Watermelon Lemonade

Today's weather could not have been more perfect.  

The morning spent at the baseball field, our first game of the 2012 season.  My team got their first win.....it's always nice to start the season with a victory.  Go Cardinals!

Then I spent the afternoon gardening: pruning, trimming, planting bulbs and seeds.  While I gardened and worked up a sweat, all I could think of was an ice-cold glass of fresh-squeezed lemonade.

By the time I was done gardening, I felt the need to add some fresh raspberry puree to my fresh-squeezed lemonade.  As usual, this complicated things........I had the ingredients for my lemonade, but I didn't have any raspberries.

So I went to the store, and they didn't have raspberries, either!  But there was some spectacular-looking watermelon.......so I found myself thinking, why not?

I've never even had watermelon lemonade before, much less made it myself, but I decided to give it a go.  I'm happy to say that it went well!

Strawberry Scones with Lemon Curd

It's been a few weeks since I made one of the gazillion recipes that I've been pinning on Pinterest.

Eenie-meanie-miney-moe...........for today's recipe I picked Strawberry Lemonade Scones by Munchkin Munchies.

The recipe says to drizzle them with prepared lemon curd.  I know, you're just. like. me.  You're thinking, "why used prepared lemon curd when I can make my own?"

I'm so glad that we think alike!

Make the lemon curd the day before you make the scones.  It's not difficult at all to make, but you need to give it time to chill before you use it, and chill time takes at least an hour.

Unless you like to get up at an ungodly hour so you can make your homemade lemon curd and give it an hour to chill and then make your homemade scones in time for breakfast.  In which case, we don't think alike at all.

Shrimp & Potato Soup

Will it really reach 90 degrees on Monday as everyone seems to think?

I figured I should take a few pictures of the blooms and blossoms in my yard before they wilt and drop from heat exhaustion.

None of the tulips have opened yet, I'm hoping they can hold on until after the heatwave!

My niece has adopted a puppy.  Meet Milo!

They live about 100 miles away, I'm afraid by the time I meet him in person his puppy days will be behind him.

Fortunately, she's posting lots of pictures of him on her facebook page so I get to "oooh" and aaaaah" over him all day long!

I made this pillow for the bottom of his crate.....puppies should be pampered, don'tcha think?

I decided to pamper myself a bit tonight!  Mr. Terrific and Sean went to the Red Sox game (Go Sox!!), Erin was out with friends, so I only had myself to cook for.  I'm the only seafood lover in this house, so unless I want to listen to a chorus of groans I rarely prepare anything remotely fishy.  

Tonight, I seized the opportunity to get creative in the kitchen without having to worry about pleasing anyone other than myself!

With the warmer weather coming, I figure that my soup-making days will be on hold for the next five months or so. The only seafood I had in the house was some shrimp in my freezer, but I had enough ingredients on hand to put together a really yummy soup!

Chocolate Banana Bread

Lots of baking going on around here in the last couple of days.

Erin's been busy.  First she whipped up a batch of Easter-themed Honey Nut Chex Mix.

Her Easter baking continued, with marshmallow peeps sitting on speckled M&M eggs in their Rice Krispie treat nests.

All of these Easter treats are gone, devoured.

We're not out of baked goods, though..........thanks to a few over-ripe bananas that inspired me to make Chocolate Banana Bread tonight.

Grilled Cheese Panini with Avocado and Prosciutto

Today I decided to snap a few photos of the flowers that are blooming in my yard.  Everything is blooming so early this year, I wonder if it will continue at this early pace?

I snapped this photo a split-second before Gus came and dropped his frisbee on these daffodils and flattened them.

These daffodils were facing downward so I held my camera on the ground to get this shot.

These white daffodils with the pink centers are my favorite.  I'm thinking that I might have to cut them and bring them into the house where I can enjoy them.

The inspiration for today's recipe came about when I was standing in line at the deli yesterday.  The deli clerk was slicing prosciutto di Parma for the woman in front of me.  He was slicing it so thin and perfect.  I bet you could've read a newspaper through the slices, they were so transparent.  It was out of my control.  I had to buy some.

Then, I had to figure out what to do with the prosciutto.  My favorite thing would be prosciutto/mozzarella asparagus wraps , but unfortunately the rest of my family doesn't share my enthusiasm for asparagus.     

So I just started pulling some of my favorite things out of the fridge (fresh mozzarella) and the fruit bowl (avocado.....I'm still obsessed) and the bread box (awesome ciabatta) and decided on panini instead.

It was sooooooooo good.  In fact, it was such a perfect combination of salty/chewy-crunchy/melty-creamy that I made another one just like it today.

Orange Creamsicle Cookies

Now that spring is officially here, official spring activities abound.

Like softball!  Pre-game pep talk on the mound.  That's my baby with the red cleats.  I'd post a better picture of my pitcher-baby, but she has forbidden me.

And baseball!  I coach a town baseball team of 13- to 15-year-old boys.  We had our first practice this week and I have to tell you that by the end of the practice my face hurt from smiling so much.

Today's practice was cancelled due to the rain.  I made a double batch of Orange Creamsicle Cookies, I was planning on bringing them for the boys to munch on after practice.  I'll have to bring them to tomorrow's practice instead!

This is one of the many recipes that I have pinned on Pinterest.  The picture looked so good, I just had to try it.  I'm happy to say, they taste as good as they look!  You can see the original recipe from Baked Perfection by clicking here.

Baked Puff Pancakes With Strawberry Sauce

Yep, I'm still overdoing the strawberries.  At just about every nearby supermarket, strawberries have been on sale for at least a month and they're pretty much the first thing you see when you walk in the door.

And I just can't stop buying them.  Fortunately, I haven't even come close to running out of ways to use them in my cooking!

Today, I'm using them to make a sauce for my puff pancakes.  You can use any fruit you like, and frozen fruits work well, too.  But c'mon, admit it.  You want to use strawberries, too, right?

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.

Stuffed Mushrooms!

I was at the hair salon last week, and Karen, the miracle worker who was applying her magic to my tresses, asked me what my plans were for the weekend.

I told her that the highlight of my weekend would be dinner at a friend's house on Saturday night.  I would be bringing appetizers. 

Karen, bless her coiffure-rescuing soul, follows this blog.  "What are you going to make?" she asked.

Artichoke Dip and stuffed mushrooms, I replied.  Artichoke dip, because Mr. Terrific likes it so much.  And stuffed mushrooms, because I love mushrooms.  

And then the questions started.  How do you cook them? What do you stuff them with?  I couldn't give her the exact measurements, because when I make stuffed mushrooms it's one of those recipes where I just throw everything together until it feels right and looks right and smells right.

I promised Karen I would measure the ingredients when I made the mushrooms, and then I would blog about it.  So Karen, here is the recipe I promised you!