we've taken up smoking cigarettes

or at least our house smells like we have.

see, last Sunday i started a pot of black beans cooking on the stove (you can already see where this is going). they were dry beans so they needed to soak, sit, then simmer for a good four hours. i was being really efficient and i got them started well before church so they would only need an hour or so more once we got home.

church went well (Tom sat on and mushed a dried blueberry all over the church pew but that was manageable). i taught lesson #14 in gospel doctrine that went well and enjoyed watching a clip of "The Windows of Heaven" in relief society. as i was getting the kids into the car to head home a red flag went up: i forgot to turn off the beans before we left!

on the way home i was scanning the sky for plumes of smoke. however, it had all stayed in the house; there was about three feet of smoke hovering throughout the whole house when i opened the door. holy. smokes. Batman.

fortunately it was a windy day and the smoke cleared out in just a few minutes. but the smell remains. only now, instead of smelling like charred beans, it smells like cigarettes. i'll admit, cigarette smoke can be kind of nice sometimes since it reminds me of traveling outside the country, and i've had a lot of good times traveling. but we're going on 48 hours with this smell now despite my efforts with fans, baking soda, air fresheners, laundry, more baking soda, more laundry - not to mention all of our windows are open all day. now it's less of a charming-hotel-in-Paris smell and more of a smoking-guest-room-at-the-Days-Inn smell. i'm kind of on the brink of tears. okay, that's too dramatic, only it's true.

i have tried everything!

i just made some bread so at least now it smells like fresh bread and cigarettes. care for a glass of wine and some cheese? i just may.

airm chair vs. arm chair

when English and i got married we were generously given several pieces of hand-me-down furniture. it was so great to have not just any couch but a really nice, classy (now antique) couch among lots of other good stuff. in the last ten years pieces have rotated in and out of our home as we've moved or grown or both. a chair that we have right now is one of those super comfy but kind of ugly things. it would be awesome in a shabby chic front room. but while my front room isn't magazine worthy, it's not shabby chic either. i haven't thought much about replacing it mostly because i haven't seen anything that i would really want to replace it with... until recently.



the question is, when you're poor students can you justify buying a new chair to replace an ugly, but functional chair? a true dilemma. :) isn't it a cool chair though? i've tried it out and it is super comfy. and i love that color.

i believe in spring

it's springtime in Reno, which means we are being tormented with little windows of good weather here and there. but it's okay because the beautiful pink buds on the peach tree are starting to blossom, the goat heads are at their soft, innocent, green stage, and Peavine Fields looks like Scotland (okay, maybe that's a stretch but for the desert it looks lush).



on the colder, blustery days there is making bread, playing "greasy corn" (see previous post), and the NMA. right now there is an awesome exhibit of Leo Villareal's animated lights showing. perfect for all ages (kids 5 and under are free)!



and speaking of bread, i've found an artisan bread recipe that i really like. this is huge because making a simple crispy crust, chewy crumb bread has been a dream of mine for years. huzzah! check out these loaves! they turned out so nice and i didn't have to let the dough rise for ten years!


find the recipe on the agreeable recipe book.

and finally, for those of us who believe spring really is going to bust through this lousy weather any day now, here is my alternative for "once there was a snowman." we sang it today at preschool. it was a hit.

once there was a green grape, green grape, green grape,
once there was a green grape big and round.
in the sun she dried up, dried up, dried up.
now she's a golden raisin on the ground.