We Welcome Spring With Paisley Prints, Corned Beef, and Easter Prep

Like most of you, we are happy to be celebrating the beginning of spring.  With the mild winter we had here in the Northeast, spring is here weeks before it arrived last year.  Although our daffodils aren't blooming quite yet, our forsythia is covered with blossoms, and the ground is greener than I can ever remember in March.  We are usually tromping through snow or mud at this time.  With all of the Christmas and winter decor put away for another year, I've been looking for some new spring items to brighten up our old farmhouse and myself.

There are buds beginning to appear on the trees, and just look at this green grass already.  It's so nice to peer out the windows and see a color other than brown or white.

I found this silky, textured, paisley top at Kohl's and couldn't resist purchasing it.  The 3/4 length sleeves are perfect for this time of year when it's still only in the forties in the morning, but the temps climb to the upper sixties by the afternoon.  I love the way this shirt feels and hangs on my body.  It doesn't cling to my middle aged midriff, but it doesn't pouf out to make me look twenty pounds heavier either.

I returned to Kohl's last weekend looking for more of those paisley tops, but I couldn't find any left in my size.  My husband spotted this short-sleeved black and white one on the clearance rack that is also Croft & Barrow.  It's not in spring colors, but at $2.80 how could I not buy it?

Along with some spring shirts for me, I've also been looking for a new kitchen tablecloth for these months leading up to summer.  Because there are so many of us, we have a nine foot table, and it is challenging to find tablecloths this long in our town.  I discovered that Home Goods had quite a selection, and I fell in love with this blue and green paisley cotton tablecloth.  Better yet, it was even on sale.  How many days do you think it will take for one of my children to spill something all over it?  I'm hoping we can make it through Easter dinner.

Not only did I find the paisley tablecloth, but I also came across these green paisley paper napkins in a clearance bin at Party City.  I thought they'd be great for St. Patrick's Day.

My youngest also talked me into buying fresh flowers at the supermarket since we had company last weekend.  I'm waiting for our daffodils to bloom.

Speaking of St. Patrick's Day, I made corned beef brisket for the first time ever.  I found a simple recipe on Pinterest where you just placed the brisket in the crockpot with some vegetables, beef broth, water, peppercorns and thyme.  It cooked all day and was so tender.  Some of my kiddos weren't fond of it, but others really liked it.

Since some of my children weren't crazy about the corned beef, we actually had leftovers, which means making my favorite sandwich ever: Reubens.  I made Reubens for lunch and dinner on Saturday, for dinner again on Sunday, and for my lunch one more time yesterday.  The last little bit went to our beagle last evening.  For those of you unfamiliar with Reubens, they're super easy to make and delicious.  

Reubens

Spread Thousand Island salad dressing on 2 slices of rye bread.  Place sliced corned beef, Swiss cheese, and sauerkraut in the middle.  Toast like you're making grilled cheese sandwiches.

Aside from buying paisley prints and eating corned beef, we've also been getting ready for Easter.  Our older daughter has been sick with the flu, so our first grader was eager and willing to arrange our Easter decorations throughout the house.  I looked on Pinterest for some new ideas, and when I saw this one, I knew it was simple enough for me to try.  Easter grass, malted eggs, and a chocolate bunny placed in a Mason jar.  So simple.  But does anyone else think this chocolate rabbit looks a little deranged?  My kids think it's a bit creepy.

The St. Patrick's Day sign was wiped away, and I drew a new design on the chalkboard for the front porch.  I'll refrain from sharing any other Easter foods or decorations until Easter Sunday has actually arrived.

From our mountain farm to yours, I'm wishing you all a Happy Spring, and may the remainder of your Holy Week be blessed.

Adding a Preppy Touch to This Rustic Mountain Cabin

When we bought this cabin near our farmhouse a year ago, we knew there would be plenty of work to do to make it aesthetically pleasing for guests.  It served as a hunting cabin for a couple of older gentlemen for decades.  It was dirty, incredibly cluttered, and smelled like it had been closed up for a very long time.  Additionally, there were layers of various carpets throughout, bare concrete walls in spots with insulation and wires showing, a paneled ceiling with holes that had been patched with duck tape, and different sized windows in every room.  Oh, and did I mention the cracked pipes that had frozen over the winter?  Probably the ugliest thing in the cabin was the shower.  Mostly concrete and brick, it looked like it had a rusted tin base.  I thought it would be the perfect shower for A Nightmare on Elm Street.  Before any company could stay there, the shower would have to go.  Once my husband started hacking away at it, we learned that the floor of it was not tin after all but concrete painted a rust color.  Who would have thought?  Unfortunately, it cracked into pieces when we started working on it, so we had to purchase a new shower that took some work to install.

