Meet the Newest Keller

Meet Honey Bunch.

We got her yesterday from the Humane Society.

She is 2 months old and so tiny I can hold her in one hand.

So far Norman seems more confused by her than anything but she is a calm little girl and puts up with his gentle prodding nicely. We are hoping as she gets bigger he will come to like her even more.

We named her Honey Bunch after the classic children's book by Helen Louise Thorndyke published in the 1950's.

here

I have two of the original printings that were my mothers sitting in the front room and have always loved the names. Now we have both!

She is poly-dactyl which means she has extra toes

See how it looks like she has mittens instead of paws? Those are her extra toes. She has two extra on the right and one extra on the left. It is like she has thumbs, she is so dexterous. Honey's favorite things to do are sit on my shoulders and play with her green ball. Scroll down for some gratuitous ball playing shots.

Seriously, too cute! We are excited to have her in the family. Now it will just be a few months of carefully controlling her interactions with Norman so ensure she grows to love him too.

They just worm in to our hearts don't they.

Boo!

It is officially Halloween season in my house. My parent's tickets are purchased and will be here at the end of the month and I am so excited to celebrate my father's birthday with him for the first time in years. The lucky man is born on Halloween. How great is that? So of course I have to make the house perfect for their arrival. So far, I've gotten as far as the front door... But more is to come!

Here is the Halloween scene that greets you when you arrive at my home.

The BOO letters are from Joann's. I had planned to paint them black (and maybe add sparkles) but I like the contrast the white gives to the whole scene.

My freaky spiders came from the dollar section of Target. I wish I had gotten more than two but these work great out here.

The wreath was super easy to make and insanely inexpensive. I took an old metal ring (I think from a wine barrel) that we found when we redid the yard and wrapped 0.99 spider "webbing" around it. This is what it looked like to begin with.

I attached the spider with an extra large twist tie that came in some packaging we got recently.

Put it all together and you get this.

Super scary. I like how simple it is and I can take it all apart and reuse the ring later if I want. All total it was $1.99 for the whole thing.

Next on the plan is to finish the mantel. I've added some webbing but I'm looking for spiders to add to it. Why is it so difficult to find little spiders? We have a trip to the pumpkin patch planned in a few weekends so I'm looking forward to carving out a few pumpkins and getting them set around the house. Trader Joe's has a great selection of fairytale and Cinderella pumpkins too so they will be added to the mix. The great thing is I can decorate with them and then eat them when I am done! Creepy right? MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Cheers!

Good Eats Challenge Week 14: Stuffed Mushrooms

I'm starting off with a disclaimer: These are the best stuffed mushrooms I've ever had. Seriously. No Lie. Don't like mushrooms? Don't worry, you'll love these. As usual Alton Brown scores a double plus win with this one. Here it goes.

The Recipe

Ingredients

For the filling:

• stems from mushroom caps
• 1 tbs shallot
• 1/3 cup heavy cream
• 1/4 cup shredded Parmesan
• 1 teaspoon dried tarragon
• 1 to 2 tablespoons bread crumbs

For the mushroom caps:

• 10 large white mushroom caps stems removed
• Olive oil
• 1 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary
• 1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed
• Bread crumbs

Directions

Heat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large bowl, toss the mushroom caps with enough olive oil to coat the caps. Add the rosemary, thyme, and garlic and combine thoroughly.

Place a roasting rack on a baking sheet. Roast the mushroom caps stem down up to 10 minutes, or until the tip of a paring knife can be inserted into the side of the mushroom with little or no resistance.

While mushrooms are cooking, sautee chopped mushroom stems and shallot until brown. Add cream, Parmesan, and tarragon and cook 1 minute. Stir in one tbs of bread crumbs and let cool. 

Heat broiler to high and move the oven rack up 1 level. Mound 1 tablespoon of filling into each mushroom cap, avoiding over stuffing the caps. Top each cap with enough bread crumbs to cover the filling. Broil the mushroom caps on high for 3 to 4 minutes, or until the filling bubbles and the tops have browned.

These make a great side dish or main course if you use larger mushrooms. We like them as light appetizers.

Add a good bottle of wine and you are all set!

Cheers!

DIY Knitted Bangle

I don't know about you but I have never been able to find a bangle that fit over my hand. It has always been frustrating because I love the look of stacked bangles but I just can't pull it off. But you know what does fit over my horribly gigantic man hands? Masking tape rolls. Or any of the cardboard innards that are left over after you finish that painters tape/ label roll/ etc. What do you know, I've been collecting them. I didn't know why until I saw this pinterest post.

Re-posted here

How cool are these? I totally know how to knit (one of my many mostly useless talents) so I thought to myself why not?? So here it is, attempt one. This is pretty easy if you know how to knit (and I'll get to a work around if you can't at the end).

Step 1: Cast on enough rounds to be twice the width of your tape roll. (I'd love to teach you all how to knit but I am seriously a novice at it so I suggest you find some you-tube videos. They will confuse you far less than I would).

Step 2: Knit away. If you know how to do anything fancy go for it! I just did a basic knit stitch the whole way.

Step 3: When you have knitted a band long enough to go around your cuff, stop and cast off. I did mine a little shorter so that the pattern would stretch a bit and look more interesting. 

Step 4: Sew ends together. 

Step 5: Slide over cuff and center.

