Odds and Ends

My tail was dragging yesterday...consider that the ends. We arrived home from our Fourth of July celebration after midnight, but then were up at our usual hour (before 6:00 a.m.). I took an afternoon nap, but never really got into high gear yesterday. Let's just talk about the odds, shall we?

Odd #1: Last week I received a very nice email from Sean who was writing on behalf of Addiction Foods, a fully rotational holistic pet food line out of New Zealand, known for their uniquely nutritious proteins like brushtail, kangaroo, venison and eel. Sean informed me that Addiction Foods was founded in 2002, and proudly family-owned. They are the only brand to offer a dry pet food with salmon certified by the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch "Best Choice” program. He offered to send me some samples, and, well, who am I to turn down free stuff? Said free stuff arrived in the mail yesterday:

Inside were three packets of their Salmon Bleu dry food along with these nifty little collapsible water dishes. I suppose there are cats who would enjoy the water dishes, but mine aren't among them. Give them good old toilet bowl water any day of the week. But I digress.

The water dishes will go to some doggy friends of mine, who will have a greater appreciation for them, I'm sure. Then I poured some of the dry food into the kittys' treat bowls. Smitty gave it a sniff and a lick and then said,

Silly Mom...cats do not eat on demand. And what is this "bleu"? I specifically requested gorgonzola. 

They nibbled at it a little later on and pronounced it acceptable. Cats also do not gush. Anyone with cats will know this. 

But here's the best part: You don't have to go all the way to New Zealand to get it (unless you live there, of course). Here in Oregon, you can find it at Animal Crackers Pet Supply in Corvallis. Their website is under construction, but you can find their address and contact information at that link I've given you.

Odd #2: Also in the mail yesterday was a "Kitty Garden". As you know, we're trying to make the catio as comfy as possible for our furriends. To that end, they have their own potted catnip, and I'm going to provide them with a garden of edible grass. Here's where we start.

The "garden" is a little pallet about 6 inches square and made from what appears to be particle board. Classy, no? And would I provide anything less for Smitty and Sadie?

Inside are these compartments, each with a pellet of peat moss.

I removed the netting from around the pellet and then replaced them in their respective compartments. Then I poured 3 ounces of warm water over them and waited ten minutes. (Cue Final Jeopardy music.) 

Ding! At the end of ten minutes, I had something that looked like raw brownie batter.

From that, I extracted about a teaspoon of "soil" from each compartment and then mixed in the seeds. Wheat, oats, rye, and barley were provided. Mine ended up kind of mixed together in all the compartments. I stirred in the seeds, and then covered them with the reserved soil.

From there I am supposed to mist them every day, but I'm using my tried and true method of covering the containers until the seeds germinate. It creates its own little terrarium, and watering to maintain the moisture becomes unnecessary.

Supposedly, they will germinate in 4-6 days. More later.

Odd #3: I'm making the Bee-utiful quilt using my own scraps, although I did purchase some of the coveted honeycomb fabric earlier. Nevertheless, I was going to need something for the quilt back, and so I've been perusing the internet off and on searching for "honeybee" or "honeycomb" or "bees". (This quilt has proven so popular that the supplies of "Bee Creative" by Deb Strain literally have all been snapped up.) I found this yardage in an Etsy listing, and I think it will be just perfect for my quilt back. It also informs my color choices for the scrappy quilt top. That arrived in yesterday's mail as well. This seems to be a mailbag post, doesn't it?

Odd #4: It was a CSA pick-up day yesterday, and lo and behold, we were given those two little apples you see on the left of the image below. Cool! Aside from melons, fruit isn't generally a part of our CSA shares. These apples were noted to be soft and good for applesauce. Well. You know I always lean to the sugary side of life, and so I got the bright idea to make an apple crisp for two. And since I had an odd pear rolling around in my vegetable crisper, I used that too.

I perused my cookbooks to figure out the amounts "for two" and came up with this combination. 

For the fruit: two small apples, one average pear mixed together with 1/4 teaspoon of lemon zest, 1 tablespoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice and 2 tablespoons of granulated sugar. 

For the topping, I used 1/2 cup of oats, 2 1/2 tablespoons of all-purpose flour, 1/2 cup of golden brown sugar, 4 tablespoons of butter and 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon. I let the butter soften and then mixed the topping together with my fingers. Then I put the fruit into a little baking dish and kind of molded the topping over the fruit. Then I baked it at 350 degrees for 35 minutes, and voila! Apple- Pear Crisp for Two. Yum.

Serve it along with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, and you have yourself a little bit of paradise for your palate.

Odd #5: My friend Karen sent me this little quiz from her teaching days. I got 11 out of 12 right. Want to give it a try? I'll post the answers tomorrow. Give it a go, and see how you do. Or don't. It's totally up to you. Not trying to boss you around, or anything. And thank you, Karen. It was fun.

Oddly, that's all I have for you today. Off to stitch now, but really, I'm just a little off, as you probably already know.