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Cooking And Freezing Fresh Sugar Pumpkins
I like to bake and cook with pumpkin throughout the year. Like many other squash varieties pumpkin is versatile when baking and cooking. For most of us pumpkin is available on the shelves of our local grocery stores all year long and the canned version tastes great. But I can’t bring myself to throw away those perfectly good little pumpkins we decorate with during the Autumn months. I don’t like to throw away food and this method of cooking these little pumpkins only takes and hour. The hardest part is cutting them up. Start by cutting your pumpkins in half from top to bottom. (I normally cut the stem off…
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Home Cooked Orange Scented Cranberry Sauce
I love to make my own cranberry sauce for our holiday meals. Its easy to customize by changing the sweeteners and spices. This recipe requires no more then one half hour from start to finish and very little cooking experience is required. One other benefit is it makes my home smell amazing! Here’s how you go from this⇑ to this⇓ I start with a medium size sauce pan. I then combine all the ingredients in the sauce pan before turning on the heat. This recipe is a combination of fresh cranberries, coconut sugar, orange juice, cinnamon sticks, water, a pinch of salt and the zest of one orange. ( The…
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Moist And Delicious Sourdough/Gluten Free Cinnamon Walnut Muffins
I became a sourdough enthusiast and began my starter earlier this year and I’ve been loving the process! Due to family health concerns, I’m becoming more mindful when baking and have been experimenting more with sourdough and gluten free recipes. I’m in the early stages of learning this technique but I felt with the slight modifications I made to make this recipe my own, the results were worth sharing. The key to this delicious muffin recipe is to let the starter, flour and water ferment overnight. Now let me tell you about these easy and tasty little treats:) These muffins begin with active sourdough starter, Flour (I have only used…
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Recover A Cube Seat Using Thrifted Denim/Adding Feet Part II
Our sewing/craft/guest bedroom is a never ending work in progress. It always ends up as the “catchall” when unexpected guests arrive or when I’m just to lazy to put things where they actually belong. When I last painted, the color didn’t come out as expected, it’s to blue and the bed could use a new mattress and box spring. There isn’t a piece of furniture that is a dedicated nightstand and the window treatments need updating. Nevertheless, it can be my favorite room, because of the crafts and sewing, or it can be the room that is never opened for the public to see, because of the state of disarray.…
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Recover A Cube Seat Using Thrifted Denim/NO SEWING
My daughter and I enjoy sewing and have been using this cube as our seat over the last few years. It’s lightweight, has a padded seat and fits into the opening under the sewing machine nicely. The problem is the fabric covering it… The pattern isn’t something I would ever use in my home. It has also gotten quite a bit of damage on the corners from one of our feline friends. This cube isn’t a storage container either. It was bought for my daughters bedroom as an extra little seat that just happens to fit perfectly under the sewing machine table. I decided to cover it with a durable…
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The Best Sweet And Spicy Pumpkin Seeds
I love to cook with pumpkin during the Fall season. The big “Jacks” we carve definitely aren’t as good to cook with as the smaller sugar or pie pumpkins but the seeds are great when well seasoned and roasted. After going through the trouble of cleaning these big guys out, make sure you treat yourself with theses tasty, sweet and spicy, crunchy treats. It’s a nice alternative to candy once you’ve had your fill after Halloween. To clean the seeds put them a bowl of warm water and swish them around. ( I use my hands) After a few minutes the pulp will start to separate from the seeds and…
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Easy Staircase Refresh With Gel Stain (Goodbye Nasty Carpet!)
The carpet on these stairs that leads down to our family room finally got under my skin enough to do something about. The damage our cats have done over the years was now impossible to overlook and I felt no matter how good the rest of the room looked the stairs dragged everything else down. We hired the carpet company that installed the carpet to remove it. They said they had special tools to minimize the damage that would be caused by pulling out the staples. After the job was finished, we came to the realization that we, could have done better. Everything looked like it had been just ripped…
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Lamp Makeover With Rice Paper, Paint and Silk Flowers.
A plain white lamp and shade. In my opinion, the best way to start a project! This lamp is clean ad needs no repairs. It was an inexpensive purchase I made a few years ago for our extra bedroom. I had been in the process of painting and throwing the room together quickly and wasn’t sure in what direction I wanted to go. So I figured buying a plain lamp and shade would enable me to change it into exactly what I wanted when the time came. Fast forward to the present…I found a different lamp for our spare room (one that definitely needs to be made over). So this…
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I Made Over Our Loveseat Using RIT Dye, Paint And Decorative Glaze.
This little road side find was not only free but the perfect size for my sunroom. The man putting it on the curb was nice enough to hide it behind his truck until I could come back with my husband and get it home:) At first glance it appeared to be in great shape and in fact the cushions and the body were. It was the fabric that was in need of work and reupholstering this piece wasn’t an option at this time. The fabric was intact though a bit worn in some spots. Otherwise the biggest problem was the amount of fading in some areas. There were also some…
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Wall Plaque Made over With Rice Paper And Hooks
Spring is around the corner and I assembled another wall plaque for a relative who will be setting up a new home space for themselves. This one is very different then the other one I just blogged about. The rice paper I used screams summer/spring and nice weather. It has a beautiful floral that includes tree branches, a birdcage and a bird outside the cage. I used another of the wood plaques I had purchased from the craft store that already had the string to hang it with attached. This is a very light piece of wood so the string alone was sufficient. I gave the surface a nice smooth…