Sweet Ninja

Work it Mr. Postman

What a mail day!

My pot holder came from Marmee Craft with a sweet Thank you card and very well coordinated business card. I love the chartreuse with the aqua trim!

Rick Rack in the "Valentine," color scheme from A Main Collection. I hoping to use this  as trim on  a sweet little dress for a cat or maybe a bunny. (Plush not real. As much as I'd probably enjoy dressing up my kitties I do realize they probably wouldn't enjoy it so I try to refrain.)

150 red and green buttons of different sizes from Charms Galore. The plans it that some of the larger ones will be used to attach  arms and lets to above mentioned plus animals.

And my first mix CD arrived from 62cherries CD Swap.It's mixed by Peta and I believe this is the coordinating blog. Here's her top ten playlist:

Top Ten Summer Sounds
1- The Andrews Sisters: Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy
2- Gypsy Kings: Bamboleo
3- Starship: We built this City
4- A-Ha: Take on Me
5- Dolly Parton: 9 to 5
6- Blondie: The Tide is High
7- Pseudo Echo: Funky Town
8- Van Halen: Jump
9- Kylie Minogue: Spinning Around
10- Umebayashi Shigerv: Yumeji's Theme (extended version)

I can't wait 'till summer so I can enjoy it the way it's meant to be!  Since it's snowing here right now...that seems a far way away.

Happy Weekend Anyway!

Feeling Hot, Hot, Hot

OK. So I think I've been posting too much about food lately. So today let me show you a cute little nugget I snapped up on Etsy.

This super sweet potholder is from Marmee Craft who also happens to have a great blog. She posts really regularly too which is nice.

It's printed with a gocco and uses rick rack,very wisely I think!

Raw Like Sushi

I wish! Fish ,or "flesh," (I know. How gross does that sound?) is not allowed on the detox I mentioned yesterday. So here's what I ate instead.

Cold tomato soup with chopped avocado

and peanut butter balls...which I'd eat any way. If you're thinking, "Hey, they look interesting" here's how to make them. I don't measure so just mix the following up in a bowl until it looks good:

peanut butter (or any nut butter you like)
raw oats
raisins
raw cocoa nibs (ok. so I cheated. I used dark chocolate chips. antioxidants right?)
a spoonful of honey or agave nectar

roll into balls

roll balls in shredded coconut

I like to freeze them to firm them up, but do what you like.

Detoxing can be difficult but this Pict makes me smile!

I like it raw

Raw food that is! Myself and several coworkers (and somehow I convinced the Mr. too) are doing a raw detox this week. I should say mostly raw because we did leave a little wiggle room, for things like soy milk.Today was day one and so far so good. Here's a pict of tonight's dinner.

Veggie wraps that were very tasty other than the Norri which we ended up pulling out of the wrap. The best part was the peanut sauce that was drizzled on top! For more, and better coverage of this detox check which Candy Penny who writes much more eloquently about food than I do.

Also very exciting we took a road trip up to RI on Sat to visit some of Bill's friends from college. Other than catching up with old friends part of this trip was to visit a small farm with alpacas. They were so skittish that I was afraid to whip out a camera and start flashing them in the face so here's a image of an alpaca that you can pretend is one that I saw.

I've been entertaining a fantasy lately of raising alpacas. My visit with the six alpacas we saw was educational but not enough so that I feel more or less strongly about this dream. Alpacas are apparently fairly easy to care for but spit stinking goo on you when they are mad. I fed and pet them but I don't think it was how they wanted things to go down. I'm pretty sure they wanted to stay a safe distance from us people but were torn when we were taunted them with their food dishes.

This little frame was also the home to several goats and sheep. When I asked the lady farmer which animals were easiest/ hardest/ most fun to care for her answer was the goats. She said they had the most personality and twenty-twenty hindsight might having her raising angora goats instead of the alpacas.

She showed us some clean roving and spun yarn that came from alpacas fibers which was pretty cool too. In the spirit of this trip I crocheted a scarf on the way to and from RI. It's made of 89% (ie. sustainable) and is soooo soft....and kind of purdy I think.

Silk Screen Sneak Peak

I love the silk screening class I'm taking at School Of Visual Arts in NYC. It makes me want to set up my own screening studio at home, unfortunately it can't be exactly how I picture it. Ideally I'd have it be in a sectioned of part of the barn so I can be closer to the animals while not worrying about making a mess. A couple of things that make this impossible 1- I don't have a barn 2- I don't have farm animals...YET...

Anyway here is a sneak peak at my first print which will be available in the Sweet Ninja Shop just as soon as I get some good photos of it.

Under the Weather

Besides being pretty busy all weekend I've also got a cold which  resulted in me totally ignoring blogland....sorry. Still feeling pretty crappy, but I wanted to make an effort. Here goes:

Our V-day meal (which we actually made on Friday because I had my silk screen class on Thursday) which consisted of homemade pad Thai with shrimp

asparagus with Thai spicy sauce

and mango with sticky rice

All very tasty and washed down with some Moet! The flavors really did bring us back to our honeymoon in Thailand, only four short months ago.

Bill knows I'm not into the cliche red rose thing so he did an awesome job by selecting for me this beautiful potted orchid. I love them because the flowers last so much longer than cut flowers. Plus they're just so pretty!

It sucks to be stuck at home but not really have the energy to do anything productive. So many ideas in my head but I guess  they'll just have to wait:(

I cho-cho-choose you.

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

Bill, thanks for being mine....forever.

Veggies and Stamps

Yay! I ordered a custom rubber stamp from RubberStamps.net (very reasonably priced) for the Sweet Ninja Shop. My plan is to use it to stamp the backs of cards and I'm sure it'll prove handy for other things too. Here it is:

Maybe not the cleanest image but that's because I dug up a crusty old stamp pad to try it on. I'll have to upgrade.

Also, I was inspired by my friend Marie to bake a vegetarian loaf. (Like meat loaf but with no meat = obscenely healthy) I made some spinach,mashed potatoes and an awesome mushroom gravy to accompany it. It was all very tasty and total comfort food in a don't feel guilty afterward way.

So the potatoes are the biggest pile on the plate! So what?!? Just look at those lentils peaking out of the loaf :)