Someone Left the Cake Out In the Rain

This pan....


...makes these cupcakes.

(The above images are from the Williams-Sonoma website, where the pan is available for sale. To Purchase, for a house warming gift or something hint hint, visit www.williams-sonoma.com)

I've not really done a lot of baking in my life thus far, but that is going to change. Now that I'm the owner of a fairly good sized kitchen with ample counter space, I have no reason not to whip up a batch of novelty cupcakes. Or a bundt cake. I like the word "bundt," and if I bake one of 'em, I'll be able to say that word a bunch of times.

I've made a lot of excuses in the past as to why I don't utilize the kitchen, including, but not limited to....
"Apartment kitchens are too small to do any real cooking or baking in."
"I live with a chef... why would I step foot in his territory?"
"I haven't got any good pans."
"I have no cookbooks."
"Grocery store too far.... must continue to sit on couch."

Once I'm settled into my Suburban Wonderland (notice the call-back to the name of this blog... nice touch, eh?) none of these excuses will apply to me anymore.

And...
I will do some baking.
Frost my words.

The House BC (Before Construction)

Here are some pictures from before I did any sort of anything to the property.



The two areas sandwiching my front door now have gardens sprouting there, thanks to my Mother, who I might add planted them in the rain. She assures me that all the plants she put there are low maintenance, which is a good thing, because I always end up unintentionally killing anything green that is under my care. Luckily, Dolemite the Cat is a nice soft grey color.

Note the dark brown foundation. This will soon be "lawn flamingo pink" if it ever stops raining long enough to paint outside. This will match the small flock of plastic flamingos that will be residing in the front gardens, once I'm living there full time. Right now I'm only staying there on the weekends while I'm working on things.

"2Clever"

The other day I bought a small oscillating table fan to bring from room to room as I paint. I just needed a cheap-o one so I bought one made by a company called "2Cool."

You can tell that a product is high quality when a word is replaced by a numeral in the brand logo.

Especially when that logo has tiny icicles dripping off it, to further convey the arctic theme.

A House of a Different Color

I painted my living room this weekend. (Actually, my father and sister painted it, I was in another room painting something else, but anyway)

I chose a bright spring green, to match the fabric of my ottoman that will soon be residing there. The ottoman fabric is a 1950's barkcloth atomic pattern, with sections of it in the same bright spring green. Now this paint is bright. Very bright. I happen to love it, although other people that have seen it have rather interesting things to say about it.

Below is a list of some comments made regarding my new living room walls:

"I'm Blind."

"Can you hand me a pair of sunglasses?"

"This color is the color of toxic waste."

"This is brighter than Sarah's car." (my sister has a blindingly yellow car)

"I'm nauseous."

"Maybe it'll look calmer when your furniture is in here."

"Wow. That's quite a color."

Now, I love the color. The room is rather small, so it really brightens up the space. Trust me. It'll all come together.
Plus, everyone that walked into the room grinned like an idiot, so i'm pretty sure the paint contains some sort of "smile-inducing" agent.

Whistle While You Work

Things I have done to the house thus far (with help, of course):

Painted Master Bedroom - I wanted a nice blushy mango pink, but ended up with something close to 100% magenta. I repainted the entire room and now have the color I wanted originally.

Removal of Wood Paneling from Living Room - Technically, my father did this...I just carried the paneling shards to my basement

Removal of Living Room Rug - The rug was so old that the rug-pad underneath disintegrated into a fine dust, which then blew all over the place and had to be swept up. I didn't have a push broom at the time, so I ended up using a small brush and dustpan. My back still hurts from crouching over.

Removel of Master Bedroom Rug - Came up rather easily, revealing a wood floor underneath that doesn't even need to be sanded down and buffed. A coat of floor wax should do the trick.

Kitchen Cabinet Rehab - Cabinets were sanded down by my Uncle, then primed and painted a base color by my Mother.

Kitchen Brick Makeover - Red brick will not do in a Turquoise, Black and White kitchen, so I primed them and then we painted them white. Later on, I'll paint a few of the bricks Turquoise and a few bricks Black.

Painted Porch - The original color of my porch was sort of Silly Putty colored...blech. So It's been painted a nice bright white.

White Kitchen - Painted the first coat of white to the kitchen walls. The walls were a soft peach color originally.

There is a lot more to do, although everyday the "To Do" list shrinks a tiny bit more.

Kid in a Candy Shop...

I recently stumbled upon J & O Fabrics and am mildly obsessed. They have such a huge selection of fabrics in general and many in prints I've yet to see anywhere else. I can see myself ordering many many times from here...so much great fabric.

I'm making cushions for some porch furniture and am currently deciding between these prints:





I can't decide!

To visit J & O fabrics and see all the great fabrics for yourself, click on the link in the "Shopping Delights" section on the left side of this page.

Howdy, Neighbor

Yesterday i went to the house to take some measurements and take in the mail and generally just walk around in the empty house because I sort of still can't believe I own property.

So anyway, as I was pulling into my driveway I noticed a giant river of what appeared to be white paint running down the length of my driveway and pooling on the sidewalk in from of my house. Being new to this whole home-owning thing, for about 30 seconds I thought, "damn, better call the landlord."

Then I remembered; Oh dear, I AM the landlord.

Upon further inspection of this giant swatch winding its way down my driveway, I came to the conclusion that it was originating from my neighbor's back yard. Since it was pooling on the sidewalk and dogs walk by with their owners quite often, I wanted to make sure that it actually was paint and not anything that would harm paws, so I went next door and rang their doorbell.

Now, I didn't want my first meeting of my new neighbor to be on these terms..
I would have preferred my first meeting to be more like "Hi, just moved in, lovely weather we're having, etc.." rather than "Hi, just moved in. By the way, what in the world is spilling down my driveway from your backyard?"

But I really wanted to know what this garbage was...

We went over and assessed the situation. Apparently, her son had painted her fence a nice bright white and left a paint tray in the backyard. Later in the day it began to rain buckets, and overfilled the paint tray, thus creating a river of watery paint that then cascaded down my driveway.

Normally this sort of thing would have made me pretty livid, but she was very apologetic and seemed genuinely sorry.

So I just sucked it up and blamed the rain. It's more important to me to have a nice friendly relationship with my new neighbor than to throw a hissy fit and demand that she get this fixed.

I can simply fix it myself.
After all, I'm my own landlord now.

Swoon!

This would look fantastic in my new pad.

*cough, cough* If anyone feels the need to shower me with housewarming gifts... this speaker system would be the way to go...*cough, cough*

"Let me help you with that, little lady."

I've been to Home Depot countless times in the past...
When I was very young I used to tag along with my father and marvel at how huge the place was, and years later while in art school I used to go quite often for project supplies.

But this time was different...
This time I marched into that orange-branded giant store as a homeowner.

I had no idea where I was going.. I needed sandpaper, wall primer and some paintbrushes, and couldn't find anything. The store is way too big. It's daunting and overwhelming.

After a good 20 mintues of accidently crashing my cart into various things as I steered up and down the isles, I finally found the wall primer. I found a 5 gallon drum of the stuff.

Now, I'm small and really short (and weak), so I had a terrible time trying to heave the five gallon drum into my cart. I must have looked completly hopeless, because some customer came over to me as i was struggling and said...

"Let me help you with that, little lady."

I thought people only spoke like that in movies set in Saloons, but whatever.. he lifted the drum of primer into my cart and saved me from what would have probably resulted in me dislocating my own shoulders.

After wandering around some more I eventually found everything I needed, checked out and left.

It's nice to have the "Home" in "Home Depot" actually apply to me.
I never thought it would.