Archives for August 2011

Oh, how Pinteresting!

August 31, 2011 filed under: photography, Pinterest, pretty

Hey guys, it’s Wednesday again! Time to share the best pins of this week!

Source: tumblr.com via San on Pinterest

Oh, who wouldn’t want a backyard like that?

Source: pursuitoffelicity.tumblr.com via San on Pinterest

True.

Source: woman.excite.co.jp via San on Pinterest

Oh my goodness, I want to bake this!

Source: polyvore.com via San on Pinterest

Love these fall colors!

Source: google.com via San on Pinterest

I usually don’t like snake-skin, but those are so pretty!

Source: tumblr.com via San on Pinterest

I LOVE this. My husband did a fist pump on our wedding day… it’s the most romantic thing!

Do you want to join in, but need a Pinterest account?
Let me know and I’ll send you an invite!

Are you participating in Oh, How Pinteresting Wednesdays?
Make sure you link up on our host’s Michelle’s blog.

Happy Wednesday and happy pinning!

Summer tales – Part I

August 30, 2011 filed under: family, photography, summer tales

I had a fantastic, and I mean abso-freakin’-lutely fantastic time with my family. I don’t even know to begin… and what’s worse, I can’t believe they left two weeks ago.

I don’t really know if I can find enough words to describe how great of a time we had. I never get “cabin fever” when I am with my family. That might seem impossible, but it’s true. Over the next few weeks, I’ll give you glimpses into our family vacation. It’s going to be impossible to share every little detail (although I wish I could), but I definitely want to share the highlights!

So, it all started when I picked up my parents on a Saturday afternoon about 5 weeks ago at San Francisco Airport. Look how happy they looked when I met them at the Terminal!

It was wonderful to see them again after 7 months, to bring them home to our new apartment, to show them our new neighborhood. I think it makes such a big difference that they actually got to see and experience the place we’ve been calling our new home for the last three months.

Since I was still going to be working for another week before I finally took two weeks off, they had plenty of time to get over their jet-lag and explore midtown and downtown Sacramento.
We spent most of Sunday in Oldtown Sacramento, enjoying the beautiful weather.

Sunday evening we were supposed to pick up my cousin, Basti, at the Sacramento Airport, but he had missed his connecting flight in Philadelphia and was rerouted to San Francisco. That meant we had to drive out to the Bay Area once again to pick him up at midnight. Obviously, we needed to get some food in our bellies beforehand and I suggested to get the – in my humble opinion – best pizza in Sacramento at “Chicago Fire”.

Yup. My Mom and I agreed: pretty good pizza!

After we had safely gotten all my family members back to our apartment and had gotten a good night’s sleep, we went out to see a game of our local Baseball team, the Sacramento River Cats, at Raley Field. Basti was really eager to learn all the Baseball rules, while my Mom was more interested in the Baseball Bingo game… ha!

It was a beautiful night and a great, great start to their three week’s vacation.

… to be continued.

Oh, how Pinteresting!

August 24, 2011 filed under: photography, Pinterest, pretty

It’s Wednesday and you know what that means, it’s time to pin!

Source: getsweaty.tumblr.com via San on Pinterest

I used to be able to do this at one point. Should try this again.

Source: honeyandfitz.blogspot.com via San on Pinterest

Love smart storage ideas!

Source: 15minutefashion.about.com via San on Pinterest

Have you tried those pins? They really work!

Source: shannoneileenblog.typepad.com via San on Pinterest

CUTE!

Source: indiefixx.com via San on Pinterest

Beautiful!

Source: kootoyoo.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Neat DIY idea.

Do you want to join in, but need a Pinterest account?
Let me know and I’ll send you an invite!

Are you participating in Oh, How Pinteresting Wednesdays?
Make sure you link up on our host’s Michelle’s blog.

Happy Wednesday and happy pinning!

Bill Maher

August 23, 2011 filed under: cracks me up, good times, my so-called life

© Randy Miramontez (on Sacramento Press).

We had tickets to Bill Maher on Friday night.

Holy goodness.

It’s been one of the best comedy shows I’ve ever been to.

To my absolute delight, we found out that we had seats in the 5th row from the stage. (I wasn’t even aware that I had purchased such good seats until we got to the venue.) Comedy is much better, the closer you sit to the stage. Obviously. And we weren’t disappointed.

There was no warm up act that was followed by a lukewarm, lackadaisical 45 minute-show. Not that I expected that from someone like Bill Maher anyway, because I think he’s serious about everything he does. But from the very moment that he walked on stage, he owned the place and he had fun doing so. For over 1,5 hours he skewered the GOP candidates, the Tea Party, religious fanaticism and underlined the importance of equal rights and integrity.

I think Bill Maher is one of the most articulate, provocative political comedians of our time. Admittedly, sometimes he’s really pushing it and your eyes widen and your jar drops and you think to yourself “I can’t believe he actually said that”, but that’s his signature, that’s what he is all about. He wants to provoke, he wants to offend, because he’s not willing to let people get away with shit.

