Top O' the Mornin' to Ya!

Dear Mom,

Yesterday was my very busy day at the yarn store but I wanted to tell you how my day started. Dressed in our St. Patty's Day greens, the desperate housewives of BB Street (and Pipsqueak) went to Brazenhead, an Irish Pub, for brunch. We had a fun morning together laughing and solving all of the neighborhood problems. We were also given lots of St. Patty's Day necklaces, pens, and light-ups, courtesy of Guiness. Our waitress told us that a girl is never too young to start with the Guiness so Pipsqueak has her share of Guiness goodies, too.

After several attempts at finding out just what an Irishman has under that kilt, we finally found out!!!! I boldly asked and my new Irish friend pulled up his kilt and showed us his Shamrocks!! Boxer shorts!! My Irish friend has never laughed so hard; Pipsqueak's expression was priceless!!

And so, dear Mom, it was another wonderful time spent with good friends.

In the spirit of St. Patrick's Day: “May the road rise up to meet you, may the wind be ever at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields. And until we meet again, May God hold you in the hollow of his hand.”

Love, Wendy

How are things in Glocca Morra?

Dear Mom,

Look, look, look tooooo the rayain bowwwww....

Today the songs from this movie http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjKLx6oS9TM are running through my head. I wish I could sing like Petula Clark. If I have time later, I may dig out our copy of Finian's Rainbow and watch. Some parts of that movie may be dated, but Fred Astaire's singing and dancing never will be. There are so many good songs in that movie. I remember listening to them when I was little, after we had gone to bed, and falling asleep with them. Daddy must have had the sound track. I remember Petula Clark and ?? guy singing "That Old Devil Moon" and Petula whispering, "kiss me"...... Really, if only I could sing. I would be making everyone, well, the kids, crazy embarrassed.

I'll make My Hero happy by NOT singing and I'll fix Reuben Loaf for dinner. The kids aren't so thrilled with it, so I make half of it with ham and swiss. I got this recipe years ago from my #1 sister-in-law and it has never failed to please.

Reuben Loaf

3 1/4 c flour

1 T sugar

1 t salt

1 pkg RAPID RISE yeast

1 c hot water

1 T margarine, softened

1/4 c thousand island dressing

6 oz thinly sliced corned beef

1/4 lb sliced swiss cheese

1 small can sauerkraut, well drained

1 beaten egg white

caraway seed

Set aside 1 c flour. In large bowl, mix remaining flour, salt, sugar and yeast. Stir in hot water and margarine. Mix in only enough of reserved flour to make a soft dough. Knead on a floured surface for 4 minutes. On a greased baking sheet, roll dough to a 14 x 10 in rectangle. Spread dressing down center 1/3 of dough. Top with layers of beef, cheese and sauerkraut.

Cut 1-inch wide strips in the dough to the sides of filling, out to dough edges. Alternating sides, fold strips at an angle across filling. Cover dough and place over a large shallow pan 1/2 filled with boiling water for 15 min. Brush with egg white, sprinkle with caraway seed. Bake at 400 for 25 minutes or until done. Cool slightly. Serve warm. Refrigerate leftovers and reheat to serve.

Love,

Kim

Try, try again

Dear Mom,

Tights are the Young Lady's enemy, but the neckline of the Tights-are-the-Enemy top I am knitting for her may be my enemy.

Attempt #1. Way too tight. I only needed to look at it to see that avoiding a loose, sloppy neckline resulted in one that might fit a 2 year old. Ripped.

Attempt #2. Slightly bigger needles and more stitches picked up. And this is what it looks like now.

Not even close. I am getting nervous. If I can't make it work I will have to start over. This is knit from the top down, so when I say start over, I mean START. OVER. Could I have miscalculated? Am I THAT far off?

After the second failure yesterday, I put Tights-are-the-Enemy in Time Out and knit some socks. Mindless knitting to boost my confidence and at the same time allow my mind to explore possible solutions to the neckline problem. Meanwhile, the socks were good company today at the orthodontist and while waiting to pick the Young Man up after school to take him to golf try-outs.

Love,

Kim

Ready!

Dear Mom,

I think I am ready. The house is not perfect, but it is clean. I am going with the belief that too clean makes people uptight. No way would anyone be afraid to sit on our furniture, walk on the carpets or grab a snack and set their drink down. This house is a home. We live in every room here.

