The amazing Tuscan Peasant Soup with Rosemary and Pancetta

http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/tuscan-peasant-soup-rosemary-pancetta.aspx?nterms=52492

At the urging of my darling husband, I am posting a link to this most amazing creation.

Here's a little hint that I learned about during my recent trip to Italy:
If your beans are tough, throw it all in a blender! It turns into the wonderful thick, creamy soup...it would be perfect with a crusty rustic bread.

Trust me, this one is good enough for even your most important company!

Home.Farm’s true beginnings!

So, today was a big day for us here on the HomeFarm. I can’t quite explain what was so special about today…maybe loading the FarmCar up with HomeFarm’s first bales of straw…maybe the finishing of a never-ending table-building project…I just don’t know.

Doesn’t matter, really – all that’s important is that it *felt* like a big day for us!

Here she is, the famous FarmCar, loaded with five bales of straw fresh from the Standard Feed & Seed Store in Atlanta. As you can probably imagine, after unloading her FarmCar is completely head to toe in straw remnants. I haven’t had time to vacuum her out yet – that’s a job for another day.

Two bales are now in the bed seen on the right of this photo. They will stay baled, but I will be piling the tops with composted manure and watering them for two weeks. After two weeks, the straw will have heated up and cooled down (hopefully) and something, probably greens, will be planted on top.

The beautiful thing about this method is that the bales will continue to degrade and compost, and next year I will have some beautiful stuff to spread in this box.

As for the rest of the bales, they will be going toward making some new beds. More on that tomorrow!

Peanut Butter Doggie Treats

So, I am definitely back on the project-doing bandwagon, only I keep forgetting to take pictures!  I apologize for not keeping updated, and will certainly try harder from now on.

Dexter, our miniature pincher, was about out of his favorite Trader Joe's peanut butter dog treats. Seeing as we are on a very tight budget right now and I absolutely refuse to go shopping, I did a little bit of research. Peanut butter dog treats, it turns out, are incredibly easy to make.  Plus, we happened to have all of the ingredients! 

Here’s the recipe I used.  It is a combination of several recipes on the web, just adjusted a bit for what I had on hand:

1 1/2 cups	organic whole wheat flour
1/4 cup	organic old fashioned oats
1 teaspoon	baking powder
3/4 cup	1% organic milk
3/4 cup	organic all natural peanut butter
1 tablespoon	molasses

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Combine everything in a mixer and stir until smooth. Dough will be stiff and not sticky, but should still be pliable.

Roll dough to approximately 1/4” thickness and cut with an appropriately sized cookie cutter, or into whatever shape you desire.

Bake for 22-25 minutes.

Store in an airtight container or freeze for longer storage.

Dexter absolutely loves these – hopefully your pooch will too!

And so the Project List begins again!

My move to Atlanta is official, and though I still spend quite a bit of time in southwest Virginia, this is my home now.

Each time I come down, I bring more of our stuff with me. This time I was a car-full of plants and a couple of my old chairs that I adore. 

I love this house, and now it it starting to feel like home. Our living room is now a mix of all kinds of mismatched furniture, and I love the bohemian feel it's getting.

There is still much work to be done, but I feel comfortable here now.

Tomorrow it's back to work on my table for over the washer and dryer. Unfortuantely, I haven't tracked it's progress, but I will try to start now. 

Love to you all!
Petunia

New home, new projects!

Okay, no more excuses!

I am officially finished with school and am a Nationally Registered EMT-Paramedic. I have some finalization to do with state paperwork, but there really are no more excuses to be found. Time to get some stuff DONE!

Now that I am pretty much moved into our new home, I've got to add some major projects to the list. Most of these will be furniture building/refinishing since we're pretty short on some major pieces as well as cash. I will be using many ideas and patterns from the Knock-off Wood website and hope that you will follow along with me. There will also be various refinishing projects from my thrift store excursions, and I'm sure lots of cooking, sewing and whatnot.

Here's a list of my priority projects:

Major:

• Table and hutch over the washer/dryer
• Kitchen island
• Entryway bench and shoe rack
• Bookshelves
• Platform bed
• Sofa console
• Falconry mew and perches
• Kitchen ceiling fan
• Porch ceiling fan

Minor:

• Oil painting magnet board (repurposing)
• Floating shelves (refinishing)
• Rocking chair (refinishing)
• Side tables (refinishing)
• Corner table (refinishing)
• Triple pleat curtains, living and dining rooms
• Roman blinds, living room and kitchen

So, lots to do, lots to do!  This is going to be a very exciting and busy time - I hope you'll join me!

I'm almost back!

One retest to take tonight, and then school is O-VAH!  There are a couple more tests to take this month before I am truly done and can call myself a paramedic, but the major stresses are over and I can get back to adding some creativity to my life.

So get ready, because here we go!

Love to you all,
Petunia

Putting it on hold for a while...

Okay, so there are a few things happening right now that are interfering with my posting.

1) School is coming to a close - we have six weeks until our finals and then national testing.  I'm simply having to buckle down and focus. 

2) I can't find my camera, and my camera phone is just not cutting it.  So, incidental posts aren't happening either.

3) We just went through a huge closing ordeal on our new house which has completely thrown everything else off.

Essentially, things are good - real good, in fact - just very busy.  So I apologize for not posting, and once I'm all tested out, I promise to start posting projects again soon! 

Love to you all,
Petunia