Friday Show and Tell

Well, I'm late again, but better late than never. This week for show and tell I would like to show you what's blooming in my gardens.Red Parrot tulips!

Lavendar colored tulips.

Bleeding HeartsYellow poppies

Pink poppies

And lots of pansies!

For more show and tell, click over to http://kellishouse.blogspot.com!

Blessings

Linda

This and That

I always get such a thrill out of seeing what plants made it through the winter, and seeing bulbs sprout up that I forgot I planted! Aren't these red fringed parrot tulips beautiful! I had totally forgotten that I planted them and when I saw the plant coming up, I wondered what color they were going to be.

I love these lilac colored tulips, I'm not sure how those red ones got mixed in, again probably something that I planted then forgot. I am always afraid of pulling any weeds in the flower garden until I let them grow and see if they really are a weed, or if they are a flower!

Let me introduce you to my redneck husband. He and my son bought this piece of junk racing boat last fall and have spent the winter trying to restore it. They have a long way to go! Any way, they wanted to try it out so they put it in the water Sunday. There are no seats in it, but they sat on the floor and drove it around. Getting it back on the trailer proved to be a problem, and DH ended up having to get in the lake to get it back on. The water is freezing, but he suffered no ills from getting so cold and the boat is being prepped to be painted in the next week or two.

Hope everyone has a great day!

Linda

Butterscotch-Apple Cake

Last week I came across a website called noblepig.com. She has a very funny style of writing and the recipes looked delicious. So I decided to give this one a try and am I ever glad I did. I'm not a big cake girl, but I loved this one as did dear husband and son. Below is the recipe, but head over to the noblepig for a very entertaining and beautifully photographed version of this recipe.

Butterscotch-Apple Cake

1 cup vegetable oil

2 cups sugar

2 eggs

2 cups all purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 cups finely chopped apples (I used Gala)

1 cup chopped pecans (I used walnuts)

1 cup butterscotch morsels

Garnish: caramel sauce and whipped cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large mixing bowl, mix together oil and sugar. Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition. Add flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon, beat well.

Let me stop right here to tell you that this mixture was too stiff for my poor cheap mixer. If you have a heavy duty stand mixer you will probably be ok, the batter looks nothing like cake batter, more like a stiff cookie dough. But keep on going, it will turn out ok!

Stir in vanilla, apples, and pecans. Mixture will be thick. (She's not kidding!).

Spread mixture evenly in a greased 9x13 baking pan. Sprinkle butterscotch chips over top. Bake 55 minutes.

Cool completely in pan. Garnish with caramel sauce and whipped cream (I didn't have either and it was great just plain.)

I had a big piece of this cake, with a glass of cold milk, I curled up in my favorite chair with my favorite mystery book and I was in heaven!

Yngwie had band practice today, so I headed down on the city market, to check out the spring plants. I ended up buying two yellow oriental poppies and some english daisies that I have now planted around my pond.

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Blessings

Linda

I'm Still Alive!

Sorry for the neglected blog. I took 4 days off for Spring break with Yngwie and we were so busy, I didn't even think about blogging!

Things are blooming around the house and that makes me happy! I love spring flowers! My hyacinths are gorgeous this year! I love the waxy look of the blooms and one bloom in your house will scent the whole house with a sweet scent.

This year the Easter Bunny left me an early surprise! I went out to the pool garden the Saturday before Easter and look what I found waiting! The Easter Bunny sure knows me pretty well. Chocolate and flowers! Wow!
I have begun planting in the Peter Rabbit garden and will try to get pictures soon. So far I have planted radishes, lettuce, and spinach in the PR garden, I still want to put in some carrots and some herbs, but it's too early yet for them. In the "big" veggie garden we have planted spinach, lettuce, radishes, beets, turnips, and onions. Yngwie has repaired the electric fence and we are good to go. It will be a couple more weeks before I will be able to plant anything else.

Wishing everyone a wonderful evening!
Linda

Happy Easter!

He is not here: for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay. And go quickly, and tell his disciples that he is risen from the dead; and, behold, he goeth before you into Galilee; there shall ye see him: lo, I have told you. And they departed quickly from the sepulchre with fear and great joy; and did run to bring his disciples word. And as they went to tell his disciples, behold, Jesus met them, saying, All hail. And they came and held him by the feet, and worshipped him. Then said Jesus unto them, Be not afraid: go tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, and there shall they see me.Bible: Matthew, 28. 6

I will be very busy this weekend preparing to Easter Sunday! I will be having all our family for dinner after church. I love Easter, it is my favorite holiday !

I will not be online until Sunday night, so I will leave you with a few photos of our Easter decor!

Easter Blessings!

