A white room. A bare wall above a beautiful couch. A storage room full of useless items. A rainy afternoon with a bottle of Irish Cream and a pot of coffee.

The result is this. It was very simple, just a little spray paint, some cheap plastic gaudy frames, a cereal box, tape, and some fabric scraps.

Spray all the frames. Trace out the insides of the frames and cut out of cereal box. Cut out fabric a little larger than cardboard. Tape fabric tightly to the back of the cardboard and insert into frames. Hang, step back and congratulate yourself on a job well done.

How great is that!? Each piece is like a little piece of art. What's cool about this project is that it can be a continuously growing work of art, creating an amazing focal point to any room.

So, there, I have now supplied you with a new reason to go thrift shopping or finally do something with those silly frames...

Happy Crafting.

Pumpkin, Muffin, Honey, Sweetie....

This Halloween came in a tornado of chores, that I almost forgot to get dressed. I love Halloween usually and spend the entire year scheming and gathering for the next great costume. This year, however, I barely found time to go out.

After many years of carving pumpkins by myself or not at all, a friend wanted to carve with me. I was so excited and ran to the store the night before Halloween to pick out two beautiful pumpkins. I was able to get a couple OK looking ones, because it was after all the night before Halloween, and set them outside on my front stoop. The next day after work, I ran home to throw on my costume, plop the candy bowl on the stoop and run out to meet my friends. The next morning....... well, after a few days of recovery, I remembered the pumpkins. Still sitting on the cold stoop waiting for me to love them, I figured, mine as well eat them.....

I have never in my adult life prepared a pumpkin dish from scratch. Most of my pumpkin adventures start with a can opener, how sad is that. No more sad than buying a pumpkin and not using it, I suppose. So, apart from cutting the bad boys open and scooping out the insides (saving the seeds of course), I was lost. I took a deep breath and called grandma. Apparently all squash is seriously simple to prepare. Cut the Pumpkin in half, scoop out the insides, cover in tin foil and roast at 400 for about 40 minutes. Let cool and scoop out the pumpkin, puree and measure into freezer bags. That's it! One pumpkin produced about twelve cups of puree. That's a lot of soup, bread, muffins....whatever one makes with pumpkin. I loved how my house smelled too!

Seeds:

boil in sea salt water for about 15 min. Drain and lay on cookie sheet, season to desire and bake till lightly browned. Eat and know you are doing something great for your body.

(Pumpkin seeds provide the body with vitamin E, iron, magnesium, potassium, zinc, and are an excellent plant-based source of omega-6 and omega-3 fatty acids. Read more at Suite101: Health Benefits of Pumpkin: Nutrient-Rich Fruit with Anti-Aging and Disease-Fighting Properties http://www.suite101.com/content/health-benefits-of-pumpkin-a153140#ixzz15kxloNMR)

With the reserve 1 cup of pumpkin puree I thought I'd make breakfast muffins. This turned into a wonderful discovery, energy bars!

preheat 400 degrees~12 bars

1c. pumpkin puree
2 eggs
1c. milk
1/4 c. melted butter
1/3 c. honey or agave nectar

Lightly beat eggs and add above ingredients.
Sift in;

1 1/2 c. flour
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2/3 tsp nutmeg

fold in;

1/2 c. sliced and crushed almonds
1/2 c. raisins, dates or figs
1/2 c. crushed hazelnuts
1 c. oats

spread into greased and floured baking pan ( about 1" high)
bake for 15-20 minutes till bouncy or clean fork.
cool and slice into 1" strips and wrap individually in saran and store.

These are so good and awesome for on the go. If you read the above article, you will also discover how amazing pumpkin is for us. I'm really glad I didn't carve this year. Maybe next year I'll do the same.

Adventures in Thriftiness

Gone are the days of seeing something on T.V. and running out to buy it with no question of need. Even though I was not raised to consume in that way, I did it anyway. It always seemed like there was ease in tossing a Bennie on the counter and walking off with that brand new something-or-other.

When the economy took a dive, I realize I was a silly woman to think this would not change things. I knew that I had to remember what I was taught buy my mother, who raised six children successfully, and my grandmother, queen of the yardsale and a survivor of the Great Depression. "If you know one stitch, you will never be cold", said my grandmother when she taught me to crochet.

