Tomato Basil Summer Pasta

One of the benefits from my job is being able to take off Fridays in August. The office is slow, so I don't need to be there as much.  I love having a three day weekend, being able to have an extra day of the Saturday morning feeling (my absolute favorite time of the week), and having enough bright sunlight when I cook to take photos! Here's recipe I found online and adapted to my liking. It's fresh and light, perfect for a summer lunch or dinner.

Tomato Basil Summer Pasta
Adapted from Ina's Summer Garden Pasta
2 pints grape tomatoes, halved
1/4 cup olive oil
3 garlic cloves, minced
12 basil leaves, sliced
1/4 tsp crushed red pepper
1/4 tsp salt
Pepper to taste
8 oz whole wheat angel hair or capellini pasta
3/4 cup shredded parmesan


1. In a large bowl, place the cherry tomatoes, olive oil, garlic, basil, crushed red pepper, salt and pepper, and toss to coat. Cover the bowl and let sit at room temperature for four hours.

2. Prepare pasta. Drain and add to the tomato mixture. Add cheese and toss to coat. Garnish with basil and extra cheese.


Total time: 4 hours 15 minutes
Hands on time: 15 minutes
Serves: 3

The Garden of Broken Dreams

Dramatic, I know. But there's a reason why I haven't done any garden updates recently! I really REALLY had high hopes for my garden this year. Here's the story: The problems started when I started my own seeds indoors. Everything was great until I took the cover off my plants and this pretty little girl, who eats everything from hair to dust bunnies to string, decided the plants were a good snack:

And yes, her eyes are always that wide. .. Unless she's sleeping. Anyway, a piece of poster board to keep the kitty away and the plants were growing again. Then I moved them into my cute little greenhouse outside.

This is a photo from last year, when I was smart and had the long side of the greenhouse against the house. This year .. not so smart! I had it turned perpendicular to the house to allow for a better view of the backyard from the house, and in a strong wind storm, the whole greenhouse tipped over. Onto the ground. With all of my plants inside. Unfortunately I was too distraught to take a photo, but I managed to save a little over half of them.

For deer prevention, I thought I was so clever in fending off the deer. Check out my circus tent style draping of deer netting over the garden:

Seems super smart, right? I draped it several weeks before planting so the deer would realize it was there and could even totally destroy it before I put in the plants. We'll come back to the netting. I set up my trellis that I made last summer inside the netting. This is what happened during a tornado warning - destroyed!

Two words when you make a trellis: wood glue. Along with the staples it probably could've held up. Also, I need to pay attention to wind direction .. again.  I have to admit, this post is kind of fun to put together after the fact, now that the shock of everything going wrong is gone.

Back to the netting. The netting did work, until about three weeks after I planted. Then they decided to just hop through anyway, tearing it down, and eat, eat, eat. Again, distraught moment, no photo. After the first attack, I still had enough plants left alive to re-drape and attach strings to the netting so the deer would maybe notice that it was there. A week later they tore it down again (they liked coming on Sunday nights for some reason..), this time pulling up plants that they didn't eat. Out of twenty tomato plants, most of which I planned on using for canning and I wanted to try some varieties I hadn't grown before, I had eight left. One cucumber plant from two. No squash from one. Thankfully they didn't touch my eggplant, and my three jalapeño plants had enough leaves left for all to survive.

And so, I downsized. I transplanted the tomato plants that had more than one leaf left into the front little garden. The back garden only has about a third of the area occupied now. The tomato plants that seemed almost hopeless (one leaf left) I transplanted into pots by the porch. This is what it looks like today.

Whose idea was it to make lawns out of grass that dies when it's not watered, anyway? 

Everything that's left is thriving and the deer haven't bothered the small gardens in over two weeks, other than chowing on a tomato plant through the fence. No telling what the yield will be (probably low), but I'm just happy to have tomato plants that have tomatoes on them and a garden that's finally able to grow.

Easy Artisan Bread!

Finally! FIN-AL-LY! I've found a recipe for artisan bread that I can make and not mess up.  You may have read about my bread misadventures here and since then, I've had a couple more mishaps trying to make bagels and other bread. I'm applauding my own persistance right now. The photo above is exactly how it came out of the oven. It's like it just popped in the pot all perfect just because I put in so much effort to find a recipe I couldn't mess up. If you'd like to make some yourself, click here. It comes from Simply So Good and she also suggests different add-ins too. 

The only catch to this recipe is you need a cast iron Dutch oven. I received mine as a gift, but it's from World Market (you can see it here). And at $50, it's pretty reasonably priced. I'm not sure exactly how much heat the World Market Dutch oven knob can handle (most are 400-500 degrees F), but I also received a replacement knob (here) to make sure that the Dutch oven can go in the oven at higher temperatures.

This bread is so good, I can't wait to make some other flavors with add-ins! Enjoy!

Mackinac Island

Last weekend, my sister and I took a trip up to Mackinac Island. We had a great time camping, visiting Mackinaw City, and going over to the island. Enjoy the photos below!

We camped at Mill Creek Campground, which is a really nice place to stay. I say that mostly because the sites are pretty well-secluded and the bathrooms looked like they were just renovated. The tent went up pretty easy, but we had some pretty bad thunderstorms Saturday night that made the tent leak!

Wolverine pride and strength!

This was one of our favorite parts from the trip: The Jack Pine Lumberjack Show. Two lumberjacks compete against each other to see who wins! It was so much fun to watch, and the host encourages cheering and booing to make it even more fun and interesting. I highly recommend it to anyone visiting the Mackinaw City area.

