Painting a Bookshelf and Making Some Sausage

I have been doing things, just not writing about them. So we'll start with painting the bookshelf. My husband make me a lovely bookshelf for Finn's room. I started off by painting it the same blue as almost everything in our kitchen because it was what I had around and I like it.

Next I found a couple Winnie the Pooh pictures that I liked. I decided to do a Winnie the Pooh theme for his room since it's something he can enjoy into his elementary years and it doesn't annoy me as much as the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse art.

 The printer paper was thin enough to see through, so rather than using tracing paper I just copied the lines heavily onto the back of the same sheet of paper. Then I used a spoon to run the tracing off onto the bookshelf end.

Pooh bear traced.

Tigger after transfer.

 I had to go through and darken the Tigger transfer because it came off very lightly, but no big deal. Then I broke out the Liquitex Basics acrylic paintand got to work!

Pooh before "inking".

 The black lines that needed painting were still lightly visible after I finished painting. Unfortunately the tube of black paint I had was so old it had dried out into an unusable (and unsqueezable) mass. So I went hunting for an alternative. In the kitchen I found a Pitt Artist Penhanging out with the ball points, and that's what I decided to use.

They turned out pretty well.

By the end of the night Finn had drawn all over Tigger with his own pen. Sad, but now you can really tell it's a kid's bookshelf.

 On to sausage making! Maybe some people think you shouldn't ever see what goes into your sausage, but I'm not one of them. We recently slaughtered our goat Clover, may she rest in pieces, and now I had some goat sausage to make!

Spices and my recipe book.

 I recently picked up a book called Charcuteriefrom Amazon and have been itching to try out some recipes. I made breakfast sausage first, which was really easy but I didn't take pictures. Next I wanted to make some Italian sausage.

Bowl of fat and a bowl of meat.

 I started with two bowls my husband had put together for me. One was meat scraps from Clover and the other was fat scraps (also from Clover). Yum!

Meat and fat together.

 Unfortunately I had to spend about 20 minutes with my hands in cold running water ensuring a hair-free sausage experience. We'll be more careful when skinning next time.

Add spices and combine.

 Now you just throw in your spices and toss to combine. I used my hands to mix it up, but obviously a spoon would work. You're supposed to place the bowl in the fridge at this point and let it all chill. I'm waaaaaay too  impatient for that nonsense. On to grinding!

My husband was not about to hand crank our grinder.

Nom.

 I would like to say that everything went smoothly and Tim's awesome drill modification cranked out the sausage super fast. Unfortunately our blade and die kept getting clogged up with connective tissue. We really need to sharpen that blade properly. But, the sausage got made and that's what really matters. Well, that and how freaking awesomely tasty the sausage turned out!

Frying my sausage for a red meat sauce.

Note- After further research it has come to my attention that one reason for the clogging could be my impatience and refusal to chill the meat properly before grinding. Whoops! From what I've read, popping everything in the freezer (including the removable grinder parts) for 20 minutes should go far toward preventing much frustration.