Showing posts with label Freyja. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Freyja. Show all posts

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Happy birthday, Freyja!

It's hard to believe that this cute little puppy...


...turned into this beautiful dog.


But it's true. 

And we got to celebrate her first birthday yesterday!


First, we opened presents...


Which she's really starting to get the hang of...


And even a dog friendly birthday card. Made of rawhide, of course. 


All in all, three presents and a birthday card... could the day have gotten any better?

Of course... there had to be cake.

The bf took the photo, so I apologize for the blurriness

If I don't get a post out tomorrow, have a happy Easter, everyone!





Thursday, April 21, 2011

Who doesn't love getting packages?

I know I sure do.

My mom sent me packages all through college and sends them now, even though I live Ontario.


I've been working very hard in my class, so it's nice to get a few surprises :)

A few weeks ago, I mentioned to my grandma (that's my mom's mom) that I'd like to learn embroidery. I know a little bit about needlepoint/cross stitch after a few projects I worked on when I was young.

(What really inspired me were the new Martha Stewart embroidery kits. If  you haven't seen them, you can check some of them out here; they also carry them at Michael's.)

So she sent me


This amazing book! Really, it's amazing. It's an older copy, but I'm sure the book is still made.

And now I can try to teach myself to crochet too! I've always wanted to learn, but it's way harder than knitting (for me at least)


She also sent me these pillowcases. They have an iron-on Scandinavian-esque design...


And a bag of miscellaneous embroidery thread...


And another Scandinavian design on a flyer.

Now I just have to go out and buy an embroidery needle and a hoop! I'm really excited to get working on this.

If you haven't figured this out by now, I'm Scandinavian: part Norwegian and part Icelandic. That's why I'm so drawn to Scandinavian design.

With a little googling last night, I found this book:


There are a lot of great crafts in this book. And at $16, I think it's a steal. I'm going to have to pick it up over the weekend.

My mom also sent me a quilter's bundle of nautical fabric:


The bf and I are both sailors (it's actually how we met) and we love anything to do with sailing and the ocean.

Each piece is a 1/3 of a yard




I have no clue what I'm going to do with it yet... Any ideas?

And lastly, a gift for Freyja...


It's a pretty special day tomorrow... Freyja's first birthday!


Doesn't she look excited?

And her first Easter is just around the corner too... It's going to be a very busy weekend!

Saturday, April 16, 2011

I've been a bad blogger

No, really, I have. My re-found love of my kindle has kept me reading for days...

And lately, I've been reading Joanne Fluke's Hannah Swensen Mysteries. If you like murder mysteries and an easy read, they might be for you... The main character is a baker (and I'm realizing how lame and ridiculous it seems as I type it) and the author lists recipes in the book, much like the Leslie Meier Lucy Stone Series, if you've read those.

So I've been baking. I made an awesome batch of peanut butter cookies from my favorite cookbook:

And they were gone so quickly, I never had a chance to take a picture.

So, I decided to make my FAVORITE cookies in the whole wide world: ginger molasses cookies.

I was so excited to finally have the ingredients and the bf wanted to help. Somehow, I got distracted... It happens to me a lot when I'm baking. My mom can attest to my many baking fails growing up. But I'd been on such a roll and I don't think I'd messed anything up in at least a year.

But, I only added half the flour needed.

So they looked less like this:

Courtesy of my mom @ Red Gate Farm
And more like this:


They taste fine, but they aren't the cookies I grew up eating.

I think I'll have to give it another go today.

On a better note, the table is DONE!

It looks quite different in different light, so I did one photo with and one without flash:

With flash

Without flash


With Miss Freyja playing fetch in the background

I love the new chairs. Not only are they much more comfortable than the old ones, but I don't feel like my chin is on the table when I'm eating.

And the chairs still need some work done...


Sorry it's so blurry; my camera didn't want to focus (and you can see we really do live in a basement!). But some of the joints need to be re-glued....


And I'd like to recover and re-pad the seats... Maybe something from tonicliving.com?

I haven't decided anything on that front yet.


Freyja seems to feel right at home at the table....


Maybe the salt and pepper shakers are at fault?

And an EVEN BETTER note, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 came out on blu-ray yesterday, so we picked it up at Costco.

For those of you who don't know, I'm a big Harry Potter nerd. 


Lucky for me, it's stormy outside. I'll be on the couch in my sweats for the next few hours dorking out to my favorite guilty pleasure if you need me :)

Sunday, April 10, 2011

A walk in the park

I've been pretty distracted this week... Which isn't good for my blog... or keeping up with the housekeeping work.

Last Sunday, while playing with little Freyja, it got a little out of hand and she scratched my cornea. Fortunately it wasn't bad and I'm fully recovered, but it made for a rough start to the week.

And school started this week! For those of you who don't know, I'm studying for my advanced paralegal certificate... And reading 6 chapters on Medical Paralegal Law, it takes a lot of time.

Speaking of reading, I also broke out my Kindle again this week. I haven't used it in months and after using it 3 days straight, I can't seem to put it down...

I did manage to stop reading on Saturday for a little outing. First stop: Starbucks.

Anyone know what these cute little boxes hold?


Starbucks mini cupcakes.... I'd never seen them before and we just had to try them.


