not even a cold could stop me...but maybe it should have

first i must confess that i have tons of things/thoughts floating in my head all day, but the minute i sit in front of a blank posting page it all seems to vanish...kind of like an etch-a-sketch that gets shaken right when you're finished with something and before you can show it off. not really sure if that even makes sense, but i just had to be honest and get that out there...i can blame writer's block for my blankness, except that i'm not a writer so it's more like blogger's block. 

anyway, yesterday was yucky, rainy most of the day and that never motivates me very well. i did work on the afghan, getting in my 4 required rows...even added a couple just cause i could! i pulled out an old cross stitch project to continue work on as well, but only added one color so i didn't spend much time on it. i think i spent more time trying to put it into the wooden frame/holder than actually working on it...i gave up on the frame when i couldn't get it to hold the fabric tight enough. 

the big crafty project of the day turned out to be a necklace that i had been meaning to work on for a few months. i had been watching a home show a while ago and really liked the necklace that the woman on it was wearing so i sketched it out with the intention of some day making it...yesterday turned out to be that someday. i foolishly thought that it would only take 20-30 minutes to work on it, not realizing that the chain i was using would be a complete pain in the ass to try to get straight! the wire wrapping of the pearls was easy enough, as was figuring out the spacing of the pearls...the hard part turned out to be getting the clasp attached. in the end it took nearly 2 hours to get it all done, but thankfully i'm so happy with how it turned out that it doesn't even matter that it took way longer than expected to make! in the end, it all worked out and that seems to be the way that things work out for me most times!

 

so, now that brings me to today...a day packed full of baking and cooking, with just a little bit of crafting thrown in and even a bit of cleaning! it's also a day when i really should have been resting since i have the lovely stuffed nose and itchy throat that signals a cold! but, i'm a stubborn person and therefore chose to bake a cheesecake, make red beans & rice, cornbread, crochet, sew, iron, vacuum, clean a bathroom and the kitchen, oh and also wash a load of laundry...after going to the grocery store of course. all in all a very non-relaxing, non-restful day and right around 8:30 tonight, when i finally sat down for more than 5 seconds, i was feeling the effects of the cold that i really hadn't felt all day since i wasn't stopping enough for it to all hit me (bit rambling, but i tend to get that way when i'm sick).

i had decided while grocery shopping, and feeling like garbage, that i would wait to make everything tomorrow and just rest today. yet, somewhere around 11am i decided that i really wasn't that sick and went to work on making the cheesecake...essentially changing my mind about not doing anything in the kitchen for the day. i used a weight watchers cookbook recipe for a lower fat version, that way i might not feel near as guilty if i eat half of the thing! crushing the graham crackers for the crust was certainly an adventure in patience for me...i tried them in the mini-chopper, crushing them by hand little bit by little bit, used a soup spoon in a bowl, and the back of a fork on a plate before remembering that i had seen some cooking show where they crushed the cookies (placed in a ziploc bag) with a rolling pin; that's the one that worked the best. with all the crackers crushed & pressed into the pan, i started getting everything else together, which was a very easy process and makes me very grateful for my stand mixer! grating lemon zest to add to the batter was the only thing that took some time. once everything was mixed, i poured the batter into the pan and stuck it in the oven for an hour to bake, then left it in the oven for another hour to cool before taking it out of the springform pan and putting it into the refridgerator to chill for about 5 hours before we had some for dessert. stephen and i were the only ones to try it, sharing a quarter of the cheesecake...he doesn't know that it's low fat and said it was very cheesy (which he liked), i thought the crust was skimpy, but i don't like a lot of crust anyway. all in all, it turned out really well, i will definitely use that recipe again, and i can't wait to have more tomorrow! 

 

as for dinner, well, that didn't turn out as well as i would have liked. i don't seem to be having much luck with making cajun style dishes, at least not when using the recipes in the joy of cooking cookbook...maybe if i tried a different cookbook things would be different. red beans and rice with cornbread was what i made tonight, nearly forgetting the rice though (i remembered when there was about 10 minutes left for the cornbread). the rice was the easiest part of the whole meal and i will never again make boil-in-the-bag rice since regular rice takes only a bit longer but comes out much nicer. (of course that's just my opinion!) the cornbread was also very easy, made from the better homes & garden cookbook, and it was the first time i ever made it in my cast iron skillet...i'm all about cornmuffins must of the time. i was very glad that it turned out well and came out of the pan very easily.

so now i'm on the hunt for a better red beans and rice recipe, as well as a good jambalaya one...that's kinda why i just glossed over the red beans side of the meal. tomorrow will be a day to rest though since i already know that i'm going to be feeling the sickness more! 

 

at least it looked good in the bowl! it tasted fine, i just need to make some adjustments if i plan on making that recipe again...it was still a bit too watery and really there were too many chopped vegetables for my taste. but i'm learning which is what matters in the end, right?!