Handpainted Whimsical Teapot Sets ~ Future Project

While seaching for Gracie's Tea Set, I found these darling hand painted whimsical tea sets.  They are really neat, I had actually thought about doing one like this for myself many years ago.  I think I will start keeping a eye out for and unusual tea set with lots of character and that is reasonably priced too!

Again I found most of these on Etsy ....  Michele Sprague Designs .... She paints more than just Tea Sets, check out her site and see all the beautiful hand painted pieces.



 





OMG..... These are so neat, so whimsical.  

I'm on a mission to find a teapot set and platter to make my own whimsical set.  

The inspiration of art!

La Bonne Vie

(The Good Life)

What a life to be able to grow up with animals, and space for many adventures.  

Here at the ranch in Riverside, thats just what it is....  La Bonne Vie!

  

    

Gracie and Mamacita (mamas)

She is a kitty, that shown up on our door step with her baby in her mouth, this is when we lived in town.  She was just a baby herself and she had a new born baby of her own.  We were able to nurtured her back to good health, we got her shots, and got her fixed, and moved her to the ranch.  She loves the ranch, and has been with us about 2 1/2 to 3 years now.  She follows Gracie around like a puppy dog.

Grace and Ace

This is her companion, he is eating her flower soup from a plastic spoon.  Everywhere she goes he is right there.  He is good protection and a companion for an only child.

The master mechanic, she fixing papa's bike.

  

       

Papa made her a bow and 3 arrows out of some branches of the willow tree.  Nana made her a quiver for her arrows out of some upholstery fabric and an old leash.  She is Brave...... all she needs is the hooded cape now, and she will be Brave, excluding the three little brothers!

   

Papa, Gracie and their horse Raider.  She loves to help groom the horses, especially Raider.   

Cheyenne and Prince Indys Ace have become good friends!  Hollywood and Sundance are alittle camera shy today..... but maybe next time they will pose for the camera, so you can see them too!

Vanilla-Coconut Pound Cake

Yield: 10 to 12 servings

Ingredients

1. 3 cups all-purpose flour
2. ½ teaspoon salt
3. ¼ teaspoon baking soda
4. 3 cups sugar
5. 1½ cups softened unsalted butter
6. 6 large eggs
7. 1 (8-ounce) container sour cream
8. ½ vanilla bean split lengthwise and scraped, seeds reserved
9. 1 teaspoon coconut extract
10. Garnish: toasted shredded coconut

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 325˚. Spray a 10-inch Bundt pan with nonstick baking spray with flour; set aside. In a large bowl, sift together the flour, salt, and baking soda. In a separate large bowl and using an electric mixer at medium speed, beat the sugar and butter until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.
2. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Alternately add flour mixture and sour cream to butter mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Add the vanilla-bean seeds and coconut extract, and mix well. Pour batter into the prepared Bundt pan.
3. Bake for 1 hour 10 minutes to 1 hour 20 minutes, or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan on a wire rack for 10 minutes; remove cake from pan, and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Garnish with toasted shredded coconut, if desired.

Notes

1. To create the garnish, drizzle cake with melted white chocolate, and top with fresh currants.

The Adventures of Gracie and her Pre K Classes Stuffed Dog Benji

Gracie came home from school this week with the her classes stuffed dog, named Benji. 

Each of the kids in her PreK class get to take him home for the weekend and take pictures of the things they do him.  Then they put their pictures of their adventures with Benji into the  

Benji's Adventure Book, and return Benji and his journey book back to school on Monday.

So the journey began with Benji and Gracie spending the weekend with nana and papa at the ranch.   After breakfast, the morning started with Gracie helping groom her horse Raider.  

Gracie and Benji sitting on her horse Raider.     

Gracie takes riding lessons, and one day she will be able to ride him on her own.  This is her

big guy/big fella, as she calls him.  He is a Quarter Horse.

Then in the afternoon, Gracie and Benji made dog biscuits for her dog Ace.  

 Benji just flipped over the making dog biscuits and the smell they were creating in the kitchen.  

He thought it was a great idea to make them for Ace!   

Ace was so excited over the dog biscuits that that he was smelling, that papa had to help Gracie give him his first treat.   He just couldn't control the puppy in him!

                                                              1 3/4 cups flour

                                                        1/4 cup bacon grease                    

                                                   (heated slightly so it's liquid)          

                                                        1/4 cup peanut butter                                       

                                                    1/2 cup beef bullion water

                                                     2-3 pieces of cook bacon

                                                     (crumbled, small pieces) 

                                                                      1 egg

Mix ingredients together by adding flour and bacon bits to a large bowl, then in a small bowl beat the egg, add the peanut butter, bacon grease and the warm beef bullion water, this will cause the peanut butter to loosen up.  Then add this mixture to the flour, stir until all mixed... knead the dough into 

a ball, then place in a large ziplock bag.  Cool in the fridge for half an hour or so and roll out onto a floured surface... and then cut the dough into shapes:

As you can see we used dog bones and dog paws.

    

Bake in an oven at 375 for 20-25 minutes.  

Remove when the edges of the treats are crispy and golden.  

Allow the treats to cool, feed to your dogs, & stay hungry!

Note:  

I took 2 cups of water, put in a sauce pan and added 2 beef bullion cubes and then, 

boiled it down to a 1/2 cup of beef bullion water.

Diaper Babies and Diaper Owls

A dear friend and I decided to make some diaper babies for another dear friends baby shower recently.  It was a lot of fun making these diaper babies. 

 You can probably guess which one I made if you have followed my blogs...... 

why of course my favorite color..... PURPLE !

Then a couple more friends decided to make some diaper owls for the baby shower..... they did such a great job making the diaper owls.  

They put a face on both side of the owls..... Now all the instructions out there on the internet are for one side faced owls. 

These are the internet sites that we used for our inspiration and instruction....

Instructions or Tutorial for Diaper Owls

 

Instructions or Tutorial for Sleeping Diaper Babies
make sure you type in this code... V=PeJZ6wwVBOY