After The Storm

I really would have written sooner but we had a pretty violent storm that we've had to recover from over the past few days. Plus, I've been called into school and have gotten very little sleep. Not a great combination. That's all changed now. :P Well, at least until next week starts. That's going to be an insane week for me and I'm probably going to show up here crawling. Yay for having my youth to pull my sorry butt through? Lol.

Being the dork that I am, I have kept a running list of what I wanted to blog about in meantime!

Once I took a good hard look at my newly organized Simply Adorned inserts and my list of the ones I want to make, I realized that I'll probably need another booklet soon.

 This is also for various school-themes.

Empty, for now.

This garden. Hoo boy. This past week, I have yet to water the plants this week. That's how serious it has rained and because of how the desert is not used to being wet, there are often flash floods from the run offs. My garden area just happens to be the lowest area in the yard. It's lovely... The day I intended to start writing about the following updates, we actually lost power for two hours but more about that later on.

Pretty little tomato blooms!

I cannot wait to harvest hundreds of cherry tomatoes this fall.

 We watched many documentaries and tributes on Remembrance Day (September 11th) and this was the beautiful sunset we saw that helped remind us that the world can heal and still be beautiful.

These are fresh Bhut Jolokia Chili Peppers aka Ghost Pepper, the hottest in the world.

I have those seeds right now and I'm debating trying to grow a tree.

One of the brothers that loves very spicy foods ate that bottom left piece. 

It rates about 1 million on the Scoville rating. For comparison, a Habanero chili rates between 100,000 to 350,000, my Bird's Eye Chili rate 50,000 to 100,000, and Tabasco sauce falls between 3,500 to 8,000. Oh yes. We have video footage and it was nuts. We had crackers, milk, and lettuce standing by for the aftermath. The SO just dipped his finger in the oils to try, turned red instantly, and downed a small glass of milk. There's no way we're going to let the brother try one with the seeds (where most of the heat is locked), let alone whole. Not that he wants to. This guy has eaten a large fresh Habanero whole before. We're all fans of staying alive.

These storms. The ground is still saturated today and it has not rained. Not as much lightning and thunder as we would have expected but what we got left its marks all over town. Our neighborhood's power was out for about two and a half hours. We were among the few thousand that lost it that night. The aftermath we had to deal with was our cable internet being out, our wireless network being zapped, and (as we discovered last night) our nearly one year old printer also getting zapped and dying despite being plugged into a six-strip at the time. What's especially aggravating about that is that we cannot afford to get a new one right now because of funding other household projects and just put in new ink cartridges. Sigh.

The SO and I have each decided on new household projects to focus on now that the faucets and light situations have been fully taken care of. I have to say that it is pretty awesome having two working showers and three working sinks instead of one of each. He's re-dug a trench for all of the water that has accumulated just off of our patio for the water to drain and not come inside, dug and built a temporary patch for the retaining wall that has yet to be finished by another brother (There was so much erosion due to the storms!), and now has set his sights on dry-walling a few holes throughout the holes. Let's just say they are large due to having three rowdy boys grow up here with many of their friends.

We lucked out when we bought the electric drills yesterday. Got this pair that we've been eye-balling for a few weeks now because it seemed like a good deal and ideal for the projects we had in mind. Unfortunately, we didn't read the box very thoroughly in all of our lust because they were too small and more for simple and quick projects. So, we went to return them and knew already which heavy duty sucker to grab and they happened to be running a deal about getting a free electric drill with purchase! The mini free one was actually one from the set we were returning. We're so pleased with ourselves. Lol.

My big project has been tackling the family's recipes. It all started when I went to pull out a recipe for a particular pork roast and I couldn't find it near the top of the pile so I started emptying the two drawers of all of the recipe cards, pages, and cook books to find it. FMIL comes around to see what all of the commotion is about and sees the floor littered with everything. We spent the next hour going through all of the pages and books and sorting them out. Fifteen minutes in, we found the initial recipe somewhere else in the kitchen, but were already in too deep. This is something that has been on my long term goals list. It has been fascinating for me to see the history of these beloved recipes and I want to preserve them. So, I've bought binders, page protectors, dividers, and bigger box to do so before they deteriorate further. They are well-loved. :P I stayed up the rest of the night to organize the smaller recipe cards that were jammed packed in a special box with the categories we had established earlier. Eventually, I'll heavily alter and decorate the binders and boxes. That pork recipe? Five minutes of hands-on preparation and slow roasting for several hours during the daytime resulted in a delicious dinner.

So good.

The table behind be is completely covered with my heirloom recipe preservation project and the fact that I'm planning my first extensive holiday workshop for Stampin' Up! I've been very fortunate to have garnered a lot of positive attention and interest with my Simply Adorned necklace at school. There will be a Halloween, Fall, and Winter themed 3-D projects. FMIL and I have been digging deep and working hard to hash out all of the details as soon as possible. A lot of planning going on there, lol.

