Updated Coffee Station (and reviews)

I confess, I have an addiction. It's bad. Pretty sure without it, I'd turn into a monster. Luckily, it's just coffee, so I'm really not too concerned. In fact, I've embraced it. My first go-to experience in any new town/city/state is to find the best coffee shops (preferably that serve donuts as well). It's truly fun and it gives me lots of energy. Win win situation!

Anyways, the down side is that I have grown a somewhat extensive coffee mug collection, to the point where my hubby started a daily cycle of complaining about it. You know, something like, he couldn't get a mug out without at least 3 falling on him in the process. Eh. So, I got to purchase some nice shelves that could match our table setup, yay! Now, all of our coffee mugs are on display (well, most of them) and my hubby enjoys his coffee mug choice in the morning again.

So this is for all those coffee addicts out there:

Shelves: I mean, you can't go wrong with Etsy. And this store was fast and the shelves are STURDY.

Table: I purchased this from Target about a year and a half ago. It's held up perfectly. However, my only complaint being that the white isn't so white anymore, but that would be our own fault as coffee has been spilled. More than once.

Coffee Maker: This coffee maker is amazing. I purchased it from Williams-Sonoma when they were having one of their 20% 1 item sale, AND I had a giftcard. Otherwise, the price is hefty. However, my husband and I are SERIOUS coffee drinkers. Black. No flavor. So, we wanted a good, simple coffee maker that would bring out the flavors of our coffee beans. Also, the glass carafe is the way to go if you want this model. I repeat, glass carafe, not metal.

Nespresso: They actually don't even make the Nespresso machine I have anymore. Well, at least the style of it. I love my Nespresso, don't get me wrong, but if you're interested in buying one, I would actually skip the milk frother purchase part of it. I've attached below the frother I use now. It was $20 on Amazon. My milk frother from Nespresso had kinks after using it 3 times. And it's officially started to die about 5 months ago. Not ideal for the price. So, click the link below and save yourself some time. However, I highly recommend the actually Nespresso machine if you like espresso and lattes! Yum.

Milk Frother: Okay, it's not even $20.

How to Handle a Pathological Liar in Your Life

So, this isn't usually what I write about, but I recently read from another blogger that you should write what your passionate about, and I'm passionate about relationships. Any and all relationships to be exact. I am also passionate about food and crafting, but unfortunately my hectic life often puts baking and crafting on the sidelines, however, my relationships can never be on the sidelines.

Now, onto the subject matter: Pathological Liars. 

I am truly sorry if there is one of these in your life. You might have read the heading to this article and thought, "did she mean, how to get rid of pathological liars from your life"? No, no I did not. I have the unfortunate circumstance of having one in my life that will be there indefinitely. My dad. 

You might say that I do not have to have him in my life by any means, but my mother passed away in 2009, and for all of his flaws and sins, he still loves me deeply. I have learned to keep a safe distance emotionally between us, and sometimes I think he is aware of it, while other times, I think he is happy as a clam just to have me in his life in a positive way. I won't go into details about my personal life and how I've reached this point with him, maybe in another post on dealing with emotional suffering, but know that my dad has not told me the truth in over 10 years. Even when I already know it. So, here are my top five points on how to handle (understand) a pathological liar in your life.

These two points have helped me better understand the situation/person:

1. They can't help it.
No really, they can't. It's a disease and an addiction. We learn (hopefully) as young children that the problem with lies is that once we tell one, we will need 5 more to cover the first. Or, perhaps, one of my favorite quotes by Mark Twain, "If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything."  As adults we think we can manage and outsmart others with lies. One lie quickly can turn into hundreds. And at one point or another, we look around in the midst of these lies and realize we have dug a hole so deep, we can't see the way out. The thought of digging ourselves out becomes so frightening that we rationalize the lies and continue deeper. Pathological liars can't understand the damage they are doing, and to point it out to them can lead to my next point.

