it's swell

does anybody else get those emails from amazon.com about the "new" music being released every week?

i honestly don't usually pay much attention to them. i'm not all that "hip" these days, and "new" music mostly passes me by with little notice.

but then, a couple of weeks ago, "strict joy" was on the "new" music list. and i thought, "hey, i recognize those faces."

glen hansard & marketa irgolva, from the movie once. and they're band, the swell season. my heart leapt for joy.

i wrote about once back in april when matt & i first saw it. i didn't elaborate too much on it, other than the fact that i absolutely loved the film. so, indulge me.

once takes two very powerful and common ideas seen both in film and life and gently smashes them together with wonderful and poignant results: love and music. watching two people fall in love is a wonderful thing in a movie, if you believe it. and you do in once. and while i love musicals as much as any girl, the necessity for a suspension of belief, e.g., characters randomly breaking out into song & dance like it was choreographed oh so perfectly, is sometimes a bit too much to ask of me. while once isn't a proper musical by any means, the movie is filled with music, songs written from a sad and passionate place, overflowing with emotional honesty. and to me, these songs are what truly make this movie for me. the amount of passion and emotional intensity found in the songs is overwhelming and beautiful, and glen hansard's crystal clear and pure tenor voice gives me chills. just listen:

this is "falling slowly," the "big" (oscar-winning) song from the movie. i teared up when i found this. its emotional intensity (both the song and hansard's performance) hits me deep.

so you can imagine how excited i was to learn that they were (a) still together and (b) had a new album of music out. but i was even more ecstatic to learn that they were touring. and that they'd be in houston in 2 weeks.

matt & i bought tickets that night, and waited for friday the 13th...though, i admit, quite nervously. we're both not huge fans of live shows for several and varying reasons. we worried about the atmosphere of a small-ish club, probably filled with rowdy, drunk texans cheering on this pure and refined pair and their wonderful music. and we worried that live, it just wouldn't be the same. well, all i can say is that we were incredibly wrong and very pleasantly surprised at how amazing and fulfilling their live show was!

even despite the rowdy, drunk texans yelling "GLEEEENN!!!!!" the entire night. (congratulations, loud man. you know his name.) glen hansard is an incredible performer who, at one point, unplugged his holey guitar, walked away from the microphone, and let only his voice do the work. it was amazing. and marketa, who is incredibly shy, was oh so cute and subdued. they make such a great pair.

i brought my camera (as you can see), but since it wasn't my fancy shmancy camera, getting a good photo was nearly impossible. this was my best shot of the night, slightly blurred, but enough to remember it by.

it was a very magical night for me, one filled with joy and pure emotions. i highly recommend anybody reading this check out once and the swell season. here's another taste of glen & marketa, music also from once:

delicious homemade pizza

i was going to do a halloween post this week...but our halloween this year was pretty craptastic. we missed our ward's trunk or treat because i guess people DO actually start activities on time here. and i didn't manage to get good pictures of our awesome pumpkins.

so i've decided to move on. and eat the gigantic bowl of candy we barely got a chance to hand out.

now, something you must know about us (matt & i) is how much we love pizza. hardly a week goes by without pizza being consumed at our house. and we don't just eat it like animals. we taste it, smell it, and let our taste buds take in the deliciousness that is pizza. we love pizza.

so most thursdays at our house is pizza night. and not just any pizza...homemade pizza! we got a pizza stone as a wedding gift, and almost immediately tried making homemade pizza.

and we failed. miserably.

and now, over a year later with a good modified recipe in hand and my baking skills sharpened, i make pizza nearly every week. and not just successfully. but awesomely. and i want the world to know it. and eat it.

nama's homemade herbed pizza

ingredients
1 packet dry active yeast (or 2 1/2 teaspoons)
1 cup warm water
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons sugar
2 teaspoons olive oil
2 to 3 teaspoons dried herbs (i use a combination of basil, oregano, thyme, rosemary, & sage, all of which make up the italian seasoning you find in stores.)
3 to 4 cups all-purpose flour

how it's made
1. first, in a large mixing bowl, dissolve the year in the warm water. be sure it's not too hot or you'll kill the yeast. swish it around in the water with a fork and wait for it to start foaming, about 5 to 10 minutes.

2. to dissolved yeast, add salt, sugar, olive oil, the herbs, and 2 cups of flour. mix by hand or with an electric or stand mixer until the flour is well incorporated.

