My day in pictures…

Today was Kuntsfest, the local fall festival in V’s town.  Her daughter Angie had a booth showcasing her jewelry, I took the M&M’s, all decked out in the daisy scrungies she made them.  They had a blast.  Maggie, my attention getting little ham, wanted EVERYONE to stop by and say hi to her.  Mollie, as usual, was more laid back, she just sat on my lap and took it all in.  It always amazes me, when I take the girls somewhere, how many people come up to me and tell me about their Yorkies.

 

V lives in a historic old river town, it was fun just sitting and people watching.  Jean and her Mother came for awhile,  we just kicked back, played with the dogs and tried to stay away from the food booths.  The last picture is of the fur kids  snoozing in the car on the way home.  They were so pooped, they slept for hours!

Our children, they grow older, but they don’t really grow up….

Thank goodness, there is nothing more charming than an adult child, with “occasional” lapses into familiar childlike behavior.

My youngest, Ryan, turns 33 tomorrow.  In birthdays of his childhood, when favorite meals were always on the agenda, Ryan would have strange combinations, things like lasagna, taco salad, and always, always, that horrid box mix of Tunnel of Fudge Cake.  I’ve talked about Tunnel of Fudge Cake many times, how nobody liked the darned thing, I don’t even think baby boy liked it, but he HAD to have it, and of course, I would make it, he would eat a piece, the rest of us would pass, I would put it in Tupperware, and it would surface months later, pushed to the back of the pantry, growing a green skin.  This happened year after year.  In fact, when Lindsay and Ry got married, she surprised him with a Tunnel of Fudge Groom’s Cake, which of course sent him into spasms of joy, while the wedding guests waited patiently for Lindsay to explain his ongoing love affair with the chocolate monster. 

You can’t even buy the mix anymore, thank goodness, but oh, I have a recipe for a homemade one, it’s a lot of trouble, and no better than the mix, but he doesn’t ask for it anymore, I think he’s finally realized there are more yummy desserts to be had than that cake, and I’ve passed the torch of cooking his favorite meal to Lindsay.  Well, not completely, because both my sons milk their birthday meal for all it’s worth, so I’m sure when he comes home he will be talking me into making yet another birthday dinner for him.

And what’s his meal of choice this year?  It’s one of those lapses into childhood behavior things.  When he was a little boy, he and his Dad ADORED franks and beans, and white gummy bread, usually served with fried potatoes or french fries. 

John didn’t care for it, I tolerated it, but oh my, Ry loved it.  So that’s what he wants Lindsay to make him, my gourmet cook, food snob son, wants a childhood meal, beans and franks, and…. TATER TOTS!!!!  Oh, and of course, the required white, gummy loaf of Bunny Bread… Blecht!!!  Poor Linds, she’ll fix it, but she won’t eat a bite, Im sure.  And dessert?  Chocolate chip cookies….  Now that would work for me, Lindsay makes rockin’ chocolate chip cookies…

I’ll be calling him in the morning, early, singing Happy Birthday to him,  and no doubt later in the day hearing in great detail about how great his birthday dinner was.

Oh, he’s a sweetheart, that son of mine, Happy Birthday a bit early, Ry…

Great grains…

I went to the natural food store today, where they had bins of all the grains I’ve been looking for in my ongoing quest for healthy eating.  I came home with things like wheat berries, buckwheat groats, bulgar, whole wheat couscous, organic soy beans, and soup mixes like sunset soup mix and organic chile mix, chocked full of lentils and black beans and barley.  And they say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.  This should be an interesting experience, cooking with some of these grains……  I was just surprised to find all of this locally in Heavensville, I thought I would have to order online.

It was one of those ahhhhh moments….

I wish I could have just stopped time this morning , it was so perfect.  I was out with the M&M’s on a potty run, the morning sun was filtering thru the trees, the sky was a vivid blue, with temperatures in the lower 50’s in Heavensville, and as I sat on Milly, warmed by my fleecy jacket and sipping my mug of coffee, I watched the horses in the pasture, and listened to the birds singing their morning songs, while Mags and Mollie scampered in the grass and I was just one with nature.

