a fresh steele

Sunday, March 18

What can you do to help?

My sweet girl, Dixie, is a Golden Retriever. I believe I won the lottery when I found her and I am rewarded everyday with her unconditional love and attention. I never realized just how social one becomes as a dog owner in the sense that on every walk I go on I have at least one encounter with another dog owner or just a dog lover walking. I hear time and time again, "oh! I had a Golden Retriever when I was growing up and Buddy, Rover, Millie, fill in the name of your pet you grew up with here, was absolutely extraordinary!" I am both blessed with the affection they share towards Dixie and happy to hear about all the stories they have from growing up with a dog.

Luck of the Irish

1. Sheer Dress / 2. Tory Burch Necklace / 3. Tory Burch Bangle

4. Anya Hindmarch Glitter Clutch / 5. Kate Spade Sandals

For St. Patrick's Day this year, I wanted to put together an outfit that I would love to wear to celebrate. Green clothing has not always been the best choice of color for my skin tone. So with gold, navy and touches of green I will be set to celebrate the Irish holiday without the fear of getting pinch!

Happy St. Patrick's Day,

Thursday, March 15

I've Done It!

Well after many months of sadness and disappointment about not having Facebook in order to sign up with Pinterest... my clever and quite smart friend said, "You can sign up with Twitter and you don't have to Tweet a thing....". So here I am five hours later delving into the world of Pinterest and loving it! I feel like I am frantically putting together the ideas I have had for many years all onto one board.

At this point I have only pinned two items... but it's a start and I'm having a feeling this'll be a late night!

So with no further ado...

Happy Pinning,

Tuesday, February 14

Happy Valentine's Day

I would like to wish all my readers a Happy Valentine's Day! I hope you'll be able to enjoy it with someone/something you love.

The picture above is actually the card I sent out to my friends and family for Valentine's Day. Since I did not get it all together before the winter holidays to send out a card then, I thought why not for Valentine's Day?! I looked online on many of websites (minted.com, snapfish.com, shutterfly.com, finestationary.com) and I could not justified spending nearly $4 a card! So, after finding the perfect font at 1001freefonts.com I created this card in Microsoft Publisher, printed, stuffed, addressed, stamped and sent out. The key to this mini DIY project was patience.

Happy Valentine's Day,

Saturday, February 11

Listening to Books

My daily commute to works gives me about an hour of time in the car to listen to the radio or drive in silence. When the commercials seem to never end of the radio I have found that audio books are a great solution. I am fortunate enough to have a great set of parents who spend a lot time in the car themselves to get audio book hand-me-downs!

Since the end of November/beginning on December, I have been listening to a number of books on CD. I love just about any murder mystery/drama/conspiracy theory novel out there and will read anything by Nelson DeMille, John Grisham, Tom Clancy, Michael Connelly, Dan Brown, James Patterson or Emily Giffin. With all those authors and genre of books I believe I am pretty well set for those long commutes that await me every morning and afternoon. I want to share my most recent reads/listens with you and give recommendations of more books on CD for those long (or short) commutes, where ever you might be headed.

Tuesday, January 17

Downton Abbey

When the opening music starts I cannot help to get excited on what is going to unfold next at Downton Abbey. From the moment I heard about this show from my sister-in-law I could not get enough. I watched every episode from Season One 3-4 times. I was thrilled when Downton Abbey returned earlier this month and was delighted to hear they won the 2012 Golden Globe for Best Miniseries. I highly recommend this show to anyone looking for a new series to follow. Many of the episodes are available on the PBS website to watch.

A fun link I found on the PBS website lead me to a Quiz for "Which Downton Abbey Character are You?" I cannot lie to say I was proud my answers resulted in the character: Mr. Bates "You are Mr. Bates, Lord Grantham’s valet (Brendan Coyle). You are a patient, kind, salt-of-the-earth type. But sometimes your self-righteousness can threaten to engulf you."

Check this schedule for Season Two and your local PBS channel to view Downton Abbey.

Happy Watching!
Kady

Monday, January 16

Triangle Quilt

Last fall the newest member of my extended family was welcomed to the world and from the minute I heard about his arrival I wanted to sew something up for him. I searched and searched through blogs and books and just could not make a final decision. Many many weeks later I found the posting on how to make a scrap fabric triangle quilt and within hours I was cutting triangles. I used my scraps from the bed caddy project to make the triangle quilt. In addition to the quilt I made a quick bow tie from the Prudent Baby site tutorial to add a little spunk to the finished project. Here are some pictures of my progress throughout the project.

Don't Judge a Book by It's Cover

Just when you think everything is in place you find something that can be placed elsewhere. After a major winter cleaning I decided to put all my cookbooks in my kitchen cabinets instead of being on display on my living room bookcase. After all the cookbooks were nicely put away in their new home I was left with a semi-empty bookcase that needed a major face-lift.

Before Picture (Taken with an iPhone)

The cookbooks in their new home.

Initially, I had all the books arranged by color to keep things pretty. The colorful arrangement that worked before was not going to work with all the cookbooks in their new home. I had a bunch of mismatched books and chatskis on my bookcase that was quite the new eyesore. Then out of nowhere came the memory of a blog posting on The Precious Little Things in Life blog I read regarding bookcase arrangements. While an article in Real Simple started me on organizing by color that blog posting gave me the inspiration for my current arrangement.

Cake Balls 101: Part Two

Disclaimer: Please work with me here as I am learning how to explain in writing the process of making cake balls. The last time I made cake balls, I timed the process to give you an approximate "cooking time". I made 108 cake balls and it took 5 hours over a period of 3 days. Day 1: Bake Cake, Cool, Combine with Icing & Refrigerate - 1 hour Day 2: Scoop and form cake balls into balls & Freeze - 1 hour Day 3: Dip cake balls into candy coating and decorate - 3 hours

Cake Ball Making Instructions by Kady:
1. Bake cake according to the directions on the box in a cake pan of your choosing.
2. Let the cake cool completely before transferring to a mixing bowl.
3. Crumble the baked cake into a mixing bowl.