My Version of Happy

Afternoon Delight

2011-07-03T18:33:00.000-05:00

Sometimes, having not gone to the grocery store for awhile can be the best thing to ever happen to lunch. I threw this delicious pasta salad together with some frozen veggies (corn and snow peas) that were being neglected in the freezer, two tomatoes that were about 36 hours away from sucking, some tri-color pasta, and the last bit of a bottle of poppy seed dressing from the fridge. I added some chicken to get some protein into Monkey, which she is always lacking in her diet. Voila, easy peasy AWESOMENESS!

28-44

2011-06-02T16:21:00.000-05:00

28. Walk on the Great Wall of China

29. Make my passion my career

30. Finish a damn Jane Austen novel

31. Get organized

32. Find a favorite red wine

33. Bring Monkey to Disney World and check my disdain at the door

34. Own an investment property

35. Eat vegetarian 4 days a week and vegan 1 day a week

36. Throw a Candy Land themed party

37. See a Broadway show

38. Go to a movie alone

39. Own an art piece by Jean-Michel Basquiat

40. Read all the Harry Potter books with Monkey

41. Go to the symphony

42. See MPLS through the eyes of a tourist

43. Have a passive income

44. Go to the SXSW festival

How does Your Garden Grow?

2011-06-01T11:00:00.000-05:00

Apparently green thumbs skip a generation. My mother has always been a dedicated gardener, but I can just barely keep my house plants healthy.

I do much better with artificial flowers.

Without any help from me, Monkey has planted and successfully grown a garlic plant on our deck.

I'll grow the kid and leave the botany to her.

15-27 of my Happy Life List

2011-06-01T09:52:00.000-05:00

It has been a while since I posted more of my Happy Life List so here is 15-27...

15. Be an extra in a film

16. Explain my feminist identity on paper, with words

17. Make homemade cheese

18. Sing a duet in front of people

19. See the Pyramids

20. Take a road trip with a friend

21. Stop feeling like I am only pretending to be an adult, and realize I really am

22. Be a delegate

23. Live abroad

24. Get really good at making Crème Brulee

25. Remove all oppressive language from my vocabulary

26. Take a train ride through the northwest

27. Reconcile my atheism with my spirituality

Here is the full list

Yahoo! What Were YOU Thinking?!

2011-05-29T18:35:00.002-05:00

Yahoo! has a feature on their omg! site where they do photo galleries of celebrities' fashion mistakes. Now often I agree with the photos they feature in the galleries, but sometimes I have to wonder what Yahoo! was thinking!

Agree:

Yahoo! is way off:

And they shouldn't even be allowed to put Gaga in their gallery.

#5 on My Happy Life List

2011-05-29T16:36:00.002-05:00

At the end of March, Monkey and I went on vacation to D.C. This gave me the chance to check off #5 of my happy life list; see the Lincoln Memorial at night. In college I took an Art History class on American Art, and much of the class consisted of sculptures and monuments. When the professor lectured on Daniel Chester French, the sculptor behind the Lincoln Memorial, she mentioned how extraordinary seeing Mr. Lincoln at night is. I took note of this and have wanted to experience it myself ever since.

Seeing Abe at all is quite a sight, but when he is all lit up at night it is something else!

These photos really do not do him justice, so if you haven't been there already GO, NOW!

Rainy Day Cookies

2011-05-29T14:32:00.002-05:00

So Friday evening was rainy and dinner was underwhelming and hadn't fulfilled that nights need for comfort food. Our cupboards were looking embarrassingly bare so I needed something EASY to make. I don't actually remember where I came across this recipe, but I knew I had what I needed. They are a variation of chocolate chip cookies. I call them "Choco Chip Ball things". Fancy. I only had half a bag of chips so I just halved the recipe. Here is the full recipe.

1 Cup softened butter
3/4 Cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 1/2 Cups flour
3/4 tsp salt (I used salted butter so I didn't add the salt)
12 oz. Chocolate Chips
Powdered Sugar

Cream butter, sugar and vanilla.

