Adventures in the Kitchen part 4

If you have read my blog since it's inception you know that I was quite adamant that while plenty of great food blogs exist out there, this would not be one of them. And while I insisted that I wouldn't be blogging about my "expertise" in the kitchen, I lied. You can look back to June 2010 to see the original adventures in the kitchen.

While I may be pretty inept when it comes to cooking, I am a "little" better at baking but I could crush anyone when it comes to using the microwave. Imagine my surprise when I learned I could actually bake something in the microwave. This turned out so good that I couldn't resist the opportunity to pass it along. Did you know that you could "bake" brownies in the microwave? Now I know some of you are thinking, warming up a frozen pre-packaged is not baking but I'm not taking about those. I'm talking about baking brownies in a coffee mug.

Here's what you'll need.
4 tablespoons flour
4 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa
1 egg
3 tablespoons milk
3 tablespoons oil

Mix all the dry ingredients and then spoon in an egg and then add the milk and the oil. Now you're ready to "bake" your brownie. Bake for approximately 3 minutes, if you have a powerful microwave like I do, you may only need to bake for 2 - 2 1/2 minutes. Enjoy!

Spring!

This picture has absolutely nothing do to with spring, except for the fact that it was for sale at the flower show I went to yesterday. The flower show was a bit of a disappointment, seems this year's theme "Rock the Garden" was more about rocks then it was about gardens. Lots of landscape companies highlighting all the ways they can create a fabulous backyard oasis using stonework. Truth is I'd rather see more flowers.

But isn't this piano the gaudiest thing you have ever seen? At the same time, it's hard to take your eyes off it. It does not go with the color scheme of my house at all, yet I want it in my living room. Looking at makes me smile and I think had I had this piano as a child I would have practiced more. Perhaps I would have been a concert pianist by now.

At any rate spring arrives here sometime tomorrow and I couldn't be happier. Spring is my absolute favorite season for a number of reason. Each day that we get closer and closer to spring I know that I can once again say good bye to winter. Some of my favorite flowers, hyacinths and tulips bloom in the spring. I can finally put away the heavy sweaters, boots and mittens. New life, iced lattes, Easter, NHL playoffs. What's not to love about Spring?

If You're Irish, Come into the Parlor

And this is where it all began. Well it probably began somewhere before here but this is the family homestead in County Galway, Ireland. My grandfather was born in this house and lived here till he came to the United States as a young adult.

I feel very fortunate that I have been able to travel twice to Ireland, once with my family and a second time with friends. My first trip to Ireland was for a friends wedding, she got married here.

Yes, that's right I have a friend who decided she was so special that she couldn't have just an ordinary wedding, she needed to get married in a castle and not just any castle but a castle in Ireland. It was the most spectacular wedding I have ever been to and I'm pretty sure that no other wedding I ever attend will measure up. This wedding and the two weeks we spent there are some of my most cherished memories.

The funniest part about my first trip to Ireland is that the day after spending a weekend in castle, we moved on to spend a few days with friends who live in Ireland. In the castle I had a bathtub the size of most people's bathrooms and a shower head the size of a small cafe table. Let's just say that I took my fair share of showers and baths while I was there. The friends that we stayed with had built a new home for themselves on their family property, we stayed in the original family cottage. My bedroom there? Well I could sit on the twin bed and basically touch all four walls, and the bathroom? My kitchen sink leaks more water than the shower in that cottage.

I don't normally consider myself to be high maintenance but it really is hard to go from being a princess to Cinderella.

Emails, books and other surprises

After 6 weeks off recuperating from surgery. Countless hours of sleep, lots of television and a few very good books. I returned to work yesterday.

I had 1,732 emails waiting for me. Oh and these. To distract me from the massive amounts of email.



And if you are looking for some good book suggestions may I suggest the following:

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
The Good Thief
Flight to Heaven
Churched One Kids Journey toward God despite a Holy Mess