yeah yeah yeah

Spending Freeze–Valentines and Chocolates

Spending freeze day three (we started this plan on Feb. 12th) and Lance wanted to throw the whole thing under the bus. He got distracted today at Safeway by all the pretty pink and red cellophane-wrapped chocolates and giant bags of M&M's. He was all ready to throw in the towel and give into the temptation of Valentine's candy, insisting that we needed to buy chocolate to celebrate the day. He pointed out lots of great options that were very inexpensive and he made a fairly convincing argument. But chocolate and candy were not on the "essential items" list so he lost. No store-bought, Valentine-decorated, cheesy chocolates today. But what would the day be without chocolate? I mean, if there is ever a good excuse to eat your weight in chocolate, Valentine's Day is it. Lucky for us I have a couple of boxes of Baker's unsweetened chocolates so I googled a recipe and made brownies from scratch. I always make brownies from a box so these are actually a special treat, topped off with some homemade chocolate icing. Thus proving that it is always good to have cocoa, sugar and butter a plenty on hand. 

 

But damn it if we didn't spend $98.00 today with our "essentials". Diapers and formula are expensive. Throw in some prescriptions and BAM, its a $100 day. I'm not so good at this limited spending just yet. But I did make some homemade valentines while snowed in. That was fun and free. 

 

Happy Valentine's Day!

Spending Freeze Explained and Syrup—Day One

As you likely know, in January Lance started working full-time again. Hooray! Such a great feeling to again have the means to pay down our debt and restore our savings. And what relief a dual income, after a long nine months, brings this family. But damn it how quickly we can jump into old habits and abandon the goal to save. More fun to spend, spend, spend. Like spending $300 at Target when you went in just for diapers, formula and Lean Cuisines. Did I really need those impulse items: house slippers (they are super cute though), fancy rubber bands, lotions, socks, onesies, candy and such? Not cool. Our money doesn't need to go to Target, Southside, Chili's and Starbucks. It needs to pay off stupid, stupid debt. Suffering from buyers remorse a couple of times in January I decided it was time to start focusing on long-term gratification instead of short-term happiness. 

Jump forward to a few days ago—snowed in with absolutely no way to get out, a bowl full of vanilla ice cream and out of Hershey's chocolate. I was stuck with plain vanilla ice cream or finding something around the house to jazz it up. Duh, I thought. I bet I can easily make some chocolate syrup. And sure enough. Chocolate syrup is simple to make if you have cocoa, sugar and vanilla on hand. In less time than it takes to drive to the nearby 7-11, I made chocolate syrup.  

½ cup cocoa powder - 1 cup water - 2 cups sugar - ⅛ teaspoon salt - ¼ teaspoon vanilla

 

I used a recipe from the "Small Notebook for a Simple Home" blog I found in my google search. What a great blog. It is all about simplifying your life, spending less and making smart family decisions. The blog author recently posted about her experience with not spending any money for a month. Interesting I thought. Very interesting. So I decided to copy the authors challenge and see if Lance and I could do the same. Not quite as ambitious, we are trying for 20 straight days. 

For the next 20 days Lance and I are not spending money on anything we don't absolutely need—gas for the car, money on the metro card, bread, milk, butter and a couple of meats and fresh produce items are all we really need. Diapers and formula too of course. Part of the challenge, as I see it, is to not go to the store to spend $200 stocking up on food for the next 20 days but instead eating the food we have way too much of already. Currently our basement looks like we are waiting on the apocalypse. It is going to take a lot of creative cooking (we call these "Quick Fire Challenges" like the ones on Top Chef) to use some of the random items stored, but none-the-less we will not come even close to starvation. 

There you have it, Day One of the Hill Smith Spending Freeze. One less trip to the store and I learned how to make chocolate syrup. Little steps toward the big goal of being debt free by 2015 (minus the mortgage of course).

I Am Not 22 Years Old (so no need to try and drink like one).

Last summer I asked my friend if she had managed to get her drink-on since the birth of her baby boy. She laughed, "Oh yeah, once. You will try once too. But just once."