3. next, add 1/2 cup of flour at a time, mixing well between each additions, until the dough is the right consistency. what's the right consistency? i'm glad you asked! you want your dough to be moist and sticky, but not too sticky that you can't work with it. and definitely not too dry that it's flaky and the flour isn't mixing well. if you find your dough in this dry state, add some more water a teaspoon at a time until it reaches the right consistency. if it's too sticky, add more flour. i find about 3 cups of flour to be the perfect amount.

4. if you don't have a stand mixer with a dough hook, lightly flour a good surface to knead your dough on and knead away! if you have a stand mixer (seriously, i don't know how i live without mine.), replace the paddle attachment with the dough hook and knead on low to medium-low speed for 5 to 10 minutes. the trick with kneading is knowing when it's ready. your dough should be smooth and elastic, and i suggest trying the window pane test to check: remove a small portion of the dough, thin it out, and stretch it slowly. if it's ready, the stretched part of the dough should be very thin and translucent. if it just tears when you stretch, it's not ready. here's a great explanation and picture of the window pane test.

5. when the dough is ready, place back in the bowl if you've kneaded it by hand. pour a small amount of olive oil in the bowl and coat the dough. place a piece of plastic wrap over the dough, cover with a damp towel, and let rise in a warm place for 1 hour or until double in size. i usually put the pizza stone in the oven about half way through the rising and put the bowel on the oven so it rises a bit faster.

6. punch down the dough and place on a lightly floured surface. this amount of dough can either make 2 thin pizzas or 1 thick pizza, both medium size. divide the dough in half if you're making 2. using a rolling pin or a pastry roller. (i much much much prefer the pastry roller; you have much more control of the pizza shape that way.) shape into the sized pizza you want. if you find that the dough is retreating whenever you roll out a section and not holding it's shape or size, let the dough sit for a few minutes to simmer down. then resume.

7. now, get out your pizza peel. flour it, and place large piece of parchment paper on it. then, place your shaped dough on top of the parchment paper. trust me. you'll have a much easier time transferring the pizza to the stone on the parchment paper. with the dough in place, build your pizza. bake at 475 for 6-10 minutes. it really depends on how thick your pizza is, so just keep an eye on it. remove and consume. and watch out for the scary bearded guy.

he'll eat it all if you don't keep an eye on him.

i must also share our favorite topping, and specifically, a sauce matt came up with last christmas.

this pizza pictured above has the following toppings: pasta sauce (we just use prego), mozzarella, diced onions and green peppers, marinated artichoke hearts, cheddar cheese, parmesan, and feta. doesn't that sound delicious?

mmm...but what about this pizza?

this is a white sauce pizza made from alredo sauce and caesar dressing, heavy on the caesar, light on the alfredo. it's probably terrible for you. but it's oh so good. we use any kind of canned alfredo and ken's steak house dressing. simply the best caesar dressing i've ever had. also on this pizza are familiar characters: mozzarella, diced onions and green peppers, marinated artichoke hearts, parmesan, and feta.

and here's another fun tip: to up the delicious factor on your crust, right before you put it in the oven, use a pastry brush to brush olive oil around the entire edge of the pizza and then sprinkle with sea salt. i can't tell you how big of a difference this makes to that small piece of crust. it's amazing.

also, stop by your local costco and pick up a 65 ounce bottle of marinated artichoke hearts. you won't regret it.

tour de (town)house

welcome to our home.

i love having a red door. it reminds me so much if both ireland and denmark. i don't think i can live in another place that doesn't have a red (or other brightly colored) door.

oh, and don't mind our ugly patio. it will (hopefully) soon be used to house our new bikes. (for those of you who aren't on facebook/don't ever log in to facebook, our bikes were stolen last week. with the help of craigslist, we found two better and more awesome bikes, but now we're trying to figure out what to install on our porch that we can lock our bikes to so that they will stay un-stolen.)

this is our dining area and front door area. i love this green. it's like an avacado/lime saturated green that i cannot get enough of. oh, and i'm in the middle of (trying) to secure the items i need to make stretched fabric frames for that green wall. if only ikea would have things in stock sometimes...

here's a peak into our chocolatey brown kitchen. i like to call this area where colors meet "mint chocolate chip." mmmm...

my small, but workable kitchen with all of the essentials: kitchen aid, toaster, crock pot, rolling pin, and deep fryer. and my cute green and orange apron i bought at target.

when we moved in, we bought a new refrigerator and dishwasher. and next summer (probably), we'd like to redo the cabinets and counter tops. the last occupants didn't believe in using cutting boards, thus leaving our counter tops hopelessly scratched. that plus the lovely yellowing of the formica is reason enough to replace it. and i bought those brightly colored tin canisters at ikea. i love how they match our house!

