Sunday Cooking

I love cooking on Sundays so I've decided to start a series of posts called Sunday Cooking.   Sunday meals are a long-standing tradition in so many families.  Each week, I will post a recipe/link to a recipe that the hubs and I are making.  Enjoy and please send along any suggestions!

I LOVE MEATBALLS.  I can't stand going to a restaurant, ordering Spaghetti and "homemade" meatballs only to find they are the frozen bag-variety meatballs so I went on a mission to find a good meatball recipe. I immediately found this one.  There were a ton of good reviews so I figured what the heck! Today I bring you, Rao's meatballs!  This is the best meatball recipe that I've found.  They are amazing.
Rao's has been in business since the late 1800's and has been serving home-style Italian food ever since Charles Rao bought the saloon at West 114 Street in Spanish Harlem in 1896.  This really is such a great recipe.  You have to try it!

I won't repeat the recipe here because it's not mine, but it has a good bit of of cheese and breadcrumbs in it.  It really makes the outside crunchy and the inside really moist.  The meatballs really hold up well in the sauce.   I've eaten them on rolls, but tonight we're having Spaghetti and Meatballs.  Comfort food is wonderful!

Of course, no great Italian meal is complete without some good wine.  We're pairing tonight's meal with Pinot Evil Pinot Noir.


Look for more Sunday Cooking posts. Hubs and I are toying with a food blog.  Tell me what you think!

Enjoy the week!  I will be enjoying left-overs!

Avoidance

I could make all sorts of excuses for not blogging, but who cares really.  I've been telling myself that I would like to be more creative, yet I haven't really picked up my camera in a month or so and hadn't picked it up in months before that.  I haven't set foot in this blog for two months.  I seem to have lost my mojo.

I've started to take pictures with my iPhone again.  Baby steps.  Nothing happened really.... I didn't even get bored.  I would do that thing where I would see something that I would love to photograph, promptly did an inner shoulder shrug and kept doing nothing.

Maybe I'm depressed.  I get that way when the weather starts to get colder.  Though I love the way the leaves look when they start to turn, I notice at the same time that my moods start to shift.  Got a case of the Blahs...  Maybe a vacation to a sunny destination would be just the ticket.

Anyway, I'm not going to make any silly promises about blogging more.  I enjoy it and just need to make time for it.  You can only stare at the boob tube so much, right?

Album vs Single

I was driving home tonight, listening to one of my favorite albums, when I wondered how many people buy whole albums anymore. When using iTunes there's no need. You hear a song. You like it. You buy it. I wonder how many people spring for the whole shebang anymore.

I thoroughly enjoy listening to an entire album. The time and thought it takes to get the order just right... The artist tells a story and with just the right order, it can be amazing or eh... Just like a novelist builds characters and story lines with chapters.

Don't get me wrong. I'll certainly buy the single of a song that really resonates with me or if I like the beat or melody, but I'll frequently go back and buy the whole album. I rarely hit shuffle on my iPod. I want to hear ian album as it was intended. I'm not just talking about concept albums here, though they're great. I'm talking about any album.

I was listening to Arcade Fire's latest, The Suburbs tonight, for the ten thousandth time. I love it through and through. I love every note. I love the progression. I love how it takes me back to living in the burbs in the 80's. I looooooove it.

Got it? Good.

I can't imagine listening to just one song or hitting shuffle. It just wouldn't be the same!

Below I'm listing some of my all time faves. These albums enjoy regular rotation on my iPod.

Arcade Fire - The Suburbs
Adele - 19
Adele - 21
Alison Krauss & Union Station - Lonely Runs Both Ways
Broken Bells - Broken Bells
Depeche Mode - Violator
Florence + The Machine - Lungs
Garbage - Garbage
Paul Simon - Graceland
Keane - Hopes and Fears
Lissie - Catching a Tiger
Marc Broussard - Carencro
Metric - Fantasies
Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More
Neko Case - Blacklisted
Neko Case - Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
Neko Case - Middle Cyclone
R.E.M. - Automatic for the People
Ray LaMontagne - Trouble
Ray LaMontagne - Til the Sun Turns Black
The Secret Sisters - The Secret Sisters
The Shins - Oh, Inverted World
The Sundays - Blind
The Sundays - Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic
Young the Giant - Young the Giamt

Ok there are more, but I got a little out of control as it is. What are your favorites?? Do you feel the same way as me or am I a maniac?

