Sneek peek new paper and stamps and upcoming class

I have been working on this cute little bookmark album that will be for sale in the new CTMH book on the 1st of February. We will be making this album at one of my classes in February which means we have a short 2 hr time frame to get this done, but my girls are great so they should have no problems.

The best bread ever!

Wow,this post has been a long time in the coming. Today is the day if you love bread you MUST buy one or both of these books Artisan Bread In Five Minutes A day and Healthy Bread In Five Minutes A Day both by Jeff Hertzberg, M.D; & Zoe Francois. These books are amazing and yield the perfect bread results. I have made boule,bagettes,sandwich loafes,pizza crust and amazing hamburger buns. You can use regular unbleached flour, whole wheat flour, spelt or a number of others and it is so easy no more kneading and rising and kneading again. You can make a master recipe batch that lasts for 2 count em two weeks in the fridge. Of course mine never lasts that long and I even make a double batch, seriously depending on your recipe you could have only 4 ingredients, mix em up let the dough rise for about 2 hrs then refrigerate. Next pull out the dough cut off a chunck, shape it, let it rest for the set time and then bahe on a preheated stone for about 30 minutes. Ta-Da fresh hot artisan bread. Please for the love of everything good and right try this bread!

A cabinet re-do

I know that in my last post I promised bread, and hopefully I will get it posted today or tommorrow. However I could not resist sharing my corner cabinet that I did yesterday, I am slowly in the process of redecorating my house and in the dining room we will be painting hopefully soon, and my hubby is going to build me a farmhouse table and I have some amazing chairs to re-do so I was ready for some change. Can I just tell you that I decided to try some Annie Sloan chalk paint and it is AMAZING I am in love with this paint if that's possible. It requires no sanding or priming(whoo-hoo) it is
fairly pricey but it requires no sanding or priming so it's totally worth it to me. I wanted to go with the color Louis Blue and I adore it. I did some distressing and I love the result,  but after I get the whole room redone I think it will fit in much better. Might I also add that who in a million years would have thought that I, who own about 100 pieces of black furniture would  ever paint a piece blue? Well I certainly surprised myself and I would just like to thank my ex-neighbor Aubrey because I am pretty sure she started my color transformation.So thanks Aubrey well from me anyways I don't know for sure that the hubby would thank you(hee hee).

I have linked this up to the following parties:

Miss Mustard Seed

How to make stock and yummy soups

I really think that all fall and winter I could live off homemade soup and fresh bread. Since we raise our own grass feed beef we have a freezer full of beef and soup bones, so I love to make my own stock. For beef stock I usually make pretty big batches so I can freeze some. I actually did 10 soup bones in 2 pots this last time. To make my stock I put my bones in a roasting pan with some organic carrots, celery, onions and garlic and roast for about an hour at about 400 degrees. Next I take my roasted bones and all those veggies and dump them into a stock pot then I add about 12 cups of water, some whole peppercorns, a bay leaf, a jar of our own canned diced tomatoes, about 5 diced potatoes and kosher salt to taste bring to a boil then lower heat and simmer for 5-6hrs, strain through cheesecloth, then let cool and remove the fat layer on the top. True stock will gel- it looks rather unappealing but it is perfect. I prefer to freeze in 2 cup portions before it gels, there is nothing like homemade stock for your soups and gravies. The same can be done with chicken bones as well for fresh chicken stock and it is extremely economical.

A recipe you must try is Zuppa Toscana, I had it for the first time at Olive Garden and it is amazing. So I looked up a recipe and found a great one HERE, the only changes I made were to use our own italian beef sausage that we make and we used Kale instead of spinach then top it off with some fresh parmesean and you have the most wonderful soup.

Next up is a super simple soup, I used some of my freshly made chicken stock and added some spices, organic, celery, carrots, onions, shredded chicken and some egg noodles then I added some Franks red hot and turned plain chicken noodle soup into buffalo chicken soup-yummo. I added fresh grated parmesean to the top which was good but some crumbly blue would have been perfect! I am sure I will be experimenting with lot's more soups this winter and what goes perfect with soup but Artisan bread. That my friends deserves it's own post so maybe tommorrow I will share the best bread book in the world- well at least in my humble opinion!

Two page Valentines day layout

Well looky there I actually posted something related to papercrafting. This is a pretty basic basic two page layout with a"LOVE" theme for my next class. All products are CTMH, if you have any questions let me know!