A little bit of this and a little bit of that...and summer is starting!

First of all, my Hungarian fold art A is finally done and framed.  I love they way is looks. 

I'm hoping I can start on B soon.  See my process here 

My garden is growing so well!  I am harvesting zucchini, pattypan squash, kale, Hungarian wax peppers, green beans and herbs.  Soon I should have tons of tomatoes, radish and carrots to add to the list.  I've also found a volunteer vine of some sort, I think it's a melon...we will see.

Pattypan

Zucchini

Hungarian Wax Pepper and you can also see the big vine next to it which I think will be some kind of melon...or pumpkin?

I also planted a new rose bed.  This is a neglected area that gets strong afternoon sun, not a lot of water and has poor soil.  Unfortunately it's become our cats toilet more than anything else!  In an attempt to reclaim the area I though thorny rose bushes would do the trick.

  I have mostly hybrid tea roses in my garden so I was excited to plant 3 David Austin roses. They are so much nicer than that stinky patch of dirt.  I amended well with compost and so far the roses (and I) are pretty happy.  The cat is sort of bewildered...

As summer approaches I am gearing up my healthy eating and exercising.  One of my favorite new smoothies is based on a recipe from Harley Pasternak.

1/2 apple, cored

1/2 banana

5 almonds or cashews

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/3 cup greek yogurt

Enough milk to fill my blender cup - about 1/2 cup.  Can be any milk or milk substitute.

Blend and enjoy.  It tastes just like apple pie to me. 

Sometimes I also add a handful of spinach.  Just enough to add some greens but not enough to change the flavor.  Usually I can't even taste the spinach.

I've been really into mason jars.  Overnight oatmeal in a mason jar has become my staple breakfast, I don't have a picture but here is my go to recipe:

1/3 cup oats (not quick oats)

1 T chia seeds

1 T maple syrup

1/3 cup greek yogurt

1/2 cup milk

Mix well and seal in a mason jar overnight.  In the morning I add some or all:

1/2 sliced banana

1 teaspoon raw cacao nibs

1 teaspoon chopped pecans

This is just my recipe but you can have fun creating your own.  There are hundreds of variations at your finger tips via Google.

I also chop salads up into large mason jars up to three days ahead and refrigerate.  I add protein like deli ham, hard boiled egg and the dressing when I am ready to eat.  I find it easier to make healthy choices for lunch when these are in the fridge ready to go.

 And last but not least, after months of neglecting my art, it's time to get the creative juices flowing because ICAD's and Summer of Color are starting! 

I loved the ICAD challenge last year.  See the roundup of what I did here.

And this year I am determined to keep up with Summer of Color, too.

Join me! 

Click below for more information:

How my garden grows

Random pictures from my garden over the last month.

 

Throw Back Thursday (but not the way you think!)

It's throw back Thursday but instead or posting picture of me when I was little, here are some sunset photos I took back in January.  Yes, sometimes it can take 3 months to organize 3 photos.

Enjoy!

Hungarian Alphabet - A

I'm so happy to finally get organized enough to joining Paint Party Friday!  It's been ages since my last PPF and I truly have missed the wonderful inspiration I get from visiting other participants and the lovely comments I get in return. 

Today I am sharing my nearly completed Hungarian Folk Art "A."  For months and months, ever since my ICAD name in Hungarian flowers (below) I've been working on a way to develop an alphabet using Hungarian folk flowers.  The index card is only 3X5 and was done in Sharpie pens so translating to something larger and making it more like "REAL" art has been a challenge.

After months of doodling flowers to get the right shapes to form the letters I was finally ready to give it a go.  First I penciled flowers on an 8X10 piece of watercolor paper.



Then I began to fill in the colors

Now I've got all my painting done but I can't decide if I'm going to add any outlines for definition as I normally do...

Eventually this will be framed and given to my niece, Ava. 

She is lucky enough to be first in alphabetical order.

I'm hoping to be able to create an entire alphabet, maybe even two - lower and upper case. 

In other news, our unbelievable weather continues.  It's been gorgeous and sunny every day.  No clouds, no fog.  No moisture at all.  It's hard to complain because most people fly 1000's of miles to get this kind of weather this time of year but for me the relentless sun is just a constant reminder that it's the driest year ever on record and we are heading toward a nasty drought.  I look around my garden and wonder who will survive. 

Looking on the bright side, the weather has been warm enough to attract this adorable mermaid.

 Finally, I've been having problems using the "Blog This!" feature in Picasa to post to Blogger.  Does anyone else use that and if so, any issues?

Sunset Watcher

Happy New Year!
A little late but this is my first post of the year. 
At this time of year I love to take sunset pictures and here are a few from the end of last year.

 

 

This one if looking out my kitchen door.

 

There wasn't much of a sunset this evening but I turned around and saw an opening in the clouds that was all pink lit up.

 

 

 

 

It's Thursday and something very exciting to share!

When I started blogging I imagined this place as an art blog but I was so nervous to share my art that my very first post was a recipe.  Posting recipes has been fun and rewarding and now one of my recipes has made it big!

Check out Redbook Magazine's online article about healthy Thanksgiving recipes to see my delicious recipe.  This is so exciting!

Visit the original Apple Cranberry Thanksgiving Salad post here.


And a little Thursday fun.
 

Me.  London Zoo?  1972ish.

It's Fall!

Living in Santa Barbara I am often told we don't have real seasons here but I beg to differ. Fall may be more subtle here and often we can get unexpected days of summer heat but our weather gets cooler, our leaves change, the air smells crisper. Today we are awaiting a bit of rain and it's the first day in a long time I'm wearing a chunky sweater. No better day to have a little Fall blog round up.

I don't get very creative with my nails in terms of nail art although I like unusual colors so I already had this bright orange and adding the jack-o-lantern face was super easy using a black nail pen from the drugstore. I'm so happy with how this looks, isn't it cute?

My first ever blog post almost two years ago was about roasted pumpkin seeds. Roasting pumpkin seeds is an annual tradition in my house. Last year I decided to revamp my roasted pumpkin seed post. It has since become my most popular post. Some of my posts only get a few hits put this one has THOUSANDS. It's also my most pinned picture on Pinterest. Around this time of year people start to come up to me ask ask for the recipe, and no wonder...the recipe is the BEST! See it here.

My sweet daughter/model

A few days ago I made these awesome candy corn rice krispie treats.  The best part about them is that the yellow tastes like lemon and the orange like orange (and the snozzberries taste like snozzberries....sorry, couldn't resist a little Veruca Salt here.)  Anyway, I love citrus desserts.

 

 Here is the recipe I used.  Rice Krispie treats recipe  The only thing I changed is using the larger portion for both the orange and the yellow.  I actually thought I would use a little more yellow, it got thin here and there.  Another tip is that it was very hard to shape the colors into the cake pan without making a sticky mess and almost ruining my manicure!  I used wax paper to press the colors into shape and that worked well. 


I finally made earring to match my best selling bracelets (in the manicure picture above.)



See them for sale here

We still have more pumpkin carving and lots of school activities this week.  And looking forward to trick or treating on Thursday.

Hope you are all having a lovely week!