Traveling really takes it out of you. I am soo sleepy! We our flying from Champaign to Chicago, Chicago to Seattle, Seattle to East Wenatchee. Ugh, it’s exhausting just saying it!

This is exactly how I feel!

I had a wonderful trip, but I can’t wait to get back into my studio! I have so many ideas I want to play around with! 

I hope you are all having a wonderful week, see you soon!!

xox

~H

Michelle over at Chocolate and Marmalade Tea passed a long a fabulous blog award…

I am supposed to write about 5 things I am addicted too… only 5? Hmmmm…

1. I am addicted to the internet period. I love blog surfing, flickr surfing, shopping, reading, anything. I love the internet! Blogging especially!

2. Chocolate. I am 100% totally and completely addicted to chocolate. I allow myself a tiny morsel each day but for those days I am weak willed I have to make Jason hide it from me!

3. Movies. I love movies that fuel my imagination like Harry Potter, All of Jane Austens book that are now movies, the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, Twilight, Charlie and the Chocolate factory, you’ve got mail I could keep going forever. 

4. Decreating. Yes Decreating. I love to create and decorate everything! It is in my blood, I just love to do it! I am truly addicted!

5. Make-up. I love to go without make-up just as much, but I am addicted to MAC make-up. I just love all the colors and textures. I enjoy the whole process of getting dressed up and doing my make-up. It’s so much fun!

Ok there is my list, it was much longer but I had to limit myself to 5. 

I am going to stick with Michelle on this one and say that all of your blogs are amazing! So instead of picking just 5 blogs I am going to pass this award on to all of you. Take this award and post it on your blog. I want to get to know each and everyone of you!

Have a great day! Today is our last day here in Illinois, we head home tomorrow morning. 

xox

~H

Thank you all for your wonderful names. I have gotten quite a few from friends and family as well, so I am taking them all in and mulling them over. It is so much fun, the anticipation. She won’t be able to come home until sometime mid January, she is 12 weeks and still only a little over 2 lbs. She is being stubborn about weaning but is getting better everyday so I am keeping my fingers crossed that she packs on the weight!

We had quit the ordeal on Wednesday. We are in central Washington and has planned on making the trip over two mountain passes to Bellevue so Jason could have Lasik surgery on Thursday. Then we were going to visit family on the coast to give Jason’s eyes a few days to rest before driving back over the passes (I don’t drive in the snow, I wouldn’t make it very far lol) Well a trip that would take us normally about 2 hours start to finish, took us 6 hours to not even make it half way up the second pass. Chains required is the sign that greeted our frozen windshield where there was only a postcard size slash for Jason to see out of. Our windshield wipers had to be scraped about every 20 minutes because they had turned to huge blocks of ice. So we got out, went to put our new chains on… they didn’t fit. Two and  half hours later Jason came to the same conclusion, by now it is pitch black out. We had to slowly make it through a turn off that was so snowy we almost didn’t make it, we turned around and literally did 25 mph on the interstate all the way to Quincy bypassing the first mountain we went over and coming home the back way. We had left at noon and made it home at 11:30pm. It was one of the scariest and most exhausting ordeals I have ever been through. This picture doesn’t even show a quarter of it:

So the only thing that I know how to do when I get through a stressful situation is to eat lots of chocolate and go shopping, so yesterday that is just what we did! I went to one of my favorite little antique boutiques downtown and had a good “ole time!

It is called Collectors Gallery Antiques:

I just love this little house with the light in it!

So much eye candy, I could spend forever in there! 

I walked away with quite a few goodies, I can’t wait to play with them! 

Hope you are all having a wonderful end to the week, I know I am. I feel so bad about Jason missing his lasik surgery, he has waited so long for it. He says that he is ok with it and has rescheduled for March. I am just glad that we are warm and safe!

I hope all of you are warm and safe too!

xox

I need help to name our newest addition to the family…..

Just look at that face!

We can’t pick her up until January when we return from our visit to Illinois, I am so excited. 

She is a bengal, she will have spots just like the Bengal tiger. I am so excited.. can you tell? I have been playing with names in my head and I just can’t come up with anything. I have always done this with every single one of our animals. Name them before I meet them and they always fit their name perfectly. Loki is named after the Norris God of mischief and the first week we had her she ate my baseboards, shredded paper and torn my wallpaper off my wall. How is that for living up to your name lol. 

I need some help with names… what are some of your favorites?

Sweet Michelle over at chocolate and marmalade tea gave me this award yesterday!

She is so very sweet, I just love her blog. I look forward to seeing what she is up to and having her be a part of my everyday routine. It is amazing the people you meet in the blogging world, they are so genuine and truly touch my soul. 

“This blog invests and believes the PROXIMITY – nearness in space, time and relationships! These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in prizes or self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers! Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award.”

I get to now pass this award onto 8 wonderful people:

1: Pink Purl

2: Spoon full of Sugar girls

3: Cynthia’s Cottage Design

4: Fat Orange Cat

5:Posie Gets Cozy

6: Karlas Cottage

7: Pink Tulipza

8: Yapping Cat Studio

All of you are so amazing! You truly deserve this award!