It’s one of the joys of growing older, when a moment in time is perfect, I’m wise enough now to realize it,  and just live in it.    I could have stayed out there forever. 

It’s those simple things…

Williams-Sonoma fall catalog…

It’s a sure sign of fall when the Williams-Sonoma catalog arrives, just chocked full of pumpkin and halloween ideas.

It makes me long for the days when the boys were little, and we would make halloween cookies. This month’s offering of cookie cutouts are so cute.

Doesn’t this picture just make you want to grab your credit card and order them?

Of course they give you the recipe, too– Williams-Sonoma just ROCKS!!!

So, if your interest is piqued, here’s a picture of the cutters up close and personal, you can order them here, and here is the link for the recipes.

And, if  cookies aren’t your thing,  you can always order the ultimate apple.  It’s a visual delight…

Remember when you were a kid and bobbed for apples. 

Well, this  isn’t quite the same thing , but Toto, we aren’t in Kansas anymore…

Oh, does this ever look decadent!!!  Just read the description -

Surprise your favorite apple aficionado with a caramel apple whose impressive size conveys the extent of your good wishes. Each confection begins with a magnificent Washington Fuji apple, a varietal prized for its juicy crispness and sweet, slightly spicy flavor.

Candymakers double-dip the apple in handmade caramel that's been simmered in copper kettles to rich, buttery creaminess.

The apple is blanketed with a thick layer of premium dark chocolate, coated with roasted California almonds and finished with a drizzle of dark and orange-tinted white chocolate.

Interested?  Of course you are, here’s the click for the link.

Don’t you just love fall???

Source:  Williams-Sonoma

Been there….

Bonnie Hunt this morning was talking about when she was a kid and if her Mom gained a little weight, she would stand at the top of the stairs, and have her kids grab her dress at the back and then she would walk down the stairs with them tugging at the dress as she walked so it would stretch. I was laughing out loud.  Too funny!!!

I’m such a sucker…

Hubby is always telling me I need to take control of my dogs.  Well, I just hate to discipline them, they’re such good little dogs, I just have such a hard time saying no to them.

I was on the phone while ago with Linds, Mollie decided she didn’t like being in the playpen anymore and she was jumping against the mesh side.  I shook my finger at her and said, “no”, that didn’t work, so I told Lindsay to hold on and I said “NO” and gave her a little swat.

Well, you would have thought I beat her.  She went to the far corner of the playpen and looked at me with those big puppy dog eyes, it just broke my heart.

So I hung up the phone, scooped her up in my arms, gave her kisses and a treat, and put her back in.  She’s happy as a little clam now, she just needed attention.

She’s no different than the rest of us, when she isn’t getting enough positive attention, she does something to get negative attention, which isn’t always better than no attention at all, it just works for the moment.

Next time hubby tells me I need to discipline my dogs,  he’s gonna get a little negative attention, himself!   I should have known better than to listen to a man! I just have no willpower with them.  I’m a marshmallow….

MEN SCHMEN!!! It’s all his fault….  Yeah, it is…

Talk shows... try Bonnie Hunt

If you're like me, I'm tired of Regis and Kelly, their schtick is wearing a little thin.  Rachael Ray doesn't ring my chimes, Oprah is on my sh*t list, so for me, that leaves Ellen, who I think is an absolutely adorable little fairy.  I DO!!!!  I think she is perky, and cute, and funny, but hey, Ellen, we all know you can dance, I'm a little tired of the dancing...
Enter the new kid on the block.  The Bonnie Hunt Show.  Oh, she's so funny and fresh and perky, she doesn't dance - she's kinda like a straight Ellen.  SHE IS!!!!
She doesn't rehearse so her material is fresh, she debuted last week, so if you haven't watched her, give her a chance.  You will have to check local times, for me she's on at 9am opposite Regis and Kelly.  She's on CBS.
Here are a couple of clips from last week with Cloris Leachman, she's 82 and a HOOT!!!! Take a few minutes, grab a cup of coffee, watch these videos and see if they don't just crack you up!  When she combed Bonnie's hair I was just howling.  Oh, this old woman is funny!!!!  I would love to go to dinner with her.  Can you imagine her after a few glasses of wine? 
Don't ya just love old broads?  I love em'.  Not old ladies, old ladies are so boring, but an old broad, , oh they are just so much fun!!!!!!!!!  That's what I aspire to be when I get old (er).  An old broad.  Yep, I surely do......

