Kiki Costume

My daughter is a fan of "Kiki's Delivery Service" so I made her a Kiki costume for Halloween.

This was insanely easy. I bought a large ladies black velvet shirt from Value Village for $5, the broom was $2 (bought it last year for decor), had some red scrap fabric and we already had a cute stuffed cat.

The Kiki dress has shorter sleeves than this but it'll be pretty cold on Halloween so I left them long. I took in the sleeve width, length, shoulders and the neck to fit my her.

She's so cute!

Jelly and Salsa

I canned salsa yesterday evening and sundried tomato jelly this morning. The recipe for salsa said it made 5 pints. I barely got 4 out of it. As soon as some more tomatoes ripen I'll be making another 8 pints.


































Next on the list is tomato basil jam.

Still Here

Just trying to recover from a nasty chest cold. Sunday I could barely breath and narrowly avoided going to the ER.

The counter top is poured and probably set by now. Limey is hoping to install it this weekend. He didn't get a chance to pour some samples so he just had a go with a colour he calls greyish greenish black. I'm crossing my fingers that it will look okay so we don't have to pour again. Right now the cost of the counter top is $30.

Chutney and Pickles

The concrete counter top will be finished some time this year (hopefully). In the meantime I've been playing around with some more canned goods.

I made 8 half pints of green tomato and apple chutney


















and 2 big jars of refrigerator pickles.























I recommend doubling the vinegar solution for the pickles because I definitely did not have enough to cover all the cucumbers.

I can't wait to can the rest of the tomatoes as they ripen!

Frost Warning

For tonight so I pulled all my tomatoes. I had about a dozen plants that I planted and then ignored all summer so I was quite surprised with the amount harvested.

85lbs of tomatoes.

















Is this about right for a dozen plants in zone 3? If I watered and fertilized would I get more?

The Sink

Has arrived and it's perfect. The counter top will be poured soon.

Mmm Chocolate

I have never had a sweet tooth. I've always preferred salty snacks to sweets. This all changed with my pregnancy with Izzy. I drank a gallon of sweet iced tea a day and baked (and ate) batch after batch of cinnamon buns.

Even then I still would not touch cake. Then one fateful day a friend came over for supper and brought with her a beautiful chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. I thought "blech cake" but had a bite because that is the polite thing to do. Well that led me to shoveling bite after glorious bite of chocolatey goodness into my mouth.

I was hooked so of course I had to try and make one myself.

I found a great sheet cake recipe over at Allrecipes. The only changes I made was switching from all purpose flour to cake flour and substituting apple sauce for the oil. You could make this in two round cake pans or make the sheet cake, and cut it in half. In between the two layers I put one can of cherry pie filling. The whole thing is topped with chocolate ganache.

To make ganache, bring 8oz of heavy cream (35%) to a boil. Remove from heat and pour over 9oz of chocolate chips/pieces. Stir until melted. Let cool for 5-10 mins and then pour/spread over the cake. Place in the fridge to harden.

Decorate as you wish or devour as is.

La petite fille dans le jardin.

Concrete Choices

While we are waiting for the sink to arrive, the decisions about the counter top need to be made.

Limey and his friend will be pouring a concrete counter top. I'm trying to match the colour of the concrete to the colour of my mirror. Originally I wanted a dark grey stone look but at this point I don't want to add another colour to the room.

Here's the mirror.

















It's kind of a silvery/bronze colour.

Here's sample A.

















It's not the right colour at all. It shows a non-glossy finish and it's been ground down a bit to reveal the "stone".

And sample B.

















This is actually pretty close to the mirror but it has a red tone to it that doesn't work at all. It has a glossy finish which I absolutely love but I don't think is appropriate for the room. Am I wrong?

If we wanted to get really fancy they could embed something green in the concrete (jade!) and throw in some fiber optics to make it glow but that might be overkill.

Bathroom Reno Update

We are still working on the bathroom. We had so many issues that it's taking a lot longer than expected. DIY is certainly interesting. The total cost for everything was about $1700.00.

We gutted right down to the studs. The insulation on the exterior wall had to be replaced due to mold. The entire plumbing system had to be replace including the um anti-gravity plumbing coming from the kitchen. Limey also did a little wiring as well as moving the toilet next to the tub.

Here's the original bathroom again.
















The gutted room. At some point in the past, a previous owner moved the door back to encompass the linen closet in the bathroom. They left the original door frame in. We removed the frame and the closet and all the faked out walls to make the room a little bigger.





















We put Aqua drywall in the tub area and regular drywall for the rest. The tub surround was pretty finicky but we did eventually get it to stick. The flooring which I didn't like before appears quite a bit darker in the room and is very close to my original pic. I'm very happy with it.





















Again because mdf beadboard panels are no longer available in Canada we had to go with the pine stuff. I'm actually glad we did. Although more expensive it looks a lot nicer.





















I was up until midnight painting the paneling with a brush. I don't fancy doing that again.





















Almost done now. This is the vanity Limey made out of our old bed. It still needs knobs, counter top and sink. We took back the green sink and ordered my original pick. It should be in late next week (hopefully). We have to wait until then before Limey can pour the concrete counter top. The ceiling is being worked on as we speak.





















I'll post new photos as soon as the bathroom is complete.