Summer in Full Swing

It has been HOT here recently!  We finally got a break from the week-long streak of 100's and it was blissful to have some cooler nights and evenings.  One of those days we had a high temp higher than it was in Phoenix that same day!!  Phoenix people!  Well, the break could only last so long and we are back up to 100 again today and tomorrow.  But it's not planning on a week-long run again, thank goodness. (I spoke too soon!  Flirting with the 100's all week!)

One of the good things that does come from all the hot weather, however, is ripening vegetables.  Tomatoes love the baking warmth of the afternoon (if they aren't in the sun directly the WHOLE day) and my zucchini are showing their abundant productivity.  The bees are out in the flowers doing their pollenating thing (and the ants its seems) and the vines seem to stretch another foot each day.  It was time to bring in some of the produce, at least before the zucchini turned into clubs.

Summer harvest!

Look at all the green beans!

Sunsweet cherry tomatoes are the best!

And now for the garden montage.  I'm sure you people get sick of these, but they're so pretty!

Onions to be harvested...

Tomatoes to ripen...

Corn and potatoes in the long evening sunlight...

I have an actual beanstalk this year!

I love the lacy quality of watermelon leaves...

So pretty!  See the baby watermelon hiding in there?

Here it is!

Ants can pollinate too...

Using the vines as a highway...

Don't forget those green beans you saw earlier (they're sooooo tasty!)

I thought the "miniature" effect on this picture captured the feel of the low sun in the sprinklers the best!

Randomly on a Thursday

The randomness of Thursday.  Not Friday, not Monday, heck not even Wednesday.  It's like Tuesday's ugly step-sister.  Here's what mine was like...

I held a triffle bowl in my lap all the way to work this morning.  No, not just for the fun of it, because we were having a potluck at work.  Normally I use potholders because the darned thing is so cold when it comes out of the fridge and it freezes my hands on the way into work.  (I ride shotgun in the mornings and Mom drives...no need to think I'm completely crazy.)  Today the bowl was pleasantly cool because it was close to 70 degrees already at 6 am.

Had my first hot flash today at work.  Just started Medrol and progesterone and thought that maybe that was the reason.  In reality everyone said it was pretty hot in the lab.  Channeled my grandmother and used a piece of cardboard to fan myself.  (Fun memory that elicited - Erin and I playing Taboo in college and me using "Grammy fans herself with this!" as a clue.  BTW, Erin got it first try - "paper plate!")

On the drive home I almost got in a car wreck!  It was REALLY close.  Driving on the little piece of freeway between two bridges about three cars merged in front of me and then slammed on their brakes!  I pushed my brake into the floor and the anti-locks kicked in.  The two tan cars in front of me bumped each other a couple of times, no real damage there, and I managed to stop before I rammed them both.  Once I stopped I looked in my rearview and saw this big Cadillac barreling down.  It managed to pull out into the other lane and missed me and the car behind it managed to stop as well.  Then I went into total adrenaline shock.  I was shaking and hyperventilating a little.  The cars in front of me put on their flashers saying they weren't going to move and I was stuck.  Finally the cars behind pulled out and went around and I was able to back up and get around.  Ahead of the tan cars was three more cars all crunched and a white pickup with it's hood all scrunched with glass everywhere.  Yikes!  You can bet everyone had perfect car placement with at least a whole car-length or more between us all as we drove into town.  SO CLOSE.

And then as we were dinking around at home before making dinner and watching the terrible news about that passenger plane, the dogs started barking and running towards the screen door.  Mom went down and looked and it was one of the kittens that have been running around the yard.  We have a glaring of white cats living under our decks (I've always wanted to use a "glaring of cats" in a sentence!  Mission complete!).  Not our choice, they've just decided it looks like a good place to live. We don't feed them and they are truly feral.  You can't even look at them without them running.  But about a week ago Mom found a kitten out between the garages.  She could get really close to it and we fed it some kitten chow because it was so skinny.  It's all white with shockingly blue eyes.  I decided to name it Gus.  We figured it could live outside and maybe with more food we could catch it and get it fixed.  A few days later we saw that there seem to be three kittens total, two all white and one white and gray.  Mom looked on the internet, because she had a hunch, and it seems that white cats with blue eyes are often deaf.  That was why we could get so close to it without it running.  We've heard them crying in the night and Mom has been worrying about it for all this time.  Well today, that's who the dogs were barking at while it slept under the grapevines.  No response.  So I told her to go get it.  She crept up and easily scooped it up.  So we went to PetSmart, got all the necessities and we have a new family member.  Meet Gus.

Life Moves On

That's how this summer for me has been.  Life Moves On.  Things are changing and nothing is changing.  I don't know how much you know or don't about my views on change.  In short, I hate it.  I like it when life is good and constant and predictable, until I hate that too.  Change typically upsets me and I retreat into my own little world where everything is okay and I can reiterate to myself who I am and that things will change but that doesn't have to cause an identity crisis.  This is probably sounding pretty confusing now...

You see I'm an idealist.  I like changing things until they fit my ideal and then I don't want them to change.  But constancy starts to feel like a jail after time.  You can't see the years flowing by in quick succession and your "rock in the river" status makes you surprised when everyone has moved on and your still sitting in your happy corner alone.  Or at least you thought you were happy until someone tells you to look around and then you are lonely.

So things are changing around here.  People are leaving from work and finding other jobs in other towns to make themselves happy.  Friends are busy leading their lives and growing their families.  Everyone seems to be happy but me.  It's not that I'm sad, just discontent.  And things are changing for me too.  My embryo transfer cycle is moving forward, things are looking promising and my transfer will happen next Tuesday.  Guess I'll let you know here what the outcome is, though we all know we should hold our breaths until week 12.  But there is so much uncertainty surrounding that.  If the first embryo doesn't make it through the thaw cycle they will have to use the second.  If neither make it then I'm back to square one.  Or if the first doesn't make it and the second does then I won't have a second to try again for a second child.  I'm not sure I have the money to do another IVF cycle. Will I be happy with just one child?  Should I try again?  What if neither make it?  No, don't think negatively.  One WILL make it.  So many questions I can't even write them all down.