I even had time to dress up the guest room before My Hero's Mom and Dad arrive. I put tulips on the bedside table.

And chocolates. (p.s. thanks to Gina Whocanparallelpark for the chocolates!)And tied pretty ribbons around the towels.

All just they way I would like it if I were a guest here.

Love,

Kim

Dear Mom,
I pause in the midst of a cleany frenzy known as My Inlaws Are Coming and Entire House Must Be Clean at the SAME TIME to bring you this:

Happy face = recipe success.
So, this afternoon, as I am perusing cookbooks, planning the meals I will serve to Grandma and Grandpa......

I find this. Same page. Opposite corner. The Young Lady's artwork. No doubt about it.

I'm making it anyway.

Love,

Kim

Yarn Bowls

Dear Mom,

I was reading one of my favorite blogs and got a neat idea for "someday". David was gone all day Sunday so "someday" arrived! We pulled out yarn, glue and balloons and made yarn bowls. The process is easy. Cut your yarn in lengths (the girls randomly cut), dip your yarn in glue and wrap your gluey yarn around a balloon.

This is a great project because it is an easy enough project that the girls took ownership of and did it themselves. Everything. But this is not one for the faint of heart. It's messy. It requires much hand washing and cleaning up afterwards.

We had to wait several days for the glue to dry.

But when the glue was dry and we popped the balloon--Voila! We now have a beautiful yarn um . . . . . .bowl?

A dear friend said, "That. Is. Soooooo. Ugly!!" Okay, so maybe a little more parental guidance next time and a lot of practice!!!! I'll let ya know!

Love, Wendy

Meg's Egg

Dear Mom,
Meg resumed her egg laying on the first day of Daylight Saving Time (Sunday). Her egg was the only one I found in the nest box that day. It was as if the other girls suspended production for the day to honor Meg's dainty little egg!

Meg's eggs are about half the size of the Orpington eggs. Golda's egg is my largest egg. (I can actually tell which hen each egg came from!)

Meg's eggs are so cute, I almost hate to crack them open! I substitute two or three of her eggs for each regular size egg in recipes. Meg has been quite feisty lately and very vocal. My dear neighbor mentioned to me that Meg was "talking to her" over the fence one day!
Love, Bonnie Jo

I felt like Dorothy.

Dear Mom,

We're not in Kansas- I mean Carmel- anymore.

That's how it felt yesterday to drive down Main Street and see this.

Disoriented, I parked Mr. Anderson. What used to be there, I wondered?

"What used to be there?" I asked the first person I saw. "I've lived here almost my whole life and I can't think what used to be there!"

"I haven't lived here my whole life," the smoker on the sidewalk said. "I don't know."

...

"What used to be there? I've lived here almost my whole life and I can't think what used to be there!" I ask the shop owner once I have reached my destination.

Are you ready?

The old Ace Hardware is gone. The IMMI building you once worked in? Gone. The "Little Shop"? MOVED!!! Apparently that was a house of Historical Significance and it is being relocated. But not the musty, dusty Ace Hardware building with its creaky wood floors, dim lighting, big store front windows and double entrances. For me, that building was the definition of a hardware store. Even though it hasn't been Ace Harware for a long, long time. Gone.

Now Mike Mulligan is at work. The plans, I've learned, are for a 4 story building with shops on the lower floors and apartments above. And underground parking I think the guy said, but at that point I pretty much couldn't take any more in. I was starting to feel dizzy because I was having an "old timers" conversation with a bearded grizzly guy and his boss. I do not consider myself old enough to have an old timers conversation. But I guess I am because clearly I was.

I know to expect changes. And keeping a city vital is better than allowing it to decay. I just didn't expect to lose everything familiar and see a whole new city put in its place.

Love,

Kim

p.s. Today is Gina Whocanparallelpark' s Birthday! Happy Birthday, my friend!

" A friend is, as it were, a second self." - Cicero

60 yard dash

Dear Mom,

Last week I had to run fast. Real fast. A heart pounding, adrenaline pumping kind of fast that ended up with everything okay, but I didn't know that when I was running. A neighbor needed help. And I ran.

