I just saw that little Belle in New Hampshire has had a boo-boo today. I hope she will get better quickly.

I wanted to thank everyone for the nice comments about mama's luncheon table. She did work hard on it and it looked great. A couple of you asked about the china plates. They were passed down to my daddy from his parents. This is the artist that commissioned the plates by Syracuse China Corp back in the 1950s. My grandmother knew this artist because they both lived in Atlanta and my grandmother was involved with flower shows and garden clubs and things like that. I think there is a very limited number of these plates anywhere. The artist did a lot of painting of nature and painted a mural in Rich's Department Store in Atlanta. I would have loved to see that mural. My parents have a book that has a picture of my grandmother with this artist and some of the pictures of birds and flowers that he painted.

Dishes waiting to be packed up to take to the luncheon a couple of weeks ago.


This is a good-looking thief. If you see this little fellow coming up your walkway, lock the doors and windows. He will take home toys that do not belong to him. The love of Aunt Sue's life is what he is.


I made this chicken, bacon, cheese to put on a bun. I thought it was good. The husband only ate the leftover bacon and some bacon off the chicken. He would not eat the chicken?? Oh, well....guess I won't make that again.


Didn't do anything but work all weekend. Never even went outside except to step out with the pugs for them to go potty. I did watch some QVC. They had Paula Deen's new cookware on there and I like it. It said to handwash it so I'm not so sure I would want to have to handwash pots and pans all the time. I've had the same cookware for 13 years...since the husband and I got married. I am thinking for our 15th anniversary, I will get a new set. I like to watch QVC this time of year since they have their Christmas items and fall items for sale. There is a new host in training and she comes on in the middle of the night just to sell one or two items. She was one of the people on Martha Stewart's apprentice show a few years ago. Her name is Shawn...I can't remember her last name. Looks like she will do a good job. I'd like to go to QVC for a day and see a show and tour the facility. Then go to Hersey Park for a day or so and then go over to Philadelphia for a couple of days. I'll drag Aunt Sue with me ... of course she wants to see all this stuff, too, but she doesn't want to drive that far and I am not going to fly! And since we'd be that close to NYC, why not drive up there and then some of our northern southern friends could meet us there.

The ladies at the church that my parents attend had a luncheon this past Saturday and some of the lady's decorated the tables. This table was decorated by my mama. I think it was the prettiest table there, and there were many pretty tables. My daddy took pictures so I could see the different tables, but the camera did not focus good on most of the pictures so I can't show the others. It was fun to see the different themes and the different colors and different china used on the tables. I have a real weakness for china and ceramic plates and tablecloths.

Mama's luncheon table.


I finished More Venetian Stories and Muscandine Lines. I enjoyed them both but not much to tell about them other than they both were short stories. Muscandine Lines had poems in it, too. I'm not much into reading poetry.

apple cake

I made this apple cake using three of the apples that Lisa sent from New Hampshire. This cake is so very good. I used melted Kraft caramels instead of making the caramel topping in the recipe. I would not recommend doing that. It was too sticky and makes too much of a mess. I think it would be better with the caramel icing recipe.



SOUTHERN APPLE CAKE
Taste of the South recipe courtesy of Jean Fradiska

16 servings
Prep 15 minutes
bake 50 to 55 minutes

2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 cup vegetable oil
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1teaspoon baking soda
3 cups thinly sliced apples
1 cup chopped pecans or walnuts
1 recipe Caramel Topping (Recipe follows)

DO NOT PREHEAT OVEN Grease a 13 by 9 by 2 inch pan, set aside

In a large bowl, beat sugar, eggs and oil at medium speed with an electric mixer until smooth.

In a separate bowl, sift together flour, salt and soda.

Stir flour mixture into egg mixture by hand until thoroughly combined.

Add apples and nuts. Gently stir until distributed throughout batter. Spread batter in prepared pan.

Place pan in COLD oven. Bake at 325 degrees for 50 to 55 minutes. Let cool in pan.

