striped bag

my mother in law insisted that I buy this bag for $1 to carry my yard sale loot in last weekend... good thing I did huh? Where else could Starsky POSSIBLY lay?

burberry?

A $2 yardsale find. I'm certain it's not real, but it is a decent fake...

purdy

I've never had one of these bloom for me before, but this one greeted me last weekend with some huge purple flowers! Gorgeous huh? It's a clementis, should bloom twice a year I believe.

Oh I do love the spring! Here's something I made this weekend with some yard sale finds. I've been hunting down pots at yard sales knowing that I can find something creative to do with them, then sure enough, at one of the yard sales I went to, I saw something similar to this. I took a picture and HAD to make it as soon as I got home. Took one of my little pots into hubby's woodshop and found a dowel that fit appropriately and off I went. No, there is no glue required for this project. I would just make sure of 2 things:

1. Put the pot where you intend to leave it before you 'build' your pots up, I'm thinking this will lead to cursing and complete frustration otherwise.

2. 'Thread' one pot on at a time, dirt and flower it and then move on to the next one. The whole thing gets more stable as you add dirt to the pots, so I would just do one at a time.

I can't wait until my flowers start taking over so it's like a crazy mass of pouring flowers! Yay!

Made it Monday and a confession...

Today I'm going to learn you somethin! One of my favorite snacks is salsa. I could put it on ANYTHING I believe. Of course, I do get a little frightened when I read a regular salsa label, there's all sorts of things in there that probably don't belong. Preservatives, colors, artifical flavors. No good. So today I'm going to teach you an easy peasy way to make your own, most of this stuff you probably have on hand.


Lined up on my counter you see I have fresh cilantro, in my green bag, which I truly believe does work because it's been in my fridge for a month now and it hasn't turned all boiled spinachy, apple cider vinegar, a medium onion, 2 cans of diced tomatoes (read the labels, the ingredient should be: tomatoes) clove o garlic and some mexican seasoning. I also usually add some hot sauce and some lime juice, just whatever your taste calls for. This is a great starter and you can doctor it as you like from here.


I'm a home party girl from way back. This is I've found the easiest way to make this salsa, I use the Quick Chef from Tupperware. It'll run you like $50 from the catalog, probably $30 or so from ebay. I believe they're red now. I feel like i have a bit more control with it than I do a food processor though. I toss the cilantro in first, I just wipe down the stalks and pull the leaves off, just a handful will do it.


I just peel and quarter the onion, the quick chef will take care of the rest. Even quartering an onion makes me cry *sniffle*. Once this is tossed in, I give the quick chef a few turns because I want to get that onion pretty fine as well as the cilantro. While they both have a great taste, neither are something you want to get a whole mouthful of!

Now for my pampered chef plug with my garlic press. This thing does get a lot of use in my house! Just one clove will do it.

Now I add 2 cans of diced tomatoes. These are aprox 14oz cans, you can adjust accordingly though.

probably 2T of apple cider vinegar. At this point I really stir it up good with the quick chef and and make sure it's all mixed in well and chopped as course or fine as I want it. Take a taste and add your spices as you like them. Be creative, when you make stuff yourself, it's all about you!

I mentioned my basic bread recipe in my last post that I used for the cinnamon rolls. Here is the basic bread as it is without any doctoring. Made it in my bread machine last night then covered it and let it rise overnight in the fridge. You can let it rise on the counter (or in the microwave) overnight but sometimes it makes it a bit too yeasty for me.

And now the confession. I have a slight obsession with small kitchen appliances. On my counter currently (which means I use them a couple times a week at least) are a toaster oven, bread machine, crock pot, wine opener, electric kettle. A vacuum sealer also makes a frequent appearance. In my pantry live my stand mixer and blender. So yesterday at Goodwill, D didn't have a hard sale when she tried to talk me into this for $5.

A food steamer. She says she uses hers every night. Rice or steamed veggies she says are a snap in this baby. So for right now, it's going to live in my pantry and I'm going to find ways to incorporate it into dinner prep and we'll see where it finds it's permanent home.

