We are not experts, this is just what we did and we liked the result. It’s one of the easiest cheeses to make as long as you get the right ingredients.

1 Quart of half and half or other light cream…Pasteurized is fine, but NOT ultra-pasteurized.  If it’s UP, it will say so on the bottle/carton.  I found some at Fresh Market, I’m sure Whole Foods has it, and if you have a raw milk source…I’m sure that would be amazing..haven’t tried it yet. For the record, we did make a batch with half ultra-pasteurized whipping cream and half regular pasteurized milk, and it worked, but didn’t perform as well.

1/4 teaspoon of Tartaric Acid…NOT Cream of Tartar.  Locally, I’ve been told All Seasons Gardening and Brewing carries it.  We got ours from a cheesemaking kit we had forgotten about!  Some people like to make it with lemon juice, but we decided to stick with what our cheesemaking book told us.

So don’t you like how both of the ingredients involve me getting all bossy about what NOT to get? Do you know how easy it is to typo MasCRAPone? Yeah, I thought so. Moving on…..

Get a double boiler going and heat the cream until the temperature reaches 185°.  Add your Tartaric Acid, whisk, remove from the heat and pour into a sieve topped with moistened layers of fine cheesecloth or butter muslin. Let cool, and refrigerate covered for about 12 hours.  Best used within a week…Enjoy!!

Yum.  I added fresh mint to one batch and it was nice, but not as minty as I was expecting. The cheese overwhelmed it a bit. (Yes, I actually have mint right now..crazy).  Experiment with flavors you like and have fun.

I can fix this without even leaving the house. I loathe rug mats/pads. I know they are a necessary evil with fine rugs, but for a $14 Target rug…Hell NO.

I can’t take credit for this idea…I saw it somewhere years ago…maybe Martha?

Whip out some silicone caulk (you can get squeeze tubes if you don’t want to mess with a gun.) This is the waterproof stuff used in bathrooms etc…I chose clear because, well, it’s clear and less noticeable. Even though it’s on the under side, I’ll know it’s there. Call me Stevie Jobs. I digress.

I used a spreader because I buy them in 10 for a dollar packs, but a piece of cardboard or even your finger will work too.

Hit that baby with a bead of caulk that zigs and zags like Heather Locklear’s drive home and then smooth the bead with your tool of choice.

The point in spreading it is to keep it smoother underfoot and to adhere better to the fabric.  Just don’t smoosh it in too deep.

I go to put it in the bathroom and it’s too damn wide.  Figures.  The kids and puppy have been trashing my rug at the front door, so how about there?

OK, so not a total waste.  I still need a bathmat though.

Recaps for previous years here:  Year One, Year Two

Around the house:

We got rid of the dining room chair rail.

I built a temporary patio/firepit.

I made an ass for myself.

Hosted a huge Halloween Party.

We’re always switching things around in the furniture department.

I seemed to cook a lot of food this year.

We contemplated chickens, but opted instead for a puppy.

I talked about my bedroom wishes (NOT THOSE) but didn’t follow up. I did indeed buy that Home Depot drop cloth after all, so now my mattress on the floor issue is gone.  Yay for $30 solutions! I also got new night tables off Craigslist I never showed you.

Otto has decided he must be the supermodel of all my interior shots….every time I’d try and take a photo, he’d settle himself right into the shot.

Yes, that is the Monopoly Man trophy you see. I NEVER win, but managed to pull one out over the holidays so it’s finally my turn to proudly house the trophy…until I lose the next game.

Elsewhere:

We had a big travel year, and while in New England, I had my heart broken at Brimfield. I seem to have better luck within my budget on my local flea excursions.

We hit up the local Rennaisance Fayre.

Had a big sale.

Doesn’t look like we got a whole lot done compared to past years.  But it felt like a busy year…oh yeah, WE BUILT A TREEHOUSE!!!!  And it took a long time.

We still haven’t painted the interior, and are beginning to wonder if we really need to. I realized after the leaves fell that I could finally get some decent shots of it so you can see how it relates to the house a bit better.

In summer, the treehouse is almost completely obscured by foliage….but now, it’s quite naked!

The sleeping bunker/level two building plans are on hold to address some more pressing needs around the ranch.  Namely a pantry, to keep the dog out of the foodstuffs, and if all goes well, a real bathtub.  I always thought we’d do the half bath first, but the lack of proper bathtub in the house is starting to become more and more important to both of us.  The CC has been playing soccer on weekends and as he limps home stiff and sore…he’s starting to want a good soak as badly as I do.  Time and money will tell.  I’ve been pinning ideas for it here.

As for which outlet I should choose to sell my finds? There’s pros and cons to all of them and if I can manage it, a hybrid of the options might be best.  Maybe an Etsy shop for smalls and E-bay for big pieces? We’ll see…I’ve actually been pretty busy this winter redoing some dining chair sets for other people.  Once I get my last set finished and out the door..it’s time to start selling again.  Hope everyone is looking forward to a good 2012…I love the optimism January’s clean slate can bring.

