Sickness and other disturbing things…

So last week on Thursday I had to go to the hospital due to having a horrible head cold. Normally I can handle a cold. This one made me feel like there were razor blades in my throat and someone was squeezing my head in a vice. It was awful. The doctor gave me medicine that didn’t do anything and I was just utterly miserable for about five days. Even honey and lemon tea did nothing for me! During these five days was my daughter’s birthday. I felt horrible but we had to cancel her party (it was going to be a surprise so she didn’t know) and my darling husband had to cook dinners.

Normally my husband cooking isn’t really a bad thing. The first night he cooked me hade Yakisoba. It’s a pretty good dish with noodles, beef, and mixed veggies in butter and soy sauce. The next night I helped him make a chicken soup by telling him what wet in it and how much he should use, that turned out very good. So all in all he’s a decent cook. Now on my daughter’s birthday though, something went horribly wrong! We asked her what she wanted for her birthday dinner and she decided she wanted “Granpa’s Chicken!” This is one of my own recipes where the chicken is covered in crackers and fried in peanut oil. It’s not terribly hard to do and when made right its absolutely wonderful! Well I talked the hubby through it and the first two pieces of chicken he burned. The third and final piece came out the golden brown we were looking for and that was the piece the daughter got. It was her birthday after all. As we were all sitting down at the table the hubby looked at me with sad eyes and said “Don’t make me ruin this ever again.” Poor guy, he tried so hard to make it right.

The daughter still had a good birthday. She got presents of course and we did lots of fun things in the house. Mostly played video games, but that’s what she wanted. The hubby made a cake and he and I decorated it with fun, cute little things like peace signs and hearts. Squiggles and dots and just lots of cute things. All in all it was a pretty good day.

Cleaning, cooking, and internet!

Sorry that I haven’t been online for a short while. We lost internet in our house and have decided to drop Comcast! So I haven’t had internet except on my phone. Now I find out that we can use our phones for about 30$ a month as portable “hotspots” and spend MUCH LESS on internet which is great news!! I’m rather excited about this!! lol I can get online again without having to pay an arm and a leg!! YIPPEE!!!

So while the internet was down, and along with all of the cleaning I have been doing around the house, I was able to finish the pot and pan rack that I had been building out of pallet wood. Its beautiful and soon it will be hung in my kitchen for the whole world to see!! It has that aged, scarred look with a touch of country home. I love it!! Now to just get the hubby to help me hang it so that it stays even and level lol. Maybe one day this week…

I’m also working on my herb garden which is taking longer than expected because the pallets I got last week are really falling apart. I was trying to pry up a piece of the wood and my screwdriver broke, which is ok because it was a cheap thing anyways but it made it difficult to pry up anymore of the wood. Then I was taking nails out of the two-by-fours that I had already cleared of wood and I BENT MY HAMMER!!! The nose of the hammer is touching the bar just above the handle!!! It’s crazy! So now I have to wait to get either a pry bar or a chisel. Hopefully that will be soon as my herbs are already growing!! I have eight out of the twelve that I planted already growing splendidly! I’m so proud! Now just keep your fingers crossed that I can keep them alive lol!! Also I have thought of an adorable way to use that bent hammer! I’m going to attach it to a piece of wood and write “Don’t mess with the O’Briens!” around the hammer lol I think it will give people a nice giggle.

I went to the grocery part of Wal-Mart the other day and picked up some country-style pork ribs. I was going to make my Baked BBQ  Pork Ribs. They are delicious!! The meat literally falls apart, but stays juicy and tender!! When I got home I put the ribs in the fridge and actually forgot about them because I was so busy that afternoon we just had a quick dinner. The next day I took them out to use them and what do I find when I open the wrapper? The area under where the sticker had been was RANCID!!! I was so upset and angry! I had picked out these ribs special and they had to have been half rotten when I bought them!! I wanted to take them back to the store but I misplaced my receipt and I was sure they would listen to me if I didn’t have it. So I threw them out and we had a quick dinner for the second day in a row. I really need to find a real butcher in town. One that I can get to on my own without having to have the hubby drive me over there. Tonight I am playing it safe and we’re going to have chicken! I’m thinking like a chicken alfredo or something along those lines. Haven’t really decided, but I’ll let you know when I do.  Anyway I am off to do more cleaning (did you know that cascade makes a great kitchen sink cleaner?) and think more about dinner. Have fun folks!

Oh hey! Here’s some food for thought!!

“It is said, without  the culinary arts the crudeness of reality would be unbearable.” – Leopold from “Kate and Leopold” one of my favorite romantic comedies!!

Seriously? Sorry about typos!

Ok to let everyone know I don’t have internet right now. I am writing this on my phone which is really weird because I can’t really see what I’m typing all that well. It’s not that the letters are small, but that the buttons are small and the phone doesn’t scroll very well. I am going to do my best to keep blogging here, but it may be slow going.

I haven’t yet decided for sure if I want to go to the Art Institute. They seem to be a little full of themselves and are threatening to take away my acceptance because I don’t have a way to take the accuplacer test right now. I’m not even supposed to start school until July and they are already getting mad at me. But right now there’s just no way. The money I had for the test has to go to pay a ticket the hubby got. Not that it was his fault but there are many things making this more difficult. The bus takes forever and I have to be sure I can get me daughter from school, I don’t have a car that I can drive right now much less a valid license since mine expired and there’s been no time to get it fixed, and the hubby hasn’t the time to help they’re working him like a dog. Its ridiculous!! But aside from their threats it takes forever to get a hold of anybody
there! I tried for at least two weeks just so I could ask a question! Its pretty bad. I know and I certainly understand they are busy. They did just start a new term, but how hard is it to listen to a voicemail and drop a quick e-mail? Not very hard by my estimation. I guess I’m just frustrated in how they handle themselves and their enrollment process . I understand I need to get that test done soon but it’s not very easy to do when it feels like there is so much against you.