i also bought this amazing wood chopping board at ikea. i'm kind of in love with it right now.

our lovely (mostly ikea outfitted) living room. this is probably my favorite room in the house. and the colors make it feel perpetually like fall, my favorite season.

we spent a long time trying to find a rug we loved. after many stores, we finally found this creation at home depot, of all places. it's perfect in this room. also, that is a fireplace you see. every place we looked at had a fire place. in houston! where "winter" lasts about 2 weeks. we figure we could open up the windows on a particularly cool night and chill the place. then we could make practical use of our fireplace.

up the stair we go...to our atomic room.

this yellow is called "atomic tangerine" and one cannot possibly be anything but happy in this room.

you can usually find matt in his musical corner playing bach cello suites. on both his cello and bass.

our cozy bedroom. i loved how deep and awesome the turquoise turned out.

our (mostly my) book collection, which is ever growing. i know. i have a problem. and yes, that is a buddha. it was my dad's that he got when he was in thailand, i believe. it makes a great book end.

the loo, me, and my new nikon d60. i'm more in love with that than my wood chopping board.

well, there's our home! we absolutely love it, and yes, it took me nearly 3 months to document it on film. and now, onto denmark...

my kingdom for a (town)house!

and now for the story of our (town)house:

buying a place of our own while living in houston was always on the table. we had saved up for a down payment, and by the time june came alone and our lease was nearing its end on our current apartment, we made the decision to buy. we were referred to a real estate agent from a friend who had used her to purchase his townhome, and within a week, we had narrowed our future home to two places: a newly renovated condo and an old, but well kept townhome.

i was leaning more toward the condo simply because i loved the newness of it. the townhome would require a lot of renovations, including at least one new appliance, new paint on every surface, including the ceilings, and hiring somebody to tear down and possibly fix a mirrored wall. we like vintage. but not that kind of vintage. after spending a weekend going back and forth, we decided on the townhome. we loved the idea of not living in an "apartment," but a place of our own with 2 stories that actually felt more like a real home. we made an offer, and a day later, after a few negotiations, we had settled on a price. woohoo!

the next few weeks were filled with paper work, trying to find a good loan, and the inspection...which is where this fun filled process started going down hill...

after the inspection, there were numerous problems that needed to be fixed before we bought the townhome, the most odd being to remove an old, non-working water heater from the attic that was apparently just left up there when it was replaced. we sent an addendum to our contract to the seller...and waited. and waited. and waited. finally, after a week (this is now mid-july, about 2 weeks before we were planning on closing and moving), our real estate agent decided we needed to step up and send a ultimatum: sign the addendum to the contact, or we terminate.

this was such a scary thought. we had to be out of our current apartment in 2 weeks, we had grown attached to this townhome, and now, we were about to lose it all because of a flaky seller who simply wouldn't sign a piece of paper.

we sent in the ultimatum and waited. the seller's real estate agent said he kept trying and trying to get a hold of the seller, but couldn't. we were suspicious that he wasn't trying as hard as he said he was, and a day later, after waiting to hear something from a incommunicado seller, we terminated the contract.

we were incredibly sad that night knowing we'd have to start the search all over again and find something else very quickly. thankfully, the night ended incredibly well. our amazing real estate agent went above and beyond to remedy the situation: she called around to some of her connections, one of them being a property manager, to ask if she knew of anything for sale. this property manager owned a townhome in the same complex as the one we had just lost, was in the process of renovating it, and was planning on renting it out, but was willing to sell it for only a little bit more than what we had offered for the first townhome.

we breathed a HUGE sigh of relief. not only had another property been found so quickly, but in the same complex! the same layout! and newly renovated! simply amazing.

we went and saw the townhome the next morning to check it out. they had installed new tile downstairs on a 45 degree angle that was awesome, were recarpeting the upstairs, and had freshly painted the place from top to bottom. we were ecstatic. and jumped. and by the end of the following day, we had a contract in place to purchase this townhome! simply amazing.

now, it was a race against the clock. we had just barely 2 weeks to switch around our loan, close, and move. we really had great people, including our loan officer, working hard for us, and less than 48 hours before we closed on wendesday, july 29th, we secured the closing date and time and were officially on our last leg of becoming homeowners.

and now the fun part. with pictures. only a few hours after we closed, we were at our new home preparing to paint. we had bought all of the paint and supplies the night before, and with the help of amazingly kind friends, started painting. thankfully, since the entire townhome had been freshly painted top to bottom, we only had to paint the walls and didn't have to worry about the ceiling or trim or doors. thank goodness.

