Sea Salt Caramel Rice Krispy Treats

If you've been following my blog, you know that I usually like to warm you up with a few photos before I get to the recipe of the day.

 You can pretty much count on the photos falling into one of two categories.

1.  Whatever happens to be blooming in my yard. (a.k.a. Flowers That I Haven't Killed...Yet)

or

2. My dogs.  Here's Clyde on the 4th of July, visiting my parents in Connecticut.  

You may think that you've just viewed the warm-up pictures, but today I've got something even better. (And best of all, I am going to share some photos that were taken by others, people who have much better skills with a camera than I could ever hope to have!)

There's been a little bit of Hollywood action here in our little Boston suburb for the past couple of days.

My facebook newsfeed has been completely flooded with pictures that my friends have posted of Robert Downey, Jr.  By all accounts, he is a really down-to-Earth, humble guy who freely steps into the crowds to sign autographs.

The above picture was taken by my friend Kerry's cousin, Reilly.

Kerry was stuck at work and is insanely jealous that Reilly was so close to one of her all-time favorite actors.

  And I'm sure Kerry is also jealous that Robert Downey, Jr. was looking right at our friend, Cristina, when she took this picture.

Cristina's son, Jake, got an autograph.

The name of the film is "The Judge."  My friend, Tracey, captured this scene outside the courthouse.  Tracey's a true rock star with her camera.

Final shot:  Tracey's daughter, Lily, getting an autograph and a little face time with a movie star.

Thanks to all of my friends for letting me share their pictures!

Okay, before I give you the recipe, I need to tell you that it's one of a gazillion recipes that I've been pinning on Pinterest.  Actually, I didn't even pin this one, because when I pin something I never look at it again.

I went right to the recipe, printed it out, and made it.  Click HERE to go to Redbook Magazine's recipe for Salted Caramel Treats.  Go ahead.  You have to click on the link.  I'll wait.

Okay, now that you're back I will explain why you needed to click on the link.  I wanted you to see how beautiful and perfect the treat looks in that picture.  I know that I'm always telling you how terrible a photographer I am, but I need to inform you that no amount of mad photography skills could ever make the treats that I made look so perfect.  (And the fact that I scorched my caramel didn't help.)  Do you think they actually photoshopped all of the flaws right out of that treat? I mean, caramel is really gooey, right?  That picture is the smoothest, most ungooey-looking caramel I have ever seen.  Where am I going with this?  The point of all this rambling is that although my treats hardly resemble the flawless treat you see in that picture, it doesn't matter.  Flaws and all, these treats are out-of-this-world yummy!

Random Thoughts

Well, I did not realize that there was a limit to the amount of photo space on my blog account.....until I tried to write tonight's post (earlier this week) and blogger wouldn't allow me to download any photos because my space was all used up.

First, I blamed it on my new camera.  All this time spent wishfully thinking about how nice it would be to have a camera that would take pictures that didn't look like they were taken under cover of darkness.  I thought it was more than a coincidence that my storage space filled up two days after I started downloading the new photos. Nah.  Turns out it was just a case of bad timing.

After a bit of research I discovered that there is a 1GB limit to photo storage on blogger, and I've apparently reached that limit.  

What to do?  Do I have to stop blogging?  Do I blog without pictures?  Terrible as my pictures are, I think a blog without pictures would be worse.  You would be stuck with my lame attempts to engage you without the lame photos to drive my lame points home.

I was relieved to discover that I could purchase 20GB of additional storage for a nominal annual fee.

Gratuitous photos of my sidekick, Gus, will continue to appear here regularly.

Lots of time spent outdoors lately.

Temps this week were in the EIGHTIES.  Which is like, practically unheard of in New England during the month of March.  We have been sleeping with our windows open overnight.  ALL NIGHT LONG.  I don't think we have ever, ever done that in March.

I've been doing lots of cooking, but almost everything I've cooked lately can be found in the archives of this blog.

