My Soap Box.....its nuts up in here!

The term foodie...is an understatement.

foodie: a person that not only likes to consume all food in sight  but is also interested in knowing everything there is to know on any and all subjects applicable. Such a person might also undertake the study of the process of food and how it becomes what it is.....aka......Shae. (if you believe this is an official definition from any other book than that from the book of bull......come sit by me. we could be great friends :) )

Well, we finally started a "small" garden! kind of... we have blueberries, a peach tree, tomatoes, and an herb garden on steroids...trust me....this is from one picking just to get some of it out and stored...

(cilantro, basil, and spearmint so far)

but i have to tell you that there is nothing like picking herbs from our backyard for dinner or even for lunch...

(this has been my summer favorite for lunch...garden tomatoes, fresh basil, mozzerella, olive oil, and balsemic vinegar.....it's tough but someone has GOT to eat it....)

Now if only i could figure out where to do a raised garden i might never need to buy produce from the store again! :)

So no secret if you know me, i am a little bit of a healthy eater....an even bigger pigger outer...and have one fierce sweet tooth....put them all together and whattya get.....a really confused foodie thats what.

I eat what i want when i want but i am ALWAYS trying to either make something myself (to get all the "extra" stuff out that you find in packaged food) or find ways to make what i want on a healthier scale. (don't get me wrong...nothing is coming between me and my pizza, and ice cream...or cake...and cheese!!!  when i want it but i try to even it out as much as possible...)

(see.... I can hang with the best of 'em.....This philly cheese steak got nothin' on me!)

The latest healthy thang in our home is almond milk.

So after my surgery, coffee really hurt my stomach so i went without drinking it for about 6 months.  (now i know just heard a shock of "huuuh" around the world because spend any time with me and you will find...i am never without my coffee...in my own cup....from my own thermos...brewed at home.)

Finally i came in one morning from walking duke, smelled it, and for the first time really wanted it again.

I couldn't drink it black (the usual) so i added milk. Well, the milk is still in there EVERY morning and i am trying to find something a little healthier. I've read almond milk adds some yummy flavor and healthy fat so i switched. It's actually really really good!

Of course there are all of these artificial sweetners, preservatives, etc in it when you buy from the store and i never use an entire carton before it sours so i decided to see what it takes to make it........why not???:)...and turns out its a sinch!! AND i use the almond "mush" left over to make almond flour to substitute for breading on chicken, fish, etc..!

I told you its nuts up in here! (pun intended.......hee hee)

(almonds soaking before blending...blend with fresh water not soaking water...bleck)

(strained almond "mush" from milk to dry out in oven)

(finished almond milk and almond flour!)

With all the butter making, jam brewing, almond "milkin" (so funny), flour bakin, garden growin n' stowin....I have decided to give them our own "in-house" labels. Relating it to my professional career...they are loving labeled ..."from the kitchen of the food architect."....logo pending and forthcoming... :) (yes yes i am WELL aware i am a crazy)

Our grocery list keeps getting smaller and smaller! whoo hoo! which brings me to the Soap Box....

Ooooh wait, you thought the healthy eating blurb WAS my soap box.......hahahahahaha...nope....i actually have......... a Soap.......box.

So again with all the making stuff my own....i have heard tons o'stuff about this subject so i decided to try it...

I made......Laundry detergant......(insert bad thoughts... i did too at first)

IT WAS SO EASY! i found a site where they did comparisons with mustard stains on 2 shirts etc and washed them individually with commercial grade vs homemade and the results they posted where exactly the same!!!

My first batch...... (umm batch is understatement...lets try 3 gallons...) looks identical. I'm going to experiment later on with scents if this works....

(This stuff smells amazing...i can't wait to use it..)

i'm going to do my own "tests" before i run out of my "all natural commercial stuff".. if it works i plan to switch! (so if i start stinkin' let me know...............................:)  )  Plus the jar i'm putting it in is so fun....almost makes you look forward to doin some laundry.............almost.

This new found discovery led to the thought process of making my own all natural housecleaners....Chemical free.....

I have already begun the labeling and packaging / testing.................our "in house" cleaning line is called....can you guess?....... The Soap Box.......(i think i have now reached certifiable crazy........no shame....)

Now to just find the right packaging...ya know for the shelves in my house that no one ever sees.......I see glass jars in their future too.....hmmmm

Hubby continues to verify with me that i realize we don't live in a cabin in the middle of nowhere surviving off the land.......yes baby....I may be crazy but not delusional.......yet :)

oh well, its all in good fun......

