Pizza!

One of our new favorite things to do is to make pizza! We started lazy. I buy whole wheat crust from Whole Foods and rub a little olive oil on it. Then I take some pizza sauce--also acquired from WF--and spread it on evenly. We started out with just pepperoni but have quickly graduated to a whole new level (because we're dorks).

We bought a brick of smoked mozzarella and some Crimini mushrooms in order to replicate one of our favorite pizzas from Trattoria 225 in Oak Park.

Anyway, we also re-discovered our Kitchen Aid slicer/shredder attachment--and it works so awesome with the smoked mozza brick! Check out the silly video! I would highly recommend the attachment if you have a KA. And I would also highly recommend smoked mozzarella with Crimini mushrooms on your next pizza.

We were so excited with teh results that we forgot to take the "after" photo of the pizza until, well, "after" we ate some! If you come visit me? I will make you some of this pizza!

Kitchen Makeover

Last weekend, we decided to do a little nesting! And we started at the greatest/cheapest organizational supplier we know of--IKEA! Which means meatballs. Ikea has this cheap-o lunch counter that serves oddly tasty swedish food! Note the meatballs and the 'lingonberry' soda! It cracks me up to eat there.

Okay, we wanted to get a pot rack to move our pots and pans off our baker's rack so we could take Dale's 50 coffee making devices and put them on the baker's rack so we could actually use our prep counter for, um prep.

Also, we have almost zero natural light in our kitchen--and our light fixture was dingy and small. So we picked up this new light fixture for $17. Seriously, Ikea is insane!

Our baker's rack is now festooned with Dale's many coffee devices--and our pots and pans are hanging!

Yay! A clean prep counter with hanging pots (have I mentioned how cheap Ikea is? It was like $20 for the pot rack)!

We also reconsidered where we put things and I feel like I have 10 times as much as space as I did a week ago. I cleaned out a catch-all drawer and now use it as a spice drawer! And I rearranged a few other things and now the top of the fridge is empty of cereal boxes! It's like we have a whole new kitchen! Yay!

The new lighting fixture and the cleaned-up kitchen in full effect! We also got a new sink drainer--you can barely see it here but our wood one was falling apart.

A Tale of Two Kitties

A Cat's Tail, Part One...

This is Bela. Bela loves his stuffed animals. We call them his "babies" though each one is Mr. _______. So Mr. Teddy Bear is Bela's favorite. And he's also fond of Mr. Horsie and Mr. Frog. Last weekend we added TWO new babies to the mix: Mr. Sheep and Mr. Duckie!

When Bela gets a new baby he first rubs his face against the baby very aggressively. Then he pushes the baby around on the floor for a little while. Here he is rubbing Mr. Sheep while Mr. Duckie waits his turn.


After the baby is appropriately rubbed up, Bela then carries the baby around (though he usually does this out of our sight/our camera's sight so this is a very rare shot of Bela walking his baby around the house). In the middle of the night he can often by heard "caterwauling"--or yelling--at his babies. I do not know what he thinks they've done but he's very strict with them!

Finally he lets the new baby rest at his feet and keeps an eye out that his brothers do not get too friendly with the new toy before he's had a chance to really make it his own!

A Cat's Tale, Part Two...

At least once a week Dale sets about grooming our long-haired kitty, Monty! First Dale grabs Monty and pets and soothes him, being sure to rub his belly and ears!

Once Monty is good and relaxed the brushing starts--and then the scissors come out! Poor little guy. He gets really bad clumps of hair under his tiny pits (that would only get worse if Dale didn't work them out). Dale tries to brush them out first and if one is really bad, he'll grab the scissor and cut through the fur (very, very carefully and slowly) to break up the knot.

Little Monty is pretty used to this routine so he actually just lies there as Dale sets the scissors aside or switches back and forth from brush to hand to scissors. It's really too cute.


Finally, Monty is all neat and pretty! Brushed out and fluffed up and free of knots of hair on his tummy. And he hangs out with his big brother, Sidney (who doesn't need much but enjoys getting his hair brushed; he also enjoys playing with the stuffed babies but not as much as Bela).

Oscars

I never posted about the Oscars. Dale and I watched it with our friend and neighbor, Tara V. We ate chips, dips, and shrimps and I won the Oscar ballot--I got 11. It was a quiet scene, not the parties of yore we used to enjoy at my girl Paula's parties!

It was still fun to watch the pretty dresses, the bizarre plastic surgery, and the spectacle. Seriously, how weird did John Travolta look? What is he up to with those hair plugs and that wacked-out face/mask he was sporting?

Cousin Chuck Visits...

My cousin Chuck stopped in for a visit recently with his boyfriend Travis. Chuck is taking a photography class and Dale was nice enough to show off all his camera equipment.

And this is Chuck's roommate Mander or "Mandy". Our cat Sidney decided Mandy had a good lap for napping. Mandy has a place just the next town over, in River Forest. When they come to town, they occasionally meet up with us. Great to see them!

