Weekend Lens

Summer weekends are always my favorite, and this one was no exception. Our weekend in words and pictures- and in no particular order.

We attended some graduation parties. We went on a shopping trip at Mall of America. I was invited to an If:Table gathering and met some new ladies, had great conversation and tasted some delicious food.

Pete and I enjoyed dinner and cocktails on the patio of Vivo in Apple Valley. It was our first time here since it opened and we thoroughly enjoyed our evening.

I love this quote taken from Vivo's website:

"In a home, the kitchen is the spot where families gather, parties migrate, and food draws friends around. That’s also the spirit of Vivo kitchen: we are a place to come as you are. We use local, seasonal ingredients to prepare food that’s delicious without being mysterious.* Vivo translates as “life” — and that is what we want every guest to experience to the fullest. We look you in the eyes, care for you personally, and make you feel as welcome as if you are in our home. Because, for us, a kitchen is the heart of a home — and great hospitality is the heartbeat."

This reminds me of a book that I have read recently called 'Bread & Wine'. This was a fabulous book about the 'celebration of food and of the joy found in life around the table.'

I cut some lilacs to brighten up my 'officina'.

My favorite.

I made some chocolate chip pancakes for the boys for breakfast.

A new toy was brought home for Bella. 

(We finally found a brand that she won't immediately destroy!!)

A new bed was delivered for Tyler. 

(I may be a little jealous of his ultra comfortable, memory foam mattress. :)

We made a trip to Morelli's to purchase some ingredients for dinner

of homemade pasta

and the most delicious Italian Sausage Tomato Alfredo sauce {recipe here}

The pasta dinner and the gelato dessert had us reminiscing about our trip to Italy.

Good food, good conversations, good memories, good weekend!

salsa making

Yesterday I went to the Farmer's Market to gather my ingredients to can some Zesty Salsa. The Farmer's Market is just bursting right now.with all kinds of end of the summer goodness, which makes for the perfect time to do canning.

25 pounds of tomatoes, 12 green peppers, 40 jalepeno's,  24 onions

oh my

Salsa making is a ton of work with all of the chopping, cooking and then canning... but the end product is always worth it. 

weekend lens {a birthday & anniversary}

This past weekend was one of celebrations for us. Saturday was Pete's birthday. We started the morning with some homemade Mickey Mouse waffles per Pete's request. :) I haven't made these in years, but it was fun to dust off the waffle iron and whip up a batch of waffles (and a batch of memories of all our Disney trips from when the boys were little. :)

After Drew's afternoon hockey game, Pete and I headed out to the Wild game with a stop first for dinner at Shamrock's in St. Paul. This is a fun place to go to before the game and they even have green buses that run to the Excel for the game, so it saves time and the hassle of parking. :)

We had a great evening and I think Pete had a fun birthday. :)

Sunday morning was our 23rd anniversary!! I woke to flowers and coffee! Mornings don't get much better than that!

Pete even stopped and picked up a little breakfast for us. So sweet!

That evening we planned on making dinner.

While we were in Italy this past Fall we had so much great pasta. and we thought it would be fun to try and make some fresh homemade pasta back at home. So this past Christmas, Pete gave me a pasta attachment for my Kitchenaid mixer and we thought it would be a great day to try it out.

It was so much fun making dinner together and a perfect way to spend an anniversary.

The pasta making was a bit of work, but it turned out so good!!

We opened a bottle of wine we had shipped home from the vineyard we visited while in Tuscany.

I tried a new sauce recipe: Tomato Alfredo with Italian Sausage; which was fabulous!

The noodles turned out perfect and were so good! We will for sure be making these again!

Another great recipe:

risotto making

When Tyler was studying in Rome this past semester he taught himself how to make risotto and would make it for his apartment about once a week. He said that he kept experimenting with the recipe each time and the recipe just kept improving. I just love how he took this on because 1. Risotto is really difficult to make well; and 2. Ty doesn't really cook much. :)

Tyler wanted to make us a risotto dinner one evening before he went back to school. We picked a date that we would all be home and headed out to the grocery store to get the necessary ingredients on his shopping list.

He really knew what he was doing with the risotto and added some amazing flavors of garlic, tomatoes, basil, lemon juice, white wine and parmesan cheese. While we were shopping, he made sure to pick out the risotto and parmesan that were made in Italy. I loved this!

Risotto takes a long time to make and requires a lot of patience with continuous stirring.

I threw some lemon chicken in the oven to go along with the risotto.

The risotto turned out fabulous

and we were so into our dinner that I forgot to take any pictures, but Tyler had also invited one of his good friend's over to join us for the feast. So our table was full with people and food- exactly the way I love it!!

Seriously, I can't wait for Tyler to make this for us again!!

Christmas baking

The Christmas treats that I made this year to share with family and friends. 

{click on name of cookie to be linked to the recipe}

White Chocolate Cranberry Cookies // Caramel Puffcorn // Spritz Cookies

Snickerdoodles // Toffee Supremes // Gingerbread Biscotti

Sugar Cookies // Oreo Truffles // Peanut Blossoms

weekend lens {Olympics & pickles}

Friday night was the Olympic Opening Ceremonies and we decided to stay home, order some pizzas and spend the evening watching this on TV.

I made a fruit pizza for dessert to go with our 'Olympic and pizza' themed night. :)

Saturday morning we headed out to the Minneapolis Farmer's Market to find the things I needed to make dill pickles and dilly beans.

Organizing my canning supplies.

The big bag of pickling cucumbers.

dill

I haven't canned pickles for a few years- it is quite a bit of work, but it is always worth it!

While I was busy doing my canning, Pete and Drew worked on the Z.

And Drew took it upon himself to trim a tree that was taking over the basketball hoop. :)

I made the easiest rib recipe ever and they turned out amazing!

All I did was put some 'country style ribs' (no sauce or anything else) in the crock pot and cooked them on low for 8 hours. Then we thew them on the grill to char them up a little and brushed them with BBQ sauce.

So good and so easy!

We also had some great corn on the cob from the farmer's market.

It was nice to have a weekend at home that was quieter and to have time to do some of those extra things (like canning) that we have been wanted to do this summer.