Lovely Weekend and 2 new recipes

We had such a nice weekend, the weather was great, which we have had very little of here in the NW. As of last week, we had only had 78 minutes of summer so far (80 degrees or higher)
Dave and I cooked dinner together on friday night. A little steak and sauteed  blue cheese mushrooms (recipe follows)and some chicken kabobs It was delicious. The next day we went out to Seal Rock campground and had a crab boil with our friends.



Sunday Dave worked on hanging lights upstairs and I did research, then we went to Dave's Produce to get some Kalbi steak and we did more mushrooms and zucchini. I know that is steak twice in 3 days, but we share a little one, so it's not much.
I've been reading about low glycemic diets and I feel pretty excited about the whole thing. I haven't felt excited about a diet forever, if ever. But I have been on it almost 3 weeks and I have lost 12 lbs and I feel really good. Much less joint pain, more energy and a happier outlook.
Today I made these fritters, adapted from HERE. They are so good, you must try them, even if you are not low carbing...

Zucchini Fritters with Feta

2 cups zucchini, grated

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup chopped red onion, 

1 garlic clove, minced

2 eggs, beaten

1tbsp chopped fresh mint

1/2 feta, crumbled

freshly grated black pepper

salt

olive oil for frying

Put the grated zucchini in a colander, sprinkle with salt, mix and let stand for 20-30 minutes. Squeeze out any excess liquid. In a medium bowl, combine the zucchini, shallot, garlic, eggs, mint, feta and . Season with salt and pepper.

Heat the oil in a pan over a medium heat. Ladle spoonful of the batter into the pan for each fritter and cook in batches for 3-4 minutes on each side. Transfer cooked fritters on a paper towel to drain excess oil from them. 

I sprinkled them with chopped green onions and served them with fried tofu.

Blue Cheese Mushrooms

1lb mushrooms, crimini or button, sliced

1 tsp fresh rosemary, minced

1 tsp fresh thyme leaves

Olive oil

salt and pepper

1/3 cup crumbled blue cheese

Saute sliced mushrooms in olive oil until they start to brown. Add thyme and rosemary, cook a couple more minutes, then sprinkle blue cheese over them. When melty, they are ready to eat.


The pictures above were not taken by me, I am a lazy photographer. I put a link to them. My mushrooms don't have that much liquid, but other than that similar.

 I can"t figure out who painted this, but isn't it beautiful?
Edit** Here is a link to the artists website

Cloud-pocalypse

I painted 3 large paintings today, 30x40". I've been wanting to paint some serene skies and low hills, and I needed to paint something for a dear man who detailed my disgusting car. I hope he and his wife like one of them for their bedroom.
I adore painting skies! I forgot I liked it so much. As I painted today I was entertained by my son who was singing along to music in Paul Oswald's voice. If you know Paul, you know how funny that is. I hope he does not read my blog.
Anyway, we woke up to a day that looked like October, but the sun came out later and we had dinner outside. Turkey tacos. Also had a lovely weekend with Asher. See that little pirate giving me a cherry? Life is good.
My husband and son are working themselves silly on the remodel, but the framing is almost done and plumbing and electrical are going in. Sadly, the ceiling in our bedroom and bath cannot be higher after all, but my studio!!! has sort of a pointy high new ceiling, like a turret. It's going to be so lovely. Ryan made a space for Asher and Skylar and other guests to have a sleep in a built in bed. And my studio closet is twice as big as it was. Hopefully form and function will finally meet in there and it will be cleaner than it used to be.
So here are the paintings, as of this afternoon. They are farther along now. I am looking at them and deciding what needs to be changed. At one point Ryan and I were calling one of them Cloud-pocalypse because I went a little crazy with clouds.Also Cloud-maggedon. But that was bad.
Please don't pay attention to the messy pile of Fine Homebuilding mags on the floor and the big hole in the living room where the closet used to be. It's a remodel, folks. And Fine Homebuilding must be consulted fairly often.

How I adore this little boy

This is from a few weeks ago, but I have it as my screen saver, and I was thinking how much I love that little smile. That smile that is directed at me. He loves me. I love him. So simple, so easy, so sweet. How delightful it is to be a part of his life. I'm the grandma.

Pinterest

Still figuring pinterest out, but here is a link to my profile: http://pinterest.com/juliefillo/


I like cake.

http://pinterest.com/pin/14276140/

I'm letting music express what I don't have words for