whoopie!

Well I got my gifty gift before Thanksgiving but I've been too busy to post it...let alone eat it! I received "whoopie pies" from Jes - yes the ones on Oprah. I do remember that show. I haven't tasted them yet - they're in the freezer. I just can't stomach anymore food after this holiday. But I WILL eat them soon!!

days of brine and roses

Ever wondered how to BRINE a turkey?












Now you know. If you want actual instructions to go with these images, click HERE.

black friday

Yes, I was one of those millions of crazy shoppers out and about the day after Thanksgiving at the black friday sales. I woke up at 5am despite only have 4 hours of sleep. I gotta say, it was worth it. I mean flannel was 99cents a yard, that's a damn bargain. I ran the heck into the store, got the flannel and raced to the front of the cutting line. That's what will kill you in a craft store, waiting for the cutting. Rather quickly, 25 people lined up behind me. Whew.

Then comes the only slightly bad incident, there was a lady at the opposite end of the counter who INSISTED she was there before me. I never saw her, and neither did the 25 irate people behind me. But in the spirit of not wanting a migraine so early in the morn, I reluctantly agreed to go stand behind her. My 25 followers boo'ed my decision but hey, it was give in or wrestle the old lady to the ground.

Anyway, she got hers, because the idiot went up to get her fleece cut and guess what. It wasn't..on...sale. The stuff she wanted was only on sale SATURDAY. So she woke up at 5am for nothing. Ha. That's what she gets for being so rude to me and my 25 friends.

Anyway, I made it out alive, went home and slept. The whole ordeal took 30 minutes. Not bad. Then a few hours later, the husband and kid woke up. So I ventured out again, and we stayed out ALL DAY LONG. We got a ton of deals with only a little hassle.

And what's the best cure for a shopping hangover? Tito's Tacos of course. So we had a nice post-thanksgiving dinner. Mmmm..tacos.

jive turkey

Thanksgiving is approaching and I am working like a crazy woman trying to get this stuff out the door for the craft show Sunday. I started making these mini totes a few days ago and now I can't stop.

Meanwhile the kid decides to get up every 3 hours all night long. Calgon take me away.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

these are a few of my favorite things

Well, you already know what this post is going to be about, I don't even have to say it. Today was Oprah's Favorite Things episode. I wasn't as jealous this year because at least time she filled her entire audience with teachers. So they deserve it.

Here's the entire list. The thing I wanted most would be the washer/dryer. Those Neptune ones are supposed to be the bomb.

Man, one of these days I'm getting in that audience, dammit.

gift registry

Remember how on Sex & the City, Carrie was complaining that the downside of being single is that you never get to cash in on gifts on registrys? Your friends are having wedding showers, baby showers, all of these things that you have to keep shelling out for - and if you don't get married or have a kid, you never get payback.

Not that giving isn't a good thing, it'd just be nice to get some back. I agree. That's why I was very happy to give lots of gifts to my friend Lucky who's getting married this week. She has been to ALL of my many showers and I greatly appreciate it.

Congrats LUCKY!

sinfully delicious

God I suck.

I joined RubberSol's "GIFTY" program, and not only did I forget to put something in the package, but mine wasn't very creative. Wah.

The point is to be paired up with someone and send em a gift in the mail. I love getting mail, so this sounded all good. The theme was "sinfully delicious" and truly that threw me, that had so many meaning, most of which didn't seem very flattering. ha ha. So I gave it my best. Here's the card I made, at least that part was on theme!

The words are on cards on hinges so when you lift it up, you get...
"Sinful?" - "Maybe."
"Delicious?" - "Definitely."

Jes - the rest of your package is coming in the mail. I swear it!

**for a better view of the card, click HERE.

right on target

Wow. Target is getting funk-ti-fied.

I particularly dig the paint by numbers wallpaper, despite the price.

Also I like the food safe decals that "liven up" your dinnerware. That would be great for a wedding or baby shower!

random acts of kindness

Sometimes you just feel like doing nice things for people for no reason. And sometimes...

Yesterday I went to Macy's to pick up pre-sale items for a friend who lives in Hawaii. I was not shopping, just picking up. The salespeople were clueless and I ended up being there for over 2 hours. Now, trying not to be my "thisclosetoangermanagement" usual self...I kept my cool. To a point. Finally I started TALKING LOUDLY (not screaming) "I want a manager and I want one NOW." The incompetence coupled with my kid going nuts had pushed me to my boiling point.

**Have you seen that horrid MTV show "Boiling Points," where they f* with you til you lose it? Well let's just say that in that one episode where they lock you in a room with a fat guy passing gas, I'd have kicked his ass at the 8 second mark...

