my favorites in august

 Here's a few things I enjoyed in August - 

It feels like I just struggled to find things to share that I enjoyed in July, and here we are at the end of August.  Bleh.

Little Fires Everywhere the book and the show - I finished the book and immediately started the show on Prime.  The book is much better, but the show is good too.

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The Great - I accidentally binged the first season and The Great is pretty great.  Hurry up season 2!

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Prime recommended Versailles after I was done with The Great.Very good but NOT light and funny like The Great.

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We changed our tv package and finally got access to Drunk History.  I don't think I've ever laughed so hard.

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Treated myself to a new face mist this month.

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educated - a really good, frustrating read.

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thai iced coffee 

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A flat of delicious blueberries!

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spending some time sitting with this.

Sunday Dinner - no bake cookie bar

This was a HUGE hit at Sunday dinner.  Everyone loved them and repeatedly asked me to make sure I had saved the recipe so I could make them again (soon).

I made these no bake cookie bars in a slightly bigger pan - 8x10 or so, to make it a bit thinner, which is our preference for bars like this.  You get more that way.

This is a good summertime treat as you don't have to turn on the oven - and who doesn't love peanut butter, oats, graham and chocolate?????

the power of orange and vinegar combined

I love cleaning with vinegar - it does a good job and it's cheap.  I decided to try one of the homemade cleaner recipes that are always floating around the internet.  I used this article for guidance although I didn't have any whole cloves or cinnamon sticks to add. 

I put my peels in a jar........

And added vinegar to cover.........

Let it sit for 2 weeks!

Pulled out the orange peels and there's my orange infused vinegar.

I added it to a spray bottle with some water.

 

And got to cleaning.

It works well and while it still smells very strongly of vinegar (of course) this is some orange there too.

Up next I want to try the lemon and rosemary cleaner - we used to have a rosemary plant in our garden, but I didn't notice if it came back this year!  Off to check.

book club - Sula by Toni Morrison

2020-24

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It was not death or dying that frightened him, but the unexpectedness of both.

They did not believe death was accidental - life might be, but death was deliberate.  They did not believe Nature was ever askew - only inconvenient.  Plague and drought were are "natural" as springtime.

"Being good to somebody is just like being mean to somebody.  Risky.  You don't get nothing for it."

Cookbook Cleanup 18 - Food

Book 18 is Food by Mary McCartney, another book picked up from Dollarama.

 

This is a book of family friendly vegetarian home cooking.  It's a toss up between what is more lovely, the recipes or the beautiful photography, of the food, ingredients, and family photography, including some photos from her famous family.

The table of contents covers breakfast and brunch, sandwiches, soups and salads, mains, sides and desserts.

I made 5 recipes from the book - 

Banana Muffins - super easy AND super delicious

Quick Breakfast Bowl - Yogurt, granola, fruit, nuts, honey - how can you go wrong?

You can't.  And you can customize it however you want.  So good.

Breakfast pancakes were a hit with all of us.

Arty's Chocolate Chip Cookies - always the best kind of cookie.

Choose Your Own Flavor Loaf Cake.  We chose chocolate.

I have to say that going into cooking from this book I was quite determined that this one would go.  I wasn't sure I could find enough recipes that interested me AND that the picky kids would eat, and also because I am determined to cut my cookbook collection down.  But I really really like this book, to look at and cook from.  It's staying and  I've got a list of what to try next:

 Hearty Quinoa and White Bean Soup

Sprout and Carrot Salad

Black Bean, Sweet Corn and Feta Tacos

Lip Smacking Minestrone

Cauliflower Cheese

Yummy Spicy Rice Noodles

Cookbook Cleanup results so far - Bookshelf - 10  Donated - 8

book club - The Proposal by Jasmine Guillory

2020-23

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"....wbat made it worse were the constant messages I got from society that women are weak, women should be afraid, women should settle for whatever they can get."

Good God, sometimes it felt like all of society was complicit in trying to make life harder for women.

Popsugar 2020 Reading Challenge

 I found a new reading challenge for 2020!

I have to be honest, I am not taking part in the library's reading club this summer. 

Keeping track of how many minutes I read at a time is not for me.  

So I was happy to finding a reading challenge with a list - and it's a very interesting list.

 

Read more about the challenge here 

snapshot - 2 new cookbooks

I treated myself to 2 new cookbooks last month - My Rice Bowl by Rachel Yang - I am so enjoying reading this!  There are many ingredients I don't know if I can find here, but I am excited to do some cooking out of this.

Over Easy by Joy Wilson - I started cooking out of this the day after it arrived and we are enjoying amazing recipe after amazing recipe. 

book club - Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis

2020-22

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Other people don't get to tell you what you can have!

Someone else doesn't get to tell you who you can be!

A goal is a dream with its work boots on.

You've got to believe in yourself and believe that you're capable of making changes to become whatever kind of person you want to be.

garden 2020 update

You guys, we grew cauliflower.  CAULIFLOWER!!!!!!!!

We planted too many tomato plants too close together - we didn't think the garden would thrive as it is.  The tomato area is a solid mass of plants.  We probably should have pulled some to make more room but let's see what happens.

The carrots are coming along nicely but we most likely won't have enough for a meal because the kids keep pulling them up to see how big they are getting.

The lettuces are going crazy too.  We have lots of salads and lettuce wraps and sometimes we just stand by the garden and eat lettuce.

BOOM.