Pinterest "Board"

I'm a big fan of Pinterest, always finding new ideas and creative projects on there, and was very amused to find this display in our local mall.

Small Projects

I was also happy to be around my craft tools once again. My knitting needles and yarn, and my stacks of burlap waiting for some creative use. My first attempt was this fun cowl that I loved the final result, soft and thick around my neck. It was also easy to knit for my first attempt on circular needles. The yarn gave me some trouble, but eventually sorted itself out and it is very soft. I found a pattern here that was relatively easy to follow with lots of youtube supplementation.

The burlap came in when I decided I needed some way to store my earrings in an easy to see display. I took a rectangle of cardboard off the back of a pad of paper, wrapped the burlap around it, sewed strips of colorful fabric along the top and bottom edge, and then glued the flaps down in the back. I've loved looking at the final result up in my bathroom shelf.

Cooking like Crazy

After nearly 5 months away from home traveling, it was with immense joy that I returned to my own kitchen. All of the recipes on Pinterest and on blogs that had tempted me in late night bouts of homesick web surfing were finally within my reach. I went on a rampage stocking up on ingredients, picking out recipes to try first, and then diving into my stacks of pots and pans and favorite utensils. It's been a busy few weeks, trying some out on my husband that I had perfected last year while away from him, then trying out the new ones, then my family arriving for the holidays and pulling out more. Here I will catch you up on the ones I managed to snag photos of before the item was tastily consumed.

One of the attempts involved my first try at ravioli from scratch. I probably won't repeat this again without proper equipment, but Talea has encouraged me to try again, so maybe I will. I made up a butternut squash filling instead of this recipe's recommended filling of pumpkin. The filling was tasty with only goat cheese. They turned out too thick though and didn't cook through, ending up soggy and hard.

I've always been tempted by the smell of those roasted nuts in malls and decided to make my own for the holidays, based on this recipe. They turned out very tasty and no one could stay out of the container.

Today I needed something extra to go with our left over soup for lunch and decided to try out this tasty recipe for garlic buttermilk biscuits. I had buttermilk left over from earlier breakfasts and about to expire, and garlic is always a hit in our home. I loved how they flaked and fell over in the oven while baking.

When I asked my sister what one dessert she would really like to have for Christmas, I couldn't convince her to any pies or fudges, traditions in our family, but we finally agreed on chocolate macaroons, tasty lumps of coconut with lots of chocolate stirred in. Because of the coconut's fineness they turned out more like no-bakes than light and chewy macaroons, but once again, that container kept opening up again and again while my family was here.

One of the biggest hits was a recipe my mom recommended from her cooking club, a curried red-lentil soup with dried cherries. This ended up being our Christmas lunch with my parents and it was very tasty with some toasted sourdough bread and sweet potato fried patties. I don't like chunky stuff in my soups so I ended up pureeing the whole batch with a hand blender, excepting the cherries.

Much tastiness!

Hibiscus!

When I approached my designated spot in the community gardens in my apartment complex, I found I'd inherited several plants started by my predecessors in Garden Plot #32. The bamboo stand was immediately recognizable, though dried out and faltering. Other plants remained a mystery, including this bush, which with some water started to show green sprouts on its dry twiggy branches. Friday, one of the small red buds finally burst into action and I was extremely pleased to find myself the caretaker for a hibiscus bush. There are two other mystery plants left in the garden, including some kind of bramble twisted up with the hibiscus and a taller vine-like plant. Some kind of green leafy plant is not a complete mystery, with bright orange flowers that attract hummingbirds, I just don't know its name. I've planted bulbs and greens and carrots in the garden, and will update with pictures here as they finally grow into existence!

Winter-time yard