Vacation

It's so beautiful outside today. I am getting into summer mode...which means VACATION. We're going to the beach in July but I wanted to share some ideas for cool weekend get aways for you and your honey. This fall James took me to Sweetwater Farm located in Brandywine. I'm not always a B&B kind of girl, ever since the creepy one with dolls that stared at me all night, but this was the perfect romantic get-away. This was our room and it's even better in real life than in the photo.

The property was breathtaking and felt like it was in the middle of nowhere even though it was only about 5 or 10 min from lots of food and shopping. Try it I think you'll like it.
The next place I plan on running away to is Celie's Waterfront Inn. It's in Baltimore (Or Ball-tomorrow as the kid I used to nanny said). There is way to much fun stuff to do in Baltimore and a lot of it requires outdoor walking so why not go now that the weather is getting nicer?! I think this room looks fabulous and they have sweets that have little kitchens and sleep 4 so if you have kiddo's you could make a weekend of it, splurge on the room and save on dinner. MMMMMMMM...vacation.

Ina

We are not having dinner club this week so I'm going to share one of my favorite websites for recipes. If you have not tried Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa yet, you are missing out. I have two

of her cookbooks and hope to get the other three. Every recipe I have ever made from one of her cookbooks has turned out great. The recipes are easy but taste like they were really complicated.
For Easter I made this ham (her's looks better than mine did) and it tasted good I thought.

Also, one of my friends made the roast turkey and it was the best I ever had.
I've made the hummus, tuna niscoise, and many others. If you are thinking of getting a new cookbook try Ina.

Stamps

I like the way stamps look and think you could make some really cool projects with them. The problems is getting enough and not paying 41 cents for each. Arpin Philately to the rescue. They sell bulk stamps or stamp packets. You can get 100 (all different) train stamps for $4.50.

If you were doing a train theme in a nursery you could cover inexpensive picture frames with train stamps or a wooden light base.
Or you can get 200 (all different) Denmark stamps for $20.

I am going to order some and try out some ideas. The list of stamps is huge and there are so many things you can do with them. They add a bit of color and are definelty interesting to look at. Also if you child is doing a school project on a country wouldn't it be neat to get some stamps from that country to add to the presentation.

Gardening

We spent a few hours on Saturday and Sunday gardening. When you've completely neglected your garden for over a year the amount of work can be overwhelming. Thankfully our good friends chipped in and had a landscaper come and start the clearing, mulching and planting for us. We would never have gotten it all done if not for them.

Even with all the help there is still way too much to do. I bought myself some gardening gloves and that is really what this post is about. I bought them from the dollar bin at Target. Let's just say I got what I paid for. They are ready for the trash after just two days of use. Oh well. Next time I'll slurge on something like this



or something like this



I think I'm leaning towards the second one because they come up so high and because they look so great. Nothing like looking good while rolling in the mud.

Crayons

When I was a nanny the boys had the greatest machine. It was a crayone recycler. You put the broken peices of crayon in trays over a hot little light bulb. When it was all melted you dumped the wax into molds. I probably enjoyed making them much more than the boys did but they enjoyed coloring with them. I always made many colored crayons and so when they colored they got a rainbow from just one crayon. I still have a few of them. I decided to find a way to make them without the machine and stumbled upon this how to.

You need:
Broken crayons
Old muffin tin or candy mold. The silicon trays work great also.
A Knife

1. Cut all the broken crayons into little bits
2. Heat the oven to 150.
3. Fill the tin with an inch think layer of broken crayons.
4. Bake till wax is melted (15-20 min)
5. Allow them to cool completely and then pop them out and color.


I almost forgot to mention if you don't have an old muffin tin that you are just going to use for crayons and art projects you can line your regular muffin tin with tin foil.

Dinner club

Every Thursday night for a while now we have had dinner club with John, Chris, Will (James' younger brothers) and Jeremy. Recently it has changed a bit cause some of them (I won't mention names) got all grownup and went to college. We miss them but dinner club continues and we've added others. This week Carol will join us (and maybe her dog Jake...Hudson needs dinner club too). Every Thursday I will post the menu for that evening and some pictures if I remember to take them. I love dinner club because I get to try out new recipes and see some of my favorite people.

Here's the menu for tonight....
Sugar snap pea and Radish Salad

Potato and Garlic Pierogi

Pork chops with onion Compote

Chocolate Trifle


I try to get creative and make something we haven't had before. The trifle is sort of a lazy move by me since I've made it a million times. But it's so good I started thinking about it and had to have it. All the other recipes this time are courtesy of Martha Stewart.

I stumbled across Wishing Fish about a year ago. I have since enjoyed looking at their kookie but fun gift ideas. I bought super cute leggins for Alivia before we went into the hospital and they were a life saver. They were great under skirts and on days when we didn't feel like wearing more than a onesie. No taking pants on and off to change diapers and no messing around with tights.

I also bought her these sweet little socks. She always looked great in them.


The next thing I think I'll get is this brownie pan. I love brownies and the corners for me are always the best part...little chewy, little crunch. What could be better. Now there will be no fighting over the corner. Everyone gets a corner (and a huge brownie to boot!)