So true, so true. Wednesday was my big trial run of acting like a 22 year old who is actually 35 with an infant and way too old to tie one on. What happened to my skills? I remember back in Stillwater when it was no big deal to drink until 3 am several nights a week and still manage to get to work by 10 am to sling some salsa into 100 plus ramekins, smile at some customers, make an easy $35 bucks, head to the Stonewall and do it all again. Hell, even five years ago I could stay up all night and recover in a day as long as I had the essentials: aspirin, water, fried foods, laffy taffy, cough drops and more water. I use to have the ability (rarely attempted mind you) to follow a strong night of fun with a little hair of the dog and keep on going. Of course such foolish action was reserved for tailgating, days at the lake, NYC, NO or trips to Summit County. 

But I guess it is official, I'm old and drinking stupid amounts of beer and Colorado Bulldogs until sunrise, no matter how awesome the company, is dumb dumb dumb. I swear I could feel my kidneys hurt for a couple of days and it wasn't until today that I felt completely back to myself. That is a total of three days. Day one: huge ass hangover. Feel like hell. Wishing I would throw up, hoping for a three hour nap and needing a gallon of water. Day two: feeling sluggish but pretty sure I'm not going to die of an alcohol related death but not sure if I will throw up on the flight or not. Day three: feeling okay but still so very tired. Day four: normal. Finally normal. 

And all this with an infant. Good god I'm stupid. Okay, okay. Lesson learned. I cannot binge drink. I am not 22 years old and hangovers now scare me. 

At least I didn't wake up with a tiger in the bathroom. 

P.S. - husband took one for the team and took good care of Sunny. Please, no need to call DHS. I was dumb, but not irresponsible. 

Number 1. More Black-Eyed Peas, Please. Twenty-five Lessons from 2009.

"When you look for the bad expecting it, you will find it." — Pollyanna

I hate to even consider saying that this year has sucked when it obviously was one of the best years of my life (thank you Sunny). But for several reasons it was also the worst year of my life. Maybe it was the black-eyed peas I ate. I did eat my peas. I always always always eat my peas. But I was six weeks pregnant last New Year's Day and experiencing full-on morning sickness. I threw up the peas. Maybe that is the reason for this ongoing run of bad luck mixed with exceptionally great luck. At least my luck is in balance. With the good comes the bad and I guess I'm learning to adjust to the ups and downs and trying to make my own big ass pitcher of lemonade.

But I'd be lying if I didn't say I was looking forward to a new year. Openly welcoming 2010. I love the hope of a new year. The prospect of greater things around the bend. The idea that if you eat just the right amount of black-eyed peas you can offset all potential bad luck for the year. A new year, a new beginning and the start of new adventures. 

So after writing my twenty-five lessons from 2009 what did I learn and what do I want to bring with me into 2010? I think I'm officially a Pollyanna. I need the Glad Game — the game of finding something to be glad about in almost every situation —  to help get me through the rough spots and I need the Glad Game to appreciate the good stuff. It is all about balance, finding good in even the worst of situations and eating your peas. Always, always, always eat your black-eyed peas. 

 

Happy New Year to you and yours and bring on 2010!
 

Number 3. Let Them Eat Cake. Twenty-five Lessons of 2009.

In times of tragedy and sorrow some people cry, some people sleep and some people eat. I'm an eater. Preferably something sweet. Chocolate cake balls, a Merritt's cake or cookie. A big pan of hot brownies, ice cream or even a big bowl of icing. The sweeter the better — sugar is where I find my comfort. Damn I wish I was a person who found peace in a nice long run. I'm completely jealous of those who use a long run or bike ride to clear their mind. But that isn't me. I unfortunately find my peace in the bottom of a bowl of raw cookie dough. I swear it wasn't more then ten minutes after my mother's death I had a Merritt's cookie in my mouth. And I'm pretty sure my sisters had one too. While my dad likely had his hands in a bowl of M&M's. It is inherited. I come by it naturally. I blame it on my mother. She was the best baker ever. I can still remember the smell of her homemade cinnamon rolls, apple dumplings and date roll cookies. Her chocolate mousse was like no other and she could make a French silk pie better then any I've ever tasted. Oh my mother could bake. So it isn't surprising that the Hill girls have a chocolate, pie, cookie, brownie, cinnamon bread, cake batter, ice cream, cookie dough, baked fudge addiction. 

So these past few months I have given the Kitchen Aid quite a workout. Ahhh, but the smell of homemade cookies reminds me of my momma and that makes me happy. So admittedly I need to slow down on the baking or at least stop eating what I make (a goal for 2010) but few things in life are better then a plate full of warm cookies made by your momma. I'm not sure growing up I realized cookies came in a box. I hope Sunny grows up the same. 

