What I'm Reading = Bread

I just finished a delightful book called "Sourdough" by Robin Sloan and you guessed it, it's a book about making Sourdough bread, well, the book is so much more than that, but reading about the process of making bread made ME want to make some bread too.

I have a bread making machine that my grandmother re-gifted to me because she never used it and we have used it in the past and it works great but I've also read and been told that we can bake a loaf of bread in a cast iron French oven and I just happen to have a few of those also, plus I can then use my experience as a marketing tool at my part time job selling French cookware.

There are a lot of bread recipes out there if you're going to use a French oven to bake.  Most of the information I was reading stated that it's better to use no knead dough for French oven baking.   My first foray was using the first recipe I found using Chef Google.  Four simple ingredients; flour, yeast, salt and warm water.

I wish I could say that my first try was a completely successful, but I can't.  It's wasn't a complete failure, but I think I know where I went wrong and I will correct those things the next time I try which will probably be in the next couple of days because the aroma in the house alone was worth it.

As you can see, it looked beautiful coming out of the oven but I messed up and cut into it too soon (how can you resist with the smell?) AND after all that, I realized I forgot the salt.  lol

So, the next time, I have a recipe from King Arthur Flour - No Knead Crusty White Bread and I've read the following article on their website; Bread Baking in a Dutch Oven and I'm going to give it another whirl........this time I may try the cold Dutch Oven method they suggest also; Bread Baking in a cold Dutch oven

I'm keep you posted...the upside of all this experimentation is how good our house smells.

döstädning

A few posts ago, I talked about finally downloading this book after reading an article about it last year.  It was a short book (71 pages and I can't believe what I paid for only 71 pages) but I'm not feeling that bad because, well.....it's a book.

These are the kinds of books that I pick up and put down regardless of how compelling they may be.  I like reading these in small doses and then apply what I learned to something.  I usually have two or three books in various stages of reading at one time anyway.

All that said, I really enjoyed reading this.  The author is witty and charming in her teaching and even though the title might be off putting, this is a great book for anyone over the age of 50 to read.

Even if you aren't over 50, there are lessons to be learned with what you accumulate over the years.

First thing, she advises is not to go through photographs and paper first.  Our photos are pretty much organized due to the fact that I scrapbook, and I already have two archival boxes that hold things like newspapers, magazines or ephemera of historical significance so her last step in döstädning, I'm already done with.  These boxes are labeled and organized neatly in a spare closet.

Here's my takeaways on the things that pertained to us:

• Clothing - Probably the easiest thing to tackle so the author suggests starting there.

I purged a great deal of professional clothes after I retired early from my government job, but I could still stand to part with some more things.  That goes for my husband too, especially now that his work attire is t-shirts and jeans.  We'll work on this step within the next month when we start to switch out some of our clothing from our master bedroom closet.  I've been donating our things to a couple places locally that provide clothing to disadvantaged men and women for job interviews.

Funny story in the book...the author received some help from another senior in her community in organizing the disorder of her computer files.  She said he looked at the screen and said: "This is like putting your toilet in the kitchen" 😀

• Do your döstädning while you can

The author makes a great point when she says "Aging is certainly not for weaklings.  That is why you should not wait too long to start your downsizing.  Sooner or later you will have your own infirmities, and then it is damn nice to be able to enjoy the things you can still mange to do without the burden of too many things to look after and too many messes to organize."

• Books - this one is tough for me.

The next time I tackle our books I'm going to take the author's advise and only keep books that I still haven't read or books that I keep returning to.   I shouldn't feel bad when I do purge our books because I donate them all to Planned Parenthood for them to sell at their twice yearly book sale that is a huge fund raiser for them and an event where I volunteer.

• Things, Things, and more Things - how I love my things

For me, what makes a home are things.  Things are pictures, framed photographs, mementos and any décor that makes you happy or tells a story.  I'm still working on reducing our things but as my style changes so do our things, except for the items that have special meaning.

I have actually made an appointment at a local home furniture and décor consignment store in early May and have already started getting things together to take.  I'm pretty jazzed that I'm getting rid of some things that have been hiding out in the basement and a couple closets and may even make some cash consigning them.

• Collections

Over our many years of marriage, we have collected things, both separately and together, but must say that we don't seem to have a problem getting rid of our collections when we tire of them.  At one time, we collected the cutest bubble fairies but sold them years later, my husband was into rocketry for a while but once he lost interest in the hobby, he sold what he had.  Other than a couple of Christmas collections and craft supplies, the only thing we collect currently is Rae Dunn pottery, it's cheap, we both like it and I can see us hanging on to it for a while.  As long as you are still enjoying whatever it is you collect, then now is not the time to get rid of it.

