Faith, Family, Food and Dogs

I bet you're wondering where 'Yard Wars, Round One' is. There isn't a post for that. In Round One I sprayed weed killer all around the house and then some total vegetation killer in an effort to make my life easier. The spray combined with a few hard freezes helped me win Round One. This was the view was you approached my front porch late last year. See the tall, green stuff with the huge leaves? Keep these three pots to the right of the steps in mind, they will come up again later. Only one has a living plant in it. The other stuff is weeds or dead plants I need to remove. See it now? It had gotten totally out of control as the previous tenants apparently didn't do anything around the house. You couldn't get to the outside spigot nor the hose hanger on the back side of the front porch. Plus there was all kinds of trash down in there that couldn't be reached due to all the big green plants. I meant to take a photo from the porch looking down towards all...

One of my favorite things about Christmas time is all the lights. In a post last year, I think I mentioned how at Nan's house, I would turn out the bedroom lights then sit on the bed and look out the window at the Christmas light display two houses over. I'm like a kid at Christmas time with lights. This post is all about Christmas lights in my current neighborhood. Yes, its a tad late but that's life, First up is my Christmas tree. It was maybe 6-feet tall but it was the best one I could find that would fit in my place. On Christmas Eve, my son CJ and I took the girls for a walk around the block so I could take pictures. First up are my meager front porch lights. My only outside outlet was half-way back on the opposite side of my home. Several extension cords later this is what I put up. This is my neighbor's house next door. He ran his extension cords like I did. The blue lights have snowflakes on them and at first CJ thought they were Star of David lights,...

Cue the music,,, I really hate moving. The purging of stuff, the packing, the total mess the house or other dwelling becomes during the process. I moved in November, but by October I had pretty much trashed,,,in a good way, the house in Stokesdale. The living room was full of packing material. As was the kitchen. Even the master bedroom was a mess. I did not take a photo of the office or the guest room. That is where the bulk of the packed boxes went to live until moving day. With the help of the BEST neighbor in the world and another neighbor the U-Haul truck got loaded. Thank you Randy Winn for all your hard work! The drive down was smooth and uneventful. My crew of friends all showed up to help me unload the U-Haul. This is my kitchen once we were done unloading the truck. My new living room. And my new master bedroom. But me, being the crazy person I am, I stayed up until 2 am that night to get some of the kitchen unpacked. I was very grateful that my new manager...

Brace yourselves, this may come as quite a shock. Not everything I make turns out great. You have no idea the stuff I make that no one ever sees because I am not happy with the results. For example, I was looking for dessert recipes that would serve two people. Recipes for one don't exist. I found one for Peanut-Butter Cheesecakes and they were cooked in a muffin pan. I thought this would be great and I was really excited as I started this project. The first batch of baked crusts with the peanut butter cups in place. The filling barely covered the peanut-butter cups. These came out pretty dry. I wound up throwing most of them away. I decided to make my own sourdough bread for lunches. When I got up the next morning I found that my starter had overflowed the jar and was like something out of a grade b horror film. What a mess! I later tried again using a bigger jar but then the dough wouldn't rise. So much for that idea. Since I still had some cream cheese I decided to t...

I bought some bay scallops a few weeks ago. When cooking for one its amazing how far a pound of these little guys will go. I made a recipe for baked scallops with bread crumbs. It was okay, not great, just okay. So I went on the hunt for a better recipe and found this one on Food.com. I didn't have cherry tomatoes but I did have some Roma tomatoes, fresh from the garden and I did have the spinach as I has just bought some for a pizza I was going to make. This recipe also called for sea scallops, the big ones, but I had to make do with what I had on hand. Let's give this a try. Scallops and Pasta Florentine 1 lb sea scallops 1/8 tsp pepper (I omitted) 1/4 tsp salt (I omitted) 1 large shallot minced (I used a regular yellow onion) 1/4 cup white wine (I had some Chablis on hand) 7 tsps oil 1/2 cup chicken broth 3 tblsp butter. softened 6 oz package baby spinach 1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved 1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped (I used dried and maybe 1 tblsp) zest of 1-...

Every time I go to the grocery store I am always looking for something new to try. One day at Wal-Mart I saw this package. Closer inspection showed that they are lamb ribs. I had never seen these before, ever! Since I simply love lamb I had to grab a package of them. Of course I had absolutely no idea as what to do with them. I did some research and found the recipe below. In the original recipe the ribs are supposed to be grilled but I did them in the oven. It is simply wonderful. The taste of the ribs with my few changes is lip smacking good. You start out by making a dry rub. You then take part of the dry rub and massage it into the lamb ribs. Let the ribs sit for one hour before cooking. Then you add molasses to the remaining dry rub. Next add some apple cider vinegar. The ribs are ready to go into the oven. These were oh so good. Some of the ribs had a bit of fat on them but I just cut that off before I ate them. Cumin & Coriander Lamb Ribs 1/4 cup kosher sa...