Vanilla Icing

Felt Food

            

 

There is a swap on swap-bot for 'felt food.'  My partner chose either a bento box of sushi or High English Tea.  Since I have almost no experience eating (and therefore seeing) sushi, I thought I would go with the High English Tea.  I've been a bit behind schedule because of spending time with our houseguest, but I still will have everything finished before the required send out date of July 2nd.  I also plan to sew some extra felt food (not all High Tea Stuff) as part of a gift for a child in the future.

Strawberries.  They do look like strawberries right?  Sort of? 

            

       

Country Club

Today, Rick is golfing at the country club. 

I'm really hoping he does well.

The Pittsburgh Executives Association is holding a Whole-in-One contest!

Blues

I'm feeling a bit cranky (sticky, warm house) so I thought I'd post a few of the flowers in my garden because despite their cool colors they still cheer me up because blue is my favorite color.

Bachelor Buttons--You can see a stray yellow Marigold in the background.  I only like yellow Marigolds and tossed an odd handful of seeds in the Bachelor Buttons mix.

Forget-Me-Nots--I almost did forget these dainty blue flowers!  This year in light of being a bit frugal and also to save the hassle of transplanting, I bought a few packets of seeds.  These Forget-Me-Nots were sent to me in the mail along with a flower seed catalog.  There were so few in the packet that I just tossed them down and forgot all about them.  I had no clue what all the green stuff growing had been until they started to bloom about a week ago.

Blueberry Muffins

            

 

Apparently, these are not a favorite in our house.

Blueberry Muffins--I shouldn't be suprised, though, becasue no one really likes to eat the berry plain either.

            

       

Guest Rooms are for Houseguests

            

 

This week we have a houseguest.  My friend, Lisette, who I met when she was working here a few years ago is visiting us from the Netherlands.  I am having a good time, but it is very easy to worry that perhaps she might be bored out of her mind!  After all, I'm a stay-at-home mom with two kids--not quite the life she is accustomed to.  Yesterday, we did go out for a bit, earlier in the day with the kids, and then again without them (thanks Rick!) to go have dinner and do some shopping.  Hopefully today we will find some places to go that she would enjoy and the kids won't be too bored. 

This is the first time we've actually got to use our 'guest room' for someone who has stayed more than one night.  Of course being the summer, there is no need to pile on tons of warm cozy blankets and quilts like I have always imagined doing.  Instead, I left the bed with a set of clean, cool sheets and set a few blankets of varying weight nearby.  As I walked by the room yesterday, I glimpsed that somebody had rumpled the sheets considerably.

Look closely at the culprit.

It's Eddie, our kitten of 8 months, who has finally found the perfect sleeping spot.  He was all curled up and remained that way for a few hours.

            

       

Andy Warhol Museum

The kids, Lisette and I went to the Andy Warhol Museum today.  I've never been a fan of his work (what little I have seen) but Lisette expressed an interest.  I thought since I had never seen very much of his work that it would be good to see more of it to better draw my conclusions about it. 

I've come to the conclusion that Andy Warhol is just as awful as I thought. Keith Haring (one of the extra exhbits that they were displaying as well) is even worse!  Personally, I find the two of them brilliant for being able to convince so many people to buy their work.

There were some other exhibits that ranged (to me of course) from mediocre to bad (but never as bad as AW or KH).  The exhibit I enjoyed most of all were the photographs and words by Gretchen Berg ABOUT Andy Warhol. (Oh, and I also enjoyed the display case full of AW's old things--old photographs, school records, etc)

We stopped in Southside at Pizza Vesuvius which makes the only fantastic pizza in all of Pittsburgh.  It's been such a long time since I've had a slice of their pizza and it was every bit as good as I remembered. And they still stock Diet Stewarts Root Beer!

This was the kids' favorite exibit!  Giant Silver Balloons drifting about in a room.  I only had my cell phone camera to take the picture so I did the best I could.

1st Tooth!

            

 

Yesterday, Maia lost her first tooth!

She was very excited and couldn't wait for the Tooth Fairy to come.

Maia said the first picture didn't show her missing tooth enough so she wanted to have this picture taken.

I was very excited because this was my first time ever playing the Tooth Fairy!   To date, Tristyn has lost 7 teeth but he refuses to put any of them under his pillow.  At one time, he said he was planning on cashing them all in at the end for a super big payout.  Now, he's not so sure, because he says he wants to keep his teeth forever and ever. 

            

       

1st Rose

            

 

It's a day of firsts.  Today, my first rose at my first house ever has opened enough to take a picture of it:

It's a little scraggly and definitly would not be considered prize-winning. Though, the scent and color is heavenly!  None of these new-fangled, fantastic colored but next-to-no-scent roses for me!  Five out of six of my rosebushes made it through the Battle with the Aphids and are producing roses.  I can't complain, because after the way the aphids had chomped through all of the rose bushes' new growth I didn't expect to have any roses this year.  I guess the Ladybug Brigade showed up just in time!

            

       

Poor Tristyn!

            

 

It's off to the doctor's again!   I have no clue what this is, except it appeared about a day after we played in the field/woods near our house and it's not poison ivy.

********A few hours later....the doctor said it was likely poison ivy/oak/sumac. We HAD been playing in the woods just a few days ago so this makes sense.  He was given a prescription for an anti-biodic and prednisone (spelling?).  He has to take both for about 10 days. 

            

       

On the Menu

            

 

Recently, I discovered a new love:  Indian Food.  I simply cannot get enough.  I don't have a cookbook yet but by patching together various recipes found in various places I was able to get a close approximation of one of my favorite meals.  I attempted (and I think it came out reasonably well too!) Chicken Tikka Masala, Basmati Rice and Naan.

One of my favorite things about summer and baking is that when you go to make something with yeast in it you already have the perfect rising temperature---outside!   This bread has a really quick rise time too--only about an hour and no second rise.

I didn't bother to photograph the rice becasue my picture taking skills just make rice look appealing so I left it out of the picture. 

I would like to get a few Indian cookbooks.  Definitely one of the Big Beautiful Cookbooks and maybe another one or two that were written (hopefully) more on a 'mom and pop' level.

When I dropped off Tristyn's prescription this afternoon at Giant Eagle, I noticed cherries were reasonably priced.  Time for a cherry pie!  They weren't loose and only came in pre-wrapped enormous bags of them but that was okay because I just made two pies with them.  The second pie was brought up to 's house for her to bake (because everyone knows half the fun of a pie is the yummy smell it puts in the house as it bakes) and to enjoy with her family.  I'm hoping hers turned out as well as ours did.

Sometime ago, I brought over a cherry pie to my mother-in-law's house and she was suprised to hear that I had pitted all of the cherries by hand.  I was equally surprised to find out that they made a kitchen gadget to do the job.  I love kitchen gadgets and couldn't believe I hadn't known about it.  It wasn't long before she gifted me with one.  I finally got to try it out today and it works AMAZINGLY.  Thanks again Pat!!  I still managed to stain my fingers purple anyway. =P

Fresh from the oven--Cherry Pie made with Pate Brise Crust.

I know that cherry pie probably doesn't go very well with Indian food but  no one around here seemed to mind!