Food Fun Friday-Peanut Butter Bars

This is a GREAT YUMMY EASY recpie for a quick fix

Peanut Butter Bars

3/4 Cup butter

1/3 Cup peanut butter

1 Cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1 Cups Flour

1 6oz. package of chocolate chips

1/2 Cup peanut butter

Blend the first six ingredients and put in a 13x9 pan.

Bake at 350° for 15-20 minutes.

Icing: Melt Chocolate Chips, spread on top of cookies

Old Man Winter

What???? I thought Winter was OVER, I mean last Saturday was a balmy 58degrees??? Much to my ( and everyone elses.. including the weather man) This is what I woke up to this morning...
my my my
Good thing Rod is off so he can drive me to work because my little California 2 wheeldrive "trailblazer" won't be blazing any trails today.
have I mentioned that I don't drive well in the slipper white stuff? I mean the car (and all the other ones on the road) are all over the place with no control....
wish i worked at home

A Hiking Day in the Olympic Nat'l Forest

Rod had the day off (yea!) and it wasn't snowing... or raining... it was a beautiful winter day. We took advantage of the Olympic Forest out by Lake Crescent. We went on a short hike up to Marymere Falls, cold air and fresh smells with green moss all around.

I love the green moss, on the trees, on the ground, on the plants, .... every shade of green

We went across a couple of little single file log bridges up to the top where the Falls were. (thats the bridge wayyyyyy down there)

I think all the trees with moss were better looking than the falls!

I was cold but the hike was a great start to our new exercise routine.

Friday Food Fun-Zuppa Toscana Soup - like Olive Garden's®

Zuppa Toscana Soup - like Olive Garden's®

1 lb. spicy Italian sausage - crumbled
1/2 lb. smoked bacon - chopped
1 qt. water
(2) 14.5 oz. cans (about 3 2/3 cups) chicken broth
2 lg. russet potatoes - scrubbed clean, cubed
2 garlic cloves - peeled, crushed
1 med. onion - peeled, chopped
2 cups chopped kale OR Swiss chard (or spinach)
1 cup heavy whipping cream
salt and pepper - to taste

-In a skillet over medium-high heat, brown sausage, breaking into small pieces as you fry it; drain, set aside.
-In a skillet over medium-high heat, brown bacon; drain, set aside.
-Place water, broth, potatoes, garlic, and onion in a pot; simmer over medium heat until potatoes are tender.
-Add sausage and bacon to pot; simmer for 10 minutes.
-Add kale and cream to pot; season with salt and pepper; heat through.

Notes: I am currently on a low-carb diet (South Beach) and I have substituted cauliflower in place of the potatoes and you can't even tell the difference- NO REALLY
AND I used turkey bacon
AND I used a lower fat sausage
AND I used less of the whipping cream, or sometimes I use half and half.
In place of broth you could use chicken bullion (3tbl with 3 ¾ water)

I know it sounds like a lot of substitutes, but it still tates like the Olive Garden's soup!

My new favorite thing is Hulu

- - - - -grrr if only I knew how to put something other than pics i've taken with my camera, you would see a picture of the hulu logo here- - - -

wow Movies, TV, TV that I've NEVER seen before let alone heard of, and TV I've only heard of but NEVER had the time to waste,. . . i mean watch.
If I have 20 minutes before bed I can watch an episode from The Office which I have just come to admire for it's quirky sense of ridiculousness.... Next I'm aiming for 30rock (again never seen only heard of) .. ALL for free anytime I want.
AND when you miss a show (like lets say while on vacation or something... you know what I mean Lauren) YOU CAN WATCH IT WITH OUT COMMERCIALS.
yummmmmm . . . .
HULU I heart you... you will waste a lot of my time...
only, I can't spend all my time with you....I am trying to read and check out TONS of creative things people do on their BLOGS! (more about that next week!)

hydrangeas

My sweet husband gave me a hydrangea plant for Valentines day. I like flowers but I love plants... the gift that keeps on giving!!

My only problem is that when I plant these plants they only grow -pink-

I love the purple flowers, and blue flowers and green to white flowers... but I guess it's the soil that has something (or nothing) in it that pops them up pink.