 

Number 14. Whip It Real Good. Twenty-five Lesson from 2009

I just recently discovered the joy of cooking with heavy cream. Seriously, who knew heavy cream was the bomb and made everything calling for milk even better? Okay, apparently most people are in the know that using heavy cream for your mashed potatoes instead of milk makes them even more awesome. I however truly thought whipping cream's sole purpose was for making homemade whipped cream. But much to my surprise it is basically a sweet replacement for milk in almost any recipe. Try swapping heavy cream for milk in buttercream icing and you'll get the fluffiest, sweetest buttercream icing ever. And it still tastes like icing. I hate hate hate cool whip type icings and this is no where near that style of frosting. Using the heavy cream just makes the icing a little smoother and a bit shiny. Perfect for cupcakes and pumpkin cookies. YUM. I also discovered it is useful in making cheesy potato soup and homemade ice cream (which I made a ton of while pregnant this past summer). So if you don't use heavy cream for your mashed potatoes, try it. Not a profound lesson for 2009 but nonetheless one that changes my life for the better.

 

Number 18. Life is Good with a Trader Joe's. Twenty-five Lessons of 2009.

We've almost reached the end of 2009 and I can probably count on my fingers how many times we have eaten out or ordered take-out since April 09. I blame W for this. He got us into this horrible mess of an economy, which is what led Lance to become a Bush statistic. He was laid off in April. So thanks to the failing economy we had to make some changes in the Hill/Smith household and eating out and getting take-out was the obvious thing to give up first. Most obvious but least fun. Not that we use to eat out all the time but we probably ordered take-out once a week and ate out a several times a month. So how do you eat cheap without feeling like you can only eat ground beef and canned soup? 

Thank you Trader Joe's. With the help of TJ's we have managed to keep our weekly grocery spending under $90. Which sounds high, right? But that covers everything: diapers, formula, cleaning supplies and food for all meals that week. But we couldn't do it without Trader Joe's. Okay, so we could do it but we wouldn't get to eat so high on the hog. Often eating filet mignon, cranberry stuffed turkey, chicken cordon blue, all with fresh produces too. And tonight we are trying sweet glazed pork Florentine stuffed with goat cheese and spinach with a side of Gouda mac and cheese and cinnamon apples. That doesn't sound like a meal for a family living on 2/3 less income then normal, right?

So living on a budget and sticking to it isn't always easy but I've discovered if I plan out each of our meals in advanced, do a good run through of the all the ingredients and items we have in the fridge/freezer/cupboards and - most importantly - stick to the list we can do it. The nice thing about Trader Joe's, it is small and your choices are limited. Might be a turnoff to some but it actually works in my favor. I don't get side tracked by the shiny new cookie box and instead can focus on my plan and if I see something new I would like to try I put on the list for next week. That's the deal. If it isn't on the list and not needed we can't buy it. Obviously if we forget to add milk to the list and we need milk, we buy milk. But just because the new holiday peppermint cookies stuffed with chocolate icing look amazing doesn't mean we get to buy it. Although last week I did stray from the list for a .99 cent advent calendar. See, only at Trader Joe's can you get an advent calendar where each day you open has a piece of chocolate. And good chocolate too. It tastes European. Oh, and the beer and wine - so very cheap at TJ's. Seriously, you can get $3 wine and can usually find a six-pack micro-brew for $4. Sure Natty Light is cheaper but a $4 import beer is usually, okay always, better then the Nat.

So in 2009 I have learned to keep a budget and stick to it all while still making meals that don’t make us feel like we are living on budget. I know this discovery isn't rocket science and I know many of you reading this have probably done is for years but for me it is new and the practice has really helped keep me sane, well feed and living the good life.

Number 25. Blue Bell Cookie Dough Ice Cream IS the Best Cookie Dough Ice Cream. Twenty-Five Lessons from 2009.

I think it is safe to say that 2009 has been anything but a typical year for me. In the past 12 months I faced four major challenges: pregnancy, loss of household income, birth of my first child and the death of my mother. But with each of these challenges I’ve learned a lot. Some lessons more valuable then others. Most of these lessons just came circumstantially but a few are results of much work and perseverance. Take for instance number twenty-five and the first in a list of "Twenty-five Lessons from 2009".

(Twenty-five lessons with twenty-five days left in 2009...let's see if I can do one a day!)

