Strung Up Cake and My Favorite Frozen Thang

I couldn’t find a heat proof glass bottle to hang my Chocolate Angel Food Cake on, so I strung it up!
The large wisk we have worked like a charm!  I just tied the end of it to the handle of the kitchen cabinet with cooking string (cotton) and wella!

What I used for the cake:

Duncan Hines Angel Food Cake Mix
1/3 cup dark cocoa powder
1 1/3 cup water

Mix the cake mix and cocoa together
Add water and bake per instructions on the box.

Now I’m debating if I want to glaze it.

Ooooooooo. It would be soooo good with my ‘soft serve ice cream’!

Point wise, 1/12 is 3 points
And my ice cream is free!

Soft Serve ‘Ice Cream

1 – 1 1/2 cups frozen blueberries or strawberries or BOTH. 🙂
1 banana unfrozen
2 tbsp vanilla (optional)
2 heaping kitchen TBSPs dark cocoa powder (optional)

Put everything into the food processor
This will be somewhat loud, turn it on and process
You will have to stop and scrape the sides down, but only 2 or 3 times.  I found out if the banana is NOT frozen, it processes sooooo much faster!
Now you can also make this with just banana, just cut up the banana, and freeze, then process.
When you have a consistency you like, scrape into another bowl, eat or freeze.

If you do freeze it, when your ready to eat, just pop into the microwave for 30 seconds ( make sure it’s microwave safe! ), or let sit on the counter for a bit.  Your choice.  Personally, I can’t wait for it to sit on the counter!

Garden Update — June 21, 2011

First day of Summer! –

1:16 pm

What a difference a week, coffee & grounds, compost & compost tea makes!

June 14, 2011

Before Compost, Coffee, Coffee Grounds & Compost Tea…

and now, June 21, 2011

Squashes, beans, cucumbers  and peas

Boy, do I have more weeding to do!

I was surprised that the coffee and ESPECIALLY the compost and compost tea made such a huge difference!  Even the strawberry perked right up!

The ‘tea’ was super easy to make — 5 gallon pail, fill 3/4 way with water, add in a few handfuls of compost, stir and let sit for about 2 days.  I waited to 2 days, and then using a container, I fed each plant.  The next day, they shot up, greened up, and look sooooo much better!

What do you do/use in your garden?  I would love to hear what different people use/do.

I’m trying to keep everything I use Organic — No pesticides!

I still have more squashes, cucumbers, cantaloupe and others to plant.  I’m just transplanting into the garden a few at a time.  I’ve been scouring YouTube for ideas for trellises.  I absolutely love the idea of growing butternut and spaghetti squash vertical!  The cucumbers, cantaloupe, and strawberry can be trained also.  ;0)    Here are 2 videos that are inspiring me..(the second one is a bit loud!)……

Weightloss, Sock update n’ a LYS store visit

I finally broke out of the 200 range!  I’m 7-tenths away from a 20 lb loss! ❤

Yesterday I stopped in at Charlotte’s Web  OH HOW I COULD STAY IN THERE FOR HOURS!  So many different yummy yarns!  It is a small shop, but it is STUFFED with fiber!  It’s like you walk in, jaw drops, and you think, OH. MY. GOD.  ya, like that.

If you live in the Exeter, NH area, you have to check out Charlotte’s Web.

I wanted to take home so many different things, but I was good.  I ended up bringing home a skein of one of my favorite sock yarns

So far I’ve made two pairs with this brand.  It wears brilliantly.  I don’t know if you can see it, but there is a bit of purple mixed in with the blue, black and white.  The colors remind me of  a comfy pair of jeans and a tee-shirt.

Speaking of socks 🙂

I’m finishing up the DIP (DESIGN IN PROGRESS) —  I started the cuff finally!

Next step is to test knit with the matching sock. (Yes, I still have to knit the other sock! uggh, I know, right?)

I can’t wait to put it up for sale on Ravelry!  These are a size Large (womans’ 10-11) You must be thinking – damn those are big!  Well, what can I say, I’m a big girl  ;0)

I still have to write-up the medium and small sizes.  Hopefully those won’t give me too much trouble.

Any volunteers for testing the size Large?  When it’s ready of course. 🙂 I’ll be putting it up on Rav – Testing Pool and I’ll put a link here too 🙂  Leave a comment, I would love to hear what you all think of the Socks!

What I made today—1 Point+ Snack

Apple Bran Muffins. 🙂
I must admit, we both love these!       http://greenlitebites.com/2009/02/18/apple-bran-muffins/
And if you don’t have bran, use bran flakes (pulverized)

The best part, only one point!  I made 10 of these.

So far I’ve lost 18.1 lbs in 7.5 weeks!  The 14th will be 8 weeks.  🙂

Mitered Squares

First, I’m down to a 14.2 lb loss in the last 5 weeks! The DBF slipped a bit and gained back 2 lbs. We shall see how next week goes. 🙂

The other day I started playing around with mitered squares with some kitchen cotton I’ve had kicking around. Really it was another project that was frogged, then another and frogged again.  I had to do SOMETHING with it!

It’s a little big, which is ok with me, the next one I’ll use smaller needles but, after all, it’s a prototype:

Today I started filling in with triangles.

I’m thinking of leaving the sides un-triangled, and getting another color for a border, maybe red.

I started writing up the pattern for it, and will post it here and on Ravelry

As far as those blue socks you see on the right, I’m almost up to the cuff, the pattern is written up to his point, and trying to decide what to do for the cuff.  A plain 2 x2 rib, a twisted rib, or something different???

On the sewing front, I scored 3 patterns at JoAnn Fabric Saturday.  $1.99 each, now how could I not?  I finished one shirt about a week and half ago.  I’m thinking of starting a tank top with the left over fabric.  Still debating.  I saw some awesome skully print jersey that would look to cool as a tank.

I’ll post pics of them later.  ;0)