In here life is beautiful… The girls are beautiful…

Don’t be put off by the name of the recipe, it’s so good-one of my standbys. When I first started making it, oh, a million years ago, I had a hard time dealing with the shells, but nowadays it’s totally easy. I think I might have skipped the “rinse under cold water” step.

From the Toronto Star, adapted by me.

1 250g box jumbo pasta shells
1 bag spinach, chopped*
1 tsp olive oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 egg, beaten
1 1/2 cups grated mozzarella
300g ricotta
1/2 cup parmesan
1 tbsp dried basil OR 1/4 cup fresh basil, chopped
salt and pepper
1 700 ml jar spaghetti sauce (I prefer the spicy kind, but with kids, I use regular tomato basil) OR use the equivalent amount of home made-much nicer indeed.

1. Cook the pasta shells according to the box, usually 10-12 minutes, then drain and rinse under COLD WATER. Important unless you have asbestos hands.

2. Steam the spinach until wilted, 4 minutes, place in colander and squeeze dry with a spoon.

3. Heat oil over medium heat and cook onion until lightly golden.

4. In a bowl, combine spinach,  onion, egg, 3/4 mozarella, ricotta, parmesan, basil, season with salt and pepper. Place one rounded tablespoon of mixture in each pasta shell**. Spread 1 cup tomato sauce in the bottom of a 8X8 or 9X9 square pan, place shells on top, top with remaining sauce. Sprinkle with the rest of the mozarella.

5. Bake in a preheated 350 oven about 30 minutes or until cheese is golden and sauce is bubbling.

Serves 6-8***

* You could use a block of frozen spinach, what the hell. They’re cheap and just as nutritious.

** Tonight I  scraped the filling into a ziploc bag and cut the corner off and squeezed it into the cooked pasta shells. Neater and easier although maybe a little wasteful.

*** Or 2 adults, a 6 year old and a 7 year old with a few leftover for lunch tomorrow.

I have no idea if this is freezable. Probably. That was my plan, I used 2 loaf pans instead of a regular 8×8 pan, just in case I needed to freeze one for a later date. I also use cooking spray on the pans before I put anything in them to save me future heartache.

We drove all the way around Toronto today on 2 separate missions. Number one was getting medicine for sick fish. Donna’s got some form of fungal infection and my first plan is to put salt in her water. It took a while to figure out what size pond it is, I didn’t want to over medicate them, but I believe it’s a 33 gallon, and with the rocks and stuff, I am saying 25 gallons. Small.  Mission number two was to get a hot knife to cut styrofoam with for Shannon, a very successful mission I am sure he will blog about later.

The sky was crazy all day, varying between black and blue. It rained a little and it was also blisteringly hot. Summer’s here.

I love pictures of the sky, but I think it might be like hearing about dreams: only interesting to the person who’s dream it is.

There are 2 pans of stuffed pasta shells (home made, thank you) in the oven, ready in 20 minutes. Smells good. Maybe I will blog that later…

My cache of acorns has grown and shrunk in the last week. I have given 2 away, and have another 3 on reserve. I’d like to move a few more out, but I’d also like to make a few more new ones. I have lots of caps and tons of eye screws, but I need more sock yarn.

So here’s the quest: anyone that has sock yarn ends and wants to do a little swapping, I will trade a complete acorn (haha, I almost typed unicorn!) for enough yarn to make a couple new ones. Or whatever, let’s figure something out.

I love each and every one of them. :)

When it comes to plants I am a terrible mother. Especially plants that are living in an area of our space that I never venture into.  So these guys were dying a slow, dry, painful death until yesterday when I dragged them one by one downstairs into the main space. Now they flank the fishpond which gives the fish even more privacy which they must appreciate. If fish are able to understand appreciation. Or…anything.

This doesn’t mean that these plants will survive, it just means they have a better chance now.

Something weird is going on with Donna, the big white/orange fish. She’s old, maybe 15 years, and her orange is suddenly fading away. Her tail was dark when we first adopted her and now it’s light orange in blotches. Also she has blobby growths on her pushing fins (the ones that propel her) that look like…warts or something. Other than that, she seems happy, her and Mackenzie (the small red fish) are good chums these days.

Unless it’s nap time, she’s all movement.

Went to my homegirl’s bridal shower today. It’s only the second one I’ve been to in my entire life so I never know what to expect-much less what to bring. This one was an easy one, no games or ribbon bonnet-WOO WOO-and finger sandwiches, fruit skewers and cupcakes. Wine spritzers. I love drinking-everyone knows that-and if I have 2 drinks in the afternoon I get the itch for more and now I wish we lived next to the LCBO. Just as well that we don’t.

I guess.

Anyway, it was nice to hang out with one of my favourite girls in the world (that would be Libs) and her mom, aunt and friends I’ve never met before.

Holy sexy undies. They were the only cliche gift she got, haha.

I’m super excited about her wedding! I guess I’d best start looking for a dress, asap!