Pasta With Creamy Pesto Sauce.  Click here to be taken to recipe.  Well, the recipe that I posted has chicken in it, but this week I made it without meat.

 And earlier this week, I made Apricot Chicken Sandwiches, because I felt like the beautiful weather called for something fun.  Click here to be taken to the recipe.

Here's a shot of the yummy inside of the sandwich.  I was going to change the ugly pictures in the earlier posts, but then I thought I'd leave them as they were, because we can all use a laugh now and then.

I'm still trying to figure out the new camera, but I'm liking the pictures I'm taking now a heck of a lot more than I did with the old camera.

Almond Cake With Fresh Berries

This has been such a busy week! 

1. Temps in the '60's!  I finally put up my new window boxes.

My parents came for a visit and I took advantage of my Dad's handy-dandy skills.  Took the two of us about an hour to drill and hang six boxes.  

Without him, who knows how long it would have taken me?  And how many sighs of exasperation and shakes of my head did he save me from?  Thanks, Dad!  

2.  The only baking I've done in the last few days is a batch of dog cookies.  Click on the link to be taken to my favorite doggy recipe.

3.  Caitie is home for spring break {yippee!}, and we have been out all day, every day this week.

4. Wednesday was my wedding anniversary, Mr. Terrific and I have been married for 25 {wow!}

years.

Which brings me to 

5.

Mr. Terrific bought me a new camera!

So awesome!  --yet terrifying, because I  have really gotten into a groove of blaming my lackluster photos on my old camera.  What if I continue to take drab pictures with the new camera?

Yesterday, I charged the battery and tried to work my way through the manual, which is over 300 pages long.

And then, last night, I proceeded to have one dream after another, similar to those dreams where you're trying to run {but your legs won't move} or you're trying to scream {but no sound comes out}.   I suppose some people might call them nightmares?  Well last night, in multiple dreams, I was trying to take photos with my new camera but the camera wouldn't work.  Knobs were falling off, buttons refused to move, the lens refused to focus.  All night long. 

So a few minutes ago I grabbed the camera and took this picture:

And this one:

I took them just to prove to myself that the camera is working.  I still have a lot to learn, but I think that maybe these pictures--taken on this overcast, rainy day--are quite a bit better than my usual dreary photos.

And since I made (and took the following photos for) this Almond Cake last week, I'm hopeful that this post will be a last hurrah of dim, dark and drab photos.

It's Not Me, It's My Camera!

Lately, I've become obsessed with learning how to take a good picture.  A clear, crisp, focused picture.  Not blurry, fuzzy or hazy.  Or too dark.  Or too bright and washed out.  You may have noticed, I'm having trouble.

It didn't help that when I was recently going through my photo files, I found a folder of pictures that my daughter took last year, with her camera.  Amazing photos, every last one of them. 

There were dozens and dozens of shots of my dogs.  In color, black and white, sepia.  At rest and at play.  Full-body shots and head shots.

Paw shots.

Eye shots.

Nostril shots!  Tee-hee.

It was nice to see the pictures of Gracie.  Oh, how I miss her.

Gus misses her, too.

I'm clicking through the folder and then (gasp) I see this.  This is the food photo I've been trying to take, where the focus is on the food and so unbelievably clear and sharp and the background is just a blur because it's not food and it doesn't matter.

So I eagerly asked my wonderful daughter:  how do I set my camera to take a picture like this?  She took a look at my camera settings and my sweet, precious camera-goddess angel of a daughter rolled her eyes and said, "you can't do that with this camera." 

My imagination added "you imbecile!" to make her transformation into Cruella DeVille complete.

Oh, well. 

Here's another fab recipe accompanied by the usual ho-hum photos.  It makes 4 servings, if you can find large, 8-ounce-ish boneless chicken breasts you will only need 3 (one roll-up will satisfy most appetites at this size); if you are using smaller breasts then you will need 4.