I have been crushing on patterned floor tiles and graphic stone flooring for some time, but have not determined if I could be swayed into this sort of carpet.

{Apartment Therapy}

{Country Living}

{Ann Sacks}

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Hi everyone!  I just wanted to let you know that you now have the option to receive EAD Living in your inbox.  Simply click on the link below to subscribe – email is delivered via Feedburner once per day.

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I hope you’re having a wonderful weekend!

xoxo,
Ami

Those of you who have gotten to know me know that I am absolutely a sports freak.  So this time of year is absolutely my favorite, because especially in an Olympic year, I am in sports heaven.

We start off the year with the US Figure Skating Championships.  The men’s championship blew me away.  Although I am an Evan Lysacek fan, Jeremy Abbott has been growing on me.  I adored his short program choreography and his long program simply blew me away (and blew the field away too!).  If you are an Olympics fan, don’t you dare miss the men’s final, because it will simply rock and the US has three legitimate medal contenders!

{photo credit to NBC}

Then, we move on to the Australian Open.  Huge tennis fan here.  Lots of late nights were spent watching the Aussie Open, and I was thrilled to see Serena gut it out and win, although I would have loved Murray to pull through.  Shame Roddick didn’t make it further as well.

{source}

Next up, we have the pièce de résistance, the Winter Olympics.  From Feb 12-28, I will be glued to the television.  The Olympics are, to me, one of the last pure things in the world – seeing athletes come together under a common spirit to strive to perform their best when it counts… it just doesn’t get better than that.  During the Winter Olympics, my husband and I literally watch every single minute we can.  Obviously, as a former figure skater, that is near and dear to my heart, but we love it all, right down to the curling.

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As you all know, I’m a mommy to the most adorable puppy in the world, Charlie.

I am a firm believer that dogs should only eat foods that contain ingredients that are natural to them and should not contain any byproducts, antibiotics or hormones (I should preface this entire conversation by saying that Charlie eats FAR healthier than his father and I do!).  Charlie’s favorite treats are chicken strips, and we have always purchased the Vitality chicken strips made by Dogswell.

Recently, my mom and I were having a conversation about pet treats and food, and she let me know that Dogswell had switched to having their treads produced in China.  I was horrified.  There are all sorts of FDA warnings about dog foods and treats made in China (you can google to find lots of articles about this, here is one). I looked on the back of Charlie’s bag of chicken strips and, sure enough, there was a teeny-tiny-need-a-magnifying-glass-to-see-it “Made in China” at the bottom.  Into the trash they went and off on the hunt we went for a brand of chicken strips not made in China.  We found none.  Seriously.  Lots of treats made in the US, lots of ones he likes, but none that are his favorite kind of treat.

So we decided to take matters into our own hands.  We went to Bed Bath and Beyond for a food dehydrator and to Whole Foods for chicken breast pre-cut into tenders, and not only was it relatively inexpensive (around $40 for the dehydrator and $3-4 for a 1/2 pound of chicken) but Charlie L-O-V-E-S the dehydrated jerky.  As in, every time I open the fridge he goes nuts because he thinks he’s getting jerky.  :)  And, I know what I’m feeding him is completely natural and healthy and it’s really no trouble to make.  Simply bake the chicken as you would if you were eating it, then pop it into the dehydrator for about 6-8 hours until it’s hard enough to break in two.  Store in fridge.  Done.

So the moral of the story is, watch the products you are feeding your pup.  I felt insanely guilty when I realized I hadn’t been inspecting every single bag of treats that I purchased!

Any good healthy-treat recommendations for Charlie to supplement his jerky addiction?

I was perusing my recipe index the other day and decided that the cupcake section was too chocolate-heavy. Not that there’s anything wrong with chocolate, but I’m an equal-opportunity cupcake lover. So off I went to find a non-chocolate, non-fruity cupcake flavor.

Dulce de leche has been on my radar for a long time (plus it’s all the rage right now), but I’ve always been hesitant to go through the high-risk process of making it at home. It involves boiling a can of sweetened condensed milk, bad news for accident-prone little me.

So I decided to spend the extra dollar and buy a can at my local Latino grocery store (I later spotted it in the ethnic foods section at Safeway if you’re not lucky enough to live near a Latino grocer). That dollar was completely worth it. Rich, moist brown-sugary cake, topped with a rich dulce de leche buttercream and drizzled with a bit of straight-up melted dulce de leche. These are equally worthy of a special occasion or a work lunch on a random Tuesday. ¡Buen provecho!

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