Photo Friday #99: pride and joy

I know the phrase “pride and joy” is supposed to refer to your kid, but I’m commandeering it. And I’mma use it to refer to my husband.

Mr. P is really fortunate to have landed an awesome job here in St. Louis, after I uprooted us from our home in Nashville to follow my science dreams. It’s a great school with great kids and a great community. And I personally think he fits right into that, great as he is.

The last few weeks of the school calendar at Mr. P’s job are filled with service activities, for all the students and faculty alike. So here’s Mr. P (front row, second from left) with most of his geometry class, serving at a center for refugees. I asked if the boys worked hard and avoided goofing off during their time there, and he said, “Of course.”

The world has lots of good, upstanding people, you guys, and I’m fortunate to be in their shadow. So proud. So much joy.

What I wore: long skirt, no jacket

You guys, yesterday, it was in the nineties. Not the decade. No Nicktoons or boy bands or oversized shirts cinched with a scrunchie. No, it was over ninety degrees here today. Mother Nature heard us all whining and moaning about the long winter and apparently tried to compensate all in one day.

That means it’s skirt weather! I used to be shy about skirt weather because I had the weird don’t-want-to-be-overdressed fear, so I only wore cotton jersey-type skirts. But now, it’s all skirts, all the time. Well, most of the time. The rest of the time is taken up with dresses and, let’s be real, jeggings.

Once upon a time I worried that a long skirt looked too fancy for work. Nowadays, nope!

Brown 3/4-sleeve shirt: From Tar-zhay, way back when
Paisley skirt: From a now-defunct outlet store in my parent’s tiny town, also way back when. I probably paid something like twelve dollars for it.
Gold sandals: Tar-zhay, baby. And of course, those are my everyday gold sandals, not the fancy gold sandals.
Gold owl locket necklace (seen close-up here) and gold hoop earrings: Both from my mams

As this was the first time I wore this skirt to work, I discovered a downside: I can’t walk in my usual super-fast crazy-length pace. But the upside? I’m wearing a skirt, yet I don’t have to shave my legs. More than a fair trade!

Anyone else enjoying skirt/dress weather? I’m expanding my collection...

Taking command

Way back in February, I received a big birthday package from family member - and blog reader! - Janice. She read my post about being paralyzed by hanging stuff on the wall and responded in kind with THIS WHOLE SHEBANG:

Oh yeah, each of those was individually wrapped in birthday wrapping paper. She's fun. And generous!

Now, as you know, I did get the guts to hang a few things on the wall - things that were fairly light (so they wouldn't require anchors or create giant holes) and things that I knew EXACTLY where they'd go and stay for our time in the apartment. For those things, I wasn't too afraid to make holes in the walls. But for other things... for heavy things, for things with placement I was unsure about... I've dawdled. Even with these command hooks in hand! Because even though putting holes in the antique plaster walls is scary, using what feels like a sticker to hang heavy frames just feels… unnatural.

So I've given my giant Command hook collection the side-eye a few times and moved on to more important things, like the dozen half-finished projects I've got laying around here. Only recently did I finally decide to give these guys a shot. Well, one of them, at least. I wanted to start with something light; specifically, my pajamas that usually hang on the back of my closet door:

... and stuck with a place not super visible, in the closet. It seemed like a safe bet, and I’d get to make my PJs a little less visible.

However, the wall in question may not be the best, command-hook wise.

It’s got substantial texture, and it’s painted in semi-gloss paint. And speaking of the paint, it totally comes off when you clean it with isopropanol, leaving a sticky surface for a few minutes until it dries.

Wait, what? Yes. If your walls are painted with latex paint, “cleaning” them with isopropanol prior to applying the adhesive strip (as the 3M command hook directions say) will remove some of the paint, and therefore some of the finish of the paint. I should have remembered this, as isopropanol is the easiest way to test whether your paint is oil-based or latex (oil-based stays put, latex comes off). Uhh, WHOOPS. This seems like a fatal flaw in the “won’t damage walls” marketing. So, if you decide to use these, be careful with the cleaning step!

The isopropanol-removing-paint issue was totally unnerving, but aside from that, the rest was easy-peasy. The red side got stuck to the hook itself, and the black side got stuck to the wall.

I slipped the hook off the strip once it was adhered to the wall and pressed for an additional thirty seconds...

Then I slipped the hook back on, but I waited an hour before hanging anything on it. My PJs are light, yes, but might as well follow the directions, right?

An hour later, my PJs were stashed away and the back of my closet door was all freed up!

I’m so glad that I tried this out in an inconspicuous spot first – the paint coming off the wall FREAKED. ME. OUT. And this is a good wall to test the adhesion of the hook – the wall texture elsewhere in the apartment won’t be as much of an issue. And finally, I think I’ll try removing the strip before actually using these elsewhere in the house. The horizontal brace just underneath the hook will prevent me from pulling the tab EXACTLY straight down (as the directions say), so we’ll see what happens when I try to remove it.