Oh. My. Goodness I'm lazy

Wow, I popped online today and headed over to my blog so I could catch up on my reading and realized that I haven't posted since August.  August?  Really?  Wow it's been a long time.
It's not that I don't have anything to say, it's just that I've been so busy that I haven't even thought about posting.  I haven't taken a photo since September.  What is wrong with me?

It's a combination of work, ghost hunting, and knitting like a maniac to make sure I have Christmas gifts done by the time the holidays roll around.  I've got lots to say.  I just have to make time to say it.
I guess it's time to make good use of that blogging app I have for my phone.

What's going on with all of you? 

Bring it, Fall!

I am so ready for Fall.  Bring it on!

I know.  I know.  That means that Winter is not far behind, but I'm ready for the cooler weather.  I'm ready for the crispness of a fall morning. I'm ready for the beauty of the changing leaves.  I'm sorry to those of you that  live in a place that has no seasons, I really am.

I'm ready for the smell of fallen leaves.  I'm well aware that smell is the smell of decomposition, but I love it all the same.  I also love the way that you can smell the hay in horse manure.  Yeah, I really do.

I'm ready for hot apple cider, making applesauce (mom, I hope that you plan on making more this year), planning winter knitting projects, football, sweaters, wearing socks, Halloween and all of the adorable kids that will stop at my door, hay rides, corn mazes, pumpkin spice coffee (thank you Dunkin Donuts for breaking it out early...) Thanksgiving, and the excitement that preparing for the holidays always brings.

I'm ready!  Bring it on! (The snow can suck it... but I love Fall!)

Are you looking forward to Fall?  Do you want to punch me in the face?

We Survived

Yup, that's about the extent of the damage at my house.

I went out to do a little surveillance this morning.  We're fine.  It was very windy and rainy, but we didn't get as much over here as they did to the east.  They said though it was a Category 1 Hurricane, it was really more like a tropical storm. 

No trees down in our yard.  I made the hubs and the Daisydog sleep with me in the basement.  There were tornado warnings all over the place and you could hear the wind howling outside all night long.  I was worried more about the wind than anything.

We had a dove adopt us a little over a month ago.  It's one of those white ones that is probably released at weddings.  The poor thing got lost on it's way home.  We can't get close enough for him to let us touch him, but we're getting there. I was worried about him.

Recently, he brought home a girlfriend.  She's a regular old pigeon.  There's a little love story going on in our back yard though I was concerned for a bit because she only came for one night last week and I didn't think that Dovey was that kind of guy.  I thought that doves mated for life and to see this little hussy fly in for one night made me a little bit suspicious of their relationship.

She and Dovey came home together last night and hung out on the roof all night.  I took a peek out this morning and they were a little worse for wear, but were alive so I'm happy.  I worried about them all night.

It's still raining and it is likely to rain for most of the day.  I think I'll stay in and knit.

What I've been doing aka ramblings

So I've been MIA from my blog for over a month.  I've thought about it, but I've been so busy getting used to my new computer (we bought an iMac!), building my photography site, and trying to re-design this blog and design another all while trying to continue knitting, working, ghost-hunting, breathing, and sleeping.

So.... drumroll please...  my photography site is up!  I have a blog over there too, but I'm considering removing it as it really is a place for my to show my "stuff" and I don't know that having a blog there is really appropriate.  I guess I can do whatever I want.  I'll figure it out.

Go on over and take a look then come back and tell me what you think!

http://www.recklessshots.com

I need to add watermarks to the photos and once I figure out how to do it the way that I like it I'll be adding them.  

This week has been crazy in itself.  We've had an earthquake, tornado warnings, and now Irene is barreling towards us.  If it starts raining frogs, I'm outta here.  Irene is not supposed to be affecting us until the wee hours of tomorrow morning, but I tell ya, it looks like it could start any minute out there.

What have you all been up to?