Lovely Lupines

On Saturday we took a trip up to Sugar Hill to see the lupines. There are several fields of these tall beautiful flowers in Purples, pinks and white. We took a wagon ride around two fields and poked around the Sugar Hill Sampler which is gift shop full of crafty stuff and yummy treats. They also have a little museum in the back of heirlooms, farm equipment, pictures and newspaper articles of the generations of family that owned the farm.

We picked up some goodies including some lupine seeds so hopefully we can have some in our own yard next year!

Smoked Salmon Pizza

I love quick, easy recipes especially in the summer so I thought I would share one of our favorite pizza recipes. This makes a really good appetizer if your having a party or we just like to eat it for a meal. I usually only make one pizza and use the leftover topping for bagels the next morning.

Ingredients:

Two 12 inch store bought parial baked pizza crusts

Extra virgin olive oil

Pepper

8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature

1/2 Cup finely chopped shallots

1/4 Cup drained capers

2 Tablespoons chopped fresh dill

Juice of 1/2 one lemon

3/4 pounds sliced smoked salmon

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Drizzle the crusts with olive oil, season with pepper and bake for 10 minutes. Let cool slightly.

Meanwhile, in a meduim bowl, combine cream cheese, shallots, 2 Tablespoons dill and lemon juice.

Spread cream cheese mixture on the crusts. Top with the smoked salmon, remaining 2 Tablespoons capers and 1 Tablespoon dill. Cut into wedges and enjoy!

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a frog..

A frog????

No, it's Muddy Dog!

Not bird, nor plane, nor even frog.

It's just little ol' me,

Muddy Dog.

Mad Scientists or Destroyers of Worlds?

My children that is. You see at least once a week I come across some concoction that my children have made. Usually when I think that are playing nicely together while I try to get something done I then come across something like this:
I have no idea what that flourescent color came from...

Or this:
Apparently the stuffing of some poor unsuspecting stuffed animal was used for this one...



Or sometimes it involves a whole bottle of shampoo and a bar of soap while I think they are bathing they are actually mixing together whatever they can find in the bathroom cabinet.
Now I am all for my children exploring, creating and experimenting and I try really hard not to squash thier need to mix things together just to see what happens but when it ends up spilt all over the carpet or involves emptying a whole brand new bottle of my favorite Bath and Body works handsoap (which has been recently discontinued) I freak out a bit before reminding myself that, maybe because they were able to do "experiments" they could grow up to become the next scientist to find a cure for disease.

Or it could lead them to blow up the house.

But I have recently found several books to channel their curiosity for good instead of evil and under adult supervision this summer we will do some exploring together.
Outside.
Far away from the carpets and my favorite handsoap.

Some Daily Inspiration

"And when it rains on your parade, look up rather than down. Without rain, there would be no rainbow." -G.K. Chesterton

Welcome to the lake

For several years Dom and I have discussed putting the boat in a marina so that we would get more use out of it because quite honestly, trailering a boat is a pain in the butt. Finding a good ramp with adequate parking isn't easy and timing is everything as far a getting a space and waiting to put the boat in and pull it back out. But dock space can be hard to come by and pricey so we put in on the "someday" list. About a month ago we drove by a marina with a sign that said "dock space available" so we stopped by to check it out. We decided on the spot to go for it.

Along with our dock we get a little chunk of land where we put up a screen house, added some patio furniture and a little grill and voila, our own cozy little home away from home. We also have an electric hook-up, cable and water! It is kinda funny because we are part of this whole new little boating community now which is just little screenhouse next to screenhouse and some people really go all out with their set-ups- TV's, bars, grills, refrigerators, etc. There is also a little campground, bathhouse, and gas dock as well as boat maintenance and storage.

So we are going to try it out for the summer and see if it is worth it. Of course the gas prices have put a little damper on our fun. Luckily we filled up the boat at the end of last summer so we are good to go for the first part of the summer. We spent our first official weekend up there this past weekend getting everything set up and finally getting out on the water. It has been hot and humid all weekend and we even went swimming despite the fact that the water temp was still pretty cool, just barely 70 but as hot as it was it felt good!

So this is the view of our little space as I was standing on the back of the boat.

The kids were sitting inside but they scattered like cockroaches when I pulled out the camera.

And here is the view from inside our screenhouse

looking out at the boat. I hope to get more pictures of a wider angle so you can see the rows of screenhouses. It started to rain so this is all I got yesterday.

Maybe someday we'll be able to afford a real house on the lake but until then this will do pretty nicely!

And here is one last picture of the girls playing in the water when we went swimming off the boat. They were having a blast cracking each other up!