A Goodbye Gift

It's hard to let Sarah go back to school. Having a nanny was a short-lived luxury. (She bought me presents just because-better than a husband!) It's probably good that we're putting Eleanor in daycare prior to any possibly shy-around-strangers stage as it will make the transition easier on her and definitely easier on me, but it doesn't make me any less sad to say goodbye to Sarah. As a thank you/we love you gift, I made Sarah a locket with Eleanor's picture.

I've had these lockets in my stash but have always been stumped about how to make them feel less unfinished. I'm not sure what they were manufactured to have in those ovals, but a jewel or fitted insert would be hard to track down in the right size if I even wanted to go that route.
However, the other day I was struck by the thought of faux enameling it with a bit of nail polish. A couple of drops and a careful spread to make sure it reaches all the sides and then all I had to do was wait until it dried thoroughly. The best part is that it's pretty easy to wipe it down and start over if I make a mistake. I love how it turned out!

New Fruits

We took Sarah up to Devon Avenue the other night for some Indian food. After dinner, we walked around so she could get a feel for Chicago's version of India (not all that far off, really), and stopped at a few of the grocery stores up there that we like. I found SIX new fruits that I haven't tried yet, so we had ourselves a strange fruit tasting last night.

From the top middle, winter melon, a Forelle pear out of South Africa, guava, jack fruit, dosakai, and a burro banana.

The dosakai tasted like a tangy cucumber (almost pickle-like), the winter melon was the blandest melon I've ever had, and the jack fruit was everyone's favorite and truly almost the weirdest fruit I've had yet. Its deep yellow fruit had the consistency of meat, but its flavor was somewhat like a mango. The guava was lightly fruity, but the hard seeds were difficult to get used to, the pear was very nice with a good flavor and firmness, and the banana was terrible! I decided to pan fry it so it really ended up just tasting like french fries. Looking it up later, I should have let it ripen because it's supposed to be a very lemony banana flavor. I think I'm going to have retry this one with a ripe one.

Also, as I typed this, I had a tasty plumcot that I just picked up from Trader Joe's for breakfast.

Photo Journal: Fountain Square, Indy

Nathan had a bachelor party in Indianapolis this weekend, so we took a quick trip down. While there, we discovered an upcoming part of downtown that I fell in love with. I can definitely imagine living in Fountain Square and having more happy breakfasts at Peppy's.

Just a Minute: July 2013

I've been back at work for a month now. I'm enjoying being back for the most part, but coming up with a work/home life balance is next to impossible. I suspect that if you ever hear someone say they've got it down, then it's probably the husband of a woman going to bed at midnight each night, getting up at the crack of dawn, and eating the crackers she found at the bottom of her purse for lunch.

reading...Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel. I thought it was great (many others did too, as it won a host of prestigious awards like the Man Booker Prize). It spans the period during Henry VIII's reign where he was married to Ann Boleyn, "the Great Pretender," and then looking to Thomas Cromwell to arrange a way out of the marriage so he can marry Jane Seymour. I really enjoyed Cromwell as the narrator, a man who is normally portrayed as a bad guy. Here he was very likable (apparently he's even more likable in the first book in the series, Wolf Hall, which I didn't read first). I haven't read Wolf Hall yet, but didn't need to for this book to be good.

listening...My current favorite song, Walking Blind by Aiden Hawken, has been running nonstop through my head this week.

Photo by Melissa Mai, friend of bride and wedding DJ

celebrating...I have a new Brother-in-Law! As of last weekend, my sister-in-law, Jenny, married her new hubby, Brandon, in a lovely and very personal outdoor wedding ceremony at a winery in Michigan. Among the items on the registry, the couple requested a kit of 20 essential Nintendo accessories in their wedding accent color (purple).

Photo by Ben Dearnley, Taste.com

cooking…I've been planning to make a Apricot Crostata for a couple weeks now. It's going to happen this week for sure though. Love the crostata because I don't have to have a pretty crust edge. I can rock the rustic look.