25 – Blue Bell Cookie Dough Ice Cream IS the Best Cookie Dough Ice Cream EVER
My absolute favorite ice cream is Blue Bell Cookie Dough Ice Cream. I could eat this ice cream everyday. And for almost seven weeks while in Oklahoma this year I practically did. The ice cream it self is good, not amazing, not the best ever, but very good. Ahhh, but it isn't the ice cream that makes me so happy. It is the cookie dough. Huge chunks of cookie dough that actually tastes like real cookie dough. And not like the cookie dough you buy pre-made in a tube but real homemade cookie dough - soft, buttery and gooey. The kind that can give you salmonella. So YUMMY. But it isn't like all of a sudden Blue Bell became my favorite brand of cookie dough ice cream. I've been eating this stuff for years and I eat each bowl the same way. I first eat around the cookie dough chunks, eating only the ice cream until I'm left with just a mound of cookie dough setting in a small pool of melted vanilla ice cream. Sometimes this strategy requires me to spit chunks of dough back into the bowl and I don't care if it is gross, I'm not sharing with anyone. MMMMM, nothing is better then a dozen or so chunks of cookie dough piled on my spoon for the last bite.

Okay, so how do I know that Blue Bell is the best? Here is the deal - a.) you can't buy Blue Bell in Virginia and b.) I was pregnant for nine months during 2009. I was a cliche. I needed, I wanted, I craved cookie dough ice cream which is why the search for a comparable ice cream took place. From Turkey Hill to Breyer's, to store brands, Ben and Jerry's, Blue Bunny - nothing even came close. With Ben and Jerry's, the ice cream part is very good but the cookie dough chunks are small and chalky and taste more like a week old crumbled up cookie. That is the problem with most cookies doughs, they are dry and chalky. Lucerne's is very gritty. Breyer's didn't even taste like cookie dough. And since I'm a big fan of Breyer's homemade vanilla ice cream I thought for sure I'd like their cookie dough but theirs was my least favorite. Hardly any dough chunks and they were dry, flavorless and small. Like the size of a miniature chocolate chip. Haagen-Dazs was okay. I could see where someone who has never had Blue Bell might think it was good, but I wasn't a fan. I think the closest to okay I found was Eddy's but the chunks were so tiny that you couldn't eat around them and save them for the end.

So in a quest to find a Blue Bell replacement I came to the conclusion that I ONLY like Blue Bell. Nothing else is good enough in my opinion. Countless bowls of ice cream in 2009 and lesson learned! The good news - I no longer feel the need to find a comparable ice cream and pretty much don't eat ice cream in Virgina. The bad news - I eat a pint or more a day when back in Oklahoma. 

Day Five: Takk

Day Five
Grindavík, The Blue Lagoon
November 27, 2008 - Thanksgiving Day

The Blue Lagoon is without a doubt the most touristy spot in all of Iceland. Bus loads of tourists pile out of excursion shuttles hourly and even on a cold November Thursday the place was busy. Busy, but not crowded. But not going to the Blue Lagoon while in Iceland would be like not going into a casino when in Vegas. It might be touristy, but it is amazingly beautiful, warm, relaxing and very different then any other place I'd been to in life.

The Showers
When we first entered the Blue Lagoon we paid the entrance fee and had to decide if we wanted to rent a robe or not. The Northern Light Inn had towels available for us to take to the Lagoon so we didn't need to rent a towel but we did rent a robe. Which was a smart decision. It is quite a bit more but well worth it. This is Iceland, it is freaking cold and just a towel isn't enough and a gigantic soft robe is very inviting in the freezing cold. So after paying the fees we were handed an electronic bracelet that operates the lockers and can be used at the snack bar to buy food and drinks which meant we didn't have to carry around money in our robes...quite handy, especially since every robe is exactly the same.

Then comes the locker rooms, showers, and changing area. Oh the rumors I'd heard about the showers. Because, unlike the US, the sign saying to take a shower before entering the pool actually means to take a shower before entering the pool. But this wasn't quite as traumatizing as blogs and rumors would lead one to believe. It is true that everyone is required to take this shower nude, no swimsuit. And it is also true that the showers are open but they aren't communal and each shower head is in its own door-less stall. And contrary to popular belief, a woman (a shower Nazi of sorts) does not walk around the stalls checking and verifying that people scrubbed their privates and it wasn't as bad as the horror stories I'd read. It was really no big deal. Each stall comes supplied with both body soap and conditioner. (I should have put the conditioner on my hair before even entering the Blue Lagoon and left it on for the day. But I didn't and consequently had straw hair for a few days). I brought my swimsuit into the shower with me so I could put it on afterward without having to do the nude walk to the towel racks, especially nice if you have a stall at the end, far from the racks. Being the only modest American in the area, I was the only one who seemed worried about getting a swimsuit on quickly... most others preferred to air dry as they casually walked to their clothes and towels.

