Christmas with TILTE 2011.

Despite knowing that every other blogger is posting millions of holiday pictures and really, nobody cares about holiday pictures unless they're featured in them, I'm still going to post a shitload of my own Christmas pix.

I can't promise they're going to be entertaining. But since this is my blog and I call the shots around here, I'm just going to do it anyway.

Christmas 2011, Featuring TILTE and Family.

Decor...

My favorite wrapping paper this year: Purchased at the $.99 Store

Holiday cards on display

Our tree

Wintery decorations at Boyfriend's relative's house

Nativity at Boyfriend's parents' house

Biscuit being a regal beagle


My Christmas cookies in the making


White Russian. AKA dealing with baked goods that take fucking forever to make


A cooking staple at my Grandma's house

Family Time...

Pearl and her cousin playing in the yard

Mom showing off the new scarf I got her

The kids were mesmerized by A Christmas Story

"Come play with us Danny..."

Grandma talking to relatives in far away places

Me and Boyfriend

Pearl and her Grandpa

Gifts and Miscellaneous...

Red Robin gift card - Holla!

Biscuit's wearing her Chippendale's bowtie

Pearl and a LaLaLoopsie (I hate those scary ass dolls)

One of our top favorite gifts: New plateware!!!

Boyfriend's super shocked face over THE BEST GIFT EVER (that I happened to get him)...

...CUSTOMIZED GUITAR PICKS.

Special Moments Caught on Film...





Worth noting:

-I've turned into a hermit and can't bear the thought of going into work tomorrow. Even though I love my job, I'm hurling at the thought of having to wake up early and sit in traffic.

-My breakfasts for the past four days have consisted of cookies and Earl Grey.

-In related news, I've outgrown every item of clothing I own. Even my scarves.

-My actual Christmas night dinner consisted of a tuna sandwich and Lay's potato chips. Since our official celebration meals took place on Friday and Saturday, neither Boyfriend nor I had any desire to cook/ clean/ go out for food. It was fucking delicious.

Was my Christmas everything you imagined it would be???

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Christmas 2011.

My life has been super hectic lately, as I'm sure everyone else on the planet's has been. This year, Christmas has been creeping up quickly on me, much like a ghetto thief hanging around the parking of the local Wal-Mart.

Just so we're all on the same page here, this is what I've been busy with.


We had a "Cookie Decorating" party at my mom's house. As you can see, the kids went crazy with the sprinkle shit. By round two of cookie decorating, all the supplies were gone.


They also made a really easy candy-type recipe my mom found, called Peppermint Bark.


Lastly, all the kids made Christmas Pomanders. If you've never made these, they're easy and make the house smell great.



I met the star and director of the film Bellflower. He was super nice and we hung out, shooting the shit, in the Humor section of Barnes & Noble.

(My coworker pointed out that I was dressed like Fred from Scooby-Doo.)

Biscuit's made some guest appearances at my office lately. She LOVES being a hard-working professional. Especially on "business casual" days.



We had my company holiday party at The Delphine in Hollywood. As I'm sure you all have guessed, I'm not a high-roller and would probably not go to a place like this on my own. So, I was very excited and felt like a pimp daddy. Unfortunately, the food was a thumbs down. On the positive side though, my hair and makeup turned out great.



And because I like to save the best for last, here are some special moments caught on camera. These are from the "Lazy Eye Club". (Click to enlarge)

This one was my original pick for my TILTE Christmas photo. However, it was too embarrassing, even by my standards.

So on that note...

Happy Holidays from the TILTE household!

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Snickerdoodles.

The other day, I woke up from a nap in a Snickerdoodle frenzy. After a short Google search, I made up my mind on this recipe.

SOFT SNICKERDOODLE COOKIES

INGREDIENTS:
-1 cup butter
-1 1/2 cups sugar
-2 eggs
-2 3/4 cups flour
-2 teaspoons cream of tartar
-1 tsp baking soda
-1/4 tsp salt
-3 tbsp sugar
-3 tsp cinnamon

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350.

2. Mix butter, 1 1/2 cups sugar, and eggs.

3. In a separate bowl, combine flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt. Blend dry ingredients into the butter mixture.

4. Chill dough and ungreased cookie sheet in the fridge for 15 minutes.

5. Mix the remaining sugar and cinnamon.

6. Make 1-inch balls of dough and roll in cinnamon mixture.

7. Place on cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes.

8. Remove from sheet immediately.

(Unfortunately, this is the only picture I took. In real life, they don't look quite so much like they were dropped in sand.)

