Happy Early Easter, Everyone!

A consequence of living far away from your family is that you don’t get to go home to celebrate every holiday. At first I struggled with this, but the longer I’ve lived in Colorado the better I’ve gotten at making my own celebrations. The trick, I’ve learned, is to not try recreating your family traditions — it only ends in disappointment. Instead, you have to find your own ways to celebrate.

To celebrate Easter this year, I volunteered to make brunch for The Mister and me. In reality, I’m a terrible cook, but through the power of Pinterest I found a few recipes to make that look yummy but shouldn’t be too hard to pull off. I’ll post photos later to show off my culinary prowess.

My original thought was to make a breakfast casserole, but that would be a lot of food for just two of us, and while it would be delicious it wouldn’t be ~*~fancy~*~, and we are nothing if not fancy. So, I’m making Crustless Broccoli-Cheddar Quiche in individual ramekins.

Crustless Broccoli-Cheddar Quiche

Next on the menu: deviled eggs. The Mister’s favorite food is deviled eggs. The first time I made deviled eggs on a non-holiday I blew his mind — he didn’t realize they’re one of the easiest foods to throw together. I’ve made a few different types of deviled eggs for him in the past, and when I found a recipe for Cream Cheese and Smoked Salmon Deviled Eggs I knew I found a winner. I don’t have a pastry bag so mine won’t look this pretty, but hopefully they’ll taste delicious.

Cream Cheese and Smoked Salmon Deviled Eggs (with avocado to boot!)

The next course is going to be Bacon-Wrapped Potato Bites, with a Spicy Sour Cream Dipping Sauce. Even though these are probably more of an appetizer or dinner-type food, who doesn’t love bacon and potatoes in the morning? Bite-sized, and they look easy to make. Instead of normal hot sauce in the sour cream, I’m going to use sriracha (my fave).

Bacon-Wrapped Potato Bites

Finally, I was going to make Cheesecake-Filled Chocolate Eggs, but I was having trouble finding hollow chocolate eggs at the store, and making my own was just too involved. Since The Mister doesn’t have a sweet tooth (I’ll satisfy mine with Easter candy), we are going a different way for dessert: bacon pops. Which basically are goat cheese balls rolled in bacon. Delicious, right?

Goat Cheese Pops with Herbs, Pecans, and Bacon

So, that’s how we will be celebrating Easter! What about you? If you celebrate Easter, are you doing anything special?

Well Isn’t That Pinteresting.

The house is slowly but (allegedly) surely coming close to completion. Keeping my fingers and toes crossed, we are hopefully a month away from a move-in date. Granted, that move-in date will most likely be pushed back again, but for now, we’re a month away from a move-in date. Which means finish work, which means mutual decision-making.

Until now, every decision made about the house has been The Mister’s decision. It is, after all, his ultimate art project. He poured his heart and soul into designing the house, and aside from an occasional suggestion here and there (no fluorescent lights in the bathroom, why cover up such gorgeous wood on the stairs, etc.), it is completely his vision. The finish work, however, will be a We thing, even if he isn’t yet fully aware of this.

Yesterday on the way to see The Secret Life of Arriety, The Mister suggested that we turn our lighting solution into an art installation – with not just table lamps hanging upside down from the ceiling, but an entire room’s worth of furniture. While that is certainly a creative way to combine our two exceptionally different design aesthetics, I told him under no circumstances were we going to live in The Twits. Roald Dahl may be a genius, but he wasn’t giving design advice in that story.

Combining our styles (pop art minimalist [him] meets kitschy cluttered study [me]) will be interesting for sure, which is why I’ve spent the past few months collecting ideas on Pinterest. Instead of being inspired by the Roly Poly bird, here are some ideas that actually could be incorporated into the house:

Handcrafted Mason Jar Pendant Chandelier

"Mercury" Glass

Bookshelf Couch

Pallet Wall (for the bedroom)

Stained Concrete Floor

If anything, these few pictures are ideas to build on. I think we will ultimately figure out what our style is as a couple, but I want to infuse the industrial feel the house has naturally (I mean, it is a cement box) with warmth and life. I should start Pinteresting again with abandon, but at the same time I want our house to organically come together. There’s only so much decorating other people can do for your living space, and the rest you have to figure out for yourself.

Related articles

• Haven’t Heard Of Pinterest Yet? Just Wait (denver.cbslocal.com)
• The Twits (bondwithbooks.wordpress.com)