On a brighter note since the hubby has been busy for the last week I started getting projects done! The pot and pan hanger just needs a few finishing touches and I have started on the herb garden!! I have twelve mason jars with twelve different herbs planted in them! Now I just need more pallets! Lol We tried to get some more today but the hubby got frustrated so we went home instead. Now I’m pallet-less and he leaves again tomorrow to go do more training. I have no idea what I’m going to do to finish my projects. Maybe I’ll find some help somewhere. Perhaps my neighbor won’t mind take me around a little.

One more thing. You should try out me new recipe idea! Teriyaki fried chicken! It’s really tasty and the added crunch makes it that much better!! I marinate mine in a teryaki and egg bath and then flour and fry as normal! There are of course several other ingredients in my recipe but I don’t share. Sorry guys. But please feel free to make your own recipe and share in the comments below!! Happy cooking!!

Another Day Another Essay

I have applied for a need based scholarship to be able to go to school. I had to write a very difficult essay and this is what I came up with. Let me know what you guys think in the comments! I have already turned in the application (which is why I feel that it’s safe to post this now because its been about a week since I applied and if they look at time stamps they’ll know that I didn’t copy and paste my own essay) along with the essay, so I can’t make anymore changes, but this version may not have all of the changes that I have already made. Any advice for future essays would be helpful!!

” For the last eight years I have been an Army Wife. There is an unspoken duty that military wives have. Not just to their families, but to their country. Being a soldier’s wife means taking care of everything else for the family so that our soldiers can be soldiers. Taking care of the home, caring for the children, being on call to look up information for your soldier, bills, shopping, it all takes its toll. Over the years I have been able to find little time for a career or to go to school and I have no community involvement or volunteer work to write about. I have been a full-time wife and stay at home mother with a few part-time jobs thrown in when  I have the time.

I worked at McDonald’s when I was a teen, I lost my job the night my husband (at that time my fiance)  left for Basic Training, that same afternoon I had found out I was pregnant with our daughter. I was just starting my senior year in High School. My Fiancee came home during Exodus and we got married December 23rd, 2003. I dropped out of school for about two years to take care of my new little family. I went back to High School and obtained a High School diploma in four months online, while working full-time as a dispatch for ABC Cab Company.  They didn’t pay very well, but they let me bring my daughter to work with me.  After I graduated I started working at American Express Membership Rewards. They let me work at night so that we still didn’t have to pay for child care. I decided to try going to school, but the only real option had been online because child care was so expensive. I chose Everest Online, and enrolled in their Criminal Investigations course. During that time we moved from Arizona to Hawaii. I did fairly well until my husband deployed for the first time. I worked at Burger King, then changed over to the Sears Portrait Studio trying to find something I could stick with so that I could start saving money for a culinary program in Honolulu. The job at Sears was a seasonal position and I was let go the day before Christmas Eve. I tried to start my own home based business about a year later, Bordering Life LLC.  After almost a year I had to close down. No one was buying and the move to Colorado really hurt our bottom line. We couldn’t afford the thirty-six dollars a month to keep the website open, but you can still find me on Facebook that’s still free.

Now we overdraw our account every two weeks to keep gas in the car and the bills are barely being kept up. There is very little hope of me being able to actually pay to go to school. While our debt isn’t as high as some, it isn’t small either, but having no real work skills or experience makes it difficult to find a job in the current economy. I know that going to school is my best option for helping my family get out of the financial mess we are in, and now that we are close enough to an Art Institute I have applied for the Culinary Arts Associates program. There are classes that I can take while my daughter is in school which minimizes the need for after school childcare. I know that its going to be hard, but I have to try.

Have you ever looked around a restaurant you were dining in and thought “This is where I belong”? I have, and one day I will get there. My goal in life is to open up my own restaurant called “Niki’s House”. Niki is my nickname and what everyone calls me. I love food and I love to cook. My favorite part of cooking is watching people enjoy the foods that I make, knowing that I put that smile on their face when they lift their fork to their mouths. Niki’s House will have a menu that changes nightly, and a webpage where you can check what is being served over the next week. The menu will consist only of recipes that I have made myself.

This scholarship will help me achieve this dream. It will give me the opportunity to finally begin. I will be able to travel the road from education to experience with less personal and financial stress. I will be able to show my daughter that no matter what happens, no matter how old or young you are, your dream can come true if you want it bad enough and work hard enough for it. ”

Well that’s it. This essay was seriously difficult to write. The guildlines requested certain things that normally you wouldn’t want others to know, but I guess it being a “need based” scholarship means that they need to ask you these things. I know winning this scholarship is a long shot but really anything would help right now. My education is going to cost about 50k and thats just for an AAS. The BA is another 15-25k on top!! For now I just want the AAS, I can always go back later for the BA.

On another note, I made tha recipe card holder!! It came out beautifully! Instead of using a plate holder I instead used the ribbon at the top to hang it on the wall next to where I am going to be putting my new kitchen counter. That way its not taking up room on the counter and its just a quick turn of the head. Now to just get the new counter and the pot and pan hanger done!! I’ll get there eventually I know, but its just slow going. I’m just glad that I got at least ONE project done! Only about 500 left to go!! lol