Sometimes You Need Soup

The job situation remains unchanged, and the male unit gets the keys to his new place on Thursday. The official move out date is the 15th, so there is a little over a week remaining. Which is somewhat unnerving, since there is so little I have control over at the moment.

One of the things I do have control over is some home-cooked meals, such as the delicious tomato soup I made from Debbie Chapman's blog, onelittleproject.com/tomato-basil-soup/. I used my first round of produce from this season's farmers markets to make her soup, and was not at all disappointed. I used all fresh ingredients, except for some boxed chicken stock.

        

The onion was even growing a new onion! The fresh ingredients made the soup tasty. But my fancy spinning chopper made it easier to get the ingredients into the soup. I bought it at a Tupperware party on a whim, and was even told by my mother "you will never use it." HA! I use it ALL THE TIME! To make DELICIOUS FOOD!

I usually chop up the ingredients into somewhat smaller bits so that the tiny blades can actually chop it. Look at the difference it makes in the onion!

So, with all the fresh ingredients, and Debbie's easy-to-follow instructions, I made a fantastic tomato soup all on my own for the first time! I even got to use a never-before-used kitchen item, a hand blender. It helped me get the soup from this:

To this:

The soup came out so well that I ended up freezing some of it into individual size bags so I can have some in the next few months. I am trying to prepare for the possibility that things will be tight, so fresh produce will be hard to come by. Luckily there are the $10 for a 5 lb bag of produce guys, but they have a limited selection at the moment. I may get some pink or yellow tomatoes from the next stand to make the soup again, with a twist, and freeze that as well. Maybe I should also stock up on veggies to freeze for the coming months...

What Do I Do Now?

Just like everything else, the plan to become self-sufficient, cook more, and start actually using that gym membership have gone... awry.

Naturally "the great move" will be taking place at one of the least convenient times: Mid-June. One month to figure out how to go from full-time-student back to part-time student while working. This should not be too hard, since that description sums up most of my adult life.

The job hunt is... going. I have decided to avoid the regular 9 to 5 trap so I can keep the volunteering that I have been doing for the last 2 years. Also, in the fall I will have a class that requires a physical presence. This means I need to find odd jobs, a series of them. I have always enjoyed a bit of chaos. We will see how that goes...

Meanwhile, my house is still in shambles. I have begun the process of scrubbing off all the male unit's hand fat from the walls and cabinets. After writing this, the goal will be to attack the closet. I am going to be finally donating the 5 bags of clothing on the floor, and then trying to get rid of another 25% of the clothing in there. hopefully I can make enough space to store my sporting equipment in there again. It's a walk in closet... you would think I would have enough space. It is overrun with multiple colors of the same V-neck shirts. It may be time to update my wardrobe as well.

Now to get on to the organization and cleaning and job hunting and lunch eating.

And Then, Hope Was Restored

The Mini Remodel...

As you can see, recording my progress has gone well. I decided it was time to finally post the pre- and post-remodel photos of my living-room. Please do not judge the before photos. The carpet was in desperate need of replacement, but what is a busy and broke girl to do about it?

I spent the day before my birthday prepping the living-room and hallway for the utter demolish-ment that was about to commence. My Stepdad was arriving at 8:30 AM and I had done none of the prep work. So, I woke up early to tape everything off and get the painting done before we replaced the carpet. As you can see below, I had some help.

Soon after, I was finished. The rooms had been painted, all in one morning, before my Stepdad'a arrival. This was a much more impressive feat than I feel I get credit for. Nonetheless, after he arrived we removed all the baseboards and the disgusting carpet, and got to the work I had been putting off for nearly five years. 

The hallway was the worst part. We spent most of the day trying to figure out how to handle the self-clicking already padded laminate I had purchased. The tiny area was not great for two people to be trying to hammer things together as well as measuring and cutting with the table saw he set up on the front entryway. However, after all the frustration and swearing, the hallway was done and he had taught me how to use the saw to make the floor look more like professionals had done it than two frustrated people who had worked on a floor all day in a condo with no air conditioning on a 90 degree F day. The worst part for me was, since there is a unit below mine, I got extra padding to cut down on sound they would hear from my place. The padding came in a roll, and refused to stay unrolled.

The plan was to finish the next day, my birthday. But, PLOT TWIST! My 15 year old sister had planned on having a boy over and Stepdad's presence was required for this event. So, I was on my own. With a table saw. Unsupervised. Besides a few pieces I needed Stepdad's help to cut, for which I went to his house to beg for assistance, I did all of the rest on my own! It looks amazing! And I would like to add, that after 9 months or however long it has been, the floor is still standing up great!

The hardest part, besides the rolling orange pad that you can see above, was trying to keep the boards looking staggered. My moment of pride was this:

I had managed to cut a teeny tiny piece to fit perfectly and prevent some ridiculous looking gap in my beautiful new floor. 

At any rate, we managed to get the living room the way the S.O. wanted for his "office" and I wanted for my living, and we have been happy with it since. 

Since then, we have also added the wall decorations and cleaned up a bit. I am sure more photos will appear in future postings. The only issue with the floor so far has been some gaps forming in the hallway, where Stepdad and I got frustrated and just nailed a few pieces in. I have been using wood-floor gap fill on it and have had no issues so far.

And the Rest of It...

The rest of domestication has been horrible. I have not even finished cleaning the house from the flooring debacle where we moved everything out of the effected area and into the rest of the condo. The newest update is the S.O. is moving out soon to try the sweet freedom of living on his own for a while. I am trying to finish up school by December, am now job hunting, and trying to catch up on the domestic hell I have created for myself. Hoping to be a bit better and recording all the inevitable misadventures as this all happens, so you can come along on this absurd adventure with me.