On the left, carrot cake for me and the right, chocolate peanut butter for the bf


After our Starbucks run, we took Freyja for a walk in our favorite park. It was a gorgeous day and surprisingly warm. 


It's really starting to feel like spring, even if there is no evidence of that in the plants.


Freyja had a blast, as always.


But she was one tired pooch when we got home.


And she really likes to cuddle up.


We also put the final coat of stain/poly on the new dining room table... I'm really hoping we can get it moved in sometime today.

And for dinner? It was so nice, we decided to do all of our cooking outside.


We just couldn't bring ourselves to go inside when it was so nice and warm.

Hope you all are having a great weekend!

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Quilting until my fingers bleed...

Thank god we're on the mend and the snow is almost gone...

But I'm still inside today because I had a project I needed to get done (or at least mostly done today). Her shower is today and even though I can't be there, I wanted her to be able to see the "finished" product.

My cousin had a baby boy a few weeks ago. And because he was 5 weeks early (due the first week of April), I can't feel bad about finishing it up now...

So my day was filled with lots of seam ripping....


One major incident involving the quilt, the sewing machine and the table cloth....

(Yep, they're stitched together)



But the end product turned out pretty great:


They're big Seattle Seahawks fans, hence the fabric selection. And the back is Minky fabric, which is sooo soft, but a big pain to sew on.


I still have to hand-tack the corners, but I'm pretty proud of how it turned out. I've only made one quilt before and I had a lot of help from mom and grandmas.

And I really didn't think the pattern (which I designed) through, so when I went to put the blocks together, I had to get a little creative.


Freyja just laid on the fabric and batting. My bad for putting it in her little spot of sunshine.... So she decided to use her bed instead, poor thing.

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Saturday, March 26, 2011

Sick Day #2

Now we're both not feeling so hot... Today will be pretty unproductive and lazy.

But we did give Freyja a much needed bath and toothbrushing last night

Post-bath
The hooded bunny towel was a Christmas gift from the bf's mom... Freyja only hates it because it means she's all wet. 

Mid-brushing

She really doesn't like having her teeth brushed, but sometimes, it's just necessary...

Hope the rest of you are having a more productive weekend :)

Friday, March 25, 2011

Doughnut Muffins and a Sick Day


We've still got snow. Boo.


On Fridays, the bf's office brings brings breakfast to work. Once a month, it's the bf's turn to bring something. Usually, he forgets until the last minute, but luckily, he reminded me yesterday.

With no ideas of what to bring, it was left up to me.

Awhile ago, I saw a blog post for doughnut muffins. But of course, I couldn't remember where I'd seen it.

So I googled. 

And I found this recipe

And they came out amazing and are so delicious:


There were some weird things about the recipe (like weird measurements), so I re-wrote some of it so it makes more sense:

For Muffin

3 cups flour
3/4 cups sugar, plus 1/8 cup of sugar
2 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
2 large eggs
3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup heavy cream (whipping cream works too)

For Topping 

1/4 cup butter, more if needed
1 cups sugar
1 tbsp. ground cinnamon


1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a standard muffin pan with muffin cups.

2. In a large bowl, cream the butter and the sugar. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, until just mixed in. In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, nutmeg and cinnamon. Combine the vanilla, milk and heavy cream.

3. With a spoon, mix a quarter of the dry ingredients into the butter mixture. Then mix in a third of the milk mixture. Continue mixing in the remaining dry and wet ingredients alternately, ending with the dry. Mix until well combined and smooth, but don't overmix. 

4. Scoop enough batter into each tin so that the top of the batter is even with the rim of the cup, a little less than  a 1/2 cup. Bake the muffins until firm to the touch, about 25-30 minutes. 

5. To finish, Melt the butter for the dipping mixture in a small bowl. Combine the sugar and cinnamon in another bowl. When the muffins are just cool enough to handle, remove them from the tin, dip them into or brush them all over with the melted butter, and then roll them in the cinnamon sugar.

Some tips:

1. Make sure you alternate wet and dry. The bf made the second batch and didn't know that this meant put in 1/4 dry ingredients, mix, put in 1/3 wet ingredients etc... I had to spend A LOT of time mixing to get the lumps out.

2. The batter is more like a dough than say a traditional muffin or cupcake batter. The recipe didn't note that and I was surprised and thought I might have added too much flour.

3. The recipe only makes 12 muffins. Shocking, but true. I wouldn't double the batch if you're making them by hand (like I did), but you could do this if you have a hand or stand mixer.

4. When you're putting the batter  into the muffin cups, you're going have to use your fingers. And it gets messy. You really do want the muffin cups FULL (I was skeptical too) and to get a smooth muffin top, you'll want to make sure the batter is completely flat. So on the second batch I floured my hands/fingers.

5. You could probably use the toothpick method to test done-ness, but I just touched them to test 
done-ness. 


They may not be great for you, but I'd bet they're better for you than a doughnut.


And also today the bf is home sick, so I took the muffins in myself. I can't have 24 of these bad boys sitting on my counter (I've already had two this morning alone). 

And I had to make a store run anyway for sick supplies...



Miss Freyja's elated to have someone who will lay and cuddle with her all day :)



Also, Fishtail Cottage is hosting a great Spring/Easter giveaway...




Hope you all have a happy (and healthy!) Friday :)


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