MichaelBubleChristmas

Currently listening to Michael Buble, enjoying the christmas songs he sings, and giggling at my silly little Ursula. She's so curious when she gets out of her cage. I think I made the right choice in getting a little bunny friend <3

My child tax got back paid today, so I went out to WalMart to get some things I needed for the house, and to splurge on some Christmas decorations as a treat. I bought a medium sized pre lit christmas tree with fake snow on it. It's so pretty =] After some wicked fluffing lol goddamn was it ugly when I first took it out. Boo picked out purple glittery christmas ornaments (shatterproof thank jebus). I also got disney princess wrapping paper, yayyy =D

Actually found some boots at WalMart that I really liked, when i've been turning my nose up at every other pair i've seen otherwise, expensive or no. They must run large in sizes though, so i'll have to exchange for a 9 tomorrow. Also taking back some icicle lights that looked purely stupid, and exchanging the baby gate I got, since I didn't want one that would bolt into the wall, I don't own my home damnit =/ And I may or may not have impulse-bought a popcorn machine that looks so cool >.> But i'm regretting it, so I'll return that too. I did get proper curtains for the living room, a blender, and 2 bar stools for my island. It must be freakishly high though, because the stools are just a bit short at their highest setting. I think they're just tall enough for me, but you can't rest your elbows on the counter. Which is best anways according to etiquette, no?

I decided to order pizza today to treat myself for how much work i'd done putting the house together, and they take an hour and a half to deliver me a pizza sans the toppings I ordered. And the wrong drink. Ugh, sometimes I wish I was more of a complainer. Whatever though. Things happen, I suppose. I asked the landlord if I could rent the extra bedroom for Avaline, since I have enough money for renting it for December and January, and I should have rental subsidy in place for February. Hopefully, but we'll see.

My big meal for the last couple days was an old family recipe for Swedish Meatballs, and my favourite garlic mashed potatoes. Now if you were to look up other recipes for Swedish Meatballs, you'll get an odd assortment of meatballs that are nothing like this recipe. These are sweet and sour and savoury all at once, so mouth watering. I can't make them like my mother, but anyone who has mine still drools. Here is the gist of the recipe for the meatballs and the garlic potatoes.


Swedish Meatballs:
In a bowl, mix desired amount of ground beef (in my case turkey) with 1 egg and breadcrumbs (I also added some quick cooking oats). Don't be afraid to mash this all with your fingers, have fun! Once mixed well, take handfuls (your choice how big you want your balls to be ;) ) of the mixture and form the meatballs. Throw them between your hands a bit, and roll to form them better. Next you'll want to brown these a bit in a frying pan (i'd say medium heat), you can choose to use a tablespoon of oil or not, whether you're concerned about calories. Ground turkey is pretty juicy though.

While the balls are browning (oh this recipe is too fun to describe lol), you're going to make the sauce. In a medium sized bowl, add 1 cup of ketchup, 2-3 tablespoons of Worcesteshire sauce, 1/4 cup of vinegar, and 1/3 cup of brown sugar. Mix this all up nice and well, the brown sugar will try to settle. Throw the balls into the sauce and get them nice and saturated in it. Then you can pour the mixture into an ungreased glass baking pan (or corningware, etc.) that isn't very deep.

Bake the meatballs at 375 degrees for 40-60 minutes (depends on the size of your balls, so make sure you check them. The sauce will saturate the centers so don't depend on colour, go by consistency. Moist and squishy, put it back in missy! Drier and crumbly, just right for the tumbly!) I would roll them around every 2 minutes just to ensure the sauce gets all over everything.


Garlic Mashed Potatoes:
This recipe can be highly dependant on your ingredients and your preferences, as well as how many people you're serving. I was just cooking for myself, but I LOVE garlic.
For this, you can use either garlic salt, garlic powder, or my favourite REAL CLOVES! If you're using a garlic substitute, you know how to make mashed potatoes, just add the garlic powder/salt to the potatoes before you mash.
For the garlic clove potatoes! Peel and cut up the desired amount of potatoes and add them to a large pot to boil. A decent rule of thumb if you're not a garlic fanatic is 1-2 cloves of garlic per potato/person, but I used 4 cloves for 1 potato hahaha. Anyways, peel your cloves, crush them, and cut them into pretty small pieces. Don't quite mince them unless you don't want them in your mash, and you just want the flavour they'll bring from boiling with your taters. Add them to the pot, boil until the potatoes can be cut with a fork, and drain. I like my garlic in my mash, so I throw it into a big mixing bowl, add a gross lump of butter and a decent splash of milk, and mix it all with my beaters. Add salt and voila! Garlic mashed potatoes that will make any man yours ;D haha not really but I haven't met someone who hasn't gone gaga for these yet.