Add flour and salt. Stir in chocolate chips.

Roll in balls.

Bake at 350 on an ungreased cookie sheet for 15 minutes. After they have cooled, roll in powdered sugar.

The dough is very dry so I just wiped out the bowl and used it for the powdered sugar. Easy!

YUMMY!

Bonjour!

2011-05-27T20:46:00.001-05:00

I have been getting ready for Monkey's French themed 7th birthday party, and I wanted to put together a mix of fun music to have playing in the background during the shindig. Three particular songs I came across have been on repeat in the house the past couple of days. An added bonus on the happy scale is that the videos for all three songs are totally great!

The first is by the duo Brigitte. It's called "Battez-vous", and they are just too cool for school. Behold...

The next is "Ensemble" from the ADORABLE coeur de pirate. She is actually Canadian, but is also popular in France. You will see why!

And last but NOT least is the hotness that is Thomas Pradeau with his cute cute cute song and video "Le Pays de Moliere?"

Enjoy and happy weekend!

Sometimes, Life Really is Simple.

2011-05-27T10:30:00.000-05:00

...simply wonderful

#8-14

2011-03-16T10:22:00.000-05:00

Here is #8-14 of my Happy Life List

8. Learn to speak French

9. Implement Yoga into my daily life

10. Complete an advanced degree

11. Make peace with the past

12. Eat only happy, healthy meat and dairy

13. Understand where I came from

14. Vacation to Savannah, Georgia

A Happy Life List

2011-03-14T13:10:00.001-05:00

In the spirit of Mighty Girl's "Mighty Life List" I have decided to make my own "Happy Life List"! I think this is a great way to focus in on what is important to me and what I want/need to make my life the greenest it can be. Some of the things on my list will be BIG (and will possibly never be attained) like #89- See Earth from space- but others will be small and beautifully simple, like the very first thing I added to my list- Send a message in a bottle- I'll roll out the list seven at a time so as not to overwhelm you, or myself for that matter.

Here is #1-7!

1. Send a message in a bottle

2. Go to a Bob Dylan concert

3. Get up close and personal with a shark (and live to blog about it)

4. Visit India

5. See the Lincoln Memorial at night (in two weeks I can mark this off my list!)

6. Graceland baby!

7. Finish a whole New York Times Sunday crossword puzzle with minimal cheating

**************************************
What's on your Mighty, Happy, things to do list?!

Can we just take a moment...

2011-03-14T11:29:00.002-05:00

This song is so kick-ass and should always be played at full blast. This video? Perfection. Around our house Adele is a goddess. I was hoping to bring the kid to see Ms. Adele when she played First Ave. in Minneapolis, but unfortunately I dropped the ball and it's now sold out. I still may try to score some tickets; we'll see.

Enjoy

Rolling in the Deep- Adele

Treasures

2011-03-08T23:03:00.000-06:00

As usual I was out shopping on Saturday. Most weekends you can find me at a thrift store, flea market, or neighborhood garage sale. Buying second-hand items for the home marriages two of my favorite things; vintage (anything really) and being thrifty. I'm planning to get my etsy shop going again, and having this thought in the back of my head I not only looked for wonderful things for myself, but also wonderful things I could pass on to someone else. This last weekend's hunt was great! Here's a little of what I brought home.

I haven't picked the perfect spot for this lovely lady yet, but who are we kidding; she's going to look fabulous wherever she gets hung.

I'm trying to follow the organizational mantra "A place for everything", and if the chaos that is my kitchen cupboards is any indication, I need to impliment this a bit better. One solution is this great little find!

I've seen these stands before, but I thought they were for jewelry (I suppose you could use it for that purpose) and I'm not much of a jewelery gal so I never thought is was something I needed. Then a few weeks ago I saw one being used the "correct" way and I knew I wanted one of my very own!

