September 6, 2012

Eat Make Grow: Blog Hop #6!

Welcome to this week’s Eat Make Grow Blog Hop where you share what you have been eating with your family, growing in your garden or making with all your creative impulses. Eat Make Grow is a collective link party that is shared across three blogs and runs every Thursday-Tuesday. Whichever blog that you choose to link up your post, it will show up on all three sites! Eat Make Grow is a way to share with many people posts about your domestic doings, whether that’s growing veggies, hosting parties, sewing, mixing up cleaning supplies, or trying out a new recipe. We want to learn about it! Every week, we will feature the most popular link, and one chosen by the the host. This week, your host is Miranda (me!)

Your Hosts
Miranda from Pocket Pause
Foy from Garden. Cook. Write. Repeat.
Marigold from Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky!

We’re not big fans of rules so there are just two of them:
No big corporation or business advertising or promotional posts. Let’s not dilute Eat Make Grow with junky posts. We don’t mind helping out the little home grown businesses of independent bloggers or handmade merchants (Etsy, etc.).
Please link your posts back to one of the hosting blogs. This is a common blog hop courtesy. This link helps build the Eat Make Grow community by sending your readers to all of the other participant’s posts. We will feature two posts each week and we will only consider posts that have a link back. A text link is fine, or you can grab this button and put it anywhere on your blog:

 

Wow, my turn again already! We had a nice turnout this week with over 80 linkers sharing their crafts, recipes and garden updates. There were some tantalizing looking treats out there, and some fun sounding projects. I don’t know how you mamas out there do all this cool stuff, what with school starting this week (here in OR at least). You’re an inspiration! Grab your keyboards for round 6 and let’s get this linky party up to 100!

Our featured bloggers this week:

2 ingredient deodorant by “Too Many Jars in My Kitchen”

Adding to the countless “make your own deodorant” blog posts on the net is “Too Many Jars in my Kitchen.” I’m a long time ‘diy deodorant’ gal myself, and she’s spot on with her basic recipe. I’ve found that cornstarch can be irritating over time, but baking soda is definitely the key to staying odor free!

Crocheted Elf Hat from Simple Stitches by Rachelle

Since knitting my own version of an “elf hat” for my husband recently, i just had to choose this post to be featured this week. I don’t crochet much anymore, but after peeking at this sweet project, i might have to try and whip a baby elf hat out myself, for my new nephew!

Is one of these featured posts yours? Grab our “Featured  Blogger” button to post on your blog and show off how cool you are. You can also  visit our Pinterest Eat Make Grow Featured Bloggers pin board to see some of our past favorites.

Show us what you’ve done this week!



2 Comments

Filed under Eat Make Grow - Blog Hop

Tagged as , , , , ,

September 4, 2012

Pocket’s Favorite Cookies

Although we feed Pocket a raw diet, i do deviate from the program with a batch of cookies for training occasionally. These cookies are grain free and should be suitable for most dogs with allergies.

When i say these are her favorite cookies, i am NOT exaggerating. When she hears the rustle of the cookie bag in the freezer she about has a conniption fit. And once we’re out on a walk? If she has knowledge of cookies in the pocket, you have never seen such a devoted and attentive Pocket. Also deviating from the purists who insist a raw diet should consist of meaty bones and ONLY meat/organs/bones – i add some veggies to these cookies. I’m sorry, but Pocket loves veggies so i give them to her. She also knows how to pick her own blackberries now, so there’s no stopping this little omnivore from being true to herself. PS, this recipe is not totally specific…. play with it until you find a mixture that works for you. Generally if you add enough to get a slurry mixture that’s not too wet, i’ll bake out right. Use measurements that will fit in your food processor with room to process.