The storms have been a sight to see. Here's some of what we've seen out back.

 Awesome cloud layered with sunset colors. We watched as it morphed and grew.

 A type of stick bug! :P

 My poor garden has spent most of the time looking like this.

 My lettuce bed is like the city of Atlantis. That's at least two inches of water.

 By the end of the day, the water is absorbed, but is replenished the next day by another storm.

The other day, I found the greenhouse tray full of water and floating in front of Gryffindor.

Fast-forward to today. Sorry in advanced for weirder looking pictures, I actually took these well after dark. Hooray for flashlights and flash!

 I potted what jalapeños that have sprouted. That small terracotta pot in the back is the parsley finally thickening up. The tiny green cup is the cilantro finally taking off.

These are their "forever" homes at 10 inches in diameter. There are eight pots total.

 You can barely see the little guys! Two leaves and no more than two inches tall.

 Pictures of the herb planter make sense now that there's nearly a little of everything making an appearance.

 Basil - Chives - Cilantro - Dill (first to go crazy) - Oregano - Parsley (sprouted within past two days) - Sage - Stevia (I believe it's the one going crazy instead of Sage) - Tarragon - Thyme.

 The lettuce, it lives!

 The cherry tomatoes have really taken off. Wow!

The peppers are each working on new lower leaf growth and branching out appropriately. Slytherin has three peppers that we're keeping a close eye upon. It's so exciting!

There has been a plethora of tiny weed growths in my area that I've tried to take care of but it's still very saturated. Tomorrow I tackle the recipes! Wish me luck. See you soon! <3

Short Stops

As the torrential rain pours and I'm running my laptop on its battery because of the close lightning strikes, I know I probably won't water the plants tomorrow. Even though I did it earlier today. Go, modern rain dance. Of sorts. Not has powerful as getting the fancy drive-thru car wash, but pretty close for someone who doesn't own a vehicle.

If this is the last storm of our summer monsoon season, it is really going out with a bang. North of us, there are tornado warnings because funnel clouds have been sighted. The dog is being a terrified nuisance because she won't think she's safe until she has successfully managed to climb under our skin, literally. I don't know what else to do with her but either all of us sit on her or I bash myself unconscious to effectively ignore the shenanigans. Sorry, there is not much more we can do about the noise.

Well, before the sky tore open, this is what was happening in the garden after the other gusty storms:

 Gryffindor is definitely suffering right now, but there's too much lightning for me to go out and try to do anything about it.

  Slytherin is as invasive as ever, but it's new lower branch is still trucking along. We're keeping a close eye on the flowers that have finished blooming.

 Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff. The former is trying out budding again while the latter is getting just as

"furry" as Gryffindor.

 This cannot be a lettuce! It's appeared in the past two days and is over an inch tall! Possibly a Palo Verde? Keeping a close eye on it, just in case.

 You can barely see them, but those are Dill sprouting!

 This is either Tarragon or Thyme, it's hard to tell because it's almost between the two labels. >_< I'm guessing Tarragon.

This is the little Spider Plant that has finally recovered from being planted in a pot. New growths!

In the meantime, I can show you what I've worked on for the past... two nights. I was scouring the internet for storage ideas for all of the Simply Adorned charm inserts that I've been making and it has been tough. I finally found a solution that I enjoyed thanks to Laura Denison of Following the Paper Trail: Her Gift Card Wallet design!

She doesn't want us to embed her videos so you have to click on the link to watch the quick YouTube tutorial. She is so creative and lovely. I spread the inserts out for the sake of the picture, but I put four per row and think that I need to make at least one more. :P

 I used Stampin' Up! cards stock, Cricut's Lyrical Letters, and the images were inspired by Cricut's Simply Charmed. Cute concept, right?

 These are themes from different classroom lesson plans. I think I'm going to have much more of these in the future.

 This one holds the generic everyday inserts.

 I will probably add more monochromatic and personal themed inserts in the near future.

 This sweet one features any holiday or seasonal inserts.

 There's not many now, but you know I have a bunch planned. I've only made it a third of the way through my preliminary idea list!

How sweet is that? It saves me from throwing them in a box and flipping through them like a deck of cards. I comfortably fit four per row, meaning that I can keep 24 inserts per booklet (or 12 coordinating pairs). The pockets are 1 inch deep and the entire thing is 5 by 5 inches when closed. 

After my first time making one, I realized I wanted to make sure I had enough give for a small spine and somehow the second one came out all crooked (it had a spine though!). That was one sign that I took to mean I needed to just go to bed already, lol. 

They peek out in the picture, but keep in mind that these tiny pieces are only 1.25 inches tall! They fit all snug and I can recognize what they are just by seeing a little bit of the top and slide them out with my thumb. Can you tell that I like blue? And my Silver Sharpie. XD I adore that thing.