The real lesson has been my day to day and trying to figure out how to keep the champagne lifestyle on a beer budget. The thing is, it's not very hard when there is no money to spend but also, it's seriously exciting when a week's worth of dinner can cost less than $15 ! Last month I had to shop for a desk (it seems my husband took over the one we had and with a new career on the rise, I needed my own). So I looked online, thinking I would be willing to spend between 50-100 dollars. Over a week I shopped discount online stores and local retailers online, nothing under 200 that was worth the $. So then, I started to shop around at local re-sale shops. I found this great old heavy-duty desk with built in file drawers in perfect condition for $39! Holy cow! There was only one problem, no chair. Since I had such luck at Goodwill, I went to a different one in a neighboring town and found the perfect chair, adjustable with lots of support for only $12! No friggin way! I talked about it for days!

The other day I ran out of shaving cream in the shower, so I used conditioner and it worked even better. It's funny cause I hardly need conditioner and now it has a duel purpose. Plus I realized how much clothing I had that I didn't wear, UGH! I could hardly get into the closet. I took 15 handbags, 10 pairs of pants, 4 skirts, and 25 blouses to the consignment store down the street. I went in to drop off more last week and found out I had $50 in credit! OMG! FREE CLOTHES!

Now, there obvious reasons we shouldn't gift thrift shop items, but then there are really great ones. One can find antiques, like trays, jewels, or even cool things like framed art. I found a neat old lamp that I took home, restored, made a handmade paper shade for and gifted. There are old cotton sheets and dresses that can be made into blankets or curtains. This is truely too much fun. The only thing to keep in mind is the addictive part of it, being warry of hording.

So, saving money for our future has been hard, but really fun. I am reverting to a life I grew up in and I find I really like the lighter footprint. I think a simpler lifestyle with less crap is refreshing and with that comes less T.V., thus, less buying crap I don't need.

Happy thrifting!

A good old fashioned folly.

As summer turns into a hot and smokey fall, the abundant harvest of our tiny veggie garden continues. I share my husband's passion for cooking fresh food, an creativity has become a key word in figuring out what to do with five cucumbers and 14 tomatoes picked ripe each day. Just in the past month we have explored new recipes, like, babagonoush, scratch tomato soup, Italian fennel sausages..... and so on. It's true what they say about the magic in food bringing families together and feeding the soul.

After boasting about how fabulous fresh tomato soup was, I came home to find 12 juicy ripe tomatoes. I started the long arduous process of coring, splitting and stewing two batches of tomatoes. After peeling and seeding them, I diced and simmered them for time enough to flavor. Then it was time to puree them, I carefully fit the lid onto the blender and turned it on low. Flipping the switch to high, I thoughtlessly released my hand from the lid to grab a cherry tomato and pop it into my mouth. Heat and velocity sent pressure to the lid, painting my entire kitchen a pretty chunky red splatter. I quickly shut off the blender, and stood in disbelief at a mess so impressive, I couldn't help but laugh. After taking a photo and sending it to my mother, I cleaned EVERYTHING! It was everywhere, seriously. I found tomato in the living room, barely missing a cherished painting. I had to wipe down the dog! The real bummer was that I lost half of the puree in the accident. With whatever I had left I finished the recipe. All that work and I came out with only two small bowls of soup! Small reward, but oh so worth it!!

It's a good 'ole fashioned recipe, that turned into a good 'ole fashioned folly.

Spring cleaning in Fall

As a part time student and full time retail goddess, I don't often find the time be the ideal housewife. Some would say I shouldn't even put a label on what it is I do, but let's be honest, that some wouldn't give credit to how hard a wife works. The modern housewife isn't really a "house"wife. She contributes financially, cooks, cleans, raises the children and looks pretty for her man. Right? No. Even thought the roles of men and women have meshed in the past 50 years, somethings men leave all to us, not out of spite, but as instinct or habit.

Lets look at spring cleaning for example. My husband wouldn't get to the point of fed-up with a disorganized pantry and tear it apart, clean the shelves and reorganize everything according to relevance. That doesn't make him a bad person. It just means I have to do it. And probably for the best because I would want it done my way.

This Spring was particularly hectic for me. I had my current job of 30 hours a week, school 20 hours a week, my household to run and a dying grandmother to take care of. Things piled up. The most used rooms of my house were "mostly" clean. Everything else, forget it. When my in-laws decided to come visit, I couldn't even get into the guest bedroom, somehow anything I didn't know what to do with ended up here. After reading the will my grandmother had made before her passing in late April, I found out she left everything up to me to take care of. That meant her things ended up ..... in my guest bedroom!

Now, just weeks away from Fall, I'm fed up. I have spent the last three days cleaning the guest bedroom, organizing photo albums, tearing apart cupboards, reorganizing, recycling, donating, dusting, stopping on occasion for a sandwich and a beer. It may be late, but damn, it feels good to purge.

Even though the modern housewife, doesn't always stay home, she is still in charge of the house. And even though I'm tired at the end of the day, I make time to be pretty for my man.