Eye for details

I'm up here all week living the country dream. I baked a Toftis to sustain me and I am being disciplined about writing. I will take breaks to strip the living room door, show the cottage, sand the bathtub, clean Ebba and other general detailing around the house.

Like this... We received our shades from Country (Rock n Roll-far out-smokem if you gottem) Curtains. It's gettin oh so homey around here. 

In the same box was also the curtain rod for the bay window so we can finally take the thumb tacks out of the pretty sheers that Rosemary sent and hang them properly. 

Last weekend we shoveled a hole in the snow where the patio is because the weather was too nice to keep us inside. We decided to enjoy the first Micheladas of the year.

Just get your basic Mexican brew, i.e. Tecate, Sol, Carta Blanca. Pour it over ice, squeeze a load of limes in it it. Top it off with bloody mary mix and a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce. It's delish.

It's a tasty thing but right now we are also on a mission. James has somehow figured out how to save money by drinking beer. We are going to brew it at home. Inspired by our seasoned home brewer neighbor Jody we are taking on our first batch this weekend. Up the road a bit is Pantano's Wine Grapes, a home winemaking store that has recently expanded to also accommodate home brewing. We got ourselves a pilsner making kit from Jerry - a kit that contains the tools and the ingredients to get through a first batch. 


And back to the Michelada. So you make the beer in a big bucket, right, but there comes a time, a week or so later, when it has to go into it's final destination. No, strike that, final destination is James' gullet. It has to get into a vessel where the actual fermentation happens. We went to our local beer distributor and picked up a bunch of bottles. Still full of beer. So here we are, step one of the process - empty the bottles. Cheers! Don't be shy, come by for a Michelada cause we need to drink 5 gallons of Carta Blanca before next weekend. Thank you to Dirk who has offered to lend us a set of beer bottles to start us off for batch #2. You just saved us a lot of hang overs.


My herb garden is doing awesome by the way. 

Cilantro. Almost enough to make pico de gallo. Can 't wait!

Parsley. Some went in to a broth I made last night.

Itty bitty basil. Enough to make a mouse portion of pesto.

Dill!

You're gonna have to enlarge this picture to see the chives. But they're there. Hm... I know they're there.

Sick of my starling pictures? Well toooooo bad. The sunnier it gets outside the prettier he is so the snapping continues.

Sunset seen through exceptionally dirty kitchen window. 

Big Green in Big Pink

The long awaited couch is here! Thank you Rosemary! First some befores just to remind myself how far we've come!!!

The couch arrived last night and it's been test driven already to 3 episodes of Damages, season 1. Our only complaint is that it's too comfy. It's hard to get up once you're in it. 

It's a Rowe couch with a custom made slip cover. Rosemary picked up all the fabric samples in Boston and we decided on this one. And now a big green velour monster has taken hold of our living room. Coze factor is in the red zone.

And cause we are so excited about it and it's such a perfect fit for the room and for us all we want now is a good rug, drapes, big crazy art for the walls, lamps, plants, aquariums, stuffed fish for over the fireplace (we would settle for a susaphone or a wagonwheel if anybody's got one)....!!! And the perfect accessory for any comfy piece of furniture. A cat. Named Todd.

Here's the start of the white bathroom. Go away pink -you are not wanted here.

We love Clintondale and feel so lucky to have found this place. Now we want more people to find it! We looked at both these houses before we found Big Pink and they are still for sale, you young house hunters you...

I call this one Cute Guy. It's about 100 years old and completely finished inside. It has a cool barn, about an acre of land and a great view of the mountains. It was a little too small for us and we also wanted a little bit of a fixer upper.

This is the crazy house across the street from us. The one with the domed ceiling in the dining room and the LED water fall art on the wall. She's a gutter for sure but a gutter in foreclosure and someone could make it a terrific house. It has about 4 acres of land and giant barn.

This is the back of the crazy house and the red barn that belongs to the house.

And this of course is the Gunk Haus and this is the first of many reminders - they open for business March 21st and it's gonna be great! Hope to see you there!

And finally an herbal update. It's still illegal in the United States of America. Oh - right my window sill herbs...

My thumb may be green but it's a little confused. I thought I planted 4 different kinds of herbs but 2 came up as Parsley and one as Cilantro. And one not at all. But parsley is good to keep around, grandma Anna Lisa thinks it cures just about everything.