C is for Cleaning ...

... I dreaded the weekends growing up. Not because I loved school so much I never wanted to leave, but because every Saturday was cleaning day at my house. I hated cleaning! I always tried to get the easiest jobs and then did them as quickly as possible. I have to admit, I did a pretty half-baked job most of the time. Sorry Momma.

I was always afraid of having my own house, because I just knew I would never clean it. With no one to boss me around and force me to clean, my house would spiral into a filthy, messy den of iniquity. (Okay, maybe not the iniquity part, but definitely the filthy messy.)

But this Saturday (Saturdays have turned into my cleaning day too. I guess old habits die hard, or maybe I just don't have time to clean any other day of the week?) as I was rocking out to my favorite girly tunes and toothbrush scrubbing my kitchen sink, in my old scrubs with my hair pulled up in a handkerchief (literally), I came to the startling realization that I was actually enjoying myself.

What? Enjoy housecleaning? What had changed? Nothing, really. Except for the fact that I was cleaning my house, my home, and that made all the difference. What a difference a sense of ownership makes!

R is for Red Velvet...

... This week I had to provide the refreshments for our office's February birthday party. I made this. People go crazy for a good red velvet cake. Something about the red color just seems to make it taste so much better. Despite the color, it really was delicious. Instead of using the cream cheese frosting between the layers of the cake, I used raspberry jam, and then put raspberries on the top of the cake for decoration. I wish I had taken a picture of it cause it turned out really pretty.

Smitten Kitchen is my absolute favorite food blog. I highly recommend you start reading it if you're into cooking at all. Her descriptions will make your mouth water, and the pictures are fantastic. She describes the cake better than I could, but I will just make one addendum to her recipe. Make sure you sift the powdered sugar for the frosting, or it will taste grainy. Sometimes I skip the sifting if I'm feeling lazy, but you don't want to do that with this recipe. Also, the cake was seriously easy to make and tasted great. Give it a try even if you don't like cooking from scratch.

E is for the Economy ...

... So the economy seems to be in a spot of trouble these days. You know what I'm talking about. Second great depression. Japanese-style 10-year recession. Dow Jones at lowest in 6 years. Government stimulus plan, rescue plan, bail-out plan, no-idea-what-to-do plan. Everyone's losing their jobs, their houses, their retirement, even the shirt off their back. All this talk makes for a real big downer.

I was doing a pretty good job of ignoring the economic woes of our nation, seeing as how I have this cush job and all, but recently the economy has reared it's ugly head and shown me that despite my best efforts to pretend that nothing's wrong, the economy can affect even my little ol' average life.

The economy hit us personally this week, in a big way. Let's just say one of us is on the job hunt again, in a nearly jobless market. Fun, right?

What I'm trying to say is, the economy is lame. The funny part is, no one even knows for sure what the "economy" actually is.

T is for Tamales ...

... Monday I had the great pleasure of making tamales with my mom and my sisters.

For those of you who don't know, my mom is from Mexico, which I like to think makes me quasi-Mexican. I may not actually have any Mexican blood in me, but I have learned to make some pretty great Mexican food over the years. Tamales are one of those.

Tamales aren't hard to make, but they are time-intensive and a lot of work. It goes by faster when you're doing it with others, so if you're going to make these, I'd recommend having a tamale party, and rolling them assembly line style. That's how we did it.

We loosely followed this recipe, improvising a bit on the flavoring of the meat and the amount of chicken broth in the masa.

Here's some directions and tips that might be helpful.

First, make the meat. We had one pork roast and one beef roast, so we just combined the two meats. But you can keep them seperate if you want. We crockpotted them over night, then shredded and seasoned them the next day. The more tender the meat is, the bettter. We like ours to be a little spicier than the recipe, so we added some chile enchilda sauce and extra chile powder. It turned out perfect.

While the meat is cooking, soak the corn husks in water, then pat them dry. Then mix up the masa. You want it to be spreadable, so don't make it too dry. We added about a cup more broth than the recipe called for in order to get it to the consistency we wanted.

Spread the masa on the corn husk with your fingers so that it's about 1/8 inch thick, and about 1/2 inch away from each side, and two inches away from the top and bottom.

Then put the meat down the middle of the masa. The higher the ratio of meat to masa, the better, but make sure you can still roll it without any problems.

Then take one side of the corn husk, fold it in half over the other, fold up the bottom of the corn husk into the roll, and finish rolling. (Did that make sense at all?)

After you've rolled the tamale, tie the open end closed with a long, thin piece of corn husk. A double knot will do the trick.

Then steam them and enjoy! The recipe link gives directions for steaming, but we had to almost triple the steaming time it called for. Don't get discouraged if your tamales aren't done after an hour, it took us almost three! The tamales are done when the masa is firm and stays together when the tamale is unrolled. Eat some fresh - that's when they're the very best!

You can freeze tamales cooked or uncooked. If cooked, just pop them in the microwave for a minute or so. If uncooked, let thaw, the steam as normal.

Home made tamales are delicious, so I hope you'll take the challenge and try making these. They are so much better than most you'll find in stores and even restaurants.

