Home-making Away from Home

This week P and I are vacationing in Hatteras. His parents have two little cabanas on the beach and have been very generous in letting us use one for the week (for free!).

We spent most of Saturday packing up and provisioning (I picked up that word on our sailing trip and for some reason I love it. You will probably grow to hate it, much like one of my friends developed an intense dislike for the word “murmur” after attempting to read Fifty Shades of Grey. I apologize in advance, because seriously, what a perfectly apt word – I just have to use it!) Anyway, we left Arlington around 12:50. As the Google maps it, the trip from Arlington to Hatteras is roughly 6 hours. HA! That drive took us over 8, not including stops for lunch and dinner. I don’t think we ever got above 40 mph on 95. On the bright side, once we got to Kitty Hawk, the traffic wasn’t so bad. We stopped for dinner at a great place called “I’ve Got Your Crabs.” 

It was a pretty low key restaurant. Apparently most of their business comes from carryout, but there were two booths and two long counters for dining in. We sat at the counter that ran next to the kitchen and ordered raw oysters, soft-shell crabs, and blue crabs. I also indulged myself with a delicious sweet tea. That food was fantastic! They put a big sheet of kraft paper on the bar and shuck the oysters right in front of you, placing them in the half-shell on the paper.  The crabs came out quickly after that. I can’t speak to the blue crab, as that was P’s meal, but my soft-shell crab sandwich was perfect, just spicy enough with a great sauce to go over it. I took only one picture of the interior, and it didn’t come out super well, but I’ll probably be back there soon enough.

The first day here consisted of repeated rounds of sleeping, eating, taking a walk, reading, repeating. Also, I made bread.

I’ve been itching to do some more domestic-type things lately, like sewing and baking and gardening. For whatever reason, I only get the urge to do productive things like that when I’m sitting in front of a computer screen at work or in class. Once I get home, the urge has left and I’d rather sit on my couch and read blogs or zone out on Pinterest or watch tv. Don’t get me wrong: These are all incredibly pleasant things that I definitely enjoy. The problem is I’ve let myself grow really lazy about creating anything – I’ve only been consuming.

Well, I decided this vacation was the perfect opportunity to do a few creative things. Since we’re staying in a cabana with a full (albeit tiny) kitchen, we are making most of our meals on this trip. P just mentioned it’s really like a staycation, just away at the beach. I figured that since I’ve got the full kitchen I might as well make some things I’ve been wanting to try – like bread and jam. I got the recipes from the blog Honey and Jam. (I love this girl’s photos, and someday I will get a decent camera so my own photos look less junky and more professional. For now it’s just my phone camera, which really isn’t so bad…)

The bread turned out pretty well. I found the recipe on Honey and Jam like I said, but it’s really a recipe from the book Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day (note: this links to the authors’ website. A new edition of the book is out in October, which is why I’m finding their recipes on blogs for now. Once the book is out I’ll either buy it or beg my local library to buy it). I was expecting my loaf to be a bit crustier, and I’m thinking I didn’t create a steamy enough environment in the oven. The baking process involves preheating a pizza or bread stone (or in my case an iron skillet) in the oven and then transferring the risen dough into the oven and placing a pan with water in it on the bottom rack. The water steams in the hot oven and (I guess?) helps to create a better crust. I’m still learning all this stuff, so don’t quote me. I have plans to slowly delve into this world of bread-baking over the next few months. I’ll let you know what I learn.

The jam was kind of a whim. I was reading through Honey and Jam and the ingredients in the jam recipe intrigued me (strawberries, balsamic vinegar, sugar, black pepper). I hadn’t really planned on making jam on this trip, but when we were gathering provisions at the store, I saw strawberries on sale, so I grabbed a box. I knew I already had the other ingredients and I figured that if I wound up not wanting to bother with the jam, we could just eat the strawberries as a snack. (on a side note, don’t you love when a recipe is so simple that you can remember all the ingredients after reading it only once?)

Anyway, here are some photos from the vacation so far.

It's Been a While...

