Dani's First Half Marathon

Hi Friends,

I just wanted to tell you about my pretty sister, Dani. The tall tan one.

I mean, my mom and Lizzie are pretty too, but I wanted to tell you about Dani.

Dani was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis this year.  It's a disease in which your immune system attacks your colon, resulting in painful ulcers in your intestines.  It's not a very nice thing.  She has to go to the doctor a lot now and the steroids she is on to treat it don't work very well, plus they make her gain weight - every girls worst nightmare right?

Well anyways she is running a half marathon in Las Vegas in December, for Team Challenge - an organization that fund raises for crohns and colitis.  I really wish I could run with her, to support her ( read : party in vegas with her...) and because it's on my bucket list!  But unfortunately I can't be there.  

She is so close to reaching her fundraising goal, but she needs about $200 more.  So I told her I would enlist the help of the lovely people of the blogosphere.  If you feel inclined to donate a lil something something to help my sister and to help find a cure for her disease, you can do so on her fundraising page.

I know she'd appreciate any tips from you hardcore runners out there as well!  This is her first half marathon!  Thanks guys!

Breakfast at Tiffany's Tuesdays : Orange Juice in My Oatmeal

Yes that's right, Breakfast at Tiffany's Tuesdays is back and better than ever!  And I have a fantastic recipe for you today... I was inspired to make this while watching River Cottage, and I am hooked.  I don't think orange juice oatmeal is the technical term for it, but that's what I'm calling it.  It's pretty forgiving and you can tailor it to your own liking, but here is my favorite way to eat it.

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup oatmeal
• 1/2 cup orange juice - give or take
• 1 apple, grated
• 2 dried dates
• 2 dried figs
• 1 spoonful of toasted almonds
• 1 Total with Honey

Mix grated apple with oatmeal and orange juice, so the consistency looks something like this...

At this point it's best if you leave it to sit for awhile, so I usually go take a shower and get ready while the oatmeal is soaking up the OJ.  You can even make it overnight and leave it in the fridge for the morning, but Lord knows I'm never that well prepared....

Next take it out of the fridge and sprinkle with nuts and dried fruit.  Then top with yogurt and drizzle with honey. 

 I liked how convenient the Total Greek Yogurt with Honey was for making this -the prepackaged portions mean I can't get too heavy handed with the honey, which my chubby little self has the tendency to do.

The best part about this breakfast is it's not only delicious, but the combination of oatmeal, fruit, nuts, and yogurt gives you the protein and fiber combination you need to feel full until lunch time.  And for those of you that are vegan, it tastes equally good without the yogurt and honey, but in my experience it doesn't keep me feeling as satisfied for as long.  I know this recipe may sound a little funny, but I think you'll love it!  Go on - give it a try!

ps.  Thanks to the nice people at Total for supplying me with this delicious creamy Greek yogurt!  I have so much of it I'm sure it will turn up in recipes later on in the week..

Wedding Fashion

Yesterday while running errands I mentioned I purchased this dress for a wedding...

From Mint Velvet.

I think it's pretty cute, but I'm struggling with styling it. 

So I was just wondering, my fashion savy blogging pals, 

how would you style it for a late November wedding? 

The only definite I have so far is I need to buy a belt,

and I will probably wear a chunky gold flower necklace with it.

Also, it is likely to be rainy and cold.  

So I am thinking tights?

Totally not sure about shoes or coat.

Help!

French Onion Soup - A Delightful Kitchen Fail

Friends I am back in the kitchen!  On Saturday I spent the day slaving away over a delicious French Onion Soup, which I saw on Closet Cooking earlier in the week.

It looked so delectable, and we had a plethora of onions from our Riverford Organic vegetable box left over from the week since I don't really cook with onions too frequently.  Let me tell you, this soup was a labor of love - blood, sweat and tears all went into the making of this French classic.

I got to work on Saturday morning cutting up 4 pounds of the things. This is where the blood and tears came into to play - I cut myself and duh onions make you cry.

I didn't want to start the soup making process just then, so I popped them in the fridge for a bit.  When I went back a few hours later, the smell had permeated our entire kitchen.  Nice little foreshadowing of things to come.

The onions take about 2-3 hours to caramelize, and need to be stirred every 15 minutes.  Like I said labor of love right?  By that point our whole house smelled of onions.  I followed Kevin's recipe exactly, (except I replaced beef stock with vegetable stock) and soon I ended up with this....

The crusty french bread, the melted emmental, oh boy, my mouth is watering just thinking about it.  It was simply perfect for a crisp fall lazy weekend dinner.  So perfect in fact, I went back for seconds.  Nick on the other hand, was not feeling well, and only ate a tiny bit.

Now you may think the review of this soup should end there, and maybe some of you more sensitive types should stop reading now, but if I were to recommend for you to make this soup I feel like I would be doing you a huge disservice.  Yes I know I said it was good and I went back for seconds and yes that gooey cheese may be calling your name, but don't do it.

You see by 6am the following morning I woke myself up with a thundering case of the French Onion Soup Dutch oven.  When my darling husband awoke to the putrid lingering smell of my onion puffs, he had to immediately remove himself from the same room as me.  I'm not sure even my dog wanted to be around me.

I had many errands to run on Sunday, but my French Onion shame nearly left me housebound.  In the end I decided that the show must go on and I didn't have time to be embarrassed, so I did go out.  One of my tasks was to get a dress to wear to a wedding, and let this be a public apology to the fitting room assistant.  Darling, that je ne sais quoi you smelled, that was me.

What came first, the soup that made the French man smell, or the smelly Frenchmen that the soup was named after?  I may never know.  But I do know that the leftovers of this labor of love were thrown out by my husband who said, "If you love me, you will never make this soup again."

Trust me, je t'aime, baby.

DIY Master Bedroom Coving Project

Where has this week gone?!  

Nick and I finished this little project last weekend, and I've been meaning to share it with you!

We are pretty much knee deep in DIY...

This was our master bedroom to start off with...

As I showed you before the hot pink and lime green wall combo is gone now!  

Thank God.

But it was still looking unfinished....  

Nevermind the fact that I cut in by hand all around the ceiling, we decided to put up coving.

Even though I have to do a bit of repainting now, I'm really glad we put this up.

I won't do a tutorial because I'm sure there are better ones out there.

What I can tell you though is it wasn't that hard, it was much easier than the last time we did it.  

Took about a day to do, and if you're thinking about it I would highly recommend getting a piece that is the same shape along the ceiling as the wall.  Not too fancy.  

Last time ours was a bit fancier and it made the whole process a lot harder.

Everything is starting to come together, slowly but surely.

And good news, Ikea started to sell the bedroom furniture we want online!  

So soon we won't be living out of suitcases!  I'm SO excited about that.

After much debating... (seriously we pretty much started World War Wardrobe in our house...)

This is our current Ikea Master bedroom wishlist...

All the furniture is from the Ikea Hemnes range, which I had in white in college and I loved it!

Actually my dad preferred my Ikea furniture to the fancy stuff in my childhood bedroom, so when I moved over here he took apart my old bed and replaced it with my Ikea one - apparently he wanted a better place to take naps.  I don't think my mom was too happy about that one!

Hope you have a fabulous Friday!