• In the Garden

This is where I need to concentrate this year.  My gardening area of our garage is out of hand and I need to make a serious purge.

• The Garage

If you are like us and live in a winter climate like we do, you'll know what a mess the garage can get over winter, so every spring we have to schedule a "garage clean up" day that usually takes us at least 4-6 hours.  This year my husband is being "encouraged" to take a hard look at what we have been hanging on to in his area of the garage while I'm going the same with my gardening supplies.

So, I'm hoping in the time between now while living in this home and when we finally make the decision to downsize our home, we'll "death clean" to where the next move will be easy and we won't be leaving a bunch of stuff that our son will need to deal with after we're gone.

Let's Get Crafty - Whatchamacallits

Book Marks or Page Markers (whatever you want to call them)

A little back story first.  😀
I've got no problem admitting that I like getting crafty and I like lots of different mediums.  I think I was born with crafty DNA.  My mother was artsy/crafty, her cross stitch (which I've shared on my blog) and her quilts are works of art and at one time she even ran a small ceramic shop out of our house part time, mostly for all the ladies that lived in the housing development we lived in.  Even my father had a artsy/crafty side to him, I remember him painting a humongous Bonsai tree in our dining room back in the 60's.  Granted it was paint by number but still a painstaking project and at one time he owned along with my step mom a plaster shop out in Nevada, so I'm not surprised I inherited the crafty chip.

I've stuck with scrapbooking and paper crafts the longest, this year marks 22 years I've scrapbooked, but I've always dabbled in other stuff too.  Everything from calligraphy, stained glass, cross stitch, ceramics, pottery, batik and when I was still in high school sewed a lot of my own clothes.

One thing that I love is when I stumble upon something really fun to make that is for something else I love, in this case, books and it's even better when I already have all the supplies.  This project takes just two things; letter size envelopes and washi tape.  You will need a ruler, pencil and scissors too.

With the collection of washi tape I have, I have carte blanche in which tapes I'm going to use in making my page markers and I usually have a stack of letter size envelopes laying around.  If you don't, go to your closest dollar store and buy thee a box.

First step - with a ruler, mark off both corners of the envelope.  These will be the page markers. Make your angles as small or as large as you want.  I experimented with different sizes.

Next, cut those babies off the envelope.

Once you have the number of page markers you want to make, get out your favorite washi tape and position the tape on the page marker where you want it and snip off the ends.

Easy Peasy!

You want to make sure that you cut off a long enough piece of tape to go completely across the triangle or position where it will.  You can use as many piece of tape as you want.  It's up to you if you want to do the back side of the marker.  I did a couple each way, just one side and both sides.

Here's one where I use a two different designs of washi tape and how it fits on the page of my bullet journal.

Ta Da!  That's how easy it is to make these fun book or page markers.  You can even get fancier and use colored paper to make the triangles, but I find the envelopes make it just as fun.  It's also an easy, fun craft for kids or even fun to make as gifts for all your book loving friends.

Enjoy!  and thanks for stopping by.......

Nostalgia and Letting Go

Late last year, I came across an article about a book called "The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter".

I am all about organizational books, I've read Peter Walsh and Marie Kondo (although I think she might be a bit over the top, I'm not going to thank my purses for doing their jobs), but the philosophy behind this book seemed to resonated with me from the article I read, so I finally downloaded it a week or so ago to see what the author has to say.  It's only 71 pages so it should take me long.  I'll report back on that once I've finished.

I'm not concerned about clutter, I run a pretty tight ship in that respect, I'm talking about things I'm hanging on to that I really need to let go.

I'm entering a phase in my life that I feel the need to really purge and downsize.   Even my spouse has an area of our garage that really needs a some purging.  We're not downsizing our space at this time, but I'm currently downsizing some of our "things".

I'm always going to have "things" in my home.  I love to decorate and I love to be surrounded by pictures and décor that makes me happy, brings back memories or tells a story, but we owe it to our son not to saddle him with having to get rid of a bunch of stuff he doesn't want, so.........

The obstacles that I'm running into are all nostalgic and who it belonged to originally.  I have things of both my mothers and grandmothers but some of it just sits in drawers, closets or the basement.  I have to learn to let go.  I'll never get rid of the beautiful quilts and cross stitch pieces that my mother made me, but I have fabric of hers I need to let go.   I'll also never get rid of the cobalt blue juice glasses that were my grandmother's that one of us uses everyday, but I have silver pieces of hers that I need to let go.  I could go on and on.