NOTE: Since each oven is different, I would suggest messing around with the cooking time a bit. At the 10 minute mark, my cookies came out gooey in the middle. 11 minutes, 30 seconds worked perfect for my batch. They were still soft.

Juju Bee @ Food.com did not let me down. These cookies are simple to make and I had all the ingredients already in my kitchen. They're a great baked item to take to holiday events since they're kind of festive (cinnamon!) and take no effort. And by "holiday event", I mean for those days when you call in sick so you can stay home and watch DVR'd episodes of Judge Judy.

Boner'ppetite.

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A Funny Story About My Dog.

I know what you're saying.

YES, it's another post about Biscuit. And YES, this blog is supposed to be about food. And YES, I am looking great today.

I'm still a little burnt out from the Thanksgiving fiesta, so I don't really have much to share on the food front.

Which means you get another story about my dog.

And before you get too involved, BE FORWARNED: This story has to do with poop.


On the December 24, 2008 (two weeks after we'd adopted Biscuit), my boss called an in-office meeting even though we all had the day off. It was going to be a short meeting and my coworker Grant and I were both allowed to bring our newly adopted pups.



During the meeting, Biscuit was full of energy. She was only a 2.5 month old puppy, so it wasn't surprising that she spent the hour pulling and tugging and yelping and just being an overall nuisance. I had to put her on a leash because otherwise she would take off running throughout the office or chew up naughty things like the Play Station cords. (I'd like to add- Grant's dog Stella was a total DREAMBOAT and just slept in his lap the whole time. Some dogs should take note (Biscuit, I'm talking to you.).)

My boss, who thought he was a fucking dog whisperer extraordinaire, offered to take the leash so he could demonstrate how to get a dog "under control".

Not long after, Biscuit wandered outside the conference room. Still inside the office suite, but outside of view.

I noticed the slack on her leash wasn't moving. Like all of a sudden she wasn't curious about anything and everything in sight.

Something seemed wrong.

I quietly got up from my seat and walked towards the door to see what she was doing.

That was when I saw it.

She was squatting to take a pee.

After a quick "Oh fuck", I ran to the kitchen to grab the roll of paper towels. I ran straight back and unrolled what I can only guess was about 500 paper towels to soak it up.

As I pressed them onto the floor, making sure to BLOT, not WIPE, I realized something was wrong again. In the split second between realizing "Uh-oh" to when I lifted my head and looked over at Biscuit, I saw the last thing any employee (who actually LIKES their job) wants to see...

Biscuit was positioning up for a shit.

INSIDE.MY.BOSS'S.OFFICE.

I quickly leapt (like an actual leapfrog) from the lesser-important pee spot over to Biscuit.

Somehow in my horrible realization of what was about to go down, I forgot to bring the paper towels with me.

And it was too late to turn back for them.

Because the shit was coming.

Literally. She was shitting.

It was just like in the movies where the main character is looking left and right for something and then at the last second they do something real crazy-like.

Which is exactly what happened.

Because I reached my hands out...

And caught Biscuit's poop.

In my hands.

Hot, steamy, soft-served poop. In my hands. While I'm kneeling in my boss's office.

This was seriously the biggest poop I could have imagined coming out of that little body, because not only was there enough to fill my hands, some turdage also landed on the carpet.

Thankfully, I managed to be hidden behind walls during this whole disaster. And lucky for me, nobody has the image of me sitting on the ground holding hot dog turds on Christmas Eve burned into their memory (like the way it is in mine).

From here, the action wraps up pretty quickly.

I throw the shit out in a trash liner, tie it up tight, and toss it in the main trash. I soak the carpet through with 409. And I burn my hands off in an incinerator.


A few months later, I was laid off due to company cut backs.

I didn't feel so bad about the shit anymore.

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What's New with Biscuit?

Many* of you have been asking how Biscuit is and what she's been up to these days.

Here are some updates:

She had to go to the vet a couple weeks back for a mysterious gaping, oozy wound on the side of her neck. Thankfully, it was just a "hot spot" that had gone awry. The vet gave her a shot of steroids and sent us home with a daily ointment (and a nice little $160 bill).

Since her hot spot was in just the right positioning that a funnel collar was pointless, and bandage wrapped all around her torso slipped off within minutes, the vet advised that we put an old t-shirt on her to prevent scratching and irritation. As soon as I heard about the shirt suggestion, I knew the perfect thing.

I KNEW THIS DOG COAT WOULD COME IN HANDY ONE DAY.


Last week, I saw this cool dog toy at Bed, Bath, and Beyond.

