I will be on a temporary hiatus until after Thanksgiving.  But have several posts in my head for when I come back.  One of which is a mini cloth gift bag tutorial – hopefully in time for the holidays.  During my break I will slowly be making my way through email and such.  Hope y’all have a fabulous Thanksgiving!  My eating plan is to skip all the things I don’t love and getting seconds of all the things I do love (Hello pecan pie!).

Two pictures of childhood pets.  The first is of my dog Trixie – MY dog!  That’s right little brother she was mine.  She was some kind of beagle/dachshund mix and the sweetest dog on earth.  Look at those eyes.  I’m certain what I read in those eyes were love, love, love.  Obviously she was tolerant too, because she’s sitting there ridiculously dressed up by me.  She was a belly scratching dog.  Every time you got near her she would lay down, roll over and present her belly for a good belly rubbing.   I don’t even remember how we acquired her, except I seem to remember a lot of pet swapping between our home and my grandparent’s farm.  So, maybe she got passed to us by my grandparents.  Loved that dog!

The other picture is of my pet duck.  Mine is the one with the most black on it.  My neighborhood girl friend went to visit relatives and came home with three baby ducks; one for her, one for me, and one for our other friend.   My parents really, really tried, but who can turn away a cute fuzzy duckling?  Only the cruelest people on earth that’s who……I wonder if I used that line on them?  Duck, that was his name, lived in an old shopping cart out in our shed when he was little.   Then when all the ducks got big enough they lived in the one friend’s backyard and their pond was an old metal fishing boat.  Two of the ducks met with a tragic end, and the other got shipped off to a farm a couple of years later.  By then we were all in the full swing of adolescence and really had lost interest in spending time with our ducks.  That last phrase made me giggle a little – spending time with our ducks.

I once had a big, fluffy, black cat named Pooky.  I would have sworn to you that we had telepathic communication with each other, or else I was part cat too.  Because it sincerely felt like we could read each other’s minds (okay, I guess I should only speak for myself).  When he was in at night he always slept on my bed with me.   There were other pets over the years, but these three were the ones that really became a part of me.   Just my personal opinion, but I think every kid should have a pet at least once during their childhood.  Especially the kind that radiate unconditional love!  How about you, did you have a special pet as a kid or were your parent’s the cruelest people on earth?

Oooohhh, ooooohh I almost forgot to tell you about a couple of interesting things.  If you like challenges here are a couple:  Dottie Angel Challenge, for one whole year buy nothing unless it is handmade or secondhand.  NaBloPoMo, blog every day for a month.  You can participate with any starting date even if it is in the middle of the month, but unfortunately it is too late to participate in the full month of November which is their free-for-all giveaway month.  I have a few obligations in the next couple of weeks, but after that I double dog dare you to participate in some kind of challenge – doesn’t have to be these!  And that makes the perfect segue into tomorrow’s post about FEAR.

It would be so rude of me not to share this recipe.  I’m not a big doughnut eater, but let me just tell you I put away three of these bad boys one right after the other.  Then later that same day I ate another one.  I will admit they hit your gut pretty solidly but they are irresistable.  Plus, let us remember it is the season of packing on winter fat so that we will be warm and toasty in the days to come!  That’s my version and I’m sticking to it. 

Pumpkin-Licious Doughnuts  (makes about 20 doughnuts or so)

• 1 egg
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 C. canned pumpkin puree
• 1/2 C. sugar
• 1/2 C. buttermilk
• 1/4 C. brown sugar
• 3 T. melted butter
• 4 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp. ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp. ground cloves
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 3 C. all-purpose flour
• vegetable oil for frying

1. Whisk together egg and egg yolk in large bowl until frothy.   Stir in pumpkin, both sugars, buttermilk, and butter.  Then stir in the baking powder, spices, salt and baking soda.
2. Fold flour in gradually until incorporated.  The dough will be extremely sticky.  Cover with plastic wrap and freeze for 15 minutes.
3. After 15 minutes heat 2 inches of vegetable oil to 370 in an electric skillet, deep fryer or deep sided skillet.
4. Pat out dough with well-floured hands on a well-floured surface to 1/2 inch thick.  Don’t bother with a rolling-pin - you will only be frustrated because the dough is so sticky.  Cut with doughnut or biscuit cutter into doughnuts, scraping up the leftovers each time and repatting to 1/2 inch thick.  Repeat til you’ve used up all the dough.
5.  Fry doughnuts in batches in the oil until browned – takes about 3-5 minutes.  Turn them once during that time.  Drain on paper towels. 
6. Finish them with either cinnamon sugar or glaze.  If using cinnamon sugar mixture coat them while they are still hot.  Let them cool a bit before using the glaze.  For glaze:   mix together 1/4 C. half and half or milk with 3 C. powdered sugar.  For cinnamon sugar:  1 C. sugar mixed with 1 or 2 tsp. of cinnamon.

