Happy Homemaker Monday

I’m trying something for the first time and joining Sandra at Diary of a Stay at Home Mom for Happy Homemaker Monday.

The weather…..
31 degrees and mostly cloudy and foggy with rain to follow.

Right now I am….

Watching the news while I start this post. The big news that is trending is the shocking win by the Seahawks yesterday in Minnesota. Ouch. And the other worldwide trending news that David Bowie lost his battle to cancer at 69 years old.

Thinking….

About the three birthdays we have this week in our family. Two of the birthdays will be celebrated without us in northeastern Washington state and one will be celebrated on this side of the mountains at this old house on Friday night. Gifts have been sent, cards will be sent and meal will be planned. Birthdays belong to #1 son, #2 son, and # 2 daughter in law.

Our kids minus our son-in-law Andrew. Katie, Josh our oldest with a birthday this month. Top row is Laura our DIL who is married to Josh. Our son Daniel who celebrates his birthday and our new DIL Jamie who celebrates her birthday this month, too. Katie and Laura had birthdays in December.

On my reading pile….

The Songs of Jesus by Timothy Keller and A travel Guide on San Francisco for an upcoming business trip that I’m tagging along on. I need to choose a good read for our plane travel and my hotel stay later in the month.

On my TV…..

The shows I’m watching this month are Biggest Loser, Top Chef, Masterchef Junior, Fixer Upper, and Downton Abbey. On Netflix we have been watching a British series based in Scotland called Monarch of the Glen aired in the early 2000’s. Our daughter and son in law have the Netflix account and since they are living with us right now we use it, too. We DVR most shows and watch them earlier in the evening since Dear and I hit the sack real early. I also enjoy watching Barclays Premier League Soccer games early on Saturday mornings.

Favorite blog post last week (mine or other)….

My posts titled Still Praying and Z is for… were my favorites from last week.

Something fun to share….

This is the Amiable Guinea Pig from my collection of Beatrix Potter figurines that I started acquiring on a trip to England back in 1973. Beatrix Potter is a favorite of mine and her animal characters make me smile so I thought this would be fun to share.

There once was an amiable guinea pig,
He brushed back his hair like a periwig-
He wore a sweet tie,
As blue as the sky-
And his whiskers and buttons were very big.

Blog hopping (newly discovered blog)….

Diary of a Stay at Home Mom is a newly discovered blog. This being the new year and because some of my oldie blogs are biting the dust I need to peruse and make some changes to my blogroll.

On the menu for this week….

Don’t judge but I don’t usually have a daily plan for meals and I’m more of a fly by the seat of my pants cook on most days. I do know that every Tuesday is Tequila Tuesday when Dear and I go to our little Mexican joint for a meal together. Our favorite waitress serves us well.

Generally we have soup on a given night, a good hunk of meat on a given night, and a pasta something dish, a Mexican easy meal, and I’ll throw in some kind of Chicken dish.

Friday this week will be a special meal to celebrate our firstborn son. There will be 6 of us at the table and I’m going with a couple traditional Russian dishes. We will enjoy Lopsha (Russian Noodle Soup) for our starter soup. For the main course I’m making Golubtsi (stuffed cabbage rolls). I’ll throw in something green, too. Chocolate Birthday Cake for dessert.

On my to do list….

I’m a list keeper and I love crossing things off of it. So far today I was able to cross off brush my teeth, just kidding, but I am amazed that I finally ironed and put the fresh linens on the guest bed. Note to self…never buy bedding again that needs ironing.

In the craft basket….

Not a craft person… I do like to be creative in setting a table so I am gathering things to set the birthday table for Friday night.

Looking forward to this week…

The birthday celebration and hearing that our northeast kids got their gifts in the mail.

Looking around the house….

thinking about getting rid of some of the clutter that has piled up here and there after the holidays.

From the camera….

This little plaque is a gift from Marg, my friend from Mennonite Girls Can Cook. Translated from German to English it says God Can! It’s a motto we use with each other when things seem hard or impossible.

On my prayer list…..

See my favorite post link for a couple specific things on my prayer list. For each month I like to use a notebook page to list all the birthdays and anniversaries in the month and I’ll say a little prayer for each person or couple that is celebrating in that given month. I have my list of people who still need Jesus. I have my praise column. I have my illness and healing columns and there are enough of those that I have them under headings like Cancer, Leukemia, Heart, Emotional, Mental, Chronic Pain. I also pray for some children of broken homes. I have a widow and widower list and a single but would like to be married list. I also have a they need a job list. Now I don’t want to give you the impression that I sit in a comfy chair and pray for hours. I don’t. I like to use this page method so I don’t forget and so I have a guide and list to pray through.

