Lazy Days

We had an exciting homeowner surprise this weekend. In the planters there were some bulbs and they grew leaves but we never saw any flowers on them. Then we woke up on Friday and they had bloomed! Into big, beautiful irises. It's so nice to have some flowers in the back yard while we are working on V's jungle he's going to make back there. Our roses are blooming too. They are pretty hearty suckers. I cut them back so much that I was certain they would die. But they are back and budding. V bought a trellis for them to grow on and it's quite pretty. It's all starting to come together.
This has been a really fun casual weekend. We weren't able to stain anymore of the deck because it's supposed to thunderstorm tonight, tomorrow, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Yesterday we did a little work on the outside of the house, then we FINALLY got to enjoy our pool! V swam and I lounged in our new chaise by the pool reading and listening to the fountain. It was so nice. I still need to get an umbrella because I am just to pale that I can't be outside for too long without getting pink. I don't really tan and if I did tan I don't want to get all leathery. But I like reading by the pool so an umbrella is a must.

Today we worked on restaining the old adirondack chairs. Unfortunately, they are going to need a lot of coats. They used to be a dark brown but the only premixed colors Home Depot has are redwood (our deck color) and a light brown. I went for the light brown but I think I should have waited in line to get a darker color mixed because you can still see some of the old stain I couldn't strip under the new stain. I think next time I might actually paint them a color and not just stain them. I love the look of painted adirondack chairs.

I made a key lime pie this weekend and it tasted pretty good. Unfortunately, I can't list the recipe because the one I used was completely off in oven temp and time so I had to improvise. Happily it didn't seem to affect the taste!

Deck

Blogging is going to be slow the next few weeks. We are working on staining the deck, and we have a whole lot of deck. The problem is, when staining a deck, you have to do two coats, and both coats need to be done within 48 hours. Then you need at least an additional 24 hours after that to let it dry without any rain. In April/May in the midwest, 3 days without rain is a rarity. We've got the top portion done and it looks great! We can't work on it this weekend because it's supposed to rain on Sunday so we wouldn't be able to stain on Saturday and we won't have time to do two coats after work tomorrow. I think this is going to be a long long process. But it will be totally worth it... once we are finally finished!

Goat Cheese Pasta

Tonight's dinner was super easy and super tasty. It's from Martha's new cookbook Fresh Flavor Fast. I think it's a good spring/summer dinner that's fast enough to make after work and after sweeping the back deck. Roasting asparagus smells a little funny but ignore it, it's worth it.

Goat Cheese Pasta

1 pound twisty pasta

5 tablespoons butter (approximately)

5-6 ounces goat cheese (depending on the size of package you find)

2 bunches asparagus

chives (if you want, I didn't want to spend the extra money)

Salt and Pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 450. Start boiling water in a big pan.

Break off the thick ends of the asparagus. Break the remainder into big-bite-sized pieces. Dot with 2 tablespoons of butter and toss in salt and pepper. Roast for 10-15 minutes.

Cook the pasta. Save 1-1.5 cups of starchy water. Drain.

Mix the butter, goat cheese, and 1/2 cup of the water. (I did this in the pasta pot to keep the number of dishes to a minimum.) Melt together. I added extra salt and pepper at this point. Stir in pasta and asparagus. Add in extra water until a sauce forms. I ended up using a little over 1 cup of starchy water. Enjoy!

Pool Toys

We finally went swimming today! It was astoundingly cold. I only went in up to my waist but V swam around a little. We also put in our two pool toys. A floating fountain and a Star Wars X-wing fighter with a squirt gun to get the baddies. Hopefully it warms up soon so we can swim some more!

Oatmeal Fudge Bars

This Saturday was kind of wasted day. Our next project on the house is to stain the deck. Unfortunately, to stain the deck, it has to have been dry for a day and remain dry for a day. Unfortunately, April showers bring May flowers and all of that. It thunderstormed terribly yesterday and was supposed to rain again tonight. So, staining was put off for tomorrow. Then about 3 this afternoon it became nice and sunny and was not going to rain after all. But, 3 is a bit late to start a big project like staining the deck. I ran errands this morning and now we are watching Sherlock Holmes (love RDJ). It's kind of nice to have the day off but I really want to be finished with the deck so we can relax and enjoy the pool!

