Tuxedos and Other Things To Do With Corn

 My brother is on the RAGBRAI ride again this year and some of the kids and myself will meet up with him and his crew this evening for dinner at their trailer.  Should be fun!

I saw this goose costume for sale and was inspired to do something in that vein for the State fair.  

It's IOWA!  Who hates a CORN costume?  Mine will be a "Corn Tuxedo."  The deadline is Saturday...  Can I get it done?  I hope so.  it might not be fair quality but we'll see if I can get it in.  I'd like to make a few other things too, but my sewing mojo isn't all the way back yet after the fiasco just over a year ago.  It'll happen.  Each day is a little better.

A friend from my sewing group brought over her projects for the fair, as I'll be taking them with me on Saturday.  She also brought me some banana nut bread as a thank you!  It's delicious and my diet has gone backwards a bit.  sigh.  But it's really good, so I'll diet longer I guess.  One of these days, I'll stick to my healthy eating plan.  It won't be today. or this week.

I found two turkeys in my deep freezer and need the space, so I made a turkey for lunch on Sunday, along with sweet corn niblets (also from deep freezer) and mashed potatoes.  Meri brought a salad.  It was all so good.  I ended up with 4 quarts of broth canned, from the turkey carcass, 5 pints of leftover turkey canned and then a pint of gravy and quart of mashed potatoes that we've been working on the last couple days.  As well as some corn niblets that should be eaten up soon. 

whew!  So much food.

And THEN!  I came downstairs yesterday morning and found the refrigerator freezer door hanging WIDE open...  REALLY?!  Most of the ice was melted, some of the packets of food squishable. I had to throw away some chicken taquitos that were in the door...  What a waste!  So we've been eating as much as we can and pitched what we figured was sketchy.  I ate a whole bag of brussel sprouts for breakfast yesterday.  I'm up a couple pounds since Sunday.  sigh. Not because of the brussel sprouts. No one is fessing up, but if that's the only way to clean up our freezer, so be it.

The grandbaby was due on Sunday.  STILL no baby.  Jen's been on maternity leave since a week ago due to her hurting her knee that weekend.  She's ready to have this baby!  Will hopefully be able to post a baby pic soon.

I need a vacation.

Toasting Dishes

 Sunday morning, Robb was out of town and I had a houseful of company to feed before they all scattered in opposite directions.  So I took my nursing home kitchen smarts and put them to work.  I made a pan of French toast and used the broiler to cook them all quickly.  Worked out pretty good but a couple pieces got a little too brown on one side.  My oven doesn't bake evenly...

Oh well.

Instead of sewing that afternoon, I spent three hours vegging and watching Netflix.  The weekend had worn me out.  THEN since Robb was still gone, I visited my bestie alone, attended a VERY short 4H meeting in place of Meri and then picked up the boy-child and brought him home.  Meri was off doing "play" stuff and Ryan was at work.  So after a quick supper, I let Leon play in the sandbox and we also planted some tomato plants and flower plants that I'd just picked up from the PTO plant sale Friday.

I didn't want them to die before I had a chance to plant them...  like last year.  and the year before.  Looking forward to some fresh tomatoes!!!

He got filthy happily and I enjoyed getting blossom pedals snowing on me.

 Also on Friday when I picked up the plants, I noticed that it was the city-wide garage sale in both towns. YAY!  Not that I had a lot of money to spend, but I've been looking for some more vases for the reception.  So I stopped at one, then texted one of my besties to creepily say that I'm going to drive past her house.  Lo and behold, that bestie's house had a garage sale too!  Her husband was manning it,  so I stopped.

Now she and I have been friends since Ryan was a baby, so 25 years...  I REMEMBER when she bought this enameled metal plate set from the Spiegel catalog...  She agonized for days before ordering it.   I have always admired them.  Aren't they pretty?!  A little beat up I suppose, but Meri has dibs on them for when she moves out.  I actually bought them with her in mind.

And to beat them up just a little more...  When Leon found out they were metal, he ran and got some magnets to test them out.  And then some wooden spoons to make a band.

and for your viewing pleasure...

We're hard on our dishes around here...

Black is the New Orange

Another glorious Friday and the wind has shifted and blowing from the North now.  Whoops!  I probably should have spent more time winterizing outside in the last few weeks...  But no.  Too many other things to do.  It'll keep.  I dumped the Halloween pumpkin guts onto the garden so next years garden is already planted!  What more is there to do?  

Except maybe put away the mowers for the winter...  Eh - it's not snowing yet.

Here's what I did over the course of the last few days.  I'm really kicking myself that I didn't take a before picture.  Meri had found somewhere, three cast iron skillets that were drenched in rust.  SO ghastly!  And that's what I should have photographed, but oh well.

Here they are at step 8 for the first time.

I looked up online how to refinish old cast iron pans.  I modified the routine just a bit.. 

Hope it works!

1) Place the pans upside down in the oven and set it on oven cleaning.  

(The handy woman's secret weapon!)  

Get your doors and windows open for this one!  It's a smoking hot mess...

Leon and I spent the morning outside during the worst of it and I worked from the car.

2) After things cool down, wash them off with a stiff brush and then let them soak in a pan of vinegar/water mixture.  I don't have the proper measurements of how much of each, mainly because the water kept accidentally seeping out of the sink so I kept refilling it every few hours and dumped more white vinegar in.  I'm out of vinegar now.

3) I scrubbed them again and then in order to rinse everything off, I put them in the dish washer alone with a bunch of coarse salt and put it on the pots and pans cycle for 2 cycles.  NO SOAP!

4) Scrubbed the heck out of them again in the sink.  I had wised up by this time and used rubber gloves so my fingernails wouldn't look so decrepit again.  They still do from the first scrub and no amount of showering, nail brushes, etc will fix them right away...  Eh - they'll eventually look better.  Use gloves people!

5) Rinsed well with really hot water.  As hot as you can stand.

6) Dried them with an old towel and rubbed hard to get as much of the old (still kind of orange) finish off.

7) Rub them down with vegetable oil or coconut oil.  Not too drippy.  

8) Place foil in the bottom of the oven if you want and then place the pans in the oven for curing.

Heat the oven to 400 degrees.  Bake them 30 minutes face up then an hour face down.  

9) Let cool.

10) Repeat from 7 to 9 at least twice for a good finish.  You may need to wash and rub them in hot water between sessions if there is any gummy residue on them.

So the finished look, I hope, will be black and gorgeous.  Otherwise I'll do it all again... 

But AFTER Thanksgiving.

Things found in the kitchen of...

Things found in Alton Brown's kitchen...

Things found in Martha Stewarts kitchen...

Things found in mine...Mine might need some heavy duty scouring more often... but I think I'll keep it. Besides... I know where everything is! (for the most part...)