Pocket’s Liver ‘n Fish Cookies

  • Liver. I used 1/2 a lamb liver. You could use 1/4 a beef liver or a bunch of chicken livers. Probably a cup or two.
  • Whole fish, with heads. I used smelt.
  • 1/4 cup microwaved yam
  • 1/4 cup chopped zucchini
  • T nutritional yeast
  • t garlic powder
  • a few tablespoons oats if the mixture is too wet

Chop all ingredients into chunks and toss into your food processor. Preheat oven to 350. Blend until all ingredients are well slurried. Grease a cookie sheet well with coconut oil and pour the mixture out onto pan. Smoosh out smooth so that the pan is filled with an even layer of cookie. Bake 15 minutes. Remove and use a pizza cutter to score a grid of lines. Put back in oven and bake until cookies are cooked through. The cookies on the edges will be brown and the ones in the middle shouldn’t seem soupy. Re-score the lines and let cool completely in the pan. (Don’t lick the spoon. You will not be happy about it.)

Thanks to the kitchen helper for doing the dishes.

Do you make your doggie’s treats or buy from the store? Either way, please avoid using wheat or buying cookies with grains in them: pups are not designed to process grain and what/corn/soy are the cause of many common dog-allergies. Baroooon Appetite!

2 Comments

Filed under Cooking, Dog Nutrition, Dogs/ Corgis

Tagged as , , , , ,

August 31, 2012

Baby Shower Invitations Part 3 – The Blessing Banner

Okay, it’s time to unveil the finished product! If you’re just finding this post, you can find Part 1: the invitations and Part 2: the banners at their respective posts. By sending out an individual flag to each invited guest, i was able to put together a banner for my sister and her new son to shower them with love, long after the actual shower. I think she loved it:

Part 2 of this series was featured at the Eat Make Grow blog hop this week and I think Marigold‘s ideas for using this Blessing Banner project for a wedding guest book or other party keepsake are just great! To re-cap my inspiration, though: i was in charge of my sister’s baby shower invitations and wanted her to share in the joy of receiving all the best wishes and kinds notes along with the RSVP cards. Remember the scene in sleeping beauty when all the fairy Godmothers bestow the new babe with a blessing? I wanted this to be like that, sans the evil curse, of course.

It was such fun to see the guests look at the finished banner, find their flag and read the sentiments of others. I hope my sister does in fact hang this in the nursery, as i think my little nephew would enjoy reading the notes as he gets older. One important detail: i left one flag blank so that my sister and her husband could fill in their own blessing for their new bundle of joy.

Putting it all together.

I hand made my invitations, but you could easily use existing invitations and cut the ‘special instructions’ cards to fit into the rsvp envelope. Make the flags a half inch or so too long and fold that over when you staple it to the card, this allows the guest to only write in the “live” area and gives you room to have enough extra length under the binding. Here’s another look at the finished banner. Forgive the terrible lighting in my terrible apartment:

One note: i invited about 40 guests and received about 30 banners back. That number of flags, at the dimensions i cut, fit perfectly on one package of binding with a foot or so left over. If you have a larger guest list, consider making SEVERAL banners so that they don’t get too long. So, there you go! From RSVP to party decoration to permanent display in my nephew’s nursery:

PS: i also made her shower party favors that matched the invitations. My natural soap company and artistic skills come together for custom soap projects. Although not listed on my website yet, i DO take orders for custom soaps for parties of all sorts wrapped in personally designed packaging made just for you. Aren’t they cute:

I hope this idea inspires you and i’d love to hear what sort of occasion you’d use this project for. Birthday party? Wedding? First communion?

6 Comments

Filed under DIY, Home, Sewing

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

August 30, 2012

Blackberries!

If you’re near Corvallis, OR you MUST go check out the EE Wilson/ Camp Adair wild area. It’s an old military base that has “gone back to nature.” Think “the zombies have taken over” or “the years after the plague wiped out humanity” but in a cool way. Elk, birds, ancient fruit trees and TONS of berries. A quick drive up 99 north of town and you can find a hidden Eden for foraging, walking, biking and angling. We had a great time last weekend and plan on bringing our bikes out this Monday to pick a mess of berries for syrup making. (I’m on a canning roll, folks!). Here are some of last weekend’s highlights:

Do you have a favorite ‘hidden place’ for picking berries?

Leave a Comment

Filed under Foraging, Travels

Tagged as , , , ,