2. They believe their lies.
Each and every one of the nastiest fights I have ever had with my dad, all stemmed from me pointing out that was in fact lying and delusional. It shot him into a fury so horrifying, that I was forced to flee my own house. Pathological liars live in a world of delusion. They have lied so much and so often, that their lies have become their reality.  They cannot tell where the lies begin and the truth ends. 

 And my next three points have helped me continue, in the best way that I can, love my dad:

3. They can't be trusted.
Quite frankly, with anything. This puts a serious damper on the relationship, but you will never be setting yourself up for disappointment. To know the limits of a relationship can help you structure it so that it is most beneficial and pleasant for you or the other person. I have structured my relationship with my dad, so that it is most pleasant for him. I do not ask him to do things that I know he won't. And I certainly don't ask him about things that I know he will lie about. You may be wondering what kind of relationship we could possibly have, and it is a very surface-level, delicate relationship. There are a number of things I could do or say that would destroy everything that we've built, but I understand that he can't be trusted, and therefore, I'm complacent with what there is. 

4. Be wary
My dad will never be allowed to be a shoulder to cry on for me. He has severally hurt me more emotionally than any other person in my life. The hardest part being that he is still in my life. I can't cut him out like an ex-boyfriend or nasty friend. He is my only living parent. So, as I mentioned above, there are certain topics that are never mentioned, at least by me, to him. Nor, is he allowed into the secrets and thoughts of my life. My heart is guarded. The trick of a liar, is that they can make you believe they are telling you the truth. I have learned, over and over, that my dad can charm me, or anyone else, into believing that he is a different person. You should never let your guard down. Never.

5. Love them anyway.
It's incredibly difficult. How can you love someone who insists that you are not worth honesty? The rules and boundaries I put up in my relationship with my dad do not apply anywhere else in my life, I promise. However, instead of choosing misery and anger, I chose to forgive my dad for his lies, past and future, and continue our relationship. I by no means have forgotten. And sometimes, I think I tread lightly on not forgiving him. But, it is not my job to change him. Nor should I give him an ultimatum of having me in his life. My dad has suffered and will continue to suffer throughout his life because of his lies. I am not holding my breath for him to change but have accepted him as he is and the way things are.

 It took the better part of 8 years for me to reach this point. It wasn't easy, and I had to stop listening to everyone around me and do what was best for me. I took time away and then came back to the situation. It made a world of difference.

On a side note, reading and learning about The 5 Love Languages, seriously helped me understand my dad and other people in my life, and I think I might write about that sometime in the future. I find anything having to do with personalities and people relating to each other fascinating, really. It's weird, really. But here's a link to the book if you're interested, which you should be!

The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman

DIY Kitchen Storage Makeover

So....

It's been awhile.

Like a long while.

In my time away, I've moved twice and got married. So, at least I have that as an excuse. Sort of. 

Anyways, my awesome hubby now gets to live the dream of all my DIY projects (he's thrilled), and I've been wanting to share them for so long now! I also want to share some new hairstyles, though these will be for shorter hair as in pixie cut short, because that's what I've been rocking for the past 6 months....

Right, back to DIY. So, I bought one of those kitchen storage shelving units awhile back. You know the ones that have the cardboard backings and seem like a good idea when you bought it because you were broke but then you realize it was actually a terrible idea because it's fugly and always will be. Yeah, one of those. However, after the whole getting married things, we had even more stuff than before, so I couldn't really afford to throw out a perfectly functioning storage space just because it was fugly. So, I decided to give it a makeover! 

(Along with my bedroom furniture that belonged to my great grandmother and had been painted when I was 8 by my mother's friend to pink and purple flowers on white. Not fugly but definitely not appropriate for marriage, let alone my husband). 

Most of my furniture is white and I am obsessed with minty blues, so I dragged my husband out to Home Depot to find some nice paint colors that fit my vision. and I researched first too. I didn't want this to be some afterthought, not properly executed makeover. I wanted it to last. I actually referred to this post a lot. It was super helpful:

http://www.centsationalgirl.com/2011/04/how-to-paint-furniture/

So my first step was buying a primer. I ended up going with her recommendation of Zinnser Cover stain primer with the brown label. I researched meticulously and that one was across the board my best option. I bought a lot of it because, well, I had big plans. But for the amount the price was right. Because of fugly's dark color (espresso) it took two coats of primer. Oh, and no sanding was necessary for this project seeing as it's all particle board and factory made parts. :)

For paint, it's really what you like best. I bought two Behr colors from Home depot, and off-white and a mint color, but I also ended up going to Benjamin Moore to get several other colors, which is an entirely different story. 