Now that I am sitting down to write this post I realize, I forgot to take a picture of the turkey!! Oh no! Bummer. It turned out really good too even though I was cooking it upside down for the first two hours. Seriously I did. I was in the shower getting ready for dinner and it hit me. I raced out of the shower screaming at Jason “I’ve got to flip the turkey!” Let me tell you, it was a sight to see. 

I have a few cuts, I stabbed my thumb with a steak knife and cut my hand open on a metal can. But it was worth it. Dinner turned out wonderful and my parents really had a great time. Everyone was so stuffed we more like rolled out of our chairs hahaha. 

The night before.

The Night before

Centerpeice

Dinner time.

Happy Thanksgiving!

mmmmm Raspberries and Champaign!

Desserts!

My Favorite, ginger pancakes with mascarpone cheese and espresso filling with chocolate frosting mmmmmmmmmm!

Yep, that huge slice was ALLLLLL mine! 

We had a lot of fun. I really enjoyed cooking dinner, it was the first year I did everything from scratch. I also tried a new recipe “crock pot stuffing” it was delicious! 

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend. 

xoxo

It has been getting cold here! This morning I wasn’t surprised to see mountain tops speckled with white. It will be upon us soon. With it being so cold I knew it was time to get out my cast iron pot. I love this time of year when it’s cold out, when you come in from outside the house smells of soup thats been cooking all day. 

So I got out my stock pot and decided to try a new recipe for Potato and Leek soup. It only takes about 35 mins! It warms you up and tastes really good. Here are the ingredients:

• 3 cups sliced leeks, white and tender green parts
• 3 cups peeled and roughly chopped baking pototoes
• 6 cups water or you can split it half and half with vegetable broth
• 11/2 teaspoons salt
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1/2 cup creme fraiche or sour cream
• 1/3 cup minced chives or parsley

Can you tell she hates clothes? She falls over like she can’t move and just looks at me like “Mom please stop torturing me!” Ok. Fine. But she just looks so cute. 

I opened the pantry to do some cleaning and saw 3 very black bananas. They were the perfect excuse to use my jumbo muffin pan. 

Here is the recipe I used from the Food Network. I made a few substitutions of course.

2 cups all-purpose flour 
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda 
1/2 teaspoon salt 
4 overripe bananas  (I only had 3, so thats what I used)
1 cup brown sugar 
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled ( I never use butter, Instead I use applesauce)
2 eggs 
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract (I used Almond extract because I was out of vanilla)
1/2 cup pecans, chopped

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F and lightly butter 2 muffin tins.In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and salt; set aside. Mash 2 of the bananas with a fork in a small bowl so they still have a bit of texture. With an electric mixer fitted with a wire whisk, whip the remaining bananas and sugar together like you mean it, for a good 3 minutes. Add the melted butter, eggs, and vanilla and beat well, scraping down the sides of the bowl once or twice. Mix in the dry ingredients just until incorporated. Fold in the nuts and the mashed bananas with a rubber spatula. Spoon the batter into the muffin tins to fill them about halfway. Give them a rap on the counter to get any air bubbles out.

Bake until a toothpick stuck in the muffins comes out clean, 18 to 20 minutes. Let cool for a few minutes before turning the muffins out. Serve warm or at room temperature

Yum!

The applesauce makes it so moist, and it is a healthier option. 

Have a wonderful Halloween!

As long as I can remember my Mother has been creating gorgeous flower arrangements. And when she is not doing that is creating a unique living environment in her home. She has a gift that one can only dream about. Her home is amazing, from the her wallpapered walls (she has torn wallpaper and placed it creating a one of a kind art) to her elaborate accents that she added her touch to, to her amazing enchanting, over flowing flower beds and her love of giraffes that adds an even more unique touch. She is amazing. I just wanted to share with everyone what an amazing talent she has. Here are some arrangements that she recently made for a friends wedding. The photographs really don’t do them justice, they were breathtaking!

I love you Mom! 

I have to say that besides my unbelievable addiction to chocolate, (they say admitting it is the first step right?) I am completely addicted to inspiration. I wake up with a game plan of what I am going to get done that day and wham! I end up creating something I never even thought of! Like the other day I went and visited Lisa’s blog  she had this adorable patchwork pear pincushion. I had to have one for myself. So after a few drawings that I had no idea what was on the paper ( i can draw stick figures ) I came up with a template. Wahla here is what I made. I loooove it! And it is all because of Lisa! Hers is so very cute, she is way better at embroidery than I am! You can see hers here.

Here is how mine turned out…

I used some scraps I had tucked away. I used felt for the leaf and stem. 

This is my first real try at embroidery, can’t you tell?

Besides getting my pear done, I also finished two bags! Whoa can you believe it? I did do that right? Maybe I’m dreaming hahah

This is the Gwynn Bag.. 

And this is the Aurora Bag…

This was my first time working with corduroy. It definitely took some getting used to, getting the nap right was well, different. Remember when corduroy was so popular? What ever happened to it? hmmm. 

p.s.

I thought I would share with you a recipe I found. Yesterday I  was digging through my recipes trying to get an idea for dinner. I happen to come across an old recipe from my aunt that my grandmother had given me for Pumpkin Pie Cake! I had to try it out… did I say I was only addicted to chocolate? Ummm edit that and add pumpkin pie It is delicious.

I will post the recipe tomorrow for those of you who want to try it out..

 Happy Friday!