Linda

Spring has Sprung!

Happy first day of Spring everyone! It's sunny but cool here in SW Virginia today and we have high wind warnings, but such is March around here.

I have been listening carefully every night waiting for the first sounds of the "peepers" that come to our little pond to mate. Night before last I thought I heard one and ran outside to see. They are back! I love the trill mating sound that fills the spring air at night, it can lull me asleep in a minute. Last year we had about 20 of the little frogs in our pond, last night I counted only 3. I'm sure the rest are on their way.

I have been getting together my menus and shopping for our Easter celebration Sunday. I will be hosting dinner for about 15 people. We are having Baked Ham, Zesty Meatballs, Potato cheese casserole, broccoli casserole, green beans, cole slaw, deviled eggs, pickled beets, stuffed cerely, homemade rolls, Chocolate "Peeps" cake, and lemon meringue pie. Okay, I am starving just typing that out! We have a tradition in our family that has been going on for at least 4 generations. The week before Easter my grandmother, father, and myself will make beet pickled eggs. This tradion started with my great grandmother. She would take the boiled eggs and put into a pink depression glass cookie jar and pour the liquid from pickled beets over them. Then my grandmother inherited the pink cookie jar and she used it for many years before she passed it on to my Dad. I called him last week and he had just put his eggs in. I haven't inherited the pink jar yet so I bought a green depression glass cookie jar just like it. Mine are in there now and will be brought out for dinner Easter day.

Wishing everyone a Happy Spring

Linda

8 Things About Me

Nancy over at http://morthanenough.wordpress.com tagged me to write 8 things about my self. I really had a hard time with this, as I guess there is really nothing "special" about me, but here goes:

1. I love to be outside gardening. Unless its freezing cold out, I will find a reason to be outside everyday and play in the dirt.

2. I collect small dolls. By small I mean under 6 inches tall. I have always liked little dolls even when I was a child. I wouldn't have anything to do with a baby doll.

3. I have back problems resulting from a freak car accident when I was six. A drunk driver crossed both lanes of traffic and hit my mom's car while it was parked in my aunts driveway. I was in the back seat laying down at the time and was thrown onto the "hump" that ran through the middle of the car. The driver got a hand slap and was told never to do it again.

4. I clearly remember the first time I ever saw broccoli. It was in first grade and I went home and told my parents that they served miniature trees for lunch. LOL!

5. My mother died from Leukemia when I was 16 years old. She was 37. Fortunately, we had a wonderful father, and alot of support from my Grandmother and Great Aunt.

6. I once turned flips all the way down the church aisle before my Dad could catch me. We had gone to a friends church and the people there spoke in tongues and would fall onto the floor and roll. I thought I should do it too! I was about 4 years old.

7. I have been married to the most wonderful man on Earth for almost 28 years! And have the greatest 16 year old son that's ever lived! (I may be a little prejudiced on that!)

8. I am a Christian and gave my life to Jesus when I was 15 years old. It was the best decision I have ever made.

So there you have it, eight dull facts about me! I tag anyone who would like to play along!

Blessings

Linda

Top O The Mornin' to Ya!

Happy St. Patricks Day! I guess its true that everyone is a little Irish on St. Patricks Day.

Grandma and I went out shopping Saturday and found her a new Easter suit. My Grandma is 95 years old and very tiny, so clothes shopping can be a chore, but we found one she liked in the first store we went in. A pretty lilac colored suit.

Yesterday afternoon I went out and checked the gardens to see if they were to wet to plant and they were:( Hopefully they will dry out before the next rain comes on Thursday. I would like to get my lettuce and radishes planted.

And speaking on gardens, would you look at the adorable "potting" apron that MammyT sent to me! Do you see the manilla envelope sticking out of the pocket? That has columbine seeds in it! She is such a sweet person, check her blog out at http://morthanenough.wordpress.com/.

Hope everyone has a blessed day!

Linda

Easter Decorations

I love weekends where I don't have to be anywhere at a certain time and can just "piddle" all weekend. Those weekends are few, but that makes them more special.

This weekend I spent almost every waking hour in my craft/sewing room. I made a blouse and a pair of shorts! Both turned out good but not really photo worthy. I also made another duck which I turned into a pick and stuck into my ivy. This one was made out of the dark colored linen I found at the thrift store last week.

I am loving those Tilda books that I have bought recently. The crafts are pretty and very easy to make. I made two of the hearts with the bunny applique on them.

I went outside and cut several small tree branches and brought them in and stuck them in this old crock that I have. I added the eggs ornaments that I made last week and set it in the middle of the table.

Of course no weekend is complete without some paper crafting! So I made some paper blossoms to stick into the glass baskets I have on the table in den.