Since retiring from my full time career, I've completely gone through every stitch of clothing we own and what we have left in the house are the things we wear, there's no more hanging on to any professional clothes I had or things neither of us were wearing anymore.  Several non-profits that provide clothing for men and women for job interviews benefited from our castoffs and our clothing is now manageable.  That also includes shoes and purses that I no longer wore.

I've also purged our seasonal decorations a couple years ago, but we still have quite a bit.  Thankfully it's all nicely packed away in totes that are labeled, easy to store and move.

So, stay tuned for a future post on what I learned from the book.......

Slow Cooker Lazy - Jambalaya

I run hot and cold with cooking.  Sometimes I want to cook all the time and then I go through phases where I don't want to cook at all.  I'm glad I have some of the time saving appliances I do, my slow cooker, my instant pot and our air fryer for those times when cooking isn't my thing or I've decided to subsist on Naan bread and tomatoes with balsamic vinegar for days and my family has to be YOYO (Your On Your Own).

I'm not someone who can create recipes herself, I'm not that talented with food, but I'm a champ at finding recipes that I want to try and cooking the things my family has enjoyed all of these years.

Recently, I had a craving for Jambalaya but I didn't want to go the Zatarain's route (which we've tried before and it's not horrible) so I went on the lookout for an easy recipe.

My google skills took me to this recipe of Easy Slow Cooker Jambalaya and I gathered all the ingredients together to try it out.

The title of the recipe isn't lying, it was easy.  Literally dump everything in your slow cooker until the last 1/2 hour when the rice and shrimp go in.  I'm sure you could do this in the instant pot also, but I was in no hurry the day I made it, so I used our tried and true slow cooker.  The after Jambalaya review was a Thumbs Up!  It makes 8 very hearty servings and since this really isn't a good recipe for the freezer, we had it for dinner than night and each had a leftover portion for our next day's lunch and a good friend was gifted with a container to keep him fed.

The only change I made was I reduced the amount of chicken to one large boneless skinless chicken breast rather than 2 pounds of chicken thighs.

Thanks for stopping by!

A Resurrection of Sorts

I knew I had let my blog languish for a few months and when I checked, yep...September was the last time I posted anything.

With that discovered, one of my challenges this year as it has been in the years since I retired from my U.S. Court career is to have more of a routine through out my week, so I'm going to add posting to my blog on my "Things to make a habit" list.   I am a creature of routine and habit.

I like being a bit accountable to it, I like sharing things I'm doing and even if nobody reads it, I feel like I'm leaving a living, breathing diary/journal for our son and any future grandchildren I may have after I'm gone. 

I'm not big on starting new things at New Year's, to me it's a little cliche but probably more about the fact I'm never mentally prepared at the first of the year to make changes. 

Some of the things I'm challenging myself to incorporate into my weekly routine and make a habit are:

• Yoga
• Blogging
• Crafting
• Reading
• Meditation
• Walking or biking (once I get permission from my foot doctor)

I need to incorporate each of those things several times during my week.  I always read at bed time but depending on how tired I am, I might only read one or two chapters before I get sleepy.  I'd like to increase the time I reach for a book.  I enjoy my time online but it needs to be balanced more with the things I enjoy in real life.  Gardening will be added to that list once our gardening season is here.

I got creative and made myself a "cheat sheet" that I laminated and can slide in my planner to act as a reminder and my cheat sheet coordinates with my journal I'm keeping to track my progress.  More on that journal in future posts.

Last October, I also took a part time job as a sales associate for Le Creuset at the new outlet mall in my burb, it's only 10-15  hours a week, so I have plenty of time to do the other things I enjoy.  The part time job adds some routine that I clearly crave PLUS a very generous employee discount to enjoy on their brand of products and a little extra money every week.

I'm also going to be redoing my blog so I can incorporate my small home based art and crafts business Serendipity Home Art & Crafts.  It a fun project of mine that allows me to be creative and make a little bit of money.  You can find my Facebook page here and I'll be updating it soon with some new stuff.

So, welcome to my blog if you've made it this far and I hope you'll visit again.

A Finished Project

I swear nothing gives me more pleasure and satisfaction then finishing a "long time coming" project, whether that be one of our home projects, or in the yard or even a craft project.

