When years from now we remodel our kitchen, I want to replace many of our upper cabinet doors with glass ones – many-paned, bubbly, antiquey glass ones. (Perhaps if I learn to use my router soon, I can make the doors myself.) But in the mean time, I’ll settle for just taking some of my […]
Our bathroom heat lamp bulb burned out recently, and when we went to replace it we were a bit surprised to find out that it had held the potential for our deaths in its eerily Satanic and yet warming glow. That there on the left is the old heat lamp bulb, and on the right […]
Me: “Sofía, I’m putting Parmesan in the macaroni because it has umami. Umami is a fifth food sense, like sweet or salty or sour. Soy sauce has it and so do tomatoes. Umami makes everything taste good.” Sofía: “ooh yeah! She delicious! We lick her!” And then my arm gets enthusiastically licked from wrist to […]
I hosted my first formal dinner on Christmas Eve, complete with one grandmother’s silver and another’s china. But the silver chest hadn’t been opened in many, many years – probably more than 20. So the silver was a little bit… unpretty. And of course I forgot to buy silver polish and only remembered when I […]
I’ve said before that I hope to make Sofía a princess dress for every Christmas. My favorite part was having her help me design it; she got to pick the color and help pick the buttons. I involved her a little bit in drawing the pattern, and then did all the actual sewing in the […]
Sofía absolutely loved doing the advent calendar this year. She quickly got the idea that each day there was a special treat in wait for her – though she never seemed to understand (or at least admit that she did) that there was only one box per day. The 24th was filled with 3 special […]
We had a beautiful Christmas full of family, love, and joy. We hope you all did too! Baking, handmade presents, family from out of state, a delighted little girl, snow flurries, and french toast made with all the leftover homemade eggnog. I wish Christmas came more often.
Browsing through my binder of magazine clippings early this month, I came across an old Martha Stewart article on making ice wreaths. It seemed like the perfect craft; very kid-friendly and costing nearly nothing. We made several using different materials in each: cranberries, pine cones, popcorn, bay leaves, and evergreen foliage. I hung them from […]
It’s been so much fun decorating the house this year, especially because Sofía gets to “help” with just about everything. What with all the baking and cooking and ‘nogging and housing and feeding of family members I haven’t had much time to post, but I hope to get at least one more post up tomorrow […]
Just a quick update – the passive solar chicken waterer works! To an extent. When I go out in the mornings it is full of slush, not frozen solid like the other waterers – I can live with that. When I put the chickens to bed it is still liquid, yay! Of course each day’s […]