Five Things

Taken at 7:08 P.M. from our balcony

The first week of daylight savings time is always a thrill.  You realize all the fun you've been missing by being at work during that extra hour of sunlight.  It's especially nice for me and John this year because it means an extra hour of playtime for Harper outside.  We've made it to the dog park a couple times this week already, and Harper says she has grown accustomed to this new life and can't go back.  I couldn't agree more!

Our friends Ray and Hannah sent John this amazing toffee from Elaine's Toffee Company for his birthday.  It was literally the best toffee I've ever had in my life.  I will search for it in every store I walk into until I find somewhere to buy it in bulk.  The genius of this toffee is that the each 3-4 bite piece of toffee (which is the perfect texture - hard but not too hard) is coated with chocolate individually.  That way you have chocolate on all sides.  Unbelievable.

How could I not buy this?  A cake stand for an individual cupcake is just something I couldn't walk away from.  I'm not sure who else is buying these other than food bloggers, but I'm just happy it exists.  John, on the other hand, is protesting this post because he believes I shouldn't be able to post about said cupcake stand until I've made cupcakes to showcase it.  Hurumph.

While visiting Sur La Tabla last weekend I stumbled upon this cookie book on sale for $8.99 plus an extra 20% off.  Don't mind if I do!  It has the best cookie recipe from every year 1941-2009.  Maybe if you're nice I'll make you the cookie of your birth year on your birthday!  I hope 1982 is a good one!

I was originally laboring under the illusion that I needn't buy a pepper mill because I could buy the Trader Joe's pepper that came in a plastic mill.  Well after eating huge chunks of pepper for a year, John and I bought a salt and pepper mill set for the dinner table from Crate and Barrel.  It looks pretty, but barely functions.  So I went from plastic to barely a step above plastic and have now succumbed to the wonder that is a Peugot pepper mill with six settings of grind.  Considering I grind pepper 6 out of 7 days of the week, it really made no sense to be using pepper mills that were so bad.  I know I'm trying to justify the steep price tag, but I'm hoping this one lasts me 20 years (or until I get tired of the color).