PUNKIN

The time is here! Ever since October 1st this year, I think everyone has been a little more obsessed than usual...myself included.  I'm talking about it, you're talking about it, and Shit Girls Say is tweeting it. the Pun-King has arrived and its cozy spicy homey goodness has permeated even the places you'd least expect it to be...

lattes

cupcakes

cheesecake

spice

oatmeal squares

donuts

muffins

beer/ale

Pudding (alliteration!!)

bread

dog costumes

pies

pasta

trash....

found this poor little guy on our front porch the other day.

Smashed dreams of becoming a jack-o-lantern, the pumpkin is literally dying to get into my life. And who am I to deny it??

Pringles too, as my aunt put it, has "jumped the shark". 

So I'm just gonna leave this here..................

35 Pumpkin Recipes

oh and this:

Autumn-Themed Tumblrs

friday...the 13th

The day after I arrive home.
The day I wake up early from the hot sun shining in my room.
The day I forget where we keep our plates in the kitchen.
The day I fall asleep while watching Say Yes to the Dress.
The day I have no place to be.
The day I nap twice to recover from being up for 20 hours.
The day I put together a fountain.
The day I help ruin a cake.
The day I have wine with dinner out of a glass that isn't plastic.
The day I remember how much I love Target. And a lack of humidity.
The day I sit on a Starbucks patio.
The day that was so lovely I forget it was friday the 13th.

stuffed green peppers

We made these a while ago, but they were simple enough that I could actually help make them (I'm not the best cook) and take pictures simultaneously.  Not to be confused with Chile rellenos which is a similar, but altogether different dish.  Maybe I'm was the only one with that confusion...?  I guess I couldn't rid myself of the association of green peppers and Mexican good.  This is an Italian style dish, but you could definitely tweak the recipe if you wanted it a lil hot n spicy.

Stuffed Green Peppers:

(full recipe can be found here)

-4 large bell peppers

-1 lb ground beef

-2 tbs. chopped onion

-1 cup cooked rice

-1 tsp. salt

-1 clove garlic, finely chopped

-1 can tomato sauce

1. Remove top of each bell pepper and its' innards.

2. Cook em for a bit to crisp them up. 350 degrees.

3. Brown beef, drain, and stir in garlic, rice, and 1 cup of the tomato sauce. Cook until hot.

4. Stuff peppers with beef and rice, stand them upright in an ungreased glass baking dish.

5. Bake for 10 minutes covered, then 15 minutes uncovered.  Add cheese as desired.

Okay okay, I am going to update this so much more regularly!! So much so, we'll all get annoyed on this Blogger format and I'll have to transition to tumblr.  I've just been SO busy looking at beautiful views of Chicago in the summer.  

And i found this blog....the mojito smoothie?? Stop it.

ho hey—tuesday

Apparently, I have over-thought and spent way too much money on all my past birthday parties and get-togethers—this is clearly all you need for a good time: suspenders, flickering lights, a couple of banjos, and confetti.

summer of 01...?

One of the not so wonderful things about going to DePaul is being on the quarter system.  This means that instead of semesters, I have three ten week periods of classes during the year and then a summer break.  This also means that summer break comes around the second week of June—almost more than a month later than some of normal scheduled schools get out.

My friend Jackie is therefore at home, with nothing better to do than rifle through old pictures and sent this to me the other night:

Precious I know. Right now, I want nothing more than to have carefree, Girl Scout-activity-filled, goggle-wearing, rainbow-suit clad, running-through-all-sprinklers-in-sight, bucket-hat summers.  Let's hurry up and get this over with, finals.

up on the rooftop

It's finally above 50 degrees in Chicago! Which—besides breaking out the skirts, sunglasses, and summer shandies—means picnics of epic proportions.  Last night, we had a brief one on our rooftop deck. Cut short by the incoming rain, we enjoyed paninis, Coronas, and root beer floats.

Maybe we'll get a grill and some rope lights this summer to have a proper 500 Days of Summer rooftop bash. 

And maybe Joseph Gordon-Levitt will show up.

an ode to my mother

Happy Mother's Day!
[Okay, I legitimately thought this published on Sunday. So we're just having this be a little belated.]

A quick tribute to Karen, the woman that gave me life. Here are some of my favorite moments/memories with her:

1) The time I was sick and missed the premiere of Cheaper By the Dozen (the remake) with all of my friends.  Mom made me stay home but popped popcorn and rented the Lucille Ball version of the movie. (I would later discover this is the far superior version anyway).

2) The year she wore this for Halloween. To her work.

3) The year I had my birthday party on April Fool's Day and she made an Angel Food cake with cotton balls.  She laughed and videoed me as I unknowingly consumed several bites, trying to understand why everyone was laughing.

