Summer Mantel

I found Layla  online who likes to change her mantel to fit the seasons just like me. 
Here is what her mantel looks like for the summer.

This reminds me of  Susan's beach look in  her home.  Cassie what do you think of the flag?

You can see how she did it at her blog http://www.theletteredcottage.net/.

I love it.

Herb garden

When Sarah came home from her mission she bought fresh basil that you can plant.  She said that the smell of basil reminded her of Italy because some of the kitchens she visited would smell of basil.  That gave me an idea...("light bulb" to quote "despicable me")  I decided to do an herb garden project. 

I bought some small pots at Lowes and black spray paint.

(Joey sprayed the space ship he built with the paint. Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of "Apollo 2".)

I decided to put them by the kitchen sink so they can get the great afternoon sun and I will remember to water them.

I am growing basil, rosemary and sage.  I would like to change the sage for thyme and would like to grow chives in the little empty pot there.

This is a close up of the rosemary and basil.

They are still alive and thriving and I have gathered leaves from these plants on more the one occasion.  The herbs added great flavor to our food.  I am really liking my little herb garden.

Stairs

This would be a fun remodel

This picture was at www.calfinder.com/blog/general-remodel/5-wacky-home-improvements/

I think it looks like fun.

Blueberries

Dad got up early on Sunday morning and started baking like crazy.  He started with some of the most delicious blueberry muffins than made us oven pancakes with blueberries.  YUM!

He got the recipe from www.allrecipes.com

TO DIE FOR BLUEBERRY MUFFINS

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

3/4 cup white sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/3 cup vegetable oil

1 egg

1/3 cup milk

1 cup blueberries

1/2 cup white sugar

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 cup butter, cubed

1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 400.  Grease muffin cups or line with muffin liners.

Combine 1 1/2 cups flour, 3/4 cup sugar, salt and baking powder.  Place Vegetable oil into a 1cup measuring cup; add the egg and enough milk to fill the cup.  Mix this with flour mixture.  Fold in blueberries.  Fill muffin cups right to the top, and sprinkle with crumb topping mixture.

To make crumb topping  mix together 1/2 cup sugar, 1/3 cup flour, 1/4 butter, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon.   Mix with fork, and sprinkle over muffins before baking.

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven or until done.

Eat----Enjoy

Here is one of the oven pancakes

I'll post the rest of what he made later.

Bears

Another weekend, another hike and another bear sighting.

Here is the trail right before we saw the first bear. 

This time we heard lots of rustling in the trees and than there was a bear.  He was small so we thought that he was the cub....but than a little bear wandered on to the trail.  The little cub wasn't at all concerned with us.

This time the bears were between us and the end of the trail.  As the medium bear kept checking us out we thought ..OK we'll just wait here patiently.  They finally moved on so Joey and I continued on very slowly until we were past the spot.

I guess we are "Bear Whispers".  If you want to see a bear come and hike with us.

Red, White and Blue

Here is my take on seasonal decor.  I really like the way the red, white and blue of the flag I painted looks in the living room.  I filled the vases with the shells the kids collected from piano lessons.  Happy Summer!

More summer red, white and blue pictures

We love these summer colors.

Red, White, and Blue

Smoke alarm

We woke up to the smoke alarm going off Sunday morning.  Dad had a pineapple upside down cake in the oven.  The unfortunate thing is that we didn't have the right size cake pan to accommodate seven nice pineapple rings on the top.  He opted to use a spring form pan.  We now know that the brown sugar will leak out the bottom of the spring form pan and burn on the bottom of the stove.  The smoke detector was going off and the dilemma was that the cake still had 25 minutes to go.  We just opened all the doors and windows and kept it bake'n.  It was worth it.

This recipe comes from the two Brass sisters.  They write heritage recipes and even though we lost most of the brown sugar the cake was delicious.

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter, melted

1 cup dark brown sugar, packed

7 slices/rings of canned pineapple from 20oz can, and 5 Tablespoons reserved juice

1 cup cake flour (  not self rising )

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

3 eggs, separated

1 cup white granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

Directions

Preheat oven to 350.   Rack should be in middle position.

Sift together cake flour, baking powder and salt into a medium bowl and set aside.

In a 9 inch cake pan, swirl butter to coat the bottom and sides of pan.  (Do it over the sink in case of drips ) Most will settle to the bottom.

Sprinkle brown sugar over the bottom of the pan.

Using paper towel pat pineapple slices dry on both sides and arrange in a decorative pattern on the bottom of the pan.

In a large bowl stir egg yolks just to break them up and add sugar, vanilla and 5 Tablespoons of reserved pineapple juice.  Mix well and stir in flour mixture until combined.  Set aside.  Place egg whites in bowl of electric mixer fitted with whisk attachment and beat until just stiff but not dry.

Fold egg whites into the batter already in the large bowl until fully combined.

Pour batter into cake pan.

Bake 45-55 minutes until tester inserted into middle comes out clean.

Coll pan on rack 2-3 minutes then invert onto another cooling rack.  It will still be quite warm and very moist.  Scrape any remaining bits of sugar or fruit from pan onto top of cake.

Serve warm or at room temperature.

Serves 8    Yummy!!