What I learned about Pompeii

I had a day off work in the middle of the week, and I wanted to spend it doing something that I've been putting off. (besides laundry and house work)  I've been wanting to see the Pompeii exhibit ever since I saw the signs for it in the summer, but I kept pushing it back. I made the excuse several times that the museum would be too busy on the weekends. So having a day off on Wednesday was the perfect opportunity to go.

It wast the best exhibit Ive seen and the museum (The Egypt and Mayan exhibits were both better) but I still learned a lot about the disaster. 

Here are the top 3 things I learned at the exhibit.

1. They decorated their houses with beautiful mosaics

The walls, floors and ceilings of many houses in Pompeii were decorated with colourful mosaics.  They were made from tiny pieces of limestone called tesserae. The tiny squares of coloured stone tiles were arranged to make pictures. The most famous mosaic is of Alexander the Great, it was made from around a million tesserae and was found in the largest house in Pompeii, the house of faun.

A floor mosaic of a guard dog

A mosaic of a distinguished lady whose identity is a mystery

2. There was a temple for the Egyptian God Isis

The most preserved temple in Pompeii was for the Egyptian God Isis. The temple had been recently restored due to an earthquake, which is why scientists believe it is so well preserved. Although Pompeii was a roman city Isis was popular among the poor, because she promised resurrection and prosperity.

Egyptian goddess of fertility and rebirth. Found in her temple.

She was adapted to Roman tastes by Greek clothing and hair, yet she still hold an ankh. (Egyptian symbol of life)

3. How the plaster casts were made

The people of Pompeii were buried in ash. As the ash hardened around them, their shape was preserved while their bodies decayed. To make the casts, excavators poured plaster into the hollow pockets and waited for the plaster to harden. Then after a few days they chipped away revealing the shape of the person.

This cast was made in the House of Orpheus, the same house where the dog mosaic was discovered

Seeing the casts of the people was sad, knowing that they could have escaped if they knew what was coming. 

I love artwork so the mosaics and the sculptures were my favourite parts of the display.

Homemade Alfredo Sauce

My boyfriend has been on nights for several weeks so Ive been struggling to make dinners for just me. Its so easy to just reach for the pre-packaged food when you are alone. I decided, after a few bad decisions, like popcorn for dinner, to make myself a homemade meal. Since Darryl doesn't eat dairy, I make all our meals without it, so I thought I would treat myself to something cheesy while he wasn't home.

I saw this recipe for Spaghetti Squash Alfredo on PopSugar and made it that night. I changed it a little to work for one person. Later that week I used the same sauce for some pasta.

Its super easy just add all the ingredients into a blender. If mine looks a little thick in the pictures below its because I forgot to add the milk. I did add it later, but I made a mess, so don't have any pictures to show you.

 

 

I tried it on pasta and it was pretty good. It tasted the best on the spaghetti squash from the popsugar recipe. I highly recommend you try it. Next time I am going to skip the cheese on top, it had enough flavour without it.

Enjoy :)

1920s Dress Ideas for your Office Holiday Party

We got our invites to the work Christmas party last week, and this year's theme is the 1920s. I'm very excited about this.  I loved the book The Great Gatsby, and the movie. I also watch Downton Abbey on BBC and Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries. If you've never heard of the latter it's an Australian show I recently discovered on Netflix. The main character Miss Fisher is a private detective who solves murders while dressed very stylish.

So I have lots of inspiration for what to wear. I want to find a dress I can wear on other occasions, without looking like a flapper girl.

I've searched the internet and these are my favourites so far. By adding accessories like a pearl necklace and a headband I can fit right into the 20s theme. Take those away and hopefully I can wear the dress later, without looking like I'm in a costume.

1.  Unique Vintage Dress $72  2. Asos Dress $117  3. Amazon Faux Pearls $18  4. ModCloth Black Dress $147  5. Amazon Pump $20  6. ModCloth Embellished Dress $159

I think I will buy the one from Asos. It looks very versatile, and reminds me of Edith's dress below. I wish it was in a sea green, that would have been perfect. Maybe I can find a shawl to tie around my waist, to make it even more 20s.

 

Here are some other dresses I like from Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries.

 

 

Next up, I need to figure out how I'm going to style my hair.

Michelle

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Chocolate Pumpkin Pie

 Its Thanksgiving weekend. We don't have any plans for the holiday, I decided not to travel to see my parents and Dare's parents are at the cottage for the weekend. I still wanted to have some type of thanksgiving dinner even if it's just the two of us.  So I've been baking today :)

It started with a pumpkin pie recipe I found on Pinterest.  I couldn't find any gingersnaps at our grocery store so I cheated and bought a pre-made crust. I don't really like pumpkin flavour, yes really, but with the chocolate layer on top, I enjoyed this pie.

You can find the full recipe for Chocolate Pumpkin Tart on the blog, Completely Delicious. Her crust looks amazing, I'm not quite at that level of baking yet.

After filling the crust I had lots of leftover filling. I couldn't let it go to waste so I made cookies too. I turned the leftover filling into cookie dough by adding some flour, oats, sugar, and baking soda.  The finished product was very thick and cake like, but I like soft cookies, so that's okay.

We will be have dinner with all this dessert. (Although I would be happy eating just pie and cookies all day) Just something simple. I got a chicken from the grocery store which we will have with potatoes and green beans.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Tips for your Next Escape the Room Adventure

I did my first escape the room challenge on Halloween this year. It was a lot of fun, and I highly recommend it for anyone who likes puzzles. We did not manage to complete the game in the time frame we were given, but we were close! We were at the end and only had the finale solution to figure out. If we had 10 -15 more minutes I like to think we would have escaped. It was a hard room only 6% of groups have gotten through it, so I don't feel so bad about our failure.

For anyone out there who has thought about trying one with a group of their friends I have a few tips I learned that I would like to share with you.

A photo posted by Company&Company (@realescapeto) on Oct 31, 2015 at 12:37pm PDT

1. Get a big group of friends 6 -11 people. The more brains the better. 

2. Search the whole room first. There may be a clue hidden somewhere that you need to solve the puzzle you are working on.

 

3. Spread out around the room in teams and tackle several puzzles at once.  But don't be quiet, talk out loud and ask for help.

4. You may not need to solve all the puzzles in the room.  Just enough to get you the answer you need.

5. Try to think of it as a real life scenario.  Go though the problem out loud and think what you would do in the situation.

6. If you can't solve something don't waste too much time on it.  Try switching puzzles with someone else.  It might just not be your strong suit. And you may have the answer that another team couldn't think of.

Hopefully these tips will help your group make it out of the room. And you succeed where we didn't.