Alabama + Graffiti

It was honestly  just a matter of time before a cheese curd recipe made it to this blog.  Being from Wisconsin, squeaky cheese reigns supreme.  I actually found a bag of cheese curds in the local Publix, so knew that I had to fry them up!

 

WHAT YOU NEED:

1 lb cheese curds

3/4 cups buttermilk

3/4 cups flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp garlic salt

1 egg

1 1/2 quarts vegetable, canola or peanut oil

WHAT YOU DO:

Using a thermometer, heat oil to 375 degrees F.

Whisk together buttermilk, flour, baking soda, garlic salt and egg until smooth.

Coat several cheese curds with batter.

Fry a few at a time. (Warning!  My oil splattered more than it normally does with these, so be careful!!)

Drain on paper tool.

Enjoy while still warm with some marinara!!

These are like mozzarella sticks, but twenty times better!  If you can find a bag of cheese curds, I highly recommend frying them up!

 

I wanted to join in SUYB today, but August wasn’t kind to me in the reading mojo department, so I’m going to talk about our Labor Day weekend instead.

Friday we drove down to my dad’s beach house in FL.  It was just me and Sheffield making the trip, and he was so good for me.  AND, we had zero stops which was a record!  We made good time and got to his house just in time for dinner.  Sheff scarfed down a PB&J, and immediately got into his swimsuit to get into the pool.  My step-mom made us some shrimp and some crab cakes, and OMG, so good.  I was pretty exhausted from the drive and work, so turned in pretty early.

Saturday we woke up early and went to  Café Aroma for bagels and doughnuts.  And we spent literally the whole day in the pool.  I mean, we were in there from like 10am to about 530 pm.  My dad had bought a model Ferrari, and shared putting it together with Sheff.  Apparently it will now be a thing for the two of them!  It was so fun!  Then we sat down to watch the Derby – it’s tradition to pick a horse, and the person whose horse comes in last has to take a shot!  That happened to be my step-mom this year, and she took it like a champ!  We got showers and sat down to a BBQ dinner from a local spot down there.  I wish I could remember the name, but the brisket was AMAZING!

Sunday, we woke up early to get more doughnuts from Café Aroma.  And we were out the door at 830 to head to the beach!  The weather was absolutely beautiful.  We played in the ocean, went for lots of walks, and came home with a bag full of shells.  We had a cookout with burgers and potato salad and margaritas for Labor Day.  We ended the night watching Driving Miss Daisy, and eating a crap ton of pimento cheese!

Sheff and I drove home early on Monday to avoid the traffic coming back – we had another burger cookout and watched Harry Potter with the kid.

All in all, it was a pretty great little weekend.  Sheffield was so well-behaved, and we both came back with a little sun.  I hope you all had a great long weekend as well.

Oh, I don’t even know where to start with this post.  To say that during quarantine, my body image struggled would be an understatement.  There were memes everywhere about people gaining weight during quarantine, calling it the quarantine -15, like it’s some giant joke that only thin people are in on.

Quarantine with my body image issues was and continues to be, a challenge.  During the first part of quarantine, I was shoveling appetite pills and bloating pills into my body like they were M&Ms.  So much so that it messed with my period, and I went a good three weeks thinking I was pregnant, despite negative pregnancy tests.  I wasn’t really eating more than normal, and I was working out the normal amount, but somewhere in my brain, I kept telling myself that I was gaining weight.

And there is no proof of this – There are no scales in my house for that reason.  It was all what I “saw” in the mirror.  My clothes still fit – but when you go down the rabbit hole on IG of all of these people losing weight and getting fit during this time “off,” you sort of start to feel like a fat slob.  Like people who I saw were losing fifteen pounds, and I’m like FROM WHERE??!?

Quarantine was difficult in this household- both my husband and I work full-time, and we had a pre-schooler who we were trying to keep on some semblance of a schedule.  And even though we did a pretty good job about it, there was still a massive amount of stress.

I broke down one night to my husband telling him all of the above, and he said something like, “Why don’t you just stop following all of those people? ”  And it shook my world.  I HATE that a little over half a year ago, I was touting all this body positivity that I was learning, and that I was going to get better, and then March hit, and I took a  huge  setback.

After this breakdown with the hubs – I believe it was the next day or two that Nadine sent me a curvier blogger to follow – Bonnie Wyrick.

And it was amazing.  I saw a woman, who had gained weight due to pregnancy, still living her best life, with wine IN A CROP TOP!!  She didn’t care if people knew her weight, and she loved herself.  She did these amazing try-ons with normal clothing, and was showing off her amazing body, and I was in awe.  I’m pretty sure within the next week, I had bought a crop top of my own.

