Crafty Craftiness and Flash Photography

I just got done working (slowly) on a homemade craft table for Charlene. To be honest, it's kind of a gift to make up for a birthday present two years ago that I started but never finished... but that's a different story. The craft table has shelves for supports, a BIG work space for cutting and working with large pieces of fabric, as Charlene is prone to do. Charlene is always working on something big it seems. It even has a shelf with dimensions that make it perfect for holding 5-6 bolts of fabric. It has white/cream insides and natural wood on the outsides with a lacquer finish. My thought behind the project is if you know that someone is productive or good at something, then you should help them to be more productive. Charlene is so crafty and creative - I think she deserves all of the best tools and a big work area, which she now has! We just got done moving her stuff from the basement to our old roommate's room and turned it into a craft room/sewing room.

The question is, am I being a nice husband - or am I just trying to get all 200 of her half finished projects out of the rest of the house?!?!?!

On another note...

I was trying to take a picture of Charlene next to her new craft table and we spent an obscene amount of time trying to take a picture with her eyes open. Seriously Char? Charlene is talented at many things, but when it comes to controlling her own eyelids in the presence of flash photography there is only one word that comes to mind: Failure. Here are just a few of those pictures put into a montage for your viewing pleasure. btw the picture up top had to be taken WITHOUT flash in order for her to leave for work on time... hopeless...

Storm

So, we had a pretty significant storm roll through our area. Here are some pictures of the damage that was caused by trees falling over on our neighbor's stuff. Luckily, we seemed to be the only house on our block with large trees that hadn't fallen over. This picture is of our neighbor's house two houses south of us. It seemed that every tree in their yard had fallen over except one, and two of them had fallen onto their house. They also had their phone lines ripped out of their house from the trees falling on them.

This is just the top third of a very large pine tree (large by ND standards) that had snapped off and fallen onto some guys car across the street from us. It broke out all of his back windows and had flattened the roof of the back half of the car. By the time I had taken this picture, they had taken the very top off of the car already.
This is our front yard. Just a lot of smaller branches all over the place. I've been hearing of trees and power lines down all over Fargo. Good thing we are still safe!

Pizza Delivery Special Instructions...

What are these drawings you may ask?

It's a wizard of course...

Why is there a wizard drawn on our pizza box? I'll tell you why.

So Charlene and I had Trent and his fiance over for a board game (Smallworld in case you were wondering) and they wanted to order some pizza from Papa John's. So we ordered online and there was a section for special instructions. We decided to put "Draw a wizard on the box." So this is what we got. This made my week. Best Papa John's employee ever.

Pizza and an Update

Delicious!

We took these pictures a month or so ago but haven't gotten around to update until now!

We are VERY busy!

Charlene got a promotion at Sylvan and is now the Lead Teacher so she works all day getting things ready for students to arrive and then teaches until everyone goes home. The responsibility came with a raise! Yay! She'll still try for a "real" teaching position this fall but it isn't looking likely.

Luke is leaving Subway for Ruby Tuesdays. He has to work on memorizing a new and larger menu!

He's also busy as a full time student.

The chemistry crayon business has slowed but we're working on figuring out advertising and how that can improve business.

Fargo is very very very cold.

But the Sabins are doing great! Busy but great!

Granola Hippie Alert!

Charlene and I made some more awesome food tonight that we thought we would share with everyone! These are some suuuper healthy tacos made with some... unconventional ingredients that turned out to be absolutely DELICIOUS. It feels good to pig out on yummy food and know that everything you just put in your stomach is going to nourish your body and make you feel GREAT. Everything in this recipe is vegan, and best of all, RAW! Charlene and I have been reading a lot about nutrition lately and we've come to side with the idea that food is much healthier in its raw state (assuming it's organic, fresh, clean, and plant based) - lot's of scientific evidence behind all of that, but it's still a relatively small and new-ish (or very old) idea/movement. BTW, the tortillas are not raw but as soon as we get the new dehydrator that we ordered in the mail recently, which has a larger area for dehydrating things that need more space, we will be able to make raw tortillas - which we are super excited about.

On the left is a rice like recipe made mostly of root plants like parsnip and daikon, on the right is a bean like mixture made mostly of soaked seeds and sun-dried tomatoes.

"Rice"
2 med parsnips (peeled and coarsely copped - about 2 cups)
1 cup coarsely chopped daikon (long white radish thing)
1/2 cup untoasted pine nuts
1/2 cup fresh chopped cilantro
1/2 cup chopped parsley (we used dried and it still worked out! about 2 tablespoons)
3 teaspoons lemon juice (fresh squeezed is best!)
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
- place parsnips, daikon, and nuts in a food processor and pulse until the mixture resembles rice-like coarse crumbs
- transfer mixture to medium bowl and add the rest of the "rice" ingredients and mix
- EAT!

"Beans"
1 cup sunflower seeds
4 cups cool water
1 cup sun dried tomatoes
1 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon chili pepper flakes
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
- place the sunflower seeds in 2 cups water and let soak for 4 hours. Drain and rinse and set aside.
- place the sun dried tomatoes in 2 cups of water and let soak for 1 hour - reserve the soaking water, drain the tomatoes and set aside
- place the seeds and tomatoes in a food processor and pulse until well blended, but still chunky
- transfer mixture to large bowl and add the rest of the "bean" ingredients and stir until combined
- EAT!
This is, essentially, a taco "meat" substitute made of ground walnut, seasonings, and mushrooms.

The Taco Meat

• 1 Portabella mushroom cap, rinsed and chopped medium-fine (nearly 2 cups finished)
• 1/2 cup raw walnuts, chopped (not too fine… leave some texture)
• 1 clove garlic
• 1 tablespoon cold-pressed olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon raw apple cider vinegar (ACV)
• 1 tablespoon raw cacao powder
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon raw cane sugar (rapadura) or some other raw sweetener
• squirt fresh lemon juice (about 1/4 teaspoon)
• quality natural salt & fresh pepper to taste
  

Mix all ingredients well and check for taste. Should not be under-salted.

Spread on dehydrator sheet and put into the dehydrator on “almost high” — no worries, you’re not cooking it. It’s only coming to roomish-temperature while you fix the remaining ingredients, then it’s coming out. You could also put on plate and stick in the oven on “warm”, just to the point of releasing some of the mushroom’s moisture so they darken a bit.

For our accompanying beverage we made homemade lemonade. We make juice often with a citrus juicer. Orange juice fresh squeezed from good organic oranges tastes 20 times better than any store bought orange juice - and best of all, if you squeeze it yourself you have the joy of knowing it wasn't pasteurized, which, though it makes it safer for keeping on a shelf longer, burns out much of the flavor, delicate vitamins, and enzymes.

flight cancelled....

So, we were going to head to to SLC this evening.....but our flight was CANCELED due to the left engine's de-icer breaking and the parts to fix it were in Minneapolis and they thought they might stick them on a plane into Fargo to get them there later and fix it and the flight would only be delayed a few hours.....but the weather in Mnpls was HORRIBLE so that didn't happen and there were no other flights leaving Fargo at all after "ours" so......we're flying out so SLC early Monday morning and they bumped us up to FIRST CLASS!!! wOOt! So.....we'll see you Sabins on Monday at 7:45 AM!

2 things

a) Follow our business blog! http://queinteresante2010.blogspot.com

b) You no longer need an Etsy account to purchase Chemistry Crayon Labels. We have a website up and running. Check out Luke's design work and Char's html coding skilz! http://chemistrycrayons.com