Februrary 15, 2022....oops, how on earth did I get so far away from blogging? I haven't a clue. Currently Tom is consulting once again in Abu Dhabi, sigh. We're too old for this nonsense. But on a brighter note I somehow stumbled on my old blog and have been reading excerpts to him as we facetime, some made us laugh so hard...what fun to spend our morning together, his evening re-reading our adventures and misadventures, and laughing together though very remotely. I have a nice evening planned as our oldest great grandson has a basketball game. I adore seeing him whenever and however I can...will even tolerate those old hard benches in the grade school gym just to get to watch him for an hour. I always get a hug afterwards so it's so worth it. I'm making him a batch of Nutella/piecrust button cookies for after his game. Lightly roll out refrigerated pie dough, use any cutter you have to cut shapes, I juse a round fluted cutter, use a straw to poke two holes in half of the shapes. Put a dollop of Nutella or a favorite jam on the solid piece, cover with the two holes piece, place on a non stick cookie sheet and bake at 400 degrees for about 8 minutes, I brush with beaten egg first. These are too easy for words and the kiddos and ahem...Tom love them.

Hello Fresh Cooking/A Promise is a Promise

I don't cook quite like I used to, mostly due to a 14 month long diet we've been on and partly due to subscribing to Hello Fresh and partly due to legs who do not seem to like the kitchen any longer. Tom loves to cook the meals, they are easy and most generally in the delicious category like this one: https://www.hellofresh.com/recipes/zaatar-crusted-grilling-cheese-598cc7b4d56afa0b41247292/ We just had this for lunch/early supper. We love the Middle Eastern flavors, I guess since we ate them for ten years. Israeli couscous is wonderful and this cheese is wonderful, this one was called Mediterranean or something like that but we were quite used to Halloumi.....you can fry it and it does not melt. This dish was wonderful, the tomatoes were just warmed by the couscous and the zucchini and onion with sumac......oh delicious. You can easily make this at home, look up the recipe. Also 3 years ago I promised the recipe for the Blueberry pound cake, which is oh so delicious.....so here you go, after all, a promise is a promise. Blueberry Lemon Pound Cake Ingredients: 1 cup butter 6 eggs 1 cup sour cream 3 cups all-purpose flour 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1/4 teaspoon baking soda 2 cup sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla The zest and juice of two lemons 2 cups of fresh blueberries. Toss the blueberries in 1 teaspoon of all-purpose flour to keep them for sinking to the bottom. Glaze: 2 Tbs fresh lemon juice and 1 cup confectioners’ sugar. Directions: Allow butter, eggs, and sour cream to stand at room temperature for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and lightly flour a 10 cup bundt pan; set aside. In a medium bowl stir together flour, baking powder, and baking soda; set aside. In a large bowl beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Gradually add sugar, beating on medium speed about 10 minutes or until light and fluffy. Add vanilla. Add eggs, one at a time, beating on low to medium speed for 1 minute after each addition and scraping side of bowl frequently. Add lemon juice and zest and mix to combine. Alternately add flour mixture and sour cream to butter mixture, beating on low speed after each addition just until combined. Fold in the lightly floured fresh blueberries. Pour batter into prepared pan, spreading evenly. Bake for 75 to 85 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near center of cake comes out clean. Cool in pan on a wire rack for 20 minutes. Remove from pan, drizzle with glaze while warm, cool completely on rack.

Life Lesson 19

My goodness gracious. I actually thought I could no longer link to this blog, but this last month have been reviewing it and "thinking" about catching up, my last post was 3 years ago.....so much has happened in our lives in 3 years, no non boring way to catch up all of that. So Life Lesson #19, quit procrastinating! We're at our beach house and recently I made an apple crisp from an age old favorite recipe and a high school friend said didn't you have a page where you kept recipes and cooking tips.....well yes, yes I did, right here and as soon as I opened it up......poof, there's that recipe of the apple crisp but without the picture. So there's the picture of the Apple Crisp and it was from my daughters 2nd grade class not kindergarten as I had remembered, that daughter will be 45 soon...sigh. The pan I used is fabulous, it's from Lodge, a very very very heavy pan I got pretty reasonable at the Outlet. I'm going to make another while we're here at the beach and share with friends and neighbors. I have some pears I will add just to use them up.

Daisy

My sweet Daisy deserves her very own post. We were able to realize a sweet dream for her....take her to the beach and let her run and play and oh how she loved that and loved her home. Once we got her to the states she never went into a kennel again, she never went to a Kennel so we could travel again, she was with us every moment.

My Mother got sick and needed nursing care October of 2012 and we took Daisy along then too, so Mom got to meet her at last. We moved over seas with her when she was 7 months old so Mom never got to meet her until she was 12 years old. We went back and forth many times to be with Mom, and also to the beach and to my daughters in Georgia. While at the beach we took her to a vet to "get acquainted", he told us she had a heart murmur and with or without treatment she would live two more months and she did just that. After burying my Mother (we had to wait two months for that due to a military cemetery issue), Daisy comforted me as I cried. Then the very next morning, our Daisy took one last stroll out to the daffodil bed in my Mother's back yard and elegantly sniffed the air in three directions as she sat down amongst the daffodils, she then laid down and sniffed in three directions again, then laid over and quiet peacefully and immediately died. I honestly thought my heart would explode. It's been a year ago now this past April, I can't believe it's been that long as I still miss her daily. (I miss my Mother too) Just before Daisy died, I knew I would have a very hard time accepting it, so I got a new puppy, Matilda, I call her my grief puppy, I knew I would need her and she truly did help with the transition. She at least knew her big sister for about two months. Daisy helped her learn a lot of things and she was ever so patient.

