Saturday, April 28, 2012

Colorful Quinoa Salad

I made this yesterday and we LOOOOOOOVVVVVVVE it!  DH said we could have had just this and nothing else and it would have made a meal.  He's right.  Here is the recipe:

1 cup of quinoa cooked (see below on how to cook)
1/2 cup green pepper diced (you can use red pepper as well)
1 small sweet onion diced
2 carrots shredded
1 can of black beans drained and rinsed
1 can of corn drained

Dressing:
3/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup lemon juice
2 Tbsp red wine vinegar
2 Tbsp sugar
1 T garlic minced
3 drops Tabasco sauce
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp lemon pepper
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/8 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground ginger

Mix together the sauce and add to the other ingredients.  Yum!

To cook quinoa - Add 1 cup of quinoa to 1 1/2 cups of water in saucepan.  Heat to boiling, turn down heat and cover simmering for 15 more minutes or until the water is mostly gone.  Take off burner and let sit for another 5 minutes.  Uncover and fluff with fork.

If you don't have quinoa, you can use couscous for the above recipe or even barley.  It has an Italian flavor with some Indian spice mixed in.  Let me know how you liked it.


Friday, April 27, 2012

Ok not good...

when your printer will not grab the paper to feed it through...It has officially bit the dust LOL.  So today I ordered another one off Staples.com.  I had a coupon what can I say?  ;)  They were going to deliver it on Monday but DH has a doctor's appointment in the afternoon so I called their customer service to see if I could reschedule it for another day next week.  Boy was the rep nice!  She had the delivery day changed in a couple of minutes and so friendly.  All customer service should be this way.  I had ordered some supplies from them last week (I was out of paper...umm yeah right like that's a problem now) and it was delivered by the local Staples store instead of coming from a warehouse in another state.  Very good idea.  They delivered it the next day too.  I think customer service is the deal breaker for me with some stores.  You have people who do not want to be there working for you, you NEED TO GET RID OF THEM!  Honestly there are a lot of good people out there who really want to work and are willing to go the extra mile and they hire nasty people who would rather be texting than waiting on customers, I don't get it.

Anyway I got a HP 8600.  Anybody out there have any comments on this printer all-in-one?  It looked like a good one.  I have always had Lexmarks but the toner on them is sooooo overpriced.  I liked the fact that HP toner is pretty reasonable so if you have any comments please leave them and not just about printers OK?  I really like hearing from all of you.  If you're a lurker, come out of the closet :)

I really would like to know what you enjoy or dislike about my blog and if you have any questions you think I might have answers for, ask away!  Do you like the scrapbooking things I was putting on here?  I know I have been pretty lapse about putting them up but if no one likes scrapbooking then I will stop putting them up or maybe I should put them on a different page?  What do you think?

Waiting to hear from all of you

Denise

Monday, April 16, 2012

Wow whata week...

Last week I...

Went to the dentist to get out some metal fillings and have them replaced with non metal fillings.

Signed the papers for the new piece of property in TN.

Took my hubby to the doctor and then to the emergency room and then he had to be admitted to the hospital.

Picked up hubby from the hospital yesterday.

Repotted all the houseplants today and potted up the tomatoes and peppers in bigger pots.

In between all of that, I cleaned the house, washed dishes and did laundry not to mention cleaned up after my old cat who is on his last legs.  He is dribbling and peeing when he sleeps and so he has been barred from the bedroom and we even gave him a bath last week but looks like we will have to do another bath soon.  I think he has cancer, he smells so bad but his pee actually doesn't.  He's alert and still eating and drinking although he is dragging his foot some and is kind of dizzy sometimes, poor old thing.  He doesn't seem to be hurting though or in any kind of pain.  It's a wait and see thing I guess.

If I am repeating myself on some of this, sorry but I'm kind of worn out....hoping this week is better.

Talk to ya later!

Denise

Scrapbooking catch up time!

Yes I know I'm really late and behind with these but here are some freebies for you!  First off some bookmarks:




http://www.mymemories.com/store/share_the_memories_kit_3



http://www.mymemories.com/store/share_the_memories_kit_2

Then a gift bag.  I'll post another this Friday.



http://www.mymemories.com/store/share_the_memories_kit_2

Yay all done!  At least until Friday :)

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Been away from the blog for a while...

To update everyone on how much I've been doing...and how exciting my life is...

The chickens are laying again...a lot.  I have several dozen eggs in the fridge.  We eat eggs almost every day for breakfast and I even made some egg salad the other day for lunch.  I really don't want to eat them for supper too, really I don't.

We planted cabbages, peas, lettuce, basil, potatoes in the garden.  I guess too early cause guess what, we're getting a freeze tonight and tomorrow night...hmmm hope we don't lose the blueberries and grapes.  I wanted to cover them tonight but hubby said they should be OK since it's a light freeze so he can't blame me if they freeze and all the berries drop off.

Dad and mom called yesterday to let me know that they had to rush to the hospital cause mom was having chest pains at 1 a.m.  Turns out she has a hiatal hernia and not having a heart attack.

We close on some new property we are buying tomorrow.  5 acres of land in Tennessee!  No house on it but we are planning on building one or getting a trailer (I don't like trailers, been there, done that and don't want to do it again :)  Hubby was thinking we might just build a pole building and then do the inside like we want but he wants to have a garage door...what?  Anyway he says then it will be easier to move in the furniture and appliances.  Guess  you can't argue with that logic huh?

My brother is moving to New York.  Dad and mom finally got him on the phone, hadn't heard from him for over two weeks.  I had left a message a couple of days after he had called me drunk.  He's an alcoholic and fell off the wagon again.  Glad he's OK.  Wish he would get his act together.

Our geriatric cat is on his last legs I'm afraid.  He's dragging his back leg and peed on our bed the other day.      I couldn't yell at him or anything, he's so old.  If he gets any worse, we'll probably have to take him to be put to sleep.  As long as he's eating and drinking, we'll keep him and love on him as long as possible.  Had to give him a bath tonight though he stunk so bad (all the peeing I think).  He's good about going to the litter box usually though.  I have shut him out of the bedroom.  I had the devil of a time getting the top pillow top clean (we have an air bed) and the top zips off.  It is so bulky and barely fits in the washer.  I put it outside to dry.

Hubby has been sick  but won't go to the doctor until after we sign the papers for the land.  I'm calling the doc to make an appointment when he's outside tomorrow...sneaky huh?

I got one cross stitched picture done.  I need to take some pics of it.  It's a fruit label and I'm making quite a few others to go with it.  I think I will make a quilted hanging out of them.  I'm still working on several sweaters and a pair of socks as well.  I get bored with one project and go to another one.

Well that's all I can think of for now.  Hope you had a very nice Easter!

Denise