Step 6: Hot glue that sucker down! Work slowly and carefully since the glue goes through the pattern but don't worry since this is the inside of the bracelet.

Step 7: Cover your seam with coordinating or contrasting ribbon. Contrasting is fun because you can add a pop of color to a neutral knit or if you'd rather it blend in go coordinating. This serves two functions: it covers your seam and makes it much less itchy to wear so go for a ribbon almost as wide as the bracelet. 

Step 8: Enjoy! Knitting included it took me about 1-2 hours to do this project. If I didn't have to knit (or was faster at it) I would think you could finish in about 30 min. I passed the time watching HGTV and entertaining myself with Norman pictures. 

If you can't knit you can easily replicate this by going to your local thrift store and buying some sweaters. I looked this weekend for some ones with neat texture and designs but they were all more than I wanted to spend on the project (I don't mind spending 10$ on a sweater I will be wearing but not one that I plan to cut up). The only step you would change would be step 4. Instead of sewing the ends together I would glue them and then cover the seam with a coordinating piece of ribbon to hide it. Crafty Farm Girl did a pretty good tutorial for all you non knitters out there but I think once you give it a whirl it will be easy. I'm still on the look out for some pretty neutral sweaters to chop up so I'll keep you posted when I complete a non knitted version for comparison.

Cheers!

Book Page Pumpkins

If you participate in Link Parties you know that the book page pumpkin is not new. There are some great tutorials on how to make one for yourself out there. I think this one by Creations by Kara is the most straight forward.

via Creations by Kara

This is the tutorial by Craftberry Bush I originally pinned when I made mine.

via Craftberry Bush

Like we hear all the time, there is nothing new under the sun. The great thing about the great wide world of blogging is that you can find so many tutorials on how to create something you are bound to find one that works for you. These are just the two that worked for me. I tweaked them around a bit and got these lovely little pumpkins for my mantle

I drew the shape free hand and I like how squat they came out. I actually got these two pumpkins out of one paper back book. The large one is about 5 inches and the small one is about 3 inches. The two tutorials I read both colored their pumpkins. Kara actually used spray paint to make her's orange! Oh the many uses of spray paint. I liked mine the natural color of the books. I love their little twig stems and ribbon leaves. They will be great all the way through Thanksgiving without clashing with anything else I put up. 

I've got my fingers crossed that my parents will make it up here for Halloween (it will be my dad's birthday) so I'm scarrying (is that a word?) up the mantle this week in anticipation. I've got plans for the porch too but work keeps getting in the way. **sigh** 

How is your decorating going? I waited for the 1st to start my Halloween decorating and now I am worried I'll run out of time. 

Cheers!

Good Eats Challenge Week 13: Chocolate Lava Cakes

In honor of being back at work at the chocolate shop I thought it was only fitting to make something chocolaty from the Good Eats cookbook (this was last Friday I've just been too busy to post). If you love chocolate, Alton Brown's recipe is sure to satisfy your cravings. It was super easy to make and with some quality chocolate ingredients definitely good eats.

Here she is

Ingredients

• 8 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
• 1 stick butter
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 4 oz sugar
• 1.5 oz  flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 4 eggs
• Butter, to coat muffin tin
• 2 tablespoons un-dutched cocoa powder
• 1 cup vanilla ice cream
• 1 teaspoon espresso powder

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Step 1: Weigh out chocolate and chop finely.

Since I had Askinosie's single origin cocoa powder on hand, I bought 8 oz of the same origin of their dark chocolate. These happen to be Venezuelan. I really feel the key to truly excellent chocolate deserts is good chocolate. The store bought stuff is fine if you are making something with lots of other flavors in it but since this cake is all about the chocolate I say splurge and get something really good.

Step 2: Place a small metal bowl over a saucepan with simmering water. Melt the chocolate and butter in the bowl. Stir in vanilla.

Step 3: In a large mixing bowl, combine sugar, flour and salt. Sift these into the chocolate and mix well with electric hand mixer.

 Step 4: Add eggs one at time, fully incorporating each egg before adding the next. It is a good idea to crack your eggs into something before adding them to the mixture just to avoid shells. 

Step 5: Beat at high until batter is creamy and lightens in color, approximately 4 minutes. 

It should go from this

To this

Then chill mixture. (I would suggest chilling in the muffin pans. This way they are easier to dish and you can pop them straight in to the oven before serving). 

Step 6: Coat the top and each cup of the muffin tin with butter. Dust with the cocoa powder and shake out excess. 

Spoon mixture into pan using a 4-ounce scoop or ladle. If you have one of those dishing ice cream scoops it would be perfect for this job. 

Step 7: Bake for 10 to 11 minutes. Outsides should be cake-like and centers should be gooey.

While muffins are in oven, melt the ice cream in a small saucepan. Stir in the espresso powder. Serve over warm muffins.

Don't you just want one right now? These will fly off your table.

Norman wished he could get in on the action too but no chocolate for dogs! These would be great for a dinner party since you can make them ahead of time and then pop them in the oven right before desert so they are fresh and piping hot. If you are curious about where to get good chocolate you can get it here (where I work) or if you have a Whole Foods in your area you can probably get your hands on Valrhona or Guittard. Both are excellent chocolate makers and well known in the chocolate and pastry world. 

Cheers!