I certainly got my craft "fix" this weekend! I cut out a purple skirt that I didn't get sewed( is that a word or should it be sewn?) up, but I hope to work on it some this week.

I have discovered that I have lost my side bar with all the blogs I visit:( Anyone know how I can get that back without redoing the whole thing?

Hope everyone has a great day!

Missing

If you were a ceramic chocolate bunny and a dozen plastic glittery eggs, where would you be hiding in my house????? I have looked everywhere and they are no where to be found. I looked in the house attic, the garage attic, the pool house attic, and in the hidey hole under the stairs. No luck. Should a ceramic chocolate bunny with a basket of glittery eggs come hopping near you, please send them home.

Thanks

Friday Show and Tell

TGIF! Kelli at http://kellishouse.blogspot.com/ is hosting Show and Tell.

This week I would like to show you some of the Easter crafts I have been making. Easter is my favorite holiday!

This little funny bunny was made following a pattern in the Create and Decorate magazine. She was really simple to make and alot of fun to decorate. The flowers are millenary flowers that I bought at a auction sale. She is made from a damask napkin that my Grandmother gave me, so that makes her even more special.This little duck was made from the same damask napkin. (They were big!) I used the pattern in my new Tilda craft book called Springtime crafts. This was super easy to make and I love how it turned out.

Last but not least in this fabric egg also made from the Tilda book. Again super easy. The only thing that took very long of this was sewing the beads on. Last night I made 8 of these eggs in all different colors, one is blue with guitars on it for Yngwie! Isn't that a cute little stand? I found that yesterday at the thrift store for .25

No big plans for the week-end, thank goodness. I have kept the house pretty clean all week so I won't will guilty about sewing alot this week-end. If the garden isn't too muddy, I hope to get it cleaned out and tilled up enough to get some onions planted. I can't hardly wait until SPRING!

Blessings

Linda

Deal of the Day or Trust your Intuition!

This past week I made a Easter rabbit from one of my favorite magazines called Create and Decorate. (I will share her tomorrow for Show and Tell). If you like to do crafts, check this magazine out. It's a little hard to find. I got my first one at Barnes & Noble then subscribed to it. Anyway, I love how the rabbit turned out, but thought I would like it even better if I had made it out of linen fabric. So, at lunch today I thought I would run over to the local fabric store and get some. As I was leaving a little voice in my head said "go to the Rescue Mission thrift store". (Yes, I'm hearing voices, so what!). So I turn toward the thrift store instead. When I get there I see they have set up an entire area with fabric. Guess what I got? 3 yards of cream colored linen for $1.00 and 2 yards of oatmeal colored linen for $1.00! Of course, I had to buy about 7 more pieces of fabric as well. It was all priced between .50 and 1.50.

Then as I was walking down the aisle I looked over in the toy bin and couldn't believe what I saw! Three Barbies from the 1970's! The photo above is not the ones I bought but the ones I bought are just like them. There were probably 20 Barbies in the bin and I asked the clerk how much they were and she said .25 each. I took them all! Plus 2 big bags of Barbie clothes for $1.00 per bag. I will keep the 3 old Barbies and give the others and the clothes to Yngwie's friends sister. She loves Barbies.

I love a good deal! The girls at work call me the "Thrift Store Queen" I wear that title proudly!

Blessings

Linda

Easter Dress #2

As I mentioned, I am showing some of the wonderful handmade dresses that my Aunt Doris in California would make for me for Easter.

Green must have been her favorite color as several of the dress she made was the color.

This photo is from 1971 and I am 10 years old. My sister and I have matching mint green dotted swiss dresses. My mom is in the middle with the blue and white checked coat that she made. The only time she ever wore this coat was to church. Never anywhere else.

Check out that console TV in the background along with the gold drapes! I remember when we got that tv it was around 1967-1968. It was our first color TV and it came on Saturday morning when the cartoons were on. I was totally mesmerized! I had never seen a color TV before. I also see a seashell vase that my uncle brought us back from the exotic and ever so far away state of Florida!

I love to look at the objects in the background of photos. My scrapbooking buddies are always trying to get me to "crop out" objects in the background of my photos, but I usually won't. I want Yngwie to look at the photos when he is middle aged and laugh about our decor!

Blessings

Linda

Easter "Baskets" (kinda)

Good Morning everyone.

Seems as if I have been neglecting my blog lately, but I have been busy crafting and cooking, and cleaning out flower beds, getting ready for SPRING!

