Pantry day

So today I cleaned out my pantry.  I may have obsessive compulsive tendencies.  I like neat rows and set places for the food pantry. (baking together, veggies on one shelf, ect...) About every 6 months I do a cleaning and inventory.  Quick confession-  I experiment in the kitchen all the time with my family.  They are use to it.  Some things turn out great and others are a bust.  But, isn't that just life.  So today when I found organic peanut butter that NO one liked therefor we will never eat. (we like our sugar filled Jiff...  and the organic stuff was expensive) and a can of expired pumpkin I knew DOG treats, I was not tossing either of these things out.  The peanut butter had set for so long that it separated with the oil at the top. I put on my trusty kitchen gloves and broke up the clumps letting that set for the hour or so it took to clean the pantry.

I started off doing a quick net search.  I know there are "people" foods dogs can't eat.  Chocolate, onions, and garlic just to name a few.  There was nothing even close to what I wanted to do.  I had a can of pumpkin and almost 3 cups of peanut butter I needed to use.  So I decided to just make one up.



So here is what I did.

3 cups of peanut butter

1 can of pumpkin

2 eggs

1 1/2 cups of flour

2 cups of rolled oats.

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

Roll the dough out on a floured surface and cut into cookies.  Bake on 350, for 18-20 minutes.  They will be medium crunchy.  My kids don't like overly hard biscuit treats.

The chocolate wine is mine.. Been a very long day.

As you can see it passed the "lick" test.  (mine love love love peanut butter, they will lick if off spoons I can hide pills in it)  I did a quick taste myself, it was not bad, but not sweet enough for me.  My four legged kids would have loved for me to add some sugar, they LOVE muddy buddies. (but I didn't sweeten it any for them)  We can't even say those words out loud in the house or the begging starts. (and they are not suppose to beg)  One of the things that ALL my fosters get trained is how to take treats.  I hand feed all of them.  This pit mix is more gentle than my little male rat terrier he gets excited, but they all are "hand treat trained".  They will all sit in a row and wait their turn as well.

As you can see after the "taste test" I had kitchen help.

Yeah, I am one of those people that needs the dough to be even.  But to my defense the rubber rolling pin rings were cheap. Only $8 at bed bath and beyond.  I got mine off the net years ago and paid about 10 with shipping, they have 5 different thicknesses.  I want a new set that fits my french rolling pin that could to pie crusts.  (who am I kidding I usually buy pre-made)

I crammed as many as I could on an ungreased cookie sheet.  They don't get any larger. 

Oh, quick confession this made a buttload.  11 dozen.  But with the three dogs, The littles getting one each and the big dog getting 2 we will go through 4 at a time.  And they have each had like 4 each already today.  They seem to like them.  (but I have also seen them clean out the litter box.)

So the next time you have expired food like apple sauce or canned pumpkin think dog treats.

Happy Baking.

Mother's day & Free stuff

A friend of a friend had these chairs.  My friend called and said get them out of her garage, right now and they are FREE.  So I jumped in my truck and away I went.  I got discombobulated on the way home and went left when I should have went right, but oh well I had five more chairs.(And they were all different.  SCORE!!!)  They are missing their bottoms. No worries I am going to use Plywood.  I'll post the fix from the lake house.

I have never messed with cane before.  So away I went on the net.  I thought I'd mess with this on my mother's day weekend. (they made it look easy)

I turned it over and took off the bottom.  As you can see someone had "redone" the seat.

Again the videos make it look sooooo easy.  Well it is not.  So after a good 1/2 an hour I am not sure what I am going to do with this one.  hmm. (well, four free is still great)

On another note the girls got me this for mother's day.. I have wanted this for like EVER... But after tons of research I want the Silhouette Cameo instead, so my youngest is making that happen later today.. Yay me.

The foster that seems to becoming a "foster failure".  (meaning they don't leave foster homes and become permanent)  I was trying to get the Joker smile and instead she closed the mouth and gave me a glare.  She has personality, and blends well.  I may be in trouble. 

Happy Mother's day.

Zuppa Toscana Soup

FREE garden kale from a friend of ours.  The realtor for the lake house.  We don't hold that against her.  ;-)  She grows great veggies & she shares.  :-)

Well, I think ...

Zuppa Toscana Soup

So yummy and so simple.  I always make a big pot of this, my family loves this soup.  Now that Olive Garden sells their salad dressing at the store.  You can do soup and salad at home.

I have played around with other recipes.  But I come back to this one.

Ingredients list

2 lb sausage (I usually use Jimmy Dean) I used a cheap store brand this time.

1 medium onion diced

5 lbs of potatoes washed and sliced

1 tablespoon of crushed red pepper flakes

3 tablespoons chicken base

2 cups of milk (I use whole)

12 cups of water

This is a ONE pot soup.  Total cook & prep time 35 minutes.

While I fry the sausage. I dice the onion.

Put the cooked sausage in a strainer allowing as much grease as possible to drain off.  I sauteed the onions in the pot.  This takes 4-6 minutes on medium heat. 

When the onions are done I toss in the chicken base & 12 cups of water.

Add the red pepper flakes.  I am convinced that if you don't add them right away they stay hard and crunchy.  Bring the water to a boil.  I don't know how long that took.  Maybe 10 minutes with the lid on.

While you are waiting on your water to boil, wash and slice your potatoes.  Also wash, de-stalk & tear your kale.   I use to break out the mandolin slicer to make sure they were all even.  I quickly realized it doesn't matter.

