It's A Chili Kind of Day

Fall, Football and Chili....need I say more.  Today was just a chili kind of day.  The weather was cool, the wind was blowing and the Colts were playing ~ pretty pathetically, but that is neither here nor there.  Yep, it was indeed a perfect chili day. J





And for dessert, I made a pumpkin roll.  This is one of my family's favorite fall desserts.  I will be sharing the recipe in the next few days. 

Let me just quickly say, that I tried using fat-free cream cheese in the icing for the first time with this recipe.  It didn't turn out as pretty as it usually does, so try to ignore the messiness in the picture. 

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Recipes from our Indian Summer Picnic

I shared with you in Friday’s post an Indian summer picnic that Matt and I enjoyed for our weekly date.  You can read more about it here. Today I’m going to share with you the recipes from that picnic.  I got the soup and salad recipe from two cookbooks that I got at Half Priced Books Several years ago.  I love both of these cookbooks:   Soup Bowl: An Inspiring Collection of Soups, Broths and Chowders  and Salad: Simple and Fresh Dishes Perfect All Year Round.  You can purchase the cookbooks here and here.

Roasted Garlic, Sweet Potato, Broiled Eggplant & Bell Pepper Salad with Mozzarella

INGREDIENTS:

2 sweet potatoes (peeled and cut into chunks)

2 tbsp. olive oil

pepper

2 garlic cloves (crushed)

1 large eggplant (sliced)

2 red bell peppers (seeded and sliced)

7 oz. mixed salad greens

10 oz. fresh mozzarella cheese (sliced)

Dressing:

1 tbsp. balsamic vinegar

1 garlic clove crushed

3 tbsp. olive oil

1 small shallot (finely chopped)

2 tbsp. fresh chopped basil

pepper

DIRECTIONS:

Roast sweet potato chunks in oil, pepper and garlic at 375 degrees for thirty minutes or until soft.  Broil eggplant and bell peppers for ten minutes or until soft and slightly charred.  Place salad greens on plate and assemble sweet potatoes, eggplant, bell peppers and cheese on top of the greens.  Whisk dressing ingredients and pour over salad.  Serves four.

Roasted Squash, Sweet Potato & Garlic Soup

INGREDIENTS:

1 sweet potato

1 squash

4 shallots

2 tbsp. olive oil

5-6 garlic cloves (unpeeled)

3 ¾ c. chicken stock

½ c light cream

salt and pepper

snipped chives for garnish

DIRECTIONS:

Cut squash, sweet potatoes and shallots in half length wise.  Scoop out seeds of squash.  Brush with oil.  Place face side down in shallow roasting  pan and  roast at 375 degrees for 40 minutes or until tender.  When cool, scoop out flesh from skin and place flesh in a saucepan.  Add stock and pinch of salt.  Bring to boil, reduce and simmer partially covered for 30 minutes.  Let soup cool and pour into blender.  Blend until smooth.  Return to sauce pan and stir in cream.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.  Garnish with chives.  Serves 6-8.
Note:  I ended up adding more garlic.  I also added a little brown sugar and butter to taste.

Zucchini Brownies

These were so yummy.  To me, these brownies have the texture of zucchini bread and the taste of chocolate, chocolate chip cookie bars and lava cake combined.  I found this recipe from a blog that I follow called The Pioneer Cookbook.  You can get the recipe here. 

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Christmas in October

            This morning I was inspired to get my craft on!  I look forward to Christmas in October every year!  My mom was supposed to go with me this year, but something came up and she had to cancel on me…..so, my husband kindly volunteered to go with me….or shall I say I dragged him along to the event, all the while listening to his subtle complaints about such an event being a waste of time and money.  That was just a minor detail though, because not even he could delude my enthusiasm of this great event!  Christmas in October is a “craft fair” where numerous local vendors display and sell their creations.  You’ll find everything from Christmas and fall décor to jewelry and personalized memorabilia.  There is a $5 admission fee, and most people gladly pay it in hope of finding unique, creative Christmas gifts for their loved ones.  Me….well I have never actually purchased anything from the vendors.  I gladly pay the $5 admission fee, so I can be inspired by all of the wonderful creativity…..and let me tell ya, today I was inspired!   I left the event ready to make some jewelry, sew some bags and get my crocheting needle out once again.  Even though I had several failed attempts at crocheting last year, I couldn’t help but leave feeling so inspired to give it shot again this year.......but.....