There are the constant things too.  Work.  Garden.  Housekeeping.  Reading.  Knitting.  Laundry.  Just keep busy so you won't notice your life is slowing ticking away.  Just keep busy so you don't think about the time wasted.  Just keep busy and it will be okay again before you know it.

So you see, happy and unhappy.  Nervous and calm.  Worried and sure of it.  Waiting for the storm to pass and to be on calmer seas again.

And now that you've read the depressing bit, some pictures of my (surprisingly) vibrant garden.  Thank goodness for a timed watering system!

Brownie Fail (Can That Really Happen?!)

These would have tasted better if I wasn't so lazy.  It all started on Monday.  I was pretty blue on Monday.  Everyone had had a lovely 3-day weekend and I got to work 29 hours Friday, Saturday and Sunday.  Happy Birthday America!  You suck.

So yeah.  Blue.  I finally got my day off and I was beat.  I slept 12 hours, tried to thin and weed the garden in temperatures above 90 that were steadily rising, was lucky enough to clean up not one, but two (two I tell you!) piles of dog throw-up,  and got to go to the eye doctor and take back my glasses for the second time (as they still weren't right).  Lucky lucky me.

To try and pull myself out of my wallowing I read other people's blogs.  The Londoner's was lovely, but made me feel like the commoner I truly am (I don't think I'd feel comfortable at a regatta EVER) and Cider with Rosie gave me an idea.  She posted about these lovely ooey-gooey white chocolate and caramel brownies!  But making some brownies from scratch was not something I was willing to do.  However, the idea of adding some caramel filled chocolate (aka - Ghiradelli squares!) to the middle of the batter was genius and my level of easy right now!!  So I pulled out some brownie mix and reached for the leftover Ghiradelli caramel squares we had from camping.  On a side note these squares are the perfect chocolate to use for S'Mores!  You can choose from a variety of flavors (caramel being my favorite), they fit perfectly on a graham cracker and they make a cheap, yummy camping treat something decadent with very little effort.  Turns out though I didn't have as many chocolates as I thought.  Really only enough for 1/3 of the pan.  So I used caramel down one row, hazelnut filled Ghiradelli squares for another row and just peanut butter for a third.  Things were looking up!

That's right!  I keep a Costco box of brownies in my pantry for emergencies!

It's as easy as one...

Two...

Three!

I tried to get a money shot of some gooey caramel, but alas, my brownies fell apart as they came out of the pan.  That means all the calories disappeared, right?

There really is caramel in there, I swear!

And some peanut butter...somewhere....

And it also turns out that peanut butter bakes up and doesn't stay creamy when cooked in dollops inside of brownie batter.  Who knew?  I thought it would be runny and thin like when I spread it on top of a warm english muffin and put jam on the top of that.  Usually I have to drop the jam on because the peanut butter is so runny.  Damn.  A PB & J muffie sounds good right now.  But I digress.

So long story short, you should make these brownies the next time you are craving something chocolate-y.  It made my blue day a bit more spring green, I wouldn't say it went all the way to sunny yellow, which was better than where I'd started.  And though I said they were a fail (lack of true caramel ooziness, peanut butter clumps) there really is no way to fail when you're making brownies.  :)

Look!  I fixed it!

Banana Sponge Cake

This weekend during the cleaning and waterbed draining/replacing heater/refilling that occured I decided to use the two very ripe bananas that were sitting on my nice clean counter.  They were only brown-ripe not black-ripe so banana bread was out of the question, but also what can you make with only two bananas?  Now a few of you know that I am obsessing about all things British at the moment and I've been looking more and more at foods that they eat and we are unfamiliar with.  One of those things is sponges.  What is a sponge you say?  Well after baking my first one I would say a dense, moist delicious cake!  The original recipe I found here at A Mummy Too is very British with measurements in grams and milliliters (you know, all those logical metric things).  I will share below my "Americanized" version and my thoughts on what I'd do different the next time around.

Banana Sponge Cakes - Americanized
(Not my recipe - I take no credit)

3/4 cup butter (room temp)
1 cup sugar
1 cup self-rising flour
3 medium eggs
1/2 cup milk (I did a smidge more because the conversion was 0.52 cup)
2 small ripe bananas
1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees (Fahrenheit).  Beat together butter and sugar, add in the eggs, stir in the flour then add the milk.  Mash the bananas in a bowl (I used a fork) and add to the batter.  Add the chocolate chips right at the end and fold in gently.  Line a 12 hole cupcake pan with liners and divide the batter evenly between them.  (Mine were brimming with batter and I had to make a 13th one for the batter that was leftover.  And I still could have scraped the bowl for another...)  Bake for 30 minutes.

They were fantastically banana-ie and the dark chocolate chips are like little morsels of Christmas morning in there.  I thought that some nuts would be good, because I like them in banana bread, so I added some chopped pecans (it was what I had at hand) to the top of half of them.  I also wanted to frost some because that's what was in the original recipe, but I was to lazy to make it from scratch.  So I had to use Nutella instead.  A hardship, I know.  I really can't decide which I like better!!

The nut-topped ones are more breakfast like and the Nutella-topped ones are all late night sinfulness.  I think the next time I might try it as a loaf because they were pretty oily in the cupcake papers, but didn't want to come out easily when you unwrapped them.  Maybe it would come out of a glass dish better?  Ultimately you should make these as soon as you can leave two bananas to go brown-ripe!