Bible verse, Devotional….

My verse on my Prayer page this month is Psalm 4:1

Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness!
You have given me relief when I was in distress.
Be gracious to me and hear my prayer!

Thank you Sandra for hosting this weekly meme. I better publish it before Monday is gone. It took me a big longer than I thought to crank this out. With all the talk of homemaking I felt compelled to take a break to iron those blasted linens and it took a very long time. I hope to get around to others who are participating sometime today or tomorrow!

Blessings on your Monday!

Fresh News

Do you need a fresh new sandwich idea? Click over to the Mennonite Girls Can Cook Blog for this sandwich combination.

I still can’t show you our finished bathroom…because it’s not finished. OYE! In fact after they wrap up today and clean everything up they will still need to come back in a couple weeks to finish up because of some boo boos. Part of the flooring needs to be redone and of course it’s on back-order and 2 cabinet fronts need to be replaced. We have come to the conclusion that we are not good candidates for hiring out work. In the meantime, I have found some nice accessories to go in the updated bathroom like that brushed nickel soap dispenser above.

Other news from this old house…apples are falling off the tree.

And these beauties are brightening up the yard and deck.

What’s new at your place?

Where Do You Keep It All?

Time for fellow Bloggers to link up at The Tablescaper and show the world where you keep your stuff. All my storage is a work in progress right now. I’m tweaking here and there and shuffling stuff around to be more organized.

I’m working on getting all my candles and candle holders together. My tablecloths are out of control and I need more hanging space for them.

My tiered servers are too tall for a shelf so they sit on the floor of this closet. One each of my different tea cups are finally all in the same place. The extras I have of some of these patterns are down in the basement on my latest storage space!

We just bought this unit from Ikea and set it up in our basement. This room is gutted right now and needs to be worked on but I’m so happy to have all my plates in one spot so I can see what I have. I like this arrangement because I don’t have to dig into the back of a lower kitchen cupboard to get at all my plates. My everyday dishes are still in my kitchen.

Now to my actual kitchen storage…

Everyday dishes, Italian Countryside by Mikasa, that I bought at Macy’s for a super price. Soup bowls and cereal bowls and tea mugs and dessert dishes that were all purchased at Goodwill or other Thrift stores..

Water goblets and Cocktail glasses. I really enjoy different styles and shapes of glasses.

My large platters and some cutting boards.

The cupboard above the refrigerator. My sets of champagne flutes in their boxes for special occasions. My pitchers, vases, fondues, punch bowl, cookie cutters, etc.

Oh dear more glasses. These are the everyday kind and then some fun sets way on top. I think I could give water to 200 people easy in all different shapes and sizes of glasses!!

I really love my stainless drawers.

And right under my everyday stainless is another drawer with dividers for my serving pieces and extra stainless.

My Le Creuset and my bake-ware. Maybe I should just insert here that I was a Home Economics Major so these are just the tools of my trade.

My baking, measuring, and other stuff drawer.

More specialty equiptment and my large stock pots.

More bakeware. This is where the cake pans, bundt pans, muffin pans, pop over pans and mixing bowls, etc. are.

Springform pans, tart pans, pie pans.

Believe it or not there is more stuff and more cupboards but this post is getting way too long!! Before you click away here is a photo of my kitchen with all the cupboard doors shut!

Photobucket replaced all my photos with ugly black and grey boxes and they are holding my photos hostage until I pay them lots of money. I’m slowly going through all my posts and trying to clean them up and replacing some photos. Such a bother.

Still Plugging Away…

…and the end is in sight!

Some of you have wondered “Where does she put all that stuff?” I wanted to show you my nifty little pull down ladder that is hidden most days neatly tucked away in the ceiling. Last year we totally emptied that attic and put everything in the basement for sorting through. Since I’ve been back in Washington I’ve been sorting through and everything has one of three destinations now…in the trash, in the garage sale pile, or repacked nicely and back in the attic. Going up and down those stairs heaving boxes up there has been a good workout!

Christmas is up there. Easter is up there. Thanksgiving is up there. Katie’s keepsakes are up there. Suitcases are up there. Rex and Verna’s stuff that we won’t get rid of is up there. Papers we need to keep for a couple more years are up there. You get the drift. See those 3 blue boxes at the top of the stairs…if you ever need wine goblets for a big party or reception call me.