The husband installed the closet system over the Labor Day holiday weekend and it's a good thing we had the extra time because as I started bringing clothes back in the closet, I think we ended up re-configuring things at least three times, but finally found what is going to work well for us.

 

Taking the door off was the right thing to do.  Makes it way more spacious than it is.  Like I said in my last post, it's only 6' deep and 7' across which is small for a master closet.....both the closet and the master bathroom in this house were disappointing to me, but coming from a two bedroom, one bath bungalow, they weren't deal breakers, the other storage in this home more than made up for the master's shortcomings.

Of course, my stuff takes up 3/4 of the closet and my husband gets the rest but that works because his current job's dress code is t-shirts and jeans, so his casual polo type shirts are only worn when we go out to the movies, or out to eat, etc.   Even so, they are much more accessible and his shoes are underneath his shirts.  We also have a spot for the basket that has our shoe cleaning/waterproofing supplies in it.

While my stuff was out of the closet, I did another purge and pared it down some more, some went to my sister, the rest will be donated.  In another month, I'll be switching out seasonal clothing

In the meantime, I pulled all my black, white, and gray colored clothing from the rest and using the new space in the back of the closet where the built in was, put my white on the lower rod and the gray on the upper along with the small amount of purple I have.  We even have room to store my yoga mat (I do yoga in our bedroom) and our down comforter we use in the winter on the shelf between the clothes.

The rest was organized by ROYGBIV as best I could.  All my black and black prints are hung on the bottom rod along with pants and capri pants and I hung some of my Hawkeye gear to the front of the top rod.

Over on the top shelf of the husband's side of the closet, I have canvas storage bins with my boots, seasonal shoes, totes & small bags, and swimwear stored.

One the top shelf of my side of the closet, I store my gym bag, a basket of hangar clips, my blue felt fedora and purses.......my precious.  😀

My purses....sigh, I needed a way that I could see what I had.  Before the re-do, they hung on large S hooks on the lower rod of the husband's side, but the closet door swung in to the closet and was usually open, so quite a few of them were hidden from sight unless I stepped in the closet and shut the door.

Now, they are all out for me to see!

The two drawer unit we installed holds my undies and bras and the wire basket holds my various pajamas.  Of course, I had to give my Iowa Hawkeye purse the love and recognition it deserves.  

I needed a way to get some of the purse to stand up better rather than flopping over.  No way was I spending the money for purse shapers, they are expensive!

I have the satin bags that the Michael Kors came in but you can't see them if you store the purses in the bags, so they are folded away for safe keeping.  I didn't want to use tissue paper and my first thought was pool noodles!.....I could cut them up and stuff them in the purses, but unfortunately I couldn't find any pool noodles this late in summer so as I was wandering my local dollar store, I saw children's water wings, swim arms, whatever for $1 a pair and BINGO, the light bulb goes off and I think I'll blow those up and stuff them in the purses....

They worked perfect and it only cost me $8 bucks!

I also found this cool purse hanging gizmo on Amazon and I hung more of my purses on that.  I have a lot of purses, but I use them and like to switch them out frequently.

All and all, I'm really pleased with the makeover of the closet and wish we would have done it much sooner than we did, especially when I was still working, but hey, we can enjoy it now.  The husband even thinks it was a good idea now that it's done.  

Thanks for stopping by and letting me tell you all about our DIY home projects or décor!

Progress......Yay!

Sorry....the crazy cat lady is out today and has to start her post with a cat photo.  Tucker likes to stick close to his human. 😊😻

Lots of projects going on in our household, but one big one was completed last week.  We finally had the carpet we have in our home shampooed and cleaned and they did a great job!  So here's a shout out to Steamway Craftsman Cleaning Service in Ames for their work.  If you need any cleaning done, give them a call!

Since we had two rooms to almost empty, life around here was in an upheaval for a couple of days because we could barely use the kitchen, dining area, foyer and hallway because that's where everything had to go, so we were squeezing through tunnels of furniture, side tables, chairs and lamps for a couple of days.

Putting things back ended up taking me WAY longer than moving it out.  I couldn't believe how dusty and dirty things were, so I took my time cleaning each thing as I put things back where they belonged.  I did manage to do a little rearranging of furniture also, a couple things got kicked to the curb and I see a cool new reading chair in our future.....that's the inner interior designer in me, what can I say?

We also made progress on our closet re-do.  The wooden built in was torn out and destroyed with minimal damage to the wall, the left side of the closet torn out and the husband patched and caulked all the holes so that I could put on a fresh coat of paint.

