Our garden this year has produced several large zucchini and I wasn’t prepared with how to use all this zucchini bounty without wasting it.  I was telling this to my grandmother, who suggested I make zucchini bread and she sent along her recipe.
My grandparents are in their mid 80s and still have a garden of their own, much larger than our garden; so I knew gramma would have a great recipe; she also sent another zuke recipe that I will try with my next from the garden.  I finally make some bread last night and it sure is tasty so I wanted to add the recipe here.

Zucchini Bread – Gramma Flo’s from Aunt Dodo’s Kitchen.

Ingredients:  3 eggs, 2 Cup Sugar, 2 t vanilla, 1 cup cooking oil, 2 cups grated zucchini, 3 cup flour, 1 t baking soda, 2 t cinnamon, 4t baking powder, 1t salt.  Optional; 1 cup chopped nuts (or sub chocolate chips).

Mix together in a large bowl and pour into 2 greased loaf pans.  Bake 325 for 1 hour.

Gramma says; Aunt Hazel used to add 1 can of drained crushed pineapple, but Gramma has never tried it.  (sounds good though, next time:)

Since I am not much of a baker; I want to add my two cents to the recipe.  I added 3/4 cup of brown sugar and just 1 cup of regular sugar since I was low on granulated sugar and it tasted great!  I also poured half of my mixture into a cupcake pan, since we do not have two loaf pans; if you want to make the cupcakes only bake for 37-40 minutes.  I also added a little bit of honey and chocolate chips instead of nuts.
I grated my zucchini with a carrot peeler and that worked just fine; I did leave some of the outer skin on and then I chopped up the grated zucchini before adding it to the mixture.

I live at high altitude, so I did not drain the water out of the zucchini and the bread is very moist; I also baked the bread for just about 55 minutes as things cook faster up here.

This is a yummy zucchini recipe and it turned out really good; I am eating some for breakfast now actually.  Thanks gramma, Aunt Dodo and Aunt Hazel for the recipe.

Wedding Day!!
My only sister getting married was a pretty big deal and I was nearly as excited as I was on my wedding day for her! Everything had turned out perfectly, the dresses fit, the jewelry was a hit, all the family was happy and healthy and here, and it was a beautiful sunny summer Michigan day! We arrived at Headliners in the morning for our hair up-dos and wedding make-up. It was so great to hang out with my cousins and sisters friends for the experience, I don’t see my cousins very much, but we always seem to pick up where we left off and have a great time together. I can say that about lots of my cousins actually on both sides of my family; the Raineys and Mahers are definitely a great family to be a part of.
We all got beautified at the salon, watching and commenting on everyone’s up-dos while eating breakfast and drinking coffee. After the salon we drove to the church to get ready, I was excited and antsy waiting for the festivities to start, fortunately my cousin Amanda had the foresight to order a pizza delivery to the church so we were able to get a bite to eat.
My sister had asked all of the girls to wear navy blue shoes of their choosing for the wedding, and being a nature girl myself, I chose a simple wedge with medium sized heel so that I could walk and dance easily; however all of the other gals chose heels that were crazy tall and I looked tiny compared to everyone else. I tried on Leah’s shoes and it was pretty comical watching me walk in those heels, but the other gals rocked theirs.
The wedding started out to be a tear-fest but somehow lightened up and we all enjoyed the ceremony without too many tears. For me, this was due to the 4 year old flower girl and Cody’s cousin Almy who sat next to me. She chose me as her new “BFF” (best friend forever) and continued to crack me up with her nonstop fidgeting and talking during the ceremony. The comic relief allowed me to enjoy the ceremony rather than fighting the tears while trying not to cry 
After the ceremony the bride and groom rented a stretch hummer limo for the large bridal party stocked with beer and champagne for the 3 hour time difference after the wedding before the reception for photos. I had insisted Laura and Cody spend a good amount of money on a photographer they really liked so they could enjoy their wedding photos forever. After our wedding photo experience, I wanted her to learn from my mistakes. Their photographer Vince was incredibly nice and had a great eye for urban shots; I cannot wait to see how they turned out!
Once we got to the reception the realization that I had to give my maid of honor speech hit and I got really nervous, but after talking to Justin, the best man, and finding out that he was even more nervous than me, I calmed down and knew it would be O.K. Both Justin and I promised each other loud laughter during our speeches and wished each other luck as I went first. The speech came easily to me and I enjoyed sharing it with the families; Justin’s was even better and received a lot of laughter from the family and a little embarrassment from Cody, as it should be.

