Dog-gone-it my pups are spoiled

I know it's not Foodie Friday but I just had to post this. I made these biscuits Wednesday for my pups from the "Three Dog Bakery Cookbook" by Dan Dye & Mark Beckloff.

I was only able to capture McKenzie eating hers as the other 4 puparoodles scurried off & left me with flashes of a furry blur. Gosh darn I love my furry kids!! LOL

Monkey Business

One of the projects I am working on: A stuffed crocheted monkey for my dear friend's baby shower this weekend. They are having a girl & the nursery is going to have a monkey theme. It's going to be rather big...hopefully baby Ava won't be afraid of it!! Ok, off to work on my monkey business...literally =)

Spinning Yarn

One of my favorite things to do is spin yarn. I've talked about it often & many friends have shook their heads in disbelief when I tell them what it is. Seriously, it's relaxing, teaches control and it's soo rewarding. Plus the feel of the fibres as it runs through your fingers is nothing less than exhilarating!!

I purchased a large amount of roving from a woman who sets up shop at the Gas & Steam Engine Village at the fairgrounds. A couple times a year the Association has activities that we partake in. Just this past year we decided to join the Association. I look forward to sitting in the yarn shack spinning yarn & crocheting with the other ladies this coming Autumn when they do their annual Gas & Steam Engine Show. But, tonight as I sit in my recliner, my youngest dog by my feet & the fireplace going, I am spinning yarn & imagining what I will make out of the finished product.

Foodie Friday: For our feathered friends

This is not a "human recipe", rather it is for our feathered friends. After all, they need to eat in the winter too. All too often people only feed the birds in the summer months. Winter is a hard season for our feathered friend up north so we feed in winter as well.

I gathered up some pine cones when we were in Massachusetts from Nana's & took them home thinking I would use them all for decorating & whatnot. Well, Ken's Nana really enjoyed feeding the birds so I opted to use the pine cones from her yard rather than our Upper MI ones.

What I do is take a couple cups of wild bird seed, a handful of dried fruit, and enough peanut butter to make it spreadable & smear it on the pine cone, attach a loop of yarn around the cone & hang it on our lilac tree in the front. Birds flock to these lil things & eat it up. Sometimes the squirrels get to the cones after the birds are finished & chew on the husks & the yarn can be used in the birds nests. A perfectly green recipe for our outdoor feathered friends.

Hope you are having a fantabulastic weekend & have a very happy Valentine's Day.

The stories our walls tell

For those who don't know, we bought this house 4 years ago from a friend of the family. For three years before this purchase we lived in an old fifth wheel camper when we weren't on the road. We lost our 1st house in 2003. The previous owners were best friends of my parents. I had heard years ago it was my Mom & Dad who got John & Helen together. Now years pass, Mom & Dad pass away, Helen passed away & John decided to go live in an assisted living home. We could not pass up the deal on this home. We knew the house had history with my parents. We also knew the home had a history of having "unpaid guests" Now, say what you will but we have had numerous occurrences happen in our home since we bought it. We have seen & heard things, lights turn on, our dogs snarl up the stairs, Ken has felt "someone" pass him on the staircase...the list goes on. We are not afraid of our home however. In fact, we feel blessed to be here & we take great pride in our old house & take great care when we do remodeling. Any sort of changes seems to stir up the activity in the house.

Anyways, last week we decided after 4 long years of not liking the dining room & den that we would remodel. The house is in complete array right now so I won't share oodles of pictures. Instead I would like to talk about this one....


We had a built in desk/curio cabinet along the one whole wall. When we took the bank of drawers out this is what we found: 1 completely empty vodka bottle, another vodka bottle with a tiny amount in it and a cabinet making book from 1949.

I posted a few pics of the whole remodel on my facebook for friends to see & because almost all of the pics have "orbs". Now keep in mind, we know the family who owned the home prior to us. Sandy, who is John & Helen's daughter commented on this particular picture & said that she remembers when those bottles & book were put there. This is what she said:

"I remember when my dad put the vodka bottles in the wall, Donald and Thelma came over that night. They shared what was in the empty bottles, and then they (dad and Donald) put the bottles there for kicks, mom was upset but laughing. They said in 100 years who will give a shit, and then he threw his cabinet book in there too. I will tell you there ... are many stories those walls will tell, and I know exactly which ones have the biggest tale, I will say be careful with the sledge hammer you never know what is behind old walls;). I often think I should have bought the house, just so I can dig stuff back up. I will tell you one spot if you have not already removed. The kitchen counter top that was by the sliding doors. Every time dad would place something to be covered up for the future mom would say "John Rickel I might want that", or she would say "I might need that" of course, he never listened."

We are having fun finding out the stories beneath the walls but at the same time, we are sooo ready for this project to be done!!

Lookie Here

Meet my new friend...she doesn't have a name yet & I'm not sure if she'll ever have one...but she's brand spankan new. Even the dent on the lower left hand corner was put in there by us...well the hubby actually cuz he really doesn't exhibit much as far as patience goes & he ran into the door while carrying it. Hence why he's not a doctor!! Ok, that was lame!!

We had an old jalopy of a washer that came with the house when we bought it. But she worked nicely until...she had a sudden seize this past week. She would fill up with water & it wouldn't drain or spin at all. Her twirling days were over...Ken was thinking he would be able to fix her, that it would be mechanical. But alas, her motherboard or something electronical went on her & we had to part with the 20 something year old beaut.