How I wish I could have them both with me. I don't think we ever forget the animals we've loved, nor the people. My Mom would've been absolutely crazy over Matilda, she loved Boston's and always had one. Mom did get to know Daisy and loved her, Daisy and I spent many many hours in the nursing home together with Mom. All the little old folks along Mom's hall loved her. I loved her most of all......she was my best friend, she saw me through so much for so long.

We took Daisy to my sisters vet for cremation and my sister picked up her ashes for me until I could get back to Illinois to get her myself. While we were gone our kids got together and made a lovely small garden in our rather large yard just for Daisy....they planted a white dogwood tree and daisies and put an iron dog there. We brought home from my Mother's the rock that Daisy laid down by and that has also gone there. We will eventually bury Daisy there under her rock amongst her plantings. Rest in peace my precious girl.

Life Lesson #18...Do not let life get in your way.

I see I have not posted in nearly two years. Yes life got in my way a bit. Not that I didn't have thoughts, recipes, projects and life to share, I just didn't seem to find the time for it. And quite honestly I do enjoy blogging, it's kind of like keeping a diary. I wish I knew how to do the pretty blogs that the sweet young things do, but I'm not that advanced on the computer. Remember the long ago post about Bali Tea? Well I've just made me a cup, hadn't done that in quite a long time. It's a hot summer day, but I'm on the porch with a fan and the setting seems perfect for this cup of tea. It takes me right back to that lovely hotel we stayed in in Bali, I remember I drank that tea every meal and kept making mental notes until I figured out how to make it for myself. I made some curtains this summer for a friend. They were made from painters drop cloths, the khaki colored ones. I cut some in half and hemmed them and added ties to the tops that I made from yellow thirties fabrics. My hubby and grandson, Morgan helped to hang them using coat hooks and pvc pipe.

I really enjoyed doing this, though it took me some time to do it and some time to figure out how to make everything work. Now I'm contemplating making pillows out of the same fabric, use the ties to close the backs, add old doilies and buttons to the front. I'm in a "I want to do everything frame of mind". I made a blueberry pound cake day before yesterday, I think the cakes stands and domes I ordered from Etsy just now arrived....how cool! I've always wanted one of those, now I will have two, a regular size one and a smaller one. This is what the cake looks like, later I will publish the recipe. I got it through a feed on facebook, it's fabulous.

I had a bumper crop of blueberries from my bushes at the beach house this summer so picked and used them daily, froze some and have made this cake twice.

We're going to attend our 50th class reunions later this summer,looking forward to that. I had thought we'd both diet and get in great shape....ha.....didn't happen. We went to different high schools but graduated the same year, and dated through most of high school. I'm eager to open the boxes that just arrived, see if it is the cake stands so will post again soon. I'll put that recipe on for the blueberry and lemon pound cake.

Life Lesson #17

My my my, I so need to catch up. I quit blogging when my hubby told me to keep it to myself that we were not going to renew his contract at the university and transition back to the states this year. It was too difficult to keep that secret so I just didn't talk to anyone for a really long time.....Life Lesson #17, if you want to keep a secret, just don't talk and certainly don't blog so I didn't....wasn't I good? But I have so much to say and no one in particular to say it to but my little blog here and I've also discovered some new bloggy friends and I'd like to link them to my blog so we can share all things cooking, gardening, crochet and quilting and sewing etc....I rather enjoy all of that and love it when an old friend stops in and leaves me a message. I'm currently working on a Granny Stitch Afghan that I just love and is totally mindless to do.....that does not mean that there aren't three so far that I've found mistakes in it, but unless you're totally picky you're not going to find them, but the Shadow knows where they are! I need to take a picture and post it and will do that soon....for now I'm just finding my old blog spot and saying hello.....and now for that after breakfast catch up on lost sleep nap.

Time for a recipe

Apple Crisp Recipe.....

Butter a 9x13 inch pan.
Peel and cut up 5 to 8 apples, I like a variety and they must be crisp ones, place in the pan.
Sprinkle with 1 teaspoon cinnamon and 1/2 to 2/3 cup regular sugar, depending on sweetness of apple or your tooth.
For the Crust: Mix and spread over apples, 3/4 cup flour, 1 cup brown sugar...lightly packed, 1/2 cup butter, pecans, chopped (optional). Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour or until done.

30 years ago my youngest daughter was in 2nd grade and all the kids submitted apple recipes for a cookbook. This was back in the days of mimeographed papers. I may have even run the mimeographs as I did do volunteer work at the school back then, I remember I loved the smell of the ink!

This recipe is simple and is so good served with either whipped cream, vanilla ice cream or a drizzle of heavy cream while the crisp is still warm. I used to make up several and pass them out to the neighborhood...oh this was back when we lived on a farm.

I have more news, but will make a separate post. I haven't blogged in a while, been busy relocating. So today made a foray into the mess that was once our den here in the states and did an I Spy on this old children's cookbook, what a find! I'm now more encouraged to clean out the room and set it back to rights. I wonder what other treasures I will find. For now I must make a grocery run for apples...ummm....can't wait to make this again.