our photo shoot

When we were visiting my mom, we met a photographer at the park for a little photo shoot. I think our original place was flooded, but she managed to find us dry land to work on.

Lou fell asleep literally as we pulled into the park. We let him sleep while all the individual family shots were being taken. When we did wake him up he was not happy. It took 30 minutes before he would even look at the girl with the camera. It didn't give the poor girl much to work with.

Here's my brother and his wife:
my sister and her boyfriend (and pooch):

Our little group of four trying to get a decent shot.

My sister and I always have a goofy time together.

the girls (that's my mama):
more goofing off... The boys were trying to goof up pictures. Not sure why my sister is modeling this hideous quilt.
Wake up, wake up Lou!

The boyfriend was really goofing up pictures! He's a fun one. He and Bee should just be in pictures together. They both like to make a silly face at the last second.






Aren't they sweet. Clearly they have a lot of fun together.

There was a lot of coddling to get Lou to cooperate. Perhaps there was bribing involved, I'm not sure.

late cinco de mayo meal -late

I finally got a few minutes to organize the pictures from our trip to my mom's that was now two weekends ago. Today is our late Cinco de Mayo meal tomorrow are my pictures from our 'photo shoot' at the park.

My brother and his wife planned out our meal. They brought some of the ingredients with them from Mexico and the rest cam from a little Mexican grocery close to my moms place.

There was this yummy (but a little spicy) jicama salad. It has diced red onion, cilantro, yellow, red, and orange peppers, jicama, lime juice, and mango fruit.

This is the sauce they brought for the enchiladas. Apparently what you buy at the regular ol' grocery here is not the same.

These were picked up at the Mexican grocery store. The fud is like sour cream but thinner and richer. The cheese was a delicious crumble cheese.

Somehow I was the lucky one who got to remove the prickles from the cactus leaves.

The prickles are removed and then the leaves are cut into a fan shape.

Then a little olive oil ans salt is added and they are grilled or pan 'fried.' My brother said they could have used a few more minutes cooking, but we all did like them.

The big boys ended up needing to take an emergency trip to Best Buy. Since I often have emergency trips to the fabric store, I understood. The girls were happy to finish up the meal prep.

It helps if someone of someone goofy is entertaining in the next room.

Here are the two pans of enchiladas. The darker pan is mole, the other is salsa verde.

We decided to throw some black beans on at the last minute. Bee loves black beans. Everything was really yummy and not too spicy.


We got a good explination of what was being served. Lou seems to think it looks ok.

Happy, full bellies.
Yum.

good things to come

I've been in need of a little good news this week. When I went to check on Bee's weed pulling, we discovered some good things in the garden. Here's to good things to come.

The last of the beans are up.


First snow pea.

Broccoli. I find this one the most interesting since I've never grown it myself.

Zucchini getting ready to flower.

Yes, good things to come.

adventures in garage sales

It was our turn this week. Our neighbors brought things over and we all set up on Saturday for a garage sale. There were some pretty good deals. Bee made out pretty well. We chose things from her room and priced them herself. She did need a disclaimer on her table say that she did her own pricing. She sold sugar cookies that we made the evening before and when those sold out she sold kettle corn. Next time we will know we need 3 batches of cookies.

She was an aggressive sales person. You can do that when you're 4. She chased someone down to the street. They did buy and he seemed to enjoy the cookies.

my mothers day gift

This is what my wonderful hubby got me this for mothers day. I don't know where to start.

I've never used any versions of this. I loaded it up but can't figure out what to do next. Any help or advice on where or how to get started would be super appreciated.

Fabric straight from Japan

Here's my new fabric, straight from Japan, via Mexico, via Michigan, via Tennessee. My buyers (actually just my brother and his wife) traveled to Japan to shop for for me (actually for my brothers work). This fabric is much better traveled than I am. After Japan, they took it home with them to Mexico. Then it traveled to their Michigan home, then to my moms home in Tennessee. It's at it's new home with me, in Indiana.

These first three are regular cotton. They feel just like quilting cotton here. Bee is particularily fond of the middle blue one.

The next two are a thinner cotton with a little bit of raised texture.

This one is my favorite. Not sure what it will be yet... but I'll be using some of it for me.


The last one is a silkier fabric, something a blouse or skirt would be made from. It brown with a scene of dragons and fat babies. This one baffels me as of yet.

I have several things planned. One or two projects will end up on etsy, so who knows where it will travel next!

strawberries

This has been the week of strawberries! The rabbits ate ours, so we had to pick some up elsewhere (Not that our very few plants would have given us anything notable). Driving home from my mom's house last weekend, the kids and I followed signs for strawberries. It led us to an Amish farm.

I would wager that no Amish people read this blog. I guess I just don't know that much about them. There were two ladies who sold the strawberries. They were very sweet and did make some small talk. I was really nervous that would would say something that would make me sound really silly or reaffirm their suspicions about 'the rest of us.' I really had lots of questions for them.

The kids found the rabbits in the hutch interesting. Their rabbits are in the cages, so they can't eat the strawberries.

We bought three full quarts, we ate half of each of them in the car on the way home.

When we got home, the neighbors had gone strawberry picking and had these for us! Half of these were cut and thrown in the freezer. The other half was used to make fruit roll ups. We used a recipe that my Grandma spied on a blog called Fly Through Our Window. I tell my grandma it's a good thing she monitors half the internet, because i can only handle half as well.

Lou helped me make them. I think I let them cook too long or I poured them too thin. I think that may be it. I will try again.

This week, we also stumbled on a you-pick strawberry place. Literally, we pulled over to turn around and there we were. Picking berries is better than being lost.

I knew Bee would be a good picker, she weeds the garden at home and thinks it's a treat!

Lou ate as many as he picked.

Bee wouldn't stop until she did the whole row!


Bee picked, Lou ate...
and ate.
Bee picked...
and Lou ate.
and ate.
We did end up with about 5 1/2 pounds. We will be going back for more though.

I tricked my neighbor Carol into coming over for a few minutes. I made her stay awhile and make jam. I also tricked her into bringing over her own berries since I was 2 pounds short at this point.

We made jam using the recipe from the Ball Blue book. It's also the same recipe that comes in the pectin box.
Bee helped... a little.

We ended up with 14 jars. They are still setting up on my counter. We were rather surprised with the amount of sugar involved! I think next time I'll look around for a slightly different recipes. It looks like there is some additional good info about making strawberry jam here at Food In Jars.