Barista at Home!

To continue the proof of my domestic kick, I recently purchased a milk frother.  I got the idea after seeing the Nespresso machine that Jen from Made By Girl posted last week.  I wasn't a coffee drinker in my early adulthood because I always felt that it was bad for you and had a negative effect on your spine.  I also felt that it was the reason that I'm short (5' 3.5" thank you very much) because my grandma would allow me to drink coffee with my breakfast every now and then when I was a little girl (7 years old).  Around age 25 I rediscovered coffee and the positive effects...like being able to stay up late and drinking it in the morning to stay awake!  I was kind of a coffee freak after that.  These days, however, I'm not a huge fan mainly because of the gross aftertaste.  I would go to Starbucks sometimes and couldn't figure out why their coffee was so good and mine was just eh.  This was the case even with Starbucks coffee made at home.

In stepped the milk frother!  Now I can drink coffee, enjoy the taste, the effects and the look!  I got my frother from Target and so far I love it!

Observe!

Simon's Latte sprinkled with nutmeg and cinnamon.

Cappuccino sprinkled with nutmeg and cinnamon.

White Hot Chocolate sprinkled with cocoa powder.

Happenings Around Our Way

Hey guys!  I realized that I haven't really posted much on the house happenings around here in a bit.  So here goes:

To start off, I finally purchased a dslr, and have been having so much fun learning all of the functions on it!  Now I may become a "professional blogger" because of the better quality images (after this post)!  If you follow me on twitter you may have seen the tweets about it.

Next, I went on a slight shopping spree at Home Goods.  I haven't shopped there that much since I got another car last August, so a week after we got our tax refund I high tailed straight to Home Goods.  As I stated last month, I have been on a cooking kick.  This trip wasn't so much about home decor (well, just a couple of things), but more so about upgrading cookware and the like (we had rusty baking sheets, sub-par pasta forks, and a pan with a missing handle to name a few).  I also was planning to cook all of the meals that were on The Everygirl for the week, and to be enthused about it I knew I needed to upgrade.  (Side note...if you haven't checked out The Everygirl yet, go there as soon as you finish reading and commenting on this post!)

Here's a photo of everything that I purchased:

• A set of knives
• A high quality pan
• A durable baking sheet
• A pasta holder
• A glass gold-dipped vase
• A small metallic bowl (decor)
• Pasta fork
• Tongs
• Set of mixing bowls
• Decorative cup (decor)
• Salt shaker and pepper grinder set (not shown)

This is where some of these items now reside and/or closeups of them (taken with the new cam!):

(placed the shakers on top of candle holders that I already had)

Here are a few photos of my recent culinary masterpieces :-D

Puffed pancakes (recipe from Naomi at Rockstar Diaries)

Veggie pizza



Chicken lettuce wraps with peanut sesame noodles

So what's been happening at your crib?

Call me Betty Crocker

I've been cooking up a storm around here lately, and Simon has been loving it!  I enjoy cooking when I get the urge.  It's not that I don't normally cook, but I have been trying new recipes and adding new spins to old ones.  Here are a few things that I've made lately-

Some of these dishes were inspired by Heather from The Lovely Cupboard.  If you've never been to her site, you should go there immediately.  Inspiration to the Nth degree craft wise, cooking wise, diy wise...all of it!