Day 20: Job Interviews!

My husband's discarded interview outfit

Today, my husband is going for his first job interview in our new hometown.  We wandered into the local library with my brother to return some books, and while my brother chatted up the librarians, they mentioned that they were interviewing for a part time job.  My brother wasn’t interested, but he mentioned that my husband might be.  My husband filled out the application on the spot, and they told him to come back the next day for his interview.

So we got up this morning and got him all dressed up snazzy for his interview and dropped him off.  He says that the interview didn’t go very well, but I’m hoping that he is just only remembering the bad points, not the good.  Hopefully it went better than he thought.

Unfortunately, before I could get a shot of him in his cute interview outfit, he threw it off in favor of shorts and a t-shirt.  Oh, well… Maybe next time.

Day 19: Homemade Pesto-Ranch Dressing

The only healthy thing I ate for dinner

This was part of my dinner that my brother and I made tonight.  We made homemade basil pesto (basil, parmesean cheese, garlic, olive oil, and pine nuts) and then mixed it with a store bought ranch dressing.  It was very good, but it made me long for my mom’s homemade ranch dressing, which would have made it even better. (I hope you’re listening, Mom.)

As I said above, this was the only healthy thing that I had for dinner tonight, the other dishes being fried potatoes, macaroni and cheese, and a kind of sandwich that my brother called “Tailgate Sandwiches” (pictured below).  They were strange, but interesting, and here’s what we did:

First we took a packet of dried Italian salad dressing and mixed it with a stick of melted butter in a large zip-top bag.  Then we put a package of Hawaiian sweet rolls in the butter mixture and let it soak in.  We took the rolls out, split them, piled them high with ham, turkey, colby cheese, and mozzarella cheese, and put the tops back on.  We drizzled the rest of the butter/Italian salad dressing mix on top of the sandwiches and wrapped them in aluminum foil.  Then we put them in the oven until the cheese melted.

What came out was a cheesy, melty, buttery, zesty sandwich that was pretty tasty for all my reservations about it.  I really liked them with the pesto-ranch dressing on top.  Mmm…

All that's left of the strange, but tasty, sandwiches

Day 18: Toes!

My newest colors: Lickety-Split Lime and Black Diamond

I love to paint my toe nails.  I have recently amassed quite a collection of nail polishes, mostly in blues which are my favorites.  These are my two newest additions that caught my eye while I was in Target shopping for pink polish for my niece’s pageant.  I like the Halloween effect when I wear the two together.

Sorry for the less than fascinating picture today, but nothing really interesting happened to me.  Hopefully tomorrow my adventures will bring me somewhere more entertaining!

Day 17: A Failed Photo

All my hard work flys away!

While driving down some back country roads today, my family and I happened to spot a bald eagle perched on a dead tree on the side of the road.  This is a pretty unusual sight, so we decided to pull over and see if we could get a picture.  As we got out and walked back to a better spot to see it, the eagle stretched its wings and flew away.  This picture was the best I got.  If you look closely, you can see a bird flying over the tree tops to the left of the picture.  Needless to say, we were all very disappointed.

My husband pointed out to us later that today is Patriot Day (Sept. 11).  An appropriate day to see such a prominent symbol of America, don’t you think?

Day 16: A Day at the Pageant

Bordom reaches its peak

So today my niece was in her first beauty pageant.  It was just a local deal for kids 4 to 7, but it was still a big affair in our house for quite a while.  My niece wore a beautiful pink pageant dress that her mom found on the internet for eight dollars.  My sister-in-law is an excellent bargain shopper and was determined not to break the bank for this pageant.

My niece did beautifully at the show, though she was very shy.  She almost didn’t walk out on stage when they called her name.  Once she got to the end of the catwalk, though, she beamed and waved her heart out and looked like she didn’t want to go back.  She didn’t win anything but she had a good time.

The picture, however, comes from the twenty minutes leading up to the start of the pageant.  My brother, my husband, and I were bored out of our minds waiting for the thing to start, so we took random pictures.  This one is of my brother’s eye.  I thought it appropriate to commemorate the occasion.

And yes, I know I’ve missed several days of photos.  I am a slacker, I admit. I will however do my best not to let this happen again.

Day 11: Moving Day, Take 2

The last time we sat on the porch...

