This weekend we snagged the old roomies (Jon and Mel) and headed a few miles down the road to this great little Norwegian Apple Garden, appropriately named Eplegaarden. (Located at 2227 Fitchburg Road in Fitchburg, WI)

We spent most of the afternoon wondering the orchard, eating an apple here or there, and looking for the perfect apples to take home. We selv plukkin and wound up splitting a 10lb “Uff Da-full” bag of assorted Cortland, Red Delicious, Jonee, and Golden Delicious apples.

Additionally, we all purchased some wonderful apple cider. Which we drank later that night with a hearty cinnamon stick. If that doesn’t say FALL, I don’t know what does.

Besides making a great centerpiece on our dinning room table and assorted lunchtime snacks. I believe there will be Apple muffins in our near future. Mmmmmm. Mmmmmm.

Here is a link to the latest happenings and events at Eplegarrden.

So, with all the weddings done and summer coming to a close, I’ve been trying to keep busy with other things besides work. My latest adventure? Cooking. We got so many neat kitchen and cooking gifts for our wedding, and I’ve been trying to put them to good use. My favorite is the box of Penzeys Spices we got from Boone’s old co-workers at MSOE. There are lots of grilling, dressing, and pasta spices to try out.

We are also part of a CSA (Community Support Agriculture) and get a box of veggies every two weeks. If you are not familiar with CSA here’s how it works: a regional farm grows local fruits and veggies, packs them, and sends them to local communities. The veggies are organic, it supports local farmers, and reduces our use of gas (you don’t need to ship veggies across the country in trucks). Our CSA program is Harmony Valley in Viroqua, WI and they ship to West and South WI, and the cities. They also have a stand at the Dane County Farmer’s Market and are always busy. The best things we have gotten are the sweet corn, edamame, and asparagus, but we also get tomatoes, strawberries, peas, cucumber, raspberries, and others. The veggies are really fresh, and sometimes we get some weird stuff that we aren’t use to cooking with, so it’s been interesting to try to come up with ways to use them. Luckily this farm sends a newsletter with recipes and tips with the boxes, so I at least have a place to start with my kitchen adventures.

Jess and I took the time this weekend to finish off the chipmunk roaster (aka. our Dryer) project from a month ago. We purchased a dryer exhaust-vent outdoor cage to prevent what happened from EVER happening again. (Thanks for the use of your Calk, Jeff)

You can see how low to the ground our vent is. The old aluminum vent was fairly worthless and as we reveled in its removal, we could see just how flimsy its construction truly was. Every time we ran the dryer the vent flap got stuck wide open, as if to say “Welcome” to the neighborhood critters. From henceforth, this inviting tube of death is exit only!

Like a good Harry Potter book, we are treating our “little dryer incident” like an evil wizard…not to be spoken of again.

Whew. Our Kitchen project is now done…and it turned out great!

I’ll let the pictures speak for themeslves.

  Before:                   After:

All-in-all it went pretty smoothly. Jess and I did this ENTIRE project our selfs and took about 5 hours over 2 days to complete. Not too shabby considering the project included cabinet removal & installation, re-routhing wall wiring & electical outlet-box installation, cabinet & wall preportion, along with the wall-mount above-range microwave installation. (Thanks Goehner Designer Builders, all that construction work in high school is really paying off) We were able to do this project for about half of what it would have cost if we’d had to hire the three seperate installers needed.

We love the finished product. If any of you have a similar kitchen or are in a similar “counterspace sitution,” we highly recamend doing this project as well.

Good Luck!

Buying (and living in) a condo is a lot like swimming in a Lake Martha. Sure, its inviting, the scenery great, and the adventure to arrive there exciting. But after you have taken the plunge and swam around for a while you find your stuck with little “attachments” not seen from the waters edge.

One of theses little nuances is “Condo Grilling” or “BBQing.” We received a fantastic grill as a housewarming gift (thanks Dave!). This stainless steel beast has all the bells and whistles, 4 burner, separate round side burner, cast-iron grates, and much more.

Come to find out, we can not store or use our new grill on our nice wood deck.

Fine. We moved the grill to the garage, only to find out that we can not have the grill’s 20 lbs LP tank in our “dwelling.” The City of Madison considers it a fire hazard. Each “family” in the multi-family dwelling (condo/town-home) residence is only allowed to store a 1 lb tank.

Moral of the story…For those of you in a similar situation, buy the SteakSaver by Mr. Heater.

This handy little item converts the normal 20 lb LP tank connection to a 1 lb LP tank connection. The Steak Saver costs about $24 from True Value and is super slick to both install and use. (It also sells online through Amazon and Northern Tool)

If you live in a multi-family dwelling condo or town-home in the City of Madison we highly recommend this item.