Your daily dose of cuteness...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once upon a time, when I was a teenager...

I was thinking about my teenage years last night, when sleep was elusive and my head was filled with past memories, and I made a realization.  That my "oops" moments were a lot more fun than any of my accomplishments or achievements as a teenager.

Has life ever been as funny as when you were a teenager?  How long has it been since you belly laughed, with tears rolling down your cheeks?  Have you acted totally silly in recent years, totally unembarrassed and uninhibited by your behavior?  Well, let me rephrase that, have you done this without alcohol?

Probably not.  If you are like me, we have our silly moments, especially Hooterville and I, but for the most part the guffaws and haha's aren't as funny as they were when we were young.

I was thinking last night of how I was with Barbara Hart in Carolyn Weiss's dad's '57 Rambler, at the Goody-Goody, Enfield's local drive-in and the place to see and be seen.  We were all sitting in the front seat, eating hot fudge sundaes, and she backs out of her parking space, no doubt to impress a boy, and smacks right into a telephone pole.  And what did we do?  We sat there, with hot fudge all over our shirts and we laughed until we cried.

I remember practicing for the senior play, and the boys came in with a basket of contraband apples, that they had filched from the local produce stand late at night, and how we all ate the apples and were shocked at how wild and daring they were.

And we roared with laughter, when a particularly nerdy teacher, while sitting on a podium in study hall, got his shoelaces tied together by some of the boys, who shimmied on their bellies to do so, while someone else detracted him with some insignificant question.

And I vividly remember being in the same study hall, when Janie Wilson, a really portly girl, went outside to lower the American flag for the day, and we all got up and went to the window and said The Pledge of Allegiance, with our hands over our hearts, while laughing uproariously.  Of course, it wasn't quite so funny when we all got detention for a week for doing that.

We had a math teacher, Mrs. Cash, a really brainy woman, but a total oddball, and we would take turns daily, sneaking into the teacher's lounge to check her lunch sack - the poor woman brought the same lunch every single day.  A cold fried egg sandwich and an apple.  Then we would report back to the others that "yep, old lady Cash had the same thing, again!"

Detention was also to be had the last week of my senior year, when our business teacher was out of the room, probably down the hall flirting with the school secretary, and we all turned all of the office equipment backwards, turned our chairs around and faced the wrong way.

And then there was one halloween when the boys broke into the school late at night and put a cow in the library.  That was quite the scandal.

And one day, the school superintendent came around the corner to see a chair dangling from the 2nd story math room.  In those days there was no air conditioning, and no screens, the teachers just opened the windows and let the breeze in.  And someone got the bright idea that it would be funny to dangle the chair from the venetian blind cords.  So we're all sitting in math class laughing, the teacher totally oblivious, until he got a knock on the door.

Such silliness,  and I'm sure today's sophisticated teens would think my memories totally not cool, but at the time it was freakin' hilarious.

Good memories of a more innocent time...

Right now...

I'm listening to Alison Krauss, A Hundred Miles or More, thanks to Dilly who gave the album to me.

What a pure voice she has, just perfect for a windy, cloudy Sunday afternoon in Heavensville....

Interested in the tunes?  Click thru HERE to see what's in the album...

Holy Batman and Robin, it's windy....

Geezy Pete, Heavensville is getting the remnants of Hurricane Ike this morning.  It's so windy, the M&M's kept blowing around  when I took them out this morning, I was afraid they were going to just topple over.

I just hope the power holds, it's been flickering all morning...