{welcome sofi 11.22.10}

Welcome baby Sofi. We love you more than anything in the world.
Best Thanksgiving. Ever. We have so much for which to be grateful. You are the most amazing thing that has ever happened to us. We love you.

{hello...goodbye}

Why haven't you been in my life these last few years?
I have missed your sound oh so much.

{thanks}

image via {dallas clayton}

Thanks to everyone for all your love as of late.

I feel like we must know the greatest people in the world.

{acorn}

You should try this recipe. It's good. I made some homemade whole-grain corn bread and added some olives to the finished stuffing. D and I had to split one half because they were so filling. That means lunch or dinner another day is covered from half number 2. Sweet.

{made up words}

Gubernatorial. Seriously?

{the great poppyseed catastrophe}

In planning our meals for the week, I decided I really wanted a strawberry and spinach salad (in hopes of recreating an old Zupas favorite...how I wish they would come to St. George). So, I rounded up the necessary ingredients to prepare a dressing which I have been meaning to try for some time. I filled a mini dish with poppy seeds and put the dish in the cupboard so Thelonius wouldn't be able to get to it. A few minutes later, I opened the cupboard to put clean dishes away, when small dishes of poppy seed and cinnamon came raining down from above. I have a terrible habit of stacking due to the lack of space in our current living space. Covered in cinnamon and seeds (at least I smelled good), D comes over laughing and proceeds to help me clean them up and offers to retrieve some more poppy seeds. He brought back a mini dish of seeds and I proceeded to leave them on the counter, forgetting that a mischievous cat also happens to live here too. I made the candied almonds and went to bed, never remembering to put away the seeds. The following morning, much to my dismay (and almost surprise), I found poppy seeds everywhere. Again. Once again my fault.

Eventually things came together and I pulled together the dressing and had my salad that day. It was glorious and worth every poppy seed catastrophe of the previous day. AND it fulfilled my craving for Zupas salad (for now). As mentioned in the recipe, this salad would be good with feta and/or the addition of some grilled chicken. I love freshly minced/grated garlic for its savory and spicy kick. I cut down the sugar and used regular yellow onion. I think honey would make a really great floral-y substitute for the sugar too, if you feel so inclined.

I guess this was my good-bye to summer. It is officially October, so Fall foods will moving in full force.

{conditioning and beans}

So I took a psych class this summer (by far my least favorite subject...I have never heard so many excuses in my life), but I have to admit there were some cool highlights during those weeks. We talked a lot about classical conditioning. My teacher would talk about ways that he would condition (manipulate? just kidding...they were funny) his wife to like football (more) through cuddling/affection. I would come home and tell D all these stories and we would tease each other about how effective crab would be in these situations.

beautiful? not even a little...but so good!
So...for the past few months when I come home from work, D and I will go to the gas station to get a soda for him (it's his favorite thing and apparently this place is a full 23 flavors- the best). This usually happens a few times a week. The timing usually works out such that I am starving when I get home from work or D is rushing to get to school and needs to eat something quickly. Since there are some really good and cheap bean burritos right across the street from the gas station, we have been stopping there more often than we should (bean burritos are embarrassingly easy to make...we have been lazy to the max). Realizing the dumbness of the idea, I resolved to using our massive bean storage on a regular basis to make "un-refried" beans for quick, healthier, and cheaper burrito eating. We used to be really good at this, but I was always so tired that first trimester that it didn't happen. Bad excuse. To this day, everytime we go to the gas station, I have this massive craving for a bean burrito. Every time without fail. It's funny how we can unconsciously condition ourselves to certain things. Have you had a similar experience?

no frills here
This refried-bean-without-the-refry recipe is pure awesomeness and combined with a good whole wheat tortilla and hot sauce, makes the perfect, simple bean burrito. I mean amazing. It took me awhile to find the tortilla I liked (Flat Outs just don't work for burritos), but now it's perfect and healthy. Lots of fiber, vitamins, and minerals. You can use black, pinto, or a mix of both. We like to mix the two, but we need to use our dried black beans and I'm too cheap to go buy pintos. Most of the time I skip the black pepper for easiness sake. The onion gets so soft that it disappears into the beans when you mash them which is perfect for onion texture haters like D. In fact, I have another batch in the slow cooker as we speak...