Paint Party Friday - Spring Shoes

Welcome to Paint Party Friday! I have some spring shoes here for you today. The painting is done on brown cardstock (4 1/2" x 6 1/2") in acrylic.

Curious Item

So have you ever seen a Bluetooth bulb? It seems one of my nephews installed this in his bathroom when he used to live at home, so you can listen to music on your phone. Apparently it beeps whenever you enter the bathroom.  Kids will be kids but I have a feeling he must have lots of gadgets in his home nowadays.

Scribble Picnic - Boats

Welcome to Scribble Picnic 'Boats' theme! I'm happy with the way this piece turned out, boats at the harbour, if you will.  There is a hazy sunset in the background.  It's done in my sketchbook (9" x 12") in watercolour pencil, outlined with a waterproof black PITT artist pen.

Cake Frosting Recipe

One of my sisters bakes a lot of cakes for birthdays and so on.  She shared this simple recipe for her frosting.  Use lots of it, she advises, so you won't pick up the cake crumbs.  My daughter likes to bake so maybe I will have her try it as birthdays are coming up!

1 cup butter
4 cups powdered (icing) sugar
1 tsp milk
1 tsp vanilla
1/8 tsp salt

Dinner Out with Friends

Mozzarella Ball appetizer made in store

Charity Bread (on the left)

Tuscan Salad

Shrimp spaghetti pasta

We had dinner out with some friends recently at a restaurant chain called Scaddabush. Apparently their pasta and bread are made in store. They recommended their mozzarella ball appetizer with prosciutto and condiments as pictured. It was delicious as was the salad. The shrimp spaghetti was also very good, unfortunately their other pastas disappointed, maybe if they had more sauce.

They offer this 'charity bread', it is a focaccia bread and if you purchase it the proceeds will go to charity.

Sunday Sketches - Green Orchid

I was inspired to sketch a pale green orchid plant for today's Sunday Sketches. It's done in watercolour pencil outlined with a black fine point marker (3" x 5") on a random piece of paper.

Some Cruise Fare

Hummingbird

Low Carb

Sticky Toffee Bun

Two of my sisters were on a Caribbean cruise recently with another friend. They sent me these photos pictured above. I think the hummingbird was captured on their Barbados stop. One of my sisters is newly diabetic after being pre-diabetic for awhile. Her low carb meal of seafood chowder, stuffed mushrooms and a crab cake indicates she is trying to be careful of her diet which is not an easy thing on a cruise. My other sister was able to have that sticky toffee bun.

Paint Party Friday - Baby Merganser

Welcome to Paint Party Friday! I have a little art project to show you today. Sometimes I get these cute boxes from Shutterfly, containing cards that I order. Daughter L told me I should decorate the top somehow and reuse the box. I remembered I had some prints I had made of some of my art awhile back and chose this Baby Merganser duck that I had painted. It turns out I showed this for PPF in a 2013 post. 

Anyway, this leads me to our little project.  The box is approximately (4" x 5 1/2") so it was just a matter of trimming the photo slightly on one end.  I used a glue stick to affix it neatly atop the box as pictured.  Perhaps I can store some of my favourite ATCs inside, I used to make a lot of those small art cards.

Lemons

My sister who lives in California was gifted with these beautiful lemons from her neighbour's garden recently. She was going to make lemonade what else.

Scribble Picnic - Fairy

I'm excited to bring you my 'Fairy' themed piece for Scribble Picnic! It's done on brown cardstock (4 1/4" x 6 1/2") in acrylic.  Interestingly, when I started, the thought came to me 'what's the difference between an angel and a fairy?'  One important difference I remember is that it seems angels would have feathered wings like birds, whereas fairies have insect wings.  What would we do without search engines like Google?

A Little-Known Method

Recently I found out there is a way to know whether the food you buy is organic, conventional or genetically modified. As in the photo of my bananas above, you look at the 4 or 5 digit PLU code on the product. If the first digit is a '4' it is conventional, '9' means organic, '8' means it was genetically modified. Here is an article explaining it.  My bananas have code '4011' (the code is in yellow under the Chiquita name in the photo) which means it was conventionally grown.

