Before & Afters... & some stuff.

Hiiiiii.
How's it?

I wore my hair curly one day last week.

It's been a while.

I liked it and my brazilan blowout is wearing off so I might be sportin' the curly look more often.  I forgot how fast it is to dry my hair if I am going curly.

Last Friday I went thrifting with my Mom.

I have been wanting a vintage laundry cart to store the kids games in, and turns out they are ridiculously hard to find.

But on Friday, we walked into the Salvation Army and this was the first thing that caught my eye.

The price tag on it said $20.

But it was 40% off everything day!

So I got it for $12.

And now, it looks like this...

I let it dry overnight,
and then I couldn't wait to empty all the games out of my downstairs coat closet and stack em up all cutsie on my new cart.

This cleared out so much space in my tiny downstairs coat closet, and the girls have been having a blast playing with games non stop.

I used colonial red spray paint from Home Depot.

After I dragged my thirfted cart up to the front register to be sure no one else would try to swipe it from me while I shopped around, I spotted this fun piece...

This quilt rack was in pretty good shape (aside from a slightly broken leg) and it was marked for $15.  But again, it was also 40% off, so I took her home for about $8.

I gave it a quick sanding, wiped it down, and spray painted it colonial white.

And being the genius that I am, I first set it up to paint right next to my red cart, and after the first coat of colonial white, I looked to my right and saw that my red cart now had a white dusting of colonial white.  Nice.  So I moved it back, re painted my red cart, and then finished my quilt rack.  And, um, don't laugh at me, but my right forearm was sore from spray painting.  I know, I said don't laugh.

The girls like to cuddle with their princess blankets in the mornings so now those have a convenient home, along with my blankie too.

Thrifting is fun.
Can't wait to see what I find next time.

In other news, I was in a bad mood all weekend.
Grumpy grump grumps.
And sicky sick sick.
I have learned that when you are three, and you get a cold, you have it for three days.
When you are thirty, and you get a cold, you have it for three weeks.
Niiiice.
I even had to cancel my date with Kelly on Saturday night.
But, after sleeping all day on Saturday (while I let my children run amok throughout my house while Mr. H was at work) and going to bed at 6 on Saturday night, I felt better, so Kel and I went out on Sunday to celebrate her recent birthday.  Dinner at Mac Grill, and we saw One for the Money.  I read the book forever ago.  It was cute, a little slow, but cute. 

We've been friends since we were 9.

Now she's 31. 

And I am almost 31.

Yikes.

I asked Mr. Hass to take our picture and he said, "You're both wearing a blanket!"

Ha.  Men.

 

In other news,

I bought these cute shoes to make myself feel better whilst I was in the throes of thinking this cold was ruining my life.  haha.

Coral lace Toms.

Yessss please.

And thank you  Mom! (she pays me with Nordie's gift cards once in a while when I do her hair.  Thanks Mumsy!!)

 

And thanks friends who text me tonight wondering where the heck I have been and why I have not posted in a while.  Means a lot.  Love ya!

Happy Tuesday friends.

Just stuff.

The next several pictures are from Feb. 17th.
After seeing the clever way Shannon decorated her family's dinner table on Valentine's Day, I knew I had all I needed to create something similar.

 Sure the 17th was no longer V-Day.  But it was LOVE week.  So I wrote happy Love week in the middle of several sheets of butcher paper, scattered a few sheets of stickers around and some markers and smarties and called the girls down from quiet time. 

 They loved it and thought our table looked sooooo "fancy".
It kept them nice and busy  (without tears or fights!) while I finished up dinner.

 We had black bean soup that I made in the crockpot.
We thought it was really good.  Very tasty (and meatless).
I got the recipe from pinterest.  You can find it here.
It did have a bit of a kick so next time I might not add so many of the spices, but we still loved it.

 We topped it with avocado and a little bit of plain greek yogurt in place of sour cream.    Oh, and I made popover muffins with berry sauce.  See the sauce in the mason jar on the table there?

 The berry sauce was soooo sweet and so delicious.  Very simple to make too.  In a small saucepan I put about 3/4 c of frozen mixed berries, 1/4 c. water, and 2 T organic real maple syrup (you could also use agave).  Cook on low heat til berries are warm.  Then remove from heat, and here's where the fun part comes in...

 Pour into beaker and blend with hand immersion blender. 
You gotta get one of these things, they are so fun! I've been "immersion blending" everything. 

My mini whole wheat popovers didn't exactly "pop-over" very well.  I think it's because I used soy milk instead of cow's milk.  Ah well, they still tasted good.  Recipe for those here.

I don't know if it was the element of fun at the dinner table with the markers and stickers or what, but that meal was the longest that the girls have ever lingered at the table eating and talking with us after dinner.  I will have to do that more often.  Although, the next morning Claire snuck downstairs and decided to color orange and black marker on the dining chair seat cushions and the carpet.  Lovely.  Good thing crayola wasn't kidding when they labeled their markers as "washable".  Thanks for that crayola.

