Laughing

When Theo came to play last week, he brought his ball and chain.



Enjoying a shared sense of humor, the girls and I couldn’t resist attaching it near his ankle and watching him toddle around…dragging it behing him.

Easter at Our House

We had a very blessed Easter Sunday praising God for his gift of salvation! We hope you did too!

Walter, Felicity, and Theo spent the day with Walter’s family. So it was a quiet afternoon at our home…quiet, but delicious! And I had a fun time setting and decorating the table.

I had seen an Easter centerpiece idea online, so I did my own take on it. I used a large, antique wash basin with a prickly wreath (symbolic of the crown of thorns), and in the center I placed yellow tulips (symbols of new life). Pretty, although it was difficult to see each other well.



I used my new linen, hem-stitched table runner…a true find at the thrift store…Williams-Sonoma tag still on it, but selling there for $3.99! Score! And did anyone else try those new coconut M&M’s this Easter? Yum!



This year we tried dyeing brown eggs from a local farm. (Their egg cartons have a tag attached that says, “From free-ranging, organically-fed, HAPPY chickens!”) We used food coloring to dye them, and got some really fabulous shades with the brown eggs.

A good day!



Easter

Glory to God! The morn appointed breaks,
And earth awakes from all the woeful past;
For, with the morn, the Lord of life awakes,
And sin and death into the grave are cast.

Glory to God! The cross, with all its shame,
Now sheds its glory o’er a ransomed world;
For He Who bore the burden of our blame,
With piercèd hands the foe to hell hath hurled.

Glory to God! Sing, ransomed souls again,
And let your songs our glorious Victor laud,
Who by His might hath snapped the tyrant’s chain,
And set us free to rise with Him to God.

Darkness and night, farewell! The morn is here;
Welcome! the light that ushers in the day;
Visions of joy before our sight appear,
And, like the clouds, our sorrows melt away.

Great Son of God, immortal and renowned!
Brighter than morn the glory on Thy brow;
Crowns must be won, and Thou are nobly crowned,
For death is dead, and sin is vanquished now.

-John Brownlie (1911)

A Birthday Celebration

This week we celebrated Felicity’s birthday! The birthday girl requested a salad bar dinner with: green salad with all the toppings, her mother-in-law’s orzo salad, my fruit salad, and Colette’s baguettes and chocolate cake.

Colette did a masterful job on the cake…oh my! It was slathered in ganache, which was allowed to set before another softer layer of ganache was pooled up on top, dribbling down the sides just a tad, and crowned with fresh raspberries. Yum!

There were pink tulips!

Colette set the table.



Deluxe fruit salad, as requested.

The happy birthday girl!

For the greens part of the salad bar, we had: mixed field greens, baby spinach, chopped romaine, cucumber, grilled chicken, red bell pepper, green onions, cheddar cheese, grape tomatoes, red onion, toasted pecans, dried cranberries, parmesan cheese, onion crisps, croutons, bacon bits, black pepper, ranch dressing, Italian dressing, ceasar dressing, and raspberry-walnut dressing.

"Happy Birthday to you..."



Timely Information: How To Hard Boil Eggs So They Peel Easily

This week, with Easter just around the corner, many of us will be hard boiling eggs. Here’s how to do it so that the shells peel off easily. I tried it today for the first time, and was thrilled with the results!

Put a saucepan full of water on the stove to boil.

Next, you want to use a push pin to poke a hole in the fat end of each egg. You don’t want to poke it all the way through the shell, just part way. (If you happen to poke it all the way through, some egg white will leak out as you boil your egg, and your egg will have a flat part on one end instead of being nicely oval.) I cushioned my egg carton by placing a thick kitchen towel between it and my countertop, so that it I felt a little more secure that I wasn’t going to break an egg doing this. Not sure if that helped or not, but it made me feel better.



Carefully lower the eggs into the boiling water.

Reduce to a simmer and simmer for 15 minutes.

Remove eggs from water and drain in a colander or seive.



Immediately plunge them into a bowl of ice water. Let sit in ice water for 16 minutes.

Peel eggs, rejoicing that this is so easy!

As an added bonus, when you use this method, you don’t get any strange gray-green color around your egg yolk…just nice yellow and white eggs.



Easy! Delicious!

For the source for how I learned to do this (with more detailed information) click here.

Spring Home Atmosphere

This is the second in a series of postings on how I think about the atmosphere of our home in a seasonal manner.  If you'd like to read the first posting, Winter Home Atmosphere, click here.



In my mind, each season has an atmosphere all its own, and that atmosphere spills over to: the kitchen, touches of beauty and comfort, and our activities. Here is how I am thinking about this spring:

Spring

Growth.  Bloom.  Color.  New.  Clean.

The Kitchen:

-fresh eggs

-quiche

-asparagus

-lemon desserts

-strawberries

-grilling

Touches of Beauty and Comfort:

-fresh flowers on the table

-open windows

-forsythia branches indoors

-lighten and brighten decorative touches

-fresh air

Activities:

-Easter!