Food

I have an obsession with food, eating it mostly. Not as fuel for my body, but because it's good. I've never had a love of cooking. I mean, I would do it from time to time, but it's so much easier to just throw something in the microwave and call it a meal.

I've been a little put off however recently reading the labels of food and not understanding half the stuff that's in it. I like knowing what I'm eating, and maybe as I'm getting older I'm more concerned about this whole 'you are what you eat' nonsense. So I'm trying to eat only foods that I can read/understand what's in it. I figure this is a pretty big step and I will try to post what I'm making on here with links or recipes so you can join me in the fun!

This first one is easy peasy, just pineapple and cherries. Hubby got me this awesome pineapple slicer thingie for christmas that you just screw into the pineapple and it pops it all out nice and sliced for you!

Homemade granola. Yes, granola has a lot of fat, but you know what? People in the old days ate a lot of fat and stayed healthy. Because they knew what the heck they were eating! This is a great alternative to cereal in the morning, very filling and doesn't give you the 10am droops... Here's how I do it:

8cups oatmeal (I use quick oats)
handful of sunflower seeds
handful of coconut
1c each of walnuts, pecans, almonds and whatever else you may have, finely chopped. I tried doing peanuts too but they sort of took over the flavor
dash of salt
decent shake of cinnamon
stir all this together in a huge bowl, while you're stirring that take a sauce pan and put 1c veg oil and about a cup of brown sugar, I use light because it's easier to find
once the sugar is melted into the oil, pour over your oat mixture and mix well, like I said, you need a giant bowl for this. Break up the brown sugar if it starts to clump and try to get it fairly even in your bowl.
preheat to 350
line a big bar pan with parchment, it usually takes 2, I reuse the same pan and parchment because parchment is pretty pricy
pour about half on the pan and spread it out
toast in the oven for 10, stir it some to flip it a bit then toast for 10 more
viola!
PS. the time between toast and burn is short! keep your nose on full alert!

Soft Pretzles, this was another one of my experiments this weekend while we were blasted with a blizzard here in the midatlantic. I had stocked up on groceries earlier this week so I felt like I could pretty much make anything with my full pantry. I got this recipe from allrecipes.com which is such an awesome site! Went much better than expected too!

Homemade Cinnamon Rolls, these were breakfast this morning and OMG were they good! I have a basic bread recipe that I use:

2 tsp yeast

4Tbsp sugar

1c warm water

1 1/2 tsp salt (I put these together in my bread machine pan and let them sit for 10 or so til it gets foamy

3c flour

3Tbsp oil

I throw all this in the bread machine and put it on the dough setting. Once it's done making the ball of dough, I take it out and throw it in a loaf pan, let it rise for like an hour then bake at 350 for like 30 minutes or until it passes the 'tap test'.

I use this recipe for EVERYTHING. I do my hamburger rolls the same way and I made an awesome garlic bread a couple weeks ago using garlic salt instead of regular and adding a bunch of parmesan cheese and basil before the dough cycle.

So this time, I added a few shakes of cinnamon to the mix before making the dough, then when it was done, I rolled it out flat and put a mixture of brown sugar and cinnamon on top of that. Rolled it all up into a tube then I refrigerated that for a bit, just because it was so squishy at that point. Then I sliced it into chunks and put them in the (greased) pan, as you can see. Covered and put them in the fridge overnight for a slow rise. Popped them in the oven at 350 this morning for 30 minutes and they were awesome!!! I had half a can of buttercream icing so I added that on top but you can also make your own very simply with crisco and confectioners sugar.

I threw chicken breast and salsa in the crock pot last night, not quite sure what would happen but I heard that the acid in the tomatoes would make the chicken very tender. I LOVE mexican food. Salsa is homemade, more on that another time.