I am a big fan of his show “Real Time with Bill Maher” on HBO. He always has a slue of interesting guests – both from the political right and left, as well as actors, activists and other comedians – and is not afraid to ask uncomfortable questions. He tends to take everything with a grain of salt, but also doesn’t hesitate to call people on their BS.

I know, opinions are divided about him. It’s either you love him or you hate him. He doesn’t leave much room for indecision.

BUT: If you do like him (and I hope you do!) and if he’s doing a show anywhere near you, do yourself a favor and go see him. It’s absolutely worth it.

And if you don’t like him, I leave you with a somewhat provocative statement from one of the commentators on the Sacramento Press website, who stated correctly:

“The dismissiveness and dislike of Maher shows louder than words that he’s striking a nerve – and he is doing so because, uh, he’s right.”

Apartment Update

August 22, 2011 filed under: home, my so-called life

I know this has been long overdue, but I am finally ready to show you some more pictures of our apartment – post-move in!

There are still a few things that need to be changed/purchased, but we wanted to wait til after my parents’ visit. I’d really like to get a papasan chair or extra love seat for our living room, but since we’re going to be sleeping there while our guests are here, I came up with a temporary solution: a seating corner made out of our old futon mattress and some pillows.

View from the living room into the dining room

Living room and front door

Living room (and seating corner)

Dining room

View from Dining room to living room

Kitchen

Bedroom

I love the hardwood floors, all the windows and the abundance of natural light, the built-in closet and hutch. Obviously, there are still some improvements to be made, but I am so, so much happier in this new place than in the tiny apartment that we lived in before.

What do you think? :)

Come and gone

August 19, 2011 filed under: my so-called life, photography, travel

It’s been three weeks since my last post. Can someone please tell me where the time went?

All I can say is: the time with my family was absolutely amazing and I just did not find the time to even send a single “hello” from the road (unless you follow me on Facebook where I checked in a few times). It feels strange though how it seems like my parents and cousin just got here, but now they’re gone again in a blink of an eye.

I know, I owe you a recap. I know, you’re dying to see pictures and I promise I’ll get around to it. But I also know, there are 3000 photos to go through, loads of laundry to do and paperwork and bills to catch up on. It’s going to take me a little while to get back into the swing of things around here.

Apparently, I am not one of the organized people who schedule posts in advance or recruit a series of guest bloggers for the time they are away. Oh well. Forgive me for deserting this place for so long (but thank you to Kim for filling in and telling us how to make jam! :)).

Regular posting will resume next week, including some of the feature posts like “Oh, how Pinteresting” Wednesdays and “Link Love” Fridays.

In the meantime, I’ll leave you with one of my favorite shots from my trip.

Guest Post: Kim makes Jam

August 3, 2011 filed under: food, guest blog post, recipe

hey everyone, i’m kim from notcrazyunwell.com and am happy to guest post for san, while she’s hopefully enjoying every minute of her family’s visit!

i promised a little while ago on my blog to post a DIY about how i made jam and figured it’d be a nice thing to share with san’s readers as well. it’s easy-breezy (seriously, don’t be scared. if i can do it, you can do it!) and i can’t believe i haven’t tried it before. i don’t think i’ll be buying jam at the store any time soon … also, i think a glass of homemade jam makes a great little gift.

so, here it goes:

the first thing would actually be to prepare the glasses. i placed the lids in a small pot with hot water on the stove to sterilize them. let the water get to an almost-boil and then turn off the stove. you can just leave the lids in the water until right before you want to fill the jam into the glasses. i also washed the glasses with really hot water before putting them into a small baking pan.

i then set the oven to 50-80 degrees C (about 120-170 degrees F) and put the glasses in the oven to keep them sterile and warm (so they won’t burst when i fill them with hot jam.) that’s where they get to rest comfortably while i get to the actual jam-making. :)

now, for my first try i decided to do a little something “different” (but not too fancy) and made strawberry-blackberry-banana jam (with the largest proportion being the strawberries).

i chopped all fruit up and ended up with 1 kg of it, which is exactly what i needed for the amount of canning sugar i bought. i cut the fruit into small pieces, put it in a pot and started blending.

next step would be to add the canning sugar. i like to use canning sugar that’s at least 2:1 (or 3:1) which means i use 2 (or 3) parts fruit + only 1 part sugar. in this case i used the 2:1 kind = 1000 g fruit + 500g canning sugar.

now stir and bring the pureed fruit-sugar-mix to a boil. continue according to the instructions on the canning sugar package.

mine said to boil (while stirring) for about 4 minutes and then ceck, if if the jam would consolidate by putting a small amount on a cold plate. i did that, it got harder quickly so i figured it was done :) i turned off the stove, got the glasses out of the oven, put them on a (warm, damp) kitchen towel, fished the lids out of the water and started pouring the jam into the glasses. when you’re done, close the glasses tightly and place them upside down for about thirty minutes.

turn them around again and let them cool off (preferrably over night). then get up in the morning all giddy and excited and enjoy a slice of (fresh) bread with butter and your homemade jam. sooooo good.

optional: i actually made small labels for the jam and covered a few of the glasses with some cute fabric to give away to friends. isn’t this the cutest little surprise gift ever?