Recipe Tips

A few weeks back I posted a very simple status update on facebook that asked for suggestions on what to serve on the side with Carne Asada. I was very specific with the fact that i wasn't interested in rice or beans. Ohio mexican food is all about the rice and beans and I wanted to get back to the fresh delicious California mexican food that I am used to...well this recipe actually came from a college friend in Denver, but it is sogood that i thought i would share. It is called "calabasitas" - and it was one of about 18 fabulous suggestions I recieved in the 5 minutes after posting my question.

Calabasitas:

this recipe is easy and doesn't require a lot of ingredients (which i definitely like)

Like lots of other recipes, this one starts off with sauteeing onions and garlic in a little bit of olive oil. I would maybe use a little butter next time too becasue it seems to help carmelize the onions a little better than oil alone.

After the onions are cooked down, mix in green chiles, fresh corn, sliced squash and zuchinni. Stir all of the ingredients up and wait for the vegetables to carmelize more than this picture below. Add in some tomato paste, Rotel diced tomatoes, lime juice, salt and pepper.

Place in a pyrex casserole dish...cover with sharp cheddar cheese and bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

I forgot to take a picture of the final product where the cheese had been broiled to perfection...but believe me, it looked and tasted delicious!

Thanks Thomas for the new recipe....hopefully you all can enjoy it too.

Poor Kid!

Some poor kid was not told that his/her friend moved away to Atlanta about 2 months ago as we consequently received the threatening message pictured above. This little crayon scribbled note was tossed into my mail box amongst a bunch of magazines and bills. I feel so bad! I would totally go outside and play (NOW)! ....but i am pretty sure they are actually looking for the kids that lived in our house before me.

How funny is that?

Chicago Baby Shower.

So I have mentioned this on here before....but Pat and I will soon be Aunt Katie and Uncle Pat. To celebrate that fact I went to my sisters baby shower in Chicago this past weekend. My mom and Jim's mom (her husband) put on quite the shower.

I helped with some of the decorations including this cute little clothesline hanging in the back. As always with pictures of decorations (oh yeah and of me too) it always looks cuter in person :) ha ha

Here are the proud parents to be...Jim is dressed in his summer's finest which luckily also coordinated really well with the decor. How cute are they?

Some of the guests in attendance all seated in front of the cute little pink cupcake table with another clothesline that had cute little onesies and bibs that said things like "Gorgeous Just like my Mom"

I wish that Lauren could have been there too! We were missing a sister this weekend (and one other aunt Katie) but they will all be coming to visit from California when the baby is born.

A little snapshot of the food table that had some really fun custom flower pots that my mom decorated. We had delicious chicken salad with grapes, a zucchini/basil/phyllo dough dish, deviled eggs, muffins, fruit, peach/goat cheese and candied pecan salad...and my personal favorite: Knox blocks ( which is really cute layered jello (the green stuff in front) that my mom makes(although it is usually in Christmas colors).

All of the beautiful and adorable gifts for little baby Dowd!

And again...just for the sake of documenting the progress from the last preggers picture of her. Kristen! one of the cutest pregnant ladies I have seen in a long time!

Wall Paper Hell.

While I generally consider my house to be extra cute there were a few areas that were far from it. Lucky for Pat and I the lack of cuteness came in the form of wall paper so it will not require removing walls, adding cabinetry or any other major renovation to get the rooms up to par. Nonetheless, I do have a new found major dislike for the art of removing wall paper. In a nutshell - It completely blows. I am terrified that the amount of hot water required to loosen the paper (I tried "Diff" and it sucks) will end up ruining my floors in the end...somehow my mist turns into giant puddles that need to be cleaned off of the wood every 3-5 minutes and that requires me coming down from the ladder, getting a whole new pile of dry rags from the laundry room - and basically it has just been really really annoying.

I wish i could just ignore it and leave it on the walls but we are talking about a "BonVoyage Paris" motif in the 1/2 bath downstairs, black and white sheet music in the guest bathroom upstairs, a cute little sports border in one of the bedrooms that would be fine but we dont have any kids so it is kind of creepy, and quite possibly the least attractive look is a "country basket, gingham, apple" motif in my mud room/laundry room. It simply cannot continue to exist in my house without causing me a great deal of anxiety.

