Camp Cook

We are back from our camping trip at Itasca State Park and we had a blast! If you’ve never been there before you should know that they have some of the best bike trails and hiking trails for a state park. Perfect for a family or a group of friends (note that quiet time is at 10 pm! That took a little getting used to.) Now I know that camping isn’t for everybody, it can be a huge hassle and turn out to be not so fun at all. I LOVE camping and it’s probably because that was what our family vacations consisted of growing up. We didn’t go to Disneyland or Wisconsin Dells. We would go camping in Grand Marais, Father Hennepin State Park, you name it. Now how do you get past the sucky parts of camping? I can’t give you any advice on how to make your tent magically pack itself at the end of the weekend but I can help you with the food part of camping. I refuse to do dishes on vacation so I have thought up a few ways to get away with it (and no, I don’t just make Ryan do the dishes.) First off is breakfast. This is probably one of the messiest and instead I’ve made it the easiest. Go to the freezer section in your grocery store and buy a box (or two) of your favorite Jimmy Dean’s breakfast sandwiches. I think that the English muffins kind work best but the biscuit kind work well also.

 They come in these individual plastic pockets so just throw them right in the cooler and you won’t have to worry about them getting wet from melted ice. Put the box in the trash, no need to have wet cardboard floating around in your cooler.

 So when you wake up in the morning and it’s time for breakfast open the plastic the sandwich is wrapped around and discard, then wrapped the sandwich with tin foil and put it on the grill. I’d say it takes about 7 minutes on each side but I would check it if you’re unsure.

 There’s your breakfast! No dishes required! Pair it with a donut or a muffin and you’ll be full until lunch time. Now, you can absolutely just make these a home yourself and package them up and probably end up saving money so more power to you.

My next great discovery for camp eating is burritos. Who would have thought? I found this easy recipe online because I had a box of Zatarains Red Beans and Rice in the cupboard and I was hoping to use it up. The recipe is (weird enough) Red Beans and Rice Burritos. Of course, the recipe isn’t for the grill but we can make it work. When you are about to make your burrito put down a square piece of tin foil and spray it with some Pam (I prefer the Olive Oil kind.) Then make your burrito and wrap it up with the tin foil. I put them in their own individual plastic bags and put them in the freezer. I can make these a week before our camping trip instead of rushing to get everything prepared at the last minute. Plus, if you have them in individual bags it’s a lot easier to just grab one out of the cooler.

 These were just a few of my favorites that I made over this camping trip but the possibilities are endless. Preparing the meals ahead of time is the key. Make a hotdish or a pot of spaghetti and meatballs in one of those foil trays and then heat it up on the stove one night. Or I’ve made foil packets of chicken fajitas and then just put the heated mix on a warmed tortilla.

 It is now officially the end of summer so I’m guessing many of you won’t be camping any more for the rest of the year but you can keep these ideas in mind when you go on an ice fishing trip or snowmobile trip this winter, don’t stop being creative just because it gets cold out!

Side Door Makeover

I finally had enough of living in a fish bowl. Our side door of our house that goes into our kitchen and the door that goes into our garage is basically a giant window. This definitely isn’t the kind of door that I would choose but I can’t just go out and by all new exterior doors. So I’m making it work. First off, they needed a paint job. Since I’ve already painted my front door black I’m going to do that same with these.

Next we needed new door hardware. Because our house was bank owned they replaced the locks with bright brass colored door knobs. Not only is that my least favorite type of hardware but it also doesn’t match one thing in the entire house. I took everything off the doors before I painted so we could completely start from scratch. The funny thing was that I actually thought I could install these new locks and door knobs myself. Ryan was off at his fantasy football league party and I thought to myself that he would be so impressed to come home to see I did this all on my own. What a mistake. Ten minutes into reading the directions and piecing things together I knew I had made a mistake. Needless to say we had to spend the night with no locks or door knobs on our doors. My dad saved the day on Sunday and installed everything. He had to totally rebuild the frame on the garage and make holes for the deadbolt locks. There were never any there in the first place!

Last is the panel that I purchased from Country Curtains. I grew up with my mom always ordering all of our window treatments from there so it’s just natural for me to do the same. They aren’t too spendy and you know that you are going to get quality products and good customer service. Plus they send you swatches in the mail for free! I hate the feeling of ordering things from catalog or the internet crossing your fingers hoping that they match.

 It's amazing what a little thing like some fabric can do to change the whole feeling of a room. I can now go down into the kitchen at night without feeling like someone could be looking in at me without me now even knowing.

Kitchen Lighting

So I’m going to go piece by piece in the kitchen because there is a lot to do to get it where I want to be. The first thing that I wanted to tackle was the lighting. About two days after moving in the light over the kitchen sink just stopped working, and yes, I did try changing the bulb. That means that this whole time I’ve been standing in the dark while doing dishes! The lights that were up before were very basic anyways.

I wanted to add some more character to the room so I’ve been searching for months and nothing had been sparking my interests. Then one day I was wondering around in Menards and noticed how cool outdoor lighting looks. Lightbulb! Who says that outdoor lights have to be outside? Of course I needed to find the best deal so I went to the internet to find the perfect lights that were also in my price range. Ta da!

Next was the chandelier that hangs over the kitchen. Enough said.

I got a tip from my Country Living magazine by building your own by buying the chandelier and lamp shades separately to save some money. I was able to put this together for only $100!

As you can probably already tell I love to find a good deal. That’s part of the fun of updating. The less you spend the more you can update so take the extra time and do your research. It takes a lot of patience but in the long run it is totally worth it.