V is for Valentine's...

... I've had lots of Valentine's days in my life. But I have to admit this Valentine's Day was the best.

I didn't go to a fancy restaurant. I didn't get any gifts or candy.

I spent it in Malad, Idaho, probably the least romantic place in the world. I spent it with my parents, my siblings and their spouses. We had a homemade dinner, and we had to clean up the dishes afterward. Kids were running all over the house, interrupting the meal and the conversation. And after dinner, we played a game that resulted in the women yelling at the men and vice versa.

Despite the fact that it was not your typical Valentine's Day, and definitely not what I had requested of Alma previously, it was the best Valentine's Day ever.

Why? Because I spent it with my family, the people I love most. And, above all, I shared it with my husband, the person I love most in the entire world.

And that trumps any amount of fancy restaurants, flowers, and gifts.

P is for Pizza...

... Last night, Alma and I went here for a little pre-Valentine's Valentine's dinner. We love it. It's our favorite restaurant. We probably went there every other week while we were dating. So many big relationship decisions were made there over a delicious slice of wood-fired pizza.

We haven't been going as much since we got engaged - we had to tighten up the belt a little - but the staff still recognizes us and remembers our names when we go.

If you live in the Provo area and you're looking for somewhere to eat that's new, fresh, and delicious, go to Pizzeria 712. You won't regret it. The food is divine, the ambiance is sophisticated yet comfortable, and the staff is friendly and professional. And the prices aren't too steep, either. Go during the week or count on a long wait for a table on the weekends, but the wait will be worth it. If it's really busy, ask to sit at the bar and then chat with the chefs.

P is for Photography...

... I just stumbled upon this wonderful news photography blog, The Big Picture. The photos are stunning. Anyone who likes news or photography should definitely check it out.

Just thought I'd share my latest discovery with ya'll.

L is for Language...

... Hello readers of my blog. I'm writing specifically to you today, for I have a question that I need your help with.

Do you think it is the same to read a book with lots of swearing and to watch a movie with lots of swearing?

See, I'm in this book club. Our current book has some swearing, specifically the F-word. It's not on every page, but it does show up a couple times in every chapter. Definitely more than any PG-13 movie would swear.

I've never stopped reading a book because of language, but I won't watch most rated-R movies because of the language in them. I just hate hearing those words over and over again. But it has never bothered me as much to read those words.

It has occurred to me that my position might be slightly hypocritical. What do you think? Is the damage the same, regardless of whether you hear or read the word?

And if it is, does that mean we should avoid reading books with a lot of swearing in them? That rules out quite a few great works of literature. Hemingway, Steinbeck, Salinger, and O'Connor to name a few.

What is your opinion? How do you handle books/movies with a lot of swearing?

G is for Grumpy...

... Don't mess with me today. I am in a bad mood. And since, as Bill Watterson* once said, "Nothing helps a bad mood like spreading it around," I'm going to tell you all about it.

I woke up late. Usually, I just don't shower when that happens, but after a night of tossing and turning and dreaming about spiders*, my hair was out of control and could only be tamed by a shower - thus making me even later.

The clothes I planned on wearing looked terrible and made me look lumpy, so I was forced to change several times, setting the clock back even more.

I had no time to do my make-up, so I've been at work all day looking like death warmed over.

I yelled at my laptop and at my husband. The laptop took it lying down, the husband didn't.

I yelled at the car in front of me on my way to work, and then yelled at a lady at work. She'd made the same mistake three times, but she probably didn't deserve to be yelled at.

Then I yelled at my favorite co-worker Rebecca for telling me my reasons for being in a bad mood were lame.

All this yelling at people makes me feel guilty, which makes me in an even worse mood.

I didn't get my homework done in time (I know, I know, that one's my own fault), so I was completely unprepared for class, which made me even crankier.

It's snowing, again.

The only good thing that has happened today is my co-worker Michael gave me a sandwich from Carl's Jr. in exchange for all the candy he eats from off my desk. Thanks Michael. You're like the one bright ray of sun on a miserably cold and cloudy day like today.

So like I said, don't mess with me today. Chances are, I'll probably yell at you too.

*Bill Watterson is the author of Calvin & Hobbes

*I saw a spider on my bed Monday night. It ran off before I could kill it, so I've been having nightmares of spiders biting me for the past two nights. It's keeping both me and Alma from getting any kind of good sleep.

J is for Jace...

This is my nephew Jace:

He came to visit us the other day. This is how he showed up:
As a turtle/kung-fu/superhero/dragon-killer warrior.
Alma and I had lots of fun with him.
He helped me make dinner:
Then we ate dinner together, on the floor, because we still don't have a table.
Jace thought it was fun to eat on the floor. I didn't. Just ask Alma. He listens to me complain about not having a table pretty much every day.
Then we did the laundry, which Jace thought was great fun. He was mesmerized by the coin machine and loved pushing the laundry cart around the laundry room.
After helping me so much, Jace was tired out, so he and Alma watched Cars on the computer until his parents came to get him.
Thanks for coming to visit us, Jace. We sure had fun, and we hope you'll come again soon!