Friday's Fences - 11/16/2012

 

It's silly, I know, but I'm always excited when I can find a cool fence to share with Friday's Fences! :)

This very rustic fence was along a walking path at the Holy Trinity Monastery. I can just imagine how labor intensive it was to build this!



Super Simple Cottage Cheese

I love cottage cheese! It is one of my favorite lunches, whether with whole-berry cranberry sauce (homemade of course!), pineapple or a beautiful home-grown tomato. By the way, this tomato is from my friend's garden...bartering milk for vegetables is good! ;)
I used to buy a lot of cottage cheese before I got my dairy goats and even afterwards for awhile because all the cottage cheese recipes I tried never turned out all that great and, honestly, they were kind of a pain in the, well you know, to make!! It bothered me though to have to buy a dairy product that I ought to be able to make myself so I pretty much quit buying cottage cheese, that and the fact that I didn't like some of the "stuff" that was in most of the commercial cottage cheese.
Then, awhile back, I had one of those ah-ha moments while making a batch of Queso Blanco. After draining the whey from the curds and before putting it in the cheese press, I thought to myself "Self, this sure looks like cottage cheese to me!" So, I made sure it was drained really well, added a little salt, broke the curds up pretty finely and stirred in some heavy cream. Voila, cottage cheese! It is a little different than commercial cottage cheese but it tastes pretty good to us. :)
Now, I'm sure some of my fellow cheese-making blogging friends have been doing this for years but I thought I would share anyway, just in case there is anyone else out there who hasn't yet had the light bulb go off.
Sharing with The Country Homemaker Hop, Rural Thursday, Farmgirl Friday and the Farm Girl Blog Fest.

Texture Tuesday - 11/13/2012

This lovely angel was at one of the graves at the Holy Trinity Monastery.
Joining up with Texture Tuesday where this week's theme is Dream.

Sunday Photo - 11/11/2012

I went to the fall Festival of the Arts at the Holy Trinity Monastery in St. David, Arizona today with some of the girls, including my blogging friend Marie at A Colorful World! It's always so nice to get to spend time with just the girls! :)
We had a great time, there were a lot of neat craft vendors, we spent money, had lunch, wandered the beautiful grounds of the monastery and spent some reflective time in Our Lady of Guadalupe Church. This lovely statue was in the church. I was really moved by her Hispanic/Native American style and I just couldn't resist taking her picture to share with you all.
Linking to Weekly Top Shot and Your Sunday Best.

Photo Art Friday - 11/09/2012

During our recent trip to New Mexico, our lovely hostess had a beautiful centerpiece of flowers and I just couldn't resist snapping a few pictures!

Linking up with Bonnie for Photo Art Friday where the prompt this week is lines. I figured the lines of text in Bonnie's Vintage Manuscript #2 texture oughta count! ;)

Cowgirl Cookies

I have been trying to come up with a new cookie recipe for the Farmer's Market and I wanted to create a Cowgirl cookie to complement the popular Cowboy Cookies. I made a variation of oatmeal cookies using Chai Spice and adding coconut, dried cranberries and vanilla chips. It was okay but didn't have the Wow! I was looking for.

Then, the other day, Tammy at Our Neck of the Woods posted a recipe for Maple Brown Sugar Granola Cookies that got my creativity going. If you haven't visited Tammy's blog yet, you really should, it's great! Oh, and I admit to totally stealing her idea of tying a ribbon around the cookies for their photo shoot. (blush) I'm always on the lookout for food styling ideas, thanks Tammy!!

These cookies have the Wow! with the addition of the granola and the Chai Spice and what Cowgirl can resist dark chocolate and dried cranberries? I know a certain Cowboy who even gave them a thumbs up! ;)

Cowgirl Cookies                **Click here to print this recipe**

1/2 pound (2 sticks) butter, softened
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 cups Baking Mix
4 cups granola, homemade or store bought (I used homemade)
1 1/2 teaspoons Chai Spice
1 cup dried cranberries
1 cup dark chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Beat together butter and sugars until creamy. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well. Add Baking Mix, granola and Chai Spice; mix well. Stir in cranberries and dark chocolate chips; mix well. Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden brown. Cool for one minute on cookie sheet then remove to wire rack to cool completely. Makes about 4 dozen cookes. I flattened each cookie slightly so they would spread out a little more.

Sharing with The Country Homemaker Hop, Rural Thursday, Farmgirl Friday and the Farm Girl Blog Fest.

Texture Tuesday - 11/06/2012

I'm joining Kim Klassen for Texture Tuesday this week for the first time. This picture is from earlier this year and I edited it with Nancy's free texture called Candy! ;-) Thanks Nancy!!

If you are interested in learning how to add textures to your photos, check out Kim's free Learn Textures In Ten Minutes class. It's geared to Photoshop but it works just fine using Pixlr too. A few things are different but not much.