Inspired by a xanga post I read earlier yesterday, I wanted to talk a little bit about being a housewife. I love being able to take care of our home. It’s a big job, and I know that if my husband and I both worked full-time outside jobs the house would suffer for it. But being a house-wife or a house-husband is about more than just housekeeping. (Let’s see, there’s budgeting, cooking, decorating, and some other things…  )

When I first read the above-mentioned post, I was really impressed by the author’s insight into things we might take for granted. I am still impressed. I am a pretty big fan of The Sims, starting from the first version of the PC game, which my best friend and I would stay up all night playing, at times (and go to bed dreaming of smoke alarms and green diamond things over everyone’s heads). I never really thought about all the ridiculous things in the game quite as in-depth as this before:

“If I don’t want to be with you anymore,
I simply don’t call you or invite you over,
and our relationship fades without the
drama of breakups.”

“I don’t have laundry and wearing the
same outfit everyday isn’t gross at all.”

Easy Peasy…

Sounds great! It would certainly make housekeeping much easier. I mean, sure there are some puddles to mop up when the sink breaks – or you could just leave them for a day and they’ll dry up on their own. And, of course, you still have to load the dishwasher even if unloading is magically automatic. I like the sound of that. Every meal take the same amount of time to make and creates very little mess and literally no clean-up aside from the dishes from which you eat. Dust is non-existent, as is mud – due to the lack of rain.

But Not So Different…

But that’s just the housekeeping side. What else is involved in being a housewife? In another post, I mentioned that I liked selling Avon because I could make my own hours. One of the important parts of being a housewife is for me to be able to be good company and a good helper for my spouse. I do that by trying to do most my my work while he is doing his work. That way, when he comes home, we can have a meal together, watch TV, play a video game, or just hang out. This applies even if when he comes home he wants to spend some time alone, doing his thing.

This is an area where I find real life to be very similar to The Sims. When I play The Sims, I find that I have to put quite a bit of concentrated effort into initially growing the relationship of the two Sims who I want to marry. After that, I sometimes forget that they still need to spend time together until one of them suddenly pops up with a wish to kiss his spouse or hug her, or woo-hoo with her. It’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day grind, even in a game like that, and forget that relationships require time and effort. Actually, they require much more time and effort than taking care of the house.

So To Wrap Up

Are there other similarities you see between The Sims and real housewiving? I didn’t want to include too much in one post, but feel free to bring up other aspects of being a housewife that you find equally important! What do you do to take care of your home and your family?

Got leftover ham from Christmas? Here’s a good way to use it up. I found this recipe online and modified it with my hubby to make a tasty dinner for three, and we used up all of our leftover ham! It could have easily been doubled – possibly even tripled – using the same glass casserole pan. There was plenty of leftover space in our pan when it was cooked.

Ingredients:

• One can of Cream of Celery Soup
• ½ cup milk
• 4 small red potatoes, sliced
• About ½ large onion, diced
• 3 cups cooked ham, diced
• Your choice of spices
• ½ to 1 cups grated cheese

Directions

1. Preheat your oven to 375ºF. In a small sauce pan, combine the soup and milk over low heat, blending until smooth. Then, pour into a casserole dish and add spices. I used about ¼ tsp. black pepper and a bit of garlic powder, which are simple staples that I can use in most recipes.

2. Layer the potato slices on top of the soup and milk mixture. Try to spread them out evenly across the casserole dish. On top of that, layer your onions and the pre-cooked ham.

3. Make sure to cover your casserole dish with tin foil before putting it in the oven to cook for about one hour. Then, take it out, uncover it, and sprinkle your cheese on top. We used a combination of parmesan and cheddar. Return to the oven uncovered to cook for an additional 20 minutes. (If you cover it back up, the water from the cheese can’t evaporate, and it makes it a weird consistency.)

4. I would suggest serving with green beans or another green veggie. (I’d say peas, but I don’t like those!!) As I said, it should serve 2-3 people, but could easily be doubled or tripled. It tastes a bit like scalloped potatoes with ham.

My husband and I made this recently, as a sort of experiment, and it turned out quite tasty! It’s a simple recipe for an inexpensive salmon dinner and a good way to use up leftovers. I wanted to document what we did so that we can recreate it, and maybe you’d like to try, too!

Ingredients

1. 2-3 (we used 3) salmon filets, skinless and boneless
2. 3 small red potatoes
3. about 1 cup of steamed rice
4. 3 tbsp cornstarch
5. 2 tbsp olive oil or canola oil
6. 1 can of sliced mushrooms
7. your choice of spices
8. optional: about 1/2 green bell pepper, diced
9. optional: about 1/4 cup onion, diced

Directions

1. Prepare your ingredients. Thaw the fish, chop the vegetables. I would suggest readying a non-stick frying pan with some canola oil in the bottom. In the canola oil, you will scatter the seasoning you wish to use on your fish. I sprinkled garlic powder and onion powder, because I was too lazy to use the real thing. This actually worked well and soaked in to the fish nicely. I’d recommend including a bit of savory and/or thyme, dill weed, black pepper, and seasoned salt. Regular salt should work if no seasoned salt is available.

