Weekend Ramblings Easter Weekend

EASTER MENU:

Ham
Scalloped potatoes
Green beans

We had awesome weather this weekend with temps in the 60's and they said 70's, although it didn't feel quite that warm.  The sun was beautiful and the wind was on the calmer side.  We had some windy weather earlier in the week with gusts over 40 mph for several days.  Oreo was insistent that she wanted to be outside even with the winds.  Poor thing had to brace herself or the winds might have blown her away like Toto.  We really need to come up with some type of fence so they can hang outside without me being with them.

Oreo bracing against the wind with her ears flying

The pups and I went out for a walk Saturday evening. We live close to the entrance of the White Cloud Trail.  Amazingly enough I've never tried hiking any of it before.  The trail loops throughout the city and is approximately 10 miles long.  We aren't quite up to that long of a hike yet but I decided we'd try a mile or so of it from the entrance.  It follows a dirt road along the James River to start.  There was a drop in the river which created a nice little rapid. It was nice and peaceful even though there were houses on the other side of the river.  It would probably be a good place to fish once I get my license.  I realized that I need to get some flea preventative immediately and I need to see what the vet suggests about ticks as I'm sure they'll be coming out soon.  There were mosquitoes out in full force along the river so I'll need to remember to use or bring bug spray/deterrent.  I used my pedometer and we walked 2.28 miles.

I couldn't do much cleaning so I crocheted another rag rug and finished it.  This one is a rectangle done in red, white and blue.  Very patriotic.  I used a 1.5" strip instead of a 2" strip so I got the more holey appearance to it then the green one I did.  I did manage to give myself a blood blister on one of my fingers from the scissors.  I would have started another rug Sunday but my finger hurt so bad it will have to wait.

I ordered a deluxe video set from Rag to Rugs by Lora and I can't begin to say how helpful the video was. She starts from how much fabric to use, how to crochet, how to make oval, round, and rectangle rugs, and how to join strips so you don't get a stair step in the row from color to color.  The deluxe set came with the Q hook, patterns, and crochet stitch markers.  The cheat sheets are AWESOME!  I'd initially planned to make another oval but after watching the video I decided to make the red, white and blue rug a rectangle instead.  I thought the rectangles looked pretty neat.

Matt spent the weekend working on the lawn and it looks awesome compared to what it did before. Sunday  evening Matt decided he wanted to do something outside with the pups and I so we went down to the Reservoir and walked along the paved path along the lake.  It was so beautiful out with just a smidge of a breeze.  We both assumed that the bridge to the island would be closed due to flooding but it was open. We'd walked so far by then we knew we couldn't handle crossing the bridge and walking the island as well. I also need to get some needle nosed pliers to pull sand burrs out of the dogs paws when we're walking in that area.  I forgot my pedometer but I'd say we probably walked closer to 3 miles on this hike.

Weekend Ramblings April 13

SUNDAY MENUS:

Brunch:    Oven fried potatoes, bacon, eggs, and toast

Supper:  Homemade pizza

We cannot wait until Menard's builds a store here.  It is horrible not having a home improvement store for supplies.  Matt had gone to Fargo with a buddy Thursday and picked up all the flooring and a roll of underlayment for the hallway and guest room.  We had some items leftover from when he did his office.  When he went to put the underlayment down this morning he discovered he was one length short.  He went to 5 stores locally and nobody had what we needed.  Our choices were to drive 200 miles round trip for one roll of underlayment, buy something in town that's different but "might" work, or order online.  Thankfully Menard's has online ordering so that's what we went with.  Shipping was less than what we'd have paid for gas. Unfortunately they're saying approximately 10 days before we get it.  On a good note, other than that snafu, he was able to get the entire hallway done including door stops and just over half of the guest room.  I am so happy to be getting the carpeting out of here. 