-spring cleaning

-make soap

-creatively dye eggs

-lighten wardrobe

-clean out closets

-start seeds

-travel

-plant garden

Turning ONE!

It seems hard to believe that a year has passed since Theo was born one snowy day last spring. What a delight to watch him grow and become part of our family! For his birthday, we all went over to Walter’s parents’ home for a celebration.

But first, Colette made him a spectacular cake covered with spots!



Presents were purchased and colorfully wrapped!

All because we love this little guy to pieces!!!!



He ate his cake with great gusto, much to everyone’s delight!

Happy Birthday, little guy!

A Wedding Get-Away

Having long anticipated a trip to North Carolina for a friend's wedding, we decided to forge ahead with our plans. Heeding doctor’s advice for Technohubby to get out and walk a bit every 1-2 hours to prevent blood clots, it took us a bit longer than it might have otherwise. But we’re really glad we went!

We left New England with 15″ of snow on the ground, but by the time we got to Connecticut, we had left any snow coverage behind. Just the four of us and the Rubber Chicken about to cross that bridge in the distance, the George Washington Bridge over the Hudson River just outside New York City.



It was just a day’s drive to friends’ home in northern Virginia, where we enjoyed their gracious hospitality as overnight guests. It was such a blessing to reunite with old and dear friends!  Great conversation! A game of Stratego between the boys. Comfortable beds. Good food! It was a short, but wonderful visit!

The wedding was in North Carolina.



Pretty stained glass windows in the church.

And they were pronounced husband and wife!



There had been thunder and lightning the night before in Virginia. But all were grateful for just a slight sprinkling of showers the day of the wedding. Remember that green brocade and silk I purchased in New York City in January? Well…there it is in its finished form.



The reception was held at this historic inn. So pretty!



There was great rejoicing! Dancing! A harpist! And delicious food!

The next day, after a breakfast open house at the bride and groom’s home, we bid farewell to our friends and went off exploring. We headed for North Carolina’s Outer Banks. There we discovered the Wilbur and Orville Wright National Monument, which consists of a small museum (building to the right), recreations of the Wright Brothers cabins where they lived while conducting their experiments in flight (two wooden buildings to the left)…



…and at the top of the hill from which they launched the first flight, this monument to their accomplishement.

It was a great trip!

Change of Plans

Our plans are not God’s plans. This was abundantly clear last Friday. Technohubby took the day off to go skiing with the kids. I spent my usual quiet Friday sewing. About 1:00 p.m. the phone rang.  Technohubby had had a skiing accident.  A fall.  A ski that didn't release.  Ski patrol.  A tobaggon ride down the hill.  An ambulance ride to the hospital.  The diagnosis...a broken hip.  Surgery.  A hospital stay.  Crutches...for the next three months.

Life is moving pretty slowly now.  Yet the days are exhaustingly full.  The prognosis is good for a full recovery.  Praise God!

One loyal dog just wants to be close to his master, anyway he can.



Developing Eating Habits

Theo, my grandson, has learned to be quite proficient at putting Cheerios in his mouth. And the dog? Well, it didn’t take her long to learn where the best place to lie is.

Summer in Winter

Last summer I visited a local farm that does u-pick flowers (see this posting).  I bought an armload of flowers for a mere $12, and they’ve been hanging in the laundry/sewing room drying. I’ve been waiting for a snowy day to arrange them in vases. But alas, so little snow this winter. And it’s already February, so I decided that I just ought to get busy with the flowers. Today was the day!

I gathered various vases and vessels and all the flowers (just a few shown here).



What fun I had! I got six arrangments for my $12 investment and the beauty of bringing a touch of summer to our winter. This one is sitting in the sunny kitchen windowsill to cheer me as I work.

And the kitchen table got an arrangement made in a redware crock from Old Sturbridge Village.



A small bouquet in a silver basket sits on the laundry/sewing room windowsill.



And in our master bath, this bright little spot of color.



And Colette even had some fun putting together this pretty arrangement for her room.



Excellent flowers for dried arrangements include:

- globe amaranth

- statice

- blue salvia (looks like lavender)

- straw flowers

- cock’s comb

I’m definitely going flower gathering again this summer!

Spud Launcher Project

First came the mathematical calculations. Then came a trip to Home Depot. Then Technohubby and Max put in many nights’ work in the basement. They’ve been building a potato cannon! Today was launch day!

I’m not sure exactly how it works, but I know it involves shoving a potato from the pantry into part of the cannon.

A long piece of wood plays the role of a ramrod.

Another part of it is filled with air from the air compressor. Valves are involved.

The inventors!

I wish I could’ve photographed it shooting. I wish I could’ve videotaped it and shared it with you. But that spud blasted out so quickly that I never even saw it happen. Technohubby managed to track the potato as it went up, uP, UP! Impressive! I fear for unsuspecting squirrels in the forest. But the guys are immensely pleased!