A Present. For me.

From me.

My nieces like to show me things when I go to their house.  Whenever I'm there, they go through their house and pick up various treasures from different rooms.  Often times, it's animal related (we have the same genes) but they also like to show me art.

The family on their mom's side is very artistic, and they've got talented photographers, weavers, wood workers, metal smiths and painters.   They often have various pieces to show me that somebody or other made for them.  And as they age, they're showing me some pretty impressive art projects of their own.

And so, when the older niece brought a canvas to show me, I immediately thought it was an oil painting.  I asked her who had done it.  I even asked her if she'd done it (and whoo, boy would I have been impressed if she did).  Looking closer, I could see that it was a print; but I still thought it was a print of an oil painting.

It turns out, it was actually a photo that my sister-in-law's sister took of a lake in Jasper.    Just the scenery is something I started thinking I'd like on my wall.  When I figured out that the girls in the corner are my nieces, I had to have it.  They sent me a copy of the picture, and I had it printed on canvas.

It arrived today.  I hanged it on the wall as soon as I got home.  Now I can't stop staring at it, or smiling.

Here's a closer look:

Things we do when we're not here

Tallulah watches dog sports.

She can't believe dogs are actually rewarded for jumping in the pool.

I think she's in love.

Cotton cleans his teeth.

Note - that is not merely eating a cookie.  That is bribery to force the Dude to chew.


Winter climbs.

And I can't think about anything to blog about.

Make this cake.

Our theme this month at cooking club is slow cookers.  We'll each be bringing a slow cooker dish to our meeting, and together we'll have a complete meal for 12.  My assignment is to make one of the deserts.  I made one of my favourites, which is dead easy.  Really, the hardest part of making this cake is to find a springform pan that will fit in your slow cooker.    Even better, when it's done, it'll look and taste like it came from a five star bakery.






Chocolate cake from the slow cooker.

250 grams (8 oz) of the best quality unsweetened chocolate that you can find

1 cup sugar

1/2 strong coffee

1 cup unsalted butter

2 tbsp kahlua

4 eggs

Slow cooker
6-8" springform pan

vegetable spray

tin foil

cotton string

• place chocolate in a heat proof bowl
• in a saucepan, bring sugar, coffee and butter to a boil at medium heat.  
• pour over chocolate, and add kahlua.  Stir until chocolate melts and mixture is smooth
• in a separate bowl, beat eggs until they are lemon-coloured.
• Gradually add chocolate mixture, stirring until blended.
• Pour into a springform pan that has been sprayed with vegetable spray.  
• Cover tightly with tin foil, and tie string around it to hold in place.
• cook in slow cooker on high for two hours.
• refrigerate overnight.

Tips:

I've done this in a bath (ie - wrapped the bottom with tin foil, then poured water in the slow cooker.)  That makes it even better.  If you peak under the tinfoil, you might see that it's still liquid when it comes out of the slow cooker.  Don't panic.  It'll solidify overnight.

I like to serve this drizzled with a thin (almost liquid) custard and fresh raspberries.

Don't do like my friend Kat did.  Strong coffee is the stuff you'd drink, not coffee grounds.

Walloped by winter.

Winter (not the cat) has raised it's ugly head.  It isn't too cold out, but we're being hammered with snow.

We've had about 30cm (~ a foot) and I hear it's supposed to continue all week.  Even better, the wind is blowing and it's drifting.  Just about everything I had planned this weekend was cancelled, due to the weather.  Even dog walks are seriously shortened, but I have been going out a few times a day to shovel, because I can't don't want to shovel it all at once.

This afternoon, when the snow let up for a bit, I made a quick trip to the local grocery store.  I've got an assignment for cooking club tomorrow, and I needed three ingredients.  Apparently, everybody in town had had enough of being housebound and decided to stock up on groceries.  At my local grocery store.  I'm normally in and out of there in five minutes flat, but my three ingredients?  They required a 30 minute wait to check out.  The store had every checkout open, with a wait of 10-15 people.  It was crazy, but I wasn't going to go home empty handed.

So, I did want everybody else seemed to be doing and I stocked up with enough groceries to last me the rest of the winter (if only!) and settled in to wait my turn for checking out.  I'm home now.  My awesome neighbour came around and used his snowblower on my walk, so I don't have to go out again today.  And maybe not tomorrow either... I'm giving serious thought to working from home tomorrow.





Also - I commented a few days ago about the benefits of short dumb dogs.  I take it back.  I didn't have to go out and clear paths to the dog pen for the tall smart dog three times today so that she could pee.  I'm thinking that outweighs the inconvenience of having to hide my gloves from her.



P.S.  The tall dog counter-surfed my meatloaf tonight.    Have I mentioned how much I love my cat?

Spoiled. Tacky.

He's spoiled.  It's tacky.

In exchange for this little beauty, the cat condo is going back to the basement.  This may not be any more attractive, but it takes up less floor space.

I wonder if a new piece of material and a glue gun could make it better.

Nuthin to see here

It's snowing out.  Again.  I'm tempted to just stay inside and do nothing, but I seem to be the only one in the house who is willing to do poop patrol.  As much as I dislike going out in the snow every day to pick up dog poop, it's way better than the alternative.  There's nothing worse than facing the great poop meltdown in the spring if you haven't kept up with it and the melting snow leaves behind a slurry of slimy shit.  (My apologies for the language... I had to go with the alliteration.)

It occurred to me today that I managed to get through the holiday without eating myself sick.  Yee haw.  I hope that means that I did a better job of controlling myself, and not that my stomach has stretched to accommodate a larger volume.

I thought my dogs were quiet when I'm not home.  Friends have said that when they come over and I'm not home, the dogs don't make a peep.  However, today the delivery guy left two Milkbones wrapped inside of my bill when he dropped off the water jugs.  If the dogs don't bark, how else would he know to leave the treats?  Does he remember that one single time that I was home and he carried the bottles inside for me (and therefore met the dogs) three years ago?  Hmmmn... methinks the dogs aren't as quiet as I thought.

I ordered myself a late Christmas/early birthday present today.  I'm very excited, and if it turns out as well as I hope, will show you when it arrives.

Tallulah has taken it upon herself to empty every coat pocket in the house of its gloves.  Although I've got a couple pairs of heavy-duty mitts for the really cold days, I also tend to buy cheapo light-weight gloves to go with each of my coats and store them in their pockets for easy access.    Today, most of the coats are on the floor, having been yanked off their hangers and divested of their gloves.   Multicoloured gloves are everywhere.

There's something to be said for short, dumb dogs.

Starting the new year off right...

... with some juvenile humour.

The little guy in the middle cracks me up.