Zucchini bread kind of weekend

Tomato thief caught red pawed and looking guilty.

The evidence, half eaten tomato.

Hello everyone!  This weekend has been busy.  I got all my homework done on Saturday leaving my Sunday wide open.  I finally got some tomatoes worth canning and to my demise I found that two of my very large heirloom tomatoes were half eaten and left to rot on the ground.  At first I thought "do squirrels eat tomatoes?".  Then I caught my little dog Peanut Butter nibbling on a tomato right on the vine!  Can you believe my mutt is eating my tomatoes?  Hello!  At first I was really mad, but then I had to get my camera and take a picture of her looking all guilty and of course the evidence of a half eaten tomato.  My son chased her around the backyard saying over and over "leave the tomatoes alone Peanut" and "not yours".  It was so cute!  My son chasing the dog and the dog looking and acting like her paw was caught in the cookie jar.

Anyway, back to my zucchini.  I made six loaves of zucchini bread today and I still have enough zucchini to probably make six more loaves.  I bought about twenty dollars worth of supplies to make my zucchini bread.  So, if I get 12 loaves that's $1.66 per loaf.  Not bad.  I found a recipe that I liked and I swapped out using whole wheat flour instead of all purpose.  I found that when you swap out all purpose flour with whole wheat flour you need to add some water to moisten the batter.  Well, it only took the hubby one batch to demand a loaf for work.  So, two loaves became four, then six and tomorrow I'm making two more loaves because I still have some zucchini left.

Zucchini bread cooling.

Here's the recipe I used.  Let me know if you try making this bread.  If you prefer to use all purpose flour just omit the water.  Until next time...
Blessings!

Mom's Zucchini Bread

Ingredients

• 3 cups whole wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 2 1/4 cups white sugar
• 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
• ¾ cup water
• 2 cups grated zucchini
• 1 cup chopped walnuts

Directions

1. Grease and flour two 8 x 4 inch pans. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C).
2. Sift flour, salt, baking powder, soda, and cinnamon together in a bowl.
3. Beat eggs, oil, vanilla, water and sugar together in a large bowl. Add sifted ingredients to the creamed mixture, and beat well. Stir in zucchini and nuts until well combined. Pour batter into prepared pans.

Bake for 40 to 60 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan on rack for 20 minutes. Run a knife alone the edges then remove bread from pan, and completely cool on rack.  Bread can be frozen.

Click here to watch the video to make zucchini bread. 

Sidewalk chalk everywhere

Chalk everywhere compliments of my 3 year old son.

Hello everyone!  Day two of back to school is done and I'm exhausted.  Is it too soon to start counting down the days to summer break 2013?  What a great summer break this was and now that I'm back to school I've forgotten that sleeping to 7:30am was sleeping in!  My geriatric dogs are back to getting me up at 5:30am and since my alarm goes off at 6am I'm basically up for the day. 

Well, up here in MN the weather has been heating up and we are having some very hot August weather this week.  My son is loving the new backyard and for his birthday he got some sidewalk chalk.  Don't tell him that the chalk is for the sidewalk.  He discovered that he can run the chalk on the sidewalk, place his hand in the chalk, and then stamp hand prints on himself and me.  What a joy it is to enjoy the last of the summer hanging out with my son in our backyard.  I know that one day very soon he will be grown up and sprinting out the door, so I have to hold on to these precious moments while they last.  Find joy in where you are now, because you're  not guaranteed another.  Until next time...
Blessings!

Pictures of the pooch

I got her to look at the camera by tempting her with a treat.

Hello everyone!  This will be a quick post because I'm back to school and I'm already tired and ticked off at all the new policies.  Anyway, my mutt by the name of Peanut Butter (yeah I know isn't that an awesome name!) got a hair cut and Jazz Wife over at Slim Wavy asked for some pics so here they are.  I can't feature one mutt without featuring the other.  Luigi (I know your thinking where's Mario?) is our big dog and we got him at a shelter.  He is a wonderful dog and I highly encourage anyone who is looking for a pet to check out your local shelters.  Luigi is the sweetest animal I have ever been in contact with and Peanut is getting old and cranky, but I love her anyway.  Until next time...
Blessings!

He wouldn't look at the camera for longer than a second.  You'd think for a treat I could get one glance.

 

My New Car!

Parked in my driveway.

Hello everyone!  Yesterday the hubby and I purchased a new car.  We both worked summer school and saved every penny to put a down payment on a 2012 Mazda 5.  This is the first time I have ever owned a new vehicle and with the current market on used cars it was actually cheaper to buy a new car.  Hello!  I also got a red one!  I always wanted a red car.  The hubby came up with a great name for the new car (I hope that's not weird) so now we call her Penny.  Can you tell I'm giddy.  

Anyway, the Mazda 5 is basically the mini of the mini vans.  It's perfect for small urban families like mine and when we decide to expand our family in the future we will have the room with this vehicle.  I have wanted one since my son was born, but life seemed to always interfere.  I love that this mini van drives like a car, but gives me the room for my family and the gas mileage won't ruin my monthly budget.  Oh, and I bought it with only 124 miles!

First family photo with our new car.

Today my son begged me to allow him to "play" in the new car.  He wanted me to drive by the daycare and show it off to his "friends".  I reminded him that it was Saturday and daycare was closed today.  It didn't matter, he wanted to show off the new car so I buckled him in and whipped around the block where he yelled out the window at some friends "I got a new car".

My bachelor older brother messaged me that I have officially become a "soccer mom".  He's single he doesn't get the demands of a family.  I love my car and nothing besides maybe a horrible tornado could  diminish my excitement right now.  Until next time...
Blessings!

Flowers for hair

Face on tree trunk with flowers for hair.

Hello everyone!  I was out weeding my vegetable garden and looked at what was left of my birch tree.  We had to take it down because it was dying a quick death.  Every time we had a storm large dead branches would litter our yard and driveway and we knew it was just a matter of time before the tree fell onto the fence, garage, or car.  So, down it came.  I didn't want a stump in the yard and I didn't want to grind out the stump because it is so close to my raised vegetable garden.  So, I had the tree guy leave the trunk of the tree up and since we had a face on the tree already, I told him to cut the tree down just above the face.  After looking at this I decided to dress up the face with some flowers.  Every face needs hair and flowers for hair is even better.  We have had a lot of neighbors and strangers stopping by when we are outside and commenting about the face with the flowers for hair.  If they only knew that I wear flowers in my hair almost everyday I think they would really get it.  Hope you get a good laugh.  Enjoy!
Blessings!

New Backyard and Patio

Hello everyone!  So, today the hubby and I took our dogs to ND to visit grandma for the next two weeks (we are leaving for a church conference later this week) and we finally got to lay our grass seed so I can officially say that the backyard is done.  Check out the before pictures below.  Basically we had to redo the backyard to prevent water from destroying our foundation.  The man in yellow is my hubby and our big dog Luigi hanging out in the backyard.

Now check out the new backyard!  We have already grilled and I added a raised vegetable garden with tomatoes, banana peppers, lettuce, and onions.  We also redid the front steps.  Don't mind my hose in the shots and wood chips everywhere.  Overall we are very pleased with the results.  We hired professionals to do the concrete, but everything else we did on our own.  Let me tell you that moving dirt and 5 cubic yards of mulch is extremely exhausting, but well worth the effort.  Don't mind the bare yard, we're growing our lawn from seed to keep the project on budget.  Until next time...
Blessings!

Rain garden of shrubs and native grasses.