After that, I started following a ton of women who looked like me – I unfollowed the accounts that made me feel like shit, and started to see myself in these beautiful amazing women.  I saw this post below on IG, and it’s so true.

It’s just not worth it.  I know that I will continue to struggle with my weight and the way I look for, probably, the rest of my life, but I am learning that a Twizzler after lunch probably won’t kill me or anyone around me, and that pizza nights with my kid aren’t something to punish with an extreme workout the next day.

Baby steps, y’all, baby steps.

This week has been tough – and long.  I thought it was Friday on Wednesday, and that just messed with my head for the rest of the week.  Work has been crazy busy, and let’s just say that I’m super glad it actually  is  Friday today.

Wednesday was Sheff’s last day at daycare.  We woke up early so we could go and get doughnuts for the teachers.  We gave them a card (which I bawled all over while writing it), and got a picture with the director.  Y’all – it is so hard to believe our journey with Cathedral Day Care has come to a close.  I remember touring the place and crying my eyes out.  I remember crying so much on the first day of drop-off, but that place ended up being like family.  Those teachers loved Sheffield, and it was an incredible experience.

The very next day, Sheff had his first day of kindergarten – sporting a brand new big boy ready for school haircut!  I talked earlier on about how weird it felt to be dropping him off at a brand-new school that he had never been in before.  I packed his lunch for his first day (apparently, it takes two days for the money to be uploaded into their account – but we didn’t know that until actually putting money into the account), packed up his snack, his blanket, extra pair of clothes and his water bottle.  I cannot believe the confidence of my kid – he hopped out of the car, with his little shark mask on – and went straight into school.  I have no idea where he gets his braveness and confidence – certainly not me.

To say I was so excited to pick him up after his first day is an understatement.  I could not wait to hear all about his first day!  He told us that PE was his favorite, that he sat at a circle desk, that there are seven kids right now in his class and they all had cool masks on:  they all played together on the slides at recess.  And they did a lot of coloring!  He couldn’t remember where I had packed his snack (face palm), and he ate something from his lunch for his snack.  He said he really liked his teacher, and was bummed this morning when I said he didn’t get to go back until Monday.  Today is kind of a free day for him since they are not starting the virtual assignments until next week.

It is going to be a very strange first school year – but we will power through it, Sheffield probably doing a better job than his mom.  I hope he continues to love school as much as his first day.  I hope y’all have a great weekend.

I’m not going to lie – these past few weeks have been the most stressful of the year.  B and I have been stressing non-stop about the start of school, what all that entails to our daily schedules, how the remote school days will look, how is Sheffield going to adjust – plus all the crap garbage floating around on the internet about how people like us are bad parents for sending our kid to in-person school.

Luckily, my sister took Sheffield on Saturday night so B and I could have a night out.

We first went to check out Monday Night Brewing’s new Birmingham space.  They were collecting ties for their tie wall in exchange for a pint glass.  We also got a couple of new t-shirts to support them.  Can’t wait until they’re open – they have a really beautiful space with lots of outdoor seating.

After that, we headed over to Carrigan’s Beer Garden (in Brat Brots old space) – and it was so great.  They pretty much still had the same foods (with some of Carrigan’s favorites, like the corndog), plus you could walk up to any one of their kiosks to order drinks and food, take a number, and the servers brought everything out to you.  We got the giant pretzel and the brat corndogs.  Also tried a super pretty cocktail that included amaretto and baby’s breath.  They are family friendly, and they have indoor as well as outdoor seating.

Then we headed over to Mayawell – a cocktail bar near Pepperplace.  And y’all!  Their drinks were amazing.  They were completely adhering to social distancing guidelines, and we sat out on the patio.  We were there for about two hours, just trying cocktails and chatting.  My favorite was the strawberry margarita, and their watermelon cocktail.  They also had a food truck out back, and it smelled delicious.  We will definitely be back to try more cocktails and that food!

We had originally made reservations for dinner, but ended up canceling them in favor of take out from Makarios.  We played Mario Kart and watched old Jeopardy’s until it was time for bed.

It was such a good “start” to the crazy week that we are currently smack in the middle of – we have curbside meet the teacher tonight, Sheff’s last day of daycare tomorrow, first day of in-person school Thursday, and first remote learning day on Friday.  Someone please pass me all the tissues and queso, because I am going to be a straight-up hot mess this week.