D.I.Y. Pinched Fabric Throw Pillows

I found this great tutorial to make these puckered pillows from Thrifty and Chic another awesome D.I.Y. blog. This was a pretty easy project. To see the full instructions for this project you can click on the link above.

Here is the original pillow from Thrifty and Chic.

Basically you mark where you want your puckered spots to be and then pinch about a 1/2 inch around the point and tie it up. Continue this across the fabric and that is about it.

Here is the pillow I used for the recover. It was cute but the colors didn't match and it had a few stains on it.

Now it fits the couch perfectly.

Charlotte vs. the Dog Park

When Charlotte was 12 weeks old and had all of her shots I took her to the dog park downtown for the first time.  Unfortunately we had a terrible experience involving a pit bull and had not been back until last weekend.  Since the first incident we've actually had a great time at the dog park.  She's already made lots of friends (that's Brutus the pug and Barney the pug/Boston terrier above).  She gets her workout from both the small and large dogs.   Here are some videos/photos from her experiences.

This is her and Barney their first time playing together last weekend.

This is her yesterday with Barney and Brutus.  Brutus was playing referee for them, breaking it up when it got too "rough".

 Just sniff'n some dogs

 This little firecracker is a mini Aussie.  She was the spunkiest little dog I've seen.  She reminded me of a corgi and Yorkie mix if they had babies.  She had very pretty blue eyes.  Just watching her gave me puppy fever for a dog like her.

There she goes, off to chase the big dogs.

Looks like the dog park won this round.  She fell asleep in the sun as soon as we made it home.

Superbowl Feast (Pancake Maple and Bacon Cupcakes and Hashbrown Skillet Dish)

 The Superbowl Sunday crew

The first Superbowl I remember watching was Superbowl XXX when I was in 4th grade.  I think this was the first time we threw a party because I remember my mom getting excited about decorating for the game.  She was busy making football shaped brownies with icing stitches when I asked her who was playing in the game.  She stopped, looked at me, and started laughing and said she had no idea.  I had to go ask my aunt, who actually watched sports, to find out it was the Cowboys and Steelers playing.  I also remember having a blast because at half time we went sledding down the hill outside our backyard when we lived on Nob Hill in Klamath Falls.

I've always had fond memories of watching Superbowl since this first one.  Even if its just for the food! This year for Superbowl Sunday I decided to take a different route when it came to food.  Usually I make buffalo wings and some sort of chili or dip but this Sunday wee served breakfast items, fruit and veggies.

The Pancake cupcake with maple, cream cheese frosting topped with crisp bacon strips.

How to:

Follow the pancake recipe on the side of a Bisquick box.

Line a cupcake tin with paper wrappers and fill with Bisquick mixture.

Bake cupcakes at 350 degrees for 12-17 mins or until lightly browned.

Icing:

11 oz. cream cheese

3/4 cup butter

3 cups powder sugar

1/2 maple syrup

Mix cream cheese and butter together until smooth.  Then add in powder sugar and syrup.  Then spread on cooled cupcakes.  Add fresh crisp bacon on top.

 Yummy!  Tasted just like a pancake and bacon breakfast.

 I also made a country skillet dish that is amazing.  

In a separate pan, brown some sausage on medium heat.

In a large pot, cook a package of hash browns (I dethawed them over night), 1 medium diced onion, and 1 diced green pepper. And to hash browns and cook on medium.  When the hash browns are heated and the veggies are tender, add in the cooked sausage and stir together.  Then using a large soup ladle, make 5-6 bowl shaped dips in the potato mixture.  Crack an egg into each bowl shape.  The bowls keep the eggs from running everywhere. You should have 5 or 6 eggs in there.  Keep the heat to medium and cover the pot with a lid to cook the eggs faster.  It will take about 20mins. to cook the eggs.  Once they are mostly white, take off the stove and add shredded cheddar, avocado and tomato.  Add sour cream, pepper, salsa or any other toppings you wish.

I'm enjoying my meal with a nice cold brew.

Oz and Jesse hanging out on the couch that actually watched the game.

The kids were engaged in their own game of chase and wrestling.

Yay for football!  I think Brandy was the only one who was watching the game and not the dogs.

Winter Wine Soiree

Saturday, January 28th was the big wine tasting event Schmidt's and First Alternative Co-op hosted at the garden center.  (Sorry this post is a little late, I was too tired recovering last weekend to post this). 

There were about a dozen wine vendors, half a dozen artisan cheeses and half a dozen delicious chocolates, including Posh and Cherry Country, both sold at Schmidt's.  There was a great turnout, almost 100 guests showed up plus lots of staff members from First Alternative and Schmidt's.  First Alternative provided the wine, cheese and chocolate and I did all the decorating and event set up at the store.  This was the first time I have done all of the decision making and planning.  Without Susan at the store to run ideas by that meant I had full control of planning.  It was very stressful but I think it turned out beautiful.  The greenhouse looked spectacular that night with white lights, primrose blooming and a handful of Valentine's Day decorations.

The only part of planning this event that I thought could have been better was the number of people that were able to buy tickets.  None of us were sure just how many tickets we could sell so we under planned, and had to turn a lot of people away when the event sold out a few days before.  Next year if we plan to do this again, we will definitely have to sell more tickets.