It’s been a while since I first decided I wanted to have a blog. Unfortunately, like most of my plans to keep a journal (or any real type of routine, honestly) the plan to blog was soon thrown off by the intrusions of life. It’s been almost two years since I wrote my first post. I never seemed to have time to write or get pictures together or tweak my page so it actually looked like I wanted it to look. I think this is one of the problems with being a perfectionist: I’d rather procrastinate indefinitely than start something that I don’t think I can realize in the time I have.

But lately, I’ve been taking some great pictures! And doing some cool things! And I need a creative outlet! And seriously, I spend about three hours on Pinterest and other sites every day placidly consuming information. If I can consume for three hours I can probably create for at least two of them.

So here’s my second blog post ever. And I’ve got to bring it up to the present, so here’s a quick rundown of everything that’s happened:

We spent a year in Arizona.

I had a huge house to decorate for the first time in my life, and it was kind of awesome, kind of daunting.

I had a super creative Christmas 2012 and made most of the gifts I gave.

Both sets of parents came to visit and we took two trips to the Grand Canyon and the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest. Northern Arizona may be the most incredible landscape I have ever experienced.

 

P deployed to Afghanistan, so I packed up the big house in Arizona, had the bulk shipped to DC, and took my car full of essentials (like my sewing machine and certain crafting supplies) to Athens, GA. My friend T flew out to Tucson to meet me and we made a road trip of it.

I lived in Athens with T, near our best friend M and her family for the summer. There were many days spent at the pool and at farms picking berries. We also explored the Athens restaurant scene – so good.

I spent most of the summer driving around the southeast catching up with friends and family. Exhausting, but totally worth it.

In July I moved to Arlington, VA. I stayed with our friend M for a few days while I waited for my apartment to be ready. He was also hosting V that weekend while she scouted apartments in preparation for her move to DC in September. V and I bonded immediately and had a great time exploring Arlington together.

Shortly after moving in I flew to Crete, Greece to meet up with P for his mid-tour leave.

We spent two weeks driving around the Island, exploring little towns, drinking espresso freddos, marveling at the evidence of wave after wave of cultures that inundated the island with each invasion and occupation and that ultimately were absorbed into the resilient Cretan culture. We explored the ruins of Knossos, imagining the kings there welcoming visitors who would come up the stone road from the sea, and turn a bend to view a magnificent palace encircled by hills covered with grape vines and olive trees. We visited some of the most magical beaches (one with pink sand and one that required a hike down hundreds of stairs). We stayed in a small village and took a cooking class followed by a feast of all the dishes we had made. We decided we want to live in Crete.

In August, I returned to Virginia and started Law School and promptly found my free time filled with student events and extracurricular activities. I met some awesome people. I also found some time to explore DC and the larger area with some new friends. 

T moved up to DC too to work on her MBA and we tried to get together regularly for drinks and shopping and other fun things.

In December, I survived finals and flew out to Arizona one early morning after the last one. P was back in the States, and I went to AZ to fetch him. We picked up the car we had left with a friend in Phoenix and started the drive to Arlington, via Georgia and South Carolina, where we spent the Christmas holiday visiting family.

Once we returned to Arlington, we hosted a New Year’s Day Hangover Brunch, then spent a week getting P settled into our apartment.  I started my second semester – even busier than the first. P had a few months of career course training in Northern Virginia.

In the Spring we took sailing lessons, unfortunately not together as our schedules wouldn’t allow it. I took the course with V and P took it a few weeks after. We’ve been out a few times on the Potomac since. I love sailing.

During the Summer, I worked at two internships and P started his new job at Ft. Mead. The commute is rough for him, but we love Arlington and our tiny apartment and I love that I can walk a few blocks and be at my school.

We took a bonsai class at the National Arboretum.

We went on vacation with our best friend from our time in Korea and his wife. Along with two other couples, we chartered a sailboat in Tortola and sailed around the British Virgin Islands. 

Y’all – sailing looks glamorous but let me tell you it is really more like camping on a boat – closer to RVing than anything probably. It was exhausting and I had a hard time being around other people constantly for ten days. But the weather was beautiful and the colors of sea and sky and the Caribbean aesthetic made for some awesome photos, so totally worth it. We learned a lot about sailing and even more about how we like to vacation (hint: it doesn’t really involve spending 10 days on a boat with six other people).

