Humble Pie: A week of cooking fails

Last week was a total fail in the cooking department. It was, as my college roommates and I liked to say, a big fat piece of humble pie. Just when you think you're getting this whole homemaking thing down... No you're not.  Get out a fork, here's a nice big slice of humble pie. 

Fall is my favorite favorite favorite time of year. Cooler weather, sweaters, boots, and perhaps most importantly... PUMPKIN flavored things! So when I had the bright idea to swap out the banana for pumpkin in my favorite Banana Muffins (from my Food for Thought  post), I was pretty excited. I made the same exact muffins, but substituted canned pumpkin for the bananas and used pumpkin spice instead of cinnamon. I even thought to myself, this is my OWN recipe! How exciting! I'll photograph it and put it on my blog! But when the muffins came out of the oven, this is what I got:

Looks harmless right? Wrong. I have never in my life tasted a worse muffin. Not only did these muffins have a strange unidentifiable taste and companion nasty aftertaste, every few chews there was a distinct gritty texture. Gritty like, is there sand in this muffin? Did I drop this muffin on the beach? Bad. And the worst part... I still powered through and ate one of these muffins (or as much of it as I could choke down) every morning all week. Bleh.

On to fail number two. As if the taste buds hadn't suffered enough, I attempted on Tuesday to make a clean eating chicken and dumplings in the crock pot.  This is how it turned out:

The best part was, I made this for Jonnie to eat for dinner since I had D group that night and would be eating with the girls. Poor guy.  When I got home, I asked him how it was, and he said, "I have no idea what I just ate." That was supposed to be our dinner the following night as well, and needless to say we ate out instead. 

Nothing like some big time flops to keep a girl grounded. Looks like I'm still a domestic diva in training, and that's alright with me. In the meantime, there's always Chick-Fil-A. Who's up for a nice slice of humble pie?

A name for the blog!

I finally decided on a name for the blog!  After much thought about what I really want to say here, I realized that I want to share honest thoughts, successes and failures, projects and explorations, recipes and tips, and just a window into our everyday life.  I’m aspiring to make my home a beautiful place and my marriage a place of comfort and joy.  I’m looking to be fit and healthy and fill our plates with food that is good and good for you.  The desire of my heart is to create a Delightful Dwelling for me and my husband (and one day our children!).

I believe that God has created me as a woman to love beauty and seek to make beautiful the things that are around me.  I believe that God has given me the responsibility to make our house a home - a place of refuge and respite.  Finding a new recipe that is good for the body and the taste buds or repurposing an old piece of furniture are small things that make me come alive, and I want to share those things with you.

We believe that God is our ultimate Dwelling Place.  Psalm 91:9-11 says:

“Because you have made the LORD your dwelling place—
the Most High, who is my refuge—

no evil shall be allowed to befall you,
no plague come near your tent.
For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways.”

We believe that true joy is found in the Lord, and that he is everything we need for a fulfilled life.  Psalm 37:4 says:

“Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.”

We want everything we say and do to be a reflection of the love and grace that God gives to us so freely every day.  As I seek to fulfill God’s calling for my life in creating this humble Delightful Dwelling that we call home, I hope to glorify Him in it all and share His love with you!

Drumroll please.... A Delightful Dwelling! 

Summer Furniture Projects

I LOVE love LOVE the fall.  I love the leaves changing, the weather cooling, the pumpkin-flavored goodies, the CLOTHES! and even the football.  I have my boots lined up in my closet ready to go, sweaters in tow, and scarves waiting.  I even tried to wear a scarf today (it was cool this morning, I swear), but by mid-day with temperatures reaching the upper 80s... it was pretty sweltering.  All that to say, come on fall!!!

I did take advantage of the somewhat less scorching heat by resuming my furniture projects today!  It was really fun at the beginning of the summer, fun enough to push through the sweat and Georgia heat.  But come July in the dirty south... I just can't stand to be outside for more than 5 seconds, much less exerting myself.  Hence a hiatus from furniture projects.

I did manage to do a couple projects at the beginning of the summer that I have not posted, so here they are now!

BEFORE:  This was a chest of drawers that was at my in-laws house.  After I refinished it, we found out it was a part of Jonnie's baby room.  Aww.  It had been painted a couple times since then, and had some knobs mysteriously missing.

AFTER:  This is in our "breakfast nook" type area and houses all of our office supplies.  I wanted to do a fun pop of color, so I went with Behr Arizona (a match for AS Arles).

I even re-lined the drawers with some pretty drawer liner I had laying around.  Then in a sudden bust of creativity, I had the thought to make a pretty matching picture frame with the scraps and a frame I got at the thrift store!

Too bad I didn't realize the frame was 5x7.  Who has 5x7s??  I still haven't put a photo in this frame but it's the thought that counts, right?

Another project that my friend Mallory helped me with this summer was a coffee table for our good friend Laura.

BEFORE:  

Shiny oaky coffe table.

AFTER:

 

Shabby chic coffe table!  This is Behr Outback (A match for AS Versaille).

Super cute in their living room!

So there they are.  I'm currently working on a hutch/china cabinet that took FOREVER to paint today.  Totally exhausted but I think it's going to be really pretty.  Tonight calls for some fro yo for sure!