Christmas Cards...

It seems I sent some Christmas cards without actually signing them! *dies of embarrassment*

If you got such a card, it should have read, "Love & Friendship, Rebecca & Dale".

So, yeah. Sorry about that.

Generally speaking you shouldn't start your Christmas cards right after finishing a round of "Thank you for your sympathy" cards. It makes you flaky, I guess.

Painting!

We've been bitten by the nesting bug pretty seriously this year. We've purchased furniture and home products like a couple of Martha Stewarts! And now we're painting our apartment. Well, Dale is painting (he really didn't give me much "brush time") and I'm taking pictures and trying to look busy.

The dining room will be three colors: white trim and ceiling, a color called "straw" for three walls and then a color called "sunflower" for the fourth wall. We like bold statements. We'll see how it goes. This is the first wall. It's straw with white trim.

Dale "cutting in" the second wall. Successful!

Getting around the radiator will be tricky but we'll just have to use a brush instead of a roller. Anyway, I love the color. It's very warm but also bright and happy.

Buying Used

One of the challenges of a vintage furniture fixation is the cleaning. Our dining room set came to us in lovely condition, overall, but was a bit dusty. We wiped everything down but the chairs were still a bit dingy. Not horrible but not as nice as they could be. Ahoy, Armor All! Cleans up vinyl much more impressively than Windex does, let me tell you!

Using Armor All wipes and a plastic glove to protect my delicate fingers, I wiped diligently and revealed the shiny white vinyl underneath.

New Furniture Pt. 3--Dining Set

So, we love craigslist. And when we saw this midcentury modern/vintage dining room set for a great deal less than we ever thought we'd find it, we freaked out and ran to get it. Thanks so much to Rebecca & Pat for helping us get the set home!

Anyway, the set includes a solid wood table with three leaves to make it nice and long, eight chairs (cane backing with white vinyl seats), and the original pad (and pads for the leaves) to protect the table during special dinners. Wow! All in excellent shape!

I like the grain of the wood, very much!

This is what six of the chairs look like...

And this is what the end chairs look like.

New Furniture Pt. 2--Mini Bar!

We are huge fans of craigslist! We look for jobs, freebies, and furniture. And we've pretty much hit the jackpot on furniture. Dale found this lovely cabinet in Elgin (a nearby suburb). We headed out to the lady's house and--wow--what a great midcentury modern house it was! This works great for us for storage. I keep dining table goodies at the bottom.

The top is why we bought the thing in the first place. LOOK AT THIS! The top pops up, the front hinge releases to show up a vintage mini bar! The original glassware is included. Six rocks glasses, six highball glasses, and six shot glasses! I LOVE it. There are two cubbyholes in the back corners where you can stow away traditionally shaped liquor bottles. WOW!

We got it for an absurdly low price and we love it! (note: Minky is on the right side in the gold box. It's a can opener that has red beads for eyes and a "mink" coat! I got him at an antique shop about a decade ago. I LOVE HIM.)

New Furniture Pt. 1--Headboard!

I've had a couple requests to see the headboard all done and in action! Here it is.
The bedroom is not exactly where I want it to be yet but can you see it? Can you feel the decadence? That spread's our thin summer throw that basically protects the nicer blanket underneath from all the cat hair. So that's not really part of the look I'm going for.

It's starting to look like it could be part of the set from Moulin Rouge. That's what I'm telling myself.

As a refresher, check out the gallery to see how it looked when we found it behind our apartment.

Moulin Rouge Bedroom

Dale and I started cleaning up my vanity--it was my great-grandmother's and I've had it since I was a little girl. It's been pretty beat up. In addition to having about 100 years of use, it's been moved multiple times (and sustained a broken leg), has evidence of having been refinished in the 1950s (you can see the power sanding marks in some places), and been kept in smoking homes up through the early 90s. It was dark, dank, grimey. So we started cleaning and couldn't stop ourselves. Above is how it looked after we cleaned the crap out of it. Dale convinced me to let him fix it so I sat biting my nails and waiting for the results. And they were amazing:

How beautiful does that wood look now? WOW! He was just starting to add a layer of shellac to it.

This is the other side, which wasn't in quite as bad of shape. Pretty! This will be part of the Moulin Rouge Theme Bedroom I'm working on. Should be finishing in 2015 at the rate I'm going!

World's Tackiest Headboard

So, Dale woke me up one night two weeks ago and let me know that the World's Tackiest Headboard happened to be right outside our bedroom window--waiting to go into the trash.

I was thrilled and we immediately scurried down the stairs and scooped it up. Of course, nothing can be simple! My goal was just to spray paint it a fabu gold and blue and use it as a free and easy piece in my dream Moulin Rouge-themed bedroom! I want to live inside the elephant in Moulin Rouge! So I started cleaning it tonight and it's filthy, of course. But worse yet, the paint--both layers of it--is coming off on my cleaning rag. And it's lovely hand-carved wood underneath! Gah! Now I am going to have to strip it in order to paint it because if I paint it, it will just flake off! *sigh*

Anyway, you can follow the progress of the World's Tackiest Headboard here, including the newly uncovered wood beneath the tacky paint.

