Reason Number 2 Why I am lucky to love Jon

Have you heard of the olive theory? Well, I don’t believe in this theory, mainly because Jon and I both really like olives. It works out well for us because when we’re at the store, and I say, “Should we get some olives?” I never have to hear Jon say, “Ew no. I hate olives.” Anyway while our mutual love of olives is pretty awesome, it’s not reason number 2 why I am lucky to love Jon. Instead this reason has to do with a mutual fear…

Last week, I was checking out the veggie garden at Dean’s house, and when I looked down, I saw a fake snake coiled around the base of a tomato plant. “Ah!” I said, then, to Dean’s nephew, “Did you put that fake snake there to try to scare me?” Then as he was saying “wha..” the snake’s head moved, and I immediately about faced, and ran (a la Richard Gere in Runaway Bride) towards the screened in porch, while yelling, “Oh my God EWWW there’s a snake in the garden!” Now, while my reaction was quite ridiculously cliché, I did have sandals on. Nobody wants a snake slithering across their bare feet- gross.

While, there’s nothing more cliché than a somewhat-girly girl being terrified of snakes, the significant part of the story is what happens next. Dean caught the snake, and he and his nephew carried it onto the patio, his nephew yelling, “Come on Frank, Face your fear!” So after my ridiculous reaction I had to go face to face with snake, and while doing that, take this picture.

Here’s the awesome part,  Jon was sitting on the sofa in the screened in porch, with his feet up and his toes curled under. No one noticed Jon’s quiet inconspicuous refusal to face his phobia, no one- except me. And can I tell you… I was smitten. Oscar Wilde said, “You don’t love a person for their looks, or their clothes, or for their fancy car, but because they sing a song only you can hear.”  Jon was singing his song about being terrified of all things creepy crawly, and it was music to my heart.  I’m lucky to love Jon for our mutual fear of snakes, mine blazingly obvious and cliché, his not-so-much.

How about you?

Do you and your significant other have mutual fears?

Is there something totally non-cliche about him/her that you just adore?

I’d love to hear.

<3 Frank

Friendship Bracelet Earrings

I love this tutorial on how to make friendship bracelets, but I’m not really one to wear bracelets. I’m all about making them but I just never liked wearing them. Earrings, however, are a whole different species. I adore earrings. I have so many pairs, I could probably wear a different one every day for several months. I thought, “Why not make friendship bracelet earrings?” Yup, I’m starting a revolution! You can be revolutionary too, just follow that tutorial and make the bracelets about 1/2 that size. Then use bracelet ending things to attach them to earrings hooks. I’s that simple. Here’s a photo tutorial about how I did it.

What do you think? I kinda love them.

<3 Frank

Eyelet Makeover

Last year, my nonna gave me a white eyelet dress she outgrew.

It was cute, except I didn’t like the buttons and the pockets. So I decided to take them off. When I did, I found a stain underneath the collar. I had been considering dyeing it, but knew I had to after I saw that lovely pink stain. I wanted to make it a sky blue, but the only RIT dye I had was Navy. I thought if I just used less than recommended, I could get a lighter shade of blue. I was wrong. This is what I got.

Well it’s not sky blue, it’s more like dark purple with a few lighter splotches of greyish light purple, but I really love it. The splotches make it look more rustic than tie dye and the midnight purple color is too pretty. Here’s how I wore it.

I wore it with a vintage belt and some high espadrilles.

Thanks to my photographer boyfriend for taking these pretty pictures for me.

What do you think? Did I improve the dress or ruin it?

<3 Frank

The Breakfast of Gardeners

When I was little, my favorite part about visiting my Nonna’s house in the summer was waking up to fried zucchini flowers. It was always such a delicious treat with my eating more than my fair share. I woke up on Saturday morning planning to spend the entire morning weeding the garden, I knew I’d need a hearty breakfast so I made myself some of my Nonna’s zucchini flowers. Unfortunately this is a tactile process and I don’t have exact measurements for you, but here’s what I did.

First, I went into the garden and picked as many as I could find. Unfortunately, that was only three!