After dinner the real party began as the DJ started playing music and I tried to spend time with family even though I could have spent the entire evening on the dance floor. My favorite piece of the night was talking with my cousins who I rarely see, and dancing with my grandparents including with my grandpa to Cotton Eye Joe, a fast bluegrass song.
It seemed the evening ended all too soon, and we waited impatiently with a group of cousins and friends for a cab to the Hunt Club for a nightcap and some deers ears (potato skins). Unfortunately the kitchen was closed and I insisted Josh call a cab so that we could drive through Burger King for some grub to soak up all the beer I drank all night. Fortunately the cab came quickly and we drove through the drive through before being deposited at the Country Inn for the evening. I hear the party at the hunt club continued till 2pm, then on into the evening for the true partiers. I, however, was ready for bed. What a great night, I wish I could make it back for the next big family wedding in August.
My parents had planned a family party for the 4th of July the next day to enjoy the out of town visitors for another day. This was a great idea and we were able to visit with family in a relaxed setting. I had a great time talking to my cousin Jim and uncle Rob, who I didn’t get to talk with as much as I would have liked the day before. We enjoyed kayaking in the lake, and then taking the boat out onto the lake for fireworks with the newly married couple to watch their first 4th of July fireworks.
After many tearful goodbyes we packed up our suitcases for the next leg of our trip with Josh’s family and to start our weeklong camping trip across the country.

Since my sister and my new brother in law picked their wedding date last fall, we have been planning a road trip back to Michigan for the wedding. Both our families live in Michigan, just a half an hour from each other, so when we visit home, we see both families, which is convenient but busy! I was excited to come home during the summer for a family gathering because not only were we able to see all of our family because of the wedding, but we were visiting Michigan during the summertime, which means swimming, kayaking, boat rides and fireworks over the water! It has been a few years since we were back in Michigan during the summer season, as we tend to only go home once per year at Christmas time, and we were both excited for the trip.
The one thing we were not excited for was the drive; it’s 1,190 miles from Golden to Hillsdale, Michigan and we have never done the drive without stopping to sleep during the middle of the night, it usually takes us 20+ hours.  This trip took us 23 long hours, including several stops for road construction through Nebraska and Iowa and traffic in Chicago, we slept in a few rest stops along the way which added several hours to the drive.
It was nice to drive through Iowa, with the green rolling hills and lush river valleys, one of my favorite things about Iowa are the large windmills used for generating power. There are more and more each drive, though not as many compared to Minnesota we found out, on our scenic road trip home from Michigan.

We arrived at Josh’s mother’s house in Hillsdale Michigan at 6:30pm Wednesday night June 30th. The family was very excited to see us, Josh’s oldest brother Phil and his family were also visiting from California. We were able to spend the evening hanging with their family before getting some rest and then heading to my parents in the morning for wedding preparation!

The Denver Farmers Market starts next weekend and I have been in need of supplies to display my items. This week, while looking for a display for my earrings, I found a huge bag of great vintage fabrics for just $2.99.

Many of the fabrics are really unique and like none I have ever seen before; there is a blue fabric with mermaids; several vintage black and white fabrics with people playing on them; lots of cotton fabrics in shades of red, which I need, and several yards of a vintage fruit and patchwork fabric shown in photo below. This is quite a good find, and I have already used several of the fabrics in my wall hangings. I did find an earring display; a bamboo tray (in photo above) that Josh added twisting back legs to it, so I can put the earrings on either the front or back of the tray. I just need a couple more things to make the table 3D and a little more unique.

Next Saturday is the market and I still have so many things to do, I am starting to wonder if I will get everything done in time. And worry if it will all be worth all the hard work. I sure hope so! I can only think of the last market I sold at, several years ago which turned into a huge disaster. But I am trying to think good thoughts and maybe the best will happen! This weekend it rained the entire weekend, so hopefully next weekend it will be nice and people will be ready to get outside and shop after a weekend inside.

This year I had high hopes of having a huge garden, bigger than all other years, because I am not working at a full time office job anymore, I thought I might have more time to tend to it. Boy was I wrong! We barely got two raised beds in and planted in time, and already my peas are looking hot and wilty, a product of the hot sun in Colorado and late planting. Other than my peas, the rest of my garden looks pretty good, I can already harvest salad and radishes are starting to come up! My spinach is not doing good, however, I am not sure what’s wrong with it, but this is my first year planting spinach, so I wasn’t sure what to expect.

