some organizing accomplished

When the temperature is hovering around 90 degrees or more, I just can't take the heat.
Maybe a little yard work in the morning and again in evening when the shadows come over the flower beds. 

So, I am trying to make good use of my time hiding inside with the air conditioning.

I have gotten my sewing room tidy and organized...

No piles of fabric and books taking up all the room on the cutting table!

I even hung those decorative plates that have been stashed away behind the dresser for years - waiting for me to decide to hang them up.  Hmmm...would they look better lined up closer to the window and higher?  I think so.

Projects organized and everything dusted and vacuumed!

Let's see how long it stays this way.

And I have been working on the "Y" quilt.  These are not all sewn together, just laid out to be sure I have enough.

I still need to make the filler sections for the edges.

I hope the mischevious Puss will leave this alone until I can get it sewn together!

saving a no-bake cookie fail

I've been trying to cut my cookie recipes down to smaller batches. With some of the recipes, I have had good luck with baking a few cookies then freezing most of the dough...portioned out in baggies to bake about 8 cookies at a time.

But the No-Bake Cookies posed a bit of a problem.  I have successfully made a half recipe before, but that's still too many cookies.
So...I tried making a one-fourth recipe.  Maybe I miscalculated, but for what ever reason the cookies did not "set".
I knew they weren't going to when I saw how shiny they were.

So, in an effort to find some idea of how I could salvage the ingredients, I turned to the trusty internet because I know it's a fairly common problem - these cookies not setting up.

There were several suggestions, like just eating them with a spoon or incorporating the mixture into a batch of cookie dough before baking. 

The best idea I found was this...Mix a new same size amount of the butter, sugar, cocoa and milk mixture. Boil as usual, but do not add the peanut butter, vanilla or oatmeal. 

Instead, scoop up your runny cookies and drop them into this new mixture after removing from heat.

Spread on waxed paper...

 ...and cut into bars while warm.

They turned out extremely sweet but at least edible.

In the future, I'll just make the half recipe and freeze the extras.  

The problem with that is...it's all too easy to sneak a cookie out of the freezer when I'm thinking of something sweet and chocolatey! 

Gladiolus, also Puss the cat

This spring I remembered to add some wire supports around the Gladiolus before they started blooming.
When I forget to do this (usually), the stalks get weighed down by the blooms and end up growing horizontally.

These pretty bright pink ones managed to keel over anyway and were laying on the ground so I cut them to bring inside.

A couple of days later, I found some clearance ones at Walmart...75% off.  That was 75 cents per bag!  The bulbs looked good too - not soft or rotten.

Really, they are meant to be planted in the spring but I went ahead and put them in a flower pot. 

I'll move them to the flower bed this fall if they come up.

My funny cat, Puss.  Now she thinks that I should open the window for her every time I am sitting at my desk.  It's okay if the weather is mild like on this day.

It doesn't look very comfortable though!

And she can't sit up there if it's too hot or too cold...there isn't enough room with the window closed.

I bought a special cat perch that attaches to the window sill.  It was junky looking so I returned it.

I might try one that works with suction cups next. She isn't a heavy cat so that might work for her.

She likes to go for a walk in the woods with me sometimes in the evening.

She gives me an irritated look if I make too much noise while she is in hunting mode!

trees - always trees

This time it's not falling trees...well it is...but it's because the Sasquatch cut one down.  It was an old diseased Sassafras.

What ever type of disease or fungus it was suffering with, caused some weird but interesting cankers in the bark.

It crossed my mind to have him cut these sections out and I would use them to plant someting in...hens & chicks, sedum, moss roses.

But, if they're full of dirt and flowers one couldn't see the formations.

But what about this hollow section? What a perfect planter!

Or this long piece below ? A good place to transplant some of my Hens & Chicks sprouts.

But it's pretty big...where could I put it?  I'll show photos if I figure out what I want to do.

Meanwhile, I bought these 6 new trees.  They are Green Giant Thujas.  

