I'm an occasional, mostly a wannabe, crochet-er. Meaning, every few years, I get the urge to dabble in crocheting (my Mom taught me the basics when I was a kid), and so I pull out some yarn and a crochet hook, brush up my skills, crochet a few lines, and ultimately lose interest in whatever it is that I'm "making." It's very uninspiring, really. But a few months ago, I was inspired to start and really make the effort to finish something. What is that something you ask? Why, a blanket! I've wanted to crochet a blanket for years but have never taken the time to really put in the work and effort to achieve that dream.
Now, I'm not writing here tonight to declare to the world that I've finally managed to finish a crocheting project (soon, soon!). However, I've made awesome progress, more progress than I've every made before, so I decided to offer a sneak peak of my blanket.
My target finish timeline (that I'm making up even as I type haha) is around the end of April, which should be very doable even with only working on it a few nights a week. And I can already say that it makes a great nap blanket, because I've unintentionally tested it out :)
Everyday, it seems recently, I'm inspired by a blog that I read or something that I find on Pinterest; whether it's a new project or a recipe to try or a quote, I feel like I'm brimming with potential and excitement. And love. Can't leave that out! I'm brimming and overflowing with love for my husband; he makes me so happy. Yes, I'm one happy, joyful girl!
I can't wait to share some of the projects I'm looking forward to getting into in the coming months. Stay tuned to the Chronicles!
On Wednesday, while I was at work, I randomly got a craving for homemade bread. I'm not really sure why haha although it may have had something to do with the blogs I was reading during the day. But I really wanted some homemade bread. So, that night, I pulled out my recipe for English Muffin Bread, and after making sure that I had all the ingredients (thankfully I had a bit of milk left), I whipped up the simple but yummy savory bread. It was actually even easy to make than I had remembered; that was nice to discover lol. As soon as it came out of the oven, D. asked for a slice. I made him wait a few minutes for it to cool first :)
Now in the plans for the weekend: make more English Muffin Bread. The loaf I baked on Wednesday is almost gone already!
Gather the ingredients:
Cornmeal
3 Cups all-purpose flour
1 package active dry yeast
1/8 teaspoon baking soda
1 Cup milk
1/4 Cup water
1/2 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
Grease a 8x4x2-inch loaf pan. Lightly sprinkle pans with enough cornmeal to coat bottom and sides; set pans aside.
In a medium mixing bowl combine 1 1/2 cups of the flour, the yeast, and baking soda; set aside. In a saucepan heat and stir milk, water, sugar, and salt until just warm. Using a wooden spoon, stir milk mixture into flour mixture. Stir in remaining flour.
Place dough in prepared pan. Sprinkle top with cornmeal.
Cover and let rise in a warm place until double in size, about 45 minutes. I heated up my oven to 225 degrees and placed the covered pan on top of the stove with the range light on; it doubled perfectly.
Bake at 400 degrees for about 25 minutes or until golden brown. Immediately remove bread from pan. Cool on a wire rack.
This is actually half of the original recipe as I only wanted to make one loaf rather than two. But I mention this as it would be very easy to make more than one loaf at a time. Enjoy!
I wasn't planning on writing a blog entry for these Southwestern Stuffed Peppers. It was more of a spur-of-the-moment kind of thing! Since I've started this blog, most of the posts that I've done have been pre-planned and pre-written; doing it this way has (at least when I pre-plan and pre-write haha) helped me stay motivated and a smidge more consistent in my blogging. But as I've been procrastinating on actually doing some of the projects and cooking that I've pre-written.....it's kinda hard to blog about them! So instead, I decided in the middle of my cooking to snap some pictures and write about my newest try-out recipe that turned out to be a smash hit. I know so since D. told me to say that they were "yummy!" Such a sweet, supporting husband I have. :)
Of course, I found this recipe via Pinterest. After scanning the recipe, I thought it looked intriguing enough to try. Good decision! Click here for the recipe. Something that I appreciated about the way this recipe was written is that it can be adapted for your eating preferences: meat, vegetarian, vegan. So while we enjoy the meaty version in our house, adapt as suits you! I also really like the southwestern flare; it adds a fun, different taste compared to what I'm used to in stuffed peppers.
Side note: I somehow managed to make far too much stuffing, plus I think my bell peppers were much smaller than hers due to it still being in the middle of winter here....oops! I added the extra to the bottom of the baking dish before putting it back into the oven. We'll have a lot more leftovers than I had planned for, but I'm not complaining; I can't wait to take them for lunch!
In other news, our family is adapting well to the new addition! Lucy still seems to be getting the balance on when we leave and when we're home, and I'm still getting used to her play time at 3 AM......sigh. But we're having so much fun with our little kitty; she's quite the entertainer!
Isn't she just so cute? :)
I mentioned in my first blog post of the year that we were thinking of adding to our family....well, we've finally done it! We've officially become cat people with our very first pet :)
Meet Lucy. Middle name Rae (cause why shouldn't a pet have a middle name haha). She's a cuddler and quite feisty, and we're very excited to have her! She's settling in nicely for her first evening here, and she's already started to curiously nose into places she shouldn't be; she is, after all, a cat.
Recently, my husband has been pestering, er, lovingly suggesting that I find a recipe to cook in the Dutch oven that we received as a Holiday present. Even though I was originally waiting to use it to bake some sort of bread (still planning on that), I decided to do as he asked and peruse the internet for a recipe for dinner this week. So I skipped on over to my trusty friend, Google, and came across a recipe for Beef and Barley Stew. It looked yummy and do-able without a terrible amount of work (always something I look at with new recipes); and since I would be done with work earlier than normal today and have some extra time for cooking, I picked it as our try-out recipe of the week.
It was a good choice! Although I believe that the original recipe was supposed to come out more as a soup, ours turned out as a stew and I'm glad, because it was de-lish! D. and I both agreed that this recipe was definitely going into the repertoire.
If you're inspired by this recipe and would like to make it but don't have a Dutch oven, you could easily whip this up in a large pot.
Gather the ingredients:
8 oz. sirloin steak, cut into bit-size pieces
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper, divided
4 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1/2 to 1 whole onion, chopped
1 large carrot, sliced
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme
3/4 cup barley
4 cups (32 oz.) beef broth
1 cup water
1/4 teaspoon salt
Sprinkle steak with a 1/4 teaspoon of pepper. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in a Dutch oven over medium heat. Add steak and cook, stirring often, until browned on all sides. Transfer to a bowl.
Add remaining 2 tablespoons of oil, onion, and carrot to the pot and cook, stirring until beginning to soften. Add tomato paste and thyme and cook, stirring, until the veggies are coated with the tomato paste and beginning to brown.
Add barley, broth, water, salt, and remaining 1/4 teaspoon pepper; bring to a simmer. Reduce heat to maintain simmer; cook until barley is tender, about 40 minutes. Return beef to pot and heat through. Remove from heat and enjoy!
Side note: my husband doesn't really pester me, but I have to tease him sometimes. ;)
…I am so happy. This day and every day; it’s a blast to experience this life with my best friend. Who knew marriage would be this fun? It just keeps getting better and sweeter. I love my Babe :)
Last night, I made chocolate dipped strawberries for us to enjoy today. Yum!
It's February, and I've hit the itchy part of winter where I long to change something up. Namely with my hair. It never fails to happen haha. So, I hopped over to my hairdresser and said, "Let's play!" She loves me; I'm always asking her to do something different, and we have fun. Yay! So happy!
Also, I got to meet my hairdresser's husband, and he told me to blog about it, so there! Done! They make a great couple, and they're cute together too :)