So that’s my first command hook adventure! I’ll let you know how it holds and if I learn anything from using them elsewhere!

Eats: pork faux mein

If it were up to me, we’d have pasta every night. With some sort of cheese! And wine! Meat and veggies tossed in there if you think of it! And every time I tell Mr. P, “I could eat pasta every night,” he replies, “Well, then, we can have pasta every night!” Because that man. He is agreeable.

But alas, we don’t have cheesy pasta every night, to the grateful relief of our waistbands and cholesterol levels. We do, however, have a fair amount of spaghetti noodles, worked into a variety of styles of dishes. Like today’s recipe, inspired by this one. They call it pork lo mein, but I know better. These are no lo mein noodles, these are spaghetti noodles. And there is no stringy cabbage in the way, either. Hence: faux mein.

I used pork because around here, it’s ridiculously inexpensive. Pork steaks are routinely UNDER $2 per pound!

But feel free to use chicken if you want. Or beef. Or whatever you prefer!

Before anything else, I set the water to boil... this is a quickie dinner, and I didn’t want to wait around for the noodles to cook. Then I sliced the pork steaks into thin strips:

And set those aside, just for a minute. Next, I heated a tablespoon each of olive and sesame oil, then added minced garlic and onion. The garlic is going to flavor the noodles – and I used a whole pound of pasta! – so I wasn’t shy about adding several tablespoons, equivalent to several cloves. If you’re not a garlic lover, go ahead and cut back.

I sautéd those around for a minute or so, then added the pork (keeping the heat on medium):

This pork gets tough easily, so it’s worth cooking it as low and slow as I can. The thin strips help; they’ll cook quickly enough even over medium heat!

While the pork was cooking, I trimmed the ends from the sugar snap peas. Let’s be real here, too: those snap peas were two weeks old. I ran out of hummus before I ran out of snap peas, and, well. There they are.

(Never mind those carrots in the background. I was going to use them but didn’t. If you are a carrot fan, though, I’m sure they’d be delicious in this dish!)

I threw the snap peas in, just as the pork was mostly done, and turned the heat down to low.

Oh! And about this time, the water was boiling, so I tossed the noodles into the boiling water, too.

While all that business was happening on the stove, I mixed together a half-cup of soy sauce, a quarter-cup of rice vinegar, a teaspoon of brown sugar, and a tablespoon of cornstarch (dissolved in a tablespoon of water first, to avoid lumps) in a separate bowl. Then poured that in with the pork and the snap peas, sprinkled the whole shebang with black pepper and dried scallions, and turned the heat up to get it simmering:

I turned the heat back down to let it thicken, then turned my attention to the noodles. Once they were done, I drained them and... do not be afraid... added half a stick of butter.

Yes. It’s crucial. Do it.

I tossed the noodles until the butter was melted, and then, finally, added the pork and peas sauce-mixture stuff:

Toss it together and voila! Pork faux mein!

I liked this because of course, it’s essentially Chinese pasta. Mr. P is a fan of rice, but he liked this well enough also. And while it may be better with actual lo mein noodles, I’m happy enough with the dollar box of spaghetti to keep using that.

It may not be much healthier than takeout Chinese, but it’s bound to be less expensive (and that’s crazy, considering how cheap Chinese food can be)! Give this a try the next time you’re torn between cravings of Chinese and pasta.

And finally, your Monday Tuesday meal plan:

Sunday: Not gonna lie, it was takeout from Five Guys burgers and fries. We had a funeral to attend that evening and I didn’t want to cook afterwards. At least I put it on a real plate?

Monday: pan-fried pork chops, mashed potatoes, and steamed artichoke

Tuesday: spaghetti with meat sauce and salad, bumped from last week

Wednesday: tacos with avocado, chips, and salsa

Thursday: Work night for Mr. P! I bought some beans to craft some awesome solo bean burritos with the taco leftovers.

Friday: Another work night for Mr. P! More leftovers for meee!

Saturday: Sausage and pepper pizza and salad

A little boring this week, but that’s how it goes sometimes! More exciting Meal Plan Mondays to come, fingers crossed.

Mom Wisdom

Hey errbody, I hope you had a great Mother’s Day yesterday! Even though I’m a day behind in celebrating here, I figured it’s never too late for some Mom Wisdom. Especially when it comes from my mom, because (humblebrag) she did a pretty great job.

Get people to take photos of you with your baby. If you can’t, set up the tripod and the remote and take them yourself. ALL THE TIME. Years from now, your kid is going to marvel at just how few photos there are of the two of you.

Encourage your kid take risks. Case in point: let your kid roller skate even if they cannot yet strap said roller skates to their own feet.

If you’re going to be caught in a canoe-rowing situation, at least wear a sweet little dress and/or fashionable sunglasses so you can look classy while doing it. Also: safety first!

You should probably not purchase an ice cream cone for your kid in ninety-degree weather. But if you do, help them eat it in the least messy way possible.

Be the sort of mom who isn’t afraid to dress yourself and the aforementioned messy kid entirely in white. Also, go ahead and belt that dress. Your waist IS skinny enough. Promise.