Soo- it has pretty much all been taken care of. Pat and i have spent the last 2 nights and part of the last weekend (actually the weekend was just Pat. I was in chicago for my sisters baby shower) working on it. We only have about 6 feet of basket border left, one more bedroom, and then we will have to tackle the wall cleaning and re-painting and we will be done.

I can't wait! (read: sarcasm)

sad...sad...sad.

Nothing makes me hate myself more than when I genuinely start to hate high school kids on TV. Why am I watching their show? Why do I care at the age of 25 what a bunch of 15 yr old idiots are doing at a prep school in New York?.....and even worse why do thoughts like "who would want to make out with these fug boys anyways" creep into my brain.

I watched this show for the first time yesterday during my lunch hour. I usually go home, grab a snack, sit on my couch, and try to find anything better than "what Not to Wear" on TLC to watch. Yesterday was no different, but it was the first time I saw this particular show. It is so sad how the kids on this show are trying so desperately to be adults but then you see how immature and "fragile" (for a lack of a better term) they really are when something goes wrong. Like the high school senior who is meeting up with a 25 yr old for a blind date and is curiously able to order a bottle of wine while filming a show about his life in high school....then the Woman (hello pedophile) never shows up and despite all efforts to look like a grown up - sitting in a restaurant, ordering wine, dressed like a total choch art dealer....he still sounds like a total baby dealing with his embarrassment over being stood up. Where are these kids parents??? and why do people even have children when they have no plans of being present?

Whatever the case I was appalled....at the kids and at myself for watching the show.

I just want to thank God that no one ever roped me into doing a reality show when i was thinking, saying, and doing all of the dumb crap that I did when I was a teenager. Although, had i been on a reality show in high school there would have been much MORE N'sync and much LESS making out - But maybe that is why I never had my own show...... or a boyfriend ha ha.

I'm in Love...

I am absolutely in love with the flowers in my backyard...especially the hydrangeas! I snipped a little bouquet from the pink plant and placed it near my sink. I love it so much that I thought i would share.

My Aunt and Grandma brought me a huge purple and Blue hydrangea that I am going to plant tonight so perhaps I will mix the 2 colors next time...get excited - It is coming soon!

Updates....

Surprisingly, I have been doing plenty of other things not related to missing Pat. Ccontrary to my last 3 posts I have actually been really busy and having tons of fun.

Right after Vegas with the O'B girls I drove to Chicago to meet up with my sister and Jim. We went to the Dowds lakehouse for 4th of July and it was awesome! The whole area was just like a Norman Rockwell painting. There were little boys playing baseball in a small park near the lake, adorable little lake cottages, american flags all over the place, fireworks on the lake and tons of BBQ. I didn't have my camera with me but I stole some of these pics form Kristen and Jim

Here we are on the actual 4th. Not as tan as I would like to be at this point of the summer, but at least I was "Patriotic" in my red dress.

And how cute is Kristen's baby bump? Only a few weeks left to go! - and P.S> that is the other Aunt Katie (jims sister...my college rooommate)

And here is most of the Dowd crew down by the lake.

And that is all...Pat had my camera in Africa still so I didn't fully document this super fun weekend.

What a thoughtful little liar.....

I finally talked to Pat again today. We had the nicest conversation catching up on what he has been doing the past 2.5 weeks.....We talked about the fabulous meals he has been having...what kind of animals he has seen ....I got info about our renters in Florida...I mentioned some stuff i had done around the house. You know, the usual quick conversation stuff. Then I asked him what he was doing for the last few days of his trip. His answer (in a very non-chalant voice): "Ummmm well i think we are going to do some sightseeing, maybe go shopping, i don't really know."

Shopping? seriously? I thought I knew him better than that....and then 20 minutes later I realized "Ido know him better than that. WTF. Especially since he is in Africa - I mean what on earth would he be shopping for."

Tara told me the truth. She is Pat's brother's girlfriend and apparently she is "tuff" enough to "handle the truth"

They are not shopping. They are Bungee jumping off of the world record Highest freaking bridge in the world!!!!!!! WHAT!.....Um Excuse me Pat - That is not shopping. Not even close.

I appreciate (in the most minimal way humanly possible) that he was trying not to worry me...but in his effort to do so I think he missed the point. I GENUINELY do not want him or anyone else I know and love to do something where you are putting your life at risk.

