A Pain in My...

I waited til the last minute to book my vacation that starts in a matter of days...
But alas, this is what I've finally accomplished tonight:

Hostel in Amsterdam: Booked.
Flight from Amsterdam to Oslo: Booked.
Hostel in Oslo: Booked.
Commute from Oslo to Trondheim: Booked.
Hurtigruten boat ride from Trondheim to Bergen: Booked.
Hostel in Bergen: Processing.
Commute(s) from Bergen to Oslo: Booked.
Return flight: Booked.

Whew. The bulk of it is booked... Now if only I weren't broke!

Give It Up For...

So today marks the beginning of Lent. And though I am not a "methodically-religious" person, I still would like to partake in my personal, pick-and-choose way.

Thus with Lent, I will be giving something up...

You know, I had planned on giving hoarding a stash of junk food in my room, but after receiving a package from Jane Hale today, I am not so sure that is an option... So after some thought, I tweeked the original notion and came up with this:

For lent, I will not buy any junk food to hoard away in my secret stash.
No Pringles. No peanuts. No Kanjeers. No chocolate covered raisins. No nutella.
...None.

Oh, and for Lent, I will also abstain from McDonalds.
...I think it's for the best. Even though that that Kit Kat McFlurry I last ordered had caramel mixed in it and was an absolute gift from the Gods...

So here's to counting down the days til Easter!

Oh Happy Day!

You know it's going to be a good day when, driving to and from school, you hear such hits as:

Thriller by Michael Jackson
I Can't Wait by Nu Shooz (which is one of the best jams ever!)
I'd Do Anything For Love by Meatloaf
Freeway of Love by Areatha Franklin

And yes, I did sing my heart out to all...

And then you come home for a little down time and have flowers delivered to you. Completely and totally unexpected. :)

What a day!
(And it's only 10 a.m.)

Travel Bug

So remember that time I had been in Europe for 5 months and had only been to all of 2 different countries?? ...Yeah, well I've gotta do something about that.

After making a list of "Places to Go" today, I realized that I have got to get a move on it I plan to visit even half of them...

So aside from spending next week in Norway, I now have prospective trips to Brussels, Portugal, and London lined up. And possible Aix-Province if I can afford it... Oh, and the Pink Pop music festival here in the Netherlands. Not to mention I'm going to study in Italy this summer. And if Victoria decided to study abroad, I'll spend my birthday in Cyprus.

...And I wonder why I am constantly broke.

But guess what... It's totally worth it.

Bakerella

Oh, and another link I came across on Stie's blog was this awesome site. If you like to bake or even just eat cute, yummy, fattening desserts at all, do yourself a favor and check it out.

I, myself, will be trying to make the Oreo Kisses this weekend for Valentine's Day. And if I could actaully find all the ingredients over here, I'd be making some of the other goodies, too... But unfortunately, I have yet to come across Red Velvet cake mix... :(
(Hint, hint: Start getting ready to send some care-packages full of ingredients this way!)

Picture Perfect Valentine

My ascension into blogging was a fluke. More or less something I stumbled upon really. This time a year ago, I did not blog, I did not read blogs, and I really did not even think about the whole concept of blogging at all. But one day while bored at work, I (while innocently Google-ing something regarding The Sound of Music), I stumbled upon this blog and have been hooked ever since.

Actually, it is one of maybe three blogs that I even keep up with. Oddly enough, it is the only blog I read that is kept by someone I don't physically know. (Don't judge. I promise it is not as stalkerish weird as it sounds.)

Anywho, Stie, who writes this blog, is awesome and completely relatable--or at least to me anyways. She is a creative, humerous, down-to-earth mother of three. And I quite envy her knack for photography and baking. So it is not uncommon for me to steal kindly borrow some of her clever ideas or delicious recipes...

And this is one such idea I've recently borrowed:







Aren't these awesome?!

Waffle House Ain't Got Nothing On Me!

This morning, I skipped breakfast. ...Not unusual.

This morning, when we opened the door to head to school, there was a fresh layer of powdery snow covering the ground (and streets). ...At this point, not unusual, yet still quite unexpected.

And thus because people cannot drive at a normal speed when there is a drop of precipitation on the ground or in the air--this is universal, I have come to find--, it took us a whopping hour to get to school. (We were late, no doubt.) And on the way back home, traffic was not much different. Another 45 minute drive...

Basically, the point I am coming to is that I was quite hungry by the time I got back to the house. Truthfully, I was starving by the time I even dropped the kids off. And sitting there in that bumper-to-bumper traffic only allowed my mind to start roaming to all the foods I could be stuffing my face with... Bacon. Eggs. Hash browns. Omelets. Pancakes. Eggos... Mmmm... A good hearty breakfast: That was something I hadn't had in a while... So breaking one of the cardinal rules of life, I took a detour on the way home and went to the grocery store while I was hungry.

Unfortunately, the selection at Albert Heijn* is not quite the selection of my treasured American Kroger or Walmart. There are no bagged hash browns in the freezer aisle. There are no Jimmy Dean, or even George Jones, sausage links. And there is no sliced bacon in the meat section (that I could find)... So having a limited selection, I grabbed anything that looked helpful and made my way home.
*Typical Dutch grocery store.

Pretty much, I wound with a sack of potatoes, "bacon" from the deli aisle, eggs, juice, syrup, and some little bite-size pancake looking puffs. And with these ingredients, I went to work on my masterpiece...

First I put my extremely thin slices of ham into the skillet and cooked them as if they were regular bacon. Then I peeled, sliced, and, for lack of a better word, grated my potatoes. When my bacon was done, I threw them in the skillet hash brown-style. In the meantime, I prepared my mini-pancakes. And while my potatoes were still frying, I threw in an egg on the other half of the skillet...

And viola!

When it was all said and done, I had one hell of a breakfast spread to sit down to. Oh how heavenly it was!

...And here are the pictures to prove it:

Before...



and

...After.



So watch out Waffle House, Huddle House, and Denny's. Cause I'm in the kitchen... And that's what's cookin'!
..And who knows, one morning next week, I may just attempt a Rooty Tooty Fresh'N'Fruity!