The ladies in my family are big coffee drinkers. The minute one us walk into each others house, we will put the coffee pot on. So, this year I made cup and saucer Easter "baskets"

I found the cups and saucers at the thrift store for 50 cent. I filled them with Easter grass, then added some silk flowers, and egg pick, and a votive candle. Then I filled the saucer with jelly beans and wrapped them up! They look so cheery sitting in ymy craft room. I will get to enjoy them until Easter day.

Then I got busy on the "baskets" for the girls at work. Again, the thrift store had just what I wanted. I bought the stuffed bunnies for .50 each. The I found the flower pots at the dollar store. Walmart already has tons of Easter candy out and I found these Russell Stover Chocolate bunnies in beautiful pastel colors. I added some pencils, some bunny purse size tissues, and an Easter egg with some jelly jeans in them. I haven't wrapped them yet because I want to get a little more candy to fill in the empty spaces.
The front flower beds and the flower beds around the pond are now leaf free and are ready to greet the warmer days of Spring. I cleaned a little around the pool garden, but there is so much left to do. I haven't even begun to clean out the vegetable garden. They are the main order of business this week if the weather cooperates. I am also going to turn my herb garden into a Peter Rabbit garden this year. Be on the look-out for further posts about that garden. My head is spinning with all the ideas I have for this garden. Hurry Spring!

Blessings

Linda

Easter Dress #1

While going through old photos, I came across several pictures of me at Easter. Easter was a big deal in our house. It meant a new dress, white gloves, patent leather shoes, a pretty corsage and sometimes even a new hat! Several times, my great aunt Doris, who live in California, would make my dress. She would phone my mom and mom would take my measurements while she was on the phone with Aunt Doris. Aunt Doris would then select the fabric, make the dress, and send it across the country to Virginia. It would always fit! I was so excited to see that box in the spring knowing it was a new dress made just for me! The above is a photo taken of her when she was in her teens. She was quite the flapper with that cloche hat!

I remember the dress in this picture so well! It was white satin underneath with a chiffon overlay that was white with green flowers. She also made the green coat to match. My Dad always got all of us a corsage for Easter and this one appears to be a rosebud. Check out that "bun" on top of my head. I almost always wanted a bun when I dressed up! LOL

I have a few more photos of the "made just for me" Easter dresses that I will share during the Easter season, which incidently, is my favorite holiday.

Blessings

Linda

Old Photos

This weekend I was going through some old picture and came across this one. This is dated January 1967. I would have been 6 years old. This picture just shouts 1960's! Check out the gray formica table with the white and gray vinyl chairs. How about that Coppertone refrigerator? The red, white and black tea kettle and pots cafe curtains were just lovely! I do believe that is a TV dinner I was eating, way before microwaves you put these frozen delights in the oven and 30 minutes later, you were dining in style! I also notice the depression glass milk glass, though at that time we wouldn't have known it was valuable. There are also some brown melmac coffee cups on the table, Mom must have had someone over for coffee.

In the lower right corner, I spot the "vaporizer". Just looking at it brings back the smell of the Vicks salve that you put in it.

This looks like a typical day in my life in 1967. I have no idea why my mom or dad would have taken this photo, but I'm glad they did. Just a photo of every day life. A very simple, uncomplicated life. Something I yearn for as an adult. Confucius said "Life is simple, but we insist on making it complicated". How true!

Blessings

Linda

Good Morning!

If any of you have never been to visit Seasonal Delights Quarterly http://sdquarterly.com/ than you don't know what you have been missing. Kelli and Phillip have a lovely website filled with recipes, crafts, poems, etc. They also include bonus recipes or crafts in between issues. Which is where I found the directions for these beautiful Valentine fans.These were so much fun to make. The most time consuming part is cutting out all the fan "blades", but after that it's pure fun decorating them. I am giving these fans, along with a small box of candy, to the girls at my office. One is also going to my Grandmother and another to my sister.

This one is my favorite! Mostly because it's purple but I also love the beaded fob at the bottom.

It's been very windy and cold here this week-end and the downed electrical wires have caused some fires in surrounding counties. Please pray that these are contained quickly and without harming anyone.

Have a great day!

Linda

Friday Show and Tell

Kelli over at http://kellishouse.blogspot.com/ hosts Show and Tell each Friday. Click on over to her blog and join the fun.

This week I would like to show you a few of my favorite pins. (Sorry for the bad photos, not use whats wrong with my camera.)

The silver angel and the back onyx pins belonged to my great grandmother. My Grandmother gave them to me for my 16th birthday.

This pin really isn't too old, but it is one of my very favorite. It can be worn as a pin or a necklace. It belonged to my mom, who passed away in 1977. She got it at a Sarah Coventry Jewelry party. Anyone remember those?

The cameo, black filigree, silver leaf, and etched amythest pins I picked up at yard sales and auctions.

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Blessings

Linda