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I had plans this last weekend to maybe make a lemon meringue pie for the first time, but then I decided to go on a food strike. Really for the sake of my esophagus, which has been angry with my food choices. As a result, I’m eating a very strict diet which does not include anything that tastes good. Basically.

Despite that, I was able to make a pretty yummy pizza, 100% from scratch. The dough was a olive oil bread dough from a batch I made a week before. Earlier in the week I had made this SOOOO yummy olive bread:

There is nothing better than fresh baked bread.

My pizza was a bit labor intensive, with most of the trouble getting the pizza dough from my counter where it had been rolled out, on to the pizza peel covered in corn meal, then from the pizza peel to the hot stone in the oven. I made a bit of a mess, but the messy delight with grilled rosemary chicken, artichoke hearts and olives was not just super tasty but esophagus-friendly.

Some of you know all ready, thanks to Facebook, that Ella lost her first tooth last week. Her 2nd tooth will be out any day now.

Easter is nearly here and I’ve got some cooking to do. I’m going to do some sort of salad. I’m thinking with pears and cranberries, feta cheese maybe? I want to make some things I can eat without worry for my esophagus. I’m also making deviled eggs. I think I’m going to make 2 kinds. I need to bring the kind every one expects, but I’m going to make another kind that doesn’t have mustard, an acid reflux no-no. And finally, a cake. The cake is from my “Martha Stuart’s Cooking School” book and has a white cake with lemon filling and a meringue frosting. I bought industrial 8″ round cake pans awhile back at Williams-Sonoma (surprisingly not expensive) I’ve been wanting to try out and I’ll use my cake stand and it’ll be a lovely cake. Split 18-21 ways. Not sure how that’s going to work out, but I’m determined! Maybe I’ll buy a razzleberry pie as well and call it good. Mmmm.

Time for an update as my next appointment is just 2 days from now. We’re at the 9 month mark folks. Only 1.25-1.75 years to go!

Image 1 is at the start (6.18.09), the 2nd was my last appointment (1.09.10) and the 3rd was taken this morning (3.21.10)

I’m a bit bummed to see so little difference between the last 2 images. Largely what seems to have happened is the wire on my left side (the right side in this photo) has moved down, straightening out the wire as a whole, which means the teeth on that side have moved down. The bottom still looks to be a mess!

Life with braces has gotten a bit easier. I have a number of teeth that now touch, which means eating is much easier. I’ve got a bit of a gap between some molars which means food keeps getting stuck back there and it’s even a bit of a struggle to remove it with floss.

My Herbst appliance continues to be a sore point with me. I had to go in a couple of weeks ago because the arm on my left side kept getting stuck, especially when I ate. Stuck in the closed position. Chomp, chomp, stuck. Unstick. Chomp, chomp, stick. Unstick. Repeat. New arm in, alls good. Except another part gets stuck every now and then when I brush my teeth. I cannot wait to get it out. Maybe just 4 months from now. I’ll try and get my ortho to tell me what he thinks on Tuesday. I’ve noticed the orthos don’t like to put firm dates on things.

So, all in all, we’re moving along, at a snails pace. I think we are now in the slow and boring part of orthodontia.

I created a new category called “braces” so you can view all of my braces-related blog posts at once to read more about what’s been going on… if you want. It’s probably  more for me than for any one else.

As far as Saturdays go today was the best of Saturdays. The only improvement I could make would be that this minor cold of mine would be totally gone. I would have slept in except at 7 when every one else got up I noticed that my nose was uncomfortably stuffed and had to get up and deal with it. Hard to complain about my cold otherwise.

Ella and I started our day by hitting up Fred Meyer for some ingredients for the evening feast (more on that later) and then Target to pick up “New Moon”. Ella had earned $5 so she spent that as well and got a new small stuffed dog.

We get home and have some lunch. Nothing too exciting there. I started my 2nd batch of bread dough. Olive oil bread, which will aid me in making olive bread (as in bread with kalamata olives throughout - yum!). The weather was just beautiful today so once the dough was setting to rise we headed outside to play.

Ella’s been feeling particularly down about us not being able to have a dog because Isaac is allergic. I thought a dog fix was in order so we spontaneously headed to mom and dad’s house to play with their dogs. The dogs sure enjoyed it and I got to sit in the sun while petting a dog. I miss having a dog. *sigh*

Yesterday evening I had started the groundwork for my first batch ever of fried chicken by brining the chicken. This morning I took the chicken out of the water and got it soaking in buttermilk. At 4:30 this afternoon I started dinner by making the dough for some buttermilk biscuits. Next I got some potatoes peeled, cubed and on the stove to boil. Then came the frying of the chicken. I went old school and used lard (another first). It was 6pm before dinner was ready. Fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, and biscuits with honey. Am stuffed, and the best part is Ella ate really well.

I have to say that with all of my “fancy” cooking lately that I always feel lame doing anything frozen or out of a box. Still, it’s nice to have a pizza or lasagna in the freezer.

Isaac drove past a Dairy Queen today on his way home from work and grabbed a box full of dilly bars, so after dinner we ate those. Am more stuffed.

To end the day we are watching Gumby. We started watching last night. Several days ago Netflix sent us Gumby and we hadn’t had a chance to watch. Ella loves Gumby. It’s been fun to share with her the things we loved as kids, like Gumby and the Muppets.

The clouds are rolling and it sounds like Sunday will be gloomy. It’s good we got this really great Saturday. The bright side to a gloomy day is you don’t feel bad about staying inside and doing chores instead of enjoying the outdoors. Right?

Oh boy. What a weekend when I stop, on this lazy Sunday evening (with a Lifetime movie on the tv), to think about it. Friday Ella was home because of a school day off. We set-up her first sleepover as hostess for that Friday evening but Thursday evening we got a call from a classmate of hers looking for a place to go on Friday (parent needed childcare we guess - we’re not complaining, though a heads-up would have been nice). All this means Friday we had 3 little girls over at our place. Good thing Isaac was around to entertain them as I worked. He even took them to the zoo, brave man.

Saturday after returning our sleepover guest to her parents we headed to SoDo to visit a restaurant supply store. I’m like a kid in a candy store at a place like that. I had ordered this book on Amazon called “Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day” and it had some suggested tools that I wanted to get (also in my Amazon box was a mortal & pestle - nothing better than fresh ground pepper!).

I am now the proud owner of a pizza peel.

When we returned I worked on my first batch of 5-minute bread. It’s a bit misleading but generally the whole process is easy and painless. You start by making a giant batch of dough and then using a pound at a time for fresh baked bread.

I made 2 loafs today. I made one and then just decided to do another, and because all of the “hard” work had been done it wasn’t a big deal.

I’ll be a baking queen before you know it. And I used to be so afraid of it!

I decided today, Sunday, that it was time to do some painting. I wanted to just start by touching up spots here and there. It got me thinking that it might be time for a bigger change in the living room and kitchen. I don’t want to think about the work involved though. I will say that getting at the spots around the house has made such a difference. Especially my kitchen cabinets, as they were looking so beat up. We Louies live hard I guess. Well, I’m blaming Isaac mostly.

So don’t be surprised if you see before/after photos one of these times.

Is this not the most ironic photo???