Off to make some semblance of a meat sauce! See you soon. <3

New Additions

That seems like a title I would have used before. Again, I'm no longer up for checking over 420 posts to see if I have. :( I think that kind of makes me a terrible blogger in some fashion.

Here to share some pictures of recent happenings! Let's start with a creepy crawly visitor:

 One of the brothers had this little one fall onto him the other night and made him a little habitat.

 After much scouring of the internet, I found that it is a Hubbard Silk Moth. Wikipedia doesn't even know about it!

This is about 35 days after its hatching, the week that it's supposed to bury itself and pupate!

It's a pretty local resident and has only gained its reddish hue in the past week. Those light white-looking scales are actually metallic silver. Wicked-looking but gentle. It's been fascinating to watch and strikingly resembles the mesquite tree it was in. 

Next comes a quick update from the garden that I've deemed the Blooms and Suckers era.

 A few days ago, we had a few buds like this one. This is from Gryffindor.

 Each day, we see more and more flowers! If you look closely, there are three in this picture. This is from Slytherin, of course.

 There are not too many spots that have multiple blooms where each survive, but there's still hope! This is from Ravenclaw.

If you lean the right way, you can see what looks like tiny black seeds inside. The original seeds were not black so I don't know what to do with this information. This is from Hufflepuff.

I cannot wait for more buds to bloom! I cannot believe how much energy these chili peppers have to give because they have so much going on right now. Take a look at what else they are up to:

 Gryffindor is overcompensating for its sudden nakedness by popping out a ton of new leaves.

 Slytherin had started this project the earliest and now has a new branch that grows like mad.

 For the longest time, each plant had little nubs where each big leaf came from. Once that leaf is gone, like here on Ravenclaw, they put energy into expansion within a week or so.

I believe these new growths are what are "affectionately" called sucker branches and while I've plucked them off on the cherry tomato plants, I welcome them on the peppers. They were never supposed to have such giant leaves but in fact a couple of busy vertical branches. Yay for finally getting these guys into a more familiar climate!

Speaking of the tomatoes, look at how they are taking off! I really hope that I see signs of budding soon. They like leaning in whatever they please despite my efforts to correct this.

Next up, I forgot to share this sooner, but we've already fulfilled our new recipe a month quota! I don't know how it ended up happening, but it was yet another recipe that required quick frying. The difference this time was that I did not burn anything or anyone! I AM trainable! Sorta. Here is a snapshot of half of the skillet barbecued pork chops we had:

They came out week despite my inexperience and their thinness. We had some cheesy mashed potatoes, applesauce, and green beans with it. The household has voted for this recipe to be a repeat! Hooray! I am so enamored with this cookbook. Three out of four complete successes! Number four (the meatballs I told you guys about) is under personal debate for the next time I feel brave enough to try again despite the family surviving un-scarred from the first time.

Lastly comes something else I've been making with my own two hands. That reminds me that I made an odd purchase at Ace Hardware yesterday when we got the final pieces for a well-working bathroom sink faucet: plant labels, a meat thermometer, and pan scrapers. I used up all of my labels with the addition of various herbs and the lettuce, I got a meat thermometer for myself to help with my cooking journey, and I actually got the pan scrapers to help me open up my Simply Adorned charm more easily. My nails are not yet strong enough, but the first time I tested it out, it opened! Unfortunately, my hand kept going and proceeded to take a chunk out of my other hand's cuticle. It smarted. Not my brightest of ideas but it more or less worked. Anywho, the things I've been making with what's left of my two hands:

 I know you've seen the top two Outer Space inserts, but I like taking the pictures in groups of six now. :D There's a Bear theme that happens in FMIL's classroom twice a year now, and the last pair is Lunar/Asian New Year inspired. The Chinese dragon is cracking open a fortune cookie with a heart and peace sign as a fortune.

I just finished these before blogging. As an aspiring school teacher and the school year just starting, I had to make obligatory Apple themed inserts. Next week, I'm going in and they are starting their Plant-themed experiments, so I made a seedling and tree inserts. I believe that two weeks from now (the beginning of October probably), there will be a creepy-crawly Bug theme. I had to make pretty bugs after watching the Hubbard Silk Moth caterpillar crawling around its chalice and subsequently viewing hundreds of pictures of different worm-like critters. 

I had challenged myself to use every current Stampin' Up! color in these inserts and as of the last pair, I've already succeeded! I'm glad that forced me out of my comfort zone because I've loved these new color combos. I now have an entire dining table covered in various scraps and feel that I should probably celebrate this feat by cleaning up a little. >_<; Whoops. I still have plenty of theme ideas but feel that this is a pretty good pausing point.

Lol, I hope you have enjoyed these snapshots and will see you soon! <3