Another Snowy Day Here in Canada

 It's a winter wonder-land!!!

       The weather network has been calling for this 25 cm snow storm since Wednesday and at around 4 this morning we finally got it! As it stands we have about 2 feet of snow, the cars and windows and doors and sidewalks and roads are absolutely buried. All the schools were closed for a "snow day" and I didn't have to go into the church office today. Which means we have a full house here; mom, dad, my sister, myself and the birds. We woke up late, had a toast and eggy breakfast of sorts and have been chatting with my sister and niece in Winnipeg ever since- they have been living in this perpetual winter wonderland since before Christmas. SO if you're planning of visiting Canada right now, don't bother!

       I've spent the last few hours sitting at my kitchen table blogging, with my copy of Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray to my left and my fancy blue-willow china loose-leaf steeping mug to my right:

The loose-leaf basket is sitting on the steeping lid.. neat right?
Isn't it soo cute?

All Time Favourite 18th Cent. Novel <3

   Here are some shots on my front and back yards to show you the result of our current weather situation here: 

Snow up the North side of the house

Close up of the same window.. Covered in snow.

Backyard

Outside one of the backyard facing windows:
my moms handing basket is covered!

You might not be able to tell, but there are two Muskoka lounge chairs
to the right of the shed.. pretty much covered.

The bush and tree that separate our front yard
with our neighbour's yard.

The evergreen bush that grows in front of our house
- shot from the living room window-

The tree's that surround our backyard are
covered in beautiful fluffy snow.

There is nothing in the world more beautiful than the forest clothed to its very
hollows in snow.  It is the still ecstasy of nature, wherein every spray, every
blade of grass, every spire of reed, every intricacy of twig, is clad with radiance.

-William Sharp-

       I feel that Winter is a time for us to sit on our rarely used living-room furniture and gaze out at the beauty of a world covered in light; I feel a renewed sense of Hope. 

I hope you're reading this from somewhere nice and warm... as for me, I'm going to steep some more Jade Dragon Mao Feng and try to get through at least 100 pages of TPDG.

Drop me a comment or an e-mail and we can "talk about the weather" if you like ;) 

XOXO

C

A Little Taste of the Old Country...

Last night my mom pulled out one of her Italian recipe books, Italy al Dente by Biba Caggiano and we decided to go through it and look up how to make pasta for manicotti from scratch- which is one of our favourite things to do :) 

So we flipped through it and came across Biba's recipe for Tortelloni with Swiss Chard, spinach, ham and ricotta- or to us Italians- Tortelloni con Biete, Spinaci, Prosciutto e Ricotta. And we decided to try it out!

So my sister and I set to work making the pasta dough and the impasto (filling) and ended up with very tasty tortelloni for dinner.  From start to finish, it took us about 4 hours but it was soo worth it because there is just nothing better than fresh home made pasta. 

Here are some pictures of our delicious masterpiece.. Enjoy!

This is how it all begins.. 

Pretty Dough Ball :D

This is the way we kneed the Dough...

Make sure you wrap your dough in cling wrap (plastic wrap)
and let it rest for at least 20 mins before rolling

All the little Tortelloni in a row

Remember to graciously flour your plate or the pasta will stick and you'll  have wasted time and effort to end up with nothing but a giant gooey gluey mess.

A simple sugo finto (light fresh tomato sauce)
suits any pasta wonderfully

Keep an eye on your pasta when cooking, because if you don't stir occasionally, it'll stick together in a big clump or to the bottom of your pot.

Biba suggests that a large wide rimmed shallow pot is best when cooking this kind of pasta (along with gnocci, tortellini, capelletti, ravioli etc)

ooooo soooo shiny....

Its best to pull one tortellone out to test if its cooked enough.. 

Strain them a few at a time and dump them directly
into the sauce as its still simmering... yum!

This book was published in 1998

This is the recipe we went off of... FYI we Italians do not appreciate or endorse the replacement of prosciutto for "ham"... ugh!

Thanks Biba!!!!

If you're interested in knowing how to make sugo finto, here are some simple steps to help you out.  P.s you'll never go back to Ragu again! 

You'll need:

-Canned whole Italian tomato's (aka plum tomatos)- 2 cans with serve 4-6 people

-fresh garlic

-olive oil

-salt and pepper

-fresh basil 

Instructions:

-Crush your whole canned tomato's in a bowl with your hands, or put them through a manual tomato sieve or crusher. 

-Add a 1 inch wide circle of olive oil into a large skillet/frying pan and warm, add crushed and chopped garlic (minced or slivered) and brown- FYI if you burn your garlic, you CANNOT use the oil, it's disgusting! so pay attention to your garlic and don't have the heat on too high. If you don't like to eat garlic you can take it out after its browned, or replace the garlic with chopped onions (pay attention when browning onions too.. same grossness issue if they burn).

-Add your now squished tomato's and bring them to a simmer. 

