Recipe Wednesday: The Best Salsa You Will Ever Eat.

My husband won't eat vegetables or anything green, except for green beans and peas. That's it...just green beans or peas. No salads of any kind, no avocado, no cucumbers, no green onions, or any onions for that matter. Green peppers are a no go, and not even so much as a sweet pickle.  He says he's allergic. He's not really allergic, but when the wait staff look at him like he just landed from mars because he wants his burger plain it's his way of joking. He's getting better, since we've been married I've gotten him to expand his diet of Coca Cola, multi vitamins and Arbys. He now eats raw spinach, a little lettuce on a sandwich, and hummus with peapods. He even told me that last week he ordered a club sandwich at a business lunch that had the usual fixings and he really liked it. That means he ate a tomato and lettuce! YAY! Oh, but he did say no to mayonnaise. He hates mayonnaise! Anyway, he is really trying to broaden his horizons and I'm very proud of him. I know for most people it doesn't seem like much but for a guy who was raised by his single dad that cooked a steady diet of meat and potato's these are big steps. (His dad hates Italian food...who hates Italian food!) Well, with this progress a really big one for him is this SALSA! He loves it!

The recipe comes from a friend of mine that I went to high school with. Her father had a vacation home in Scottsdale Arizona so she spent a lot of times out there and has taste for Southwestern food. I'm not really sure where she got the recipe, maybe she made it up, but it honestly is the most perfect salsa I've ever eaten. It's not really hot, so if you like a hot salsa you certainly could add jalapenos or green chilies, but it's just a very good basic recipe. 



3 Large tomatoes 

1 small green pepper

1 small sweet onion

2-3 cloves of garlic minced

2 limes (just the juice)

salt & pepper to taste

Finely dice the tomatoes, pepper, and onion. Mince your garlic, juice limes over veggies and add salt and pepper to taste. This keeps for a few days in the fridge and makes a lot. I usually make this when I do chicken enchiladas and use some of the salsa inside the enchilada.



One of my husbands co-workers brought us these beautiful yellow tomatoes from her farm.







CTBB Tuesday: Womb Chair Inspiration

After my post last week about coveting a Eero Saarinen Womb Chair (despite the awful name "womb") I thought I would try and find a more affordable alternative for CTBB, that's Champagne Taste on a Beer Budget Tuesday. If you have a few thousand you should be able to get an original. If that's not in the budget around $800 will get you a nice replica. Unfortunately I've only seen one that was less expensive and it was in the $400 range but the colors and fabric were bad...really bad. I don't think this is the chair to cheap out on fabric with!

Origianl Womb Chair designed by Eero Saarinen for Knoll





This Ero Saarinen Style Womb chair and ottoman in white is from LexMod and on SALE for $798 (reg $1600)



Monday Makeover: Halloween Lampshade

To give a spooky edge to a lampshade black cardstock is your best friend. It's amazing how many strange things you can find on google images! I just googled mice silhouette and bam...there you have these little guys just begging to make a lampshade their home. I printed them on regular printer paper, cut them out and traced them onto black card stock then cut that out. A little tape and that's it! You can see them when the lights off but at night they really light up well! I think bats would be great too!

It's friday and I'm going to assault your senses...

This may be one of the greatest video's of all time...not in a Michael Jackson's "Billy Jean" kind of way, more in a "what did I just see, did she just say don't slap me?" kind of way. By the way... you're welcome.

Have a great weekend and I hope you don't have to have a meetin in the ladies room!
-Shelly

Hot Mess to White Hot, Dining Room Table Makeover!

