PSA: make these...

yesterday was a ridiculously dreary, dark, rainy, foggy day. what else better to do than make chocolate chip cookies. plus, dylan wasn't feeling well and had asked for them a few days ago. a quick google search (didn't have mom's recipe on hand) led me to this martha stewart recipe. honestly, they were amazing. they stayed chewy and a little crunchy around the edges. the recipe says it makes about 3 dozen. along the way, i figured i ate the batter of about 3 cookies, and when i was done and counted the finished cookies, i had 33. so, talk about bang on.

warm cookies. nothing better.

if you're looking for a classic chocolate chip recipe, give that one a try. A+ martha stewart, A+.

brighter than sunshine...

saturday was pretty close to a perfect day. the weather was just incredible and i took advantage by taking a walk down to the st lawrence market (by myself, since dylan was at a first aid course for work). i spent some time just sitting by the (not yet running) fountain, with the sun in my face, and doing some people watching. i bought us some fruits, but i could only buy so much because you know, i had to walk home with it. ;)

the day ended with watching some friends in a band playing a bar. good day indeed. 

lip smackin' good...

for christmas, i got (personal sized) cast iron skillets that i had been asking for for a while. i finally put them to use and made gnocchi gratin for our first official meal in our new place. i was flipping through a magazine a few weeks ago and snapped a picture of the recipe and i've been dying to try it since. let me tell you, it was easy, and really, really delicious and creamy. (although i found it a little on the pricey side, personally. mostly the cheese; the mascarpone was $7.50 and the parmesan $4. to be expected.)

dinner is served.

getting full at this point.

what i liked about the recipe is that it had no oil, butter, or cream. so for a 'mac and cheese', it was fairly healthy. and not lacking in flavor. in the magazine, it said it served 6. ummm..i got everything into 2 personal sized skillets; dylan ate all of his and i ate about 3/4 of mine. so yeah, i wouldn't say it serves 6. but go ahead. make it!

nigella lawson's gnocchi gratin: recipe here.

pivot! pivot!

moving day went surprisingly smoothly given the fact that we didn't have as much packed as we would have liked. it started out at about 7:30am, dylan got the truck around 8am, and then his friend and brother met us at our place to start getting it loaded. they actually helped us pack a lot of other things we weren't planning on taking just yet, just because we were ready early, but didn't have the service elevator at our new place until 3:30pm.

 let's do this!

pivot! pivot! pivvvoootttt!!

 our life in a truck.

 :)

 nope. not excited at all.

 time to unpack now..

 everything. everywhere.

never-ending boxes.

somehow, somehow we unpacked everything and this place was completely ready within 24 hours. i have no idea how we did that. in our other place, i think it took us a good month to get settled and get everything put away and pictures hung. not here! we still have our other place for a month and have random stuff still there in storage (truthfully, we have no idea what's down there. we haven't been down/looked in our storage for 9 months, which means there's a good chance we don't need anything in there and can sell the stuff. the only remaining thing left to do there is clean it spotless for the next tenant!  

waking up at 7am, still laying in bed, and this is now my view.

we're loving it here. obviously.

taping; party of 1...

a couple nights ago, i came to our new place to get all the taping done in prep for painting the next day. dylan went off to work and i taped away. as much as i could reach anyways. bright and early the next day, we picked up our friend and got to work.

 lots to do..

 a seriously boring job.

 yay for proper full length mirrors!

a little dinner and the oc once i was done.

 9ft ceilings; not the easiest.

painting white (on white) is slightly hard.

the one good thing about living in a small place is that there's less painting to do. i think the whole place took about 4 hours. not too shabby. but next time, i think i would rather just hire a painter. i have no desire to go through all that work again, trying to cut the corners and make it perfect (ours aren't, but that's ok). 

sail away...

after we got the keys on monday, we took a walk down to a coffee shop, then walked along the pier and admired the boats and saw a couple planes take off, too, since there's an airport there. i think this will be a good summer.

a little pup in the right corner just watching the boats; the owner was sitting close by.

cheers to the weekend!

keys to the good life...

monday, we met with our agent one last time at our new place, signed a few final documents, and got the keys!! we were beyond excited, obviously. we took a look around all the amentities (we couldn't see them until we were actually residents) and they are ahhhhmazing! there is everything you could possibly think of, right at our fingertips, for free. we basically live in a resort. every month there's a fitness schedule all mapped out (yoga, pilates, bootcamp, body fuse etc)..i better get my butt down there and put it to good use!
we met up with our friend and showed him around our new digs, and then walked around the city a bit. then of course, we were so giddy, we drove home after rush hour, got a few things to bring back and some stuff to sleep over. along with wine and chips. and we slept on the floor. uncomfortably. but we just couldn't help ourselves.

the drive in. obviously looking forward to it.

i'm back, baby.

from our balcony; the lake and the airport. can't wait to see planes coming in and leaving.

missing the fridge? nope, the fridge and freezer are the white 'cabinets' beside the oven there. and one of the 'cabinets' by the sink? that's the dishwasher. a dishwasher! hidden gems.

ahhHH!!

the happy couple moving into our 2nd place together.

a few things for our first sleepover + netflix.

our ultra comfy sleeping arrangements.

of course, we brought the morning essentials with us.

we're completely in love with this place and can't wait to really get moved in soon. the only issue? our big (and it is big, but oh so comfy) sectional is actually too big for this place. we paid a fair amount for it, and even though it's only 9 months old, nobody would pay close to full price for a used sofa. so a light bulb went off and i asked dylan why not just try to take the middle section out and piece together the end two. even though it's a sectional, there's hooks and brackets and it's not really meant to mix and match the pieces; it's meant  to be used as one huge couch. but! dylan went to work and we think we may just be able to make it work. thank goodness because i do not want to go on the hunt for another couch purchase. that was the worst. living in a tiny condo? you must be resourceful. 

blue skies...

the rain has finally subsided, though it seems like only for yesterday and today. but! today is going up to 20 degrees (celsius) and we're thrilled. another sunday dinner at my parents was upon us and we used the nice weather to bbq some burgers.

 we hadn't seen blue skies and sun in over a week.

 looks like summer.

 best burger recipe dad has made yet. i'll take my burger plain, please.

yeah, he enjoyed it.

spring, anytime you want to stay, and leave the rain behind, that would be great!
happy monday!