I bought Floetrol to help extend the drying time for the paint as well as Minwax's water based polyurethane to protect my hard work. Seriously. I meant business. 

The Floetrol might not be necessary for everyone, but for me it was a must. I am a slow worker and a perfectionist and definitely had some dried paint drops at first that drove me nuts. 

And I did the brush on Minwax polyurethane....but considering I was losing patience at that time, I am likely to invest in the rub-on formula mentioned in the above referenced post.

TA-DA! 

Ah, so much better! The handles on the outside are the mint color as well. And my hubby actually perfected the whole project by using a scraper to remove excess paint in the corners and any dried paint drops. He's the best. Now it matches our kitchen is no longer an eyesore to me. If anyone is super interested in the colors I will go and look in my garage for the names because right now they are escaping me, and then I will post them. ;)

Chocolate Chip Cookies

So it's been....some time. In that time I've found a new job and got engaged. Been a little busy. And all of my fun hobbies kind of disappeared. But I'm starting back up again. And now I have a hubby to do even bigger projects with (whether he likes it or not). 

So I decided I was on a mission to find a good chocolate chip cookie recipe. I know i had one I really liked, but I decided I didn't. And seeing that Pinterest has about a billion I picked a couple and got started. Here is my first one, and I'm not going to lie, they are delicious. Nice and crunchy on the outside and chewy and soft on the inside. I used a mixture of chocolate in mine, since I may have not noticed it called for a full 2 pounds of chocolate (umm what?), but now I can definitely testify that you want bittersweet chocolate chips in these. And actually not chips, you want good hand-crushed bittersweet chocolate chunks.

This recipe also made about 70 of these cookies. That is usually cause for me to freak out about what to do with all these cookies, but we're going to a church BBQ tonight, so now I'll look so thoughtful with all these cookies made....

Here's the link to the blog I used for the recipe, and I'll also include the link to my pinterest, which has this recipe and several others on it. :)

My Pinterest

TENDER CRUMB Blog

Coffee Cheat Sheet

I made this, so I always know all the ways to enjoy coffee.  Mmmmm coffee.

My many espresso drinks to make with my Nespresso maker. Dreams coming true everyday. 

And hey! I painted this whole thing by myself!

Side ponytail.

You can really do anything with the over-and-under idea.  

So I took that idea and made it into many, many smaller loops and started on the sides of the head instead.  And trust me, those ponytails stay. This hairstyle survived a jillian Michaels Workout. You know it's hardcore if it can take that.

Cinnamon Roll Waffles.

Who knew this could be so easy and delicious. But seriously. EASY.  It's easier than baking the rolls in the oven....

Just pop open those Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls and flop them on a waffle maker. Genius! Make sure you grease the waffle maker first though. Then smear with icing, whether included in the can or your own cream cheese concoction.  Mmmm yum. 

Messy Weaved Braid

I included the weaving below the picture, because there's just no way I could explain this coherently. I have lots of fly-aways and layers in my hair, so the braid actually looks better messy than clean and tight in my hair. It's a nice style for a day of errands or just hanging around and nothing fancy. :)

Message boards.

I bought these little wooden quote signs at Michael's too. I love wasting my money on random art projects. But they were only a dollar, so it's technically not even wasting money..... Anyways...I painted them colors to match my walls, and then put the green one by my doorway adorned with my cute little message (I'm a total floor freak). I used stencils for the lettering too because my hand writing is horrendous with pens let alone paint brushes. But, they were fun to make and are cheap too, but I'm not sure what to write on my blue one....any ideas?

DIY Black and White Photo Frames

I really love buying those dollar frames at Michael's and then painting them or modge-podging them. The frames i used here were actually more like 3 dollars, but still....