The kale should be bite size pieces.

When your water reaches a boil add the potatoes.  Boil for 6-8 minutes.  When potatoes are done add the kale & cooked sausage.  Stir & Bring back to a boil.

As soon as the soup reaches a boil, turn the heat off and add the milk.  Stir & serve.

For quick clean up, I use a grocery bag to collect the trash. (that and my trash can is not near the island)   I am also a big fan of kitchen gloves.  The store brand sausage was fine.  It had great flavor, but was way more greasy than I am use to.  But I usually get my sausage from Sams club and I wasn't paying what they wanted for Jimmy Dean.

Thank you Angela for the yummy kale.  Now what to do with the other bag of Kale? 

Happy Cooking.

Epoxy

So if you have never painted a basement or garage floor with epoxy.  The directions are simple- mix part A to equal parts of part B.  Epoxy is a simple flooring fix and lasts a long time.  It is easy to clean and offers a variety of colors.

We purchased the garage kits for the garage in Houston, it was simple and we have been pleased with that floor.  This floor had the "garage" kit with the sprinkles when we started.  We did not want the basement family room to feel like a garage.  We had the garage door removed and replaced with a french door, so we knew we wanted to do something different with the floor.   (also the color was "flesh tone beige" .. horrible)  We sanded it, and got it ready for new paint.

We were going for a stone or granite look.  Not sure we got that.

A FEW things I learned from doing this.  1-  more paint is needed then you think.  2- ventilation is SOOOOOOOOO important. (We were so paint high with horrible paint fume headaches)  3- I would have only used the squeegees and no rollers. (we walked on yard spikes to not stick to the floor, golf shoes would work too) 4- a third person would have made this floor easier. 5- even taping off the rooms doesn't make me happy with the "lines" of paint difference between them. (I would do the whole floor at one time) 6- don't try to be in the house for 24 hours while the paint dries. (fumes are crazy)

This is a family, pet friendly floor once all the furniture is in place the I'll post another photo and the floors will not be the main focus point of the room.  Gary loves them.. I am not sure.  But they are 100 times better than they were.   And it is just paint if we get sick of it just paint over it.. (only epoxy over epoxy)

LHB heart art

I picked up a 10 x 10 burlap canvas (on sell for less than $4 each, and decided to do something simple.
I know it is not "perfect" but this is a lake house and things should be fun and light.  I am going to see if I can figure a way to keep the hearts more in line on the next one.  But I still like this one.

  I made a grid on plain white paper.

Then I took a marker and dotted the center of each line on the grid. 

Dots on the canvas.

A dot of glue on each black dot.  Then I took the heart punch and punched on of each color from the color strip sample from my color wheel.

I am doing a red one next.

The tree hugger in me wanted to keep this paint wheel to be “useable” so I took one heart from one side.  As you can see still a very usable color wheel.  Yes this is a Sherwin Williams wheel.  I also took the stationary pin from the bottom and replaced it with a bolt & nut.  From my new home sales days.  I pull one color card out at a time and tape them to walls.  I have the "professional" paint kit with 4x6 color swatches as well.  Colors look very different depending on lighting & surroundings. (furniture)

LHB pots & plants

I knew that I wanted to block this side of the driveway. (so no one ever drove over the edge)  I also wanted a splash of green.  There is a driveway on the other side of that retaining wall/edge that leads to the back, so at the very edge of the house there is over a nine foot drop.

 

Remember this is a lake house so no one will be here to water these little guys during the week.

I am using a beer bottle right now while they are little but I will change them out for wine bottles as they grow.  This works great.  I can water the plant and fill the bottle once a week and the little grasses are happy.  (Just water the plant fill, flip and replace the bottle weekly.)

In the first photo you can't see the bottles at all from the street.  Neat trick.

LHB planks

We were in some little town in Texas, I have no idea where, just someplace between San Antonio and Houston.  I got both of these slabs for $90.  I knew the moment I saw them what I wanted to do with them.  Lake house decor.. But when I got them we had just started looking for the lake house.  So they set in the garage in our Houston home.  Yes I neglected them.  They got eaten on by some bugs, and the bark started to separate.  Here is one sanded down and one in the natural state.

This is my fault, I should have sanded down and put the poly on them right away.

As for the bug holes- I think it adds character.  I did glue the bark back on the wood, I used bungee cords to hold it while I waited for the gorilla glue to set up.  Yeah, I do like my gorilla glue.  It is good stuff.  I did lose some bark completely on both boards on the ends that they were standing on in the garage floor for over 9 months.  I just sealed the ends.  Again it just adds character.  Below is the before.

Here it is sanded up close.

One is completely finished now.  I sealed all the sides, front, back and two heavy coats on the bark. (one coat from the front seal and another when I sealed the back, so the bark got coated from two angles)  It is a semi gloss poly, I couldn't get my hands on any satin.  I didn't want any sheen but semi is better than gloss for this project.

I finally got them on the wall.  I love it.  I used the ook 50lb eyelet hooks, one on each end of the plank.  I then used the 50lb sheetrock hooks.  It was a kit $5 each from Home Depot.

This is where the farmhouse table is going.  We put the chandeliers up.  

I keep moving the stripes around.. Not sure I like them there either.. I like that painting just haven't found it a home yet. 

When doing a vacation home, think rustic and bring the "out doors" in whenever possible.  It adds to the fun carefree ease you are trying to establish.  Set your quests in the vacation mindset.  I want everyone to know that a little sand and mud is not the end of the world.  Have fun.