Pour warm Caramel Topping over cake in pan.

CARAMEL TOPPING

½ cup sugar
½/ cup firmly packed brown sugar
4 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup evaporated milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a small saucepan over medium high heat, combine all ingredients and bring to a boil. Cook for 2 minutes stirring constantly. Stir in vanilla.

rainy day at the seafood festival

Aunt Sue and I went to the seafood festival on Saturday. There were a lot of nice arts and crafts and lots of jewelry. It was so humid and wet and hot but the crowds were still pretty big.
These birdhouses/church structures were so pretty.

This pirate would look so nice in someone's yard.

Pinecone wreath...lovely fall decoration.

Glass mosaics were very pretty.

This is an old engine that takes the corn cob and and makes the grits. I've never had these grits before but I bought a bag to try. They have to cook for 20 minutes instead of the five minutes that I'm used to cooking.

Browsing around.

Rained before we got there but didn't rain on us while we were there.

This is the only thing we bought to eat there.

These pictures were so pretty.



Thank you for the compliments on the cookies. We really enjoyed doing those. I have a big plastic tub that I keep cake/cookie decorating things in and I went through it this weekend and found so many things I had forgotten that I had. Lots of nice cookie cutters and lots of food colorings and color dusts. Gets me excited about doing more.


Sandi asked what kind of icing I used on the cookies and it was royal icing. After I made the recipe for the royal icing, I put it in a bowl and added the food coloring and stir and stir until I got the color I wanted, then I add a tiny bit of water and stir and stir until it gets to a flowing consistency and that makes the icing look smooth.

AM asked about the macaroni and cheese in the crock pot so I looked up the recipe and here is where you can find it. I hope if you all try it, you'll let me know how it worked for you.

Aunt Sue and I made these cookies today. The dough was made Friday night. I baked them Saturday and then we decorated them today. I'm pleased with them, but we now have learned some things that we need to do differently to make them better.

It's been a rainy weekend here and hot.

I also made a macaroni and cheese recipe in the crock pot that did not turn out well...most of it went in the trash. I followed the directions so I don't know why it didn't taste good...just bland.

I made a focaccia bread recipe and it turned out okay. I didn't take a picture. I wasn't real thrilled with it so I'm not bothering with the recipe.

I finished the book Widow of the South. I really enjoyed it. It was sad and very descriptive of the battle scene at Franklin, TN., and the injuries and deaths that happened there. I would recommend it for anyone who likes read Civil War stories. The husband and I went to the Civil War re-enactment at Gettysburg, PA., a few years ago and it is amazing to stand there on those fields there the battles took place and think of what happened there...even though it was sad, the people fought for the country and their beliefs and how brave they were.

Happy Birthday T!

Happy Birthday to Miss T up in New Hampshire! I hope you are feeling better and have a great birthday weekend!

This is Miss T looking very pretty after having her hair done at the salon.

This is one of my favorite funny pictures of Miss T! I hope you don't mind me showing this...I'm sure we won't see this hairstyle on you very often!

Fresh Apples

I heard a little knock on the door this morning and when I got there, this was left on my doorstep. Yea...a box of fresh apples from Lisa and family up in New Hampshire. They smell so good and taste great. I've never had a fresh-picked apple, and now I know how good they are! Thank you Lisa and Family! I will share a couple with Aunt Sue and mama and daddy.

Here is the very nice box.

This is how they are packed so that they don't get bruised. The smell was so sweet when I opened the box.

I'm so glad I finally got to taste an apple like this. I am going to find a recipe to cook with apples now! If I don't eat them all first!

Happy Anniversary to Aunt Sue and her hubby

September 19, 1987. Seems like a lifetime ago. Aunt Sue and her hubby got married at the church we grew up in. It was so pretty. Two of our cousins were in the wedding. Magnolia Sun came to the wedding. There was left over wedding cake and that made me happy! I still have my dress from her wedding.

This is the bridesmaids and I am on the bottom right and my cousin is standing right behind me.

