Sunday, May 31, 2009

I'm Dreaming of These.....





I have lots of sundflower pants about 3 or 4 inches high in my garden. I am tending them with extra care and hoping they will make their way into all kinds of creative arrangements like these soon....

I love this adventure called gardening and have just spent a warm and productive morning weeding, watering, and admiring my little green children and watching them grow....who knew????

A Wonderful Side Dish for a Summer BBQ....Try These!



Stuffed Tomatoes on the Grill

Ok...I made these last weekend and they are really good! I found the recipe on the Willis Sonoma website. We actually found a barbecue grill rack at Wal-Mart for quite a bit less than the Williams Sonoma one. They are delicious and on the healthy side. Last Satruday we did both the tomatoes and some Portabello mushrooms...so good!

I am hopeful that we will soon have a bumper crop of heritage tomatoes from our garden and I need lots of creative ways to prepare them. Let me know if you try this recipe and what you think....enjoy!



Ingredients:
2 oz. bacon, diced

3 Tbs. finely chopped shallot

2 garlic cloves, minced

1/8 tsp. red pepper flakes

4 cremini mushrooms, minced

2 Tbs. dry white wine

3/4 cup fresh bread crumbs

1 1/2 Tbs. sour cream

1 Tbs. finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

3/4 tsp. minced fresh sage

2 Tbs. grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese

Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

9 plum tomatoes, each 1 1/2 inches in diameter

Olive oil for brushing

Directions:
In a fry pan over medium-high heat, cook the bacon until crisp, 5 to 6 minutes. Drain on paper towels.

Discard all but 1 Tbs. of the fat from the pan. Add the shallot and cook, stirring constantly, for 1 minute. Stir in the garlic and red pepper flakes and cook, stirring constantly, for 30 seconds. Add the mushrooms and cook until any moisture that has been released has evaporated, 3 to 4 minutes. Stir in the wine and cook until evaporated, about 1 minute.

Transfer the mushroom mixture to a bowl. Add the bacon, bread crumbs, sour cream, parsley, sage and cheese and stir to combine. Season with salt and black pepper.

Prepare a grill for indirect grilling over medium-high heat.

Cut the tomatoes in half crosswise and remove the seeds. Brush the tomatoes on both sides with olive oil and season with salt and black pepper. Place the tomatoes, cut side down, on an appetizer grill rack. Place the rack over direct heat, cover the grill and cook until the tomatoes begin to release some moisture, about 5 minutes.

Remove the rack from the grill, turn the tomatoes over and stuff each half with about 1 Tbs. of the bacon-mushroom mixture. Place the rack over indirect heat, cover the grill, and cook until the tomatoes are tender and the stuffing is golden and crisp on top, about 15 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes before serving. Makes 18 stuffed tomatoes.

Williams-Sonoma Kitchen.

Thursday, May 28, 2009

A Little Late Spring Surprise...



These iris bulbs shot up greenery months ago and looked like large green onions for hte longest time.....WELL...in the last week they went into bloom and what a great surprise for these warmer late spring days. Gardening is really an ongoing experiment....

Old School Organization with Chalkboard Paint





Here's some chalkboard labels I made for some fabric baskets for Jackson's closet. We just painted pressboard with primer and chalkboard paint, cut them to size, mounted them on some burlap ribbon (from Wal-Mart) and hot glued them on. This is a great way to temporary label things and change the "label" at any time with a chalkboard eraser and some chalk.

I just love this idea and will now move on to Allison's room and the pantry.

Old School Organization.....

hoI made these chalkboard labels for the fabric baskets I had for Jackson's closet. We just painted particle board with chalboard paint and cut them to size....Then I used my handy dandy glue gun (can't ever be without this tool) to glue them onto the burlap ribbon. What's great about these type of labels is that all you have to do is erase your title and re-write a new one when you need to!

I got the inspiration from seeing other types of similar labels on etsy.com and a few other blogs I follow. Next I will make some for Allison's room and then start on the pantry.

Moving into a new house is hte perfect opportunity to get organized. I LOVE being organized, but sometimes fail to keep things as tidy as I'd like. My dream is to someday be like my friend Diane who literally does not own a "junk drawer"....CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT?

I've Been Thinking About Doing This For Awhile....

Ok....I guess the first post is always the hardest????? I am calling my blog Starview Sonnet because the street we live on is named Staview. We didn't choose it, it was chosen for us. It is very significant to me and descriptive of this beautiful place we call home. I feel like I am on the very top of the world here and have never seen stars shine so bright or moonlit nights so beautiful.

I had to find out what a sonnet really was....it is no ordinary poem...it is one that comes with many rules about rhyming and meaning. Thanks to the Internet, I was able to get the basics for writing one. With lots of help from my husband, this will be the sonnet that begins my journey into this new way of documenting the memories that we create each day....here goes nothing...


A change for balance within and out
A garden with flowers of varying hue
To surround oneself with beauty on the mount
New friends and contentment near mountain of blue

A change from city girl to country mouse
Festivals and events with new friends and fruit from the vine
Creating memories of childhood within our house
Four visits of seasons all in their time

But what of friends and dears left far behind
The longing pull of closeness surely brings daze
Modern devices of wire maintaining clear line
Perhaps most will follow the trail we blazed

Visits and contacts from friends old and new
Balance with all things will surely ensue