Let me Explain

Monday's post. for those of you who read it was a bit confusing.  Let me explain.  I wanted to participate in scavenger hunt Sunday again (refer to post).  I went to the blog that gives the five photo prompts, posted them into Blogger and scheduled them to post.  I planned on going back over the weekend and importing the fabulous pictures I took . . . obviously that didn't happen.  I totally forgot about the whole thing and was surprised to see that post up when I checked out my blog.

Anyway, I have had a crazy weekend and plan on having an incredibly busy week as I have a ton of volunteering I signed up for, two tests, school, and . . . oh yeah A BEAUTY PAGEANT to prepare for!

SO, the posts may be in short supply this week readers!  So sorry!

Felicity

The Weekend

1. Smile
2. Stand Alone
3. Rusty or Something Old
4. Artificial
5. Repeating Pattern

Friday Funday: Origins

I don't think I ever told y'all where Friday Funday came from.  For about 13 years I was on swim team.  It was a love/hate relationship but all in all I am glad I participated.  Occasionally on Friday the coach would proclaim 'Guess what guys!  It's Friday Funday!'.  Now this could mean one of two things:
1.) We were gonna play water polo, jump off the diving board and have a fabulous two hours of fun OR
2.) The coach was gonna bust our rear ends and give us the hardest workout we have ever experienced or will ever experience in our entire life.  This would stink at the time but in the end we felt stronger, we swam better, and no one can complain with results like that.

That's right, I swam with Leverenz (when I was a wee tot)!

Now that you know what Friday Funday is all about for me I will explain how I plan to make use of it in blog form.
1.)  I will provide a post of stuff I think is fun, inspiring, and brings a smile OR
2.) I will give you the most miserable post to read ever because I feel like complaining.
Yes, I realize that with this in mind you probably have no desire to read the rest of this post but hey, at least I gave you fair warning.

The troubles with this week:
1.) My roommate was at a conference and I was all by myself until Thursday!  I was very lonely and sad.  Now I am very excited she is home and less sad so it did get better, which is good.

2.) I like to run.  I am not good at running, I cannot run far, but I run intervals 3-4 times a week and do other exercises the other 2 days ion a week, with Sunday as my rest day.  Well, I had a really nasty blister on the arch of my left foot.  It popped and was raw which hurt while running but I said 'no pain no gain' and sucked it up.  Now, I have a blister inside the perimeter of the old blister.  I asked my PE professor what I should do, he took a look at it and said it was infected.  SO, guess who's not allowed to do any exercises like running, or elliptical, or things that involve your feet until it heals?  Oh yeah, me.  So basically my entire exercise routine has been killed for the foreseeable future.  After all of that ranting I can attest that it is healing and my foot it feeling better which is really nice because I was in a lot of pain.  I guess every grey cloud has a silver lining.

I know her!!!

3.) I am having the hardest time waking up.  This in itself does not seem like such a bad thing but it is similar to a time when this symptom as it were brought me face to face with a serious health problem so it concerns me.

4.) I'm whining and I hate whining but I am doing it anyway and that bothers me.

If you read all of that you are better than me, I would have quit 4 paragraphs ago!  Well thank you for listening, I feel a lot better having gotten all of that out.

Have a wonderful weekend,

Felicity

Disney Cooks?

I found a recipe for lemon chicken that sounded really good at http://family.go.com/food/recipe-ak-829160-lemon-chicken-t/ so I went and bought all of the ingredients.

Ingredients:

For the Chicken:

• 2 large chicken breast fillets - cut into chunks
• 1 teaspoon soy sauce
• 1 egg yoke
• 1 1/2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 2-3 tablespoons vegetable oil for frying
• 4 scallions to serve

For the Sauce:

• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 1/4 cup water
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• salt and pepper to taste

Easy enough, so I cut up the chicken and let it soak in the soy sauce for half an hour or so.  I mix together the sauce and put it on the stove over medium high heat until it thickens.  I turn to the computer to determine my next step and see that the recipe is from Disney family!  I had no idea Disney had their own recipes!  I didn't know Disney cooked, I just thought they entertained!  How strange is that?!

Moving on, I mixed the egg yoke and cornstarch together, rolled the chicken chunks in it, frid the chicken in some hot vegetable oil, mixed the sauce and chicken together, added scallions and put it over rice!