We were blessed to have the help of our eldest son who recently moved nearby.  It took a couple of weekends, but I am so happy to report that a new shower is in place, and it was tested by family from out of town this past weekend.  Everything works, and it doesn't leak.  I had my eye on a woodsy shower curtain in Kohl's since last fall, and I couldn't wait to run out and finally get it.  It works perfectly in our mountain cabin.

Kohl's has quite a collection of various decorative items for a cabin or lodge.  Since our nineteenth century farmhouse needs constant maintenance in addition to our cabin, we can only tackle about one project per year for each building.  This is frustrating for me since patience is not one of my strong virtues, but I do what I can by adding a little decorative touch of rustic preppy wherever I go.  Since Kohl's is having some great sales right now, I perused the cabin/lodge sections last evening and snapped pictures with my phone so I could think about the selections later.

For the bathroom, they have towels, rugs, shower hooks with bears on them, owl cup and toothbrush holders, bear soap dispensers, and that little boat soap holder.  I didn't buy any of those, but they are too cute.

There were so many moose, bear, and deer towels and shower curtains.  I haven't decided yet if I'll purchase any of these or not.  The cabin came fully equipped with linens, but none of them were of a mountain forest theme.

I love this moose waste basket for the bathroom, but it needs to come down in price some more before I can justify buying it.  The bathroom floor is currently concrete, and I think we should probably take care of that first before I go crazy on bathroom accessorizing.

One more towel.  If it said "cabin" instead of "lodge," I might have bought it.  I definitely can't give our cabin the name of lodge though.  It's far from that.

For the bedrooms, Kohl's has these woodsy comforter sets that I really love.

They have cabin/lodge sheets, coverlets, and pillow cases.

And they have lots and lots of throw pillows.

Then there are all these curtains.  It's so tempting to get some of these, but since every window in our cabin is a different size, and I'm not sure what we're going to do with the walls, it would probably be unwise to purchase any window treatments at this point.  Right now there are blinds and curtains up in every room (although none of them match) so I can't deem new curtains a necessity.  I'll have to wait on those.

Finally, there are so many kitchen items for the cabin: trivets, charcuterie boards, coasters, bottle openers, and more.  Our cabin came fully equipped with more kitchen gadgets than I have in my own house, but these would be nice to put on a wish list.

I love these dish towels.  I'm still contemplating picking up one of these because you can just never have enough dish towels, right?  Not sure which one I like best.  I think I'm leaning toward the tan with pinecones.

You know how much I love plaid, so when you combine plaid and cabin, I cannot resist getting something.

I ended up getting these bowls a few weeks ago, but they never made it up to the cabin because the children have been using them for their cereal in the morning.  It turns out they hold twice as much cereal as the bowls they had been using, which means that a typical box of cereal doesn't even make it through all five of my children in the morning.  Which also means the last person up is grouchy because the best cereal is gone as soon as it's been opened.

There is an entire aisle in Kohl's devoted to cabin placemats, napkins, and tablecloths.

Since the cabin didn't come with enough placemats, I did justify buying five of these last night.  I really liked the plaid moose variety, but there were only two of those left.

Several weeks ago there were quite a few signs and wall hangings for cabins in the woods.  Last night I could only find a handful.  I really liked this one, and I think I might go back and get it.  Do you think it would do well on the outside next to the door?  Or maybe it needs to be in away from the wind, snow, and rain.

I've also found a number of crafty cabin creations on Pinterest that I'd like to try.

Any ideas from you readers?  I am open to suggestions on incorporating some rustic preppy into this mountain cabin.

And just in case you're wondering if I'm receiving any kind of kickback from Kohl's for this post, they have no clue they're mentioned in Preppy Mountain Farmhouse.  I just happen to really love their cabin/lodge selections.  Although, it would be great to get a discount on the above items. ;)

Going Kelly Green for St. Patrick's Day

I couldn't stand it any longer; I had to return to blogging.  I just missed it too much to take a longer break, and I missed sharing our life with all of you.  Over the past couple of weeks I have discovered that there are more of you visiting from all around the world than I originally thought, and that is encouraging and exciting to know.  To all of you readers who sent me emails, messages, or comments since my last post, I thank you.  Your opinions and words mean so much to me, and I appreciate that you took a few minutes out of your day to drop me a line.