The Bottle of Canola Oil

So I bought this bottle of canola oil the other day and had forgotten that this brand never has a pour spout, which results in very messy use as the oil always manages to drip over the side. I decided to email the company to suggest they add a pour spout and they very quickly sent me a thank you letter with some coupons. However, at this point I wouldn't buy another bottle without a pour spout. My friend S says she will take the coupons.

My friends thought I seemed to have a lot of time on my hands, but I felt an email wouldn't hurt. I was mad at myself for not remembering to avoid this brand due to this design deficiency!

And that's what's new around here, lol.  Happy Monday and welcome to the first day of Spring!

Sunday Sketches - Designer Purse

Welcome to Sunday Sketches! I wanted to do a spring-themed piece for you today with this 'Designer Purse' number. It's done on good quality peach-coloured cardstock (6" x 6") in acrylic.

Scoop

Kay had an interesting post the other day when she spoke about visiting the Nixon Presidential Library in California.  I didn't have a good opinion about Nixon as I only associated him with the Watergate wire taping scandal in the 70's. He championed noble causes such as the environment, cancer, gender bias, world peace in Vietnam and China.  Bill Clinton knew it as evidenced by the speech he gave at Nixon's funeral.

So have you heard about this new Scoop car pooling app that is now being used in the US?

They have a good video explaining a bit about how it works. It's hard to keep up with all the new technology these days. 

Paint Party Friday - Water Lily

This piece for Paint Party Friday in done in acrylic on good quality textured cardstock (6" x 6"). The lily is outlined with a waterproof black Pitt artist pen.

And the painting is green for St. Patrick's Day, how's that?  Have a happy one if you celebrate!

Roasted Brussels Sprouts

I roasted some brussels sprouts recently and thought you might like my most recent recipe:

1 kg brussels sprouts quartered

2 tbs olive oil

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1/2 tsp red pepper flakes

1/2 tsp basil

2 tbs balsamic vinegar

dressing

2 tbs balsamic vinegar

3 tbs olive oil

2 tbs Dijon mustard

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 pepper

2 tsp honey or diet syrup

2 tbs mustard

350F

bake 20 mins on a tray lined with parchment paper (or silpat silicone mat)

mix dressing in

Scribble Picnic - Lantern

The theme for Scribble Picnic is 'Lantern'. I decided to go with a lighted Chinese lantern here. The piece is done in acrylic on good quality textured dark blue cardstock (6" x 6").

Foundation Primer

My friend S told me to mail away for this free sample of foundation primer. It promptly arrived in the mail. I had no idea what a foundation primer is, but daughter L came home and said 'Smashbox!  I use foundation primer!'  She was quite welcome to have the sample, glad it won't go to waste! Apparently you put it on, then apply your eye shadow and it has this long lasting effect or something.

Take-out Eatery

chicken katsu burger

chicken katsu noodle

chicken katsu noodle in soup

taro chips with nori and salt

Daughter L insisted on us going to this take-out Japanese/Korean eatery called Fat Ninja Bite that she discovered. It is a small place, the food was delicious as pictured above. The portions are quite large. My favourite are the taro chips flavoured with nori (edible seaweed) and a dash of Himalayan sea salt.

In other news, I hope you survived the time change to Daylight Savings Time which happened in our area yesterday.  I was so tired at the end of the day.  We are expecting a snowstorm to start this evening and through Tuesday.  The good news last I heard was that it was downgraded from 8 inches of snowfall to 4 inches.

Sunday Sketches - Cake

Welcome to Sunday Sketches! This cake piece is done on good quality textured dark blue card stock in acrylic (6" x 6"). If I have it printed up as greeting cards they could be used for weddings or birthdays.  I'm very conscious of adding some depth these days so I decided to add the black background.

Wine Tour

Daughter L had a getaway with friends at Niagara on the Lake. She stayed at a nice hotel and took a fabulous wine tour. In addition to excellent and plentiful food and wine pairing samples, she learned so much. It seems the region is a wine micro climate similar to the wine regions in Europe. There is a concord grape that grows there naturally but they had trouble cultivating the fine grapes such as merlot, pinot noir, etc. They developed a grafting technique which allows these wine grapes to grow on the trunk of the concord grape vine. Now they export these quality grapes to the winemakers. In addition, there is a local winery that makes its own award winning and highly rated wines.

