Monday, August 30, 2021

Farewell, August...

September is knocking with its apples and spiderwebs hanging in the glowing, frosty dew... My son's 40th birthday is the 5th! W.O.W! How can I have a son older than I am? Ha ha!



I plan to try very hard to recreate something from Little Caesar's Menu. We don't have one near here, and he is a software developer for them.  I found some copycat recipes for their marinara sauce, crazy bread, wings, and buttery garlic dipping sauce online, so... for his birthday it's "Pizzapizza!" I am not as excited about my gifts for him as I was last year... I hope he has a sweet day Sunday!

This picture was taken yesterday.... wasn't it?

We dragged out the Autumn totes (four!) It really soothes my soul to decorate for this beautiful harvest season... I decided to just go ahead and put out Halloween early... it's just for him and me, so it can't be too spooky for us! 



I don't really like the brushy look here, so I will probably move it tomorrow. 

I have one more corner of the kitchen and my bedroom to finish.  I've had some help this year... (not!) Although my son has offered twice to put up tall things!  And then.... there's the 👸 queen! Lol... She is such a helper!

See you.... in September! 



Saturday, August 28, 2021

pictures... like I am a food blogger!

I thought you might like pictures of the pizzas I have made since finding out about Chaffle dough....a couple posts back is the basic recipe.
I decided to do a quick pepperoni and pepper one. Usually I use Rao's pizza sauce, but this was open..  it was great!
This is the pan that came with my toaster oven.  The dark places are where the dough wasn't... lol.  It is a lot of pan for that little batch.

After baking about 10 to 15 minutes.

Sauce it

Add toppings and cheese. 

AND BAKE! Yummy! Let it cool just a little to set up. 

Happy End of August. 

Saturday, August 21, 2021

Ahhh... the ole dump and go plan@

If I eliminated every post that details my attempt to "organize / clean /pare down / and eliminate clutter" in my home, it might just sweep.this Blog under a rug!. Lucky for me, I don't plan to do that! 
I have been cleaning and rearranging in my typical dump and regret style! I learned that as a child. Oh, I can so remember my poor mama's face when she sent me to clean my room! She would check in and find such chaos! SO UNLIKE HER! She could sweep into a place and have it company ready in 15 minutes. She employed the "Basket trick." Boom! She might just have owned  a wooden, peach laundry basket with a pretty liner just used for that process. Every item out of place was whooshed into the basket. Then a red- handled father duster flicked the dust about and gone. Her beloved cannister Electrolux gobbled up the floors; et Voilá! The room was ready, and she was making a pot of coffee. She grabbed out that basket after the company went home and put every item away in its proper home. 
Alas! I don't work that way! Never did... First, any stash thus relegated to such basket is likely STILL in said basket! I might have learned a lesson or two when, years ago, I had to skulk down the basement and paw through a blanket full of superfluous clutter I had toted down there Santa Claus bag fashion. It was filled with stuff, and a group of women were meeting in my house. One of those dear ♥ ladies had the nerve to crave sugar in her coffee!  Oh, sure! My Tupperware sugar cannister was deep in my furnace area...  busted! I won't even go into how often I have repurchased something only to find it finally months or years later in such a basket trip- type purgatory....  
Nope. No feather duster for me either. I bought a pretty pricey number from Flylady and came down to ? Help?  My mom and dad clean for company. I breezed in with it and a steam mop. First, the steam mop did something truly bad to the years of linoleum wax... suddenly the floors were covered with horrid, white,  blah/ bleachy-looking spots. My dad looked at me over his glasses and invited me to take that thing back to my car.  I then whipped our my fancy feather duster... and snagged a red Polish crystal water glass with the second whisk.  Crash /shatter / gasp! I looked across the room to four reproachful eyes. Daddy just softly said, "Go home." So.... I think I did!
<many moons ago>

So... my current quest involves creating nooks. I now have A COOKBOOK NOOK in my kitchen. The little bookcase was a gift in the forties, handmade by my dad for his future in-laws... I love to stack! I'm liking how it turned out! 
Mom's Daybook/diaries

Yep! Now on to my Studio currently in the omygosh! Phase...  I hope to make nooks for Devotions, handwork, and crafting...

Yesterday would have been my parents' 71st  wedding anniversary. I finally put something in the freezer for the first snow... strawberries from Aldi... a far cry from home grown peas!  But... it will do

Have a great weekend! 




Wednesday, August 18, 2021

Hmmmmm...