I cracked one egg.

I added about 1/3 cup of water, some flour, salt, and pepper to the egg; then I mixed it all up with a fork. The batter should be wetter than pancake batter.

Next, I dipped the zucchini flowers into the batter, and made sure they were properly coated.

While I put together the batter, I heated vegetable oil in a frying pan. After dipping the zucchini flowers I put them into the hot oil. I flipped them after about 2 minutes. They probably cooked for about 4-5 minutes total. 2 minutes on each side.

I removed them from the oil.

And sprinkled powdered sugar onto them.

Finally, I got to eat them YUM!

I had a ton of extra batter left and since I didn’t share any zucchini flowers with Tex, I decided to make us some pancake-like creations. I added some more flour to the batter and mixed until it was the consistency of pancake batter. Then I fried it up and added powdered sugar, and shared them with the bubba.

<3 Frank

Taco Night

Jon, Dean and I had a taco night tonight. We used this recipe. It was delicious and easy. I highly recommend it.

There’s nothing like a relaxing on a Sunday night, enjoying cool breezes and delicious food on the patio, and hanging out with awesome guys.

How about you? What did you do on this lovely June Sunday?

<3 Frank

And now I’m off to enjoy the season premiere of True Blood!

To deserve to be stung…

Thomas Jefferson & My Garden

Thomas Jefferson said, “In gardening, the failure of one thing is repaired by the success of another.” Now, Tom had over 330 varieties of vegetables and 170 varieties of fruit on his plantation, Monticello, so obviously a few failed crops could definitely be repaired by some successes. For me, the impending failure of my tomatoes, is unfortunately having a bigger impact on my gardening psyche than it should. Sometimes it feels like no matter what I do in the garden, things are not going the way I want them to.

The heirloom tomatoes I grew last year, were my pride and joy. I brought everyone I knew those tomatoes. People were always surprised, “You grew all these in your garden? They’re beautiful.” And they were. Yellow pear-shaped ones. Bubbly brainy red ones. Shiny strawberry pink ones. Red and Green Striped Ones. Tiny pale yellow ones that tasted like candy. I had 10 kinds and I cherished each one for its unique color and flavor.

I spent all winter… and it was a particularly long and cold winter… looking forward to growing new types of heirloom tomatoes this summer. But then I killed all my seedlings, and I had to rely on the volunteer tomatoes in the garden and the last-minute seeds I planted directly into the garden. Now the tomatoes are presenting another problem.

BLIGHT.

This nasty fungus is slowly destroying the leaves and stems of all the volunteer tomatoes in the garden.

I know it’s not the end of the world if all my tomatoes die before I get to eat a single one. I am definitely being dramatic, but I love tomatoes. I enjoyed the satisfaction of growing my own and they taste so much better right out of the garden. But I guess Thomas Jefferson was right about the failure and success aspect of gardening. I should be focussing on the fact that the blight doesn’t seem to be spreading to any of the other plants in the garden. (I think only tomatoes are susceptible.) I should focus on how well the Heirloom, Italian Marconi Beans I planted are doing.

I should be focusing on the fact that while my tomatoes are fighting an untimely death, everything else seems to be flourishing. So I will try not to bore you with anymore tomato woes. I just had to fret one last time.  And really, if it had been my choice, I would have sacrifised every plant in the garden, just to have my tomatoes flourish. I guess I can only hope that even against the destructive power of blight, my tomatoes might prevail.

<3 Frankie

Orange Fennel Kale Couscous

Last night, I finally got back into cooking (hopefully on a somewhat regular basis).  I decided to cook the Kale we had in the fridge leftover from last week’s farm share. Before yesterday, I’d only cooked Kale once, and it was because we got it in a different weeks farm share. Even though my good friend Kira, among others, suggested making Kale chips, I really wanted to try to make more of meal out of the kale so I did something a little different.

