Going Domestic

... a Picasso or a Garfunkel ...

I know that I've posted before about how a home feels more lived-in, like a home, once you've driven a few nails into the wall and hung up some pictures. In the last few months, Chris and I have picked up two paintings.  The one pictured here is a piece of aboriginal art that we bought in Australia (great tax rebate at the airport!).  It's supposed to depict a dream known as "Banana Bush".  We made at least a half-dozen visits to various art galleries in Sydney before buying this painting.  I like it because it looks like it's art - some of the paintings were kind of random and sloppy and made me wonder if gallery owners didn't just drop off art supplies to everyone in an outback community and pass off the results as aboriginal art *of note*.  Our other painting is "perfect mood for dancing" by Marina Mirnaia. This one hangs on our blue feature wall in the dining room, above the new sideboard.

Öops

Last week, I tackled the assembly of the Markor sideboard that we'd picked up on our last visit to Ikea. I usually really enjoy assembling Ikea furniture, which I've heard makes me weird.

It's the most complicated piece that I've ever tackled, but the frame went together pretty quickly.

Then one evening last week I noticed that I had put one piece in completely backward. See:

I was kind of bummed because I had to disassemble quite a bit what I've done to fix it, and taking off the that heavy top piece was awkward, to say the least.  But Chris lent me a hand, and I finished the sideboard assembly two days ago!  Empty dining room no more - yay!

Nothing sucks like an Electrolux ...

... that phrase has stuck in my head for years after taking a marketing class and learning that sometimes things get lost in translation.  Anyway, I'm on the hunt for a small dust-buster type of vacuum.  Not big, and preferably quiet, too, as Madeline has lately become freaked out by our full-size Hoover.  I feel bad that our budgie doesn't get much time outside of his cage but I don't want Madeline to end up with hands covered in birdie poo and birdseed shells, and I was thinking that a quick vacuum in the morning would do the trick and grant Edward some freedom.

I was at first thinking of checking out the Euro-Pro Shark.  From the Amazon reviews, i gather that it would be great on our hardwood (and suck up all of those annoying down feathers!), but I'm skeptical now because I'd want to use it on our area rug as well.  Boo. Must research.

I see a pattern emerging ...

So, our new front-loading washer was delivered ahead of schedule, on Tuesday. We received a call from Sears on Sunday afternoon, asking if it could be delivered early. That was fine, and I agreed to spend Tuesday afternoon at home, waiting for the delivery. The washer arrived on schedule, only the warehouse neglected to include the pedestal that we'd bought to go with it.  The pedestal was still supposed to arrive today, which was the original delivery date.  And to make up for the goof, the pedestal was going to be installed for us (Chris hooked up and leveled the washer himself).

The pedestal was delivered about an hour ago, and after all of the connections had been undone and the washer was tipped over, the installation guy realized that Sears had sent the wrong pedestal - it was incompatible with our washing machine.  So we're back to square one ... and I'm beginning to wonder about Sears after a bad experience at their portrait studio earlier this month ...

Needle in a Haystack

Last weekend, the three of us and two vehicles (one with the carseat, one with fold-down seats) trekked over to Ikea to pick up the Markor sideboard so that we actually would have some furniture in our dining room. "Out of Stock" read the label affixed to the floor model in the dining section. Blah. We filled up our shopping cart with other Swedish goodies, and resigned ourselves to checking the Ikea website every couple of days to see if the store here in Calgary had received any new stock.  Yesterday, the webite finally indicated that some new sideboards had arrived, so the three of us and the same two vehicles made a return visit.  This time, the floor model had a label that said "Aisle 7, Bin 26", so we headed over the warehouse.  Lo and behold, aisle 7, bin 26 was empty!  The staff at the customer service kiosk were certain that they should have had 16 sideboards, so they went off hunting for them, and found that they hadn't been put on the shelf yet.  Lucky us!  Now we just have to find the time to put the thing together - there are a lot of drawers to assemble!

