On Top of Spaghetti

When Mom and Dad were here this past weekend, I made dinner on Saturday night, spaghetti casserole, beer bread, corn and raspberries-on-the-bottom cake.  I love casseroles so much; I make the same ones over and over again in phases but I never grow tired of them.  Most of the time, I don't make totally-from-scratch-spaghetti-sauce for this, so don't think of me as a cheater.  Sometimes I feel like there's just not enough time in the day, but if there were more than 24, I'd be exhausted!

Without further ado, I present to you my broccoli-spaghetti casserole recipe.  Most of the time I make mine in a 13" x 9" Pyrex dish, but on Saturday I made it using my dutch oven on the stove top and it was awesome.  The great thing about this recipe is that it can be prepared in ADVANCE, how wonderful is that!  I made the sauce and cooked the noodles on Thursday night last week, stored them separate in the fridge and combined them and added the cheese while my bread was baking before dinner on Saturday!

R.'s Broccoli Spaghetti Casserole

1 lb. ground beef

1/2 t. minced garlic

2 jars Bertolli Organic Tomato and Basil pasta sauce

2 T. olive oil

2 T. Cabernet Sauvignon (or your favorite red wine; I use whatever is open but Cab. Sauv. is my favorite)

1 bag frozen Steamfresh broccoli florets

Thin spaghetti (I like to use linguine, too)

1 1/2 c. shredded mozzarella cheese

Brown the ground beef in a dutch oven over medium heat; use a baster to remove the fat.  Add garlic and let simmer for about 1 minute.  Add both cans of pasta sauce and stir in olive oil, then stir in Cabernet Sauvignon.  Add frozen broccoli to the sauce; cover sauce and simmer for 30 minutes.

While the sauce is simmering, cook your spaghetti noodles (you'll need about half the box for this recipe, depending on the sauce-to-noodle ratio you like) according to the package directions.  Drain and rinse.  Incorporate the desired amount of cooked noodles into the sauce in the dutch oven, then top with mozzarella cheese and cover until cheese is melted, or you can pop it into the oven at 350 degrees F for about 15-20 minutes (or until cheese is brown).  I did mine on the stove top because I was baking some beer bread in my oven, which only houses one rack.  Try it out and let me know what you think!

Bend and Not Break

Happy Sunday afternoon to everyone!  Dad and Mom skipped town right after lunch because, as evidenced by Virginia's recent wild weather, it was snowing down south while it was monsooning here in Charlottesville.  Basketball's not the only thing experiencing March Madness...

I blog today with a heart full of joy because I have finished my very first piece of handmade apparel:  my reversible wrap skirt!  I had several ups and downs while making this skirt.  First and foremost, I consider myself a novice in the vast world of sewing.  I have read article after article and book after book about how to carry out multiple sewing techniques, such as gathering, inserting zippers, sewing buttonholes , etc. Some of you might have just said to yourselves, "Child's play!" but I have yet to try them out.  I suppose I should practice, but I really like to dive right into the project.

Anyway, my low point on this wrap skirt project came when I was turning the ties right-side-out.  Something so simple turned me into the frustrated, irritable R.-monster.  I broke down in tears, people.  Seriously.  That was last Saturday.  I have come a long way since then.  I just wanted to share that tidbit because while I love making things with my hands, sometimes I would like to strangle my projects in a world where they had necks.  I am proud to say, though, that I have conquered this wrap skirt, even though I wanted to finish it before March.  FYI, the pattern I used is called the Audrey Wrap Skirt by Fig Tree Quilts.  I was concerned that it wouldn't drape right or even worse, look like I was wearing a quilt as a skirt, but I'll let you be the judge of that.  

I'm sure most of you have figured out that I love polka dots.  And I love red.  So here we go, ta-da:

Quite possibly the coolest thing about Audrey is that she's a two-in-one skirt:  that's economical, eh? I was expecting to favor the polka dot print, but I fell in love with the blue floral 1930s print (from the Betty Dear collection, designed by Darlene Zimmerman), and its my favorite "side" of the skirt:

The Ice Is Getting Thinner

...And by that I mean, I can see spring at the end of winter's tunnel.  Actually, I think I'll capitalize Spring and Winter, they're characters in this post.  Moving on.  The last time I posted on here, I said something to the effect of, wow, I can't believe February is halfway over, and boom, it's March.  I have really got to do a better job of keeping rintherealworld a living, breathing blog, consider this CPR. 

