Everything is food-related these days.  I decided to replace my old faux-Pyrex blue glass casserole dish that I bought back in my student days (possibly a Big Buds special) and replace it with something a little more grown up.  Something that would actually make the food look good coming out of the oven and not eerily blue.  (See full food-fug photo here.)

I am planning on making this gnocchi recipe tonight in it.  Mmm.

I popped over to Elgin St. to the home store and run some errands.  I ended up with this “homestead” casserole dish.   I’m not sure when bus tours decided to start making the home store on Elgin a tourist destination, but the place was packed.  Weird.

On the to-do list for today:

• go to the farmers market
• snooze
• read food magazines with Orville
• cook
• snooze
• pat the cat

• The OC Transpo driver joked with me yesterday to not have the baby on his bus.  Ha ha.  Yeah, believe me that is NOT going to happen.
• Entered the sore and swollen feet days.  Shopping is not a cure for swollen feet.  Sadly.
• Trekked to Hull today to pick up paperwork… hopefully the last trip to Hull for a looooooong time.
• Made more sweet potato burritos for the freezer.
• Cruised the Orange Cat pool on Flickr.
• Delivered mittens and patted kittens.
• Started reading In Defense of Food (halfway done already!  a great read!)

• Two new important discoveries happened over this weekend and both are gelato-related.  First, maple scrock may be the best flavour ever.  I don’t know what scrock is, but here’s what I know… it’s awesome.  So awesome, I had it twice.  It tastes like a Toffifee candy… but not quite as sweet.  Mmmm.  Thank you, Pure Gelato.  Second, peanut butter and jam flavour gelato is delicious.  It’s not quite scrock, but it’s pretty darn good.
• Visited Robyn’s new kittens and got to imagine what Orville would have been like as a kitten.   Answer: totally adorable.
• Devoured scones at Hava Java.
• Tried the new Umi Cafe on Somerset and the Lydia vegan ‘orange chocolate chip’ cookie  (which sadly, didn’t have a lot of orange flavour and I’m pretty sure it only had ONE chocolate chip.   Maybe I just had a freak cookie, but skimping on the chocolate is not a good way to win over a pregnant lady. ) It’s nice to have a Bridgehead alternative in the ‘hood.
• Had a nice grown-up meal at Kafe Oz… because it may be a while before we get back.  It’s still one of the best dinner spots in town.
• Made significant progress on some knitted mittens
• Took too many cat photos
• Had a coffee for the first time in like … 10 months??  Needed to kick up my blood pressure a bit because  I am too zen.  Didn’t really enjoy it, but it did the job.

Wow, most of those bullet points were food related.   Some things don’t change.

First, I totally confused Orville by staying home.  He meowed and meowed in confusion trying to get me out the door and off to work.  I think it tired the little guy out.  Finally, after much kitty frustration, he collapsed on the spare bed with me reading cookbooks.

Then, I decided to make some chocolate-zucchini cake.  Technically, it was pattypan squash and not zucchini… but close enough.

After a power snooze, I went down to the Glebe to check out the farmers market and see what day-dwellers get up to.  Maybe it was luck, but I didn’t have to wait at all for a bus and people moved from the priority seating.  It was a bus miracle!  Daytime rocks!  The market is pretty sparse on Thursdays with just a handful of stalls.  Still, enough vendors were there to come home with a decent haul of carrots, eggplant, beans and blueberries.

Then I got busy in the kitchen again making dinner - it was the Indian carrot salad recipe from Jamie at Home.

Oh yes, and I mixed up some dough for the flatbreads in the breadmaker.  Yum.

Poor Orville crashed in the evening after all the cooking.  At least he crashed in his new bed.  I was starting to think he was never going to use it.

As for maternity leave: day two.  Let’s just say, it has started off by recaulking around the tub.  Must learn to chill out.

When I tried the tops on way back when with the ‘fake baby belly’ pillow at the maternity store, I thought there was NO WAY I would ever be that huge.  Well, the pillow didn’t lie.

With today being my last day at work, I won’t have to worry about “front mooning” anyone on the bus.

Tip of the day: Forget t-shirts, buy dresses.   No drafts, no front mooning.

Three years ago my now husband (then boyfriend!) decided to adopt a cat.  We had been living together in our new apartment for all of 25 days before bringing Orville home - in fact, we didn’t even own a couch at this point.  To me, a cat seemed like a more priority apartment essential. (We didn’t buy a couch until months later!) Before we moved in together, I lived in a little bachelor apartment and it didn’t seem fair to have a pet in such tight quarters.  So I waited.  Of course, as soon as we moved into a bigger apartment together, I immediately started cruising the adoptables at the Ottawa Humane Society.

I saw Orville’s photo and thought he looked like just the right cat.  I must have checked the website for at least a week and he was still there everyday.  His profile said he was living with the adoptables at the Emerald Plaza SuperPet, so off we went to “look” at Orville.  I figured if he was still there, it was meant to be.  At SuperPet, he was housed beside the biggest cat we had both ever seen.  That cat was the size of a small pony!  We got a bit distracted by the giant cat before asking to see Orville.  Once the clerk had plopped Orville in my arms, it was pretty clear he was the perfect cat.  He was very happy to be held and purred nonstop.   Sold.

Oh, he was so quiet for the car ride home and those first few days but then his true orange nature came out and we realized we had adopted a chatter.  He’s a super friendly little guy and I couldn’t imagine arriving home after work without him running to the door to greet me.

Happy anniversary / birthday / homecoming Orville!

Project #1: fix the leaky toilet.    After a glance at my “Do it yourself” guide, I figured it was the rubber flapper that had worn out… and happily, it was a quick five-minute fix.  No special tools required.  Problem solved!

Project #2: re-caulk the area around the tub and tiles.  This project is definitely a weekend project due to the time required for the caulk to cure.  Supplies have been purchased and ALL of the instructions have been read.

Aside from home improvement, there’s been cooking and a lot of cruising for recipes online.  Have you seen Smitten Kitchen’s latest recipe for roasted eggplant?  Yum.  I hope to get back to the farmers market this Thursday to pick up more of those fairytale eggplants.    And definitely more cranberry beans.

Basically, the only things I think about these days are baby, napping, Orville, food and home improvement.  And figuring out when the next episode of Gordon Ramsey’s “Kitchen Nightmares” will air.

I think I need to take a page from the book of Orville and put my paws up for a bit.