 Last week the girls got to spend some Valentine money they got from their Grandma Hass.  Claire refused to leave the store without this fairy purse filled with glitter nail polish and lip gloss, so that was what she picked out.

 Hannah picked out a hello kitty bubble toy.

 Claire is sippin a smoothie that I whipped up with my handy dandy immersion blender! ;) 

We sure have had lovely weather lately.
I'm starting to get spring fever in a bad way.
I want a tan.  And I want to wear my new shorts. 
I fell asleep outside on our wicker loveseat in the backyard with the sun shining on me while the girls were playing this afternoon.
I was sort of like a zombie for most of today because I was up coughing until 3am.  I took Nyquil to finally fall asleep, but you know how that is trying to snap out of that at 6am.  Not fun.  At all.

Happy almost weekend.
Anybody have any fun plans?
I've got a girls night out planned.
Can I get a woot woot.
See ya round friends.

I'm Turning Into my Mother.

Yup, it's true.
I am.
I wonder if these two will also turn into their mother?

 My Mom has always loved to cook.
I grew up having delicious home cooked meals nearly seven days a week. 
I never took much interest in cooking until I had my own family.
When I moved out of the house with my best friend at 19, I thought knowing how to toast a bagel would be suffient kitchen skills.
When I got married my mom desperately wanted to teach me several of her staple meals that she had always made (that I am sure her mother taught her).
I did try, but to be honest I was more interested in building my wardrobe than I was in building my recipe rolodex.

my first homemade french bread loaf.

(o.m.g. I could have eaten the whole thing myself)

When I registered for my wedding, I had absolutely no idea what kind of dishes or china I wanted.  I was 21 years old.  I knew nothing about that stuff. 

My Mom helped me select a pretty pfaltzgraff pattern of dishes, but really what I wanted to do, was take that registry gun two departments over to the handbags and juniors department and scan anything and everything that caught my eye.

If only I could register again.

If my now 30 year old self could speak to my 21 year old self standing there in the home department of JCPenney, I would tell her this:

One day Gennifer you are going to love cooking and providing healthy meals for your family just as much as your mother has enjoyed providing them for you.

One day you might actually save up your money to buy dishes and kitchen gadgets just as you have seen your mom do so many times.

One day you might make bread in a bread maker, just like your mom.

One day you just might find yourself standing in your own kitchen, with your young daughters sitting on their knees at the island barstools trying to watch you prepare dinner, and asking you questions about the new dishes you just bought at Kohl's, 

 and you will think to yourself, I have turned into my mother.
And you will smile to yourself, because you know that turning into your mother is not a bad thing at all. 

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And now for some random weekend stuff:

I worked all day Saturday and Mr. H took the girls to one of Hannah's friends birthday parties.

 It was at Pump It Up.  Which is basically different bounce house type stuff in different rooms, and the last room is cake and ice cream and presents.  It's really kind of genius for kids parties.  Except for the germs.  You know I'm such a germaphobe.  They didn't mind the germs one bit though.  Claire kept up with those 5 year olds no problem.

Sunday we were most productive.
Mr. Hass finished painting the playroom.  It is aqua and brown now.  (pictures soon.  maybe. if i ever get it organized in there again.)
He also did a massive clean out of his man cave the garage.
I cleaned.
Went to Kohl's and bought my fun new turquoise fiesta ware.
Went to B&N with a gift card and bought these two books...

 I can't wait to make some of Jamie's recipes.  I'm a big fan of his.
I also can. not. wait. to dive into Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.
It is Barbara Kingsolver's first nonfiction about her family's pledge to eat locally for an entire year.  It is part memoir and part journalistic investigation.  I'm so excited to read it.

 I made prosciutto and pineapple pizzas last night.
With a beautiful green salad from the farmers market.

I am officially on twitter now.
Not because I wanted to tweet (although I might),
but because a client was telling me how she follows people like Jamie Oliver and Michael Pollan.
Jamie shares a lot of recipes it seems, and Michael Pollan mentions lots of good food info and articles he has written. 
I'm also following Ellen.
And Oprah.
You know, the important people.
My twitter name is GennDoesHair in case you want to follow me.
;)

Speaking of Michael Pollan, in case anyone is interested I wanted to share this really great FAQ article in the New York Times that he recently wrote. 

From that article I wrote down the dirty dozen and clean fifteen food lists.  The dirty dozen are the twelve plants that have the highest amount of pesticides when grown industrially and these are the most important foods we should buy organic.  The clean fifteen, obviously, are the foods grown with the least amount of pesticides and it's ok to not buy these organic.