Now we’re back in Arlington, my internships are finished, and tomorrow we drive down to Cape Hatteras to spend six days in a cabana by the sea. Life is pretty good.

I’m writing this as I sit on my crowded little balcony drinking my iced coffee (Vietnamese style with sweetened condensed milk), enjoying a leisurely morning with the sounds of the city in the background. Later I’m meeting V for lunch, running errands, packing, and cleaning, but for now I am just sitting here thinking about the past two years and feeling blessed.

B-

A Little This, A Little That, and the Beer Punch Recipe

For several years now I've been considering creating a blog, but I've never quite managed to get around to it. Now a combination of events and changes in my life have made writing a blog both doable and personally useful.

If you're on Pinterest, you've probably lamented, as I have, the lack of an "I did this" option on pins. I've always been fairly crafty (craftish? prone to crafting? craft-inclined?) and Pinterest has been great with helping me keep track of inspiration and ideas to try. However, I now find myself craving a place to post those ideas and inspirations I actually followed through on! So this blog will function in part as an archive of completed projects.

So the advent of Pinterest was one incentivizing (yes, I am claiming that as a word) factor. Another is the upcoming deployment of my husband, Pete. He'll be heading out to Afghanistan soon and I'll be needing some distractions while he's gone. A blog will really help if law school doesn't work out.

Yep, that's right. Law school. I've got some big changes coming this year: I'll be moving to D.C., trying to find an apartment, a job (or at least an internship that will jazz up my resume), and hopefully (like seriously crossing my fingers, arms, legs, and eyes) starting law school in August 2012. And lucky you, hypothetical reader, you get to come along for the ride!

So I guess I'm finally getting around to blogging because I finally feel like I have something to talk about! Fair warning: It's going to be a mishmash of what I'm doing and what I find interesting, but that's what bricolage is: taking disparate things to create a combined whole.

Now, since this is a pretty lame first post, and no-one really cares about why I'm writing: Mama's gonna give you something meaty: A boozy recipe.

No seriously, everybody who has tried this adult beverage has wanted the recipe. Don't let the ingredients prejudice you: This stuff can be presented as fancily as you fancy, or as simply as you like.

Before I get too much further into details, I need to give credit where credit is due. We begged this recipe off my Aunt Abbey (aka Princess, as she insists we all call her after she's had two cups of this punch). Additional flourishes I mention are due to personal experimentation or ideas I found on Pinterest.

Beer Punch
1 can frozen lemonade (we usually use the plain yellow stuff, but the pink lemonade also works!)
vodka
three beers (y'all are going to be mixing this anyway, so save your 'spensive micro-brews and use Bud or Miller)
cranberries
2-quart sized or larger pitcher or other receptacle (we bought one of those handy-dandy gallon containers with a handle and spigot - I highly recommend getting one if you potluck frequently)

Dump the frozen lemonade into your container. Fill up the empty lemonade can half-way with vodka, and add that to the container. Slowly pour in three beers (you want to minimize the foam). Add cranberries and mix well (and carefully, remember this concoction has a tendency to foam when first created)

Garnishes and Presentation
The cranberries are primarily a garnish, but they do add a bit of flavor to the punch. If you can't acquire any cranberries, try any frozen berries you can find. I've also used frozen chopped rhubarb, which is quite tasty.

To make this punch extra fancy, consider adding special "ice cubes" to the mix. One idea I saw on Pinterest (it originally came from industrious justice and y'all should totally check out that blog, 'cause the lady has some great stuff!) was to slice up some lemons and put them in a cupcake pan, one slice per hole. Then you fill the holes up with either water or lemonade and freeze. Once the liquid has frozen, you can pop the fancified "cubes" out and add them to your punch. You may have to let them melt just a tiny bit around the edges before you can remove them from the pan.

Well that's all I've got for now. Check back later this week for a new post - I've got a few projects in the works and next time I'll include pictures ; )