This afternoon I also made outmeal fudge bars. They are pretty interesting and very rich. There's a thin oatmeal base, then the chocolate later is so fudgy and creamy that they shouldn't be so easy to make. I would recommend them to bring to the office, or an outdoor party. I'll definitely make them again.

Base
1c brown sugar
1/2c butter- softened

1 egg - room temp

1 tsp vanilla
1 1/4c flour
1 1/2c oatmeal
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt

Filling
12oz semisweet chocolate chips
1 tablespoon butter
1 can sweetened condensed milk

Preheat oven to 350. Line a 13x9 baking pan with parchment.

Cream the butter and sugar. Add egg and vanilla. Mix in the remaining base ingredients.

But 2/3 of the base mix in the pan.

Combine the filling ingredients in a microwave safe bowl. Microwave for a few minutes until melted and combined, stirring every 30 seconds. Pour filling over the base. Then dot the remaining 1/3 over the filling.

Bake for 20-25 minutes. Let cool completely before cutting.

Seeing Double

There are several Caitis in my life right now. My sister Caiti and Little Caiti are the two that I actually like. All the other Caitis started coming around in the fall when it was dark after I got home so at first it was hard to tell the difference. All the Caitis are varying shades of orange with white stripes and all about the same size. Thus the confusion.

Evil Caiti comes around at night. In the fall she came around several times. She's a little bigger than LC and much fluffier. That's the easiest way to tell the difference. I try to chase away any cats that I don't want to stay around here but at first it was pretty hard to tell the difference and I scared LC a few times (maybe that's why she won't let me pet her). This Caiti is evil because she scared the kitties. Anytime EC came into the yard my kitties would run and hide. And EC has stopped being scared of me. I would chase her away and she wouldn't run, just amble away. I need to get V after her.

Doppleganger Caiti look exactly like Caiti. Same color, same size same everything. Finally I started staring out the backdoor enough to notice that DC's fur is a little darker and his face looks kind of smooshed. But the kitties didn't seem scared of Doppleganger Caiti. They ignored him while he was eating their food, but they didn't hide.

Caiti Cinquo has only been around once. She was about Inky's size and her face looked exactly like LC's. I might have kept Cinquo - she was cute. But she ran away once I walked toward her and she hasn't been back since.

Tonight there might have been a sixth Caiti. I'm not sure yet. It was eating the kitties food so I ran to chase it away and it didn't seem to scared of me. It also had a very fluffy tail so it could have been Evil Caiti with a shave. I took the food and water inside and it hasn't come back. I hope the cat isn't eating the kitties food during the day. I'll have to watch for the cat to come back to find out if it's a 6th Caiti or not. Hopefully not.

Creamed Spinach

Tonight's dinner was a mish mash. I planned our dinner to be pork tenderloin, creamed spinach, and Italian bread. Unfortunately, the tenderloin took about twice as long to cook as the recipe said and V and I were too hungry to wait. So, my dinner was creamed spinach and bread. V had creamed spinach, bread, and leftover pizza. We are such adults.

The creamed spinach was amazing. It was creamy, garlicy, and rich. It's another recipe from The Pioneer Woman. It was very easy to make and I changed the recipe around a bit to suit my cooking style. However, no matter how tasty the dish was, it was definitely meant to be a side, not a main dish. It was soo rich! My tummy hurts. V thought it would be better as a dip than a side. It probably would be good that way. Or it's good by itself, just as a side. But soo good.

Creamed Spinach

1 stick butter plus a few extra tablespoons, separated

1 small onion

3 garlic cloves

8 tablespoons flour

2 cups milk (I used 2%)

Salt

Pepper

Fresh ground nutmeg

20 ounces spinach (she called for 24 but the only packages I could find were 10 ounces, not 8 ounces)

Melt stick of butter. I cooked the onions at this point because I like soft onions. She added the onions at the same time as the garlic. Add in the flour and stir. Let it cook about 5 minutes to brown (I forgot to do this and it was fine). Add in the milk slowly and stir the whole time. Add in the garlic and allow to cook while working on the spinach, stirring occasionally. Melt a few tablespoons butter in another pan, wilt in the spinach. At this point, I would sieve the spinach to get out as much excess liquid as possible. I didn't do that and mine was a little thin. Stir in spinach, salt, pepper and nutmeg. Serve.