It's a dog puzzle where you hide little treats under each slide-able circle and the dog has to sniff around and figure out how to get to the treat. It was a little pricey, but it was one of those "smart" dog toys that keeps dogs busy for hours. I figured it would be good for those long days when Boyfriend and I are at work.

Yes! Great idea!! I'm pet owner of the year because I think about smart dog toys to keep my dog entertained for hours because she's a fucking dog genius and needs brain stimulation all day long!!! High five to myself!!!

Yesterday, Boyfriend came home to this...

Hm. Not exactly the outcome I was hoping for with my new genius-dog-toy.

Or maybe she's smarter than I originally thought.






*None

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We Hosted Our First Thanksgiving.

When it comes to cooking a Thanksgiving meal, I've heard some horror stories. Everything from forgetting to thaw the turkey, to forgetting to take out the giblets, to overcooking, to under cooking, to putting the thermometer in the wrong part of the meat, to the thermometer not working, etc.

That, coupled with my not-exactly-stellar cooking abilities meant the potential for things going wrong this Thanksgiving was in a zone I'd like to call "EXTREMELY HIGH".

Did I mention, neither Boyfriend nor I had ever made a turkey before...?

So Boyfriend and I were in shock and awe over the TOTAL MOTHER FUCKING SUCCESS that was Thanksgiving 2011. We pretty much high-fived each other all day long.

The menu went as follows:

TILTE and Boyfriend in charge of...
-turkey
-mashed potatoes
-asparagus
-rice pilaf
-sweet potato casserole
-rolls
-cranberry relish

Mom in charge of...
-apple pie
-pumpkin pie
-cranberry fluff
-stuffing

Sisters in charge of...
-cheese ball appetizer
-crackers
-drinks


Our preparations actually began probably two weeks before, when I started hoarding non-perishables like the people on those crazy couponing shows. Except, like an asshole, I totally forgot to buy my fresh herbs until the day before the dinner (which was actually the day AFTER real Thanksgiving). I went to two local grocery stores and both "herb" sections were picked clean. Except for Tarragon because nobody fucking buys Tarragon.

BUT THEN...

The produce guy at Albertson's was my superhero when he brought me a "Thanksgiving Plant" that had the exact three herbs I was looking for: Sage, Rosemary, & Thyme.


My next hero was a pack of Knorr Homestyle Stock that was a freebie from BlogHer. I used two little tubs to make stock for basting the turkey. Adding stock to the bottom of the roasting pan was a savior. And as a non-turkey-maker, I had no idea anything even needed to be added to the pan.


Since I'm not a big fan of plain old turkey, we opted for one of those fancy looking, "herby" birds. The recipe we used for the herb-butter can be found HERE. It was delicious tasting and looking. And it made the house smell like we were legit chefs and shit.


The house was all set up for guests.




People started arriving. While Boyfriend and I slaved away in the kitchen, everyone mingled and ate homemade cheese ball.


All the food was ready for serving by 5:30.

Only 30 minutes late, which is great if you ask me because I'm always late and with a menu like this, things were destined to not only be late, but really awful too. But they weren't awful. In fact, everything turned out great. AND it was all ready at the same time due to meticulously planning out how long each item will take to prep/ cook and noting exactly what time to start said item.

The blessed turkey.

The herb-butter was a hit. However, next time I would probably cook it for a tad longer.


Table 1 of 3. With some extra tables, everyone was able to eat in the dining room. All twelve guests.

That's right.

We fed twelve people without making anyone sick. And trust me, if we had made anyone sick, they would have called to complain by now.



Afterwards, everyone split up around the house and found their preferred lazy spot.

Mom and sister watching TV in the bedroom...


Brother and his middle finger...


Boyfriend relaxing from our victory...


And yours truly. Practicing my greasy Barbizon model pose for the camera.

Awww, and Biscuit with her hologram eyes. (Contrary to what you've heard about Jersey Shore's Sammy the Sweetheart, BISCUIT is actually the sweetest bitch you'll ever meet.)


All the kids had their own thing going on. And since they had free reign to do whatever they wanted as long as no one was being an asshole, there was lots of running and hiding and it seemed uncomfortably close to Lord of the Flies.
Also, there were costumes.






And just because I don't want any of you thinking my nephew is some kind of bohemian hooligan, here's a picture of him being "normal" with a mouth full of whipped cream.


Also. A pic of my sister. So there's that.


And just so we end NOT on a note that points out how weird we all are, here's a shot of some pie.


Now that you've basically participated in a home cooked TILTE Thanksgiving, are you as impressed as I am??

Probably not.

But it was a completely success in my eyes.

Boner'ppetite.

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