July 21, 2013

From Rags To Ringlets...

Hiya!
So my last posting I mentioned that I had put Natalie's hair up in rag curls, and I showed pictures. So today I took out the rags and wanted to show the results of them..here ya go:



After I took them out I then put it up in a pong tail for her so the curls would be grouped together in a Fantastic Curly Cascade!

Looks great huh?
Far better results than we have had with hot rollers or curling irons.
Natalie wanted to try sponge curlers...BUT we tried the rag curls first and they are the way to go!!

Okay...catch you later.

TTFN



A Heat Wave, Free Fabulous Finds and Rag Curls!

A heat wave blew into town last week
She came from the island of Martinique
The can can she dances will make you fry
The can can is really the reason why

We're having a heat wave
A tropical heat wave
The temperature's rising
It isn't surprising
She certainly can, can can!

I don't think it's a dance making it hot...but we are certainly having some nasty ol' hot weather here.
I think it got up to 100F or more
Tomorrow's gonna be even hotter.
I got one word for it...G-R-O-S-S!

Let's see..despite the heat we managed to go out in it...not very enthusiastically mind you.
Natalie and I went to the Rogue Book Exchange
I love going there!
Ya never know what kinds of books you will find!
It's a free book store for the community. They NEED volunteers and donations of books and money to keep them open...if you are ever in Medford, check out their store!
The volunteers are really nice and helpful...and they have a lot of books in all genres.

Today I scored! I got craft books! WOOT! I got one on Macrame, Terrariums, Cross Stitch Patterns, Embroidery..all kinds of stuff. I even found some funny ones, like the "How to Guide to Watching Football." I thought that would make Edward laugh...and it did.
I also found a lot of really awesome books some going back to the 50's! 
I snagged a lot of stuff from the 60's & 70's though.
I love that groovy stuff!
Natalie got some Heathcliff books and a series of double books that are classics.
This is the one I started tonight:

&

We weren't able to get them all...but we did get the ones they (The Book Exchange) had.
I already started the Grimms' Fairy Tales tonight.
I love old books.
I am very <VERY> anti-e-books...kindle...whatever...I think they are evil.
I know, click your tongues and say 'oh please' all you want..but I will freak out completely the day the last paper book disappears...that will be a sad day my friends...a sad day.

Okay so....came home, cooled off and Ed tells me about freebie yard sale leftovers.
So we go back out into the heat and check it out...I managed to snag:
a golf club (for protection), a pink night shirt (for Natalie), a nice bake dish, a polka dot cappuccino mug, a cute little angel ornament..and I think that's about it.
All for free! You can't beat FREE.
They had some fishing poles and I was tempted to take them...cause I haven't been fishing in so long and it sure sounds like fun, and I would like to teach the girls how to fish...but we didn't grab them.

We did a surprise drop in at Grandma & Grandpa's house and I got a surprise gift from Mom.
She made Natalie and I these really beautiful bookmarks..take a look:

Mine's the coffee one...aren't these pretty? That's fabric folks! It's art...my Mom is so crafty!
I'm lucky to have a Mom that can make awesome things.
THANKS MOM!
We Love You!!

Lastly we came home, and really needed cooling off by then, and I put Natalie's hair up in rag curls tonight.
Here's a picture of what they look like in the back:

Cute Huh?
Tomorrow I will take a picture of her when they are out so you can see how curly they are.
Here's a cute collage of her in them:

Caitlin of course won't let me do anything with her hair, plus it's too short for rag curls.
I've been working on my cross stitching, I can't show any of it...cause some of it is for Christmas presents.
NO PEEKING!

Okay, it's really late and I need to get.

TTFN







July 19, 2013

New Recipes and an Old Recipe Revised...Perfected?

Tried a new recipe the other night and it was soooo good I just had to share it with you.
Every now and then I get this overwhelming urge to try some new recipes and test them out on the family.
Most of the time I do pretty good, sometimes I make a dud.
This one was definitely a WINNER!
If you click the name of the recipe below it will take you to it.


This recipe is so delicious!
Okay so I made a couple of omissions...I didn't want to slice and add in hot peppers...I know, I know...
I just didn't want to overload on heat and make it so we couldn't eat it.
So I added in red chili flakes and a few shakes of ground Cayenne pepper.
Of course I forgot the lime at the end...which stinks cause I had the lime...I just forgot it.
Next time I make it I am going to make it a little hotter and double the recipe..there was just enough for us to eat..it was that good!