The Truth About the Limes ...

On a whim last week, I sent an email to the author of the One Smart Cookie book, asking if her recipe is intended for regular limes or actual key limes, not really expecting a reply ... but I had one within a couple of hours!  We ended up exchanging a half dozen messages about limes and a couple of other topics - it was quite fun corresponding with her!  And it turns out that the recipe is indeed written for limes of the Persian variety ...

Dinner Notes

I've spent five birthdays with Chris in Calgary now.  The first one, 2001, we dined at the River Cafe.  It was freezing cold outside and since the restaurant is on an island, there was no close-by parking and we had to walk quite a bit to get there. We went to our fave Italian place, Da Paolo, for the second birthday. There was a huge blizzard that day and we were one of three filled tables in the restaurant.  Ironically, one of those was another birthday celebration.  The third birthday we celebrated at La Chaumiere; and amazingly, there was another blizzard, and very few other diners. One family, one May-December romance couple who were into public displays of affection, and a bunch of obnoxious businessmen dining on someone's expense account. For Birthday 4, we returned to Da Paolo, rightly thinking that we'd better get one more lovely meal of their specialty pasta in before M was born, because who knew when we'd return.  Oddly enough, the weather was fine that time. This year, we enjoyed a casual dinner at home, catered by Glory of India, the finest Indian restaurant in Calgary.  And Chris and Madeline managed to score a Diablo Cake from the Brulee Patisserie, so my birthday ended on a perfect note.

my fabric, my enemy

Last week, I decided that it was high time to start sewing the crib skirt to finish off Madeline's room.  I had bought a bunch of turquoise taffeta at $3/metre for it. The fabric was a lot softer and kindly wrinkly after the laundering.  Maybe it was the wrinkliness or just the fact that I've never worked with a slippery fabric before, but I managed to mangle the cutting job.  And this was with using my cutting mat, rotary trimmer, and a t-square to cut out the rectangular panels. Blah. I have enough taffeta left to re-cut everything.  I ironed the fabric this time in the hopes that smoother fabric will help me produce straighter lines.

I also have unearthed a couple of place to order fun fabric from in Canada, like flannel and faux-leather, over the internet.  Wazoodle even has a diapershop section!  Davey Fabrics looks a little business-like.

Suds, but not the beer kind ...

The new washing machine is schedule to arrive on March 18.  We were very tempted to get a cool European washer from Asko or Samsung - they are tiny, ultra energy- and water-efficient, and seem to heat the wash water internally instead of drawing from one's household hotwater tank.  Two problems - we were doubtful that we'd be able to get one of those serviced if we had a problem and lived elsewhere, say, Newfoundland. Second problem is that they're a lot of money. So we took advantage of the scratch and save promotion at Sears this past weekend and got ourselves a medium-capacity Kenmore front-loader.

I know that a few companies, like Tide, make special "high efficiency" detergent for front-load washing machines.  Apparently, they don't produce as much suds in the wash compared to regular detergent.  Problem that I now have to solve is what to use to wash the baby laundry in - I've been using an unfragranced detergent on all of Madeline's clothes, bedding, and diapers, and really want to continue to do so. But I haven't yet found an unscented high efficiency detergent!  Perhaps I'll just start using a bit of baking soda and vinegar instead ...

Blimey!

I am planning on making a batch of key lime squares today, from the One Smart Cookie cookbook.  One of the things that has been baffling me about the recipe is that it doesn't specify whether it intends for the recipe to be made with key limes or regular limes. I would assume key limes (and that's what I bought), but the ingredient list has the item "zest of two limes" and since a key lime is about the size of a shallot, that wouldn't amount to very much.  Blah. I will be improvising with this one ...

Update 03/01/05: I suspect that the lime square recipe actually calls for regular limes, not key limes (what a misnomer!) as I used key limes, and even with the juice and rind of sixteen of them, the squares are not very limey.