Over? Already???

Good Evening Internet Friends!

WOW!!!  I cannot believe that weekend is OVER already!  I had "SEW" many BIG plans for this weekend.  Alas.....minimal accomplishments on that front.

This morning in addition to laundry, dog walk, and house cleaning I did meal prep - dinner and lunches for the week.  As part of this preparation I made Poppy Seed Cake with cream cheese frosting; one of my favourite comfort foods:

Not gonna fib.....but between kiddo and I this is almost GONE!

After lunch we headed out to The Bay as kiddo needed some new jeans.  All looked like supreme flood pants.  I also picked up a new pair of every day boots for myself as my current work shoes need to retire.

Arriving home I finished up dinner.  Roast beef with fresh mushrooms, onions, mustard and sour cream spent the day in the slow cooker.  I have found that the No Frills not too far away from here has an amazing selection of fresh veggies.  I still do most of my grocery shopping at Costco but this place has a unique medley or things I cannot get at Costco or simply do not need the size of.  In the refrigerator I had red onions, garlic, broccoli, green beans, carrots, parsley and zucchini that I chopped up and roasted along with a small bag of baby potatoes.  Dinner was DELICIOUS!!  Plus......we have left overs now:

Served with a head lettuce salad with cucumbers, tomatoes, radish, green pepper, green onion, and celery dinner was complete.  

After more laundry, kitchen tidy and dog walk I did spend a bit of time in my craft room.

With the exception of the 4 corner blocks my 52 Week Star Block Challenge from 2016 hosted by A Needle Pulling Thread Quilt Shop is complete:

TAH DAH!!!!  

Will stop at Sew Divine tomorrow on my way home and hopefully get some border and binding fabric for this "sew" I can get if off to be long armed.

Hope this inspires your own creativity and wishing you all the 

BEST Day EVER Monday.

Kathy

In the Kitchen...

Good Evening Internet Friends!

A very long and busy but very productive day at work.  Arriving home I was tired but needed to get dinner ready and not just dinner for this evening but something that will last a for left overs for tomorrow's dinner.

Last week I purchased the MOST amazing eggplant.  This evening I decided that I would make a Ratatouille for dinner using vegetables from the fridge and my home made tomato sauce:

SO YUM!!!!

I paired this side dish along with a ground beef, onions, garlic, red pepper, green pepper, celery, mushroom, and sweet potatoe skillet simmered with the remaining home made tomato sauce:

So good that kiddo ate extra helpings.  

Now that I had left overs taken care of for tomorrow evening I set about getting organized for lunches for two more days of school and work.  Banana bread was my solution to round out the lunch boxes: 

There just might be extra chocolate chips in it too!

While the banana bread was making I made Block 6 of the Jewel Box Block Challenge that A Needle Pulling Thread Quilt Shop is hosting.  "Sew" far this year I am still on track.  Meet Block 6:

 And here are all 6 together:

Now to see what else I can get in to before heading to bed.

Hope this inspires your own creativity and wishing you all the 

BEST Day EVER Thursday tomorrow.

Kathy

BEST Day EVER Sunday!

Good Evening Internet Friends!

Doggie woke me up at regular time to go for a walk....apparently he did not receive the memo that it was THE weekend.

After returning home I decided that I would make French Toast for breakfast and use the fresh raspberries I had in the fridge from earlier this week:

Delicious of course, but this innocent breakfast is responsible for almost everything that happened after.

I used the last pieces of bread to make the French Toast and that meant I needed to make bread:

Dough rising in the sun beam looked so awesome.

Additionally, while I had been getting the raspberries out of the fridge I also remembered the 5 lb bag of beets that I had purchased at the same time as the raspberries because the beets were TOO good a deal.  So.....out came the food processor portion of the Kitchenaid and 5 lbs of beets and 2 lbs of carrots became:

Added some freezer peas,onions, some of the dill I dried last summer and Borscht soup for lunch was a GO!

Bread was baked and turned out FABULOUS.  Doggie was sitting in front of the oven door as usual waiting for it to be done so he could get the heels.  He did of course and was super happy:

Nothing tastes better than fresh bread in my opinion.

