the little things

the end

well friends, after 4 years i have to say goodbye to this blog.  i am moving back to blogger.  from here you can find me at a little bit of this, a little bit of that...

excuse the mess and all the green that is there now, at some point i am going to have to make it all pretty but my mac is not working and i am blogging from the kids computer (poo) but hopefully we can get it fixed soon!

just peachy

i recently received my june issue of cooking light magazine.  (i have to say, my love for the magazine is slowly declining due to all the tons of ads and articles and not enough recipes- more recipes please!) in one of the articles this question was asked: "what summer food defined your childhood, and what are you excited about now?"  well that's an easy answer- peaches!  i grew up in georgia and summer was the best because of peaches! 

the best day would be the day we got up at 3 am to get ready to go to talbotton to pick our own peaches.  by the end of the day our baskets and stomachs were full of gorgeous golden peaches.  i would eat them straight from the tree, and then my great great aunts would make peach jam, peach ice cream, peach pie, and cobbler!  they would also do some canning to preserve the peaches over the summer into fall and then some pickling, which i am not much into, but i ate those peaches any way they were prepared.  to this day, it still remains my favorite fruit because not only are they delicious, but they take me back to all those hot summers in georgia and i can't wait for them to come into season.  the peaches here don't taste the same as georgia peaches, and when i go shopping for them it's always hit or miss.  but boy, what i wouldn't give for one of those giant, luscious, golden georgia peaches right now!

i wanna make this right now:

A fresh peach cobbler recipe.

Cook Time: 35 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

• 3 cups peeled and sliced fresh peaches
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup (4 tablespoons) butter cut in small pieces
• .
• Crust:
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup (4 tablespoons) butter
• 1/2 cup (or less) heavy cream

Preparation:

Lay sliced fresh peaches in a buttered 1 1/2-quart baking dish. Sprinkle with 1/2 cup of sugar. Dot with the 1/4 cup butter which has been cut into small pieces. For crust, mix together, flour, baking powder, 1 tablespoon sugar, and salt. Cut in the remaining 1/4 cup butter. Stir in heavy cream until dough is manageable. Roll dough out on a lightly floured surface; place over sliced peaches. Bake at 375° for 35 minutes, or until top is nicely browned.
Peach cobbler serves 6.

indoor dining

one of the pieces of furniture we own that i love is our dining room table.  it seats 8 (possibly 10), and fits us perfectly.  it's long and narrow and fits the space that it's in perfectly as well.  the problem: we don't have enough seating.  when we first got it i think it came with 8 chairs, but that was 15 years ago.  i can't even tell you how we lost 2 chairs, but at our old house it didn't matter because we had a bench.  when we moved into the new house, i sold the bench in a yard sale because i hated that bench.  it had grooves in it that caught every crumb of food that the kids dropped and it was hard to clean and disgusting.  j has brought up buying a new dining room set, but i can't really justify spending thousands of dollars on a new set when we have a perfectly functional table that fits us.  the chairs are old, but they are not falling apart, we just don't have enough of them.  since we only need seating for two, i had every intention on buying either a new bench or host and hostess chairs.  i really like the way host and hostess chairs mix it up, yet bring together the look of a dining room.  i can already hear j saying how the chairs don't match.  no, they don't match, but they all go together. 

as you can see in the above photo, none of the chairs have to be the same but they all coordinate to accomplish a great look. also see here.

 

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we have ladder back chairs so i want the end chairs to have a different look.  i'm liking the look of wicker.

 

i think any of these would work for the look i want.

i looked, but could not find a photo of my table.  i would take one, but the kids are doing their school work there right now, so later perhaps.  

weekly menu [june 1-5]

ok.  i think we have established that i am not good at this menu planning thing.  not that we don't eat, i just am not used to planning it out.  i buy food, we eat it according to what i feel like making that day.

this week i will give it another go, and if today is any indication of how the rest of my week will be, then this menu will be perfect:

monday- memorial day- we went to a friend's house

tuesday- tacos

wednesday- spaghetti

thursday- tortellini

friday- pizza

saturday- breakfast

that's a pretty loosely based menu, but it works for me!

lately, i've tried some new recipes that i have not shared here but have been big hits with my family:

baked creamy chicken taquitos-  i made this last monday and my family liked it so much that i had to make more on wednesday!

cinnamon toast- the right way- did you know there was a wrong way?  i don't think my way was wrong, but this way is definitely much better!!  let the pioneer woman take you to school!

