Home Sweet Home

Yippy!  We are all moved in.  Very few cardboard boxes are left and man oh man are we glad to be home!

We had a LARGE moving “Party” on Jan. 23rd in which we invited all our friends here in Huntsville to come move all our heavy things to our new place…aren’t we so thoughtful?    We are SO thankful for all the help and because of it we were completely out of our apartment and into our house within a few hours.  Wow, I know.

Grandma and Granpa ‘Woof’ came the week prior in response to our pleas for help in the massive task of painting the lower level of the house.  It went from ‘just color on the walls’ to a all out, week long 8+ hours a day,  many volunteers needed, extravaganza. Many of our friends and family came to watch Little Man while we painted or joined in the many hours spent putting double coats of primer and double coats of paint in all the walls, trim, molding, doors, and casing.  Why, oh why did we decide to tackle all that at once?  More to come on that in a future post… Needless to say, it is done and I sure am glad we like the color…because we’re never. doing. it. again. 

You want pictures you say?  Well just hold your horses, we’re not quite ready to reveal it all yet.  Give us this weekend and I will post some up next week…patience ok?

Until then, here are a few pictures of our very faithful helpers without whom this home of ours could not be as sweet as it is:

Typical…ladies doin’ all the work! Hehe…

Master of Painting Windows!

Queen of Trim!

Little Man loves this sweet friend of ours who logged many hours playing with him!

The Tool Men!

Thanks for all your excitement with us.  We feel supremely lucky to have you all as friends and family.  Your celebration with us during this time has been so sweet.  Love you!

House pictures

Since it is Friday and many of you have asked for pictures of the inside of the house…how’s about we have a little You Asked For It Friday, hmmm?

So excited to share this with you all. Thank you for all your excitement with us. It means a lot.

Here we go: These are pictures of the house as it was shown on the market. All of the rooms we intend to paint at some point or another. Everything downstairs will be painted before we move in.

The previous owners had this as their ‘keeping area’. I think we will turn it into a eat in kitchen area, putting our current kitchen table here.

This another of the four total bedrooms. All bedrooms are located upstairs.

This gi-normus thng with its 25×14 measurments will probably be our first do-it-yourselfer. It’s begging for a glamour bath and we plan to fulfill its dreams. :)

This is the front room on the right side of the house.

This is the formal dinning room located downstairs.

AKA Eric’s dream workshop come true.

Not pictures are the other two bedrooms and the two full baths.  Oh how you will giggle when seeing pictures of the bathrooms in their full 1970’s-bright-colored-tile-glory. They also beg “re-do” and at some point during our stay here, I am sure their needs will be met.  Until then…anyone have some bright pink or yellow porcelain bathroom fixtures they are not using…cause they would match our baths perfect

SOLD!

Could it be true?? Could we actually own a home? Yes my friends…it is true. Our first house! Sorry we didn’t mention much about our home hunt. Things kept falling through here or there and we were trying to be careful to not get our hopes to high at any point. Holding the whole house-buying thing with an ‘open-hand’ if you will. So buy the time we even let ourselves get excited…we were signing the closing papers and taking this picture!

As of yesterday we are the thankful owners of a home. How is our God so generous to us? Oh yes… because He is gracious, merciful, and He owns it all…and has seen fit to give us this huge blessing to use for His purposes. Wow…what a whirlwind.

The next month will be full of cleaning, painting and moving since we have until the 31st of Jan. to be out of our apartment. Things around here may be a little slow, but stay tuned, as I have a good feeling there will be many before and after photos coming your way at RobinsonHomeSweetHome…because we now have a place to call HOME Yay!

A doggie for Christmas

No, no we did not get a dog in our little apartment…however we did buy Little Man another stuffed one (like he needs one…he doesn’t) that barks!  So when he opened it and we showed him what it did, his face was so precious I was exuberant that I caught it on camera.  Click here to watch it.

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all our friends and family!

We love you!

Patty Cake Patty Cake…

Baker Man… Doesn’t he look like a little lobster?

Homemade Duvet

So remember the fabric that won me over to yard saling?  Remember the big plans to make it into a slip cover duvet for our down comforter?  Remember how all of you who know me well doubted that this would ever actually happen???

WELL…

I did it!  I did it!  I did it!

(You will want to imagine me skipping while singing this little chorus because I am both so excited and surprised that this turned out the way it did.)

Hooray!

Pumpkin Enchiladas

Our friends who bought us the monster pumpkin passed on this recipe to me after our family trip to the Pumpkin Patch.  I admit I was leery as well, but my oh my am I glad we tried this!  So tasty!

