Lasagna Lover

Have you seen these lasagna pans by Rachael Ray? They are stoneware, 9 x 13, and come in many colors. I discovered them while searching a bridal registry at Bed Bath and Beyond. She does not have this on her list, but I found it on the website...I called the store 24 hour number at 2:30am this morning to inquire if I could add a gift from the store in with the registry items that will compliment this pan. They said yes...they could help me over the phone or in any store...so I am heading to the store this afternoon to make a customized wedding gift. She has a set of stainless steel lasagna serving peices on her list to go with it, and I am also adding some towels that she has on her list. I think it will be just about as perfect as it comes, don't you??? This is the color I would choose, but she will get the blue one with matching towels.

A new blog started and carrots planted!

This morning my DIL and I and daughter and baby ran around doing some chores. DIL is a bridesmaid this weekend and she is closing up loose ends getting ready. I polished up some 6mm white pearls I had made years ago on sterling silver lever-backed earrings. They look very shiny and ready to wear now. She is wearing pearl earrings, necklace and braclet, and will look very pretty with her dress of a satiny material sort of a dark brown, purple shade (VERY BEAUTIFUL)! I think she will look like Cinderella, except with Snow White's hair, LOL!!!!

Ran to Home Depot to buy my favorite organic cow manure compost (it's very inexpensive too)...and got my three new pickle green 5 gallon tubs filled with the compost and some Miracle Gro soil on top, and planted my Big Top Carrot seeds! I can hardly wait to see how they do both in the containers and in that mixture. I will take a pic of them when the seedlings are up! Buddha is watching over them out there for me! Hehehe. We calculate they should be ready by Christmas, and for grandson, Donovan's birthday...so we decided we will be making a fresh carrot cake!!! He is excited...yeah!

I am washing my new uniforms, checking to see if I still own any socks, and getting paperwork ready to take to work tomorrow. Our job ads look really terrible here...narry a job listed. I am feeling grateful for my new job.

I was playing around last night (late) trying to make some paper beads to be like the Pandora or Trollbead style...and this is what I did. I rolled them on a wider stick (a skewer) and actually painted them. This morning I am putting a few coats of glossy nail polish over top and they are actually really pretty. I may need to make enough to try a bracelet.


I started a new blog...granted, it may not be frequently updated, just as my ATC and collage cards blogs are (not)...but it is a record for myself as to what I am doing or have done. Maybe someone can be inspired by some little thing there. I hope so. The new blog is here at "Let It Beads".

Do you have a plastic pelican in front of your fax machine???

Chances are, you might, if you are a parent or grandparent! I had not ever had one until today when a grandchild placed it there. My first reaction was a negative one, and my daughter completed the statement I was ABOUT to make, with a totally positive one, and with a feeling of gratefulness! My attitude changed on a dime, and it just goes to show how you can take a situation and turn it around all with how you look at it!!! So...the pelican in front of the fax machine is a symbol of love for me! I can't dare move it!!!


Now if anyone wants the recipe I used for my roasted pumpkin seeds, you can find it HERE, at Allrecipes.com. These were the best I've made so far. I have roasted them about 5 times over the years, and these were crunchy, sweet and slightly spicy (only a tad). I didn't have any chili powder, so I substituted cumin.

Oh, and it is official...I am gainfully employed once again!!! I start orientation on Friday! I have to buy scrubs again, and either nurses shoes or sneakers...I am leaning toward nurses shoes...as long as they are COMFORTABLE! I will report on it all later! Wish me luck! Hopefully this will be a dream come true...I hope so...regardless, I am sticking it out till the day I retire! Only 12 more years!


Oh...and I am already planning the Disney World trip with the kids in a few months! Nice time of year to go when it is cooler during fall/winter...maybe around Thanksgiving or Christmas time...we shall see. Gotta see Micky and Donalds house and get an ice cream cone on Main Street!!!

Pumpkin carving!

The grands with their Mom. I think Em was ready to go!! LOL.

Donovan and Emily had a grand time picking out pumpkins yesterday at our local pumpkin patch! This morning (even before dressing), we went outside in the cool breezy air, to carve. Donovan was the carver (or mostly grandma... since Mom was at work...with strict instructions on exactly where to cut, and how the features were to look). Emily was too young, so Donovan drew a nose and mouth on her little pumpkin and we attached sticker eyes. They both turned out real well.


The large pumpkin lost his right eye in a terrible pirate accident!

Happy Pumpkin time to you all!