Join your kid and walk alongside them for their faith journey and any unfortunate plaid trends.

Make sure you clip that newspaper photo of you and your kid at high school graduation. It may be the only one you have of that day, considering that you spent most of it taking all the photos yourself.

Pestering your kid about being “always a bridesmaid, never a bride” will get you absolutely nowhere.

But when your kid is the bride, take that joy of roller skates and ice cream cones and unfortunate plaid and high school graduations and let it show on your face in every single photo. Because you worked your buns off to guide your kid to that moment, and you deserve every ounce of joy you feel.

For all moms, but particularly my classy and adorable mom: celebrate yourself! You are loved, you are appreciated. And you look really pretty today.

Photo Friday #98: joy-seeking

I’ll be honest. While I typically refrain from discussing work-related matters on the blog, I can’t help but mention that this week has been... well, heartbreaking. Due to the government sequester problems, my scientist friends are losing their jobs, perhaps their careers. The whole business makes me cry and feel really dumb when I come home from my still-intact job and write about organizing and paint colors.

But sometimes, this just needs to be a happy place. So I’ll allow it. And if I only post photos of how my neighborhood exploding with flowers nowadays, well, that is just fine too.

Clothes cleanout

As might be expected given my documented efforts to dress like a grownup, I’m experiencing a bit of a wardrobe overhaul. I haven’t necessarily purchased that many more things, but I’ve definitely noticed items that are getting less worn. Or... never worn. Seriously, there are things I packed up around this time last year, hauled to our new place, unpacked, and let them sit in my closet doing nothing but getting in the way of clothes I actually wear. Given my twee closet size, that’s an egregious waste of space.

So, my closet became one of my fixations for my recent organizing spree. I hadn’t really reorganized it since buying the one shoe shelf last year, so it was definitely overdue. Here’s a slightly-wonky shopped-together photo of the “before”:

It’s not the most disorganized closet ever, no. But what can’t be conveyed in just the photo alone is how little I wear some of that stuff. Take the two (two!) bathrobes on the back of the closet door. The pinkish one I’ve had since high school. The red one is newer and nice and fluffy, a gift from a few years ago. I don’t know why I kept the old one when I got the new one. And I don’t know why I keep the new one when I don’t wear either one of them. That is some valuable back-of-the-door real estate taken up by two items I don’t think I’ve used in years.

There’s a similar story running through the rest of the closet. Now, don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing in my closet I haven’t worn ever. I often have the opposite problem – I don’t wear many of the things in my closet because they are too worn for me to wear them again without embarrassment. Because really... wearing cardigans to cover holes? Stains I selectively ignore? Yeah, those need to go.

So I spent last weekend getting it all out there. Shoes with the soles flopping off, sweaters that haven’t been flattering in years, shirts that I like but fit into the rest of my wardrobe about as well as the turquoise curtains fit into the rest of our apartment.

And when I was done... I filled it all back in.

Ok, yes, so that probably looks exactly the same to you. But it is different! Here’s how:

1) New shoe shelf! Now the only shoes on the floor are my tall brown boots. Before, my shoes were hidden by the hanging clothes – no more!

2) I hung my cardigans on wooden hangers, last seen beautifying our coat closet. Someday all of my hangers will be wooden, but this is a start!

3) Removing the cardigans from the shelf meant I could put my pared-down sweater collection in their place (thus emptying out a dresser drawer).

4) Clearing out the jeans and shorts I don’t wear anymore meant they could be consolidated into a single stack, too.

5) Before, I had tank tops hanging in the closet AND residing in a drawer across the room. Now they’re all in one nicely folded stack in my closet.

5) Sweatshirts and hoodies got pared down to a select few, and the remainder got stashed in the cubby at the top.

6) The top, by the way, is where I used to store my overnight duffel bag. Now it’s stashed in the back on the floor now, behind my laundry basket. I know where it is when I need it; otherwise, it’s out of sight and out of mind.

So yes, there’s probably the same amount in the closet as there was before, but that’s because I moved it all out of the dresser drawers. Which means most of my wardrobe is in that closet, save for dresses, dress pants, skirts, and scarves in the other closet. That’ll get attention soon, too!

And speaking of emptying dresser drawers, I still have one drawer that holds tees, pajama pants and shorts, and workout clothes:

With everything neatly folded and slightly staggered to see the contents!

Honestly, just pulling everything out and re-hanging or folding neatly felt like it refreshed my closet – I recommend that, if nothing else! But condensing my clothes and getting everything where I can see it (instead of stashed away in drawers) really helped me see what parts of my wardrobe I could relinquish in another round of closet-cleanout. Which means... if I do splurge on a nice top, I know exactly what I’ll get rid of in its place.

Of course, there’s more work to do... perhaps starting with getting the discarded clothes to the donation box. And while improve the clothes in the closet, I’d also like to improve the closet itself (like the aforementioned wooden hangers). Still... progress! Slowly but surely, I’ll swankify this closet!