Freezing Cold. Nice and Warm
After the shower I met up with TL. The men and women's locker rooms both ended in a small lounge and snack area. Off to the side was the enclosed entrance to the Lagoon but it only seemed right for us to go for it the hard way -- off with the robe and a careful run a few feet in the freezing cold before entering the water. And it was freezing outside -- literally freezing. Cold, windy and freezing. Twenty seconds in only a swimsuit outside in the cold was brutal. But oh so worth it once my feet stepped into the hot geothermal waters of about 102°F. Very similar to a hot tub, but a huge hot tub. A 53,850 square foot hot tub. And the water was the most beautiful blue. A sort of milky, light aqua blue. We couldn’t see more the a few inches below the surface because it was so milky but it was such a beautiful color. It looked like a blue sports drink mixed with part milk.

Much to our surprise, the water isn't deep at all. Around the edges of the lava rocks it is very shallow but for the most part is is about four or so feet deep throughout the entire pool. Perfect for me. TL had to bend his knees to walk around on his knees so he didn't expose more then just his face out of the water. and with the cold wind blowing - our hair, eyebrows and eyelashes would freeze if you didn't go under every few minutes or at least splash water on our faces. We could feel your face freezing and I think my sinuses actually froze a time or two.

So imagine doing in an hour long in-water massage on this cold day... annnh, it wasn't so bad. The massage therapist laid a huge towel over us that covered our entire bodies so the only thing not warm was our face and he would dunk our bodies in the water every five minutes to warm up the wet towel and the massage was relaxing and nice. I would however recommend doing an indoor massage if it is freezing outside but since we had made our appointment weeks in advanced we couldn't change it. Oh, and I didn't laugh as she massaged my toes, which is huge for me.

After the massages we spent a few more hours hanging out in the water and saunas. As recommended by everyone at the Blue Lagoon, we put handfuls of silica on our face and lounged in water looking like freaks with white masks all over our faces, but everyone else looked like too. When we finally got out of the water, we were pruned, sleepy and hungry.

The Free Show
Too bad TL couldn't use the girls changing area... he could have seen quite a show. I will explain...
The changing areas in the locker rooms are very accommodating with plenty of hair dryers and mirrors so basically everyone visiting the Lagoon is using the changing area and getting ready before leaving. Which is great, it is too cold to go outside with wet hair. But, what I didn't understand was why, why in the hell did the 10 or so women changing in my area feel the need to blow dry their hair and put on their make-up with only their pants on? Seriously, why couldn't they at least put on their bra before prancing around the changing area getting ready? So annoying. Everywhere you turned you had someone's boobs all up in your face. I'm just saying, put on the bra before fixing the hair. Please!

Thanksgiving Dinner
In the spirit of Thanksgiving, Lance and I had a special dinner at the Blue Lagoon restaurant, Lava, and we couldn't have picked a better place to eat and celebrate Thanksgiving as a family. First off, we lucked out with a table right by the water with an amazing view that overlooked the Blue Lagoon. And since I'm obsessed now with Icelandic lobster, we ordered an appetizer of lobsters. They are smaller then that of a Maine lobster and they are oh so good. I think they just might be my absolute favorite of seafood. For dinner I had more Icelandic lobster, beef fillet, portabella mushrooms and potatoes all covered in a pepper sauce. Lance ordered the fillet of lamb with potatoes and both dinners were better then average and the best meal we ate in Iceland.

This was a photo of my dinner from Lava. It might not looks so appealing because I'm not very good at taking food photos but you get an idea of just how small the lobsters are. I could eat those lobsters everyday. Seriously, everyday. But the rest of meal was just good but not outstanding. I think TL and I are slightly spoiled with all the amazing places to eat in DC and Old Town. So although the dinner didn't blow us away, they were really good. Dessert, different story. The dessert that night was typical of all Icelandic dessert we experienced, not so good. Such a bummer to not find really good dessert in Iceland. But their candy bars, especially the Nizza with the candy chocolates in the chocolate, are freaking awesome. If you ever see a Nizza candy bar, buy it.