While he was working this morning I made us a huge country style brunch of oven fried potatoes with plenty of onions, crispy bacon, eggs over easy and buttery toast.  He needed a good meal for the work he wanted to get done.  We shared a Butter Beer he'd picked up at the party store last night when he took a break.  Those of you that are Harry Potter fans will have heard of Butter Beer before.  It taste sort of like cream soda, Matt described it as butterscotchy in flavor.  It's good but I don't think good enough to pay $2 a bottle for it. It's a novelty item and I might buy some to send the kids for gifts.

My early morning was spent cleaning and doing laundry.  In the afternoon I continued my work on my cross stitch project and watched The Bletchley Circle on Netflix as well as helping Matt whenever he needed my assistance.  It was a 3 part Masterpiece Theatre drama about a group of women that had worked as code breakers during the war and gather back together to find a killer.  They were living ordinary lives while keeping the work they'd done during the war a secret when one of them starts noticing patterns to a series of killings.  I highly recommend it if you like British dramas or period pieces.  

WEEKEND RAMBLINGS APRIL 12TH

The weather has been beautiful here the past week.  I think the entire week was in the 50's and 60's.  You can only imagine my disappointment when looking at the forecast for the next week to discover temps won't get above 40'!  This is life in North Dakota.

The furkids and I have gotten out for several walks (or wonders as I call them) even on the windier days. The geese are still heading north and honking up a storm as they pass overhead.  It's a beautiful sight to see. I can hear the geese even at night when I take the pups out for their last outing before bed.  I noticed green grass starting to pop up in the yard and the dogs have been after ever bit they can find to graze on. They love eating grass.  We seem to have several crows in the neighborhood that I've been watching from the window during the day as they dash about finding bits for their nests.

Saturday Menu: 
Lunch: Egg salad on baguette and Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies
Supper:  Out to Eat

The yard sales have started!  Another good indication that summer is on it's way.  We went to two different ones today.  One was more of a farm sale since we had to travel a ways outside of town to get to it but it had the best items.  Matt found a box of tools that he picked up.  He bought a trailer to put the snowmobile on last weekend and needed some wires to hook his harness back up and found what he needed there for $1.  Not surprising with my focus on rag rugs of late that my first item is a chocolate brown colored king size sheet set that I bought for $2.  They had 3 more sets but they were all purple.  I probably should have picked them up for that price.  I also found a multi-level basket for $3, which I plan to use when I start selling my homemade goat's milk soaps.  I need to start getting some of these for displays.  I didn't find anything at the second yard sale but Matt found a leaf blower that he talked her down to $20 on.

After a busy morning I decided to relax and do some cross stitching.  I picked up a kit at an estate sale last fall for a quarter and started working it today.  It's robin eggs in a nest.  I think I've decided to go with a bird theme in the guest room so it will fit in with that.

Matt pulled up carpeting and finished up about 7 pm.  He was very sore afterwards. Since he worked so hard I made him some of his favorite Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies (recipe below).  As he says, they have everything in a cookie you could want.

While he was finishing up, Oreo insisted on going for a walk.  The wind had picked up so I wasn't really wanting to take a walk but she was being annoyingly insistent that she wanted a walk.  I wish I could have taken a picture of her.  The wind really picked up about the last half mile and she was literally having to almost muscle her way through it (she only weighs about 18 pounds) and her ears were flying back.  She's spunky for a 14 year old pup.  I'd planned to make shrimp scampi with linguine last night but when I pulled the shrimp out of the freezer I discovered severe freezer burn on them so we ended up going out to eat.

I found this recipe on the Internet but for the life of me I can't remember where so I apologize for not being able to give credit for it.

Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

2/3 cup peanut butter
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
2 cups oatmeal (I use old fashion)
2/3 cup chocolate chips (I used mini chocolate chips)

Turn oven on 350'.  Cream together peanut butter and brown sugar, vanilla and eggs.  Add oatmeal.  Mix in chocolate chips.  Use cookie scoop and drop onto cookie sheet and then use fork to flatten a bit.   I used a 1.5" cookie scoop and this made roughly 18 cookies.  Bake for 12 minutes.  I found with the size scoop I used it took 13 to 14 minutes.