Mackinac Island .. before it got crazy busy in the afternoon.

My goofy sister on Market Street. Although, maybe she's not being goofy .. maybe she's cold because it was freezing on the island!

We took a nice stroll around the island (about eight miles total) that was a very pretty walk. We had to try not to get run over by the people that don't know how to ride bikes that rented them because they're on the island. Thankfully we got out with just two close calls. 

I hope you all had an amazing weekend too!

Daily Notecard Calendar

My sister and I both have horrible long term memories, and it seems like often photos from our childhoods end up turning into memories (does that ever happen for any of you?).  I saw this idea for a daily calendar on Pinterest and thought I'd give it a try. I bought some notecards and used my printing kit to stamp the dates on the top of each of the cards. Yes, this did take forever. So far I've done through August, so once I get there, I'll be stamping again. I keep the cards in one of my revamped oatmeal boxes on my nightstand so each night (or every few nights if I forget) I write a line about what happened that day.

I'm really excited for next year when I can see exactly what I did one year ago. Even the mediocre days will be interesting to see! I started mine on January 1st but you can start any day of the year. And all you really need is some note cards and a pen. Easy way to keep memories!

Oatmeal Box Storage - A Tutorial

Organized storage of craft supplies is a problem for me. It seems as though my stash keeps growing but ways to store it well are super limited in my workspace. Also, being thrifty by nature doesn't help .. I don't want to spend a bunch of money for plastic containers! I was looking for a way to store my packets of vintage buttons a few months ago in a way that would be cute and hold them well. I happened to be recycling an oatmeal box and noticed that it was the perfect width for button cards. Oatmeal box storage was born! See below on how to make your own. I've also used this folding technique to wrap boxes for more attractive storage (see last photos).

What you'll need:
An oatmeal box
2-12" pieces of pretty scrapbook paper
Scissors and tape

Why, hello empty used oatmeal box.

Cut it in half .. no need to be exact here.

Tape up the open end.

Place one box half in the middle of an piece of scrapbook paper. The paper should be facedown and there's no need to be exact here either. 

Fold up and tape the short ends. The paper doesn't need to come up to the top of the side (you can see about a half inch uncovered on mine). It'll get covered up later.

Now fold up the long sides of paper and fold over the short end(see the next couple photos).

Now cut down the paper to the corner of the box.

Fold end inside

Do the same thing with the other long side of paper to make a clean looking end. 

When you have both short ends done, it should look something like this. Now just fold in the long sides and tape all the inside flaps down.

Now just do the same with your other oatmeal box half and you'll have two ready to go. I didn't line these boxes or make them look nice on the inside because it wasn't necessary for my purposes. Here are a couple other ways I've used this folding technique with some larger boxes and postal paper purchased at the dollar store.

The favor box for the monster baby shower was out of a used box with the flaps cut off and the dollar store postal paper.

I used wrapped boxes to organize all of the laundry supplies on the dryer. You would not believe what a mess this was before!

I've also used them to organize miscellaneous hardware and tools on a shelf under the basement stairs, and to organize the mess of the junk drawer. It looks better than having plain ol' boxes to hold things! Hope you can find some uses for them too!

I Made This Swimsuit

You may remember this photo from my post ... yesterday :).

I also noted that I made this swimsuit! Honestly, I didn't know that it was going to be possible to make a swimsuit that I would feel secure enough in to wear in public. But, I can assure you, I received no strange looks and nothing came peeping out while in the water or on the beach. And I mostly winged it! Crazy, right?

I found this mustard striped swimsuit fabric on clearance at JoAnn's for $3.50 a yard. I had no idea how to make a swimsuit and had no pattern to go off of, but I love a challenge (especially one that only costs $3.50 .. and works out well in the end!). So I bought a yard of it.

I saw a cute swimsuit at the store that seemed easy to make, so I somewhat shamelessly took it into the dressing room and took these measurement photos.

Body parts are the best for measurements! I also picked up this pattern to get the front piece right. I used the top front piece from the center top image.

And then .. I winged it. I cut out two of the top front pieces from the pattern. I used my measurements and trial and error to make the tapered back pieces, using a swimsuit clasp from JoAnn's (super cheap) for closure. Since I didn't want to be all hanging out there .. you know what I mean .. I used some lining cups from an old swimsuit and made the ends of the swimsuit so I could insert them and take them out.

I made a long tube and tapered it to make the front tie. I put the strapless suit on to measure to add the halter string. Top stitched everything along the way. And .. boom. Top done. The bottoms were much more straight-forward. I used a bottom that I liked to trace a pattern and cut out an outside and lining piece. Sewed it all together .. done. If I hadn't been super lazy, I could have serged the seams to make it look better. But I only see that so it's okay.

Here's how much it was to make a swimsuit that was around $40 in the store:
Fabric - $3.50 + $3.50 lining fabric for bottom = $7.00
Swimsuit clasp - about $2.00
Pattern - $1.00 on sale
Total - $10.00

Moral of the story: Don't be afraid to make swimwear, if you know how to sew. A pattern more than likely would be easier to use than what I did, and although these patterns are in short supply (I only found one in the McCall's book at JoAnn's), they can at least get you started.

I'll end with this photo .. the photo I was considering not posting because I have horrible burn lines, the one I adjusted the color to so those burns wouldn't look so bad, and the one I decided not to photoshop to cover up my burns :). This photo is also (ironically) the best one from vacation of me having the swimsuit on!