A New Year Begins With a Fresh Pumpkin Pie

Hi there everyone and Happy New Year!!! Hope you had a good first day of this New Year!!!

My day was relaxing. I finally cooked up that pumpkin I bought back in October. Had plans of making a pie with it in November but, it never made it to the oven. Neither did it make it to the oven in December.

But here it is...January 1st and that cute little pumpkin got cooked up.....sorry no pictures in it's original state. Here it is all cooked up. I put the pumpkin in the oven for about an hour. Took it out and let it cool down a bit. Peeled off the outside shell, then sliced it and scooped out the seeds and stringy stuff.

Then I put the pieces of pumpkin in the blender and added some water....it became very creamy (Thanks Biz for the blender). See the pie shell crust? I tried something new, using a spoon, turned it over and pressed down on the crust-ridge making a different kind of design. Think I will do this from now on.

In this picture is the recipe I followed from www.cooks.com , the pie shell and the pumpkin liquid all mixed together.

Here is a closer look at the recipe....hope you can read it.....tis very simple.

AND.....wah lah....here is the pie all baked up....my crust got a little burned, next time I will add some tin foil for protection.

Here is the end result of that pie....OMG...guys was it ever delicious....this will be my "go-to pumpkin pie" for now on. YUMMY I want another piece but my blood sugars might be too high tomorrow morning, so I will reframe from having another piece tonight.

New Years dinner was hamburgers, mushrooms and cheese, potato hash browns, beans and salad. Simple but delicious. Well, time to close. I am recording "The Taste" so I want to get downstairs and watch that. (gee, I wonder if I could get the taste on a spoon of what we had tonight...that would be a challenge.)

JP is sleeping right now, he had the day off. Sooooo, my schedule changes quite a bit when he is home. Can I say, I enjoy my evenings when there is just me and Kylie. Well, you have a great day and I shall post again when something exciting happens...or not. Cheers ~ Louise

A Card Makin' Kind of Day

Hi everyone of you!!! Hope your day went well. Watching "The Taste" right now. Instead of just sitting here and watching...perhaps I should do a short blog too. "I loves" these cooking shows, some of these people must have 50 recipe books in their heads. To just know what works with what and some dishes are just so elegant. Right now they are choosing the best and worst tastes....think Jay will go home. Nigella will be down to 2 cooks on her team. (Yep...he went home)

Today was a good day....I ventured out in the cold....the temperature in the car said 8 degrees. It actually felt comfortable. I must be a hardened Wisconsinite!!! The weather this weekend is suppose to warm up to 30 degrees....a heat wave!!!

So today I went to Betty's house for a card making session. It's always fun to get a few new ideas.

In the above picture are the 4 cards we made, 3 bird cards and 1 doggie card. The doggie card was my favorite...I need to buy a doggie paw stamp, must keep my eye opened for one. The bottom card on the right was an interesting card to make. We used "onion paper" folded it like a fan and laid it on the card...rather a pretty effect. Now where do I find "onion paper"?????

This was my favorite card....the little puppy. He was colored in with copic markers. Finally getting the idea of working and shading with the copics, but I really have more to learn. The card was then layered with pretty papers and stamped with the doggie paw. The heart was popped up with pop-ups to give it a 3-D effect.

I liked the colors on this card...blue and orange (are those Chicago Bear colors????) Oh my.....Packer colors are better. Hahahhahaaha!!! Well, it was a fun card to make. While at Betty's, I stamped a little boy playing football and will be coloring him with Bear Colors for someone I know....I am sure he will like it. Maybe that would be a cute card to put on my Etsy store. The little boy playing football in the colors of all the teams in the NFL....something to think about for the new season.

Well, tis time to close this blog and get something done before JP comes home from work. So talk to you later and have a good evening, whats left of it. Keep looking up and keep warm. Cheers ~ Louise