Yummies amidst the mess

Hi everyone! I've contemplated starting a blog for awhile now...I even had a couple while I was in college. One for studying abroad, one that amounted to all of 3 posts (usually about school). But now that I'm getting married (almost 3 months exactly from today!), moving into a new apartment and starting a new chapter of my life, I figured this was as good as any time to start a blog and really keep it up.

Status of my life: As I said, I'm getting married in three months. To my best friend and the best man I've ever met. He's wonderful - hilariously witty, way smarter than me, kind and...well...jolly. He's always laughing and teasing me (which I need) and reminds me to calm down (in a nice, non-antagonizing way) when I'm being crazy or moody. AND - he cooks, cleans and does laundry. All in all, he's the perfect man!

Also - we're moving this weekend. So our apartment looks like this:

So while Future Husband was taking all the stuff off the bookshelves and getting everything ready to move, I made a favorite dinner - French onion soup and toasted cheese sandwiches. YUM. Except I didn't let the onions really and truly brown so the taste wasn't quite as deep and rich as it usually is. Toasted cheese sandwiches turned out well though. They're made of a mix of dijon mustard, sour cream and cheddar cheese and, as Future Husband said, "I could eat five of them." Here are the onions pre-soup:

 

And here's the soup simmering and almost done:

 

Delicious. Except not as delicious as it usually is. Future Husband still thought it was good combined with the toasted cheese sandwiches, as evidenced by this expression:

 

So the soup wasn't horrible. :) And it was the least I could do while Future Husband dismantled the living room. For fun, though, before he came into the kitchen to eat (since the dining table is covered in stuff from the bookshelves), I styled the sandwich and soup a la Donna Hay, whose recipes I used. I LOVE her. She's amazing. I own four of her cookbooks and can't find anything wrong with them (except sometimes the Australian names for things...that can be perplexing).

 

To top it all off, I made "thank you" cheesecake brownies (also from one of Donna's books) for our leasing agent and for Future Husband's groomsman, who is helping us move all of our stuff on Sunday. They were pretty good. And we polished off the little bit of muddy chocolate cake (also Donna) from last week. Needless to say, our bodies are oversugared and will not be ready for heavy lifting soon. Here are the brownies in production:

 

  

I've made it my goal to start baking more - I love it. But I'm trying to shed a few pounds, I'll be baking, trying a bit of what I bake and then dispersing it between work and our friends. I'll take requests, so if any of you out there want something specific, let me know! Otherwise, I'll probably be working my way through Donna's dessert book and her entertaining books. Everything I've had of hers (except my failed attempt at butternut squash soup, which my college roommate choked down so as not to immediately hurt my feelings) has been wonderful and gotten rave reviews.

Along with baking more, I've made it a goal to really and truly decorate our new apartment. I want it to feel more like a home since we'll probably be there for two or three years. I'll have a post on my decorating inspirations later - probably next week after the move. And I'll need plenty of advice and ideas, so if anyone wants to offer suggestions, I'm open!

Until then, happy Friday everyone!