Curls, Smiles, Flowers and Clafouti

Hello!!! Tonight I have a variety of pics. The cutest ones are of my grandkids, of course! I was looking at Emily's head as she was turned around in the bathroom last night and saw this (I did not mess with it at all, this is all natural, lucky girl)! :

Then she turned around and I saw this:

Then a few shots of Donovan being his usual fun and handsome self:



I made a wonderful dessert last night! It was a
Pear Clafouti recipe from Organic Gardening.Com. You can see a pic of it at this website. I had to make it once I saw the pic and read the recipe!!! The only problem was that I couldn't afford the fresh pears for it. I figured I would need 8 pears and the least expensive ones were a dollar each! Good lord, I may as well go to the Cheesecake Factory for that price!!! With all of the other ingredients it would have been well over 14 dollars!

So I substituted apples. We looked for MacIntosh, but only found Jonathan apples (all the others were crunchy ones). I also added about a tablespoon of Apple Pie Spice, and when I went to get my flour, I was all out of white, so had to use whole wheat. I did make a little more of the crust too, just because it was kinda scant and I figured "Why not"??? I'm glad I did it...the whole thing was fantastic! A lovely fall dessert. Here is what was left of mine after we all had some...(I am polishing off the last bit tonight)!

A huge okra bloom was opened this morning and I ran out as quickly as I could to snap a few pics! (They close up quickly). I am so in love with these hibiscus relatives!!! A few close ups:





Have a wonderful weekend everybody!!!

Scanner photo contest

OK, now I am hooked and I learned about this contest over at Gardening Gone Wild, so felt I must try an entry. I hope fellow blogger Not So Angry Redhead will forgive me since she too, has entered, and I am new to this whole idea, and just felt as though I must give it a shot. The contest closes just before midnight tomorrow night...so if anyone else wants to have a go...check out the blog! Thankyou to 'Not So Angry Redhead' for telling me to check out the links in her post, as this is how I realized I could do this. Wish us both good luck! Here is my entry (you can see pollen smears, and some of the flowers are blurred, but overall it looks kinda cute, don't you think? The gloriosas are the stars of the show! Obviously I need more practice...it's not as easy as one would think! There are great tips on Gardening Gone Wild's blog, BTW!

Scan your flowers, leaves and other interesting items!!!

Scanning your flowers! What a neat idea! I just saw it done over on Not So Angry Redhead's Blog, and wondered if she meant that she actually scanned her flowers in her actual scanner...so at 11:30pm, here I am...heading out to the backyard with a lantern in one hand and scissors in the other... to cut Gloriosa's to scan. LOL. My sweet DIL was there to help me and we first scanned normally...

first the white background (with light variations due to not being able to close scanner all the way), and the black background (with a peice of black construction paper on top of the flowers to cover the top of the scanner). My black construction paper had tiny flecks of silver in it and you can see it in the scan, just to let you know.

It worked out beautifully! I am looking forward to trying a few other flowers and leaves! This was just a test...I did not arrange them or really plan any sort of layout ...this was just to see what would happen by scanning. Make sure your scanning bed is clean so small bits don't show. I am also wondering how it would look with pretty scrapbooking paper behind. Maybe a few other embellishments!!! Hey, I feel a lot of experimentation coming up!!!

Happy Cactus Monday!

This post is for all, but especially for Evelyn over at Sensational Succulents since she particularly likes her pink plants!!!! Three shots of my Euphorbia lactea, with tips turning pink in the fall sun! So sweet! This plant was in the screenroom, but was moved out in full sun in a cactus tire a few months back and this is what is happening.


Then a few more shots of okra buds! Sorry...I know you are probably sick of seeing okra and flowers, but these sideways shots show how pretty they are with the red coloration showing on the outer bud. These could possibly be the most beautiful flowers I have ever seen, closed or open (and minus the aphids)...I AM IN LOVE!


P.S. The aphids are non-stop, and I have had to spray weekly with insecticidal soap, or a mixture of soap and water to attempt to keep them at bay. They are persistant and a real pain in the butt!

A cheery hello on Saturday!

Just here doing some art with grandson, Donovan. Nice weather outside...opened the door here this morning to 60 degree air! WOW!!! Hubby out mowing grass. Been seeing some more northern birds passing through the yard. Cardinals, and a yellow bird (???)...he was quick. Looking out my kitchen window, I am seeing a swallowtail butterly, a few dragonflies, bees, and all kindas of flying things...squirrels on fence on other side. Looks like a fun day for the wildlife...sunny, yet cool.