I did NOT follow a recipe for this meal. I tend to take recipes more as suggestions anyway, like “these things taste good together, experiment with quantities of each at your leisure.” (Sidenote: in my head, the word leisure is always said with an English accent.) I’m not really one for measuring whilst cooking, when baking yes, I measure mostly, when cooking, never. In my humblest of opinions, baking is more a science where as cooking is an art form.  If you leave out an ingredient whilst baking, like say the yeast in bread, you’re not gonna get anything really, except grossness. BUT if you leave out an ingredient whilst cooking, like say the orange juice I wanted to use in this recipe, you’re not gonna get gross, it just might not be perfect. OH and don’t ever forget to use salt when cooking, that’s like leaving the yeast out of bread (that requires yeast). Salt is imperative. So all of my ingredient measurements are estimations as I measure not whilst cooking.

So without further( rambling) adieu. Here’s how I made Orange Fennel Kale Couscous

Ingredients:

1 Bunch Tuscan Kale chopped into 1 inch slivers (not the technical term)

1 head, bulb, head, bulb,  Fennel (chopped into 1 inch pieces)

1/4 or 1/3 of a Vidalia Onion (chopped into long strips/ slivers)

1 garlic clove (chopped )

1 inch section of Ginger Grated (using special ginger grating plate, so fancy!)

1 orange peeled and cut into chunks

zest of 1/4 of said orange

juice of 1/2 a lemon

salt and pepper

red pepper flakes

1 Container of Trader Joe’s Israeli Couscous (or equivalent grain, i.e. regular couscous, bulgur wheat, quinoa, etc.)

First off, cook your grain based on box instructions. When cooking all grains, I always add a bay leaf and some red pepper flakes when I have both on hand. These simple additions give them more flavor depth. Fancy.

Next, prep your ingredients. Cut and Zest the orange, grate the ginger, chop the fennel/onion/ garlic/kale, and juice the lemon.

Heat a pan, with enough olive oil to coat the bottom. With the heat on low- medium throw in the fennel, onion, garlic (and any kale stems you want to eat). Add some salt and pepper now, also red pepper flakes (amount depends on your tolerance/affinity for hot).  Cover with lid. Wait a bit, say 2-4 minutes. Add the grated ginger and the orange zest and the lemon juice, and stir a bit (preferably with a wooden spoon, as to not have your mom yell from napping on the sofa “Cook Quieter!”) Cover again.

Wait about 2-3 more minutes. Add the Kale leaves and stir again. At this point add enough liquid (either water, veggie broth, or orange juice) to cover the bottom of the pan and go up the side about 1/4 of an inch. For me this was probably about 1/4 cup of water because it’s all I had on hand. Stir it all up, and cover. Leave until the Kale is all the way cooked. Probably about 6-8 minutes. I did not leave it long enough, and I think the Kale was slightly undercooked. I always worry about over cooking things so I’ve begun to under cook stuff now. You can’t really under cook the Kale because people eat Kale raw in salads, but I think it’s better cooked.

When the Kale is cooked to your liking, put this mixture in big salad bowl. Add the previously cooked still warm grain and the cool orange chunks and mix it all up. Taste, add salt if necessary. Then Serve.

 

So I really liked this, as did my dad, but we both like Kale. Jon liked almost everything except he said, “I think I just don’t like Kale.” My mom liked everything but not the orange chunks. Tex loved the kale, he ate almost all of Jon’s.  You’ll notice the Kale in the picture is not cut into 1 inch slivers. These chunks were too big for my taste (but still delicious), so I suggest cutting them into 1 inch slivers or smaller.

I’ll make this again. It was pretty yummy. The sweetness of the orange played in nicely with the bitterness of the Kale and the nuttiness of the Israeli couscous, but I also might try it with a different green, like Swiss Chard, Spinach, or even Arugula. If you try it let me know how it tastes!

<3 Frank

P.S: I always use the word “sofa” when typing because I trying the spell the c-word for the same furniture item causes me anxiety. I never use the word sofa in conversation. I imagine if I did it would slip out in an English accent, and then I’d be embarrassed, because my English accent sounds like Lindsay Lohan’s in The Parent Trap.