4) Every year after my birthday, we'd go on a shopping spree together with all my acquired birthday cash. I'm terribly indecisive—there's no way a full day of tween wardrobe shopping could have been fun for her.  But she always pretended to be excited—our tradition of California Pizza Kitchen probably played a large part in that...

5) The other day when I was texting her in Starbucks about a cute guy sitting at the table next to me:

She always knows what to say (or not say).

Thank you, mom. Love you.

cubs vs. cards

Earlier this week, I went to the Cardinals vs. Cubs baseball game.  And I found myself in a strange dilemma.  We all know I am not a very sporty person, but my family does love baseball.  (Hate on its' excruciatingly slow pace all you want, there is no stopping the "buy me some peanuts and crackerjacks" type of carefree attitude!)  I was born in St. Louis and know baseball well enough to realized the rivalry I was witnessing.  

So, who to root for?  Which team did I belong with?  It's typically a very obvious answer in accordance to where I am or who I'm with, but I had some sort of affiliation to both these teams.  It was not a strange sensation in not knowing who I wanted to cheer for more—I've been more than indifferent when it comes to sports situations before.  It was strange because I had a choice.  I was born in St. Louis.  I can take as much of that with me throughout my life.  Chicago is where I live now, but I tend to get very proud of the places I'm not in whenever I'm elsewhere, so something kept pulling me towards St. Louis.

I ended up wearing a green jacket and a purple scarf to the game—colors totally ambiguous to any fan associations.  

Forever indecisive,

--molly

I'm beginning my list of summer shopping must-haves! The maxi skirt (if I can find one long enough) will definitely be included.

I'm campaigning for a copy of this Denver print (by January Jones on Etsy) to go up somewhere in the apartment.

A list of the top ten DIY blogs—how I've been procrastinating this week.

BRUNCH

I'm sure it's clear to anyone that has passed by a restaurant serving brunch between the peak hours of 10am-2pm...aka the hungover rush or just-coming-back-from-church crowd...that people love brunch.  Perhaps the most blogged about meal, it seems that many—myself included—believe brunch to be THE best meal of any day.

The only problem I have with it is choosing to either go the sweet or salty route—do i pick apple cinnamon french toast or a breakfast burrito?  Red velvet pancakes (oh yes, that's a thing at Brunch) or the Denver omelette?

So when I went to Ann Sather Cafe off of Belmont with my high school theater teacher and her two lovely daughters (and friends of mine), my problems were solved.  I was able to order my go-to breakfast burrito AND get cinnamon rolls and fruit as sides.  (They had heard of the place based off only their reputation for great cinnamon rolls—a good sign, to begin with.)  A brunch dream, turned reality.

The only problem was, I was so enthralled to satisfy both my salty and sweet palettes, I didn't take any pictures.  I guess I'll have to go again...

The picture above is the aforementioned red velvet pancakes from Brunch.

I'm two decades old.

Hello!

It has been far too long since my last entry unto this website I call my blog.

Let's see...

We've had Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, Passover, whatever else you might have celebrated in the past two months, aaaaand my birthday! I am two decades old.  I can do nothing more than I could have at nineteen years of age, besides officially not be a teenager.

It's been truly a life-changing experience, being this old.  And to catch you up with all the monumental events that have happened since my last dinner I posted about, I'll quickly just synopsize the highlights:

1.  This year, I had more Valentines than ever—ALL of my roommates said yes to being my valentine!  That's right, while you couples were stuck with just one date, I had four willing candidates to watch Glee and eat chocolate we had bought for ourselves that night.



2.  I met the pianist of folk-esque band The Head and the Heart.  On my birthday weekend. Fate?  You betcha.  He may have closed his eyes in this picture that should have had a flash on, but I was too embarrassed to make him wait and take the picture again.  So that's how the picture looks.  It doesn't matter though because in my mind, he agreed to be my valentine for next year's V-Day when he agreed to take a picture with us.

3.  St. Patrick's Day was the warmest day of the year thus far making the multiple piles of throw up that I jumped over on the sidewalks that much more disgusting.  Like I said, life-changing.

4.  My ability to tan decreased if that's possible.  I went to Florida for Spring Break and got sun poisoning.  No, I didn't have the Panama City/MTV style Spring Break rager.  I went to Naples, Florida (aka retirement country) and got sun poisoning because my skin repels light.  Cute.

5.  I got a tumblr account which is a large part of the reason I have not posted in so long.  Who knew there were so many great outfits, beach scenes, and GIFs of Ryan Gosling I needed to reblog!  I am going to try and continue to keep both of them updated in order to spend way more time than necessary on the internet.  If you're interested in discovering just how much I love Ryan Gosling or Hunger Games memes, you can check out said tumblr here.

So now we're all caught up!  I hope to more consistently update this so everyone can know about my new life as a twenty year old.  Because I'm that much cooler.