Gigantic okra!

Well, I think that my okra had gotten as big as it was going to...don't ask me why I think it...I just did! I measured the outside curve to be 10 inches, and the inside curve 9 inches, so will go with 9.5! I am now hoping to keep these plants going until the South Florida Fair gets here so I can enter a huge okra in the vegetable growing contest! I think this must be Cowhorn okra with the size and the way it curves. It is also called Steer horn okra. I will be saving some seeds. I sure hope this one hasn't gotten so big as to turn woody and inedible...if it has, I will pull the others off at around 7 inches and see how they are. It's all just one big experiment...but from the looks of it, it is a success! Yippeeeee!!!!! Now where did I put all my okra recipes.....

Rag Rug attempt!

Well, this has ben fun! This morning, I ripped a queen sheet into 1.5 inch strips. Then I sewed them end to end on the bias (for strength, I assume). Then I rolled the whole mess into a ball of "yarn".

This afternoon, I started to crochet a rag rug. I had read some tips and watched a few YouTube videos on HOW TO, so I just forged ahead. I chained about 12 inches, then begand to crochet in a round, around the middle 12 inches worth (to make an oval shape). As you can see, it is turning out to me more of a rectangle!!!

I used up all of my queen flat sheet tonight, and tomorrow I plan to shred up another one with mostly blue in it to continue building outward. The rug has a nice soft cushy feel to it, and it is heavy, so should lay well. I am trying to think of a way to attach a non-skid back to it, but still be able to remove it for washing. Velcro comes to mind...we shall see.


The rug (in this lighting) looks mostly a beige color. Well, the sheet was beige with a gren, a cranberry and a blue plaid in it. You can see it better up close and personal in real life. Hehehe. It will definately look good with a border color...and I am looking forward to finishing it soon!

Hope everyone has had a wonderful week so far!
Julie

In lieu of Cactus Monday...

Since I have nothing interesting in the line of cactus or succulents to show you, I thought I would do a stand in with Palm Tree Monday instead!!!
My grandson, Donovan, and I went for a wander down the edge of a canal one block over from my house. It is lined with apartments and condos and we walked straight down in their backyards, basically, along the canals edge. First, we came upon this really cool reflection of a palm frond hanging down into the water, and the reflection made it look like one of those "God's eyes" we used to make when we were kids with sticks and yarn. Do you remember doing that??? It was a challenge to hold the sticks straight while weaving the yarn around and around. Anyway, I thought this was a really neat photo!

Second is a pic of some seed pods floating in the water with other things to make an interesting pic. I like all parts of a palm tree...even the trashy pods that fall. They look particularly nice floating in water, don't you think???

Here is some great weaving of a lovely palm tree fiber that I think is the basis for keeping them standing during hurricanes!!! LOL...but seriously isn't this amazing?...the tight weave is another of natures surprises!

Last, I took a pic of one of the backyards at a condo building. They had lush green back lawn all the way out to the water, but little walking paths out to two table and chairs areas complete with grills at each, and also two of these areas here with colorful adirondack chairs, in sand and a palm tree in each too! Yeah, I could see myself living there...with my feet in the sand, looking at all the beautiful palm trees, boats and water!

Happy Cactus... er, I mean Palm Tree Monday!!!
xoxo- Julie

Well, yeah...okra flowers are edible!!!

I'm not sure I would be a flower eater, but a battered and fried one might be interesting! Check out all of the edible flowers HERE! See if any of yours are on the list! If any of you are flower eaters, I would love to know if you eat them raw, cooked or as a garnish!

Surprise in the garden!

In one of the areas where there are Gloriosa Lilies growing, this magnificent creature climbed it's way out through a mass of ferns and gloriosas...growing taller and taller, with beautiful slender tendrelling leaves everywhere! It looks like a firework explosion to me! Gorgeous! But...what is it??? The leaves are thinner and more abundant than the Gloriosa, and the Gloriosa stem is green...this has an almost black stem! Anyone have any ideas????? Whatever it is, I LOVE IT!!!!!

Best Buddies, Day and Night!

Emily and Doozey

Tea with the princess!

My Mom, daughter and I had tea on the back lawn with princess Emily today! Somehow it made the day sparkle really brightly.

Happy Cactus Monday

On Cactus Monday, I thought I would just show you an interesting conglomeration of succulents with a cactus in the middle, and a few weeds thrown in just for fun!

And how pretty these Donkey Ears (Kalanchoe Gastonis Bonnieri) are getting!

Happy Monday!