I am such a wimp. It isn't that i do not have a sense of adventure....I just find no-fun in doing something where you are 100% out of control and you can't prevent your own death (thank you white water rafting for ruining my life and making me feel this way).

I for sure will not be sleeping tonight....and i now have a whole new set of worries to worry about before Pat finally gets home on Sunday.

....oh and yes...that picture is of the actual bridge my husband will be dangling off of some time in the next 24 hours.

Eff x's 1000000000000.

I am needy.

This dude (pictured above) has abandoned me for 3 weeks and I miss him. We have had 3 converstaions in that time totalling an unbelievable 5 minutes and that is just not enough to keep me content. Just thought I would share.

nice face.

In honor of my husbands trip that he is currently on in South Africa I decided to don this wonderful Lion hat I found at the MGM Grand in Vegas along with the obnoxious Miley Cyrus platypus face. I think I pulled it off pretty well. Don't I look annoying?

Anyways, Miley Cyrus aside...I miss my freakin husband! He has been gone a week now and we have only talked once for about 2 minutes. He is in the middle of nowhere being all safari chic and I am at home wondering all day long what it must be like to see all of those wild animals and marveling at how times change. We used to spend 2-3 months apart on a regular basis back when Pat was playing baseball and I was usually fine with it. We did talk non stop, but still...I was tougher. I did 2 months apart like a champ compared to how wimpy I am being with the 3 week departure.

The funny thing is that all of this time away has made me realize that i don't think we have honestly ever gone 24 hours without talking (ever) in the last (almost) 8 yrs!! That doesn't mean we never call each other just to say "Hi whats up - you suck" but it does mean that we have never broken up or really not liked each other enough to not call. Funny huh? And then when i am all bored and lonely I think about the fact that we have been together 8 years. In my mind that makes me feel like we met when i was about 10 but really...it was on my 18th birthday that we met. I used an ID that belonged to a girl he was sort of dating to get into a bar and we pretty much fell in love after that ( side note: I guess pat had a "type". I used her ID because she was the only other 5'10 blonde with green eyes in the bar). Don't worry though....we didn't meet in that bar. We met shortly before that in a dorm room doorway where I offered him a french fry. Jim (my sisters now husband) told me all about Pat and how he was the nicest guy he had ever met - a super hot baseball player -a smart little finance major - and all around superstar. Lucky for me he wasn't lying and Pat really was super nice and funny and awesome.....the only downside was that he was gone all the time.

We were officially together by October of my freshman year and he left in December to go to Spring training. From that point on until the following September I would maybe see him a combined total of maybe 20 days. That went on for 5 more years like that!!! So I guess it sort of makes sense that now that we can be together for the full year i don't really want to be apart even if it is for just 3 weeks....and especially because it is one of my absolute favorite holidays this weekend. Bummer. I was looking forward to some lovey dovey firework time.



* for those of you that are going to read this and tell me that i am on crack pretending that i am 5'10", I will point out that when i started college I was that tall...unfortunately I just grew another inch and a half after that. I am huge. ha ha.

Mini Frogs, ADD, and Me

My morning started out well. I was in a really good mood and actually walked out the door before 8:00 to get to work on time. I had a very fulfilling glass of water for breakfast. I loaded a few dishes in the dishwasher and made my way to the garage. I am even wearing a new shirt to work so I was feeling good. When I opened the door and walked back to get in my car I realized that there was this adorable little miniature frog that would be right in the path of my tires when I pulled out. I decided to spare his life and so I sort of chased him (one very tiny short hop at a time) to the side. He reallly only moved like 12 inches total but i had to go to work so I just decided to get in my car and be extremely careful. I watched in my drivers side mirror to make sure that i wasn't going to run over this little dime sized kermit and as I watched and as I worried....I took my Effing mirror off the other side of my car!!!!! GRRRRRRR. Why can't I multi task? Why did i just cost myself probably $500 to spare the life of some dumb little frog that probably just ruins plants in my yard anyways? I hate animals. What (yep I said it)? seriouslyI do. It's out. And something else you should know about me -When i got out of my car to survey the damage I literally looked at the frog and said "eff you" although I did actually use the F-word. It is a filthy habit that I wish I could stop but sometimes no other word seems to express my true feelings.

I have a truck driver mouth, I knocked the mirror off of my car, I hate animals and now you know.