Last night we had


It turned out really well and was also a big hit.
Yesterday I also made a favorite dessert of our whole family..Ice Box Pie.
I was trying to find the recipe and I couldn't find it anywhere, so what did I do?
I tried to find it online...but I couldn't find the recipe that my Mom makes anywhere...so what did I do then?
I called Mom of course!
She told me the ingredients/amounts etc..over the phone and I proceeded to make it.
I've made it before, but it's been awhile.
So I tried a few "new" things to it and I think I finally mastered the secret of excellent Ice Box Pie!!!
Here's what it looked like before it got devoured:

<<<<<<<<<<<<  Here's the recipe and what I did  >>>>>>>>>>

Ingredients
1 stick of butter (softened)
1 C flour
1/2 or more of chopped pecans, walnuts..etc (optional)
2 boxes of cream cheese (softened)
1 1/2 C powdered sugar
1 large tub cool-whip
1 large box of instant chocolate pudding (or whatever flavor you want)
2 1/2 C cold milk
Chocolate Chips and Caramel Sauce for the top (optional)

Directions
1. Heat oven to 350F
2. Spray a 9 X 10 size glass casserole dish with non-stick spray.
3. Put flour and butter in a a mixing bowl and using your hands work the flour and butter together until you get a fine grain texture, if adding nuts do so now....pour flour/butter crust into casserole dish and press evenly into pan.
4. Place casserole dish in oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, just until it starts to golden brown, don't let it get dark.
Take out and let cool completely.
5. In an electric mixer put the cream cheese and powdered sugar. Beat on medium until a creamy and slightly fluffy consistency, no lumps!
Pour the cream cheese layer onto the cooled crust. Be careful in spreading it over the crust, as it can come apart on you...it just takes patience.
6. In the same mixer bowl put the dry instant pudding mix and the cold milk, whisk until thickens.
Carefully fold in 1/2 of the tub of cool whip.
Pour pudding mixture over the cream cheese layer and spread evenly.
7. Cover casserole with foil and place in freezer for 30 minutes up to an hour.
When you are ready to serve the ice box pie, remove the foil and "frost" with the remaining cool whip.
You can now top the cool whip with chocolate chips and caramel or whatever you want to add to the top.

It turned out wonderful!
Before when I've made it the layers would slide off each other when you cut it, so this time I decided to put it in the freezer to see if that would help...and sure thang baby!!

GROOVYNESS!

Letting it sit in the freezer really firmed everything up and made it even more of a "Ice Box" dessert.
It was so nice and cool and wonderful to enjoy when we have been having so much heat here!
It cut beautifully and really stayed together this time.
I didn't add nuts this time 'cause I didn't have any in the house (other than us! LOL!) and I really wanted to make it, so I just went with it.
Either way it's really good. 
You can use whatever pudding flavor you want, next time I am going to try banana cream or something like that.
Lemon would be good too!

Anyway, that's it...been working on my cross stitching too as I have time.

TTFN!










Old Time Movies

I watched a couple more "old" movies.

In the past few days I've watched a few more old time movies.
The first one was a Laurel and Hardy movie called "The Flying Deuces."
Here you can read about it:

I thought it was pretty funny. Especially the jail house chase scene! LOL!


Then I watched another classic film called "It's a Pleasure."


Here you can read about it:

This was a great movie and moving love story.
Sonja Henie was one of the founding ladies of figure skating.

Here is some information I found about her:

Three times the Olympic figure-skating champion, Miss Henie won most of the major world skating titles from 1927 to 1936, when she turned professional.
A petite, glamorous woman with a taste for luxury and a shrewd business sense, she was immensely successful next with a series of her own ice revues, and prospered as a motion picture star.
Born in Oslo on April 8, 1912, Miss Henie received her first skates from her father, a Norwegian fur wholesaler, on the Christmas after her sixth birthday.
While improving her skating, in the next few years, she also studied ballet with a former teacher of Anna Pavlova, and eventually she combined the two forms on ice.
She won the children's figure skating championship of Oslo when she was 8, and two years later, in 1923, she won the figure skating championship of Norway.
She entered her first Olympic Winter Games the next year, primarily for experience, and took third place in the free skating competition.
(She accomplished all of this before the age of 12)
She won the first of 10 consecutive world skating titles at Oslo in 1927, captivating the crowd with her ballet style, a white silk and ermine costume and short skirt and a dimpled smile.
Over the next decade Miss Henie won Olympic titles at St. Moritz, Switzerland (1928), at Lake Placid (1932), and at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Bavaria (1936).


