An Everything Day

Good morning, my friends. It's a welcome stay-at-home day. After being out for the past three days, I'm happy not to be going anywhere today. That doesn't mean I don't have anything to do. There's plenty. I need to pick another bucket o' weeds, and I have a single housekeeping chore. We found cherries and apricots at the grocery store yesterday, and so I'll make my annual Apricot-Cherry Upside-down Mini Cakes today...always a favorite.

But let's back up to yesterday. As I mentioned, we had a big grocery shopping trip ahead of us. It was good to get that finished. Back home, I did a little cleaning in the kitchen, and then got outside to deadhead the hydrangeas. It had me working where the Edda clematis is, and so I was able to get a better picture of that.

With the gardening finished for the day, I spent some time on the second "Joy in the Ordinary" block. I'm catching up on these. One and one-half done. Two to go.

It was mid-afternoon by the time I was able to make it to the sewing room. There, I put in another hour on my "Vintage" art quilt. I'm far enough along that it's starting to look like something now.  Here's your peek. 

When my hour was up, Smitty wanted to know when we're going to put pink pajamas on the next cat.

And so, I couldn't really finish my day without getting all the cutting done. I should have time to finish May's pink cat today.

When I went back upstairs, I found the kitties chain-napping in the afternoon sunshine. I'm told that napping in a chain like this keeps the warm flow moving along the surface of both cats. Or something like that. I might not have a good understanding of the physics involved in this positioning.

For dinner last night, I tried a new and interesting recipe. This is Shake and Bake Chicken Thighs with Parmesan Peas.

Here's how the recipe was described in the NYTimes:

Crushed shredded-wheat cereal perked up with spices creates a super-crunchy coating reminiscent of the "Shake 'n Bake" of countless childhoods. Here, it works so well on boneless, skinless chicken thighs that you won’t even miss the crispy skin. For a twist on the classic beloved side dish, buttered peas are showered with Parmesan cheese.

Okay, so I'm game. I bought the bite-size unsweetened shredded wheat. I weighed out six ounces, and then just used my hands to crush it up inside a zip-lock bag. It was pretty easy to do that way. More seasonings were added, and then...shake the chicken and bake. It was easy and tasty. I wouldn't say it tastes like the "Shake 'n Bake" of my childhood, but it was tasty in a different way. We liked the nice crunchy coating.

It's a NYTimes recipe, and so you won't be able to open that link unless you have a subscription. Here's a screen shot from my Paprika app. Mine took a little longer than the original 20 minutes to cook, and so I've added five minutes to the cooking time. It could even use five more minutes.

All right. So I've already given you the run-down on the day's activities. Mike is just now getting out of bed, and so I suppose I'll go make some breakfast for the two of us. There's much to do and time's a-wasting.