         

              
 ....... somehow that inspiration wore off after Matt took me out to lunch.  I'm pretty sure the giant burrito loco  that I was only able to consume one third of from El Rodeo had something to do with turning my enthusiasm into lethargy.   Rather than going home and picking up that crocheting needle and yarn, I found myself taking a very long nap and then losing all motivation to do anything profitable the rest of the evening!  Hmmm…maybe the enthusiasm will rekindle after a good night's sleep?  We shall see….yes, we shall see.  I’ll keep you posted on my attempts at creating some inspirational pieces in the next few weeks…or maybe my lack there of.   Until then, good night all J

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Indian Summer Picnic



            After several weeks of rainy and cool fall-like weather, the past five days have been full of sunshine and above average temperatures.  With the thermometers steadily rising above 80 degrees, Indiana is in the midst of an Indian summer.  The warm weather brought with it a stuffy nose and sore throat in my case….go figure.  That’s ok though, because I’ll take this warm sunshine any day......although it looks like I only have a few day of it left, because a cool front is coming in on Tuesday.

            Since this warm weather won't last forever, Matt and I wanted to take advantage of it for our weekly date, so we planned to meet at the park after he got off of work tonight for a warm autumn picnic.  Not to mention, making a nice dinner myself and packing it in picnic basket to enjoy somewhere outdoors, is more than half the cost of dining at a restuarant for our weekly date. 
           Dinner was certainly yummy, and enjoying it outdoors made it even better!  Using wonderful harvest vegetables, I made roasted garlic, sweet potato, broiled eggplant and bell pepper salad with mozzarella (yes, that is the official title in the book I got the recipe from) along with a roasted sweet potato, squash and garlic soup.  A cold glass of sparkling apple cider made dinner all the more festive and refreshing.  When we got home, I had zucchini brownies with vanilla ice-cream waiting for us.  I will be sharing all of these recipes with you in the next few days, but for now a few pictures will just have to do……..



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20 ORB Door Knobs for less than $20

        
           When Matt and I bought a foreclosed home in January, we knew we had a year of home improvement projects ahead of us.  After moving in and forking out all of the intial closing cost, our goal was to complete the following projects in one year's time: buy appliances, buy blinds, fix water damage in basement, paint the entire house, furnish and decorate the entire house, update bathrooms, redo kitchen cabinets, update all light fixtures and update all hardware.  Most of the things on our list are small cosmetic issues, but they have certainly consumed much of our time and money this year.  Year two will involve things like replacing the floors and doing some major landscaping.  Bigger projects will include fencing in the backyard and building a better deck and patio area.  And of course, long term projects include finishing the unfinished basement, but for now, we have plenty of smaller projects keeping us busy.
        We were recently at the point in our home improvement projects that we were ready to update the hardware.  We had twenty door knobs to update from brass to ORB, and at $15-20 a door knob, the cost of those door knobs really adds up.  It would have easily cost us around $300 to replace all of the door knobs. 
       BUT....then, I discovered ORB spray paint!  If you'v been around blog land for awhile, I'm sure you've heard of this stuff.  But for those of you who haven't heard about it, I know what you are thinking....spray paint really?  To which I reply....YES, really!  Two cans of paint covered all twenty door knobs.  At $7 per can of paint, two cans of paint cost as much as replacing one door knob.  That's a savings of 95%!  I'm sure your wondering if it looks as good as the real oil rubbed bronze door knobs.   Well, you can tell a slight difference if you hold up the painted door knob to the original - I found that out when I painted one door knob and took it to Lowe’s to compare - but the difference isn't noticeable to the average person entering your home.  In other words, no one is going to notice you used spray paint unless you tell them.  In my mind, that made this spray paint project a huge success! 

I spray painted the door knobs oil rubbed bronze using Rust-oleum spray paint from Lowe's.

Tip: toilet paper tubes help keep the door knobs in standing postion for painting.

After painting one door knob and liking the results, I took off all twenty door knobs and got them ready for their paint job.

Good bye ugly brass......Hello oil rubbed bronze ;)

After letting the door knobs dry for several hours, they were ready to go back on the doors.

I love the updated look, and I think this project turned out pretty good.

Yes, pretty good indeed!  $14 beats $300 any day;)

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Decorating My Home For Fall

I love fall!  It is by far my favorite season!  A few weeks ago, I decorated our house for fall, and today I thought I’d share a few pics of our home decorated for the cozy autumn season .  Enjoy:)

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