January instagrams (photography).

Overall, January was a beautiful month here. We had some rain, but we also had many gorgeous warm sunny days. Despite getting sick (twice! ugh) I still made it out a few times to get some pics of our fantastic city.

We had lots of blue skies. My friend from back home jokes that in San Diego "partly cloudy" means there's one or two small fluffy clouds floating around in the distance; today the weather on my phone said it was "partly sunny," and I didn't see a single cloud all day. We're spoiled here (you should see the fuss - and traffic - that a few drops of rain creates!).

My tiny kitchen (writer's workshop).

I'm back for another week of the writer's workshop. This week I'm choosing Kat's third prompt: Show us your kitchen! Don't get me wrong, I'm not choosing this prompt because I think I have a beautiful kitchen. On the contrary, I want to show you that you don't need a huge fancy kitchen to cook your heart out (although I do dream of double ovens, six burner stove tops, and islands full of storage; heck, even a few feet more counter space or a window would be amazing, but I digress).

We've been in our place for three and a half years by now, so I have the kitchen set up just how I want it, and I am comfortable in it. One nice thing about having a small kitchen is that everything is always within a few feet of you (never mind that sometimes that means a few feet above my head causing me to climb to reach it... these are the perils of being vertically challenged). Anyways, the moral is that you make do with what you have. I've even made Thanksgiving dinner for 8 people in this kitchen. It took some planning, good timing, and a lot of stacking, but I made it work, and you can to.

Okay, enough talking, now I have to go clean the kitchen so that I can take some pictures to share with you (at least since there's no window I don't have to worry about taking pics during the daytime!).

 Here's the overview shot; you can see that I wasn't kidding when I called it small. It's long(ish) and narrow, so there's not much space for more than one person in there at a time. Matt and I are always sidestepping each other trying to get to the fridge or microwave.

Pastry wrapped pears (get your chef on).

I love participating in the Get Your Chef On challenges. So far I've competed in the lemon, coconut, and apple challenges; it's always fun to be challenged to use an ingredient in a new or unusual way, but what I really enjoy is seeing what everyone else comes up with. When I saw that this rounds theme was pears I had no idea what I would make. Honestly, I don't know if I had ever cooked with pears before (I don't know why - they are delicious poached, in tarts, and even in jams). I turned to Pinterest for inspiration, and I was not disappointed!

 

This dish was inspired by the beautiful picture in the recipe for Pera in Crusta. The only problem, is that the recipe is in Italian. With the help of Google translate, I was able to get an idea of what it said. I adjusted the recipe (the original calls for brandy, and what's the point of cooking with alcohol if you can't have a few sips while you're doing it?!), gave it a try, and was delighted with the results. This is an impressive looking recipe that is actually very easy to put together (15 minutes of prep work, tops), and can even be put together ahead of time. The only changes I will make next time are 1) add a little cinnamon to the honey and butter mixture, 2) cut the pie crust into thinner strips so that it wraps around more times, and 3) not flare the edges before putting it into the oven (I think they will flare on their own while baking). 

Four for one (treasury, but not Tuesday).

I'm bringing you these treasuries early this week because there's something very special on Tuesday. January 22nd is the day we all unveil our creations for Get Your Chef On: Pears, and I can't wait to show you what Ive whipped up.

The first treasury is one that I created in honor of Punxsutawney Phil and his shadow. The other three are fantastic treasuries that feature some of the items from my shop. Enjoy the eye candy!

Groundhog Day

Music is my Valentine by WavicleWays

It's Amazing What You Can Accomplish! by Tiffany Heater

Spillover by Tiffany Heater

  I link up to these parties.

Grilled cheese fail (testing Pinterest).

I'm sure you've all seen some variation of the above image on Pinterest or elsewhere online by now. It's always captioned with something along the lines of, "Turn your toaster on its side to make easy grilled cheese!" Now, I saw this, and thought, "wow, genius! Why didn't I ever think of that?"It looks so simple. The only drawback I noticed at first was that there was no excuse to use copious amounts of butter like I do when I fry my grilled cheese (and I suppose that could be thought of as a good thing, it's just that I sort of have a love affair with butter).

Crockpot dulce de leche (testing Pinterest).

I've seen so many versions of this slow cooker Dulce de Leche on Pinterest, and I finally had to give it a try. I actually made this a few months ago (it just took me a really long time to get around to editing the photos), and I as I sit writing this post I'm wishing I had some to indulge in right now (there would be a can of condensed milk in my crock pot right now, if it wasn't already full of beef). 

Going back in time (writer's workshop).

I have been a spectator of the writer's workshop over at Mama's Losin' It for a while now, and I'm finally taking the plunge and becoming a participant. I actually linked up last week too, but that was just because my post happened to fit one of the prompts, not because I had planned it. This week I chose prompt #5)  Find a photo of yourself taken 10 years ago and display it on your blog along with a current photo. How have you changed since the day that photo was taken?

10 years ago I was a junior in high school, fall 2002; Showing off my new baby journal Christmas morning, 2012