Thanksgiving Prep

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I’m hosting Thanksgiving again this year, if by “hosting” you mean having two people over for dinner. I’ve hosted for the past several years, which I didn’t find terribly stressful, so I thought I would share a little of what I did for first timers. My first Thanksgiving was 7 people, which still isn’t that many, but qualifies me a lot better than serving dinner to two people. One of whom is my mother. An important disclaimer is that I’m single, which means I never got married, which means I never registered, which means there are a whole mess of Thanksgiving related things I had to hunt down because even not-entirely-average single girls like me don’t randomly have carving boards and gravy boats and a whole mess of serving utensils.

My main concern was all the random stuff I wouldn’t think of until I had a pan of gravy on the stove with no receptacle, as well as messing up the timing and having a cold ____ because it came out of the oven an hour early. So I made myself a poster. People teased me, but it helped–even with a minor* issue, things went off quite well.

My categories are dish, ingredients (which to me is things I could potentially not have on hand, so I don’t include butter/flour/oil/staple items), prep (again, special tools I might not have, so “knife” isn’t on there but “roasting pan” is), serving (everything here–this is where you determine you own two serving spoons and need five) and timing (how long does it take/early should you start/temp & time in oven).

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With all of this information, it was pretty easy to work backwards from my desired serving time, call my mother in a panic and tell her to bring spoons, email my aunt to ask for a carving board and figure out when to put in the stuffing**.

Also, helpful side note: You are going to screw up the rolls. The timing is impossible to get right unless that is someone’s sole responsibility.

Have you ever hosted Thanksgiving?

*When the stovetop timer went off, my mom helpfully hit “Off” on the oven panel, turning off the timer. And the oven, which is where the turkey was, and I didn’t notice for 20 minutes.

**This is a lie. My family doesn’t like stuffing, so I didn’t make any. We mostly eat mashed potatoes. The rest is just details.

Gingerbread Party: The Rules

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Time for the nitty gritty….

I’ve talked about my annual party before, and I’m making sure me evite is ready to go out the day after Thanksgiving. I feel funny doing it before that, but I have already told people who asked the date.

This will be the fourth year, and its gotten really popular. That means everyone has an opinion and the competition has heated up–people started trash talking in October.

Last years winners caused some serious drama, so this year I’m going all out official on the rules, to prevent another situation like this one:

Beach Cottage. Well-researched, well-executed, and the most contentious thing to ever happen at a party.

So make fun of me all you want, but this party needs some rules. I figured if I’m doing rules go official, so here’s what I have. Please feel free to share feedback. These will be official on Thanksgiving when invitations go out. And make fun of them all you want, I’m happy as long as they are specific enough to prevent drama.

Gingerbread House Party Rules

Children’s Division: 6 pm Judging

Amateur Division: 7 pm Judging

Professional Division: 8 pm Judging

There are two divisions adults can enter their houses under, Amateur and Professional.

Amateur houses use a standard gingerbread house structure and are decorated with standard decorations (those provided to all guests). While amateur houses have some additional decoration, fully decorated boards would be considered entrants into the pro division.

Professional houses are any sort of gingerbread structure (with a limit of xxx crackers?) and may use provided materials as well as entrant supplied. If you are an architect/designer/engineer/cookie ninja this is your division.

This year, there will be two non-entrants serving as division judges. Non-entrants are defined as an individual who is neither entering or closely connected to an entrant (as a significant other, for instance). Division judges will provide the final say for which division a house is judged in.

Cooking from a CSA, Part 12: Homemade Vegetable Stock

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Remember back in the summer, when I said I was saving vegetable scraps in the freezer to make vegetable stock? I finally got around to doing just that.

It was really easy. First, I put a little olive oil in the bottom of my stock pot. I heated that on medium, and added all my onion and garlic type scraps (leeks, onion pieces, garlic scapes). I stirred that until it was soft (about 10 minutes), then I added some of my tougher or more fragrant scraps, such as carrots, celery and parsnips. I let that cook for another 10 minutes, then just covered everything with water. I let it come to a boil, them tossed in some of my softer scraps, like salad scraps (lettuce, radishes, tomatoes). I added just enough water to cover, and let the whole pot simmer for about 45 minutes. Then I turned off the burner and let it cool.