The nice part is that the hotel where L stayed left roses in her room each day so she saved them for me, as pictured above! She wants us all to go on this tour but I'm thinking I'd be drunk after tasting about 2 wines, that's me!

Paint Party Friday - Happy 6th Birthday

It's Paint Party Friday's 6th birthday! Here is my party piece, what could be better than a yummy cupcake! It's done on good quality textured pink cardstock (6" x 6") in acrylic. Thanks so much to Eva and Kristin for hosting all these fun years, it's incredible how fast the time has gone.

18 years in the making

I picked up this Stevia chocolate bar for 50c on clearance for my diabetic husband. It has a real coconut flavour. He says it's ok, of course he much prefers a real chocolate bar. Maybe he is not fond of dark chocolate.

Adam posted an interesting fact on Alexander Fleming the other day. Fleming, a biologist, discovered penicillin accidentally in 1927. I went to Wikipedia to learn more about this. It seems Fleming was studying bacteria and returned from vacation to find that one of his cultures had become contaminated with a fungus. He noticed the bacteria around it had been destroyed. He published his discovery in a scientific journal in 1929. However subsequent clinical trials proved inconclusive. The problem may have been that it was initially used as a surface antiseptic. Fleming kept trying but gave up in 1940 just at the time some chemists (Chain, Florey, Heatley) from Oxford started to research it for mass production using government grants. They devised the correct structure of penicillin and were then able mass produce it. The drug was used to treat wounded allies after Pearl Harbour in 1944. This led to mass production and distribution in 1945.

It was interesting to me that this miracle drug was 18 years in the making! It certainly required a lot of teamwork. 

Scribble Picnic - Umbrella

Welcome to Scribble Picnic! The theme this week is 'Umbrella'. Here is my piece in acrylic on textured purple cardstock (4" x 6").

Silpat Mat

Silpat mat

Instructions for use

I finally got a real silpat baking mat and I've used to to warm up some slices of pizza and it worked fine! I am very happy with the product so far.

I had problems using another no name mat.

Signs of Spring

Here are some first signs of spring captured in the neighbourhood last week!  My friend S and I went for a frigid walk yesterday but at least the cold weather alert had been lifted.  We enjoyed the last day of the free small coffees at McDonald's.  I am sure the employees will be relieved as it is a busy week when that offer runs.

It's the time of year when we receive and gather all of our tax receipts.  The deadline for filing is April 30, 2017.

Sunday Sketches - Cake

It's time for Sunday Sketches! This piece is called 'cake' done in acrylic (6" x 6").  It is on good quality textured beige cardstock. 

A new flavour

I noticed they have a new guacamole flavour of Doritos and decided to try it. It tastes very similar to their nacho flavour with a hint of guacamole.

It is freezing the past few days, maybe I will stay indoors today.

Paint Party Friday - Flowers

Greeting Card scan

Greeting Card Photo

Envelope scan

Envelope Photo

Welcome to Paint Party Friday! I did a flowered greeting card on textured yellow cardstock (4 1/4" x 5 1/2"). I started drawing mistakenly on the white envelope first, so I decided to post it as well.  I used a Pilot extra fine gold permanent pen for the outlines.  Unfortunately the scans don't do justice to the pinks I used.

I just had an idea to give this card to my friend on the occasion of her 60th birthday which happens to be today!

A Lovely Surprise

We received this lovely handmade card in the mail recently. It was from my sister and her kids who visited in January. They live in California. Her daughter made the card and it was signed by all of them thanking us for our hospitality.

Scribble Picnic - Cabin

Welcome to Scribble Picnic's 'Cabin' theme! This painting is done in acrylic on cardstock (4 1/2" x 6 1/2"), inspired by a photo I saw of the Himalayan mountains. I am happy with the depth it adds to the cabin piece.

Wow, it's March now.