With St. Patrick's Day coming tomorrow, I thought I'd share with you some of the things we're doing at our farmhouse to celebrate this feast day.  I whipped up some Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies the other night as an experiment.  I saw on Pinterest that you can simply add green food coloring to your regular chocolate chip cookie recipe to get the above effect.  I added about 15 drops to the 2 sticks of melted butter before adding and mixing all the other ingredients.  Once I did that, it seemed only natural to add some peppermint extract because who doesn't like mint with their chocolate?  A little goes a long way, so I only put 3 drops of the extract into the wet ingredients.  They turned out great; although, I would have preferred a darker shade of green.  Once you add all that flour and sugar, it lightens up the butter quite a bit.  I also had to add an extra 1/4 cup of flour since the peppermint extract and food coloring added more liquid to the recipe.  Oh, and I found the napkins in the top photo on clearance at Party City.  That place has everything!

Last evening, I treated the children to Rainbow Sherbet Floats.  I couldn't find any lime sherbet in the grocery store, so I had to settle for a gallon bucket of rainbow sherbet instead.  I decided that I actually like the looks and taste of these even better.

Simply put a couple of scoops of rainbow sherbet in a mug (we like ours frosted) and add 7-Up to the brim.  That's it.  The kids loved them.

All St. Patrick's Day items were 50% off at Kohl's this past weekend, and with my Kohl's cash I was able to pick up this wall hanging for only $5.  It's on our front porch this year.  There's not much Irish blood in our family, but I was able to find one Irish ancestor in my lineage from the late seventeenth century.  Regardless, I've always loved Celtic jewelry, music, poetry, and home decor.  My husband and I even had our wedding bands custom made into Celtic love knots.

Not one of my best chalkboard designs for the porch, but I was in a hurry so I used shamrock cookie cutters as stencils to make this.  With Easter coming in just a little over a week, I'll be changing over to all new decorations this weekend.

The best green of all is the one found in nature.  Our grass and pastures are already turning a lush emerald green.  This is such a treat for us because the past two winters brought so much snow that we didn't see green grass until well into April.  Our goats and sheep are very happy.

Our banks are also full of clusters of daffodils getting ready to open.  I think it's possible they'll be blooming by Easter, which is remarkable for us since Easter is so early this year.  We didn't have daffodils or tulips in bloom until the latter part of April last spring.

Tomorrow evening I'll be making corned beef for the first time in my life.  I saw an easy recipe on Pinterest where you just put the corned beef, cabbage, potatoes, and carrots in the crock pot with some water and beef broth for the day.  That sounds quick and easy enough.  I'm not sure if the little ones in my house will like it, but we're going to give it a try.

Happy Saint Patrick's Day, Readers.  And thanks for coming back to read Preppy Mountain Farmhouse over and over again.

Taking a Break: The Real Reason

It's spring break for our kiddos, so it seems like a good time for a break from blogging as well.  Plus, it's Lent, so I could use that as an excuse to take a blogging sabbatical too.

But the truth is, I need some time to reflect, pray, and ponder the future of Preppy Mountain Farmhouse as it approaches its one year anniversary late next month.

I have loved blogging.  I actually get excited when I compose a post and hit that publish button sending it into cyberspace for the world to see.

But then I start checking my stats, and I realize that most of the world isn't reading it.  Installing Google Analytics in January to more accurately track traffic to my site has been a harsh eye opener.  While Blogger stats have been showing steady growth in pageviews since I began last April, Google Analytics has revealed that most of that traffic is coming from bots.  For those of you non-bloggers, that means most hits on my blog aren't from real people, but from web crawlers and spammers either indexing my site for search engines (not a bad thing, but not real humans) or trying to get referrals and links back to their own sites.

This has been a devastating blow to my self-confidence as a writer/blogger.  Although I began this blog to learn a new skill, have a creative outlet, and to share parts of our outside-the-norm life up here on the mountain, I also hoped for an increase in readers as well.  What writer doesn't want to hear that his audience is growing?  If no one reads our stuff, we might as well just keep a journal and scrapbook...which I already do.

So I am taking a bit of a break to figure out my next move and decide if I love Preppy Mountain Farmhouse enough to keep pouring my heart and energy into it twice a week for a handful of daily readers or if it's time to move on to another creative venture.

For those of you who are live human readers, I would love, love, love to hear from you.  What do you enjoy about this blog?  What would you like to see more of?  What might be lacking?  Do you continue to come back to be entertained, informed, inspired, or just to see what we're up to?

