Crochet that doily!

As I said a few days ago, one of my goals is to crochet a doily from a beautiful vintage inspired pattern I found. I set out to crochet it small first and get a feel for crocheting doilies since I have yet to do one myself. WOW. I officially respect anyone who can crochet these beautiful little things! I am struggling big time with mine. It is just so intricate and it's not flat. I know you are supposed to wash it and then (block?) it to get it to lay flat, but I feel like mine won't do that no matter what I do! I'm only on the fourth round and already I'm questioning my qualifications on the art of doilies! I will persevere and hopefully I will succeed because I am absolutely in love with doilies. Don't they have such a romantic feel to them?

A Simple Flan Recipe

I wanted to share a dessert recipe that I grew up on. My mother would make it and then cover it with foil and put it in the refrigerator and like a good mother she shook her finger at us and in her most stern voice told us to stay out of it until it's cool. BUT as good little children, we never listened. We would come flying through the kitchen, pull the foil up and drag our little fingers through. By the time it was time to eat our flan we had left little finger streaks over every inch of the top of the custard. I will always have fond memories of sneaking into the flan!

Flan

1. 2 cans evaporated milk (12 oz)
2. 2 cans sweetened condensed milk (14oz)
3. 6 eggs
4. 1 cup sugar
5. 1 cup brown sugar
6. 2 tsp vanilla

Preheat the over to 325 degrees F. Take the brown sugar and push it into the bottom of a 13x9 glass cake pan. Mix all the other ingredients really well and then pour it over top of the brown sugar. If the brown sugar comes up it'll be okay- it goes back down when it cooks. I use a 10x15 cake pan to place the 13x9 into and then fill the 10x15 up with about 1.5-2" of water then place into the oven. Bake for approximately 1 hour until you can insert a butter knife into the center and it comes out clean. Cover and cool in the refrigerator overnight and serve cold. 

You can also use custard dishes or pie pans to bake in. When you make it smaller you can just flip the flan dish over and let the brown sugar run over the flan, or simply flip each slice over and spoon the brown sugar over top.

My favorite way to switch this up is to take a dry chocolate cake mix and pour it out over top of the flan before baking, bake, and then dust any excess powder off the top. It makes a yummy chocolate layer over the top!  

Making memories, building dreams

Well thanks to the rain our basement flooded. It took two back breaking hours to get the four inches of water out with five gallon buckets and three people. About twenty minutes after we finished hauling all the water out, my husbands oldest brother calls to ask if we needed a pump to pump the water out. Seriously?!


Another memory can be added to the list I suppose. At least our two boys enjoyed the giant swimming pool! The best part about this situation was me telling Zachery a few weeks ago that we should just make a pool and call it good as opposed to building our house. God definitely has a sense of humor!

one to-do turned to a to-done!

I officially can check off one of my to-do's! I finished knitting my kitchen curtain! I initially intended on it being longer, but with four kids under 5 running around my house this last few weeks, I'm afraid it'll get yanked from the needles again. 

Just envision this over the kitchen sink with a set of sheer white curtains hanging behind it, tied over to the sides.... beautiful!

If you are wondering about what yarn I used it is the Naturally Caron Spa Collection in Green Sheen as seen here. My picture makes it look like a louder color than it really is. I found it at my local Hobby Lobby on sale for $2.99 each! I used about 2.5 skeins of it and I plan on using the other 1.5 skeins to make either some towel toppers or possibly a doily for my dining table.... ideas ideas.

crochet dreams

I posted a while back about being inspired by the ocean. This little 3.5"x4" frame is a thrift store find simply painted and then filled with crocheted pieces.

Did I tell you guys how much I love Moss...?

For all those other moss obsessors, Ireland is the place to go. Talk about a wonderland! I think God spent a little extra time on the fine details in Ireland. :)

This happens to be my most favorite moss photo from my Irish adventure. 

an Irish adventure

BOO! It's just me again. There is lots to tell and lots to show, but I want to keep my post semi short. Some viewers enjoy reading while others would rather just see. I'm of the latter on most things. This last week I had the honor of visiting the most beautiful and mystical places on earth. Okay so I'm biased. I've not been to many foreign countries. I was lucky enough to visit Ireland! The weather was absolutely stunning while my sister and I were there. 50-60 degrees fahrenheit and sunny. What are the odds eh? There are a few things I would like to note.

• They use real butter. Margarine what? Ya this part blew me away because I LOVE butter. I'm officially spoiled and may never buy margarine again. Thank you for the upgrade Ireland. 
• Their soda bread is to die for. 
• Scones are my newest obsession- in fact I just pulled some out of the oven. Why haven't I obsessed on these before? Probably because I have been to involved with my dinner roll love affair to see there are other things out there. 
• Kilometers per hour makes more sense and we drive on the wrong side of the road. Also if our roads were as skinny and windy as their are, we might not have so many speeding tickets. I feel like my hand eye coordination was boosted big time for navigating their roads. AWESOME.
• They knit better than I do.
• There is such a things as Thirsty Thursday in Ireland. Their beer is stronger than ours. 
• I understand why they call it the Emerald Island. 
• I hate long plane rides. 7.5 hours did it for me. 

If I could ever convince my husband to leave America, we are definitely becoming sheep farmers in southern Ireland. Life is so much more simple there. I could just bake, knit, and sweep my floors all day and LOVE it. Our houses here are much too big and we can't take care of ourselves without all the fancy doodads we are so used to. Gah we are spoiled brats. 

Top left- Blarney Castle, Top Right- Cliffs of Moher, Bottom Left- A cute pond on the Ring of Kerry, Bottom Right- Poulnabrone Portal Tomb

Anyways, so I advise everyone to go bake some scones. And locate a recipe for Irish Soda Bread and get to baking- and for the record if you want a real recipe- think old school simple ingredients and remember the people who created soda bread were POOOOOOOOR- so if your recipe says beer (can you say stereotype) or buttermilk- find another because that is not a real traditional recipe. 

As for a scone recipe- heres a simple one. 

2 cups flour- sifted before measured

1/3 cup sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

3 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 cup butter (and yes I used real butter!)

2 eggs

1/2 cup milk, or more if needed

Sift the baking powder, sailing and sugar with flour. Chop in butter as in making pastry. Beat eggs together, add milk and mix with the flour making a soft dough using a little more flour if necessary to handle. Lift to a well floured surface, knead lightly, roll out to 1/4-1/2 in thick. Cut using a large biscuit cutter. Place on a moderately hot griddle and bake slowly to ensure center gets baked well. I baked mine at 325 for approximately 20-25 minutes (I didn't watch so don't trust that- keep an eye on them). Bake until golden brown. 

I got this recipe from my most favorite cook book. "Southern Cooking" by Mrs. S. R. Dull. It's the Scotch Scone recipe from page 155.