Once again I find myself writing one of those apologetic posts in an attempt to explain my prolonged absence. I don't have a good excuse. Life is busy. There you go.
You're definitely right if you're guessing there are probably many more productive things I could be doing than taking pictures of my kitchen, but there's a reason for it, I swear. Today we were supposed to have our new dishwasher installed, the dishwasher which has been sitting, swathed in bubble wrap, in our basement for a week and a half. It is supposed to replace this thing, which currently makes enough noise to compete with overhead air traffic.
Opposite the counter, we have one of them baker's racks, which I actually bought a couple of years ago for clothing storage (yeah, I don't really know what I was thinking.) It works much better for pots, pans, soda, etc.
My two favorite parts of the kitchen are the fridge...
We don't have so many spices right now, but the essentials are all there: cinnamon, hot pepper flakes, cumin, rosemary, cinnamon, garam masala, and cinnamon.
This is what we woke up to on the first morning of 2007. After a day of rain the day before in the North Woods of Wisconsin, a three inch coating of honest-to-goodness snow fell overnight. The sun shone in a cloudless sky and the world had been transformed into a winter wonderland.
It was already warm enough for it all to begin melting by mid-morning, but here in these pictures taken in the early afternoon, there is still a powdery blanket coating everything. It was the first fresh snow I'd seen since early December, and from the way things are going here in Chicago, it may be the last I see this winter. (Of course now that I've said that we'll have non-stop blizzards from now until May.)
My Christmas vacation is almost over. Tomorrow I hit the books again hard and the only real break I'll see until mid-June is the one measly week we get for "spring break" in March. To be honest, part of me is glad the holidays are over, though. I love Christmas, which is why I start celebrating so early, but I'm definitely burned out by Dec. 26th. So by the time New Year's Eve/Day rolls around, I'm done with the gaudy decorations, the annoying TV commercials and the heavy food.
New Year's festivities up north were as ridiculous and amusing as they've been for the past four years, so nevertheless, I had a good time riding out the end of the holiday season. It's hard to leave the natural beauty up there, but it's always good to be back home again here in the city of big shoulders. Happy New Year, everyone...