I painted one a vintage white and then one black. Then I went over them with stencils in the opposite color.  So black got white, and white got black. There's some gray too.  Just really easy and fun. And pretty. 

Cinnamon Sugar Shortbread Cookies.

This was actually a recipe I posted in april, but I didn't have a picture of them at the time. Here's the picture, and I think they should really be called shortbread snicker doodles. Soooooo yummy.

Preheat oven to 350 Degrees


1 1/2 C flour
1/2 C confectioner's sugar
1 TBL vanilla sugar1/4 C cornstarch
1/2 tsp salt (the recipe called for 1/4 tsp, but it was looking very sweet)
1 vanilla bean
1 C cold, cubed butter

Cinnamon-Sugar for rolling the cookies in.

Add all dry ingredients into electric mixing bowl and sift. Then split the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape the seeds into the flour mixture. Next, add the cubed butter.  Mis on medium-low speed until dough just comes together.  Roll dough into 1 1/4 inch balls.  Cook for about 10-12 minutes (I eyed it).  Now in the recipe I used, it said that once you remove the cookies from the oven let them cool on a  wire rack for 5 minutes. Then, in a medium bowl roll them in vanilla sugar and then place them back on the rack to cool completely.  The vanilla sugar tasted great, but it was a little too sweet for me (plus vanilla sugar isn't always just hanging around for people like me), so I did a cinnamon sugar mixture. More sugar than cinnamon because the cinnamon can stick a little too much, but they came out great! 

Criss-Crossed French Braids

This one is a bit tricky to explain. Maybe I'll attempt a video of it next time.  But you section the hair in half diagonally, and make sure that one side has the bottom half of your hair and the other half has the top. Yep, that makes no sense.  You do have to start each braid taking strands from the ear and top of your head though. If you look at the first picture, you can see what I mean. Only one braid is braided all the way through, while the other is only braided to the nape of the neck. then you wrap the completely braided one around the half braided. Okay, I really will attempt a video because it's complicated, I know. :(

Nutella Crescent Rolls.

Pretty straight-forward and delicious (if you enjoy Nutella). I got the idea from "Chef-In-Training." Look her up, she's my new inspiration for all things delicious. 

Take 1 package of Pilsbury Cresent Rolls (I had the 8 pack), spread Nutella on them before you roll them up, and then I sprinkled cinnamon sugar on them too, but you could always do that after they're cooked or not at all! Follow the package instructions for temperature and baking time, and then enjoy! They are just delightful warm....

Coffee Cart

I've always wanted one, and here it is.  Finally, my very own coffee/tea station. 

I just bought a kitchen cart off of target and converted it to my caffeine addiction station.  Can't go wrong really.

Braided Up-Do.

Hey there. So, I moved. And trying to do anything but not go completely insane during moving time is actually quite difficult, so my poor blog had to wait. Only now, am I finally settled and feeling mostly at ease. Sure, painting still needs to be done and fixing up the balcony, but whatever. I love my new place. It's really small though, and let me tell you, I have a fair amount of...uhh....stuff. I've really utilized the whole small space living idea, ha.....

Anyway, here's a hair style I did right before I moved, and I promise, lots more to come!

 First I did a french braid starting from the nape of the neck and went to the top of the head.

 Then...on each side of her head, I did one little twist (the ones where I twist the two pieces of hair in opposite directions of each other). And finally just twisted it all into a high bun.  Messy up-do of sorts.

Braided Headband.

Sorry for the lack of posts. I'm in the process of working extreme hours and trying to find a new place to live. It gets stressful and disheartening. 


Anyways, a simple french braid headband.  

Just section out a piece of hair and separate.  I left my bangs down and some of the front sides. Then french braid the separated section. I pinned back the front pieces but left the braid still hanging down.  My hair was kind of crazy that day...

Coffee Ice Cream Floats.

It's exactly what it sounds like. A root beer float, except the root beer is replaced with coffee. In my opinion, this makes the dessert about a million times better. I even have the cute little ice cream glasses to go with it (thanks Ashley).