Because we are nerds, I got something very exciting (to me) for my birthday awhile back.  A meat grinding attachment and a sausage stuffing attachment for the stand mixer.  I know, some gals get excited about a pair of Louboutins for their birthday, and I get excited about meat processing.  We are a high class crew over here.

Modern Thrifter sent me this apropos vid that I had forgotten about completely.  Perfecto!  If I can only have Kramer’s flair whilst grinding meat, I will have achieved great success in life.

I’m a Ruhlman fan, so there wasn’t any way I wanted to tackle my first snausage without his input.  While we didn’t have the fancy commercial gear he has, we soldiered on.  He’s got more about it here. The second book is also highly recommended and it’s pretty serious.  Meat dudes in the know.  The CC is suitably impressed with them and their scientific approach.

BTW, you can’t work in volume for this stuff, you’ll need to have a scale to measure ingredients by weight.  Sausage making and pastry actually have more in common than you’d think.

For our first attempt, we decided on a pork and sage pesto sausage.  In looking at recipe ideas, a classic pork/sage sausage and a simple garlic sausage recipe were combined by using my sage pesto which has garlic, sage, almond and salt.

We used this recipe as our guide.

Everything we’d read told us how incredibly important it is to keep the ingredients cold.  We chilled the garlic and pesto and chopped the meat while a tad bit frozen, and then returned to the freezer for further chilling. The white wine stayed chilled before adding as well.

While the seasoned meat was chilling, we had our casings soaking (these were hog).  Then we rinsed them through.

Then we ground the meat into a chilled bowl.  Despite attempts to remove sinew while chopping, we had to stop and clean the blade about 4 times to remove the clogging sinew.  Maybe there’s an art to avoiding the issue we rookies need to look into.

Then the ground meat is mixed with the paddle blade of the stand mixer and put back to chill.  Once chilled, add your liquid (we used sauvingnon blanc) and chill again. Then it’s time to stuff!  Beware: the following photos can be offensive.

Food Porn!!  I did warn you.

My camera battery started to wane so I used the phone to finish up the process.

We sauteed one to see how it would hold up (raining out, so no grilling).

That is one. ugly. chubby.

But, a tasty one!  The Things loved it too, so we cooked up some more for dinner!

While these were not perfect, we felt good about our first try. I think I could get more aggressive with the other seasonings, but the salt ratio was perfect.  Our snags were a bit chubby, which is a common rookie thing, so we’ll have to get the hang of feeding through a slimmer sausage. When they are overstuffed, the skins don’t hold up to cooking so well, obvs.  But the freshness and smooth texture was unlike anything we’ve ever bought.  No more crumbly, dry sausage!  I wonder how they will hold up to freezing.  Time will tell.

I can’t wait to make all sorts of other varieties.  Next up, I’ve promised the things an apple and maple breakfast sausage.  We reserved some of the sausage un-stuffed to use for our Thanksgiving dressing.  I’m thinking of adapting the Pioneer Woman’s dressing using our sausage in place of the Italian sausage.

Lots to cook this week for the holiday, so if I don’t make it back…Happy Thanksgiving!

What’s been happening is a mad scrambling and stuffing of pockets, “Oh, I don’t have any/enough/big enough pockets to get all these accessories into!” and when he’s sniffing and circling, there isn’t time for that sort of flapping about. I decided to make us a couple of aprons prepacked with anything we might need for an outing.

I picked up these contractor aprons to use at the Sale.  I think they are $1.99?  Not that I have anything against Ace hardware, but I thought it might be more fun to make it a bit personalized.  I printed a Vizsla silhouette onto t-shirt transfer paper and ironed it on.  I mistakenly thought that the background was a creamy color, but it was just on the screen and the image was clipped.  Instead of totally covering the Ace logo, I just ended up with the silhouette on top of it…Oops!

But, I decided I actually liked it.  It stays for now…I’ll consider it a happy accident!

Ready and waiting for little bladders on the move.  Wanna see him again?

About 6 weeks ago, I saw an ad on Craigslist that got my attention.  A former flea seller was looking to unload a few boxes full of primed rattan/wicker birdcages.  Boxes full?  Really?!  When I asked how many he had left, he said he’d sell me the remaining 29 for $40.  He was clearly over it.  Dealio.

So first things first, I had to lose the matte primed finish, so I decided on glossy black and gold.

So what am I going to do with these, you ask?  Well, you know that I’m a crazy bird lady, so that’s a given.  I have a few feathered ravens, but those peeps ain’t cheap, and I have many cages to fill.

Time for paper crafts (again).  I downloaded some clip art (my favorites came from here) and printed off some creatures on a vellum cardstock.  By printing them on vellum, the translucence of the paper allows the image to ghost through to the other side, so you can still get the idea from almost any angle of view.  It was the best way I could think of to make a 2-D figure work.

Once trimmed out, they look like this.

Then I threaded some fishing line through them and hung them from the top of the cage.

I think these guys are going to be a fun addition to the forest,  as well as the buffet table.  I might explore snakes and rats and bats…but for now, I’m liking my birds.