She had her wedding portrait made and mama and daddy had it in their house for years and now she has it at her house. This is a small proof photo that she has in her album.

This is the whole wedding party. Our other cousin is on the guy's side. He's the guy standing down in the front.

This is our family photo. This sure makes me miss my grandparents. We found a nice way to block my ex-husband's face...but that is his little boy who was so cute...now he must be 24 years old and is married and has a child.


I think we did look more alike back then! There is six years age difference between us.



Aunt Sue told me she was on her morning walk with the ladies that she walks with and telling them today is her 20th anniversary and that she and her hubby were going out to eat and one of the ladies invited herself and her husband to go with them!!!! I am floored sometimes at what some people will do. Not on a 20th anniversary?? Aunt Sue is too nice to tell her no.
******EDIT EDIT EDIT: The friend decided not to go to dinner with them last night.

On their 10th anniversary she got another wedding cake done in chocolate and I really enjoyed that! I couldn't talk her into this year.

Weekend

That you all for voting on my polling question. I think it was RUDE. My husband said it was nothing to think twice about. So I won't...it's a girl thing!! Thank you for the compliments on my hair. I really like it and plan to keep it short.

Aunt Sue and I started the weekend on Friday going over to the cake shoppe and buying these items to make some pretty fall cookies. Now, you all know I can procrastinate doing any kind of craft or hobby, but sometimes when it involves sugar and icing and baking...I can usually get off my duff and get it done. But this stuff did not come out of the bag yet. But I will show you when I do get them done.

Here are the cookie items. I want to order some brown edible glitter before I get started so I need to go do a search to find it.

We ended up at a steak restaurant for lunch that we both had not been to in YEARS. I mean probably 17 years for me. It is really dark in there and they have a lot of cowboy sculpture and dead animal heads on the wall. But the steak was pretty good.

This is the foyer area of the restaurant.

Saturday morning Aunt Sue and I got to an estate at 8:00. First time we had ever been to one around here. It was a beautiful house for sale and it had been a model home at one time and they were selling some of the furniture out of it so it was really pretty but most of it sold on Friday so we were a little late. Good thing I didn't plan on buying something anyway.

This is walking up to the house where the sale was taking place.

Saturday night I cooked a stuffed pork loin roast for dinner. It was stuffed with a mixture of cornbread, pecans, bacon, apples, celery, onions, thyme. It smelled like Thanksgiving dinner. We ate it on Christmas plates that I collect. Mother-in-law came over to eat! She said she liked IT.


K-Ville starts tonight on Fox Channel at 8:00 Central. I can't wait to see how I like it. I really like Anthony Anderson, one of the main characters. I hope they really filmed most of it in New Orleans...I really miss going to New Orleans and I hope we get to go this December or January. I can't go there when it's hot outside.

We stopped by Fresh Market in Destin the other day and this is what I brought home. Yummy. I wish we had grocery store like that near here. I'll just say that Aunt Sue loves shopping out of those bins that have the nuts and snack mixes in them! Of course, I had to get some candy from one of them, too.

I am going to try a new recipe this weekend, I hope. I'll take pictures to share if it turns out okay.

I'm sitting in my office room at the computer and I hear the toilet paper roll in the bathroom just rolling and rolling and this is what I find! Baxterman loves to eat paper so he thinks he has found an endless supply from the toilet paper roll. Now the bathroom door has to stay closed because he has learned to get the paper on the roll and unroll it down the hall.

You also can see the Chichi and Tiny wall hangings that Leah and Jason sent us and the pictures and poems collage that Punchy made for us. I think they look great hanging together. I'll take a picture to show it better in the light.

The Coast is Clear

Now that tourist season is over here, Aunt Sue and I drove over to Destin, Fl, about 40 miles from here to eat lunch at a restaurant called Beachwalk Cafe at the Inn at Crystal Beach. The Web site I looked at said they were open for lunch on Monday but found out they were closed when we got there. when I got home, I looked at another Web site and see that they are closed on Mondays. But there is never a shortage of places to eat. We like to do to Destin during the off season because between April and Labor Day, the traffic comes to a stop because the area's growth has outgrown its roadways. You can sit in traffic forever trying to get around. There are lots of stores for shopping in that area.