The Resident Cookie Monster had also mentioned as I was getting underway with all my baking/cooking projects today that the cookie jar was nearing empty!!!   Horror.  Well.....crisis was averted as I made Sea Salt Caramel Chip Cookies from a package of chips I had in the pantry:

These are pretty tasty!!!  You can try to eat just one......But......

Back to the refrigerator where I took out a zucchini, a red, yellow, and green pepper along with some spinach that was all going to need to be used up this week.  I decided that lasagna for dinner would take care of all of these vegetables and so that is what I made:

This should get us through dinners at least part of the week as it is a five day work week for me and a five day school week for kiddo.  On top of that all extracurricular activities will be resumed this week.  

While all of this baking and cooking was going on I also did an amazing amount of house cleaning!  Everything is washed, vacuumed, polished, scrubbed, and cleaned in some form.  The house looks and smells like HOME which is great because it was three months ago today that we spent our first night in our new home.  🏡

So.........a GREAT day thanks to doggie not getting the weekend notice memo.  

Hope this inspires your own creativity and wishing you all the

BEST Day EVER Monday tomorrow.

Kathy

It's Back to Work I Go...

Good Evening Internet Friends!

Crazy busy day here in Kathyland again as tomorrow is back to work and school.  Kiddo will get a few breaks with semester break, PD days and non instructional days but for the next three months.....I work.

Did lots of cooking/baking/food prep today:

First up....this awesome salad that I used fresh veggies from the refrigerator to make.  Salad dressing is a recipe that I found in the latest edition of Costco Connection.  All veggies except for the green onion are from Costco.  My friends and family all know my mantra..."If you can't buy it at Costco - do you really need it?"

Then it was on to a batch of Rotten Banana Bread as my brother refers to it.  I will only eat bananas just as the green starts to turn yellow.  Any yellow or brown on the banana means it is "rotten" to me and needs to be made into muffins or bread:

For dinner I made a Shepherd's pie with more veggies from the freezer and a package of lean farm ground beef.  Used sweet potatoes for the topping:

For dessert I made an apple crisp using the frozen apple pie filling that I stashed away in the freezer last fall 🍎:

SOOOOOO Yummy.

In addition to housework, laundry, clearing snow off the deck and walking the doggie I did manage a bit of SEW time:

Blocks 17 & 18 of the Red and White 2017 52 Week Block Challenge hosted by a A Needle Pulling Thread Quilt Shop. 

Hope this inspires your own creativity and wish you all
the Best Day EVER Monday.

Kathy

Clean Up...

Good Evening Internet Friends!

I have been on a huge clean up of my house intermittently for the past year or so.  I really have NO idea how so much junk has managed to find its way in here and I am not longer disputing the idea that maybe some of it reproduced.....there may be second or third generation junk in here. It is not that my house is mess, there is just MORE stuff than what I would like.

Dinner this evening was also in keeping with the theme of clean up.  You know the vegetables that look a little sad at the bottom of the fridge a week later (okay, I know.... no one else has these) well I chopped all of the peppers, broccoli and onions up with some chicken breast, tossed with some salt and black pepper and some of the Garlic Olive Oil I picked up yesterday and along with potatoes put it in the oven to bake:

Turned out great considering it was the sad looking vegetables:

After dinner I went down to my craft room with the intent of organizing and sorting some more but then decided that I should start on the next section of my Flowers for My Wedding Ring Quilt.

After scratching my head for a bit and a few failed starts I think I finally got how the flying geese paper pieced borders are supposed to go together.....follow the instructions on the paper like the other blocks:

"Sew" there I am!!   Tomorrow I will try and get a few more done as I will need 22 of these sections in total to surround the quilt.  

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Whirlwind Sunday....

Good Evening Internet Friends!

Well, my three day weekend is over and now back to work for 4 days, off for one and then evenings this weekend.  I can always account for my days yet always seem to wonder where the time goes.

This morning kiddo and I were up bright and early because we had to help his Boy Scouts group organize and inventory all of their equipment for the upcoming season.  I started a load of laundry before we left.

We returned home after lunch to carry on with the laundry (we were cold though cause it started to rain on us) and get ready for school and work this week.