My parents are visiting this weekend, and I'm excited to see them.  We will probably do some shopping and maybe hit up Dave Matthews' winery out in Albemarle County, which is really cool.   And we'll probably eat some food, too.

In their honor, I'm making a new recipe from a book that JavaLady gave to me as a Christmas gift entitled Chocolate Cakes:  50 Great Cakes for Every Occasion.  Who knew I liked cake?  Anyway, it's called, "raspberries-on-the-bottom cake," which sounds delicious. I will tell you how it goes.

In other news, I still haven't finished my wrap skirt, and I am bummed about that.  I wanted to have it completed before March 1, fail on my part.  It is my celebration-of-Spring project, so I guess I have a few days until the season is official.

I feel like this is a random topic buffet, but have y'all heard of Pinterest?  I found out about it through some blogs that I read and thought it was such a great idea.  Here's why I think it's so cool:  it's a place to collect your favorite images found while beebopping around on the internet.  I have been testing it out to see how I like it, and I love it.  It's an awesome place for me to store ideas for my very own house one day, pictures of DIY projects that I want to tackle but can't for the lack of space in my apartment, dresses that I think are stunning, etc.  You get the point.  So rintherealworld is on Pinterest, check it out.  It's a pretty neat site.  Okay, peace out. 

Winter Song

February is halfway over, that's obvious.  I haven't posted anything since the beginning of the month, also obvious.  There's a moment in winter when the dullness just sets in, can I get an amen?  For me, the frump moment begins February 1.  I don't hate February.  Heck, I don't even hate winter, but there does come a time when in order to survive it, I prep for springtime.  Don't get me wrong, March is a teaser month, but at least it owns the official equinox date.

As I previously posted, I started an introductory interior design course back in January, and it ends mid-March.  I have learned a lot in the class.  For starters, I have learned that I don't want to be an interior designer, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.  To me, it's progress in the never ending process of figuring out what it is I'd like to do with my life (career-wise).  I have learned some really neat things in one of my favorite departments, practicality.  So while I won't be getting an MFA in interior design anytime soon, I can draft floor plans and design and/or change spaces based on principles of scale, proportion, color, etc.  How cool is that!  We all design the spaces where we live to fit our tastes, and a lot of the things I've learned in class will be very useful in my every day life. 

Since I'm not redoing a room in my apartment at this time, my final project will be to design a sewing/craft room.  I feel like this is every woman's dream, but I'm probably way off on my made-up statistic.  I'm thinking of that scene from Glee where Will Scheuster and his wife Terri are standing in her craft room and she says, (pointing to her glue gun while using an evil, I-want-to-be-a-mother-now tone) "It's not a bad thing, Will, to want a real life, AND A TO HAVE A GLUE GUN THAT WORKS!" I'm pretty sure Glee was making fun of craft rooms, but I kind of love that quote anyway.  If they were making fun of craft rooms, I don't care because I dream of the day when I don't have to pack the sewing machine up from the kitchen table every time I'm finished using it.  Sooooo, that's my final project in interior design, which leads me into my next creative venture.  All I'll say now is that it involves my prep-for-springtime motto being in full swing (literally) because I am currently sewing my very first skirt!  But I've said too much, more on that later!

9 to 5

Raise your hand if you love The Office.  I do!  It's my favorite television series, and well, sometimes I go on little Office marathon binges and I watch every episode all over again because I own every season on DVD.  In my daily life, I have little Office moments wherein something happens or someone says something that makes me think of an episode or quote from Agent Michael Scarn or the character I simultaneously love and hate, Dwight.  

One such moment happened to me a few weeks ago.  I volunteer at a local arts organization in town, and I was sitting in a meeting with people I did not know, and I would definitely be seeing them again.  There was one little problem:  I could not remember everyone's names.  I immediately set forth in my mind to think of a way to remember people's names sitting across the table from me, and that's when it happened.  Please read the below quote, and try to picture me in the meeting actively trying not to crack up.  Anybody remember this episode?

Michael Scott:  I don't know you.  But I need to know you in order to sell to you.  That is why I have asked you to go around and tell me your names.  I have an amazing mnemonic device by which I have no memorized all of your names.  [Pointing to people] Shirty, mole, lazy eye, Mexico, baldy, sugar boobs, black woman.  I have taken a unique part of who you are, and I have used that to memorize your name.  Baldy.  Your head is bald.  It is hairless.  It is shiny.  It is reflective, like a mirror.  M.  Your name is Mark.