Not bad Disney, not bad!

Enjoy,

Felicity

Quilt Fiesta

This past Saturday Kirsten and I went to the Quilt Show!  Guess who I saw at this winderful quilt show?  Beth of LizzieBcrea8tive!  I even got to take a picture with her!

I even bought her book!

Find her website HERE and her blog HERE.


There are so many talented quilters!  Instead of trying to describe the beauty I will let the pictures speak for themselves.

Look at that detail!

Those points are incredible!

It's Harry Potter!

In awe and amazement,

Felicity

Recycle Day: Old Notes

As a math major in my last semester I have accumulated a ton and I mean, literally a TON of scrap paper with oodles of chicken scratch that at one time or another resembled practice work for math homework or practice problems worked out in all of their detail in order to prepare for a test.  For some reason or other I have a hard time getting rid of all of this math that I put hours and hours of my life into.  In some way I feel as if I will use it again.  Even though some of it is illegible I have this gut feeling that I will need to reference it someday in order to remember some technique.

I know this is silly because I could Google a question and find an answer faster than I could search through tons of papers, find what I was looking for, interpret what I wrote, figured out the context of the notes in which that tidbit of information was given, and then realize that that wasn't the information I wanted at all!  Still I can't quite rid myself of the four inch stack of papers that sit to the left of my desk.  Using the sublime inspiration of pinterest I found a way of using the notes to decorate!  These new paper flowers are cute but I only expect to decorate with them in this college house and plan on throwing them out upon graduation, but for their short college life span they are kinda cute.

This is the pinterest inspiration:

These are my math doodles before:

This is what I turned them into!

It might be a little childish but I can rest at peace tonight knowing my math notes are close by, but look a lot cuter than they did before.  I hung this flower above Samantha's bed to surprise her!  She will probably roll her eyes and move it back into my room with a smile.  She knows I'm a bit silly!

Dreaming of Laplace transforms,

Felicity

Scavenger Hunt

Just to share some of my personality with y'all I have a wonderful digital camera, Canon Power Shot SD970 IS, a much used gift given to me by my grandfather (thanks Papoo!).  Now, I know I am not a photography genius, I don't even know how to use all of the settings on my camera but I just love taking pictures!  I enjoy taking pictures of things more so than people and found Scavenger Hunt Sunday and decided to get involved!  This is my first week participating.  Without further ado, my findings:

1. Sunset

2. Black and White

3. A Day in My Life

4. Four

5. Colorful

That's all for this weeks scavenger hunt folks!  

Felicity

Friday Funday: My Adventure

GO TO FACEBOOK AND LIKE MY PICTURE!!!  PLEASE!

Today, being Friday Funday, I thought it appropriate to share with y'all a little bit about me.  I love a challenge. Like Barney from How I Met Your Mother I will turn things into a challenge that were not intended to be challenges.  With that being said I will begin the background story.

Samantha and I were watching Miss America and commenting about how they were a bit too skinny, how it was incredible that they had six-packs and how a lot of them did not directly answer the question they were asked in the interview portion.  Well, in reality all of these were my comments because I can never keep my mouth shut while watching TV.  I then began to tell Samantha how much I would love to be asked an opinionated question in front of a large crowd and give the audience a piece of my mind.  After that I said to myself, 'self, you could totally be Miss America'.  So, after some focused internet searching I signed up for a local pageant.  Yes, that's right I will be competing - in 2 weeks!

Well, after signing up it occured to me that I would have to do more than just answer a question, I would have to strut my stuff in a swimsuit, wear a ball gown, perform a talent, and submit head shots!  Samantha, being the most wonderful friend ever, kindly accepted to help me with my head shots which were taken at home.

These are the two photos I submitted to the pageant, but in the process of getting these head shots I made plenty of not so pretty faces.  This one is my favorite, I feel it depicts the true me!

Samantha had the wonderful idea of using a fan and I loved acting like a super model with it, that is why my hair has such volume!

I hope you enjoyed a peak into my life,

Felicity

Capers?

I had capers.  What does a college kid do with capers?  They were not the cheapest thing in the world so I went on an internet search to find an easy recipe with capers and boy did I ever!  It is called Tilapia with Caper-Parsley Sauce and it was scrumptious.  I love fish plain so I figured I couldn't go wrong with the tilapia but the sauce had a tangy taste with a good color, much better than just squeezing lemon juice over the fish!