We finally got all of our stuff out of our old house and cleaned it all up.  Tom and I spent a few minutes on the porch to remember old times by.  We leave this house with a lot of mixed feelings.  On the one hand, it was an older house that had quite a few problems and in a neighborhood we didn’t particularly love.  On the other hand, it was one of the first places that was truly our own, not counting a couple months in a cottage owned by my husband’s work.  We both really enjoyed being able to do what we wanted with the place, both being ourselves there, and having all our friends over for awesome parties.

Hopefully, our friends will continue to visit us wherever we move.

Day 10: Birthday Socks!!!

Would you look at those socks!

Today we drove back to our old house for the last weekend to get the rest of our stuff out and celebrate another niece’s birthday.  For confusion’s sake, you should know that I have four nieces and two nephews belonging to three different sets of parents.  One set (two nieces and a nephew) belong to my husband’s sister, one set (a niece and a nephew) belong to my older brother, and the last niece belongs to my middle brother, who we are living with now.  This is one of my husband’s sister’s daughters.  Now that you are nice and confused, I will go on:

So this past week was my niece’s 10th birthday, and to celebrate her double digits I got her, among other things, this totally awesome pair of socks.  Well, actually it was three socks, all mismatched, and yes they were sold that way.  And of course to try on her new socks, my niece immediately went to put on a nice dress to match.  Don’t they go well together? =)

Day 9: Dinner of a Different Sort

Very different from my dinner a couple days ago

I would like to start by saying that I have no idea why I continue to eat food from McDonald’s.  It does not taste that good and it always leaves me feeling nasty afterward, but for some reason, every once in a while, I find that I really want to give it another try. Which is why, at around 5pm on a Friday night, my husband and I went out to the local MickeyD’s and it turned into a very interesting experience to say the least.

You know you are in a small town when you walk into a big chain restaurant like MD’s and everyone, and I mean everyone, stares at you as you walk in.  As we made our way to the cash register to order, the two families and two older couples watched us, unabashed, so much so that I glanced down at my shirt a couple times to be sure I didn’t have something all over myself.

Secondly, the whole place was covered in local artwork (or at least I would guess it was local).  All fishing and hunting scenes that you could expect to see in small town America in vivid murals all over the walls.  My husband and I chose to sit in a section away from staring eyes, and inadvertently sat underneath a painting of a girl fishing, the chest area of her white shirt had been decorated with ketchup.

Finally, the grand finale for this McDonald’s trip:  My husband and I were sitting in our booth (facing each other), finishing up our meal when a rather large man eating an ice cream cone walked up and stood behind my husband, a couple feet away from us.  He wasn’t looking at us, but staring off into space near the door of the bathroom.  I couldn’t help but stare and think of that guy from Lilo & Stitch, near the beginning:  the big guy eating the ice cream cone that Lilo takes a picture of.  I wish I had her courage…

Day 8: Tequila

I think this was a "I was trying to go to sleep" face

Now, I know what you all are thinking, but Tequila is actually the name of my husband’s lizard, a blue-tongued skink native to Australia.  And he didn’t get that name for my husband’s favorite drink, if that’s what you’re thinking (in that case it probably would have been Vodka), but because upon his first encounter with the species, he misread the reptile’s scientific name, Teliqua.  You can see how this might be confusing.

Tequila is over a foot long and very chubby with tiny little legs, as you can see.  He actually does have a blue tongue as well.  Sometime when he is in a better mood I will try to get a picture of it.  The long car trip did not agree with him, however (he yacked all over his hiding spot), and he still hasn’t quite forgiven us for it.

Day 7: Dinner

I hope you've already eaten...

I’ll admit it.  I had to cheat on this one.  After I made my post for yesterday, I went in the kitchen to cook dinner.  We had a bunch of pasta with marinara that I had made for a side the night before, so I decided to doctor it up and serve it as a main course.  Here’s how I did it:

First I sauteed a bunch of mushrooms and put them in with the pasta.  Then I cut up some pepperoni slices and put them in the skillet as well, just until they were crispy.  I mixed the pepperoni and mushrooms into the pasta with about three fourths a bag of Italian blend shredded cheese (mozzarella, provolone, Parmesan, asiago, etc.), and then put it all in a casserole.  I topped the pasta with the rest of the cheese and put a few pepperoni on top to make it look pretty, put it in the oven for about 15 minutes (the last 3 were on broil), and this came out.  It was so pretty, I took it all the way into the living room to show my husband, who immediately suggested I take a picture of it.

Believe me, it tasted as good as it looked. So that I would not be entirely cheating, I took the picture below today of all that was left for me to have for lunch.  It was the best thing I’ve ever done with leftover pasta.  I highly recommend.

Not much left for lunch =(