Another dorky grandkitties post!

I am lame. But I love that they looked like they were having a meeting when I rudely interrupted them. And Bela looks so content with his eyes closed.

Grandkitties & Simple Solutions for Your Home!

Dale is a genius.

He suggested we use a boot tray to combat the growing Cat Food and Water Problem. The kitties tend to nudge their food out of the bowl. They also have this weird habit of stepping in their water, or worse yet, sipping water from their paw. This makes their food area quite unsightly! Dale came up with the idea of using a boot tray. Voila!

Note that this boot tray has only been in use two days and there is already a ton of kitty food on the tray itself. But now we've only got to lift the tray and dump in, instead of sweeping the floor and then mopping it up (food+water=paste).

Better Pic of New Lamp

Dale took an awesome picture of my new lamp!

New Counter Space!

So, we have a smaller kitchen with almost zero counter space. This makes doing more than one thing at once quite challenging--and the coffee maker takes up like 33% of the overall counter space! We found the free standing kitchen at Ikea to be just what the doctor ordered!

Dale hate empty kitchen space!

Dale put together new counter!

Pretty new counter! Sweet!

The Grandkitties

Rebecca's mom requested pictures of the "grandkitties" so here are snapshots from last night. These are not the best pics but we do what we can on short notice! All three were snuggled up next to Rebecca--one on her lap and the other two right next to her on the sofa. Dale was on the other end of the sofa and received no love at all.

Sidney Poitier requires a flash photo! And he was not amused. But he purred anyway because he's just a good sport in general. He has a tendency to rush the camera whenever he sees it. I think it has something to do with flash trauma.

Young Monty Clift is especially photogenic--he really does always look directly into the camera and puts on an air of quiet dignity that is rare in a one-year-old! His quiet dignity is only disturbed by the sprawl of new Ikea purchases on the table behind him.

Bela Lugosi is a bit camera shy. He doesn't really enjoy having his picture taken (he had gained a lot of weight but is slimming down again thanks to Monty chasing him around the house at all hours of the day and night). He always looks slightly perturbed in photos, as if we've just bothered him to be frivolous while he was in the midst of a very important nap or bank statement or something.

Random Life Stuff

Here is a poor photo of my new beloved lamp! It's THE HOTTNESS. It's so deliciously weird. I really can't take my eyes off of it!

And to commemorate the big day, I took photos of us at breakfast; we were deliriously happy with visions of gold tacky antique lamps dancing in our heads:

I almost look tipsy! And slightly cross-eyed. Weird.
--rebecca

Knobs

BEFORE!
AFTER!

I'm doing a revamp of my antique vanity. It belonged to my great-grandmother and it's in desperately in need of cleaning and a fresh shellac. So, I used brasso on the door pulls and it's like amazing! What a fab product! I'm not exactly stripping and refinishing it; just repairing/cleaning and using denatured alcohol to get the grime off it. I'll be putting a fresh coat of shellac on it once I get all the grime off. Holy cow is that thing filthy!

Pictures of our Place

Here are a few pictures of our place. Dale took the cool huge living room ones!

I love our little patio! It looks out over a retirement home and they have a little sitting area with a small water feature that makes a lovely babbling brook sort of noise. It's fun to light the candles on the porch and turn on our little string lights and relax on the porch in the evening.

Our little kitchen and pantry.

What's up with Dale?

He got a new coffeemaker and is in hot pursuit of the perfect cuppajoe! He's making two or three pots a day with a strange alchemy involving a variety of coffee types, a new grind for each style of coffee and on and on. It's quite the experiment. Good thing I like coffee! --Rebecca

I made awesome pancakes for b'fast using the most awesome mix from American Spoon Foods.
I got the mix from Rebecca for Christmas and I've been ordering it ever since. It's heavenly! I like the wheat and malt mix best. YUMMY! Buy some, yo!

Laboring on Labor Day...

We've been enjoying the holiday weekend by shopping! How uniquely American of us!

First we headed to the stores:

Dale's favorite store in Chicago! He had to get a little treat to celebrate his first paycheck.
I pretended to approve.

Next up:
We found curtains! There, and at Sears. We found the softer side of Sears with Ty Pennington curtains. They are hot, as you will see.

Exhausted, we decide to indulge in one of our favorites: Thai food.
It was our first trip to Amarind's but it will certainly not be our last:
It's shaped like a castle. And the food is tasty. What more could we want? Excellent service, too!

So, we worked hard putting our apartment together (we just got new windows last week) and here they are, in all their dark blue glory:

And these are my beloved bedroom curtains with adorable fixtures:
We had some champagne and relaxed on our absurdly cute porch, which you can kind of see through the curtain. More pics to come. Whee!

Home Sweet Home

Home Sweet Home!

A view from the top.