Anyway, as I am fuming, TALKING LOUDLY (not screaming), this other shopper, this little old Japanese lady comes up to me and goes, "You should be more aggressive." I thought she was being sarcastic since I was CLEARLY ticked - Note: all other shoppers were clutching their belongings in my presence - but she was dead serious. She went on to say, "You're being too nice, you should really give lay into them!!" I was like, what? Huh? Short of jumping the counter and headbutting the saleswoman, what was I supposed to do?

Anyway, to make up for this disaster I went up to kid's wear and some lady didn't have her "take an extra 20% off" friends and family pass. So I let her use mine. She said, "Oh my, you are so kind, so kind!" I thought to myself, you should have seen me 10 minutes ago.

Meanwhile, someone better go clean up my kid's Cheerios down in Handbags...

want to get DIRTY?

So on Oprah today they had the women from the tv show "How Clean is your House." They go to people's EXTREMELY filthy houses and clean it up. I would be damn embarrassed to show my house if I were these freaks...

This one woman was so nasty I actually felt sick to my stomach when they showed her house. She hadn't cleaned her toilet in years, it was filled with feces on the sides of the toilet and on the floor. And THAT was the toilet she used everyday!! She had 3 dogs and apparently they use her other bathroom cause there was dog poo strewn across the floor - everywhere. Why not clean that up???

Ugh, and if poo didn't make you sick enough, when they opened her fridge flies came out, I said FLIES. Also she had a box of strawberries on her table that were a year old and completely molded over, and in her bedroom there were actually plates of old food with ants on them...IN HER DRESSER.

M*ther f*er - what?? I don't care that this is a "sign of other problems" - she is positively nasty. You know the people sitting next to her in the audience were probably searching for some damn Purell in their purses. Sheesh, I'd get up and move seats just in case she brought some feces with her.

Right after that show I went and cleaned my bathroom.
I still feel sick.

behind the Orange curtain

I have never seen an episode of the O.C. Why should I - we live right by there, who cares. HOWEVER, I have started to watch MTV's Laguna Beach: The real O.C....good lord is that show addictive. Maybe because they are real people and the O.C. tv show is just made up crap. Who knows.

All I know is watching that show takes you right back to high school. When the only important things in life were boys, friends, and everyday was a new drama. Seems like it was just yesterday. Suddenly I'm in my 30's and up at 6am cooking breakfast for my husband and kid. What happened?

Also I started watching the Real World/Road Rules challenge. I didn't even know there was another one. You know you're old when the only person I recognize on that show is Eric Nies from Season One.

if I was invisible

Yeah I bought the new Clay Aiken Christmas cd, SO WHAT?
That boy's straight pimpin' yo.

he stole our hearts away...

Tonight was the beginning of Amazing Race 6. I'm not amazed.

However - I was amazed at Morrissey on Dave Letterman. I mean, why was he there, the album came out in May, what the hell? That guy will have that great voice at 80 years old just as crystal clear as when he was 20 years old.

Spectacular.

run as fast as you can

Well it's time I started thinking about baking. I was planning on making a ton of gingerbread houses, but I don't know if this is feasible. Maybe just cookies.

I have seen this idea everywhere this year - I don't know why I haven't thought of this before, but if you turn a gingerbread man upside down you can turn it into a reindeer head! Ingenious.

(image from www.flourpotdesign.com)

What the hell am I doing drinking in L.A. at 26?

What???
Everytime I see the name Jenn I feel like it's me. Especially since most people just use one "n".

www.cocktailsbyjenn.com

The packaging and font on this thing is very cool. Too bad I don't drink.

sumo

Kyle vs. bRuiner
round one...FIGHT!

in hot water

A friend of mine had surgery and encouraged everyone to go visit him in the hospital. Friends, co-workers, he didn't give a crap. I'm not down with that. For him, that's great, if that'll make him feel better, for me, no way. Unless I specially ask you to be there, just leave me alone until I'm not just wearing a sheet and shuffling my a$$ to the bathroom for all to see.

When I was pregnant I didn't want any visitors, hello, I just pushed something out of me a la "Alien" I don't need people around while I recover. In my family, unless you are immediate relatives, we just go to the person's house AFTER they get out of the hospital, bringing along with us food and gifts and junk. It's better that way. Less pressure for you, less pressure for them.

Speaking of hospitals, my grandpa was in there a few days ago. He was taking a shower and turned on the hot water, it scalded his feet to the point where he now has third degree burns. The hot water heater in their apartment is central and it's "the law" that it has to be that hot because it's connected to the washer. That sucks. The man is 87 years old.

The injury didn't keep him from eating fritos and fudge for lunch. I think that's what's kept him alive for so long.

sew what

Well, I said I wasn't gonna do it, but I have no choice...I'm back on the craft circuit. I have two (and only two) shows coming up.

