Congrats to Sable

Eco goodness is coming to my house this week. I'm having a heat pump installed (the above ground kind). Overall, a lot less energy will be used (way less propane, but more electricity than our current system). We pay extra for wind powered electricity, so that is not so bad.

There will also be an air purifier and a humidifier added to the system. Hopefully my skin won't be so dry. Anyhoo, I'm excited.

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On the dog front, Sable was adopted this past Sunday by a really nice family. Here are a few pics of her hanging out.

PIF 3 & some sun

Here are the people participating in the double PIF. Thanks so much for joining me, it should be really fun.

Please email me your mailing address at "sdcatvegan [at] gmail.com", so I can send you your PIF loot. Note that it will take me a couple of months to make it. I'm slow, but steady.

Wingraclaire
Sal
Beastmomma
Tejolote
PirateWA
Charlotte





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I had to try this mango & coconut cake when I read about it a while back on Sal's (Alien on Toast) blog. Hats off to you, Sal, for sharing such an amazing recipe!

It was so good, that I've made it twice now. One of these days, the cake will last long enough to try the frosting recipe. The second time I added pineapple and it was even more fantastic. The mangoes don't have to be perfect, so if you get a blah mango, this is the perfect way to use it.

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Believe it or not, it's been really hot and sunny the past few days here in the Seattle area. Of course, we're now back to gloomy weather, but the sun bolstered my mood and I will survive until the next burst of sun.

Now that it is warmer, Kobie will be fighting me tooth and nail to stay outside all day and night until bedtime. Which is fine except when he is really hot and needs to cool down. Stubborn doggie! Here is a pic that I took through the window of him sleeping on the porch.


Tubs is pinning down Chippy so he can groom him. lick, lick, lick, bite. The nosy Judge is watching.

Tubs took off and The Judge moved in. Mostly so he can see what I'm doing. That's what a pesky photographer's assistant does.

Pay It Forward 2

A while ago, I had also commented on beastmomma's version of Pay It Forward saying I wanted to participate (and I still do :) ).

I really like her version of PIF so much that I'm going to adopt it.

She really opened up the possibilities of what you can do for somebody in PIF. It's not limited to crafting by any means, so have some fun and get creative. Really it is all about making a connection by doing something unexpected and nice for somebody.

I will "randomly" choose the first 6 people that say that they want to participate (3 for Guava, 3 for Beastmomma) that I will send something to (ok, so that might not be random, but that is ok...). If you're interested, just comment on this or the previous post saying that you want to participate. The number of people that you in turn choose is up to you.

1. You must be a person who wants to spread kindness and joy into the world.

2. You must be willing to leave a comment describing how you "pay it forward" or provide a link to your blog in which you describe your "payment."

3. If you want to participate you must be willing to do something unexpectedly kind for another person (or persons) within the next 365 days. For bloggers, it is preferred that you mail something delightful to folks who leave a comment on your site. An entire year to mail items is very exciting!

4. If you want to participate, please leave a comment on this post saying you want to participate.

Pay It Forward

This post is long overdue. I was selected in Pay It Forward (PIF) by the lovely Guava.

What is PIF? Basically, it a really good excuse to craft up a storm and send said crafts out to 3 other bloggers. Here is the flow:

Guava handcrafts something and sends it to me within 1 year. In turn, I make some crafty crafts and send them out to 3 people within a year. Those three people then make some crafts and send them to 3 people, and so on and so on and so on...

If you're interested in participating, add a comment to this post stating that you want to play. I will randomly select 3 of you.

The only qualifications are that you have a blog and you're willing to make 3 items to send out to the people that you select for PIF. You've got a year to do it, which is nice.

Not a crafter? I think it's ok if you bend the rules a bit :). UPDATE: I think baking is a craft (especially if you're wingraclaire). And soap making is too (who wouldn't want some Alien on Toast soap?). "Crafting" covers a lot of things, so do whatever you want. It's all good in my book.

So what am I into crafting? Just about anything. Lately I've been knitting a lot. Here is an ultra simple hand towel that I'm currently working on.

I'm also working on a cable knit scarf. I recently finished my first sock which was ribbed using a cable knit consisting of 2 stitches repeated many many times.

I make a yearly cat/dog calendar named Cattywumpus.

So really, you could receive just about anything... I promise not to send the super huge evil vampire zombie clown heads that I made out of papier mache a few halloweens ago.

Rewind to Indian Cooking, Fast foward to next week, oops, rewind to the present, then pause...

I just got back from my sister's wedding in SC. I flew out on a red eye, which was a huge mistake because I didn't sleep at all on the plane and was coughing and run down the whole time. My body is still trying to figure out if it wants to get sick or not, so I'll just drift around today like a zombie.

I, Bethany, hereby promise never to take a red eye without ambien. It may be the stuff of the devil, but it is better than feeling horrible for days on end because because of no sleep for 2 days.

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I have about a kajillion pics to download off my camera and sort through before I can post the teensy amount of food pics I took in SC. So I will post about some fantastic Indian cooking.

I bid for and won a cooking class at a NARN auction. My friends, Suzanne and Anthony, very graciously let us have the class at their home.

Here's Nitin, the super chef and our instructor, chopping away. He gets major points for being nice to me while I pestered him.
Here is the base of the curry bubbling in the pot. It was a game of sitting and waiting for the oil to make its way to the top after each addition of an ingredient. This bit of info is what I was missing in my curry making. Here is the final curry before the potatoes were added. My plate before I devoured it. All of the pot tending was worth it. I'm pretty confident, thanks to Nitin's excellent teaching, that I can make this on my own. Thanks, Nitin!!! I see this curry base becoming Mattar Tofu in my near future...

For dessert after the delicious Indian food, we had this very lumpy and lopsided cake that I made for Suzanne's bday, which was the day after the cooking class. What can I say, I need to practice at making layered cakes. I've been hanging out in sheet cake (that stays in the glass pan) and cupcake slacker land for a while now. Long gone are the days of the layer cakes with shocking blue frosting with little frosting cats prancing around on the top.

In the cake below, each layer is 1 batch of the toasted coconut cupcakes from VCTOTW. I was a bit nervous on how it would taste because of the lumpy dryness of it, but it was good. FYI - if you're going to use whole coconut milk while baking, water it down because that is what the recipe is expecting. otherwise, you'll get a lumpy looking dryish cake :) ~~~~~

I also made Suzanne some Nusseken, which I gave her on Sunday, the day after her bday. I got the recipe from Mihl. I used pecans instead of almonds (because I didn't have any). They reminded me of really tasty mini pecan pies. Everybody agreed either through verbal praise or by eating lots of them. Many thanks to Mihl for sharing this recipe.

I only remembered to take a pic just before the last 1/2 piece was eaten. I promise that I dipped both sides.

(side note: I only used 1/2 cup + 2 tbs of margarine in the topping instead of 1 cup + 2 tbs)

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Here are some pics of The Judge and Sable playing.

Almost off the ledge.
Boo hoo hoo! quit head butting me!
Are you ignoring me? One big head butt that starts at the neck...
and works its way down Sable's leg...
Until The Judge's head is on the floor and Sable is using him for a head rest. Oh, the life of a dog.