Back to School

Tonight I'm starting an introductory interior design class.  I've got to be honest, though, I hate the first day of classes.  I get butterflies in my stomach, just like the time I went to my very first class in college (ENWR 110:  Music in Visual Media, MWF 10:00-10:50).  I mean, do we have to play those name games every time?  And why did my mind's bank of top dog interior designers just go blank?  Wish me success tonight, friends, even if it is being able to recall that I have an affinity for retail window displays and built in bookshelves.

Mostly Martha

Since mid-last week, I have been reading Martha Inc.:  The Incredible  Story of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia by Christopher Byron, and I'm over halfway finished with it.  In short, I have loved Martha Stewart my entire life, and it's kind of funny to me that I really don't know when I first became familiar with Martha.  I do remember watching   Some of my dearest and most hilarious memories are from my mom and I cooking together.  We would mock the Martha Stewart Show (and by mock, I mean try to be like it); I was Martha, and my mom was Julia Child (a guest on my show, no doubt), and we referred to each other as such until our dish was complete.  On one of my birthdays in college, I received a package from my brother that had a set of Martha Stewart stainless steel measuring cups in it; no other measuring apparati will do.

I'm sure you can imagine that some folks have been laughing a little at my reading Martha Inc., but I don't get it.  Why wouldn't I want to read about a woman who turned poaching pears, embroidering napkins and whipping up homemade bath fizzies among other "good things" into a billion dollar business?  I just wish I could have beaten her to the punch (I can hear the rest of you echoing the same sentiment)...And let's be honest, who doesn't love her signature aqua/turquoise color?

Last night, H. and I were in Wal*Mart buying batteries for a Wii controller, and we found ourselves standing in the impulse buy section (aka waiting in line). Then something wonderful happened.  I glanced over at the February 2011 issue of Martha Stewart Living magazine, and in the bottom right-hand corner read these words:  "How to Host a Crafternoon."  Sold.  I looked at H., pointed to the magazine and said, "That's why I'm reading Martha Inc.," and snatched it up. 

Dreams

Last night I dreamed that I was hunting in Antarctica and I got a polar bear.  There's no need to call PETA on me, but I remember feeling proud in the dream.  My dad's cousin has been working at the South Pole and sending "Penguin Reports" via email, so I suppose I have had the Pole on my mind.  Anyway, reading all about her adventures has been super interesting; although, there haven't been any polar bears in her writings.

I made a new dessert last night called "Duo Pots de Creme," which is a milk chocolate baked custard topped with semisweet chocolate ganache.  I ate one for breakfast today.

Something in me wants to make those marshmallows that I made before Christmas; they were heavenly. Here's an idea for a winter celebration (because, who doesn't want to celebrate something in the dead of winter?):  Hot Chocolate Bar!  The possibilities are endless:  homemade powdered hot cocoa mix  & marshmallows, peppermint sticks and/or Schnapps, Mexican seasonings, caramel syrup, cinnamon sticks, etc.  Hot Chocktails!  How long would it take me to get that trademarked?  Anybody want to come to mine? All I have to do is set a date...

 

You Can Keep Your Hat On

...because it's cold outside!  I finished my green hat and made a pom pom for the top of it, just in time for our predicted snow showers tonight.  As it turns out, you don't need one of those fancy-schmancy pom pom makers.  I made mine with my fingers, some yarn and a pair of scissors, and it turned out pretty good (for my first pom pom).  I fear that I've started an obsession.  Raise your hand if you love pom poms!!!

For All The Cows

Happy New Year everybody!  I thought I would kick off the new year by posting a picture of the most adorable stuffed animal on which I've ever laid my eye, besides my white cow Puffalump when I was a little girl (my friend Chels had the yellow duck Puffalump).  Did anyone else have a Puffalump?  I really hope that my mom still has her locked away in the attic because I want my little girl to have it one day.  After you've admired the Puffalump below, check out the adorableness that awaits thereafter. 

Via This Old Toy

 
Anthropologie presents Caroline Cow!

I am going to find a way to knit Caroline Cow for my children, or create a home for her on a shelf in my apartment.  In short, she is wonderful.  Before I saw Caroline Cow, I was planning to knit a stuffed teddy bear this spring, but in the project lineup, I am prioritizing the knitting of this stuffed cow, and I think I might color it like a Jersey because they're so sweet (but then again, I do like the cream and black, like a Holstein).  You can take a farm girl off the farm, but you can't take the love of cow out of the girl.