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Posted on September 17, 2011

I had a baking day today. I made four new recipes. Two I froze so I can’t tell you if they are good or not. I’m saving those for a busy day when I don’t have time to cook but don’t want to eat junk.

However, the other two recipes I sampled and they were very good. I thought I’d share.

I introduce to you the very delicious RASPBERRY CRUMB BREAKFAST BARS! I got this recipe from the Smitten Kitchen blog.

Raspberry Crumb Breakfast Bars

For the crust and crumb:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
1 1/4 cups rolled oats
3/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch pieces

For the raspberry filling:
1/4 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 pound raspberries, fresh or frozen
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled

Make the crust and crumb: Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter the bottom and sides of a 9-by-13-inch glass or light-colored metal baking pan. Put a long piece of parchment paper in the bottom of the pan, letting the parchment extend up the two short sides of the pan and overhang slightly on both ends. (This will make it easy to remove the bars from the pan after they have baked.) Butter the parchment.

Put the flour, brown sugar, oats, salt, baking powder, baking soda, and cinnamon in a food processor. Pulse in short bursts until combined. Add the butter and pulse until loose crumbs form.

Reserve 1 1/2 cup of the mixture and set aside. Pour the rest of the mixture into the prepared pan and use your hans or the back of a large wooden spoon to push the crust into an even layer at the bottom of the pan. The crust should touch the sides of the pan. Bake until golden brown, 12 to 15 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack and let the crust cool. Keep the oven on while you make the raspberry filling.

Make the raspberry filling: In a medium bowl, whisk the sugar, lemon zest, cinnamon and flour together. Add the raspberries, lemon juice and butter and use your hands to toss gently until the raspberries are evenly coated.

Assemble and bake the bars: Spread the raspberry filling evenly on top of the cooled crust. Sprinkle the reserved crust mixture evenly on top of the filling.

Bake for 35 to 45 minutes, rotating the pan every 15 minutes, until the top is golden brown and the filling starts to bubble around the edges.

Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely, then cut into squares and serve. The bars can be stored in the refrigerator in an airtight container.

 

The second recipe I tried was CHEWY GRANOLA BARS adapted from What Megan’s Making.

The recipe called for 1 1/2 cups of chocolate chips. I put 3/4 cup in half of the mix so that I could have some bars without the chocolate chips. I think when I do this recipe again, I might reduce the amount of chocolate chips by half. I thought it had a little too many.

The recipe also called for craisins. Since I didn’t have any, I left those out.

Posted on July 30, 2011

Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky.  ~ Rabindranath Tagore

Posted on July 21, 2011

I’ve walked by my in-laws old chicken coop a million times. During our last visit, I glanced inside hoping to see a critter so I could take it’s picture.  Instead, I found some old windows and immediately had an idea. My daughter has been wanting to keep her jewelry untangled and displayed in a neat way.  My idea was a window jewelry display. Here is what I did:

 First, I took the glass out of the big frame (the other one already had the glass gone).  Then, I cleaned them off with a soft wire brush (Dollar General find) and wiped them down with a wet wash cloth sprayed with Windex. I’m not sure that Windex was the appropriate cleaner to use but it worked.

After they were clean, I screwed in wall hooks on one of the windows and attached window screen to the other window.

It’s all hung and decorated. No more tangled necklaces and what a beautiful wall piece. My daughter loved it!

Easy as pie! Here’s the finished product.

Posted on July 11, 2011

I love to make use of things no one else wants. I’ve wanted a swing for my front porch for a while so I started looking online. I found a wooden swing that I loved and immediately got the idea of using a pallet. I found a pallet that was going to be thrown away and started to work (with hubby’s help of course).

Step 1 – I took the two end boards off the pallet. Then, I had hubby cut the pallet in half.

 Step 2 – I added some boards from the leftover wood to the end of the pallet for drink holders.

Step 3 – I lightly sanded the top and sides….just enough to get rid of anything that would cause splinters. Then, I stained it.

Step 4 – Hubby and I attached the swing to the porch with strong nylon rope. I still want to add an outdoor pillow or two but all and all it’s finished.

Posted on June 29, 2011

My latest project involved a door from an aunt’s old house.  I really like how it turned out so I thought I’d share with you.

Here is the door before I started. Lots of paint and a few unsecured boards/trim.

Hubby helped by sanding down the boards for me. It was so much easier than trying to strip off three layers of paint. Plus, I didn’t want all the paint off.

I did have to strip some parts of the door. The trim inside the panels were hard to sand so I sprayed paint remover on them to help. I also sprayed paint remover on the metal lock plate.

After I had the paint off of the trim, I was ready to paint the panels of the door with magnetic primer.

Once the magnetic primer had dried, I painted the panels with chalkboard paint.

At first, I had plans to stain the wood but changed my mind once I saw it all sanded down. Instead, I applied a coat of Tung Oil to bring out the natural beauty of the wood.

And here is the finished product, a chalkboard entryway thing-a-ma-gig. I bought some dresser knobs to hang things from and some old pop tabs for magnets.

Thanks for looking. I hope you enjoyed it. I have another door and I’m ready to start that project too. Stay tuned!

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