Below are some photos of my decorating and of the party itself.

Whitney and I toasting to the night.  Everyone that attended received 3 wine sampling tickets and an engraved wine glass from the event.

Marsh, from Cherry Country.  They make chocolate covered cherries right here in the Willamette Valley in Rickreall, Oregon. 

 Yummy, both our customers and our staff really likes these and are having a hard time resisting taking the free samples at the store.

Sartori cheeses.  He made four delicious types of cheeses.  My favorites was the one with salsa added into it.  A lot of people really liked the rosemary infused one.

I love cheese, I could have eaten it all night had I not been working!

Even Tim had a bird station at the event.  Tim has become the in-house bird expert.  He has lots of information and loves to share bird stories with customers.

It was a very busy night.  I had the event set up to have half of the vendors inside and half of the vendors in the greenhouse.  Thank the weather gods that it wasn't raining this night!  The greenhouse sometimes drips when it rains and if it did, I don't know how we would have fit everyone inside the store!

Some table decorations in the greenhouse.

The week of the event, Whitney was very busy planting up beautiful flower bowls to have ready to sell that weekend.  We also received a bunch from Peoria Gardens.  The flowers in the greenhouse were definitely the icing of the cake as far as decorations went.

We bought 3 to 4 dozen of these red tissue paper balls for decorating.  I love putting these together.  They are so simple and you can use them for all sorts of events.  I will have to write a blog sometime on how to make them.

A beautiful garden angel among blooming tea cups.

The greenhouse had beautiful music filling the atmosphere from the dulcimer bells.

The greenhouse was sparkling that night.

There were lots of great vendors at this event.  Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.  Thank you to everyone that contributed to the event and thank you to everyone that came to taste wine and support all these local businesses.

Homemade Valentine's Day Card from Charlotte

Now, I myself am not a huge fan of Valentine's Day.  I guess I just don't like celebrating a lovey-dovey holiday when I know lots of other people are doing the same thing on the same day.  I pride myself on usually being outside the Valentine's Day box.  But Charlotte, is a romantic and wanted to show her boyfriend Porter some love on this holiday.  So I helped her make a large homemade card.

We used a large plastic/cardboard heart that we used at the garden center for store decorations.  

 Then we used scrapbook letters, valentines day stickers and printed photos of Porter and Charlotte to decorate the card.  This was a very simple project.  I spent maybe 15 mins putting the whole thing together and it turned out really cute.  It reads, "Porter, be mine, Charlotte."

 A photo of Porter

Charlotte's baby photo

 She is so proud of her card.  She couldn't wait to give it to Porter.  We saw him yesterday for the super bowl and he brought her a pink stuffed wiener dog toy to remind her of him.  What a sweet boy! She also wanted to share her dog treats we just made so we gave him some to take home.

I tried to take a photo of the two together but they play so rough and wild it is hard not to get a blurry picture so I gave up!

Wheat and Corn Free Treats for your Dog

This morning I made Charlotte some delicious dog cookies.  Since Charlotte is a breed that gets lots of food allergies I make sure not to feed her any corn or wheat products because these are common food allergies for dogs.  I found these two recipes from a really cute website called Life with Lulu and Wally too!  Its about two Boston terriers and their daily antics.


The site has some great homemade dog treat recipes, both wheat and wheat free versions.

So this morning I made the Wheat Free Blueberry Flax Dog Cookies.


Mine looked different than the ones from Life with Lulu, mainly because she cut hers into nice looking squares while I rushed it and threw them on the tray in giant heaps!

The ingredients are:
2     cups rice flour
3/8  cup flax meal
1/4  cup blueberries
1/8  cup coconut oil
1/8  cup apple sauce
1     cup water

Bake at 350 degrees for 30nmins or until they turn light brown.  Then, turn off the oven and leave them inside to slowly cool for an hour with the oven door closed to keep in the heat.

I couldn't find any flax meal at the grocery store so I skipped this part, but I think the cookies turned out just fine.  They were a little on the chewy side but Charlotte still enjoyed them.  She loves blueberries!  Even I sampled them and thought they were pretty darn good.

That looks like a happy customer to me

 Mmm, thanks mom!

 Then, we made some peanut butter cookies using more rice flour. Another wheat free recipe from Life with Lulu.

The ingredients for this recipe are:
1   cup peanut butter
2   cups rice flour
1   cup milk

Mix ingredients together. Roll flat so dough is 1/4 inch thick.  Cut dough into squares or use whatever cookie cutter you have in the kitchen and place on a baking pan.  Bake at 350 degrees for 10 to 15 mins and let cool before feeding to your hungry kitchen helper like Charlotte.


This recipe made a lot of peanut butter cookies.  I gave some away and am saving some for another dog treat recipe coming later this month.  They turned out delicious.  I sampled these ones too.  If they had any sugar added to them they would taste just like regular peanut butter cookies.

 While I was busy making the cookies, Charlotte was busy cleaning the peanut butter container out for mom.  What a nice girl.

Etsy Shop SALE month

To celebrate the 1 year anniversary of my Roosevelt Kid shop on Etsy.com and to celebrate Charlotte's first birthday, all items are 25% off through the end of February!