First off because the weather seemed rather nasty outside I cut down all of my chive plant and chopped it up and put it in the oven at 170 F for two hours to dry:

All chopped and ready for the oven on top of a piece of brown paper.

Two hours later I have almost a cup of chopped dried chives.  These are now living in the freezer for use in cooking in the upcoming winter (which right now seems like tomorrow).

I decided that I better start working on some of the veggies from the haul last weekend so decided a quick way to get rid of lots in a hurry would be to make borscht:

We had some for dinner and will for lunch as well tomorrow.  The remainder has been packed into containers and is bound for the freezer as I really did not feel like starting the canning process late in the evening (today anyways).  

Nothing tastes better in my mind than soup with fresh bread so I made Oatmeal, Multi-grain, Whole Wheat bread:

YUM.  My favorite with butter!

For dessert I used the last of the fresh rhubarb from the refrigerator and made Rhubarb Crumble Pie:

I LOVE this dessert!!!  So Yummy!!!

Now of course in typical me fashion while all of this was going on laundry was not enough to keep me occupied so between loads and batches I also worked on:

Socks!  I wore my wool socks today and they were amazing as always; I was cold but my feet were not.   ☺

Thrum Mittens because it is getting cold out (as I have mentioned a few times....right?).

Both of these yarns are from my Yarn Crush/Sock Crush subscription boxes.  As I sat knitting these today I realized that part of what I love about these boxes is that the boxes only contain yarn from Indie Yarn Dyers!  As you likely know I love supporting small and local businesses and these boxes allow for me to expand my yarn intake more than I probably would on my own as right now I have 4 favorite Indie Dyers and pretty much always use these.

I will post more details later in the week about each of these, but for tonight I think I shall go to sleep.  It's been a long but very good day. ☺

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

What am I Doing Now???

Good Evening Internet Friends!

I went out over the weekend to the farm to my garden.  Not sure who had the brilliant idea to plant all those carrots, beets and potatoes but whomever it was was NUTS.  Now I know this is no where near the garden my mother used to plant.... but in my defense she fed five people; I feed two all the time, and three when hubby is home from camp so no real comparison.

Here is my version of a tailgate party for the September Long Weekend: 

There are carrots, beets, tri-colored carrots, onions, rhubarb, green, yellow and purple beans on the tailgate.  

Potatoes red and purple ( I do not grow white or yellow potatoes cause I just don't like them). ☺

I really wanted to leave the pumpkin until the weekend but was worried with the temperatures dropping something would happen to it and then I would be upset.  In perspective this pumpkin is larger than a gallon pail.

Tomatoes, red, purple and yellow!

This evening has been spent blanching the tri-colored carrots!

While the carrots are boiling and cooling I have started working on my latest knitting creation.

For the past 14+ days I have been driving the F 350 Super Duty Crew Cab with an 8' box as my daily vehicle.  This means that there is no heated underground parking garage for me when I arrive at work.  To park the truck I have to park almost 3 blocks away from work and walk.  Every morning it seems to be a little colder on my hands.  

Since I love knitting (it is still my favorite of all crafts and let's keep that in perspective I learned to knit when I was 8 years old and it is always part of my daily life) I decided it was time to knit myself a new pair of mittens.  My yarns are all from Indie Yarn Dyers.  There are so many fabulous yarn dyers here in Canada.  Just about the time I think I have found my FAVORITE yarn, I find another that I love just as much if not a little more.  I love being able to support these Indie artists and the work that they put into the wool that they choose and the dyeing process to get the unique one of a kind colors.  Most of the yarn that I use is wool, sometimes I will get a wool with a silk added to it.  It is rare for me to use commercially prepared yarns as I love natural fibers and the feel of true wool for my projects.  I also love these more natural wool yarns because I have a lot of allergies and skin sensitivities that are not affected by the yarns I get from Indie yarn dyers.  I always encourage people to try these not as processed wool yarns before they give up on wool because it is just so amazingly soft, comfortable and warm in winter.  ☺

Cast On and away I go!  

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

It's A Kathy Kind of Day...

Good Evening Internet Friends!

