LAZY DAYS IN THE KITCHEN

I tried to write this post yesterday but my pictures stopped uploading halfway.  Now today, of course, it has fixed itself.  But...the pictures are a bit out of order so if I sound more scattered than usual, you know why.  I spent the day in the kitchen, it was so rainy and gloomy out, yet I was restless to do something a little fun and creative.  I made French toast with fruit for breakfast, soup for lunch and then tried my hand at these pretty cupcakes. 

I just caught the end of Giada's cooking show last week as she was finishing up these cupcakes.  They looked so perfect for Valentine's Day.  I used a simple vanilla cake recipe and the filling is whipped cream with raspberries folded in.  Take the wrapper off the cupcake, cut the top off and put a generous amount of filling on the bottom half.  Replace the top and sprinkle powdered sugar over.  Ta Da!  Very easy and so pretty!

After breakfast, lunch and baking, I finally jumped in the shower and put on clean pajamas.  Yep, just switched out the old for new!  We had a simple dinner of chicken Caesar salad and then Abby and I watched the Grammy's together.  Isn't that show like the best concert ever?  I love watching the red carpet arrivals, too.  The dresses, the hair styles, wondering how they walk in those sky high heels!  It was a nice cozy day spent entirely inside.

I have some fabrics I have been looking through, I mentioned I am having the two chairs in my living room reupholstered.  I would love to have them covered in simple cream colored fabric as the room is small, but since we use it so much and we have dogs, I am leaning toward this ticking stripe, which keeps it somewhat neutral but doesn't show dirt or doggie hair!  This is the thin stripe...

...and this is a bit thicker.  The colors are the same, it's just the photos that make them look different.

This is my floral sofa that I am trying to coordinate them with.  I'm trying to play off the blue in the flowers.  The chairs as they are now are a dusty rose with mossy green accents.  I am SO over those colors.  So, here is the thicker stripe...

...and then again the thin one.  Horrible pictures, it was so dreary out and I couldn't find the best setting on my camera for these without natural sunlight.  So, let's have your vote.  I truly love them both.  The thin stripe has a more concentrated color and the thicker one seems to accent the pattern more.  Very different looks.

This is where my pictures got out of order.  I found the vanilla cupcake recipe in this book.  I bought this for Emily when she was a teen and first started baking, but I find it comes in very handy for me!  To be totally truthful, I wasn't crazy about the flavor of the cupcakes and would definitely try another recipe next time.  I have a few more valentiney recipes I'm trying this week, so stay with me.  

Other breaking news in the kitchen...I am doing so~so with following my weekly dinner menu book. It started out great, I loved knowing what to make ahead of time and we are promptly at six which The Husband loved.  We got a little messed up when we spent most of Friday downtown and decided to have an early dinner at a Chinese restaurant.   I didn't feel bad about the "eating out" part (which the menu is supposed to eliminate) because we had a gift certificate,  I just need to shift that meal to another night next week.  But then we ate leftovers Saturday night and last night after having French toast for breakfast, no one felt like having the planned BLT's for dinner, so I swapped it for the salad.  I guess all of this is okay, I'm not totally rigid but I really thought we'd all benefit by sticking to a plan.  And you know, once you start to deviate from a plan, things can go awry.  On that note, I enticed The Husband to go to my dermatologist appointment with me by telling him we could have dinner at Mimi's Cafe across the street and he went for it! lol!  So, I'm swapping out the planned dinner for one with good company.  Have to love that! :)  See you soon!