All you need is french vanilla ice cream and some iced coffee. I made my own strong batch of coffee and shoved it in the fridge for a day. Then I stopped out some ice cream and poured the coffee until I had the desire ratio of deliciousness. It was like a vanilla latte. But better. I'm thinking of making some chocolate syrup and pouring some of that on top. Or caramel....mmmm, yum.

Maple Cornbread

It's cornbread with a subtle sweetness. Basically, pure deliciousness.


Maple Cornbread
from The king Arthur Flour baker's Companion

1 C flour
1 C yellow cornmeal
1 tbl baking powder
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 C milk
1/4 C maple syrup
1 tbl dark brown sugar (optional)
4 tbl butter, melted
2 large eggs


Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit. Lightly grease an 8 x 8 square or 9 inch round baking pan. I had neither and used a 9 x 5 bread pan.


In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together flour, cornmeal, baking powder, and salt until thoroughly combined. in a small bowl, whisk together milk, maple syrup, melted butter, eggs, and sugar. Add liquid mixture to dry ingredients and stir until just moistened. 


Pour the batter into your prepared pan and bake the cornbread for 20-25 minutes, or until lightly browned. It is best to serve warm with butter or maple syrup on top. but it's not bad in the mornings if you refresh it in the toaster oven for about 30 seconds to a minute on the toasting setting. Mmmm, I want more just thinking about it.

Braid Crazy

Start by taking two small strands of hair from each side of your head, four in total, one from the top and one from the side, and then twisting them together and securing with an elastic. Twist the two strands together and then tie them together with another elastic. See the top of the braid in the picture below if these instructions are confusing. I'm utterly exhausted as I write this, so I'm sure my clarity is nonexistent. Once the twists are secured, start a french braid, incorporating the twisty pieces. Leave the bottom layer of hair out of the braid. Split the bottom layer of hair into two sections and then each section into two more pieces, so once again four in total. Twist the two strands around each other (the way described in hair twists continued) so that you should have two twists on either side of a braid.  then braid it all together and you're done. Sorry if that is massively confusing.

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Sea Salt

Such a simple cookie, yet one of the hardest to perfect.  Maybe it's because it's so popular. Or because so many companies spew out these chocolate chip cookies in bulk and then throw them in a plastic bag to sit on a shelf for months.  I've made a lot of chocolate chip cookies in my life, and this recipe is by far the best. With or without the sea salt. I discovered the recipe on epicurious, and took several pieces of advice from different reviewers about modifying the recipe. And some of my own thought s well. And now, I'll never make a different recipe again.




Chocolate Chip Cookies with Sea Salt

3 C flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
3 tsp sea salt, divided
10 oz unsalted butter at room temperature
1 C vanilla sugar (vanilla sugar can be made by adding about 2 C sugar to an airtight container and adding an empty vanilla bean, or you could add the beans and pod to the sugar as well and then letting it sit at room temperature for at least a week).
1/2 C brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract 
12 oz choc chips, half milk chocolate and half bittersweet chocolate


Preheat oven to 375 degrees and line baking sheets


Sift together flour, baking soda, and 1 to 1 1/2 tsp salt (it depends on how salty you like your sweets) Also, if you don't want the sea salt, just substitute 3/4 teaspoon of kosher salt and it's regular chocolate chip cookies, and they are still so delicious. 


In stand mixer, whisk together butter and sugars until pale yellow. Whisk in the eggs one at a time until thoroughly combined. Whisk in vanilla. If you used regular white sugar instead of vanilla sugar, which is totally acceptable, I would recommend adding an extra 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract. If you're really feeling crazy add 1 whole extra teaspoon. Pour in flour mixture to the butter-sugar mixture. Stir in the chocolate chips until evenly distributed.


Drop by tablespoonfuls onto baking sheets. Sprinkle each cookie with remaining sea salt (or not if you opted for no sea salt).


Bake for about 12 minutes and cool on a wire rack. 


Makes about 60 cookies. I got just under that, and I make my cookies too big usually.