Just a very few more boxes and I’ll be done with this project whoohoo!! And in other news…

Some big equipment and workers are arriving today to work on this part of our property. The utilities have been marked so we don’t have any unfortunate accidents. Puncturing a gas line wouldn’t be good. We are going to be doing some grading and a trench will be dug along the property line on the right to put in a retaining wall. Eventually this will be a driveway and the area at the top of the photo will be built up and leveled out…

Fun times around the homestead. So today I hope to finish those remaining boxes and then put on my rain coat and mud boots so I can watch some heavy equipment make noise moving dirt. What are you doing?

Busy Around The Homestead…

We’ve been working hard around our place here in Washington getting things ready for Spring. Last week we tackled the yard. We have two major projects that we are going to hire out and then in a year tackle some more. The center photo is the “after” with the side yard cleared and all the branches are finally clipped and taken away.

We are anticipating the future arrival of most of our stuff from the Condo. We wonder where are we going to put the stuff? The piles of throw away and save for Garage Sale are getting huge. We still are in a debate about the benefits of an all consuming all day garage sale versus taking all the stuff to Goodwill. My daughter seems to be more in favor of the Garage Sale.

Dear and I walk around each room thinking “will that fit here? or should we get rid of that?”

I went through my closet today and emptied all the items I haven’t worn in years. Next stop my dresser drawers. I’m also slowly going through my really old posts on my blog. You might be seeing some re-posts soon…

In the meantime things are not neat and tidy and organized around here…I think I need some blinders!

Photobucket is holding all my photos that I stored on their site from 2007-2015 hostage replacing them with ugly grey and black boxes and asking for a large ransom to retrieve them. It is a slow process to go through all my posts deleting the ugly boxes.

Making Having Out of Town Guests Easier…

Summer is coming and for some of us that means an increase in overnight guest traffic. When Dear and I moved to Washington away from both of our families we were introduced to holiday visitors. You can stress out if you want or plan to make it less stressful. Learn from our good and bad experiences.

At first we thought we had to be there for every little experience sacrificing our sanity. Then we learned to give our guests some freedom. We also learned to give them some responsibility. If someone was great at making pies, we picked blackberries for them. If someone was celebrating a birthday we made reservations at a restaurant to celebrate. Our guests have helped with car repairs and home improvement projects.

Over the years we have had very mellow go with the flow guests and some more pamper me guests whose eating patterns changed from year to year. (No fat, some fat, no sugar, only Diet Coke, no meat, only chicken, no carbs, etc. etc.) Here’s what we ended up doing. Before they ever arrived in Washington we asked them to research and decide what they’d really like to experience and what they were comfortable leaving up to us. Then we asked what their favorite breakfast cereal was and their favorite beverages. When they arrived they were shown the notes on the refrigerator.

#1 ~You are welcome to anything in my refrigerator and cupboards. Please check and see if I have the items you need to be happy. If you do not see the things here that will make you happy we will make a trip to the grocery store so you can purchase the items that will make you comfortable during your stay here.

#2 ~ I do not ask you over the course of the day if there is anything you need. You are very welcome to get whatever you need and want at any point during the day without my permission. I and my family will get a snack without asking you if you want one. If you want a snack please know that we want you to treat this like your home. Get up and get that snack you want without asking permission! If there is something you need please feel free to ask and we will hunt it down for you!

#3 ~ You can use the dishwasher, the stove, the oven, the microwave,the washing machine, the shower anytime during the day.

#4 ~ We encourage our company to participate in making at least one meal while they stay with us. While they are making the meal the rest of us will set the table and have fun creating an atmosphere to go with their menu. With my sister-in-law Letty who happens to be Hispanic we really go all out with the Mexican theme while she makes the Mexican rice, beans, salsa and Carnitas for all of us to enjoy!!

This may sound harsh to some of you but you need to know that we do make several meals and drive our company all around town to see the sights and we do enjoy all of these activities. It’s just good to have the comfort of knowing they don’t have to be cared for every minute of the day. That’s why we give them the freedom to get up and get whatever they need whenever they need it without our direction.

Being pro-active in spelling out things and squashing any unreasonable expectations will make it easier on everyone and make you welcome overnight guests over and over again…

We always look forward to out of town guests since we’ve set up guidelines for ourselves and them. There are always those who don’t need any guidelines, those who just fit in with the everyday flow.

Mystery Pasta…

I just called Dear at work to warn him that I’m experimenting for dinner. I always like to warn him ahead of time just in case it’s one big flop! I’m using these basic ingredients and then throwing in something very unconventional. I’ll let you know what happens and what the mystery ingredient is tomorrow.

Photobucket is holding all my photos I stored with them from 2007-2015 hostage unless I pay them a lot of money. I’m slowly cleaning up many posts from this time period and deleting their ugly grey and black boxes with a ransom request. Such a time consuming bother.