The recipe from realsimple.com included potatoes in the recipe but yesterday was a very busy day for me so I skipped the potatoes and steamed green beans instead.

This is how easy this recipe is:

Ingredients:

• Tilapia
• salt
• pepper
• 4 1/2 tablespoons butter
• 1 cup white cooking wine
• 2 tablespoons capers
• 1/4 cup fresh parsley

Directions:

• Season with salt and pepper. 
• Cut the tilapia in half lengthwise.
• Cook the tilapia in batches in a skillet with 1 1/2 tablespoons butter over medium-high heat (it takes about 2-3 minutes per side).
• Pour 1 cup of white cooking wine in the skillet and wait until it is reduced by half.
• Whisk in 3 tablespoons butter, 2 tablespoons capers, and 1/4 cup fresh parsley.
• Spoon it over your tilapia and enjoy!

Well, gotta run,

Felicity

The Polls are Closed

Thank you for your input friends!  Based on the poll 66% of voters decided Claret would be the color of choice for finishing the turtleneck of my poncho!

. . . and now, the moment we have all been waiting for (drum roll please); Felicity and her completed poncho!

This project used about 7 skeins of yarn and is the warmest poncho ever!  It is a bit heavy with all that yarn but I feel as if I am in a cocoon of warmth and beautiful yarn.  The colors remind me of fall and the poncho surrounds me in soft cozy comfort.

The turtleneck, with the claret portion connected to the main body of the poncho and the oatmeal portion being folded over, is a large circle of Lion Brand Wool-Ease that I can bury my entire head into for extra warmth.

This project was so much fun to make and gave me a nice blanket in the winter as I was knitting it!  

Poncho up,

Felicity

Recycle Day: Leftover Yarn

Hello, my name is Felicity and I am a yarnaholic.  That's right, I am addicted to yarn.  Right now I have nine skeins of partially used yarn from past projects that I finished.  Often I am left with a little over half a skein of yarn.  This is not really enough yarn to make a full fledged project but I usually don't want to go buy more of the same color to make another project because I want a new color, a new weight, new, new, new.  I did find a nice project, requiring a small amount of yarn in which to use the leftover yarn from my poncho project!  Glovelets!

Easiest project ever!  It uses very little yarn and is a quick project you can finish in just a couple hours!

Materials:

• 9mm (U.S. 13) Knitting Needles
• Appropriate sized yarn

Procedure (make 2):

• Cast on 15 stitches
• Garter stitch (knit every stitch, every row) until piece measures 8 1/2 inches
• Cast off leaving a long tail
• Fold piece in half width-wise
• Mattress stitch sides together starting at one end for 2 inches
• Leave 1 inch without stitching sides together (thumb hole)
• Stitch the remaining length together 

There you have it - easy-peasy glovelets!

Knitters Anonymous,

Felicity

Day of Service

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day.  A perfect day to fly your American flag and be proud of your privilege of freedom.  Martin Luther King Jr. fought for an end to racial discrimination and segregation using nonviolent methods.  he stood up for his rights as an American in order, not only to obtain civil rights for himself, but for everyone being discriminated against.

"Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, 'Life's most persistent and urgent question is; 'What are you doing for others?''"

This is the time to take advantage of your freedom and your rights and to reach out to those who are struggling around you.  We live in America!  We live in a land of liberty and freedom!  We have the largest national economy, the most ethnically diverse nation, the Constitution, and civil rights!  With all of these blessings it is time for us to reach out to those around us, living in the great nation, and lend them a helping hand.

This is our time to serve our country, and honor the freedoms our forefathers fought so hard to obtain.

Go to http://mlkday.gov/ and get involved in an area near you.

"Let us swear allegiance to a land that's free,
Let us all be grateful for a land so fair,
As we raise our voices in a solemn prayer.
God bless America"
-God Bless America, Irving Berlin

Felicity

Friday Funday

It's Friday!  The good news is that I don't have class today.  However I do have homework.  But in my spare time I have been dreaming of knitting, quilting, and baking.  Here is a preview of some of the projects I would love to conquer in the future:

Pi Cloth {source}

Sockhead Hat {source}

Chocolate-Blueberry Cake {source}

Scrap Map {source}

Have a wonderful weekend,

Felicity