My knee still sort of hurts, which has me thinking about running.

The last time I remember running FAST was on field day at College Wood Elementary when I won the 60 yard dash, beating Missy Hartman and becoming (on that day, at least) the Fastest Girl in the 6th Grade. That marked the beginning and end of my track career. In fact, my entire athletic career can be summed up in two sentences:

1. I won the 60 yard dash in 6th grade.

2. I was on the 9th grade volleyball team.

I've dropped these bombshells on my kids during "oh yeah, well your DAD is not the only one who can do sports stuff" and " I used to be a girl before I was a Mom" kinda moments. Not necessarily my finer Mom moments, but worth the stunned expressions on their faces.

Over the years, my running has been mostly errands, but on those rare, "I'll just run this over to my neighbor's" occasions, I realized that I had started running like..... you. You know. Like a MOM. When that cold reality flashed into my conscious, I had two nearly simultaneous thoughts: "ACK! Stop running! You are running like a Mom" and "You ARE a Mom."

So, last week. I am sure I ran alot faster in the 6th grade. And My Hero caught up to me even though I had a head start and he stopped to put on his coat. And probably what initially slowed me down (and hurt my knee) was the garage door limbo I had to do when the door wasn't going up as fast as I needed it to. And even in the 6th grade I don't think I could limbo. Last week I just ran as fast as I could. And I didn't even think about running like a Mom who is running fast.

Love,

Kim

My Pipsqueak

Dear Mom,

Brace yourself. There may be something wrong with me. I blinked and my Pipsqueak went from this:

(5 minutes old, with her broken little collar bone)! To this:

(13 months old and taking on the world)! To this:

I blinked. I just blinked. She was just my little baby bundle of joy. Now she is six. She is in kindergarten. She is reading. She wants her fingernails painted and plans to have slumber parties. But she is my baby.

Pipsqueak's favorite color is red so we are having Red Velvet Cake (Grammie's recipe) with Cream Cheese Frosting. We also dipped marshmallows in red chocolate and heart sprinkles for her class.

Daddy painted nails for the big day!I think she is ready to have a very happy birthday! We are going to celebrate her very important six years, but I'm going to try not to blink!
Love, Wendy

A Taste of Spring

Dear Mom,

Today, we were blessed with 70 degree weather. My garlic is coming up!

The frogs have made an appearance in our little pond.

We are planning our outdoor projects...like how to remove the tree that blew over in the winter wind storm. I even did some weeding, and started thinking about what to plant in the vegetable garden. The maple sap has stopped, which is another sign of spring on the horizon; the sap stops flowing when the trees are ready to bud! Rain is expected tonight and tomorrow, and the temperature will drop to the mid 40's again. The weather today was a blessing!

Love, Bonnie Jo

OUCH!

Dear Mom,

While knitting as fast as I could to finish this:

I did this:
The point sort of crunched off my needle. I kept right on knitting, though, and finished the sweater last night. A trip through the pencil sharpener may repair the damage.

I am making good progress on the Young Lady's "Tights are the Enemy" top. We had a fitting this morning and it fits just as I hoped it would. I am knitting it from the top down and have reached the point below the arms where I add increases for fullness. It is pretty much straight forward knitting for length from here, so I should make some speedy progress. The tea pot is full and my ipod is loaded!

Love,

Kim

Outdoor Outpost

Dear Mom,

My clothesline is one of my favorite things, the simplest of pleasures. And today it is just sunny enough, just warm enough and just breezy enough to hang sheets and comforters out on the clothesline. Nothing smells like sheets after they've dried in fresh air and sunshine. It is just the cleanest of smells. And tucking in with that fresh sunshine smell on your pillow? Re-lax-ing. Sweet dreams. Good sleeping.





Before all this sunshine, fresh air and clothesline drying started, I ran to the bookstore to pick up a knitting book I ordered. And as I typically do, I wandered back to the crafts and home decor/ home improvement section. Where I found this: (modeled by the cooperative Bumper Joseph)

Mary Jane's Outpost, by Mary Jane Butters. The Mary Jane of Mary Jane's Sewing Room. It is full of out door inspiration and decoration, and things I will never do (like bathing out doors and filleting a freshly caught fish) but is such a beautiful book with a healthy, refreshing perspective that I had to bring it home with me. It has recipes. It has instruction on Two-handed Whistling. Which being a whistling impaired person, I plan on studying. Out door picnic-y stuff. Plants. Pretty pictures to look at if you don't feel like reading. Camping and hunting. Okay, that is another part I will. not. do. And aprons, and bugs and inspiring quotes. Like this one-

"Alone, I am one drop of water, together we are blessed rain."