This is my inherited dining room table. She's very traditional, she's old, she's seen children grow up, and many grandchildren, she's been the place for pancakes and birthday cakes. She was even set on fire once at a party my grandparents had. Apparently a candle that was under a ceiling vent burned down a little too quickly only to catch the table cloth on fire. A helpful guest dumped the punch bowl on her! She has a small blemish from the fire...OK, it's really a medium blemish but a dinner plate covers it. She was also once like Michael Jackson, much darker in her youth. Solid cherry but my aunt lightened her up in the 80's. She was passed to another aunt and eventually to me. Only the bench and one chair survived. To say she's been road hard is an understatement! But I think there is new life in the old gal yet. I have big plans for her, starting with a paint job.



Nevermind all the "decor". I'm ridding myself of a rustic adventure I took when I lived in Arizona. Some things will get makeovers, some thing will be given away or Craigslisted. The Windsor chairs will be replaced with something clean and modern eventually. Of course I would love these, or these, or these!

 Oh yes, and this is Pippa the Poodle.

I first primed the old girls legs.

Then the top. I used a small fine roller that you would use on doors and kitchen cabinets. She got a couple coats of semi-gloss paint.

I plan to paint the bench and make a cushion with a few pillows. I really doubt the bench will stay with the table. I'd like to get 6 chairs and possibly move the bench over by the front door.

For now the bench needed a little padding as it's very uncomfortable. I'm still looking for a fabric I like. The quilt and pillow will be returned to their rightfull space after I get that figured out.

It just feels so much fresher in here. The dining room was a bit of a project dumping ground before.

The dreaded light fixture that's hanging way to high thanks to the previous owner. I hung these shell stars off it so I hate it a little less until we can replace it.

Recipe Wednesday: Stuffed Cherry Tomatoes

There are so many recipes for stuffed cherry tomatoes out there, but this is one of my favorite and it does not involved dealing with a piping bag! I'm not so good with the piping bag.

Slice off the tops of your cherry tomatoes, scoop out the guts with a teaspoon and add your filling. There are a million variations on this type of filling, but for the above tomatoes I choose thin sliced honey ham and thin sliced baby Swiss cheese. Any meat/cheese combo you like will do, just make sure to ask the deli dude to slice it thin! Mix a little yellow mustard and mayo together, I like a little more mayo than mustard but you can adjust to your tastes and spread between the meat and cheese. Roll and slice a little taller than the tomato. Than just cram your roll into the mater! Top with a sprig of dill or some other green....they need a little green...we all need a little green in our lives! One more tip, I put these on a grooved plate so they don't roll around, but if you don't have a plate that will work they will stay still by just slicing a tiny bit off the bottom of the tomato. Easy Peasy!     

CTBB Tuesday!

It's Champagne Taste on a Beer Budget Tuesday and Aunt Peaches has given a whole new meaning to "beer budget" with a little tutorial on recreating a modern masterpiece.

While I'm putting the dining room back together and trying to decide what to put on the table and maybe re-hang some artwork it got me thinking about my current chandelier. In a word, it's dated, in two words, it's ugly and dated, and in a full sentence, I can't wait to get rid of this THANG that is hanging WAY to high, and screams I live in the middle of America where if you want anything good you have to travel to a big city or order it on the internet...OR, make it yourself? YUP I'm seriously thinking about making a chandelier myself. It's not that the Tord Boontje Garland shade is so expensive, but if there is one that you can DIY yourself for under $5 it may be worth a try! Maybe it will look like a $5 shade, but maybe it will be awesome...lets face it, it can't get much worse. Ok, it could get a lot worse, but my current light fixture is just not my style.

First here is the beautiful Tord Boontje shade. Say that three times fast. I love that it's modern, yet feminine, and certainly very interesting. Plus it would look pretty sweet over my new white dining table!

Next I will show you my light...or the best photo I have of it...you don't really need to see more than this, and I also covered it with Halloween decorations last year....anything to deflect.

Hope to say goodbye to this thing in the near future! If you want to try your own Garland Shade go visit Aunt Peaches for the tutorial. I'm not sure if I'll try my own version of this, because honestly the real deal is not that expensive, but it is tempting!

Not bad for just a few bucks!