She signed with Darrly F. Zanuck and 20th Century-Fox, and her first skating film, "One in a Million," was released at the end of 1936.
It was a box-office smash, as were others she made in the following dozen years. 
The pictures were reported to have grossed $25-million.
She was once quoted as saying
"I want to do with skates (in the movies) what Fred Astaire is doing with dancing."
She also began staging and appearing in ice shows, in association with Arthur Wirtz, her business manager, and these, too, were very successful -- with lavish costumes and spectacular routines.
These shows, the "Hollywood Ice Revues" were major attractions at Madison Square Garden for many years, up to 1952.
Sadly she died October 12, 1969.

Here are some little known facts about her:
She was the first skater to parlay her athletic success into a lucrative career.
10 time World Champion Women's Figure Skating.
She was the youngest Olympic skating champion - 15 years and 10 months of age when she won the 1928 gold medal. This record was beaten only in 1998 by a two-month younger American 'Tara Lipinski'.
She began a modern art museum with her third husband, Henie-Onstad Art Centre in the city of Tampere, about 200 km from Oslo. The couple is buried on the hilltop overlooking the museum.
Inducted into the World Figure Skating Hall of Fame in 1976 & the International Women's Sport Hall of Fame 1982.
The signature of her ice skate blades adorns the cement at Grauman's Chinese Theatre.
Here is a list of the American movies she was in:
Holiday On Ice   1956
The Countess of Monte Cristo  1948
It's a Pleasure  1945
Wintertime  1943
Iceland  1942
Sun Valley Serenade  1941
Everything Happens at Night  1939
Second Fiddle  1939
My Lucky Star  1938
Happy Landing  1938
Ali Baba Goes to Town  1937
Thin Ice  1937
One in a Million  1936
What an amazing Ice Skater!
I just thought I would highlight this very talented lady.

Well in the words of Porky Pig..."Th-th-th-th-that's all folks!" 


July 15, 2013

Chinese "Take-Out" & Some Crafting News

Hidy Ho!

Had a nice day yesterday (Sunday, July 14, 2013) as we went over to Mom and Dad's and I made Chinese food for dinner for everyone.
Unfortunately, Edward had to work again...so he didn't get to join us.

I made General Tao's Chicken and fried up some Pot Stickers.
Mom stir fried some fresh veggies and made some Jasmine Rice with Saffron.
Yum was that a good dinner!

If you want to know the secret to making Chinese food at home that tastes like what you get in the restaurant here's the tip:
individually coat chicken pieces with flour and then fry getting them nice and crispy & golden, then you add your sauce/veggies to it at the end...and make sure to let the sauce thicken over low.
Turns out great every time!
It's a lot of work but it's worth it in the end if you are making, Sweet & Sour Chicken/Pork, General Tao's, Szechuan Chicken/Pork..anything like that.

After tasting how Mom made the Jasmine Rice in her Rice Cooker...NOW I want one!

Anyway...had a nice time. Played a round of Star Wars Trouble with Natalie, Mom and I.

Then had desert..Mom made a delicious carrot cake:


I really suggest the "Kraft Food and Family" website.
The recipes are easy and most are quick, family friendly, economical recipes.
The recipes are centered around Kraft products, but you can substitute..I do.

I've made this Carrot Cake...and it was really tasty too:


Of course, I still need to perfect making layer cakes..mine kind of fell apart because I didn't wait and let the cake cool long enough before attempting to frost it.
You could make it into a sheet cake and just frost it like that.
Both recipes are really good.

Mom is busy working on sewing projects and I am busy working on cross stitch projects as I have time.
I love to cross stitch...and Mom loves to Quilt.
I need to take more pictures of the other quilts she has made and share them.
Mom is a very talented Quilter...which she inherited from her Mom (Norma aka GG) who is also a very crafty and skilled lady.
In my case...I think all that talent...kind of skipped a generation!
I don't think I could sew a straight line if my life depended on it!
I can cross stitch..although I had to admit I am still in the Beginner level as I haven't completed to many projects.
If you need anything hot glued...well then I am your gal!
I'm a whiz with a glue gun!
LOL!
I've tried to make other crafts...all with pretty much disastrous results.
You should have seen the rag rug I tried to make!
Holy Shizzz that was a mess!

