieces
2 ripe Gala apples--peeled, cored, and chopped into pieces
Cinnamon

Place apple pieces in crockpot. Sprinkle with cinnamon. Cover pot and turn on Low. Stir every couple of hours to prevent apples from sticking to the side. (Complete cooking time will be between 4-6 hours, so you have time to go on a run, clean the house, watch a lot of tv or whatever you do...) When apples are cooked, mash them gently (leaving some for that chunky applesauce texture) and pour them in a glass jar.



This applesauce is absolutely incredible. It will make you wonder why you ever bought the storebrand applesauce. The key to the sweetness is using really ripe apples. I use Fujis because they are super sweet--no added sugar required! The finished hot applesauce can be:

drizzled over icecream or frozen yogurt
cooled and then mixed in with plain yogurt for a delicious breakfast treat
made into cobbler (place applesauce in a dish then mix a bit of cinnamon, butter and oats together to form cobbler crust and press over applesauce. bake in the oven until oats brown a bit. yum!!!)
and of course, you can eat it straight from the jar, too!

i was a little late getting on the bandwagon for this one, but i just discovered "julia & julie", and am going to read it as soon as i have a minute's time. what a great idea to try to cook your way through an entire cookbook (and then blog the results, hehe.) the author (julie powell) has a blog still and it's a great read...:)

the other night i grabbed joy of cooking before jumping into bed and read up on different kinds of grains. (i had a reason for this, but i can't remember it) i was busily reading all about the differences between polenta and couscous when it occurred to me that my mom used to do the same thing and i'd think, "why would you read a COOKBOOK?" and think it strange. ah well, now i know why 'cause it's so funny to read! my copy is almost 30 years old (mom bought us each one that was copyrighted on the year we were born) and so it is full of these frightful 70s recipes that would make 90% of the population gag nowadays. it's good to know what the ingredients are in turkish delight and mincemeat, though, and it is indispensable when it comes to roasting chicken/turkey and other things of that sort. anyway...

emma's felt kitty now has five sisters. except i made their eyes like the eyes i stitched on my holiday hangup that i did for loobylu's month of softies. i'll take a picture and upload it this weekend. speaking of which, i have loads of pics to upload, but haven't touched my computer at home all week. sadness.

more crafty/sewy/knitty sites to peruse:
kylie gusset
jen leheny

went home for lunch today and saw this in the distance. i love hot weather but it almost always means fires...hope everyone is okay!

**update**
the fire is out! my sister (in idaho) told me they reported the fire on the news but never told them if it had been contained. so, i'm here to say it has! :)

"If you don't go after what you want, you'll never have it. If you don't ask, the answer is always no. If you don't step forward, you're always in the same place." Nora Roberts

this guy's illustration mixed with humor is incredible.

(sunrise from a beautiful weekend)

mmm, what a delicious weekend! if i'm not careful, this is going to turn into a food blog, haha. anyway, after a brilliant moment of inspiration at work the other day, i decided to break down and buy myself a little food processor. this thought process was started because i've been trying to eat less sugar (i know! and after all those posts about nutella and cakes and cookies, too.) as delicious as it is, i'm tired of the sugar-induced coma (hehe), so i decided to cut back.

yeah, well, everything on this earth has sugar in it, folks, so it's been easier said than done. my goal isn't cut out ALL sugar but the refined stuff has got to go. which led me to making my own strawberry jam. (just cook the berries on low over the stove. if they're ripe, they don't need any sugar. mmmm) but then i wanted peanut butter. the problem? the regular stuff has piles of sugar and the organic better-for-you stuff is so expensive.

enter food processor.

so on friday, i made peanut butter. then i made hummus. then i chopped up red peppers. all while making strawberry jam and nectarine jam. mmmm as i said, it was a delicious weekend. :)

i also discovered FAGE yogurt on friday while i was at the store. oh. my. goodness! i love yogurt but have been saddened to notice it is 50% sugar. but not this stuff. it is fluffy, moussey goodness. mmmm it's really expensive, though, so that led me to this site: 101 cookbooks. the making your own yogurt thing has been in the back of my mind (weirdly enough) for a while but i've never listened to the impulse. maybe if i got one of these, i'd do it?

all i know is eating fresher foods and lots of fruits and veggies makes you feel so much better. mmmm



here's a way to use some random leftovers...

2 slices bread, lightly toasted
sandwich meat
a little bit of onion, diced
bit of red pepper, diced
handful of mozzarella cheese
olive oil
black pepper (and salt, if you want)

Cook onion, red pepper and a bit of black pepper in olive oil over low/medium heat until veggies are soft. Remove from heat. Turn oven broiler on to 350 degrees. Place bread on cookie sheet and layer as follows: meat, onion-pepper mixture, cheese. Broil until cheese melts and bubbles (approx. 5 minutes.)

Serve with coffee and fruit and smile! It's a lovely day!

i thought i'd share sunday dinner with you. portebello mushroom tortellini with a bit of sauteed onion/garlic/red pepper drizzled over. oh, and a delicious salad too. mmmm

i walked to the park today.



sketched a tree.



saw the moon.



walked home with the sun setting.

i inhale great draughts of space... -walt whitman

a shop filled only with things from the shop owners' travels??? it exists. how cool is that?!?

last night as my cousin was searching for something (again), I thought of an invention that will make me instantaneously rich (after I go through all the capital investment and research and marketing, of course.) we have gps, yes? we have tracking devices, no? so why can't we put that technology on a "sticker" that we can stick on all our easy-to-lose objects? one on the car keys. one on the ipod. one on the cellphone. you get the idea.

these little stickers would all be trackable by way of a computer program, so you could log on and find your object in a matter of seconds. a flat-screened computer grid that masquerades as a beautiful photograph would also be a nice way to do it. so you check out the screen, find that you've been sleeping with your keys since they're nestled in your blankets, and go on with life.

wouldn't that be soooo much better than wasting all that time and energy back-tracking?

hmmmm...

the thing is, somewhere in the world they probably already have something like this. and someday little kids will be slapping these stickers on all their toys. :)

i love you, largo. last night, my sis and i went over to largo for some music and dinner. we got there in record time so we sat in the parking lot for a while and caught up. right across the street from largo is canter's deli and when we peeped in, we saw rows and rows of delicious looking pastries. mmm canter's is open 24/7 so if you ever get a craving for a chocolate-dipped treat at 2 in the morning and you're on or near fairfax in l.a., now you know where you can go.

wow, they must have some crazy and incredible stories...

and now for a day of links

i've always loved making stuff but before my eyes were opened to the HUGE community of crafters/knitters/makersofwonderfulthings on the web, i thought the only other people who liked to make things were the little old ladies in front of me in line at the local fabric store. (i bet they could kick my butt in knitting, though!) anyway, this community has been so encouraging to me. so when i wonder if it's lame to be jennie-embroidering onesies for baby emma, i just do a little web surfing and realize i'm not alone. ;) so many fun places were discovered today...

rebecca magazine - a lovely german (!) knitting magazine that is incredible. usually knitting magazines make me gag a little b/c they're either full of bulky, boxy sweaters or full of weird knit things that might be fun to make, but who would ever wear a knitted skirt? huh? anyway...

make workshop - oh. my. goodness. i want to go here sooo bad. does l.a. have a place like this? could i start a place like this??!!! how incredible!!!

tucker nichols - my new favorite artist.

floating on water - gorgeous, simple design. beautiful!!

tania howells - i love her stuff and i got a postcard from the exchange from her! what a treat...thanks, tanya!!! :)