My fabulous DIY project

So I have pondered, complained, scoured craigslist, and stared blankly at the spot above our guest bed that is missing a significant element. A headboard. I wanted something cheap (it IS the guest bedroom), but fabulous.

So I first thought about buying a headboard off craigslist and painting it. That was going to cost about $100. I continued to stare. And ponder. And stare. And then it struck me, I can do this-on the cheap!

I happen to follow this amazing DIY blog called YoungHouseLove that will motivate even the laziest of project do-ers (like myself) to grab a paint brush and a hammer and get to work. I decided I wanted drama, in the form of color for my headboard, and this post gave me the exact inspiration of the color I wanted to add to my life the room.

Click here for the color inspiration

I went with a greener color called "Caribbean Green" and lurved it. (lurve=love for all you non YHL'ers).

Before:

hello fat dog.

After:

hello fabulous!!

For $30 it was a complete DIY success! We went to Home Depot, cut the trim according to our likings (for ~$15), and the baby quart of Caribbean Green paint was another $15. We simply taped of the measured section to paint and then cut the trim accordingly. Home Depot even has these amazing sawing stations too, to make life easier, seen here:

*Of course, it helps to have a super-hunky husband to help with all the cutting and hammering man-jobs.*

So unfortunately while I was waiting for the paint to dry I got the itch. And then this started to happen in our kitchen. Which then morphed into painting the trim and painting the rest of the walls....oh my!

Chalkboard wall!

More on this later...when the kitchen turns right-side-up again!



Rolo Cake Mix Cookies

I did some blog browsing recently and found Buns In My Oven, a super fun food blog with tasty treats that you will drool over!!

I am a lover of all things chocolate and caramel intermingled, so I decided to make her Rolo Cake Mix Cookies to get my chocolate fix for the evening.

These tickled my baking side because first and foremost-they were easy and only require 4 (yes FOUR) ingredients!

Rolo Cake Mix Cookies


1 box of Devil's Food Cake Mix
2 eggs
1/3 cup vegetable oil
Rolo candies, unwrapped

Preheat oven to 350. Mix first 3 ingredients and make into little round golf-ball sized balls. Flatten cookies and add one rolo candy to each cookie, and wrap cookie dough around rolo to cover.

Bake for 9 minutes. Dust with powdered sugar. Eat, eat, eat until your chocolate fix has been "fixed".

*If my amateur photograph does not make your mouth water and make you stop what you are doing to make these cookies, go check out Buns in My Oven's website and hers will surely convince you.*

Just Peachy Muffins

So, as I was stumbling across my new favorite food site Tasty Kitchen, I ran across a picture of a beautiful fluffy muffin drizzled in confectioners sugar glaze, and I stopped in my tracks. What WERE these magnificent muffins, and how quickly can I make them??

The muffins were Peach and White Chocolate Chip Muffins by featured user MotherThyme, who has recently been posting about all things Peachy.

This is perfect timing, as every year I get 1-2 cases (yep you heard that right) of the most decadent, glorious peaches that have ever grown on this earth from McLeod Farms in the middle of the country in MacBee, South Carolina.

I am confident that these wonderful people growing these peaches in MacBee sprinkle sugar into the soil of their peach trees, and water their trees with sugar water. They may even inject the peaches with sugar while growing on the tree. There is NO other explanation for the perfect sweetness that these peaches contain. (Nor will I accept any other explanation.)

So, upon getting cases of peaches, they tend to ripen quickly, and I am always in need of great recipes to use them in.

Enter, stage right, MotherThyme's Peach and White Chocolate Chip Muffins:

The muffins are moist, with the slightest hint of cinnamon. The miniature chunks of white chocolate chips become the yin to the yang of the sweet, supple peaches. The glaze really becomes the "icing on the cake" (ok, I had to), adding a creamy drizzle of confectioners sugar to these already mouth-watering creations.

Stop by MotherThyme's website for the recipe, you won't be disappointed!!

Till the salmon sing in the street...

So there's been this poem on my mind today. It is a beautiful poem that makes me happy because it tries to explain how when you love someone, it can be a grand and silly feeling of extraordinary volumes...

Thank you W.H. Auden:

"As I walked out one evening,
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.

And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
'Love has no ending.

'I'll love you, dear, I'll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,

'I'll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky."

I imagine God feels that way about us. I imagine too, that he is capable of  extraordinary things like asking salmon to sing in the street, and could physically make China and Africa meet, but that would mean there would be an end to His never-ending-unfathomable-BIG-big love for us. God loves us past the impossible and the extraordinary things. His love does not end when miracles begin. And for that, I am grateful.

Oh for the love of Food!

So, thanks to the lovely Pioneer Woman, I stumbled across this new recipe website called Tasty Kitchen. It is an AMAZING site where you can browse delicous food and "Add Friends" and follow different food bloggers.

I found these tasty temptations today that I MUST try on Tasty Kitchen:

Tomato and Marscapone Pasta

Layered Greek Dip

Oh, and guess who else happens to be on this website? Me! You can find me here: DomesticDivaa

Stop by and say hi! Look through my recipe box, add me as your friend, and we can share an online hug.

(Oh, and thanks PW for being so amazing for letting me semi-copy you. Ifyouweretoeverreadthisbloginyourwholelife. ( ; )

Barbeque Chicken Pizza, Yes Please!

So, a few nights ago (ok this is a stretch, its been a few weeks), I made Pioneer Woman's (PW) Barbeque Chicken Pizza, and it was Ah-mazing.

I made some shortcuts to PW's fabulous recipe, and used store-bought pizza dough, a rotisserie chicken, and Guy Fieri's Kansas City-style BBQ sauce (which was deLISH):

BBQ Chicken Pizza:

Store Bought Pizza Dough

Rotisserie Chicken

BBQ sauce

1/2 Red Onion

Cilantro

Hot Cherry Peppers (for your hubby)

Sliced Provolone Cheese

1. Oil pan & stretch out pizza dough to fit your pan (This may seem impossible, but I trusted PW, and it CAN be done.) Drizzle more EVOO on pizza and a little salt.

2. Mix BBQ sauce into pulled rotisserie chicken meat.

3. Spread BBQ sauce onto pizza dough.

4. Cover in provolone cheese slices (I used almost a whole pack).

5. Add chicken, red onion slices, and red cherry peppers for your husband who only likes to eat spicy things.

6. Bake at 375 for 15-20 minutes until cooked throughout.

7. Take it out of the oven, drool over the tasty smell, and add chopped cilantro to the top.

My McWonderful husband even gave it his seal of approval.

Printable Recipe

A Blueberry Breakfast

It's hot outside. 100 degrees hot. There's nothing fun about this kind of hot, except that its the perfect time of year for perfect blueberries. The kind that are ripe, sweet and delicious! So I turned the pages back in my Cinch! diet/recipe book and found this tasty way to start my (hot) day:

Blueberry Nutmeg Smoothie:

All you need is 1 cup frozen blueberries, dash or two of nutmeg, and 8oz of skim milk! And then you get this:

Yum!

*serve with 1/2 whole wheat english muffin with 1tbsp Almond Butter*

"In everything give thanks..." 1 Thessalonians 5:18