I would love to know how to crochet and knit...which that would be handy as I could make things for my family and friends.
Maybe someday I will try and learn again...maybe I just need more patience.
After all I did teach myself how to French Braid Natalie's hair.
Most of you will laugh to learn this..but as Natalie's hair got longer and longer I wanted to learn how to do different kinds of braids...so I ordered a book, that shows you how to do many different kinds of braids.
Here take a look:


Awesome book! I really recommend it to people who want to learn how to do all kinds of braids.

I've only mastered the French Braid...I have to get more confidence, time and a patient Natalie, before I can attempt to learn how to do more braids.
ALTHOUGH --- I did teach myself how to do rag curls...which are sooo cute and make Natalie's hair SO curly!
Here's where I went:


It was pretty easy to learn and it turns out great!
I would like to learn how to do pin curls on my hair, as it's usually way to short to do much of anything with it.
I will have to take a picture of Natalie in her rag curls and then after when it's all spiral curled.
She really wants curly hair (got figure!) she's got gorgeous straight, silky soft hair!
She keeps bugging me to get a perm, so I tried to compromise and get curling irons..well that didn't work cause her hair is so long, so then we tried hot rollers...nope those didn't work cause she complained that they were "too hot & uncomfortable." Then I thought to try sponge rollers, but then Mom and I told her how uncomfortable they would be to sleep on...so that got a frown and an "uh..okay no."
So to avoid a perm (cause I am anti-perms since I had my hair ruined by one) I tried rag curls.
They turn out better then any perm could ever give you.

TTFN 

July 14, 2013

What's Old Is New Again....


Awhile back, in another one of my postings, I had mentioned that I wanted to start watching "old" movies to expand my movie repertoire.
So..today (after all that baking I did earlier) I watched 

"Hit Parade of 1943"

What an awesome movie!
Here you can read about it


I liked the movie and the characters...there was a lot of comedy to it as well as some great songs & choreography. If you click below you can watch the Harlem Sandman song & dance that was in the movie.


Natalie and I loved the costumes...the dresses were beautiful...I wish we could still dress like that.
Natalie loved the jewelry and hair-do's.

So that's one down....and countless more to go.
It'd be nice if I could watch a new movie (new to me) once a day...but I don't think I will have enough time for that right now.
I am working on cross stitch projects and have a ton of other things I am trying to do...don't we all?

Anyway, just thought I would share movie I watched today.

TTFN


It's Baking Time!

What do you do for fun when you are stuck at home all day and into the evening with a 14 year old, a 10 year old...and a house of cats?

Well... ya bake of course!

That's what the girls and I did today...we baked some yummy stuff.
Thought I would share the recipes and photos of what we made.

First we made Blonde Brownies
Here's the recipe I used

They really turned out delicious!
Soooo easy too!

Once I started baking I couldn't stop..I got bit..by the baking bug!!
So I decided to make these yummy Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars, I'd made them before...and they're a keeper and everyone loves them.


Then I decided to try and make something new, something I've never made before.
A few days ago I came across this recipe for Rugelach, it's a traditional Jewish holiday cookie/pastry.
(at least that's what I've read)
The recipe was really easy to follow and they turned out very delicious. 
I used a golden raisin mixture, finely chopped pecans and apricot preserves in the batch I made.


Next time I am going to bake them on a lower temp and watch them closer.
I had never made them before and my oven is old and frankly...it just doesn't work right.
But they are still delicious.
The Girls and I had a lot of fun baking together today.



We weren't alone in the kitchen either...Sookie and Squeaky supervised our every move.
Especially Sookie...she had to be right up in the action...Squeaky...he danced around the floor hoping for something yummy to drop.

After all that baking we were all pretty pooped out.
See?


I took a break from the kitchen for awhile and then later made  Grilled Mojito Marinaded Chicken with Grilled Red Onion, Flafel, cucumber/onion salad, cucumber greek yogurt dressing with cilantro and flat bread.
Can anyone say YUMM?

It was all pretty tasty.

So...that was most of my day...I'm pretty tired now.
Maybe I will get a nice night of sleep. 

TTFN