-Carefully drop 3-4 medium or large size fresh basil leaves in the center of the pan and drop a tiny bit of olive oil onto each leaf (this helps infuse the basil further). --

once the basil leaves have turned dark, your sauce is pretty much done (you can also pull out the basil if you don't like to see green things lol) 

-Add your salt and pepper to taste and let it simmer on medium to low heat for about 10 minutes. 

-Stir and add your pasta

-The longer you leave the sauce on low heat, the thicker it'll become.  

-Keep in mind, the joy of sugo finto is having a thinner, lighter sauce with tomato chunks.

-Pull your pasta out of the boiling water and put it right into the sauce and toss it.  When you drain your pasta completely and it dries, it won't absorb the sauce as well. 

-The sauce will be ready to use by the time the pasta is cooked (although keep in mind that certain pasta's take a little longer than others i.e spaghetti versus tortelloni).

Anyway, thats my sauce- Hope you enjoyed my post... 

XOXO

C

p.s Drop me a comment, if you want the full recipe or just wanna say HI.. always look forward to getting an e-mail as well. So don't be a stranger! <3

ugh.. Sick again!!

I may or may not have mentioned previously that in December I caught a bad cold (see my post about Halls encouragement packaging), and that it dwindled out with a lame cough and then disappeared completely.  Well, last week this cold reappeared in my system and my cough has returned with a vengeance.  I had also been fighting cold sores previously to this cold and then once my cold came out, I had three big cold sores take up residence on the left side of my mouth. You might ask yourself, Is there anything worse than a cold sore?? I'm here to tell you that yes, yes there is something worse than a cold sore... three cold sores and the flu!!!

Apparently the cold/flu that's going around this season can last up to 100 days in your house if you let the germs circulate... As a result, none of your family members and probably not even your pets or house plants are safe from it. And 9 times out of 10, it's viral, which means that the doctor's can't even do anything for you.  That's right, you've just got to rely on your immune system to fight it off. Interestingly enough, I believe that I caught this cold again because my immune system went down while I was at home over the Christmas holiday... and right now I feel like I'm still waiting for it to reboot. Ugh!

All 4 members of my household- myself included in the 4- have had a run in with this annoying flu and we've been actively cleaning and sterilizing and airing out the house in order to rid our bodies and our surfaces of the germs. I don't know how effective it was but we all did feel better after getting rid of the stale sick air. The biggest issue that this cold brings is a suppressed cough that resurfaces weeks later and sticks around to keep you up at night and annoy you and everyone around you.

Sound like Fun?? I hope and pray that YOU dear faithful reader- where ever you may be- do not ever experience this cold.  Right now as I type, I am wheezing and coughing and hacking up a lung -figuratively- but I'm hoping that with expectorating, I'll be breathing easily soon enough.

If only I didn't hate cough syrup so much... Buckley's is disgusting although many of my family members swear by it and drink it straight from the bottle when they're sick.  I'll stick to my Advil Cold and Sinus Plus and Buckley's daytime/night-time cold and flu Pills.

Random question: if you've used the Buckley's pills before, have you noticed that during the first fever and chills part of a cold, taking the daytime ones (the yellow ones) makes you feel even colder and more fevered and shaky and gross?? My sisters and I have all had this experience with them... You're nose stops running but you feel even worse... Weird right?

By the way, it's January 16th and there is NO Snow here in the Southern part of Canada.. It's a lovely  blue sky day and 3 degrees Celsius... The grass is green and the ground is dry. It's absurd for winter!! The other day is was 13 degrees above zero, which was record-breaking for us.

Anyway, I've got to get back to reading but aim to post again soon

Ta Ta for Now!

XOXO
C

2013.. A New Year For Change.

       My cousin google'd "Ways to be a Better Person" and found a list of about 50 things... She chose the best 20 that suited her needs and I think that these ways might benefit all of us to be a better person for 2013 so I thought I'd share it with you:

1- Forgive those who have offended you, even if they are not sorry.

2- Thank those who have helped you, even if they never thank you.

3- Be kind to those you need nothing from. 

4- Care how stranger feel, even though they dont care how you feel.

5- Watch what you say and do and how it affects others. 

6- Never use lousy emotions to justify lousy behaviour.

7- Be the change you want to see.

8- Do good without anyone doing, when no ones looking and don't do it for the praise.

9- Let go of anger and don't use it as an excuse to act poorly.

10- Let go of selfishness by loving others as much as you love yourself.

11- Let go of self abuse and love yourself enough to love others.

12- Learn to love the loveless.

13- Accept that others have the right to disagree with you.

14- Accept your choices and actions and life's circumstances.

15- Tell the truth even if it hurts you.

16- Don't gossip. 

17- Give up something you love to help someone in need.

18- Care more about learning what's right than being right.

19- Great things take time. 