Yes, I am still up and I started this day a little after 0600 hours this morning.  Starting to feel tired so might sleep more than four hours tonight.

I had big plans to get all my "stuff" done here in the city so that I could get out to the farm and get the rest of the vegetables out of the garden.  Before I could do that though I had dill and chives that I wanted to dry for use later.  Cucumbers, beets, carrots and beans to pickle.  Beans and carrots to blanch and freeze.  Zucchini shredded and in the freezer.  Beets, dill, beans and carrots to turn into borscht.  Laundry to do for back to school and work this week.  Pack up the stuff to go to the farm as well as food and clothes for over night.

Well, here it is late at night and all the veggies have been processed, the laundry is almost done and I am still home because that was a lot to do, and then it started to rain again...

Kiddo helped me make pickles (cause he loves them):

He helped wash and clean and prepare all the veggies.

He helped pack the jars:

The first batch into the canner.  In total we have 14 quarts of Dill Pickles!  YUM!

The first batch processed and starting the cooling process.

We were both tired after getting all of this done, Kiddo gave up on me shortly after lunch.  Now came the question of what to make for dinner!  I decided that tonight felt like a pizza night.

I made a batch of whole wheat basic dough.  It turned out fantastic!  Kiddo ate almost half of an 18" pizza!  Lots of veggies, beef and cheese.  

 One of the things that was on sale at Costco this week was a package of Fresh Mozzarella.  OMG on pizza this stuff is amazing!!!  I will definitely purchase this again.  Oh wait, have I ever turned down a cheese.....I'm thinking....... if I ever get an answer I will let you know.  Here's the pizza:

After dinner I sat down with Kiddo for a bit and we watched some tele and I knit a bit.  Then it was time to tidy up.  After all that I decided to finish the last load of laundry.  Since I was near my craft room I finished Block 3 of the Scandi 3 Quilt that I picked up recently:  

TAH DAH!  This is Block # 3.  

Here they all are together:

One more of this color to do and then I can move on to the next color.  In total I will make 25 blocks for this quilt.

I did take a few pictures today while doing this to explain cutting the diamonds and squaring up the blocks but right now I actually am tired so will head off to bed as soon as I get the next load of laundry underway!

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

At the Farm again. ...

Yesterday morning I loaded up the car and my son and I headed out to the farm on an extended road trip.

We stopped in Ponoka, Lacombe and Blackfalds for of course you guessed it; Fabric!  I will post pictures  of my new stash additions when I get home tomorrow  or Monday.

Today I weeded  the garden some and dug up some of the veggies to take home and can or freeze this week:

After dinner I worked on my Jelly roll quilt.  I had the main part of the quilt done but thanks to a trip to my new friend Sharon's house earlier this week I was able to get a border from her awesome stash and the outer border fabric as well:

It's cat fabric!!!!

Okay, here is the quilt:

This evening we decided to have a camp fire as well:

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

In the Dark...

Good Evening Internet Friends!

Yesterday was one of those days where I tried to pack as much as possible into the day.  I was up by 0730 (even though it was Sunday) to get all my vegetables taken care of.

I pickled all the cucumbers, all the yellow beans, blanched green beans and carrots all before 2 pm.  Laundry and some more general house cleaning were included with the festivities.  Then my son and I headed out into the river valley riding 28 km in the river valley:

The weather was hot and it was a great ride, and the city looked pretty.

We got home had dinner and while my son started his bedtime preparations I thought I would get a batch of blueberry jam made and that could process while I read my son his bed time story.  Two minutes away from the jam being ready to jar the power went out.  U^&*()_)*(&*^%%$^&*!!!!

Seriously.  Worse yet, it did not come back on.  A check on my phone of the city's power web page let me know that a power line was down and it would be at least 2 hours before power was restored.   At 11:38 pm the power came back on.  I had to re-boil my jam, get the canner back up to boiling and process my jam.  Bedtime at 1 am.  Somehow I have dragged through today and am still up....

Here's my first batch of pickles:

The first batch of veggies:

As of this evening all veggies are bagged and the pickles are on the shelves.  Can't wait til the pickles are ready to try...

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy