Memorial Day cleanup with Veteran's in Mind

This beautiful rose bush hanging over the side of the front porch just makes sitting on the porch cozy and comfortable. This bush wasn't growing the first few years we had the house. Then, one summer I noticed it growing and cultivated it hoping it would do just what it's doing now.











Below are some spring pictures of our house near DC.











Tee

Location:Cambridge, MD

Vintage and new coat rack.

I purchased the green hooks at Anthropologie the other day not sure what I wanted to do with them. Then we found the chestnut window sill at Community Forklift in Edmonston, MD. The Forklift is a non-profit salvage and green home improvement center.
Mike attached the hooks to the sill. Looks great! See for yourself.







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What a dinner - zucchini

Adding more veggies into my diet has been complicated. I generally like vegetables but they can get boring. So, I came up with this quick zucchini lasagna lat night that turned out to be a great side to lemon braised chicken cutlets.




Thin slice about 3 small zucchinis the long way using a mandolin. Place a layer in a casserole dish and sprinkle sea salt, pepper and garlic powder and about a quarter cup of tomato sauce over the top. Layer more zucchini over this. Salt and pepper as you desire. Sprinkle shredded mozzarella over this layer. Place another layer of zucchini over the cheese. Pour a cup or less of tomato sauce over the top and sprinkle more cheese over the sauce. Cover the casserole with foil and bake at 400 for about 20 minutes. Let cool, cut into squares and serve.


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Mother's day present, complete.

Gift on display and Ma's spring garden.










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Easy summer picture craft project.

I love Modge Podge but I am really not a fan of mosaic decoupaged items. I prefer items that are a little more subtle and vintagey, like music and old book paper. So I got a little creative using vintage music paper, Modge Podge and Martha's slick nautical-themed, self-sticking screenprint templates.


These mini oil painting canvases (5 x 7) were perfect for this project and were only a few bucks for a package of five at Michaels. I can envision using multiple sizes to fill a wall with homemade pictures.

I cut out the music paper to fit around the canvas enough to be able to cover the edges on the backside with a piece of scrapbook paper. Modge Podge the back of the paper and carefully stick it down onto the surface of the canvas scraping out the bubbles underneath and folding the extra over the edge to th backside of the canvas. Be sure to get rid of any bubbles while the Podge is still a little wet. Immediately, coat the front with a coating of Podge. Let dry, coat again, let dry, coat again. You should have a nice glossy (or satin, depending on which Podge you chose) music paper background.


Peel and stick Martha's screenprint template onto the dried surface and daub paint over the screenprint. Screenprinting is more of a "scraping of the paint over the template" type of action, but because of the small surface I used a sponge brush and dabbed the paint, making sure to get paint into all the crevices of the template.

Let dry and display.


Tee

Eating Natural, trying new things

Before my thyroid became a problem, I'd been peripherally paying attention to the various diet programs out there, for example, Atkins, Paleo, South Beach. Partly because I tend to stay away from carbs, starch and white flour and also because one cannot escape seeing ads for these diets.

After the surgeon removed part of my thyroid earlier this year, I've been delving further into the more natural based diets. I'd downloaded a couple of books to bone up and seeking new and exciting natural recipes - I'll go into those on later posts.


Last week, though, I made a recipe from Oxygen Magazine, April 2013, page 56. Morning Glory muffins! I love traditional Morning Glory muffins, probably owed to my taste buds which crave a variety of tastes at once. The standard Morning Glory has a ton of stuff it, carrots, dates, nuts, apple, and seeds. The Oxygen recipe has the same except one difference, it uses coconut flour, which I've never used or even THOUGHT existed. I can't even tell you how much I love this muffin.

So now I'm sold on using coconut flour and needed to do more research on the stuff. Apparently, its a substitute for grain-based flours like wheat flour. I'm not completely averse to using typical grains but my gut seems to better handle the gluten free part of coconut flour. There is a particular feature of coconut flour that might put you off. Recipes call for a tremendous number of eggs - six in Oxygen's Morning Glory muffin. I'm a fan of eggs so six didn't scare me at all. One thing I recommend with these muffins is to refrigerate or freeze them as they will go rancid left on the counter for more than two days.

For more information, The Nourished Kitchen has some amazing recipes and this great explanation of coconut flour.




Tee

Mother's Day Project.

Project revealed! Mike did a great job putting this window together with chicken wire, sifter fence and a green painted piece ply wood in the middle. Hanging below is a rusted plant holder - an idea which I love! But I think I'm going to have to scuff up the paint on the window a little to make it look a little more rustic to match the planter. I think Ma is going to love it!


Tee