2. Rinse your thawed salmon and pat dry with paper towel. Then, over a plate to catch the excess, pat on an extremely light coat of cornstarch. I read about this on instructables.com and have found it to work very well keeping the moisture in and keeping the desired spices on the fish. Without it, you’ll find you end up with a very dry piece of fish! Make sure to shake off the excess cornstarch, as it is meant to be just a thin coating. Place in your pan, on top of the spices.

3. On the top of your filets, add a light coating of oil with a brush or a spoon, and then spice the top. I did not use all of the same spices on the top, but I did add a coating of the big flavors: the seasoned salt, black pepper, and garlic powder.

4. Cook on medium heat for several minutes. You will know it’s ready to turn when the pink fish has turned white about a third of the way through, and the bottom of the fish will be a sort of crisp golden brown. Simply flip and wait. Remove from heat after the bottom is the desired color. The fish may be either cooked white all the way through, or with a thin line of pink through the middle.

5. We started the potatoes cut into pieces and microwaved to get them soft. Then, we chopped them up into more bite-sized pieces and added them to pan that the salmon was cooked in. By this time, the salmon should be set aside. You will want to add another teaspoon-or-so of oil to the pan. Add any vegetables that need to cook, such as your green peppers or onions. Add your mushrooms, including about half the water in the can. Black pepper and seasoned salt may be added to taste.

6. Lastly, add your pre-cooked rice. We used leftover rice we had in the fridge. Continue to stir and fry until the vegetables are softened and the rice is slightly browned, then remove from heat.

7. Serve the salmon on a bed of the rice and veggie stir fry, and enjoy! (Good for 2 large or 4 small servings)

Why should you drink coffee?

Because it’s made out of a bean, not a nut. Duh.

No, but seriously. I love coffee. I love it even though it give me terrible heart burn, and I have to take Prilosec OTC every day to counter it. It makes me tall! And strong! And smart!

No, but seriously. (What?) I find coffee to be a great social-interaction-maker. I don’t smoke, so when I worked at an office I couldn’t take smoke breaks outside with other people. However, I could go to the back and pour myself some coffee, and interact with the other coffee drinkers. We have something in common right off the bat! When I worked at the hospital on some days, I could go downstairs to the little snack shop, order coffee, and chat with the other customers about how much cream and sugar we use though we know we shouldn’t. And how expensive the coffee is, and how much better it is to buy it here than at Starbucks, where the prices are so outrageous.

Speaking of which, I think I’m in the minority here. I am a coffee lover who actually likes Starbucks. I don’t go there often because I’m a cheapskate, but if I get a gift card…I’m all over it! I love it. The atmosphere, the flavored coffees, the friendly staff. But that’s okay. Not everyone can be as classy as I am!

To sum it up: you should drink coffee because “it does a body good” – or is that milk? Hmm.

What do you think? Love it? Hate it? Drinking it since you were under the age of five, like me?

I am beyond excited about this website. I’m thrilled because for me, my day job is now my passion as well. It wasn’t always the case. I’ve spent many years working at things about which I’m not passionate. It’s not a fun place to be, and I hated that time in my life with, dare I say, a passion.

I hate how it seems that we’re forced to work without passion. Yes, we’re told we should find a job we love, but if all else fails, find something that pays well. In the end, that’s what we’re pushed to go for. By society. And we have to, because we have to have that well paying job to live, really.

Not everyone can give up their day job for their passion. I was lucky, in a way. But then again, most things that seem like luck are just God working in my life. He has guided me and opened up the doors, putting me where I now stand: at the threshold of my passion.

One thing I know… Even if I’m doing what I’m passionate about every day, it’s still going to be work. My day job is no less of a job now than when I went to Dr. Chiang’s office five days a week to sit at a desk. Despite people thinking that homemaker and self-employed are the same as has it easy, I’m finding that my passion requires real work. I have to set goals, make lists, put in effort. It’s definitely more enjoyable than my old day job. It’s definitely fruitful. It’s definitely worth the effort. Why? Because I love writing, I love sharing what’s on my mind, and I love meeting similar-minded people and making friends!

I wanted to share some of my goals, or, in other words, my passions. I’m in a new phase of life: a new army wife, new to “homemaking,” newly self-employed, new problogger. How I got here is amazing; where I plan to go is exciting!

I want Ocipura.com to reflect me in more ways than it does now, in ways beyond just being decorated in my favorite colors. I want my thoughts and opinions to be easily understandable when my current and future friends read them. I want the site to mean something. I want to reach other military families who “get” me, other homemakers (be they wives or husbands), other animal- and art-lovers. I want to help people understand why I love my God! I want to share my thoughts on marriage and military and the work I do. I want to see more traffic coming to this site and also to my Avon store as I give my honest opinions about products. I even want to welcome those who disagree with me and want to argue their points.

When you come back, you can expect to find a place where you and your friends can hear about opinions and experiences of some one who may be going through the same things you are going through. I plan to include posts about what I’ve learned about home business, homemaking, art (I enjoy casual scrapbooking, drawing, crochet), being an army wife, marriage, and cooking (including recipes)!

I’m excited about the future of Ocipura.com! What do you do as a day job? Are you passionate about it? What would your dream job be??