In my second planter, I planted things that needed to grow after all danger of frost or snow, and as we know here in Colorado, snow can come in June. I planted these about 2 weekends ago and the onion bulbs are coming up, so are some green beans and one squash plant. I hope the raised beds help me contain the weeds a little better.

Unfortunately, when I went to check the plants today, I noticed the lettuce and radish are already being eaten by some bug! I never know what is doing this because I never see them, this is the earliest in the season we have had bugs and I am not too happy about it. I see some little flies around the plants and also teeny white wormy things in the soil, but I am not sure what either of these are.

Here is a photo of the leaves, if you have any suggestions.

I am going to go pick some lettuce and try some of the bug killer around the outside of the garden, hopefully that will get rid of some of the bugs without putting pesticide in our vegetables. But I guess it probably gets into the water and soil. *sigh* Isn’t there a better way? The soapy water never works for me.

Hopefully your garden pests are staying away this summer season!

My second planter box in the photo below, I just planted about 2 weekends ago. The green beans are just sprouting out of the ground, as are the onions and squash. None of my chives or green onion came up, thus continuing my bad luck with herbs. I am going to try to replant something in those rows after camping this weekend and hopefully I can harvest something there before the summer ends.

Since quitting back in February, I have been meaning to send out an email to family, family and literally everyone I know, announcing my new business venture.  The idea was brought to my attention in an article I read a while back about starting your own business.  


I wanted to paste that email here and maybe this will help promote Hip-Threads just a little more.  

The spring just flew by and farmers market season is nearly upon us!  Eep!  I am *not* ready!  Despite the countless hours of sewing, beading, cardmaking, etc…I still am not done creating items nor have I bought everything needed to display my items.  (clothing rack, tables, hangers)  This is causing me to stress out just a little bit  I really need a helper, and have asked some friends for assistance; last week I made cards with the girls and next week I am making necklaces with Heather.  
Next week I really need to gather everything together and set up a display, see what I have and need.  Hopefully this will help me feel more organized!  I am also hoping to have a new website published before the farmers market; my friend Jim is making it for me.  I am really grateful for his help, and I really hope it gets done before the market starts.  
However, in all of my stress, I am still a lot happier doing what I love each day rather than going into an office.  I still get a little excited and giddy when Sunday night comes; and I think, “I don’t have to fret about Monday, because I don’t have to go to work tomorrow.” It’s a great feeling.  
This weekend I had been hoping to go camping and get away from all the stress and work for a few days.  Unfortunately, Josh has come down with a really, really nasty cold and it’s not looking promising to leave tomorrow like we had planned.  Maybe we can shoot for Saturday morning.  
Happy Memorial Weekend and Summer Solstice! 

I  have mentioned many times in this blog that I have some incredible girlfriends that I am very grateful for and those ladies come up with great ideas for my business.  They are my “idea fairies.” Often, I will come to our weekly girls night with an idea or a vague thought about something to make and they will run with it, coming up with a brilliant idea for me to create!  This year I have been trying to come up with some new ideas for the farmers market booth, but I wasn’t coming up with anything that I really liked.  


I have been so busy this spring getting ready for the market; sewing skirts, bags, making jewelry and cards and other small items for the booth.  But I still needed something else, something for the home, maybe?  I decided to email my mom and my sister, two other creative ladies in my life, and see what they thought about all I had done to prepare for the market.  Maybe they would have a suggestion or idea, or notice something I had missed?  A few days later I received an email back from my mother; who reminded me of the wall hanging I had made for them, my grandparents and my mother in law for Christmas in 2008.  
Everyone loved the wall hangings and she thought I should make more.  
About a week later, my sister finally emailed back; she made some suggestions, then near the end of the email she says the wall hangings are a good idea; “maybe you should make wall hangings of Colorado landmarks?”  (light bulb goes on over head *right now*!)  Why hadn’t I thought of that?  What a great idea!  Colorado landmarks for the Denver farmers market!   Yes, perfect!  This week, I have excitedly stitched up three wall hangings with the Colorado Continental Divide image on it; which is also the picture on the CO license plate.  Next, I will cut out some with the Denver skyline both looking east and west with the mountains behind it.  The wall hangings don’t take me very long to make, except for one detail that nearly doubles the time on each wall hanging, the binding!  Why isn’t there a better way to bind a quilt, besides hand stitching it, lol?  I hope to have at least 10 of them done before the market; hopefully they will be a big seller because I really enjoy making them!  


Thanks so much to those idea fairies who help me to be creative, I couldn’t do it without you!