I've got this in my crockpot today...

I'm making cinnamon apple butter.

8 gala apples

1 T cinnamon

1/4 tsp ground cloves

1/2 tsp nutmeg

juice of one lemon

and about 4 cups of organic apple juice made with no sugar

My house smells amazing.

Hope you are having a good Monday.

Claire is sleeping (and has a cold),

Mr. H and Hannah went to watch the Globetrotters on a date today,

and I have a sore throat (caught the kids cold) and am off to rest my weary head. 

The Winner Is... & V-day, and more stuff.

 Hi everyone!
Did you have a nice V-day?
We did.
Low key.
Hannah had school.
Mr. H worked late.
Claire and I shopped in Michael's and Old Navy.
Fun stuff.

I wanted a few pics of the girls before H went to school.

I laid out their clothes, and Mr. Hass got the girls dressed.

It was really cold out that morning so I just snapped a few pics really quick.

Then we came inside and I realized that Claire's Valentine's t shirt was on underneath the long sleeve.

Woops Mr. Hass. ;)

And Claire is too stubborn and did not want to put it on the right way.

So she sported her v-day shirt on underneath all day long.

Sigh.

So who's dying to know who won the giveaway???

The winner of the Kenra blow dry spray is...

Jenny @ Smith Squad!!! 

I used random number generator and #60 was the winner.  I just don't know how to post the screen shot of that.

Jenny I will get your new product in the mail to you soon!!!

Congrats!
And thank you to everyone who participated!
I loved hearing what ya all are using (or not using) on your hair to blow dry!
I will do a post soon with some product suggestions to protect hair from heat damaging blow drys.

Here's a peek at Valentine's Day here in the Hass House:

I got just about everything in those pink baskets for the girls from the dollar bins at Michael's about a month ago.  They loved it.  Dollar bracelets, necklaces, necklace making bead kit, sun catchers to paint, stickers, bouncy ball, good stuff.  They each got a shirt from ON, and the big basket was glitter paints and rollers and paper.

 When Mr. Hass took them to school he said the director said that they looked like little Valentine's.  :)

 See that jumping for joy picture up above?  That's what I was doing when it was the girls bedtime.  Because I was exhausted! They have both had colds, and the bickering and screaming has been non. stop. 
But, Mr. H and I cracked open a beer, tried to forget about all that and made these for dinner...

 A co-worker of Mr. Hass' goes lobster diving off of Malibu and he gave us these.  I don't think it gets fresher than that! 

 We boiled them for 6 minutes in salted water, then Mr. H brushed the tops with butter, and set them under the broiler for just a quick minute.  They were good!


And a few random cell phone pics from the week:

 -playing  at my mom's neighbors house on a BEAU-itiful chilly day.

 my lunch at work yesterday.  one fish taco from wahoo's and i brought in quinoa with tomatoes, olives, cilantro, and squeezed lime juice all over it.  It was so good.

 coming home from work and it was raining and cold last night. 46!

and this morning, it is windy and chilly, but with snow topped mountains and crystal clear skies as far as the eye can see.  love that.

 The girls and I on the way to school this morning.  Before snapping that picture, I took this one...

and when I quickly glanced at it and saw what looked like an empty car seat I started to FREAK out! I was thinking, wait, now I know I got Hannah in the car this morning, so WHY is she not there now!?!?!
She was just leaning toward her window trying to see the snow on the mountains.

Oh life.
It's always interesting is it not?
I'll leave ya with this funny for today...

Today it's me.
haha.
well, actually, maybe it's neither.
can't win em all.
;)
peace out.

Food, Food, Shopping, Cooking, & More Food

You might want to get yourself situated, get a snack, and get comfy, cause this post is not short and sweet.

Susanne recently left me a comment asking this:
"I have a question/request for you.  I love when you post the different healthy things you are eating/cooking.  Could you do a post where you list everything you plan to eat or cook for a few days or a week?  I'm trying to eat healthier but run out of ideas and/or get lazy."

Don't we all run out of ideas?!
Thanks so much for asking this Susanne because I have been holding back some of my food pictures thinking that others might get bored of seeing what we are eating or cooking.  And I know I'm no food blogger, so maybe it's best to leave it up to them. 

Well,
A while back after I saw Michael Pollan on an Oprah episode, I read his books Food Rules and The Omnivore's Dilemma.  I swear that Oprah, and his books are what made me want to learn more about where our food comes from.  We've been making slow and steady changes with our diet ever since.  I am currently reading this...

and last night, Mr. Hass and I finished watching the documentary Forks Over Knives.  Please watch it.  I know not everyone is a foodie, or thinks that they are better off not knowing stuff that may gross them out.  But FOK is the most informative and interesting food documentary I've seen yet.  We netflixed it.  I promise it will not be a waste of your time.