Pumpkin Enchiladas

1 cup cooked cubed chicken

½ onion diced very fine

½ cup cooked black beans

2 cups pumpkin puree

4 cloves garlic

1 jalapeno pepper, de-seeded

1 tsp. chili powder

8 flour tortillas

1 ½ cup shredded cheddar cheese

Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 425.  In med. Bowl combine chicken, onion, and black beans. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, toss and set aside.  In a blender, puree pumpkin, garlic, jalapeno, chili powder, 2 cups water, 2 tsp. salt, and ¼ tsp. pepper until smooth.  Pour 1 cup sauce into the bottom of an 8in. square baking dish.  Spoon ¼ cup of the bean mixture into a tortilla, roll up, and place seam down into the dish with sauce in it.  Repeat process until all mixture is used.  (may need an additional baking dish).  Pour remaining sauce over rolled up enchiladas and sprinkle with cheese. Bake for 25-30 min until sauce is bubbly. Cool for 5 min.  Serve.

Pretty spicy…may want to half the jalapeno if you don’t like spiciness and half the garlic if you don’t like a strong garlic flavor.

Pumpkin Pie Robinson Style

This is my take on the traditional pumpkin pie.  Its lighter and fluffier than your typical pumpkin pie.  Rich, flavorful, tasty.  It got high reviews this last Thanksgiving

Pumpkin Pie Robinson Style

2 cups pureed pumpkin (canned or fresh)

1- 8oz. package cream cheese, softened

1 cup sugar

1/4 tsp. salt

1 egg + 2 egg yolks, slightly beaten

1 cup half & half creamer

1/4 cup butter (1/2 stick) melted

1 tsp. vanilla

1 and 1/2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice

1 pie crust (Can use the pre-made from the refrigerated or freezer section at the grocery store or make your own.  I made my own this year and it is not NEARLY as hard as I thought it would be…pretty fun actually!)

Directions:

Take dough, whether pre-made or homemade, and roll out into flat circle large enough to hang over the edge a good inch or so.  Crimp the edges to make it look pretty and put it back into the refrigerator to set while you mix the pie filling.  In large mixing bowl beat the cream cheese, add the pumpkin and combine until smooth.  Then add the eggs, half and half, and melted butter.  Combine.  Next add sugar and salt and combine.  Lastly, stir in the vanilla.  Pour mixture into the pie pan with crust in it.  Cut a circle our of a piece of foil large enough to allow the center of the pie to show and bake however small enough to cover the edges of the pie to keep the crust from browning too quickly.  Bake at 350 for 20-30min. with foil on.  Take foil off and bake another 10-20 min or until a butter knife inserted into pie 2 inches from edge of crust comes out clean.  The pie filling will continue to bake after being removed from the oven and will set more while being chilled in the refrigerator after cooling completely on counter top for an hour or so.  Serve with whipped cream!  Enjoy!

Pumpkin Bread

Remember the monster pumpkin…the one that I roasted and pureed and froze. ..that provided me with almost 3 gallon size freezer bags full of 1/2 cup frozen portions.  It is still producing delicious pumpkin-y food and its DECEMBER!  We have been loving it.  We have even gotten to try some new recipes and find some new favorites.  I am dedicating the next few days to posting the recipes so you can get in on this deliciousness.  We have made everything from the traditional Pumpkin Bread to the not so traditional Pumpkin Enchiladas that are to-die-for-good.  I will be sharing them all.  Buckle your seat belts and get your recipe cards ready cause here we go…  (have I mentioned on hear that I am a bit of a dork…?)

We will start with the traditional Pumpkin Bread.  My sweet sweet friend has a delicious recipe that she was gracious to pass on to me.  We have chatted about why we love the original recipe so stinking much and have come to the conclusion that it is probably because it only called for 1/2 cup more flour than sugar…and boy oh boy is it good!  Here is my take on her wonderful recipe that I can feed Little Man without giving him a sugar rush first thing in the morning.

Pumpkin Bread

2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour

1 cup unbleached white flour (can use all whole wheat but makes for a little bit more dense bread)

1 1/2 cup sugar (I like to substitute 1/2 cup sugar for 1/2 cup honey)

2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 cup oil (I use coconut oil and melt it over a very low temp. just until liquid form)

1 1/4 cup water

1 1/2 tsp salt

1 Tbsp Pumpkin Pie Spice

1 Tbsp Cinnamon

4 eggs

2 cups fresh or canned pumpkin

Directions:

Dump all dry ingredients into a LARGE mixing bowl and mix thoroughly.  Add wet and mix well.  Pour into oiled and floured loaf pans (Or prepared muffin tin’s).  Bake at 350 for 1 hour or until done.

Makes 2 large loaves or too many muffins to count.  You may want to half the recipe if making muffins.    Also its better if you make this bread a day in advance.  It needs a day to sit and get moist!