So the chicken got done and I intended to make like a taco salad with it, but I suddenly had a major hankering for fajitas. Problem was, no tortillas in the house. Allrecipes.com to the rescue again! I know she says not to substitute shortening for lard, but one thing I don't normally keep in my pantry is lard, so I did it, and it worked, and I will probably never buy flour tortillas again. I took the additional dough (the recipe makes A LOT) and vacuum sealed it in individual balls, hopefully they'll still roll out at a later date.

That's all for this weekend, I'm exhausted from eating quite frankly! Hope all my midatlantic friends had a great weekend at home as well. Us Marylanders don't know how to deal with 2 feet of snow! I for one don't even pretend!

art

As much as I've been nesting in my house, I haven't gotten around a whole lot to actually putting pictures on my walls. I didn't realize it was really missing until I hung some stuff up there. So I've decided to let you in on one of my little secrets. This. Free, whimsical, printable art. Add in some cheapy frames and suddenly your house is a home.

too much, not enough?

It seems like I've had way too much going on to blog, yet, when I think about what I have to blog about, I got nothing! So here's the facts:

- I'm on a cooking binge. I'm trying to eliminate 'junk' from my life, you know, that stuff on the food labels that you can't read? So I'm striving to make wholesome meals and hoping that a healthier (thinner?) lifestyle will come with time.

- Hubby is on a woodworking binge. Hopefully pictures to come. He's been making these great coat racks with shelves over them, EVERYONE has a spot for one of these.

- My desktop died. :o( Christmas Day of all times. Hubby and I have tried to fix it, I think it's a power supply issue, but since both of us work on computers (to some extent) all day, neither of us really has the patience to deal with it, so we're going to send it to the professionals.

- I collected 225 pairs of shoes to donate to Haiti and now I'm obsessed! So a friend and I have started a new drive to collect items to donate to the God's Littlest Angels Orphanage in Haiti. Hopefully we will be successful in that, wish us luck!

We should all read this every day!

'You Are Worthy'

Do not undermine your worth
By comparing yourself with others.
It is because we are different
That each of us is special.

Do not set your goals
By what other people deem important.
Only you know what is best for you.

Do not take for granted
The things closest to your heart.
Cling to them as you would your life.
For without them, life is meaningless.

Do not let your life slip through your fingers
By living in the past nor for the future.
By living your life one day at a time,
You live all the days of your life.

Do not give up
When you still have something to give.
Nothing is really over
Until the moment you stop trying.

It is a fragile thread
That binds us to each other.

Do not be afraid to encounter risks.
It is by taking chances
That we learn to be brave.

Do not shut love out of your life
By saying it is impossible to find.
The quickest way to receive love is to give love;
The fastest way to lose love is to hold it too tightly.

In addition,
The best way to keep love is to give it wings.

Do not dismiss your dreams.
To be without dreams is to be without hope,
To be without hope is to be without purpose.

Do not run through life
So fast that you forget
Not only where you have been
But also where you are going.

Life is not a race but a journey
To be savored each step of the way.
So smile and let the sun shine through.
For there's someone,somewhere, watching over you.

slooooowwwww down!

Written By Regina Brett, 90 years old, of The Plain Dealer, Cleveland , Ohio"To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 41 lessons life taught me.

It is the most-requested column I've ever written. My odometer rolled over to 90 in August, so here is the column once more:"

1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.
2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.
3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.
4. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.
5. Pay off your credit cards every month.
6. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.
7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.
8. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.
9. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.
10. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.
11. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
12. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.
13. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.
14. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.
15. Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.
16. It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.
17. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.
18. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion. Today is special.
19. Over prepare, then go with the flow.
20. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.
21. The most important sex organ is the brain.
22. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.
23. Frame every so-called disaster with these words ''In five years, will this matter?".
24.. Always choose life.
25. Forgive everyone everything.
26. What other people think of you is none of your business.
27. Time heals almost everything. Give time, time.
28. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
29. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
30. Believe in miracles.
31. Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.
32. Growing old beats the alternative -- dying young..
33. Your children get only one childhood.
34. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.
35. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.
36. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.
37. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.
38. The best is yet to come.
39. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
40. Yield.
41. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.