Wednesday

made it to the middle of the week, feeling a lot better than i did on monday.  nothing a little benadryl can't fix though.  i thought that if i made it past the weekend i would be good, but things are still going on.  last night was the pto board dinner.  everyone on the board was able to make it, we invited one teacher(because we really like her) and the principal.  our principal said she was feeling sick so she ended up not coming but we had a great time anyway.  i had half a mai tai which was so strong i couldn't even finish it.  but taina finished off a scorpion and a pina colada!  afterwards, i went to taina's house (no i didn't drive-taina had her daughter and boyfriend pick us up) to watch american idol.  during a commercial i blinked, and when i woke up, american idol was over and taina had also fallen asleep! i tried to wake her up- i called out her name like 4 times and nothing.  i then started working out in my head which one of the 5 cars at her house i was going to have to find keys for to drive myself home.  just then, one of her daughters walked in and woke her up so she could take me home.  that's when we decided that we are too old to drink.

backing up to monday...

i was feeling poorly and i guess a little bored.  it hurt to talk so i took to typing out haikus.  plus, i had been over at pw reading her josh haikus.  here was my first one:

today i am sick.
my throat hurts when i'm talking.
please do not call me.

number 2:

today i am sick.
the kids need help with school work.
i should cancel school

number 3:

(drew texted me from school and asked me to come and pick him up after lunch)

drew, when mom is sick
don't call her to pick you up
just because you're bored

he responded with:

How am i to know
That you are feeling badly
When i am at school?

number 4:

drinking hot green tea
i feel so relaxed right now
oh darn! go get drew!

and my last one:

the hot green tea worked
my throat feels a lot better
though i burned my tongue

my friend zee got into it too:

You are on a roll.
All this Haiku stuff you write.
Color me impressed

sometimes being sick can make you silly.

i have to go now

and wait for drew to text me

cause he has no lunch.

monday

just getting over a long weekend.  school carnival and silent auction was friday, varsity finals for track was saturday, end of the season picnic was sunday.  i started feeling sick on saturday evening, but kept going.  i should have stayed home and rested sunday evening but i had already made plans to go to a friend's house for movie night.  besides, i figured since i'd be watching a movie it'd be fine since i wasn't doing any physical activity.  i was smart and called my walking partner to cancel our morning walk so i could sleep in and not have to get up at 5:30am.  i got home late, and woke up this morning miserable.  my throat feels like a briar patch every time i swallow.  my head and ear has stopped hurting since i got out of bed, but my head still feels achy and now i have nasal drippage. 

the kids need help with school work- devyn is starting to diagram indirect objects, which i love to do, but it requires a lot of talking and it hurts to talk.  carter needs direction in his phonics book- again, a lot of talking.  i don't want to cancel school today so i guess better get myself together.  besides, tonight is book club and i have been waiting forever to discuss our book! more talking.  tomorrow night is the pto board dinner.  talk talk talk talk talk.

final

if my decision to get rid of the pink bathroom was not final, it is now!  the tub area needed re-grouting in a bad way, so j decided to handle it.  as he was chipping away at the old grout, the tiles started falling off the wall and he even broke one.  so now, we are not considering reglazing and recoloring the tile, we will have it removed and replaced with new tile! 

time to do a little shopping!!

save the pink?

i just got the estimate today about the pink bathroom.  to have the tub refinished and glazed white along with the surrounding pink tile will be $650.  it's not as much as i thought it would be, so it's really worth considering.  on the other hand, camryn is having a fit about getting rid of all the pink- "MOM!!!  IT'S AN ANTIQUE!!"  boy, she really bought into it when i was trying to sell it and convince myself that we should save the pink bathroom.  well now that i have come to my senses(pink just really isn't going to work for me...i have to be true to myself and this is my house.  well, mine and jay's but i don't think he'll mind if the bathroom is no longer pink) she is still fighting to keep the pink.  once i get it the way i want it, she'll be a fan i'm sure. 

i have something to this effect in mind... 

 

attic mag

 

unknown

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sense and simplicity

unknown

coco cozy

source

better homes and garden

light and airy is what i like.  do you see a pattern with these bathrooms?YES!!  wainscoting!! love it!!!

instead of baseboard, we have tile bordering the floor.  i mentioned that i wanted baseboard and found out that my husband thinks there should be tile in the bathroom, not wood.  i disagree.  wood works too!!!

striped walls

they drive me crazy.  when i was younger, it used to be polka dots.  they made me dizzy even when i wasn't moving.  i'm pretty much over it, but now it's stripes. they just bug me and i am seeing designers doing this wall treatment a lot.

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better homes and gardens

how do you feel about striped walls?

random things that have been going on around here...

we celebrated a birthday...

we made it through track season for high school, still one more week of practice and a track meet for the rest of us...

carter lost his first tooth...

we had a day warm enough for water fun, but it's been june gloom ever since...

and the kitchen is still blue and the cabinets still need painting.  still confused as to what to do- i have read/heard so many different things about what i need to do to paint the cabinets: sand, don't sand because of lead, degloss, don't degloss because of fumes.  i stopped at the paint counter at lowe's and was told that i didn't need to sand or degloss, just clean real well and prime with zinsser primer which will adhere to anything. 

anybody out there got any other helpful tips?