Rhododendrons grow plentiful here too, they are nice but NOTHING beats a beautiful healthy hydrangea bush!!

agree? or disagree.... what is your favorite flowering plant

Friday Food Fun-crockpot Groats (oatmeal)

I’ve decided to have a FOOD Fun for Friday. With recipes I’ve tried during the week. That way I’m motivated to cook and you get a recipe that has worked out great!
Win/Win
Today its GROATS

That is to say, overnight oatmeal in a crockpot.
(I got this from a great natural food blog)

This is a perfect cold-wet-blustery weather recipe. Waking up to the smells of cinnamon is nothing short of bliss. Have you heard of oat groats? It’s the whole oat and they look like this:
I get them in the bulk section at my local health-food store.

1 cup oat groats

1 3-inch piece of cinnamon stick

pinch of salt

4 cups water

1 apple peeled and chopped (optional)

Throw all this in your crock-pot and turn on low before heading to bed. Last night I started mine around 10pm and it was perfect by 6:30am, and judging by the dirty bowl in the sink, possibly even by 4am when my husband had a bowl before work. You can cook this on high as well with similar results but be warned your porridge will burn to the sides of your crock-pot. If you have leftovers, use them as a thickener for soup. They taste "fuller" than oatmeal, but just like oatmeal. yum

Back to Life

a picture of my girlfriends back yard. (near Joyce)

DEPRESSING.

Such a wonderful vacation. Family, Food, WARM WEATHER in the dead of winter! Arizona is definitely where you want to be in the Winter season. I wore my flip-flops every day. Only used a jacket at night when the sun went down. Every walk was taken in the mild (not sweaty, not chilly) air. Ahhhhhhhh Shangri-La

Then flying back into Seattle on Sunday, not too bad I think it was 40. BUT. . . . .Monday it was 33 when I left for work. And at about 2pm it started snowing, a light steady snowfall…. still falling when I got off work …and all thru the night. A light beautiful fluffy SNOW. Then the over night freeze came so the drive in the dark of the morning was hazardous! Sigh I can only flip thru my pictures of Arizona and dream of being warm. Guess what it really means is that I am still getting used to Winter in the Pacific Northwest.

Vacation = Food

Live Well

Laugh often
Eat Much

yes gotta love vacation time!

And BOY OH BOY are there a ton of different places to eat here in AZ!

We found a Black Bear Diner ... (Sequim is building one)

We thought that we would check it out and see what we have in store,

Yum Yum Yum, we had a breakfast fit for a king/queen. I even took picture of the biscuit..

Gi-normous .... and its just the biscuit! now I can't wait for them to come to town!

Apparently the prime rib on Fri/Sat is great too...

So far the best place we've eaten has been Rumi, a Hawaiian/teriyaki Rice Bowl place, LOTS of food and really good flavors in a ultra casual setting, complete with surf boards and grass skirts!

oh yeah.... gotta love vacation foods.

Desert Botanical Gardens

When in Arizona... what do you do? you visit beautiful gardens.. what??? you say, how can there be gardens in the desert? wellll there are ..... with blown glass... pretty amazing! We saw cactus and more cactus with all sorts of glass by Chihuly to brighten up the scenery. It was a beautiful fun summer ahhh winter day! Kieri drove over from San Diego so it was a nice family get together. oh yeah and it was hot.. a blistering 77degrees. They also had a live concert in the back of the gardens.. so plants, glass and music... who could ask for more!

Lauren and I laughing at ourselves...

Forest-- yes-- they call this a forest.

Kieri and I posing.

My First Blog

This is my first entry into the blogging world, via a tutorial by my daughter Lauren. I have been a blog voyeur for way too long and now I hope I am ready to enter the realm of the underworld of blogging.

But now I have to learn how to:
1) Find a cool background
2) Post pictures
3) Link to other websites
4) Link to other bloggers (all the better to blog stalk you, my pretty!)

And who knows what else--- I'm sure there will be more as I learn all this!

So let's see if we can teach this old dog new tricks.