Sending all our love from Texas,

crazy-lady stinson (the non-delusional kind :) )

2 cents from hunter...

Hunter is officially a "big potty trained boy" now... well, has been for awhile but ma' here is slackin on her bloggin :)

He is so sweet in his little routine and saying everything as he does it...."pull up underwear....then britches (ya know, southern for PANTS)....wash my hands..... dry... light (turn off light)"

Well dad and I still tend to "chaperone" the event so we take turns who stops what they are doing and goes with him. (when we don't, entire rolls of toilet paper end up in the potty...)

Sometimes we high five and say "tag your it" or just "Your up, I got the last"...

So hunter was pulling on his "britches" one day and I think just decided that he was tired. He pulled them off (had them halfway on)... walked over, handed them to me and said "your up, I got the last one".....

It would be much easier to convince a toddler you mean business if their side of the conversation did not make you laugh....

Year of the house....

Phew where does the year go! I can almost start my count down to halloween! (or should i say the countdown to start decorating for halloween!!...(in case you don't know, fall goes up on Sept. 1st...Halloween goes up on Oct. 1st!.......and christmas, well THAT goes up thanksgiving NIGHT!!!! it's a whole party thang..)

This year the family is coming to our house for christmas....so besides a countdown for the holidays, a countdown for "get yo' booty in gear woman and get some stuff done to your house that you have been putting off forever" list(s) kick in too... and um.....it is a LOOOONG list... there is NO WAY it is going to be all done before they get here but I will give it my all... and all that my wallet will give :) :)

First thang is first. We start with the floors and baseboards.

So we bought our home 3 years ago...and as it usually does, life happens and besides painting and refinishing our cabinets, not a lot has happened.

The floors were neutral color and in fairly good shape when we moved in so we had them in mind to do but not immediate. Well, 3 years later, dr's tell us carpet needs to go when possible as bad as hunter's asthma is and with a 3 year old, sippy cups of juice, and just a plain ol' busy life...thats just what they did....they "got gone" fast!
Here's the tile scheme:

Before/demo picture....(didn't take a whole bunch....nothing NEEDS to be remembered... :)

after.....

(picture frames are now symmetric on both sides adding a 4th incase this bugs anyone else :) ..maybe just me...and family pics inserted so the "rent-a-fam pics" that came with frames are gone)

hunters little art corner.....it gets used.. A LOT

(office fixture...still unpacking this room :( ...)

aaand we mounted the TV above fireplace...hubby has decided we now need a bigger tv...shrug...

loving the after shots... is it REALLY necessary to have to live through the "during". Can we just skip to the end......

We still have the bedrooms and baths to do.... now we just need the time...

In all the "rearranging" commotion in this process i discovered a wall that none of our current art pieces look "right" on. (uum the office looks like the art slots at stores....just flip through the twenty or so not hung and find what you need...I am officially out of walls... what can i say...i heart my art....)

so what do i do....see something on pinterest that sparks an idea and there I go...making something that does work!!

May I introduce our GINORMOUS menu board...

(still working on the frame.... i have to find someone that has a miter saw or just bite the bullet and buy one... i still have my headboard and dining table to make so I know it will get used TONS...)
I ended up making two because someone else was having way to much fun on the first one....

so now the first one is in his toy room. (the "toy" room is the future room of baby number 2...WHENEVER they decide to come along....when this happens....lets just say it will become the year of hunter's room....building stuff that will fit what we need in his room to fit a baby in the other)

then came hunters bathroom....

it has been painted, fixture changed, mirror changed, and finally accessories switched out...flooring is in its future...and tiling on the wall..42" up on the wall to be exact but who's thinking that far ahead. :)

(still have some spackling to do where the old fixture was but you get the idea)

Now its time for our bedroom. No pics yet because it has not been started but it's "a-comin". Paint, flooring, baseboards, fixtures, headboard (building because i cannot find one i like)...like i said...may i skip the "during" and just see the finished? :)

and the WONDERFUL hubby gave me my birthday present early....6 months early! (to some this is no shock...hubby and i have this thang that we are always way too excited about each others gifts so the minute we get em....we usually give them to the other.....no matta how early....eh whattya do...we love it!)

I got my farmer's sink for the kitchen!!!! this gives me time to get it installed and find a fixture we can both agree on! whoooo hoooo!!! I hated to give you a picture of a box so i will give you one from the store...

needless to say I....am.....excited.

and last but not least we bought a refridgerator for the garage....I'd say we are definitely "gearing" up for christmas....(see why we are calling it "year of the house")

So that about wraps up the last month in the Stinson household. It has been a hot mess here let me tell you but it's getting there!