Here is inside the Inn at Crystal Beach. We'll be going back here sometime.

We found this little restaurant on the water...a little shack really. And this is the scenery as we parked the car.

We sat out on the dock and this is how clear the water is there.

Here is the little seafood shack. It sits on the water's edge and the seating goes out onto the docks. No air conditioning!

We ordered the hot crab dip just to try because we like crab dip...but this was NOT GOOD AT ALL. We also had shrimp salad sandwiches but I forgot to get a picture...but they were not that good either. If we ever go back, we'll stick with grilled fish or fried shrimp.

The nickname of this stretch of the Gulf of Mexico is Emerald Coast. The water is so green and blue.

Pelicans were hanging out. I didn't see any of them fishing.


The water was really blue this day. These birds were taking a nap.

Just a little video of Aunt Sue and I on Monday over in Destin. I'll post pictures tomorrow.

Scuppernongs!

You either like them or you don't!

Thank you all for the happy birthday comments to my daddy. Aunt Sue and I were over there today. I stopped at the seafood market and got some grouper and took it over there along with the Whistle Stop Cafe Seafood Batter. We fried it in the Fry Daddy. It really is the best batter I've ever had on seafood. It's seasoned just right. You can go to the Whistle Stop Cafe store and get some if they don't sell it in your area! We also had hashbrown casserole...so very good. And some cole slaw. And the chocolate cake.

My mama has a women's conference coming up at church and they are having a luncheon and mama volunteered to decorate a table. I can't wait to see how it all looks when she sets it up. This is the flower arrangement she had made. It's so pretty. I'll be sure to post a picture in a few weeks of the table after the luncheon.

Daddy picked some scuppernongs on somebody's property and they only charged 50 cents a pound. I let him keep the leftover chocolate cake in exchange for this stash of scuppernongs. Good trade!

Happy Birthday to my daddy today! He wanted a yellow cake with chocolate icing so I made this yesterday. Made the house smell really good for a while. I hope to remember to take pictures at lunch today.

I finished the Eat Pray Love book. I enjoyed some of it but some of it, I didn't. If you've read the book, look at the 10 FAQs about the book. There are pictures of some of the people she mentions in her travels.

I'm now reading Widow of the South. WARNING: loud music plays as soon as the site comes up.

Opera Great Passes

Pavarotti passed away early this morning in Italy. I love to hear his singing. I know a lot of people do not like opera music but if you just close your eyes and listen to it and not try to hear words that you understand, you might hear how pretty it is. I don't know the languages so I don't understand the words but it is still just pure, beautiful music.

Go listen to this!

niece and friends out west

Our niece (far right) and her friends out in California recently climbed to the top of this place in one day roundtrip! I can't imagine doing this. She said this made running a marathon seem easy.

Our nephew and his wife got their twins are home recently and look who's babysitting! Just kidding. I think sweet dogs would make great baby-sitters. But they could easily be misled by food bribery.

Aunt Sue and I started on Friday over to Fort Walton to the Greek Festival...but it was on Saturday and not Friday...my fault. So we went to the Big City Grill. We really like this restaurant and would like to see it at night because the patio looks like it would light up with fire pots and white lights on the fence.

This was our lunch and was so good. Only cost $11.50. Steak and fries and salad.

Aunt Sue

Why is the Apple Ipod shuffle so difficult to get the music on it?? I have a Dell Juke box MP3 player and no problem...I try to put music on this for Aunt Sue and it takes me forever to get it figured out.

We made it to the Greek Festival on Saturday and it was really nice. It was indoors at the Emerald Coast Conference Center and there were booths with items for sale. This guy was putting on a show with his guitar. He would stand up on the table where people were eating! We were so excite about our food that we forgot to get a picture of it!