More Food

Have you tried Gilt Taste yet? It's really great! A few weeks ago I ordered some duck fat and could not wait to use it! I knew I wanted to make fries with it, but I needed a special occasion to make duck fat fries, so finally that occasion came a few weekends ago when we had a get together for our friend Alpa so she could tell us all about her trip to Africa (soooooooo jealous!)

She actually even prepared the fries, so I could sit and relax! (They are fried twice!)

perfection

 

Carol actually threw the food eating bash and she whipped up three types of sliders! Beef with a blue cheese inside, pork (my favorite one), and turkey thanksgiving style. 

Okay okay a lung post

I've been putting off doing a lung update from my check up last week because I had to process a lot of things -- mainly that my wait for lungs might be much longer than I thought, like fall/winter.  The problem is I am staying stable at 22% lung function, so sicker people are moving ahead of me on the list --which makes sense, I know -- but that leaves me hanging here at not a great position (in limbo basically) just waiting for who knows how long.  I get out still, but I probably spend half my time sleeping, and a lot of time on the couch watching TV, or reading and that lead can clearly be depressing. So if I have to keep waiting I need to do something to stimulate my mind.  I am finally going to buy Rosetta Stone and learn Italian, which I have wanted to do forever, and I clearly have the time so why don't I get on that!? I need to just find things I can do in my home to help me from getting disappointed and down.  We also talked about listing myself other places, mainly Duke, but I am not there yet.  I just really hope lungs are coming in 2011...

Happy Monday

Let's start this week off with something funny! My friend Carol is a really great stacker -- it's a hidden talent that only comes out sometimes!

Tomato Salad

What you'll need:
lots of different varieties of tomatoes (yellow, brown, red, orange, grape etc.)
tomatiloes (they are green and tart)
1 avocado
3 garlic cloves
olive oil
salt/pepper to taste

cut up all the tomatoes into wedges, or halves for smaller varieties, cut up avocado in chunks, cover everything in olive oil (more than a drizzle, really coat everything) cut up garlic cloves and add to salad, add salt and pepper and really toss it all around so everything gets covered and let sit for at least 30 minutes (on counter or in fridge)

Zuchinni Fritters

This is a super simple recipe and a crowd pleaser

zucchini-fritters

Watermelon Jello Shots

This weekend we entertained (food posts coming all weekend!) and I saw these cute little idea for jello shots that look like watermelons over at this blog and decided to make them myself

You will need:
a box of watermelon jello (or anything red if you can't get that)
a cup of vodka,
and 10 limes

Cut the limes in half and remove the insides, I did this by cutting around the inside (like a grapefruit) and turning them inside out and ripping the stuff out.  Once that is done you an make the jello like you normally would (add one box to a cup of boiling water, remove and add the vodka slowly) then pour the liquid in the lime halves and store them in the fridge for at least 3 hours.

Once the jello has hardened cut these in half! You can try adding chocolate pieces to look like the seeds too. 

Tryday Friday

The tricup from DD. It melts too fast for me, apparently you need to chug it down and get a brain freeze. I am also unsure of the Vanilla Bean flavor--it is so sweet.  But Blue Raspberry and Cherry are great!

Lip Scuff

My bottom lip is always dry and peeling (gross! I know!) even though I use a sugar scrub once a week (a really expensive one too, that shall remain nameless) Well, the other day I had to buy something to get my parking validated (after I had already bought things but forgot, haha) so we wandered in The Body Shop -- who even knew this place still existed? and I thought this is a great place to find something for my flaky lip problem.  Laura found a lipstick that exfoliates and I was sold.  It's called Lip Scuff and I've used it for only 3 days and my lips literally are not peeling and flaking anymore, like in all seriousness they are back to normal! This is a miracle product!

More Whine?

Today I just had one of those days where everything is annoying me, more specifically because being hooked up to oxygen 24 hours a day is really fricken annoying.  It makes like running out to get a tomato much more than running out to get a tomato.  Everything is a process and some days it just gets very overwhelming, trying to get things done carrying my little oxygen around, being tired, and being out of breath.  We take for granted being able to do little things, like I imagine doing anything in a wheelchair is a horrifying process that all of able walkers take for granted.  Don't take for granted breathing! When you are running around today doing simple tasks imagine what it would be like if you added 20 minutes of annoying to get that task done.  Thank God for those lungs you have!  

Check up next week.  Hopefully I've moved a spot up on the list....shoveling the food this week, weigh in Tuesday : )

Mall Food Court Date

Don't let out this giant secret that I'll go on a food date to a food court -- because normally I would not! I'll do it for like a handful of people and because I love Sarku Japan (I keep calling it Sakura, but whatever.) And it's super convenient because Laura works like almost in the same building.  So tonight we met for Sakura and Pinkberry = Perfection. 

First though, I got lost in the Pru parking garage because I was forced to enter a way I normally don't.  That lost me 15 minutes! Finally once I got there we started off in Sephora because I wanted to try this new peel (blog later) and met two very nice sales people that guided me (shout out vanessa and guy at the register) I got my stuff and we went fast to Sarku.  Okay so I know I'm the only person that gets the meat here.  Is that weird? Everyone else gets chicken.  But I loved it, and ate almost all of it (tip get extra sauce)

Laura is here somewhere

Next we went over to Pinkberry where we finally go to taste the Salted Carmel flavor. It was really yummy but I didn't think I could stand a whole thing of it, so I stuck to regular flavor and Laura impressively got the carmel flavor and loved it!

a little melty

And that makes for our food court date tonight. Next up chick-fil-A!

More Pizza Cups

My friend Carol made a version of pizza cups with basil, fresh mozzarella and a cherry tomato. Check it out. 

Tomato Tartlets from Martha

Sliced tomato over cheddar cheese on puffed pasty (cut out into circles from a sheet)
Bake at 375 for 30 minutes

Must have Stila makeup

Stila waterproof liner in Starry

 

Stila lip/cheek stain in Yumberry Crush

 

the most amazing foundation of all time with a primer mixed in

Stila lip glaze in Watermelon

It's been awhile...

Sorry for the lack of updates! Eek, I think I say this a lot! Last week Pazzo was critically ill (congestive heart failure) and it made for a long long long week, but he seems to have made a super recovery and even goes for his usual buzz cut today! Things are looking up.  Hopefully everyone had a nice fourth.  Mine included lots of food and friends! My aunt Alisha came, and Laura and Abe came on Sunday for the day and I force fed them: hot dogs, chicken wings, pizza dip, Stromboli, pasta salad, grilled cheese, crab cakes, chicken and broccoli, pulled pork and salad.  I made the grilled cheese (brie and apple, or just mozzarella) and the crab cakes (with my own homemade mayo!) and the pasta salad.  I also made a somewhat Martha version of sangria because I didn't have all the ingredients where I used white wine, watermelon, strawberries and sprite and that seemed to be a big hit!

I'm not sure what we were looking up?

After all the food we hopped in the boat and enjoyed the fireworks