it was kind of cool seeing the ceilings stripped to the joists. even with the EASILY AUDIBLE sounds of the mice nattering away in the attic/crawl space, it made the whole place seem cleaner. stripping away the gunk meant that we could start over and do it right. from scratch.
last night for dinner i made us an AMAZING SALAD. i'm going to post the recipe at the end of this entry. so good! instead of a dressing you used pickled mixed vegetables (sold as giardiniera) pureed with some of the pickling liquid and olive oil. so good! T from work recently made some pickled eggplant and she gave me one of her precious 12 jars. so tasty. she gives them a brief boil in the pickling liquid and then sets them out to dry for a couple of days so that they retain some texture. the salad was definitely hearty enough to serve as a meal. we had dinner after stopping by the house and meeting with the electrician. he's good! the lowest quote by far but he seems honest...he just has a bit of an odd way of speaking and he's not a great front person for the company - he doesn't coddle you, but he says it like it is. he's kind of brusque, but he's not trying to upsell us. there's not that much knob and tube to be replaced and a lot of the receptacles are good - so that's shaved down the price a lot. we're also not touching the kitchen wiring for now. we figure if we're going to gut it in a year *knocks on wood* hopefully - then we won't bother messing around only to have to re-do it later.
today was a short day at work, then i went with the dotytron to eq3 and we BOUGHT OUR NEW COUCH! so exciting! even if we DID get declined for the financing option! i guess the underwriters weren't too impressed with our new $300000+ mortgage (we haven't even made a payment yet!) lol! we ended up going with the byrd couch -
with espresso legs and a stainless steel grey microfibre upholstery. i'm excited! picturing what our living room is going to look like when everything is in there is sustaining me through these long, lonely nights of exhaustion.i sold our ikea expedit shelving unit. the 5x5 is too big for our space and i hated the birch effect. instead we're going to get two 4x4 in white - 1 for the living room for our books and knick knacks and 1 for the dotytron's studio for the music and his stuff. i also took apart my matthieu desk from ikea -
took the WHOLE THING APART. undid all the screws and dowels...disassembled the whole thing. the dotytron was a bit grumbles about it but i want to do it right. i'm going to sand it, paint it with a high gloss white and then maybe varnish it and get a new knob for the drawer. i treated myself to a new orbit sander! 
this is going to make all my furniture refinishing so much easier!!! instead of using a sanding block, you attach the grit you want and what would take and hour or two takes only a few minutes! it's also going to come in handy when we're sanding down our plaster patching on our walls. home depot is having a sale on behr paint this weekend. buy 2 cans get 20% off, buy 3 cans or more, get 30% off! so we're going to get our paint - it's too good a deal to turn down. we're pretty sure we've figured out our colours. most rooms will be white with just 1 accent wall in a colour and white trim. my craft room is going to be a soft cucumber-turquoise - i think i'm going to paint the whole room...or maybe two walls...and the dining room is going to be a soft blue grey - because that room is broken up with the entry to the living room and a big window, we're going to paint that whole dining room.
we've spent the night cleaning our apartment so that the landlord can show it tomorrow without being too fearful as to its' state. our packing is going pretty well...i'd say we're 30-40% done. we can take over carloads of clothes and we're hoping to have the kitchen set up before our big moving day.
tonight for dinner i made us a fresh tomato, white onion, basil pasta with nice balsamic, some grated grano padano, and chili oil from T's chilies. it's a seasonal thing i make when the tomatoes are in season. it's so fresh and easy. i don't even cook the tomatoes...just chop them up and mix them with the hot pasta. we have 1 can of coke so for dessert we're going to have bowls of vanilla ice cream with coke poured over. so luxe! haha.tomorrow is a huge day. i want to sand all the furniture i'm repainting. i think the pink telephone table i'm going to sand down and repaint so that it's the same cream colour as the other one. the pink is a little tart for me and i don't know where i'd put it with the rest of the decor. the russian white colour will make it more versatile. i also have to do the grocery shopping and do some prep and stop by the house and see if i can smear some of the paint samples we got on the walls - we're undecided for the main bedroom - i want a bold colour called "citron" which is a peppy, punchy, bright chartreuse and the dotytron favours something a little softer - a colour called "corn husk" - we'll see who wins!
after that i'm meeting up with L at her house to do girl talk and primp for A & C's wedding!!! so exciting! i love it when other people get married! i love mulling over the details and providing advice...just can't do it on a large scale for my own! then it's A & C's wedding at the mcmichael gallery in kleinburg. when i told my colleagues they all ooh and ahhed which means that it must be a pretty special place! i'm so pumped to see them be wed and to see the kdubsguelph crew - haven't seen them since pre-hitching and we have much to discuss - and what better forum than celebrating the lurve of two amazing people and friends?
the dotytron is hilarious - it was late one night and i was figuring out what to put on their card - "what should i write???" the dotytron (from beneath the covers of the bed, where he had already collapsed, exhausted), "may - triton - bless this union" lol!!! so that's what their card says. it's pretty solid as far as salutations go!
okay...i'm off.
fin.
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chickpea salad with giardiniara dressing
serves 2-4 (main course or appies)
1 c. giardiniara vegetables (italian mixed pickled vegetables), chilies stemmed and drained
2 T. of the pickling liquid
1/4 c. of olive oil (i used 1/4 c. of chili oil)
salt
pepper
2 cans of chickpeas, rinsed and drained
2 tomatoes, chopped
1 c. of pickled eggplant (feel free to play fast and loose with the ingredients - add cucumber, red onion, olives whatever you want)
100 g. sliced provolone, cut into strips
100 g. genoa (or the salami of your choice) cut into strips
1 head of romaine, washed and chopped
- take all the ingredients from the chickpeas down and toss them together
- take the dressing ingredients and blend until it forms a chunky puree
- toss the dressing and the salad together
- serve with crusty bread.
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