I had to go back and see what my word of the year had been. Where have these seven and a half months gone?  I chose



whimsy as my word...

No big news though. Kind of a blah representation of a great word. I feel as if I have a ton of things to think about, do, change, be... but instead I just snuggle under my heated throw in our icy cold, air-conditioned house... a lot! 

However... I did make an awesome keto-ish pizza. It was 

Backyard Barbecue Copycat Pizza (my creation)

2 c. shredded sharp cheddar (any cheese will work)
2 eggs
2 T. gluten free biscuit mix (or almond flour perhaps)
1/3 c. bbq sauce of your choice. (I just used the Aldi Kansas City so not really keto there)
1 -  1 1/2 c. cooked, shredded or sliced chicken (I used the precooked fajita grilled strips from Aldi)
1/2 thinly sliced red onion
1.2 lb. cooked, crumbled bacon

I baked the bacon 12 minutes on a sheet pan that fits in my mini oven.  Crumble the bacon and drain most of the grease. I left it as the oil for the pizza pan. Using half the cheese, the eggs, and the biscuit mix as the dough, I stirred them up and patted it out all the way to the edge of the pan. It was thin. but it puffs up. I baked at 350 for a few minutes until very lightly browned. Add and spread out the sauce and then the rest of the ingredients, and top with the other half of the cheese. Bake about 20 minutes until it is the color you like for the top cheese. It gave Pizza Hut a run for the money! Serves ?  I dunno... Four? six with a salad and no seconds? in our case 2 a couple of slices and a salad twice....... but I think you will want seconds! 



I made three huge packs of modern gal cards and envelopes, several autumn journals, and some vintage children cards and journals. I need to start on a big ole project... Ugh... I have been crocheting cotton dishcloths which you saw in my last post, but.... my skills are lacking with unforgiving cotton. They look ugly... I can use them, but I need to up my game if I plan to make cute sink baskets for the holidays... 

I am moving furniture a little. Again. My 2022 word of the year needs to be U-Haul.  


Whimsy and Hugs!

Friday, August 6, 2021

Waiting...

Tonight again the lovely sound of locusts at sundown... I love that song, their proclamation of Fall in the wings. Our night sky is pink for a while, presumably due to those devastating western fires. 

Today we made another jar of pickled eggs. 


These will be slightly spicy with jalapeños. We have planned to make beef jerky over the weekend. And 

Crochet with cotton... not my favorite but I bought a ton to make dish cloths... I finally switched to my gramma's hook... and it helped. 

Next week will be the Homecoming Festival in the town where I taught. We will be sitting this out... and I think my Fall decorating may be on the agenda.

Thanks to all of you who so faithfully read my blog! We got this!

Sunday, August 1, 2021

Good morning, August!


The day began with chaffles... a new concept shared by one of you, Jenny the Pirate. She has a cool blog called "I'm having a thought here." [The recipe calls for a half cup of shredded mozarella, one egg, and a T. Almond flour. Mix and cook in a mini waffle maker. Yields 2.]  In absence of almond flour, I've been using gluten free bisquick, and these were made with sharp cheddar shreds. They are deee-lish!

I finally gave up my early morning dreams and crawled out of bed. I was having really visual, beautiful dreams about being a wise and tiny Korean mother flying high into the clouds with the assistance a cluster of emerald and rose-colored balloons... I was off to rescue someone! A group on the ground was trying to alert the military not to shoot me down! My kimono was long and fluttering in the wind... beautiful shades of Grey, azure, and crimson....  lol... you know, the basic dream that you keep trying to go back and re-join to finish the job! I'm sure I saved the day! How could that go Wrong? 


I'm going to repaint this little sign,.but I just felt the need to see Mom's beautiful words she told me while I was helping her through one of her rare cranky days after her stroke. Exactly... I think most of us at our ages know how to change the color of a day.  But do we use that super power for good or evil? Hmmm? 


Here we are in August of Year 2 of the pandemic. Possibly never in our lives have we needed this strength more. 

My son and I were talking about the "go-to" conversations or processes that seem to live in our conscious minds. He said his usually revolve around code for his computer programming or code for a video game he would like to create. Wow! I mean no disrespect, but I would probably die if my mind constantly revolved around integers! 


I told him mine revealed either projects or more likely conversations inhabited by my parents and grandparents now gone from this earth. His reaction to my interior monologue? Precisely the same as mine! Oh, how funny!

Have a wonderful and safe August. May we color wisely and kindly... ❤