Anyways lovelies I'm off to bed now. Back to WalMart tomorrow to correct my mistakes in shopping haha and to pick up a couple things I forgot. I keep getting more vitamins, and they almost don't fit into my cute little pink pill case anymore! D= I just need vitamin E though, and I think they're pretty small.
All of you have a fabulous night, may your dreams be filled with glitter and garlic ^.^ Wait, garlic? YES haha.

FridayTea

Let's have a moment of silence to lend support to the recovery of my beloved iPhone.
WHO FELL IN THE MOTHER EFFING TOILET OH MY EFFFFF HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN.
Currently iPhone is laying in a bed of rice, while I fervently wish for it's speedy and miraculous recovery.
This means no Instagram D= I am a little bit too interested in that app. Probably the thing I update most. Really, if you're interested in what's going on in my life, you'll get the most answers from Instagram.

So, it's a Friday morning, I threw my tea at my laptop because Fridays with PewDiePie still managed to have a damn jumpscare, and I am blogging because Boo is with her daddy. Probably going to watch the Little Mermaid later because I not-so-secretly have always wanted to be her. (Legitimately had a mermaid obsession for years.) Wah. If only I could be a Disney princess.
I should also clean up, considering when my mom was visiting the other day from Langley, she cleaned my entire house while I was at a movie with Vicky. (We saw Silent Hill Revelations. If you enjoy the games, you won't like the movie much. I can only relate it to what happened to Saw; The first movie was done fantastically, had an epic story line, made you think, just enough gore to horrify you a bit. Then the next ones were a mindless gore fest. Same thing here apparently.)

While momma was down she tried to get everything I needed to do done. Although I couldn't go for my tests because apparently I have to fast for 10 hours before them, and I have to eat shortly after waking or I get sick. Ew. Blood tests.
But she did take me to order a replacement birth certificate for Boo, so when that comes in 10 days I can apply for rental subsidy. I lost my second job, so things are really tight and i'm relying on all the familial help I can get, which totally feels shitty. As well, child tax should be coming in again this month, as I filed my taxes 2 months or more ago (I know, very late), and I received a letter end of last month saying I owed THEM 189 dollars or something. So much confuse. But it should just be taken out of my payback for not having child tax for a couple months. Not uber concerned, so long as I get it end of this month I can stop feeling so stressed. If I don't, at least I am making the exact amount to cover rent.
She also tried to help me get a green bin to recycle food waste. I agree with recycling, it's smart, but generally I won't go out of my own way to get it started myself. The city only allows one regular can of garbage to be picked up every two weeks though, and I accumulate far more than that. So I need to start splitting up my waste. The landlord was delivered one in October of 2011, but the last tenant must have taken it, so he told me to get another and take it off my rent. I also wanted a recycling bin, but you can't get them apparently. You just need to ask the garbage men for the bags. Which is silly. I did see plenty of garbage cans with the recycling bags taped to them though, so I may just get a smaller can and do the same. May as well help the environment, and myself.

I'm going to try and do two regular segments on YouTube from now on, and one random video a week (or at least every two weeks) that is beauty related. I want to share things I am passionate about and that I have experience in. So I'm going to restart my idea that I'd called the BodyMods Chronicles, which basically goes into detail explaining everything you could ask about a piercing, in under 10 minutes. I also decided that since whenever I feel like vlogging, I am in pajamas and look haggard lol, i'm going to initiate No Makeup Mondays, and that will be my vlogging day. I'll rock the jim jams, bedhead, and bare face. Most beauty gurus never show their naked face, and I think that's a little silly. Maybe because i'm a mom and have other things going on, so when i'm not going out or working, I don't want to put makeup on only to have to take it off. Besides, at the end of the day you have to take your makeup off, and you'll always look the same underneath.

I'll also try to share recipes and things i'm trying on this blog, and maybe i'll do the occasional Cooking With Barbie videos. I'm hoping to get a nice camera for Christmas, something just to take HD videos and photos for my makeup work, and YouTube of course. I'm considering doing a Reading With Barbie segment, where I start a new book every two weeks, and you can choose to read along with me or not. I'll start it by reading the first chapter aloud for my lovelies, as well as the blurb, and my anticipations for the book. At the end of the two weeks, I will read the last chapter aloud and share my impressions and opinion of the book. We'll see about that, but i'd love to include all of my favourite activities on my channel.

Here's hoping!