This set is going in my etsy shop asap and will be going home with someone who enjoys a chuckle with their morning coffee!

Now I don't know if there is a special name for this tea-steeping cup, but it is special! If I drank tea as often

as I should you better believe I would be keeping this.

Don't judge a man by his name

2011-03-03T19:53:00.004-06:00

Each morning when I open my eyes I say to myself: I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn't arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I'm going to be happy in it.

-Groucho Marx

No animals were harmed in the making of these Cupcakes

2010-08-30T14:04:00.021-05:00

Don't those look yummy?!
I had a casual dinner party (editor's note: all dinner parties I attend are "casual") to go to with some of my fabulous feminist school mates/best friends a lady could have. The dinner party was potluck style. Although I think a different word other than potluck would be more appropriate. Potluck sounds so country, we were drinking wine for goodness sakes. We are classy bitches. Oh well. Since I, as one of only a few omnivores, was going to be outnumbered by the vegetarians, vegans, and even a pescatrian, I thought I would try my hand at a vegan recipe.

I have been a daily reader of the awesome foodie blog The Kitchn, and I knew I would find just what I need there. How happy was I when I came across a recipe for Ginger and Orange Chocolate Vegan Cupcakes. I knew it was perfect when I read that the author of the post preferred them over regular cupcakes.

The best part is the ingredients list. Nothing weird, nothing that will force you to search all over town trying to find. In fact, if I had already done my regular grocery shopping for the week I would have had most of the list already.

The most important ingredient, though? An eager little helper!

I like Sugar! I like sugar so much that I actually have a cookbook titled " I ♥ Sugar".

The above picture is the frosting pre-mixing. Instead of butter, you are using vegan margarine; a lot of vegan margarine. Make no mistake, these cupcakes are not health food. Many people erroneously believe veganism is all about being healthy. Now while being a vegan will force one to turn to fruits and veggies more often and processed foods less often, you can get pretty down and dirty (i.e. unhealthy but delicious) in the kitchen and still keep it vegan.

The recipe for the frosting yielded a lot more than was needed to frost the cupcakes. So unless you love you some frosting you could probably cut the recipe in half and still have enough.

Also, if you want to be a little less naughty, I tried one as soon as they came out of the oven and these babies could definitely go unfrosted and still be a hit.

YUMMY!

Happiness is...

2010-08-25T12:50:00.005-05:00

I am begrudgingly finding out that the path to happiness is often just deciding to be happy, regardless. So, that is a bit what this blog was started for. Kind of like tracking my happiness. A way for me to be conscience of my happiness, (force myself, at times) to be aware of what makes me happy. So even like today, while I am online for hours job hunting for the millionth day since graduation, wishing I was still in the security blanket that is the university, I am happy anyways. Namely because I get to look at my fabulous screen background.

Oh, Bettie Page.

Chuck

2010-08-22T13:24:00.004-05:00

I have come late to the Charles Bukowski party, and on account of my feminist identity (let’s chat about this soon) I should not be in attendance at this party. But I am. There is something dirty and raw and sexual and biting about his work that attracts me. I am always interested in poetry that speaks. And his speaks. This, I imagine, is why he is beloved by so many. He is a poet for people who don’t like poetry; and for those who do. I came to him because one of my favorite bands, Modest Mouse, has a song (which is one of my favorites) called Bukowski. I felt after listening to it as many times as I have I should actually know who they are talking about. It was also suggested to me by the Netflix gods that I watch the documentary “Born into this” about Bukowski. I watched him. I hated him. I loved him. He is humanity. He is the ugliness. I think he knows this. I think this is why I enjoy him, even the most ugly parts. I give to you just a few bites.
This one is called “dinosauria, we”

And this is "The Shoelace

	Charles Bukowski - The Shoelace .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

And you may enjoy this

Oh Yes
there are worse things than
being alone
but it often takes decades
to realize this
and most often
when you do
it's too late
and there's nothing worse
than
too late.