We both had desires to get a front load energy efficient model. Those things are beyond gorgeous & are supposed to save big buckaroos & are way awesome for the environment. All pluses in our book. We did some research & found that their electronical system lasts about 5 yrs...now, to pay a handful of hundred $$$'s or a grand or more how would that save us any money at all in the long run seeing we'd be replacing it in a handful of years? We priced them around town, checked online to see what they usually go for, did comparisons & in the end we bought this one at Sears. Don't get me wrong, the dandy bright, shiny green front loading green beaut had me almost drooling, envisions of doing laundry in it were running through my head. I could picture me with that having "loads" of fun with her. Really. That's how pathetic I am. I quickly snapped out of it & told Ken I would love to have the Kenmore in the picture. Anything with the name Ken in the brands works for me =) I anticipate a long, productive life for her.

After she was installed, the 1st load put in we started gutting our den/dinging room. Talk about chaos!!

Foodie Friday: Twinkie Cake

Oh wow, this week whooshed right by without a single post. I didn't plan it that way I assure you. On Sunday night I decided at the last minute to go on the road with my hubby. We got home on Tuesday night. Wednesday I caught up on my domestic goddess duties around the house that I had missed the previous days. I'm pretty anal about staying on track with my cleaning schedule. I'll talk more about that in a different post. Anyways, I had hoped to write something witty yesterday while in between loads of laundry but the darn washer decided it would be a fine time to croak...and the hubby is on the road so I'm yet another day behind schedule. I honestly can't tell you where yesterday went & I'm not all too happy I basically got nothing done. So that brings us full circle to Friday & I cannot NOT post this recipe!! I made it a week ago & that very same day it was GONE!!! No joke!! It's that delicious =) I'm not a huge Twinkie fan but occasionally enjoy chowing down on one. But this cake...yeah, pretty much kicks all sorts of bootie!!

Twinkie Cake

1 yellow cake mix

1 pkg instant vanilla pudding (I used the big box)

1 cup water

1/3 cup oil

3 eggs

1/2 tsp salt (I omitted this)

Filling:

1 cup water

5 TBSP flour

1c. sugar

1/2 cup oleo

1/2 cup Crisco

2 tsp vanilla

bit of almond extract

Mix all of the cake ingredients together in a large mixing bowl. Pour into a 9 X 13 inch pan lined with wax paper. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 to 40 minutes. Cool and turn out onto tray. Split into two layers. Put top half back into pan.

Filling: Cook 1 cup sugar and 5 TBSP flour on stove top until thick, stirring constantly. Cool and add the sugar, oleo, Crisco and extracts. Beat until thick and light like whipped cream. Fill cake. Put other layer on top. Chill cake (if you have the patience...we DIDN'T! and it was still delish) Keep in refrigerator (if you actually have any left...we didn't) May be frozen.

One more thing...I also made this with a strawberry cake mix & holy bean bags Batman!! Scrumdiddleeeumtious indeed!! Today I am going to have a good ole date with my kitchen & try this with a lemon cake. =)

Foodie Friday: Homemade Veggie Soup Kathy style

Happy Friday folks!! So this is week two of Foodie Friday. I tried several recipes this week and most were sweets so I figured I better show you I DO actually eat healthy-ish meals. This soup really has no recipe but this is what works for us. We prefer a tomato type sauce rather than a brothy one. It made a honkan kettle full...so big that we still have some & even put some in the freezer for later meals. Perhaps I should call it never gonna get to the bottom soup!!

4 cans veggie broth (or make your own stock)

1 jar home canned stewed tomatoes (or you can use a store bought one if you wish)

1 jar homemade tomato sauce (or 2 small cans of the store bought stuff)

a bag of broccoli

half bag of cauliflower

bag of green beans from the garden (or store bought)

2 cups of corn (that you were smart enough to cut off and freeze that you bought at the Farmers Market this past summer

1 big honkan onion chopped

a good couple handfuls of carrots cut up

salt & pepper

garlic powder or if you're like me you'll mince some fresh stuff up. A dish without garlic is pretty much a sin in our house.

Put all of these ingredients & any other veggies you need to use up into your large sized crockpot. Let it cook on low for a handful of hours. Once the veggies are cooked add a couple cups of barley & let that cook until it's done. Serve with homemade dinner rolls & that my friends makes one delish meal!!

Until next week...Happy eating

Guess who made our dinner?

Guess who made our dinner tonight? If you guessed Stone's Downtown Deli you'd be right!! We hadn't planned on going there tonight but my brother, Kelly called this afternoon & inquired about it. So we invited ourselves & made it a mini family shin dig. You have to remember I have 20 siblings...

Mike, Kelly, Joe & Laurie ordering their food.

They even have big enough tables for a mini shin dig of Pepin's!

My brother Mike on his way into the dining room.

I got Kelly to stop and pose too

Hold up Joe!! We've gotta take your picture too!!!

And my sis Laurie making her grand entrance

Once again...two happy people...who happen to be full of some scrumptious food =)

Stone's Downtown Deli

These are pics of one of my most favorite places to eat downtown. Stone's Downtown Delicatessen. The building is old (as are all our buildings on our Main Street) What character though!!!

In previous years this building was The Wiffletree. They sold men's fine clothing there & rented suits. Even then the place was filled with character.

I didn't get a picture of the deli part of it but you can sit on either side. This side is where they have gourmet coffees, smoothies & ice cream. Charming huh?

The food is out of this galaxy folks!! I kid you not! We try something new each time we go & we have never had anything that hasn't been anything less than delish!! In fact today was so into his food that he was moaning as he took each bite. He told me that the sandwich he was eating was THE BEST sandwich he has ever eatin'....IN HIS WHOLE LIFE!!!

Clearly a full, happy couple!!