Feel free to send me an email (address on "Contact Me" page), leave a comment here, or send me a Facebook message.  And while I am on hiatus, I'll probably still be posting pictures on Instagram.  So you can comment there too.

Enjoy the final weeks of winter, Everyone.  We've got temps in the 70s here this week.  I am on my way outside to hike with some little ones and our beagle.

10 Fun Snacks for Children

My children are always famished after we return from school, so I'm forever on the lookout for healthy snacks that we can put together quickly.  The more fun and interesting I can make them, the more eager they'll be to try something that isn't from a shiny package full of artificial colors and preservatives.  If it's something they can participate in making, that's even better.  I share below 10 of the most fun snacks we've tried over the past year.

1. Owl Bagels: This one was Pinterest-inspired.  I spread pumpkin cookie butter on toasted bagels, but you could use peanut butter instead.  Simply slice up some strawberries to use as the beaks and wings, then slice bananas for the whites of the eyes.  Finally top the eyes with fresh blueberries.  These would be great for breakfast as well.

2. Honey Balls: Just 4 ingredients are used: peanut butter, honey, oats, and dry milk powder.  Kids love to make these.  For the recipe, click here to link to my blog post from June.  No cooking or baking is required so you can cut your kids loose in the kitchen to measure, stir, and roll.  It is a bit messy and sticky though as you can see in the photo.

3. Fruit & Veggies Spelling Out LEGO: If you recall, we made this for our son's 9th birthday party last summer.  I used baby carrots, sliced strawberries, chopped cantaloupe, and maraschino cherries, but you could use whatever fruits and veggies you have.  I did discover that the cherries "bleed" all over the tray, so that wasn't the best choice.  I found this idea on Pinterest and adapted it based on what we had in our refrigerator.

4. Banana Chips & Nutella: Absolutely no prep time required for this snack.  Just let the kids dip dried banana chips in a bowl of Nutella.  Simple, relatively healthy, and delicious.

5. Heart Shaped Cucumbers & Cheese: We made these for Valentine's Day.  Slice up a cucumber and use a metal cookie cutter to cut out the hearts.  Do the same with a block of cheese and place on top of heart-shaped pretzel crackers.  I've never seen my children so eager to eat cucumbers.

6. Yogurt Pops: Simply stir together plain or vanilla yogurt with some honey and berries or other fruit.  Either place in disposable cups or plastic popsicle containers and put in the freezer.  We made these last summer after purchasing many quarts of locally grown strawberries.  So much better than store-bought.

7. Meat, Cheese, & Crackers Displayed in Animal Shapes: We designed this for Thanksgiving, of course, but I might try another animal sometime soon.  The kids enjoyed helping arrange this, and they devoured it within ten minutes.  I used sausage and pepperoni because I knew my children would eat that, but any thinly sliced meat would work as long as it was the right geometric shape.  I had to improvise and use black decorating icing for the eyes, Miracle Whip for the nose, and matches for the legs because I ran out of toothpicks.  Pinterest-inspired.

8. Pretzel Treats: I'm not sure I would classify these as healthy, but they're bitesized, so eaten in moderation, they're not too much sugar.  We used butter flavored square mini-pretzels, topped with zebra striped Hershey's Kisses slightly melted, topped with M&Ms.  These were made for Valentine's Day, but you could easily change the color of M&Ms to suit any season or holiday.  This was also inspired by Pinterest.

9. Vegetables in Shape of Christmas Tree: I'm always trying to find a way to make vegetables more appetizing for my kiddos.  I saw this idea on Pinterest, of course, and decided to try it out on Christmas day.  Mine doesn't look nearly as pretty as the Pinterest pin, but it still turned out fairly well.  It still didn't entice my children to eat cherry tomatoes, however.  If I make this again, I'll use a larger platter because everything was squished together.  I used pretzel sticks for the tree trunk, and the yellow pepper slices at the top are supposed to be a star, believe it or not.

10. Apple Mouths: We finally tried these Pinterest designs yesterday afternoon.  It was messier than I anticipated.  Spread peanut butter on thin slices of apples.  Place mini-marshmallows (the teeth) on the bottom slice and place another apple slice on top.  We tried to get creative by adding chocolate chips as cavities and sliced up chocolate licorice for braces (photo at top of blog.)  I also purposely left a big gap in the middle of the one mouth above because our youngest has lost her two front teeth.  These were fun, but gooey.

So the next time you're looking for a quick, healthy snack to make with your little ones, instead of reaching for the box of fruit snacks, give one of these a try.  The only ones that require more than about 15 minutes are the yogurt pops since they need time to freeze.