I'm glad I got them when I did because they were sold out (Lowes) when I went back to get a few more.  

I'd like to get them planted so that I don't risk letting them get dried out, but I doubt that I could even penetrate the dry, hard clay dirt with a shovel to dig holes for them.

And, once they are planted I'll have to carry water to them for a while...they will be far from the hose!

Mexican street vendor corn

This is definitely not a low carb recipe...not when it's corn!

I think the authentic street vendor corn is whole ears of corn on a stick, grilled and coated with ingredients like these.

But, there are lots of recipes online for short cut ways to get a similar finished product.  I compared several of them and morphed them in to this version...

Mexican Street Corn

12 - 16 oz. frozen corn
1 T butter
2 T mayonnaise
2 T lime juice
dash cayenne pepper
1/3 cup  shredded cotija cheese (found in the grocery near refrigerated salsa and tortillas)

Melt butter in a skillet, add frozen corn and saute until corn gets slightly browned.

Turn off the burner, add everything else and stir.

That's it. You're done!   Serve warm or room temperature.

It's a good side dish for Mexican food...but it would probably go well with steaks or burgers too (maybe even barbecue?).

At supper, the Sasquatch added some inside his taco and said it's good like that too.

Many of the recipes include a sprinkle of cilantro but I have a family member who does not like cilantro and it's perfectly fine without it.

summer sewing

My new routine of early yard work gives me time in the hot afternoons to stay inside and do some housework   sewing.

I am making good progress on the 3D quilt.  I have several triangles made and I couldn't resist laying a few out together to see how things are looking.

 This is how the triangles will be sewn together in columns. 

So then I just had to lay a few more loose strips around to check the color contrast.

I am happy enough with how it's looking.   

Speaking of colorful...here is a cross stitch piece that the Sasquatch finished up one recent afternoon when his electric went out after a storm.  No TV, no internet, no A/C...and too hot to do much of anything else.

Awww, cute!

He said this was a quick and easy kit to do since the design was printed on the canvas...no counting stitches.  He bought it,and some others, on a website called " aliexpress ". Their items ship straight from China.

His stitching puts mine to shame.  The back of his work looks as neat as the front...no big raveling knots like mine - all the ends are woven in.  Just take a look....

So tidy and precise!  It would be a shame to cover it up with a frame.

Well, it's sewing time for me. I'll have to wake up Puss. She is sleeping in this window next to my desk and I need to close it now.

Wakey, wakey...

trying to get ahead of the weeds

With all the rain we had last month my flower beds are choked with weeds.
Usually, I pull weeds a while every evening but there were just too many...so I gathered up all my self discipline and I've been making myself go out for a couple of hours early every morning to work in the yard.

I am usually very lazy feeling in the morning and like to spend a while reading and internet-ing while I have some coffee.  But, getting out there early is really paying off.

New mulch makes everything look bright and fresh.  I've switched back to using only cypress mulch. It's more expensive but lasts much longer than the hardwood bark mulch.

I always have trouble getting anything to grow in this area. Even those agressive Rudbeckia seem to just creep around the edges of this spot leaving the center open.  I think it might be due to moles tunneling underneath...leaving roots dangling.

I bought a clearance Hydrangea and planted it towards the rear.  I thought it was a real bargain but it didn't have a label and now I think it is one of those fancy ones that won't last through our winters here.

I'd like to do some rearranging of plants but it's not a good time of year for that.

It crossed my mind to just buy a concrete bench to put in the area above and forget planting anything there, but I thought it might look too cluttery since it already had the birdbath and arch.

We wouldn't want to sit there anyway. You can see how close it is to the overgrown field next door...it's teeming with chiggers!

Every day before I go outside to weed, I slather myself with this product, Avon "Skin So Soft".  it's actually a bath oil but it works well to protect from chigger bites.

Here are some photos of the flowerbed by the driveway.  It is full with blooming flowers right now so I can't get in there to weed without breaking the stalks. Zinnias, Gladiolas, Crocosmia

Lots of gaudy color - just what I like!