Sunday, August 30, 2015

Chocolate Chunk Beet Cake

This cake is dense like a brownie and it’s light sweetness and chocolaty flavor masks the beets and blends them in with no iron-ish aftertaste (my issue with eating beets).  It has become the only way my family will eat beets, so I have decided to embrace it.  Enjoy!

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Friday, August 28, 2015

{This moment}

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{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo (two this week) - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

{Inspired by SouleMama}

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Thursday, August 27, 2015

Roasted Tomato Sauce with a kick

This year was so hot….  Sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, but seriously…  this summer was SO hot!  And hot summers mean TOMATOES. 


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Tuesday, August 25, 2015

For the glory of determined people

I am one of those people.  I will find a way to do just about anything and I have no issue with doing some things twice or even three times before I get it right.  But dog-on-it, I will do anything I set my mind to.  So when I want to spend my time writing again now that life has calmed down, I am going to do it.  With my trusty sidekicks beside me.  Who are just as determined as I am.  Watch out world…  I spawned 4 of me. 

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See you soon, blogland.  I’ll be back.
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Thursday, August 13, 2015

Making of a pantry – DIY Kitchen Remodel phase 3

I really love food.  And in this love, I have always had a pantry.  Even when I had to build it myself.  This is the third phase of our DIY remodel and perhaps the most impressive…. because I built a room in my house!  It has been in for over a year now and we used it many times a day.  It is the best investment I have put into my kitchen so far. 

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Within weeks of moving in, I had built my pantry on the empty wall.  I actually do not have a true ‘before’ picture of this corner.  So this is the before:

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4 years later, I decided to turn this wall into some much needed storage space.  I took down the shelves I made and turned this corner into a pantry:

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It was a big adventure which took a weeks of planning and about 6 days of construction.  We got a puppy the day before I started building so I was pretty much on my own during this build as everyone else was in honeymoon ‘puppy’ and the puppy was sure this corner was just for him.  (He really was super cute…. )

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But 6 days later, we had this!
 
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In Dec of 2013, I paid a neighbor and friend with a woodshop to make me cabinets for the empty spaces.  This one, next to the pantry, has a garbage drawer beneath and a full sized cabinet above.

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We painted them white the next month and they blended right into the kitchen as if they had always been there!

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We asked a friend to help us cut and put in the butcherblock countertops.  It took him two whole days and I am SO grateful that he was willing to put that time in because I had NO idea what I was doing with that!

With the countertops and tile in, this whole space looks like it was always here, which, of course, the goal of any good remodel.  But to the DIY remodeler, having this type of success is a goal worthy of a whole post.  

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