Last year we cobbled together a lighting situation that I am determined to improve upon for round two. We thought we’d have installed some low voltage lighting on the trail by this year, but the treehouse kinda sucked all the energy and resources for such a project.  I saw this project below and wanted to do something kinda like it, but with a slight twist.

via eighteen25

I loved the idea of creating a big “moon” in the forest with bats affixed to it.  When I discussed this brilliant plan with the Things, I was immediately shot down as Thing One said, “But there’s already a moon.  It will look like Tatooine.”   I countered that it might be cloudy, and wondered since when has a touch of Star Wars EVER been a problem around here?!  For proof, go here.  They relented.

I ordered a 24″ yellow paper lantern to act as the moon and I already had some of these LED battery powered mini-lights.  The less extension cords out there, the better, so I’m hoping if I group a few of the lights in the big lantern, it will give off enough light for impact.

 via Just Artifacts

To test my crafty plan, I happened to have both a small yellow and a white paper lantern up in the attic.  They are a little worse for wear, but at least I could get an idea of how it will look before the big one comes.  I can use them in other parts of the party as long as they are high enough to hide their flaws.

I used a bat template from Country Living, but it was too big for a folded piece of 8 1/2″ x 11″ paper, so I ended up freehanding them, and just looking at the template for reference.  I used 80# black card stock.

Here are the “test lanterns.”  I’m excited about how the big one will look in the forest…I think it’s gonna work!  As you can tell, the dining room is officially, Halloween central.  I think we’ll be eating at the breakfast bar, or outside for the rest of the month….

The cushions were not cushions anymore and had dry rotted….ew.

I had some green velvet that I liked with the chrome…so it was showtime.  I had to start from scratch with the cushions.  Nothing salvageable there.

And now they will be available for someone to enjoy.

and just a few other items that will be available….

That’s all for today…I hope some of you can make it!  Looks like the weather will be outstanding..phew!

I believe I might have mentioned a barn door recently? Well, we didn’t do all that well documenting the door construction, but you’ll get the gist. We did get the Tractor Supply hardware we had mentioned before.

The CC basically took the same siding used on the treehouse and nailed it to a frame he built to size, so that when the door is open, it won’t cover the window strip.  Instead of using the brackets that came with the door hardware to hang the box rail, we mounted it onto our cantilevered beam that houses the bucket pulley.

The CC nailed up a couple of temporary support brackets to aid in installing the big beam that will house the hardware.

We mounted stops to keep it from sliding off into the forest….

We are still deciding about floor guides.

Having a proper door makes it feel much more cozy and homey inside…paint coming soon I hope!

Bad shot.  Inside view…a handle to slide it shut and the bottom beam wrapped in flashing….

We’ve been starting to add some more minor details to the lair……

Ahoy!!

Thing Two made his own sculpture that he wanted to incorporate into the treehouse, and by pure luck, it fit perfectly between the beams as a shelf.

Which now is home to his slingshots and ammo….

When the hammocks aren’t in use, they hang up in the corners.

We are slowly adding shelves to gain some much needed storage for the stuff they want up here.  We can’t let them keep snacks up here b/c the raccoons would break in and trash the place (our raccoons can remove bungee cords from garbage cans-crazy skills).  Bottles of water are OK though.  Games and other activities now have a place.  The fans hangs up high when not in use to keep it out of the way.

It always helps to keep track of time.

We are resisting any outer hardware for the barn door to give it more of a “secret door” feel…by putting your fingers in the grooves, you can pull open the door without hardware.

More shelves are going up, and hopefully we have time to paint inside soon before the weather turns cold.  For new readers, previous posts on the treehouse can be found here.

via Zipper 8 Lighting

Same principle here, but too feminine for my Things.

So I thought smaller, tighter circles might give it more of a fishscale over floral vibe…so I punched out LOTS of little circles…this was just the beginning.

Gluing.  Small circles.   For FIVE AND A HALF HOURS.  Taking into account the breaks taken to feed people and other tasks…it took me WAY longer than I thought it would.  Just as well I love these little people.

Speaking of, Thing One helped me with the design.  He requested a stripe scenario with the silver at “the equator” of our globe, so I like to think I took direction well.

I might have opted for a solid, or an ombre effect, but this is their lamp and I want them to have input and ownership over their space, so stripe it is!  I started to worry that using card stock would block too much light, but I wanted the stiffness of the heavier paper and decided to risk it.

Well, once I hung it…it looks kinda like a disco ball!  Oops…or not!?  Hey-o!  Things like to disco!

It is not really bright enough for general lighting, but it is really great mood lighting/nightlight which might work out perfectly here.  There are other lanterns and such in here….

Of course, right when I finished, SFAS aired and I saw Orb-lando’s DIY wire pendant and well, that would look so much better in here.  THANKS Orlando.  I was happily discoed for a few hours.  We’ll see what the Things say on the matter.

BTW, I am really digging season 2…loving her vintage choices, and well, everything else. I’m so pleased to see a show like hers doing well.  Long may it last.

Where was I?  Yes.  We have a lamp that looks like a disco ball!

Next on the horizon?  Well, things are heating up around here….barn door installation, The Flea next weekend,  and THE SALE…and all the prep leading up to said event.  I’ve got to start shooting items for your previewing pleasure!