Ignore the gross carpet, it's going to be replaced in October.

On a side note.....progress with the weight loss.....down 24 pounds now since August 2016, but it does fluctuate a bit and I don't weight myself everyday or even every week.  Just concentrating on eating and snacking as healthy as I can and if I have a bad day, I make up for the next.   Unfortunately, I've completely blew my goal of yoga everyday, but I'm managing twice a week right now and 2-3 good walks a week.  It's all I can manage right now.

How in the world did I ever work full time?

It's finally happening.......

After 13 years of a master closet that I hated and that I have fought with to find a workable solution to our clothes and my shoes and purses, we are finally going to gut it and re-work the shelving system. 

This has become necessary now because we are going to put new carpet in our master bedroom and that includes the closet floor.

Our master closet has this awkward wooden built in (see below) set right in the middle of the back wall and it is wasting at least 6 to 8 linear feet of hanging space.  As you can see, I use canvas bins and baskets as storage within the built in, but it also makes the space dark and the clothes that hang to the back of our closet get "lost" because of it.........so I want it gone!

So, we need to get that built in out of there before we can proceed with carpet, but since we are demoing the closet, we might as well re-configure it and give it a fresh coat of paint, especially since it looks like we'll be staying put for awhile.

Unfortunately our budget does not include those fabulous wooden closet systems, I checked out Martha Stewart's line of wooden closet systems but I'm not going to spend 3k on a closet do-over and our master closet isn't that large, just 6' deep and 7' across.

So, knowing wood was out of the question, I went to Lowe's.com and looked at their Rubbermaid coated wire closet systems and accessories and found exactly what we need for under $300.00.

I'm hoping to empty the closet today so tomorrow the husband can take on the task of demoing that built in out, then I can paint, using the same Sherwin Williams Dover White (SW 6385) that all the closets are painted.  Once the painting is done, we can start installing the closet system. 

We also decided to take the door off the closet permanently, or at least until we decide to sell because where the closet is located nobody but myself and husband see it and although the husband doesn't know this yet, we'll be replacing the light fixture also because it's doesn't do the job.  So between the door off and a new fixture, it should help immensely.

Now days, I'm not as fast at completing home projects as I used to be so I'm hoping that we get this project done before the 16th of September when we leave for our 30th Anniversary "honeymoon" in Estes Park, Colorado.

Enjoy your weekend!  and I'm keep my blog updated with our progress.  I'm excited!

Letting Go........

Next month I'll be celebrating a milestone birthday and because I'll be entering in a new decade, there are some things in my life that I'm finally letting go of to start off my next decade off fresh.

My family has had a rough 18 months.  As I have mentioned in previous blog posts, both myself and the husband lost a parent and recently we lost a long time pet, so we desperately need some cleansing of bad mojo but just recently the tide has seemed to turn with a new job opportunity for the husband in his career and our son finding a floor manager position with Target (my favorite store).

I've had a whole lot of things taking space up in my head that have caused me emotions that aren't necessary and it's totally foolish of me to continue to let these things bother me and cause me pain.  Some have had their grip on me for years and some are relatively new.  I need to let them go and I'm working on some self-talk when those thoughts start to enter my head.

In the last year, I've had to re-evaluate friendships and other relationships and decide what course of action to take because more important than ever in my life and in this world, I want to surround myself with people who share the same values and be done with those that do not.   I'm not ashamed to admit that our circle of friends has grown smaller but for us at this point it's quality, not quantity that counts.

I'm also letting go of the ideal that I'm going to go back to weighing the 125 pounds I did at age 21.  It's not going to happen, it was almost 40 years ago and I'd look like crap at my age at that weight.  I'm letting that go and be thankful for my current good health and just concentrate on moving, be that gardening, walking, biking or yoga.

I'm also letting go of a lot of time spent on social media.  Lately, I found that whenever I am on Facebook, my news feed is depressing and I see the same damn thing posted by multiple people and it's just not fun anymore.   I'm not giving it up because it is the only way for me to keep up with my out of state friends but I'm scaling back big time.

Lastly, I'm excited about a possible part time job opportunity.  A new 75 high end store outlet mall is opening up in our burb in late October and they are having a job fair next month that I'm going to go and see if I can find PT work that will fit my needs.  Cross your fingers!

Since it appears that we will be staying in this home for a few more years, we've got some home projects coming up that is going to keep me busy over the next 3-4 months and I'll share as things get done.

In the meantime, as my water bottle says "Worry Less, Live More"