Today I sewed as much as I could, so much that now my butt is sore from sitting all day. I made ALL these holiday puff bags. I could make these darn things in my sleep already.

(click on image to see larger)

wishing and hoping

We are two weekends away from Thanksgiving, you know what that means? I gotta get my Christmas wishlist together! Cause that's when our family pulls names and we hand over our lists to some lucky family member who has to buy us something for under $50.

I have two more weeks so I'm going to add to it as I think more about it. I'm gonna post it on the internet so it'll have easy access. Unless of course my grandma pulls my name. Then I'm outta luck.

My wishlist.

frank the tank, frank the tank

So I've been resisting talking about this, since it's been all over the news anyway, but this morning I was watching Regis and Kelly and they actually drank it, so...

Jones soda has released their holiday sodas. Last year was turkey and gravy - and due to the success of that, they put out a whole MEAL this year.

Turkey and Gravy soda, mashed potatoes soda, green bean casserole soda, cranberry soda, and fruitcake soda. Now, I love me some mashed potatoes, but drinking it? Well, that's just sick.

I dig the fact that you can get custom bottles with your picture on it, not that you can't just put your own labels on any other bottle of soda, but I appreciate their ingenuity.

lazy days

Dig this, the ultimate cooking mag, COOK'S ILLUSTRATED, has a very cool section called "quick tips". Where people write in and tell various things that they've come up with to help them in their cooking. Nothing spectacular, just things like putting a wet towel under a cutting board so it doesn't move when you chop, or putting rubber bands on the ends of rolling pins to get an even dough. Junk like that.

The thing is, if they pick your tip, you get a year's subscription free! Seeing as how I love this magazine and I am broke, I submitted a few tips. Here's one, don't steal it now, I've already submitted it, so there.

My grandma actually came up with this one, since it was hard for her to bend down and find the jars in the back of her fridge, she put a lazy susan in there and now she can find things super easily - she's an evil genius!

i'm good enough, i'm smart enough....

The house next door is for sale. They put this sign out front. It cracked me up. Total self-affirmation. Just go around telling people..."I'm gorgeous inside."

you break it you bought it

Good lord. Be forewarned that I'm sure the upcoming posts will all be about shopping. The holiday season is upon us and I gotta get my a$$ in gear.

"Pre-kid" - I was on the ball. I had all my shopping done by October. I SAID OCTOBER. Now I'm way behind.

My father in law has an annual pass from Hawaii, meaning that he can travel to and fro whenever he damn well pleases. Well that thing's going to expire in December and he's not renewing it. So my sis-in-law and I came up with a plan for him to fly out here with their gifts and take my gifts back. Brilliant, eh? Except he could only get a flight for...one...day. Doh. So he's flying here on a Monday and leaving on a Wednesday. Ha. Good thing he's retired.

Anyway - he's coming early December, which doesn't leave me much time to shop. Today we went to Crate and Barrel and the kid took it upon himself to grab a stack of ceramic bowls while still in his stroller. Nice. Thank god we caught him just as he was pulling them off the shelf toward the ground...

hit the road jack

Today we went to the mommy and me movie. It was "Ray", the Ray Charles story. It was a really good touching movie, however, no one told me it was three hours long. Geez Louise, the kid was NOT HAPPY. I ended up having to walk out on the last ten minutes.

Another movie I FINALLY saw was "Jersey Girl". Man what a tearjerker. It was really good, I can't believe it took me so long to see it. I'm a bad Kevin Smith fan, bad bad bad. If you weren't going to see it cause you don't like J-Lo, don't worry, she dies in the first ten minutes.

double happiness

Rusty's wedding was quite an event - the ceremonies were very traditional. Everything was good luck and this and that. We were part of the groom's tea ceremony so we had to caravan in eight cars to the bride's house. Then eight gift bearers had to bring offerings to the family, Kyle carried a giant roast pig. Like an old skool dowry thing.

Once at the house the groom had to offer money and gifts to coax the bride out, and eventually bust down the door to get to her (per tradition). That was followed by food - lots of it. After the tea ceremony we had to head back to the other house and do the tea ceremony for the groom's mother. That was followed by even more food. I've never seen anything like it. It was something.

The reception was later that night and lots of craziness ensued. We got to see lots of friends we haven't seen for quite a while. Everyone has kids now so it's a totally different experience. We all had to take turns eating and trade off to take care of the kids, so we never got to all sit down at once. It was an 8 course meal, luckily it was over like 4 hours so it was easy to digest. The fried rice is always the last course which sucks cause I'd rather have that first, but it was worth the wait.

The bride loves Tiffany's so their cake looked like a Tiffany's box. Very cute. And of course, oh so delicious since it was a paradise cake!

All in all, it was a great day. I think I've eaten enough to store up for winter....