Three or More? ~

So I’m trying to figure out exactly what the 3 or more boundaries are. I’m going out on a limb here. I’m going to show you the inside of my kitchen cupboards in our home in Washington that definitely have more than 3 in all of them. I’ve been asked many times where I store all my thrift store finds. Where do I put all the dishes that I enjoy. On Monday for Metamorphosis Monday I showed my kitchen with all my great cupboards. Well here’s what’s inside of them.

Wine glasses, Water Goblets, and on the top shelf some of my creamer collection. Bottom shelf all our coffee making accessories…

Water goblets and Cocktail glasses. I really enjoy different styles and shapes of glasses.

Serving bowls, serving trays, platters, and bread baskets.

My large platters and some cutting boards.

Cake plates and shower and tea plates, doilies, napkins, place cards, mirrored coasters.

More luncheon plates. Some thermoses. Oh and those old fashioned glasses for my gin and tonic ( don’t tell my mother).

The cupboard above the refrigerator. My sets of champagne flutes in their boxes for special occasions. My pitchers, vases, fondues, punch bowl, cookie cutters, etc.

Oh dear more glasses. These are the everyday kind and then some fun sets way on top. I think I could give water to 200 people easy in all different shapes and sizes of glasses!!

I really love these divided drawers for my flatware.

And right under my everyday stainless is another drawer with dividers for my serving pieces and extra stainless.

Knife drawer and knife sharpeners.

My Le Creuset and my bake-ware. Maybe I should just insert here that I was a Home Economics Major so these are just the tools of my trade. And while I’m inserting stuff…can you feel my pain that I am living 1200 miles away from all this equipment. :0)

My baking, measuring, and other stuff drawer.

More specialty equiptment and my large stock pots.

More bakeware. This is where the cake pans, bundt pans, muffin pans, pop over pans and mixing bowls, etc. are.

Springform pans, tart pans, pie pans.

The mixer and the food processor plus the large bowls and flour and sugar in the bottom of the pantry.

The tupperware I haven’t gotten rid of yet :0)

I’m so sorry for this boring post but now my insurance company knows some of what they’ll need to replace if anything happens!

So does anyone need to borrow something?

For more Three or More visit Tam at The Gypsy’s Corner.

Recipe Round Up ~ Sandwiches

Italian Grilled Cheese Sandwich with Sauteed Zucchini

I saw Rachel Ray make something similar to this and I didn’t write down the ingredients but played it by ear to recreate something similar.

For the sandwich I used fresh mozzarella, tomatoes and basil. Any bread you like will probably be fine. I used a white farmers bread. I cut the crusts off. I layered cheese, fresh tomatoes and fresh basil on a slice of bread then topped it with another slice. I heated a large frying pan with olive oil dipped each sandwich in the egg and milk mixture and then set the egg coated sandwich in the pan.

When browned on one side I flipped it over and browned the other side. Rachel Ray served something similar (she used sun-dried tomatoes and cut her bread in circles) and served it with some sauteed zucchini. Here’s how I made my zucchini.

Cut zucchini, drop into pan heated with olive oil. Salt and pepper well. Cut a bunch of scallions and add them to the zucchini. Grate or press a couple cloves of garlic over the zucchini. When the zucchini is done add some grated Parmesan on top. (I think Rachel Ray added some chopped parsley to the dish also).

Enjoy! For more Sandwich recipes head over to Dorothy’s at Field Stone Cottage.

For my Calzone Recipe that I posted earlier this year click here.

Photobucket is holding all my photos from 2007-2015 hostage and they have blacked them all out. I’m slowly working at restoring my posts without their help. Such a tiresome bother!

Gracious Hospital-i-Tea Blog-a-thon ~ Stitches

April 6th – 12th ~ Share ideas and pictures that involve stitching for the tea table. Any kind of stitches count: sewing, embroidery, knitting, crochet, tatting, quilting, etc. The work can be yours or of someone else, but should be homemade rather than done by factory machines. Ideas are
napkins, tea cozies, table linens, and other creations made with tea themes.

I have always called these dish towels tea towels so I’m including them in my stitch post. The Tea Cozy in the center was a gift that a friend in England knit for me after I was so excited seeing my very first tea cozy at her house in 1973. The doilie to the right of the tea cozy is great for setting a teapot on. I have a lot of tablecloths and napkins that I use for pretty tea tables that do not have a tea theme in particular. Most of these items are in my home in Washington and I don’t have access to them for this post. I’m looking forward to my visits to your sites to see what stichery you have…

I forgot about these fancy teaspoons we inherited from my MIL and decided to add them to this post

For more Hospital-i-Tea blogathon posts on stichery click here.