Love,

Kim

A Blanket For Alejandro . . . er, I mean Thomas

Dear Mom,

Pipsqueak has a friend named Diego. Diego came running to us one afternoon at the bus stop, "My baby brother is here! My baby brother is here!" Pipsqueak and I were very excited and asked the new big brother all about his baby!

"What is his name?"

"Alejandro"!

Pipsqueak and I gushed all over Diego for his vast and incredible knowledge of Alejandro and all things baby.

Alejandro was born 4 weeks early, though. I wasn't ready for Alejandro. I quickly went home and frantically cut strips, sewed strips together and fringed the strips. To make this. For the new baby, Alejandro.

This is loosely based on Fringe Frenzy by Little Red Hen Designs (loosely based because I still have that very bad habit of never reading patterns or instructions). I used baby boy flannels. Here is the back of the blanket.

Pipsqueak and I wrapped the blanket nicely in a ribbon, of course, before we officially wrapped it in darling baby paper.

When we were finally able to deliver our blanket to Alejandro (who was in the hospital for awhile because he was so early), Carla, my friend and Diego's mom, burst into fits of giggles. Fits. Of. Giggles. Couldn't. Stop. Laughing. I gave her a gift with a card addressed to Alejandro. What was so funny?!

"The baby's name is Thomas. Diego just REALLY wanted an Alejandro."

Love, Wendy

Another Family Trait??

Dear Mom,
I think that perhaps along with the genetic traits that have us loving to vacuum, getting holes in the big toe of our stockings and compulsively counting out the correct change, we may be compelled to collect and save ribbons. I didn't realize this until I saw Wendy's ribbons yesterday. Some of hers look very familiar. Very. Familiar.
I am unable to resist a bargain bin full of ribbons. One dollar for a spool of ribbon? Can't beat that! And searching through my ribbons for just the right one is as much fun as going through my button box. One of my favorite ribbon sources is LFN textiles . They have some of the most beautiful, interesting, and unusual ribbons.
Love,
Kim

Breaking News

Dear Mom,
My friend, Jeannie, has posted photos of the sweater she and another friend made from my design!
Love, Kim

Backyard Girlfriends

Dear Mom,
Meg and Marge are best friends. They have had a special bond from the moment they were introduced to each other. I think it is because Meg is the smallest hen and Marge is on the bottom of the "pecking order" of the three Buff Orpingtons. As a result, Meg and Marge pal around together and take care of each other. I love to watch their special relationship. I will see Marge cleaning off remnants of grass from Meg's beak, and Meg showing Marge the best patches of green grass to nibble on.

Here is my sweet little Meg. Her "Mille Fleur" D'uccle breed name means "millions of flowers" because of her many spots and speckles...

and here is Marge, with the crooked point on her comb, looking up at me. She is my social chicken...curious and interested in me and what I am doing. I knew she was special when she jumped up and sat on my knee one day in the coop...

and here they are, all together--Meg and the Buff Orpingtons (aka The Fat-Bottom Girls)--enjoying a rare afternoon of above-freezing temperatures to free-range in the backyard.
I am so looking forward to spring and summer, the first for these four ladies together in the backyard. I'm sure there will be many, many adventures and stories to tell!

Love, Bonnie Jo

Channeling my Inner Audrey Hepburn

Dear Mom,
I won't be sitting on the window sill, strumming my guitar and singing "Moon River" or anything, but I got my hair cut this morning and I am feeling very Audrey Hepburn-ish right now. The feeling carried me through the grocery store and I am hoping I can keep it up long enough to clean the bathrooms. Maybe I will do the housework with my sunglasses on.

My slightly out-of-focus self portrait is accidentally slightly out-of-focus, but goes a long way to "diminish fine lines and wrinkles" and makes the grays look like shimmering highlights. Which, of course, they are.
Love,
Kim