I am learning how to remove processed foods from our diet.
It is certainly taking some work, and time to read and research recipes and ideas, but it is worth it in the long run.  Mr. Hass and I have been eating 95% unprocessed foods for about a week and we both just feel so much better.  I've been trying a lot of recipes from pinterest, and have found a couple helpful blogs full of ideas too.  This blog has been so amazingly helpful with lots of great articles and tips.

So let's get to the food shall we?
Last week I tried these stuffed bell peppers one night...

They were good.  I might add a bit more spices to the sauce next time to jazz it up a bit.  recipe here.

We were all HUGE fans of this cauliflower pizza!!!

  So scrumptious and I must say not difficult at all.  I would like to get a "grown up" sized food processor eventually though.  I have a mini so that took me a little longer to rice the entire head of cauliflower but totally worth it for this healthy version of pizza!
My only advice; roll the cauliflower (or pat) it out thin enough.  A couple of my crusts were a bit smooshy in the center and they could have been thinner and crispier.  recipe here.

I found this breakfast cookie/snack recipe on pinterest and am so glad I did!! I have probably made this 5 or 6 times already. 

Mr. Hass and I have whipped em up together at night (it only takes a couple of minutes) and then we've taken em to work or eaten them at home reheated in the morning for a healthy and filling breakfast. recipe here.

Also from pinterest, yes I know hot dogs are "processed foods" but I used chicken dogs from Trader Joe's and stabbed them with whole wheat pasta noodles.

Simply boil until done and the girls got an absolute kick out of them.  I did not eat them.  ;)

In an effort to keep more fruits and veggies on hand for easy snacking, I thought I deserved to add this adorable fruit tier to my Target cart.

I love all the color that it adds to the kitchen.  Do you see my breadmaker on the counter in the background there?  I've been trying to perfect my bread makin' skills.

I tried this yogurt whole wheat loaf that was so unbelievably good.  I've made this recipe twice.  And a sweet reader Tonya shared her family's favorite recipe with me and thank you so much Tonya I cannot wait to try it!!!

These are chicken lasagna roll ups found on pinterest.

These were really easy, tasty, and the best part of all, both my girls ate every last drop on their plate!! I couldn't believe it.  I will definitely be making this one again.  It is easy to change up the flavors too with different sauces or meats, or cheese combinations.

recipe here.

I made pinto beans in the crockpot for the first time and they were gooooood!

The recipe called for 1/2 of a jalapeno but next time I think I'd use a whole one.  I set them up at 9am and they were ready to eat by 5.  recipe here.

To go with the crockpot refried beans, I tried this health(ier) version of nachos, also seen on pinterest.

You could essentially top them with anything you want.  I used freshly grated sharp cheddar cheese, black beans, tiny bit red onion, and after broiling, topped with fresh cilantro.

That's Mr. Hass squeezing a little lime on his quinoa (cooked in chicken stock).

recipe for nachos here.

With all of this cooking I've been doing, the amount of dishes I've also been doing is a little depressing...

so in an effort to keep the excitement going in the kitchen, Mr. Hass okay'd my trip to Sur La Table last weekend!  I love that store and could honestly spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars in there.  I didn't, but I could.  Here's what I got...

a yellow cuisinart immersion blender, cute pot holder on sale, cute oven mitt on sale, a rad garlic press that takes the smell off your hands, a cedar plank, fun cheese grater, cute polka dot tea towel, and that super cute reisenthel farmers market bag that was on clearance.  I can't wait to go to the market looking all stylish with my new bag.  ;)

Oh yeah, also got those dry measuring cups that I needed for my bread making.
And last night, I got to try out my immersion blender for the first time while making split pea soup.

It is fun.  I can't wait to use it to make smoothies and apple butter and all sorts of things.  Do you have an immersion blender??

I served my split pea soup with uncured bacon crumbles and a slice of fresh homemade yogurt wheat bread. 

recipe for split pea soup here.

Today while flipping through this book, I realized I had all the ingredients on hand to make granola bars, so I did!

They were so easy to make and very tasty and filling.

The girls and my nephew enjoyed them today.

Well that's that.

You still there?

See anything you might want to try?

Before I go, a couple of funnies for ya...

I saw this today on pinterest and laughed out loud at the fabulous truth of it

I sent it to Mr. Hass via text while he was at work and he had a good laugh too.  We decided to call our crazies midget gasoline thieves from now on. 

Also today, I received an email that I had a new pinterest follower...

J Lo.

Jenny from the block?

Could it be?

Signed up to follow ME on pinterest?

haha.  I am sure there are probably 3 million women named Jennifer Lopez that are on pinterest, but I'm pretty sure this is THE JLO following me.

Pretty sure.

That's all for now.

Gotta go.

Mr. Hass and I are having lobster tails for dinner!