20. Let it Be.

          If everyone tries to make this change, we will all be better people and then society will be a lot better in general. My cousin suggests that you keep this list somewhere visible to you- on your fridge, on a wall in your bedroom, on your cell phone- and read it daily.  We can change the way we act and ract, if we work at these 20 changes even a little at a time.  If you recognize that you need to make these changes, you're one step ahead of the game and already have your feet pointing in the right direction. 

It isn't easy to make these changes but if you can, you will be greatly fulfilled and each small change will not only benefit you but everyone around you. 

So put your best foot forward and have a great new year!!!!!

XOXO

C

Dec 26-27 2012

Yesterday our crazy hammer-town received its post christmas gift... 3 feet of snow!
It snowed all day, and snowed all night and didn't stop til this morning. All the houses and cars and plants and Christmas lawn ornaments were covered!
Since my family is so busy for the christmas holiday, we usually post-pone our gift exchange/christmas morning until the week after the christmas festivities have ended. So yesterday my siblings and I went to the mall- because we're insane!- and shopped for one another.. we always like to take advantage of the boxing-week deals... I managed to pick up a few things for pretty cheap- dresses that would normally cost $150 reduced to $30, electronics all $100 off or more.. the savings were beautiful! But the chaos of the mall was the ugliest thing ever! My sisters and I observed that not only did we all look like little capitalist aunts feeding the machine of greed etc, but furthermore, if someone pulled the fire alarm we would be unable to locate or get near an exit. My brother was probably thinking that we'd be sitting ducks if there ever a zombie apocalypse was to break out. Gah!
Anywho we made it back home from the mall, over the treacherous fast blowing snowy drifts and through the un-ploughed streets after about 5 hours of boxing day madness... but our anger was yet to be quelled. After going out to Kelsey's for dinner, we wrapped up our preciously sought out bundles and put them under the tree.. then at around 12:30am, my sister and new bro-in-law left for their own home. They drove up a street to the next intersection, and got stuck trying to turn the corner. My bro-in-laws front tires had no tread left and he didnt have a chance to change them before the snow came... So at about 1am, we get a chilly phone call and a summons to shovel. So my brother and I dressed warmly and set off with the shovels to see about getting them out. My other sister came shortly after with boots for our married sister - she was in pointy toe pumps naturally and freezing in 3 feet of snow...
By 2am we were back home- we had pushed the car safely back into a parking space on the left side of the road and left it there. Then my sisters, brothers and father went out in my dads new car to the other house because my sister needed her meds and we figured they might as well sleep over so we could have our pseudo "Christmas morning" with them. Then I set to work changing bed linens and finding enough pillows to accommodate everyone and by 3am we were all nicely tucked away in bed.
Luckily, no one was hurt last night- besides my sister getting a little cut when we were wrapping gifts- and no frost-bite to be accounted for. We woke up this morning to find a tree full of gifts and the world full of fluffy white stuff.
Christmas miracle of the year I suppose :)
Xoxo
C

"Today for YOU a Savior is Born..and His name Is..

Christ the Lord... You will know it is He- For you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a major"

Merry Christmas to One and All!!!
Buon Natale a Tutti!!
Feliz Navidad a Todos!

Joy to the World!! The Lord is Come! Let Earth Receive Her King! Let every Heart, prepare him room!!

Good Tidings we Bring, to You and Your Kind- Good Tidings for Christmas and  a Happy New year!

Silent Night.. Holy Night.. Son of God, Love's Pure Light.. Radiant Beams from Thy Holy Face, With the Dawn of Redeeming Grace- Jesus Lord at Thy Birth!

Come They Told Me pa-rum-pa-pum-pum- A new Born king to See!!

O Holy Night, the stars are brigtly shining- It is the night, of Our Dear Saviors Birth.

He can turn the tide and calm the angry sea... He alone decides who writes a symphony.. He will take the time to hear a childs first prayer- Saint or Sinner Call and Always Find Him There! He'll Always Say, I Forgive.

Oh Come Let Us Adore Him- Christ The Lord!!!

The Newly Arrived Baby Jesus in our Family presepio (nativity scene)

  Merry Christmas  and A Happy New year!!

XOXOXO
C

Positive reinforcement from Halls..

My sister gave me a package of Halls honey-lemon cough drops to help me get through the dry cough my cold has left me with, and upon opening the package I was pleasantly surprised.

When I pulled out the first wrapped losenge, I read the following message.. "keep your chin up". That's right, my Halls was giving me some positive reinforcement. I thought this was the neatest idea ever so I took some pictures of the other wrappers I've encountered in this package for you.

Thanks Halls, for reminding me that I can overcome these physical obstacles that come with a cold :)

Definitely helped me feel better :D

Xoxo
C

P.s in case its not too clear, the first picture has the messages "you've survived tougher." And "you can do it and you know it". The second pic has the messages "march forward!" and "don't try harder. Do Harder!" . Cool right?