I Need This

I love making lists...well actually I just love checking off lists. I even write, "write list" on my list so I can check it off. I'm weird. Imagine my delight when I came across this adorable mug on emmy lu's blog.

i know, its kinda old...

...and most of you reading this are used to only Caitlin posting here, but...check this out.

I love this

I love this also

another photo of her books

Very Excited

I have been searching for a way to organize my recipes other than folders and binders for a long time. I found this cute set on Etsy and now I'm waiting for my custom order to be done. If you'd like one of your own, visit Gifts and Talents shop at Etsy.

New Hobby

I have a habit of moving from hobby to hobby. First it was cardmaking, then scrapbooking, then knitting, then quilting, then digital scrapbooking, then calligraphy. Well now I have a new hobby to add to the list: bookmaking. My friend Jenny taught me how to do this. I made two journals this weekend. Aren't they cute?

Thanks Mom and Dad

They sent me these beautiful flowers today. They are from Petals a Florist in Buckhead.

Surgery Update

I tried to post an update yesterday, but after I started typing I realized two things: 1) I had way too much vicodin, versed, and dilaudid in my system to make a cohesive statement, and 2) everytime I sat up too long it made me want to throw up. Hence I'm doing better today because I'm able to type this. I'm still in too much pain to try and go to work though. So here's the rundown of my surgery, mostly praises because I was terrified of a few things:

• getting my IV. I'm not afraid of needles in the least bit (come on I had a bone marrow biopsy without any sedation, I can take an IV) but I'm notoriously hard to stick and it makes me feel bad when people can't get IVs started. Mainly because as a nurse you feel like an idiot anytime you miss anybody's veins, regardless of how hard they are. But no problems, my nurse got in in on the first try.
• going to sleep. This was where I thought I was going to freak out. There is a loss of control when you are put to sleep for surgery and I've been in plenty of surgeries where things get a little hairy and the patient never finds out. I was replaying all my terrifying surgical cases. But no problems, they gave me some versed before they wheeled me to the operating room and I hardly remember it.
• waking up in pain and being nauseated. I did wake up with some pain, but the nurses were quite on top of that. I was too asleep to ask what they were giving me, but they put something nice in my IV that made me all warm all over and stopped the pain. For the FBC nurses: I found out later it was dilaudid. Tell Dr. Frank that I liked it and I'm sorry he's allergic to it. But no nausea, Yayyyy!!

The surgery only last about 20 or 30 minutes, but I have a nice incision in my armpit that's about 4 inches long. I spent yesterday on the couch sleeping. I thought at 10pm last night that trying to eat something other than saltines or 7-up was a good idea. BAD idea, it gone thrown up rather quickly. So here I am, waiting for my ibuprophen to kick in and toying with the idea of taking another vicodin without any food in me because I'm scared to eat anything. We'll see. Hopefully we'll get the pathology reports back early next week and we can have this whole ordeal behind us. Thanks for all the prayers.

Surgery Tomorrow

It's sort of a long story, I know. I told you that I wasn't going to see the oncologist for 6 weeks and decide on surgery. Well, I changed my mind. I decided we might as well have the lymph node removed and tested now rather than later. Mainly because it just seems pointless to drag this out any longer. So tomorrow I will have surgery at 1030am at Piedmont Outpatient Surgery Center. The surgeon said I could go back to work on Friday, so it doesn't seem like it's going to be such a big deal.

My husband's becoming a southerner

you know this when he requests banana pudding for dessert.

My favorite ingredient

I spent the day baking and thanks to my wonderful hubby was able to use my favorite ingredient. vanilla from the Caribbean. He picked me up some when he went on his cruise in February. This stuff is amazing.

Have you ever had an UGLI fruit?

Neither had we, but I found one at the grocery store today and wanted to try it. It's a fruit from Jamaica and it takes alot like an orange.

The Answer

Thanks Abs for reminding me I didn't actually tell you how to cool melted butter. The chef from chefslink just said to cool for about 4-5 minutes. I don't get break into the cake until tomorrow, but it looks very yummy.

New Discovery

Have you ever been right in the middle of cooking dinner and reached a part in a recipe that stumped you? Well, maybe that's never happened to you, but as somebody who rarely reads recipes before she starts them, I have. I know, I know I really just need to start reading recipes in their entirety before starting, but I don't. Part of this is because I do consider myself to be fairly well versed in the cooking and baking area, but occasionally I find that I haven't watched enough Alton Brown or Giada DeLaurentiis to be ready to handle all situations in the kitchen. Hence my dilemma today when baking a lemon cornmeal cake and it said to add melted butter, cooled. Now doesn't that mean the butter will just get hard again? Here's the answer to my cooking dilemmas: chefsline. They are staffed by chefs that answer questions, how great is that!!! Now my lemon cornmeal cake is baking away nicely in the oven and the yummy lemon glaze is waiting to be spread over it.

Just Finished

Okay, so here's the deal with this book. My friend Regan said I just had to read it that it was amazing, and then someone told me it was hard to get into. That did it for me, I do not read books that are hard to get into. I give up very quickly if I'm not sucked into the book in the first few chapters. After much convincing from Regan I started it...and finished it in about 5 days. Yes, Regan you beat me...she read it in 1. Well I must say that this book is very good. I just have two suggestions. 1) have a conversation with someone whose read the book once you've read the first 10 or so pages, it helps to get a grasp what's going on. 2) catch up on Lost, since the whole time traveling thing is sort of similar. If you think about it that way it helps to understand.

Day Off...Oncologist, Bodies, Food and More

Both Chris and I had the day off together, which is pretty amazing considering we didn't plan it that way. Our morning started off with a follow up appointment to Atlanta Hematology and Oncology Associates where we met up with Dr. Jonas. I had a few more vials of blood taken and another look at the lymph node in my armpit. It's unfortunately still unchanged, however he's encouraged because we probably have a reason because of the diagnosis of mono. He gave me the option of having surgery right now to get it out and test it, but he also thinks it's reasonable to watch it for another 6 weeks. So for now we wait and return in 6 weeks, if it's still there we're heading to the operating room. After that trip we ran a few errands and then went to The Silver Skillet for breakfast. The Silver Skillet is a total dive that's been in Atlanta forever. Because the diner is so old they've used it for tons of movies. Then we went and saw the Bodies Exhibit. It was incredible. The tickets were spendy, so we were excited last week when we got a buy one get one free admission in the mail. After the Bodies Exhibit we did a little window shopping...by the way H&M is my new favorite store. A few more errands and we ended our day at Jake's Ice Cream, a crazy ice cream shop in the Inman Park neighborhood which is in an antique store. And today we're finishing our day with Figo Pasta while we watch Lost.