oh, blue paint tape. i love you, and yet, i loathe you. i don't think we realized how long it would take to tape the entire house, especially the kitchen and bathrooms. but tape we did. this is our friend gareth who is our almost-neighbor in the complex and one of matt's good friends from school. he was there practically the entire time we were painting helping out.

once the paint started coming up, we were elated! we had picked very bold color choices, and while slightly afraid that they wouldn't turn out as we had hoped, we were thrilled and relieved to see them all turn out mostly as we had thought.

we painted for the rest of that day, turned in relatively early (by midnight?), and were up bright and early to begin a new and full day of painting. that was thursday and we were moving on friday, so we had to have everything finished before we started the move. we painted, literally, all day. and most of the night. until 2:30 in the a.m. again, with the help of friends, who we could not have finished all of this work without.

ruth and grant come over to help, too. which is amazing, since they were moving the same day as we were. they were truly great friends. and did all of this for the price of papa john's pizza, which we fed them for dinner.

funny story: that corner ruth is taping in the picture apparently didn't like the tape. she finished taping that corner soon before we painted that wall, and it just fell off. oh, and she also left before that. i started blaming her all night for anything that went wrong at the last minute. way to help us out, ruth!

as that long night progressed, we were obviously starting to get a bit giddy. (paint fumes, much?) this was the last wall to be painted, and we felt the need to document it. it was amazing.

and it turned out fabulous! i think the giddy made matt angry instead of happy...i'm not sure why...

after the last coats of paint (ha! i typed "paints of coat" first...) were up on the walls, we cleaned up a bit, and went home to sleep for a measly 4 hours in our first home together before the move. it was quite bittersweet leaving our little apartment. while we had started to get so sick of the smallness of it, we actually found ourselves sad when we left it for the last time. we ate a dinner of burgers and fries from burger king on the floor the next day before we completely cleaned out the place. and when we left, tears were shed. it was our first place together. and it will always hold a special place in our memories.

as this post is getting way to long, i'll post again soon with an official photo tour of our townhome completely put together. i finally had an excuse to take photos of the place soon after my nikon d60 arrived in the mail. yeay! but one last note: i'm not sure what it is about me (lack of grace? passionate artisticness?), but both days we painted, i got covered in paint. much more than anyone else. while it might have something to do with my lack of coordination, i choose to blame it on my passion for art. and awesomely colored paint.

you know you're a geek when...

...amazon.com sends you the book recommendations like this and this.

...and when you spend 2 hours of your sunday evening discovering ardi and then convince a professor to let you "borrow" his copy of science.
>

1,000 words...or so...

i'm moving on up in the world.

photographically speaking.

out of the point-and-shoot world and into the digital slr world.

!!!

(this is me trying to contain my glee...)

and since i know some of you are photographers, amateur or otherwise, i need some advice on what to buy. i'm looking at nikons and cannons, specifically these models:

nikon d40 & d50
cannon rebel xs & sx10is

i want to stay below $500 and since this is my first digital slr buy, i want to know what your opinion is. yes, you.

and not only is this an investment in my (our) life, but this new camera will also be gracing us with its presence on our next trip...

let the opinions/advice flow.

p.s. i have spoken previous of my love for the pioneer woman (or p-dubs, as i like to call her). it is because of her, her awesome blog, and her fun smartypants quizzes that the purchase of this new camera is possible. thanks, pw!

for the love of (processed) food

this one time, we bought a (town)house.

then, we had a house-warming party. which gave us an excuse to make spinach artichoke dip.

i found a good recipe, and matt proceeded to make it the night of the party.

unfortunately, we sadly do not own a food processor, a kitchen item i have desperately long for.

but we have a blender (every couple gets one of these when they get married, right?) which i really only use to "process" food.

matt then placed all of the spinach artichoke dip ingredients into the blender and blended. and blended some more. and then some more.

and that's when the blender started smoking.

whoops.

a week later, i was making strawberry lemonade cupcakes, and needed the blender to "process" the strawberries into a puree.

and that's when it became certain that our blender was officially deceased.

matt suggested that he run to target to buy a new blender.

and then, brilliantly, he suggested we just buy a food processor. since that's all we ever use the blender for.

and i fell in love with him. all over again.

a half hour later, i had a food processor. and we've been very happy ever since.

especially when i made this for dinner the other night: red pesto penne with roasted cherry tomatoes and goat cheese.

thank you spinach artichoke dip, the best use of our now-dead blender. you went out in blazing glory.

thank you matt, for the gift of being able to actually process food.

and thank you love and olive oil for your deliciousness.