Sending all our love from texas!!

Livin' in a dog house now!

Is it fall yet?....Are you sure??... Well in my little world (the hubby calls it crazy land) i am going to pretend that it is.

Heat is not my friend right now. Especially when I am trying to take duke for a walk.... .....who's duke? oh yaaa............................... DUKE IS OUR NEW DOG!!!!!! :) :)

Meet duke!

duke, meet invisible blog reading friends....








(forgive the lacking picture quality....empty internet space is SO hard to photograph...wink wink)

Duke is our wonderful new addition to our little family. He is a rescue German Shephard / Husky mix and the sweetest dang dog you will EVER meet. (sshhhh just don't tell lurking burglars)...

No, actually he is an impressive guard dog as well. I was putting hunter in his pj's one night ( duke was laying quietly at the door keeping watch) and a door slammed or something on tv in the living room and i thought duke was going to TAKE OUT A WALL getting to the front of the house to see who the heck just entered his territory. Scared me to death that's for sure so i'm sold. Plus, he has that whole alert look...especially when he is watching over hunter..

and his milder moments...(he doesn't leave hunter's side very often...especially during his breathing treatments...)

Someone found duke about an hour from us. They took him in for a few days and looked around to see if he had an owner... when that didn't work they sent out an email looking for him a home before taking him into a clinic. Well, luck have it, a friend was on that email chain and sent it to us (knowing we had been looking) and POOOOF! long story short... hubby went and picked up our new 4-legged baby!...and we now possess someone that actually wears hunter out!!

I picked up Hunter that day while daddy picked up duke and I got to surprise hunter with, "We are getting a new dog!" Hunter was sooo excited. We went to Petsmart, where we met up with daddy and duke and did some shopping for our new family member. Leeet's just say he is a little spoiled...

While at PetSmart, random kiddos were coming up and bear hugging duke like they had known him a lifetime.....and what was even better was.....HE WAS LETTING THEM! Perfect strangers he had never met and yet he was instant best friends with them. After that it was time to go home and introduce him to our other 4-legged baby, watson.

Watson was our first rescue baby we got 9 years ago!! He is a senior citizen now but you wouldn't know it until his arthritis kicks in! It took duke a day or two to figure out how he needed to play with watson but as soon as he did, let the playing begin!

What is even better is Duke is completely submissive to watson. Watson sheepdogs him! Watson will guide him and herd him where he wants him to go...especially if he thinks duke is being to rough with hunter (he's not but its nice to know watson is a surrogate mom :) )...watson will put himself between duke and hunter and basically tell duke to back it off if doesn't like how they are playing....Man we love this dog. hunter is pretty attached to him too...

Watson and hunter have been buds since birth. Weeell except for the first night we brought hunter home and he was up all night because mom did not have a clue on this nursing thing yet... watson kind of disgustingly huffed at us and walked out of the room like "WHAT have you two done.."... HA....Well now they are besties.

(insert song in head "imagine me and you, and you and me...no matter how you toss the dice it had to be, the only one for me is you, and you for me... So happy tooogetther!!!")

With the five of us now, it is obvious who runs the house... all I can say is that we are livin' in the dog house now!..

Here's to loving our babies...no matter how many legs they have. :)

Sending you all our love from texas!!

2 cents from Hunter

Aaaahhh, I love our mornings together. The pitter patter that turned hulk style thump thump, when he turned 2, thundering through the house, fills my heart with love and yet the need to want to RUN AND HIDE....:)

I was eating my breakfast, ummm maybe i should rephrase to say healthy breakfast, and hunter runs up to me and asks for a bite. Weeeeell.... I use the term "ask" lightly...when i say ask that means he sticks his head out like a little bird and makes a light smacking sound with his lips... sooo i look down at my steel cut oats, almond milk, blue berries, and chia seeds... with a splash of cinnamon....and stupidly think hmmm, he might love this..... so i give him a bite and the Mmmm Mmmmm expression turns terror as his cheeks turn red and he is looking for a place to spit.

I put out my hand......motherly instinct, i'd take it back if i could...... and he spits in my hand only to start scraping his tongue with his finger nails! I ask him to run and get me a wipe and like the loving son he is, he goes to get a wipe....to wipe off his own tongue... then brings ME the wipe to wipe my hand that apparently now is his trash can. I told him now he knows how i feel when he makes me take a bite of his Mcdonalds cheeseburger....ooohh the moments....