Cassa’s Grad Party Decor

Sorry about the inactivity on the blog for the past however many days. I know that one of my five readers has complained. (Sorry Hil). Excuses are useless, pointless, and a dime a dozen, but nevertheless my scapegoat is the fact I exhausted myself preparing for my sister’s graduation party. After this exhaustion took place, I attempted to recover by doing pretty much nothing but hang out and eat food (that others cooked) every night for the past two weeks.  I think I’ve finally recovered and I’m about ready to start cooking, crafting, and wholeheartedly gardening (aka attempting to save my tomatoes from blight, to warm the peppers on nights that are too cold, and to rescue the carrots from some evil, hungry beast). 

Before I get to those lovely activities calling my name, I thought I’d give you a few glimpses into the exhaustion-causing party. Overall, I’d say the party was a pretty big success. I may have been too exhausted to hold decent conversations with people and I also may have fallen asleep on the sofa at 10 o’clock while my brother, my sister, and their friends raged until nearly 4 in the morning, but I did a pretty nice job on the decorations and I enjoyed feasting on lots of deliciousness.

 

When my mom put me in charge of the decorations, I immediately asked Cassa what colors she wanted me to use (if it was left to me I might have done some fuchsia, teal, and grey combo perhaps.) Cassa said, “How about my school colors,” Me, “ok what are they?” Cassa “I dunno look it up online.”  REALLY? Like she wants her school colors and doesn’t even know what they are! Totally unfair. Her colors = white, black, and gold (which is really marigold yellow). I went along with her ludicrous request and this is what I came up with:

 
Mexican party flags intended to be strung around the tent, the rain prevented that dream, and I had to hang them up inside.

Dangly Tiger mascots, that I hung from random places, including the chandelier above the food buffet, under the arbor near the keg, and around the umbrella.

Yellow, black, and white tissue paper flower bouquets placed in newspaper modge podged, white washed coffee can vases.

A personalized Black and Yellow ”Congrats Cassie” Sign with  handmade letters, which I strung above the big window in the kitchen.

 (Cass and Me at her party)

Anyway, It might not seem like much, but it was a lot of preparation, and I’m glad everyone seemed to enjoy the decor. Cass loved it, she wanted to take it all home. But with all of the food in the car, and two extra bodies (also known as live people= Lauren and Jane), there was no room, so she’ll bring them back another time. I hope you enjoyed seeing what I did!<3 Frank

Tomato Tragedy & Garden Update

So it’s kind of really upsetting to talk about it still, but all of my 13 different types of tomato seedlings, died on friday. More or less I murdered them, by not planting them on Tuesday, or Wednesday, or thursday when I could’ve should’ve. I’m still really upset. My response to this, was planting the seeds I had leftover directly into the garden on Saturday morning, and hoping they’ll grow. I’m still really disappointed I let that happen. But regardless of this terrible occurence some things in the garden are doing pretty well.

My zucchini plants are HUGE! And I already have zucchini flowers on all three. 5-6 zucchini flowers total. And I am resisting the urge to eat them just like that, so instead I’ll have actual zucchini in about 2-3 weeks. YUMMY!

The beets and the carrots are growing bigger and bigger. I love root veggies, eating and growing them. Have I told you it’s like finding buried treasure? Because that’s what I equate growing root veggies to.

Putting aside the tomato murder tragedy, the volunteer tomato plants already in the garden are pretty big! AND they have flowers too- but I have no idea how long it’ll be before they are actual tomatoes from the flowers because I don’t have a clue as to what type of tomatoes they are. I remain excited nonetheless.

Also our peach tree has a ton of baby peaches on it! Let’s hope we can get to the ripe ones before the squirrels nasty evil creatures do this summer. Fresh peaches are my favorite, when they’re so ripe and juicy, they make your whole face sticky.

Also I forgot to grab a picture of it and I don’t want to go outside to do it, but all three types of beans have flowers! Huzzah! As well as the cucumbers, who are refusing to grow up the trellis I put next to them causing my dad had to tie them to it with twine (lame). Naughty cucumbers!

How’s your garden growing?

<3 Frank

P.S. How cute is the bubba with his little stuffed twin?