Citrus and such

Can I just say that I looooove the weekend? It's the best part of me week, every week. 

We cleaned yesterday (the house needed it so very badly) and then sat ourselves down to a lovely meal of oven roasted potatoes (tossed in 21 season salute, oil and salt) and some large homemade meatballs. It was divine. And for dessert we had the last of the chocolate chip cookie pie with ice cream. Mmm... Sorry, no pictures though! (Too tired after all that cleaning!)

Let me share that new stuff I promised in my last post! :)

New Christmas star, from Ikea. It's red and gorgeous and casts stars all over the room in the dark. :)

There is my new valance, Vallila "punaposki". I have been searching for quite a while for some apple-themed curtains for the kitchen, but the fabrics I wanted were kind of expensive and I would have had to have sewn it myself. That's why I was so happy to find these -- and they were on sale! :)

I finally bought one of these from Ikea! I have wanted a tier plate for serving baked good and other goodies at parties! I plan to use it to serve cookies at the upcoming Christmas party I am having!

These are two of the frames we bought...we're finally hanging up some of our Japan honeymoon pictures! Yaaay! (these are going above this couch with a picture shelf from ikea)

Randomly on to the next topic...

The hubby and I made these this morning since we were having company in the afternoon.

They are raspberry lemonade bars from Annie's Eats. If you haven't checked out this blog, now is the time! I love it! Really do-able recipes and very inspiring. :) Unfortunately for us, we had just a bit too little raspberry to work with, so they didn't come out as gooey as I would have hoped, still tasty though! 

By the way, I served these with whipped cream on the side, too!

Using lemonade as a segue way...

I've also been very into citrus still lifes. Please forgive me for the onslaught of citrus. Lol!

Can you tell I have been reading up on photography and trying to use the camera to its fullest potential? I guess you can expect to see more random and spontaneous photo shoot shots.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy your weekend!

forest walks

Happy Saturday!

Well, I am moving on past my phase of tension and stress, I need to just let things go sometimes and relax. I know I have a habit of trying to control things beyond my capability and I get so darn frustrated when it doesn't work out exactly like I wanted. Argh. I'm still mad, but ya know. Life will go on and I will move on too. 

We have enjoyed taking longer walks here, the area really is so beautiful. I snapped these earlier this week on our morning walk with the dogs. Fall is here! Most of the trees are still green but I have seen branches on quite a few that are solid yellow and some colorful maple leaves on the ground! I can't wait for the real burst of color, we have a large maple tree we can see from our windows - it should be beautiful!

The pictures above and below are growing out of a stump! It's mushroom heaven apparently, all those little dots have opened up into mushrooms too!

Birch leaves above!

Dew drops in the morning!

We have also been enjoying walks through the residential  area here. All the houses are old and beautiful, brick foundations and wood homes. The yards are gorgeous too! From a quick google search, I read that the area's home are mostly from the 30s and were the small homes of factory workers. I have been so tempted to take pictures, but it's kind of rude I think so I don't think I will.

I baked this blueberry crumble to make some room in the freezer for my mom's homemade apple sauce! :) 

I finally had the time to sit down and crochet and as always when I start again after a long break, I wonder why I haven't been doing more of it! It's really so therapeutic. I crocheted an Irish rose and a mushroom from Lesley Stanfield's beautiful books here and here.I will share pictures soon perhaps. I am working on a "wreath" to put on the front door. I have been reading up on some feng shui techniques (because while I am skeptical, I could always use some luck!) and it says you should make your door welcoming. I would have put something on it anyway though, lol. 

Thanks for reading, I'm off to do more therapeutic crocheting. Have a wonderful weekend! :)

Strawberry dreams

I am one lucky girl. I have a birthday fast approaching and to spoil me utterly rotten, I got some crochet-related gifts, namely books. 

I am in loooooooove!!! And inspired!!!

 Other books that have been inspiring me lately are the Tilda books written by Tone Finnanger.These are from the library and I loved them so much, I renewed them so they are in my custody until the end of June AND I have reserved 2 more of her books, I hope the people who have them return them soon! ;) 

(By the by, these books can be found on Amazon.com in English, too. Yes, I've looked into it...Christmas perhaps? Teeheehee)

I love the romantic style and cute ideas and the patterns are pretty easy to follow, especially with my mom there to help me. So yes, I have taken the plunge and am trying to learn how to SEW! I can't believe it myself. This strawberry pillow seemed magical and once my mom assured me it was simple enough to start with, we began making them.

 Here is my version, complete with sleeping princess, my parent's dog who is staying with us for a few weeks. 

My mom is thrilled we are going to start using up her vast collection of fabric. We are in the planning stages of a quilt, too!!

I have also been spoiled in the form of roses and pork chop dinners.

The pork chops are marinated in oil, lime juice (from 2-3 limes), garlic cloves to taste, 1-2 sliced onions, salt and pepper. If you like some spice, add pepper flakes. Put it in the fridge for at least 30 min, obviously the longer the better. Then just dump it in a buttered dish. I like roasted potatoes so I cut them up small so the cook more quickly. They still take forever though. The potatoes can also be marinated! I bake it at 200C/375F until the chops and 'tatoes are done. Serve with lime to squeeze over the pork. Mmm tasty!

I've also been experimenting with a rhubarb pie recipe from a magazine. I made both regular and gluten-free versions. SUPER DELICIOUS!

Gluten-free:

The crust is a simple butter-flour-small amount of sugar and at the very end cold water type. Apple sauce and rhubarb are the filling and the crumble is butter-sugar-flour and coconut. I'd post the recipe, but since it's not my own, I'll skip this time. Sorry!

Thanks for reading,  happy Monday!