We'll go back to last weekend, when we had the curbing put in. That was a frustrating event (They rescheduled 3 times after Les took a day off work to be here for the original time!) and it's still not a completed project for a few reasons.
Here is the front yard after they cut out the grass getting it ready to put the curbing down. I only post this picture because it is the one that you can kind of see the neighbors curbing on. The dark gray concrete. Well we went with the same company and ordered the same curbing and stamping that she had done 1) because I really liked it and 2) since they were going to "meet up" on that front flower bed I thought it would look better if they matched. Now keep that color in mind when you see what's here...
We've got lots of dead spots in the back lawn so Les started shoveling out the grass in the one big spot so we could replace it with the rolls of sod that they removed for the curbing. Hopefully it'll take - so far it looks pretty good.
Here's the new curbing with the stamping... the stamping matches the neighbors quite well, but the terra cotta color that is visible now is a long way off from the dark gray! (Les is making sure they didn't bury the sprinkler head that is right in the corner there.) The company does have to come back in a few weeks and put the sealer on, I don't know how much that will change the color! Then we also need to remove the little bit of bark that is left in all the flower beds and put down weed blocker and rock. So it'll be a few weeks before this project is finished.
This lovely fire pit (I do mean that, I really love it) hasn't weathered very well and all the tiles are loose and falling out. I finally decided it just needed to get taken apart and the tiles reset. So I cleaned out all the tiles and put them in a bucket and then Les came through with a hammer and crowbar and pounded out the extra grout that was in the bottom of the metal tray. Now it is waiting to get finished. Went to home depot yesterday and wasn't even thinking about that project so didn't get what we needed to finish it up. Soon....
This is a new dish I tried - the supposed only subject matter for the blog this week... I'm not sure what it is (hamburger or meatloaf!) or how Salisbury Steak got its name other then it says it was invented by a Dr with the last name Salisbury, but you mix the hamburger up like you would if you are making a meatloaf, but then you divide it into patties like you would for hamburgers, so why isn't just called a hamburger steak!? Anyway - you make the patties and fry them until browned. Take them out and then put the potatoes in the pan with the carrots, onions, onion soup mix, some spices, tomato paste & water and cook that all up, put the steaks back on top and heat through. And the best part - the leftovers were yummy in my lunchbox. :) Next time though I think I will make extra potatoes - can't ever have too many of them.
Tiffani made cupcakes for her friend Kaitlyn's birthday in yearbook on Wednesday. She used store bought frosting and there wasn't quite enough for all the cupcakes so she spelled out her last name with almond bark to put in the other cupcakes. Love the purple color of the frosting!
This was just a really cool picture Tiff took of the "B", how it glows all around.
Tiffani missed her Exploratory Foods class on Monday because she had to take her AP Chemistry Exam. That means she had to do a make up dish at home. They made a Vege Stir-Fry that day so that's what she had to make at home last night.
All the veges ready to go (step 1 was to have all veges cut and ready to go) I'd say she passed that!
Stir frying it all.
The finished dish. It was really yummy. Though making the dish as the recipe was given to her didn't really make a meal - Les and I got a few tastes, but Tiffani ate the rest. Next time she will make a little bit more of it and we will make our favorite marinated chicken to go along with it.Tiffani was also asked to make cupcakes for an 8 year old boy for his birthday and Dillon wanted a hunting/Cabela's themed cake. Well none of Tiffani's books that she usually gets ideas from had anything along those lines. So she came up with the idea to frost the cupcakes with "camouflage" frosting and then we'd put cut-out deer in some of the cupcakes. The first plan was to find a deer cookie cutter and make cookies like we did for the light bulbs on the Christmas cupcakes or to soften some chocolate and cut out chocolate deer. We didn't find a cutter, so we made chocolate deer from melted almond bark instead. That was easy enough, the tricky part was getting those deer into the cupcakes!
Completed herd of Chocolate Deer
Chocolate Deer
Tiffani frosting cupcakes with her camo frosting (chocolate and white (colored green) cream cheese frosting in the same bag.)
The completed herd of deer/cupcakes. Ended up piercing the cake with a knife so we could slide the legs into the cake. A few ended up in there whole (standing in the cake), but the rest broke at various points so they appear to be sitting on the ground instead and the front two turned into does rather quickly when their antlers broke off. We made 15 deer thinking we'd do half of the 24 cupcakes with deer in them, but with how fragile they were we ended up with only 9 whole ones, so used 8 in the cake which worked out as well, since Dillon was turning 8 - Only we had another fatality upon delivery so only ended up with 7 deer. (We'd left the one extra at home...) I think we need to keep our eyes open for a cookie cutter for the next hunting themed cake Tiffani is asked to make. And stay away from chocolate statues that have "toothpicks" to support itself!!! And Dillon liked his cupcakes so all is well! :)
No comments:
Post a Comment