Once it was cool, I ladled it into appropriately-sized freezer containers, straining it through a fine wire mesh as I poured. I got about 5 1.5-cup containers worth of stock. I froze three of them and used two within the next few days, and they’ve worked great for everything from soup to risotto. For things like risotto, I let the stock thaw in the fridge for 8-24 hours before using, but when making soup, I just tossed in the giant ice cube.

Pinterest Challenge: Magnets and Push Pins

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I’ve been working on a new bulletin board for the past week (I’ll share that project soon!) and I decided that I needed some new push pins to go with it, because my boring old thumb tacks just wouldn’t do. Then, as I was thinking about what I wanted to do there, I remembered a few projects I pinned and I thought:

Here are some of my inspirations:

From papervinenz.com

From Sarah Ortega

From NotMartha.org

It was actually really easy to do the magnets. I bought two sizes of flattened glass marbles, some craft paper, Mod Podge and peel and stick magnets. I also bought some letter stickers once I decided I wanted to do alphabet tiles too.

To make the alphabet magnets, I peeled off the round magnet backing and stuck it to the craft paper. Then I trimmed around the edge, leaving a little paper overhang to wrap around the edge. I centered a letter sticker on top, and Mod Podged the whole thing, smoothing the paper around the edge as I went.

To make the glass pebble magnets, I cut the paper a little larger than the pebble, than Mod Podged the bottom of the pebble and smoothed the paper against it. I let that cure, then trimmed the paper as close to the pebble as I could. I coated the backside of the paper with more Mod Podge (avoiding the glass as much as possible). After that cured, I trimmed a magnet to fit, leaving it as big as possible since the glass is heavy. I peeled off the backing, and attached the magnet to the stone.

I did the push pins just like the pebble magnets, but instead of attaching a magnet, I super glued a thumb tack to the back of the paper.

Cooking from a CSA, Part 11: Easy Fall Salad

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My most recent CSA box had a great selection of fall vegetables and lettuce greens. This salad was an easy make-ahead recipe that I ate all week. I roasted beets by wrapping them in tin foil and baking them at 375 degrees for two hours. I also diced the butternut squash (only about half the squash), wrapped it in tin foil, and threw it in the oven with the squash for about an hour. Then, I let both packets cool, and simply put them in the fridge.

The next day, I peeled and sliced the beets (after you roast them, the skins slide right off). I put some of my freshly washed mixed greens in a bowl, topped with sliced beets and diced squash, them sprinkled some pecans and goat cheese on top. Easy, delicious and pretty dang healthy!

When it rains…

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…sometimes the rain falls in your house. And it is NOT. GOOD.

This should be a final reveal of my new  lovely bathroom. Except it isn’t.

So.

Two weeks ago I was fast asleep, snug in my bed at 2:15 am, when I heard water. Rain? Maybe, but I usually can’t hear it in my bedroom. House guest in the bathroom? Showering with the door open perhaps? Nope, doesn’t sound like the shower…

So I got myself out of bed, confirmed no one was in the bathroom but water, turned a light on and…promptly flipped it back off. Because water was pouring through it. My upstairs neighbor somehow overflowed her toilet (I’ll let you put the 2:15am pieces togethere here) and caused a whole lot of water to come through a whole lot of places into my house. I was up over an hour that night putting out bowls, ran late the next day, and generally did not have fun.

It could have been worse.

There doesn’t seem to be any significant damage to the bathroom, the water has stopped, and her insurance will cover the damage. But grabbing bowls, having water come through your (also new) hallway light fixture for over 2 days and not being able to close the bathroom door (ahem, still) are not my idea of fun.

But it really could have been worse. I was home. I woke up. I stopped a lot of damage before it happens, including water sitting on my radiant heat floors. Life will go on.

It just wasn’t what I wanted to be talking about here. You can see some nice demo pictures of the hallway Lesley and I painted back in January. It will get repainted now, same color. It will be smoother. But mostly it will be the same, and my house will get dusty and dirty and have random people in it again. I’m not exactly excited.

Have you ever had water pour through your ceiling? Oddly, this is at least my fifth time, although my first in this place.