The fish continue to entertain me. I know this will sound terrible, but I think I love them more than I love Rose. Well, maybe not, but once they start letting me pat them, that will be true. I love how weirdly unpredictable they are: after the little red fish died, they didn’t eat at all for 2 days. Then the filter was cleaned and they cheered up and now their appetites seem insatiable. Yesterday I fed them in the morning (and the white fish was so excited she swam CRASH into the side of the pond), then gave them 2 snacks at night. TWO. Pigs. How did I know they were so hungry last night? We were watching my dance show and suddenly we heard SLOSH SLOSH SPLASH!!! Looked over, and there was what amounted to probably a large glass of water on the floor, 2 feet out. Hint hint.

Also, did you know fish nap? Me either. But they did yesterday, after a busy morning of…swimming and eating.

How cute are they? I have to say, I’m no photographer, much less photo editor (especially compared to Shannon) but I love this picture and I am thinking about painting it.

I got nicer coffee for my French press: it’s a President’s Choice one, their West coast blend. Hot diggety, it’s some kind of good. LOVE it. It’s cheap and delicious, and I am worried that it will just disappear and I will have to go back to drinking less…good…coffee.

And yes, I made another cozy. If you want one, tell me, they’d be cheap.

Finally, on my way to work yesterday there were tons of cops lumping around Bloor and Lansdowne (not unusual, I guess) and when I got to the corner I saw this:

I am assuming that the enormous crane truck was making a wide right turn and the dingaling in the Buick tried to squeeze through and got caught. Very cool.

Shannon had been bugging me to start a new project (oh, just find a diy stuff website and pick something!) so I decided to get back to work on one that we’d started in June 2007 and put away indefinitely. The quilt. Remember? Me either, almost. Until we moved and all those bags (I think 6) of old t shirts that haven’t even been cut yet appeared. This was started so long ago I didn’t even have a blog then. So!

I laid out all the blocks onto a duvet cover in some sort of order and started pinning them all together. It’s very haphazard and crooked, but when I sew the strips of patches together, I am hoping it sort of looks ok. I’m not even doing proper seams, just lots of raw edges, the black fabric always on top.

Picture taken from the loft, which is why the perspective is off. I don’t know what’s going to happen on the back, but I can decide when the time comes. I also ended up switching a bunch of blocks after I took this picture. My sewing machine is going to have quite a workout!

Other good news? Donna, the white fish that survived, seems to have become good pals with the little red fish that survived. They swim side by side a lot and seem to hold hands. Well, maybe not that cute, but it’s still good to see them both relaxed and happy.

In not so good news, Ashley’s dog Puppers has gone missing.  He’s a little weiner and he needs his meds. Not that I expect that this will help his trek, but if anyone that reads my blog lives in her area, please, PLEASE keep your eyes peeled for a little white scruff ball.

We have a little planter, it’s about 4′ by 5′, that is completely in the shade and I’d kind of been avoiding dealing with it, but today is a sunny day and it felt like a day to tackle an ugly project. The hole was full of broken glass, beer bottle caps, w-d-40 cans, plastic water bottles and cigarette butts. And it’s got cement cylinders buried not too deeply…I cleared out the garbage and tidied up our old planters and dug them in too, and made a flower with bricks. Then we went to Rona (yes, open on Victoria Day, but only the gardening centre) and I picked out 3 different hostas, a fern, an astilbe and something else that’s escaped my memory. Ooh, and a gnome.

The long planters will eventually have small plants in them, ground cover type things, I just need to find ones that are shade happy, maybe violets would be nice. The pebbles are just filler for now.

Much improved!

We survived, but only just. The empty lot is pretty small (so that made for a quick and easy clean up) but it also meant we were all packed in and at the mercy of the fireworks. Ari and I started with sparklers inside, to get warmed up:

Then a few friends showed up and we dragged the 2 laundry baskets outside and had a ball. This is the moment where Shannon probably thought he burned his ponytail off:

Even with a ratty leg he can move fast when he has to. Then we all came inside and hung out, literally, and spun til we fell on the floor:

It was good. It was very fun, loud and awesome.

As usual, as in my entire life, I celebrated my birthday and Mother’s Day on the same day. I took the 9.30am bus to St.Catharines yesterday and my mom took me shopping and it was super fun. I wound up with 4 dinner plates, 4 salad plates, workout shorts and top, a yellow paring knife, a knife sharpener (that I already used!), a French press coffee pot, a bag of fancy peanut brittle and a beautiful print of an owl.

We used the French press this morning and MAN does it make superior coffee. So good. Then I decided it looked a little naked so I made it a cozy with brown alpaca yarn mixed with rainbow ribbon, crocheted in stripes. With lime green and pink buttons to keep it on. Very cute.

And yes, that’s the coolest electric kettle ever. It glows blue when it’s on. Love it.

Also, it’s a long weekend here which means fireworks. Anyone who’s been around for a few years knows that Shannon loves fireworks. We started having barbecues back in…2000, I think, before iam was even built. We went out this afternoon and picked up a couple fireworks. Ok, a couple? He told me to write a list but all I could come up with was this:

1. Bang

2. Boom

3. Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-bang

I think we got those covered.

I doubt it will be the best one, but my favourite one is named PIG OUT. Pure awesomeness.