*this is my attempt at being pollyannish about my on-line absence.  We’ve been experiencing a perfect storm around here lately – a conspiring of circumstances, a job change, lack of sunshine until this week, being at a place in therapy that is really hard work and emotionally draining, leaving me feeling raw and vulnerable like a sun-warmed marshmallow.  If you tapped me on the shoulder I would probably burst into tears.  So, I don’t know if any of you ever feel like  holing up in your house sometimes and not talking to anyone, not wanting to answer the phone, or catch yourself in the grocery store trying to avoid people you know just so you won’t have to talk.  But that’s kind of where I’ve been lately.  And rather than spew all my negativity on-line I’ve just been lying low.   So……just wanted to explain, you know just in case some of you have been really missing me as we agreed you would – because even in my absence it’s all about me!  Kidding!!  Alrighty then – get out there and enjoy those carbohydrates. 

p.s.  Cinnamon is spelled with two n’s and only one m.  Spellcheck just told me that about 5 times – remedial spelling anyone – I think I’ll go back to my hole now!

I’ve gotten such a kick out of Diane’s Memory Mondays that I’ve decided to occasionally join in the fun.

This is a photo of myself (on the right) and my cousin Nina circa July 1976.  That summer I had my first real paying job.  I went to Nebraska and stayed with my cousin and her family for two weeks.  She and I worked for those two weeks with a company that hired people to detassel corn.  I hated that job!  We got up early every morning, I think around 5:30 and worked til noon.  We piled into the back of a truck with about 15 other people.  It was one of those big dump truck sized trucks, and headed out to the corn fields.  Each person was assigned a few rows of corn, and we had to walk down the row of corn and yank the tassel off of the top of the stalk, and drop it on the ground.  The tassel is the fertile part and by pulling off the tassel it allowed those plants to be fertilized by the other desired variety of corn.  Corn sex, that’s what that job was all about!  You can’t really tell from the picture, but quite often the fields were muddy and the corn wet from rain.  A few times we wore garbage sacks over our clothing to stay dry.  I remember one gal who seemed to think she was God’s gift to detasseling.  She just radiated snooty superiority and I remember her being bossy.  Everyone else just seemed tired (kids those days weren’t drinking coffee like kids nowadays).  I think my cousin and I spent our afternoons sunbathing at the local swimming pool, and then eating dinner and going to bed early so we could get up at that inhumane hour.  

Despite my hating that job it was not my last agriculturally related job.  I worked every summer for a friend’s dad who had a truck farm.  I would help him pick tomatoes, cantaloupe, potatoes and melons.  I would use my t-shirt as a collecting basket, the weight of those deep red globes pulling against my neck.  To this day I love the smell of tomato foliage – it’s what dark green smells like to me.  In college I worked seasonally for a family owned greenhouse as a dibbler.  That was the term they used for the people who took the crowded seedlings, separated them, and then transplanted them to a bigger pot.  For that job I also learned how to drive a school bus to deliver plants to several retail outlets.  Talk about empowering!  As I would drive that bus I would catch myself thinking “HOLY COW! I’m driving a school bus, a big ass school bus.  I am superwoman!”  I loved both of those jobs, and I think I learned the value of hard physical labor.  It was a pleasure to go to the greenhouse in February when it was cold outside.  I would step into the greenhouse and be surrounded by moist, fecund air.  The smell of dirt and growing things strong in my nose.  I would get to run my fingers deep into the dirt under the seedlings and gently separate them.  Grab a tray and start poking holes and setting the seedlings in.  I also got to know some amazing people while working there.  I think those people had a great influence on my thinking.  They were earthy, artistic people.  They listened to NPR.  They were non materialistic, with calloused hands and dirt under their nails.  They were authentic and genuine, drove old vehicles, and laughed a lot, hired college kids and paid them a good wage.  I was drawn to them and the work that we were doing.   In addition to earning a paycheck, I also earned the sense of a job well done.    

So, if anyone needs some strong young boys to work on their farms let me know.  I’ve got three of them that I would love to learn some of these lessons.

Here it is!  I have some tweaking to do – painting the rocking chairs and sewing up some seat cushions for them, maybe a rug for the winter months, finishing the chalkboard paint on the stairs, repainting the old dressers that I’ll be using for storage,  finding a cheap bookcase for all of my books and magazines, putting my sewing machine at one of the workspace stations, and filling up my inspiration wall behind the workspace.  The small table by the window is set up with a fabric cutting mat, and I’ll store my wool and wool felt in the cedar chest below it.  I’ll actually be moving an old library card catalog to the space between the rocking chairs to hold nature treasures in. 

 So, that’s the progress so far.  When it’s all finished I will post pictures again.

On a very somber note I think every parent should read this article.  I will warn you ahead of time it was written by Susan Klebold, the mother of  Dylan Klebold one of the Columbine killers.   It is painful, heart wrenching, thought-provoking, and filled with one mother’s humble cries.  I can’t imagine.

At least from my personal point of view.  I could make this post all polite and say that these are some of my favorite things at the moment.  But I’ve pledged to be authentic, and these are things I WANT!!  I’m making out MY Christmas list, throwing all caution and crappy economy to the wind.  You know you want to do this too!  Go ahead, make a big fat list.  It won’t cost you a dime to make a list.  Post it around your house, stick it up in your cubicle at work.  I’ve made it into a downloadable PDF file Greed Postcard, (!!!!!!! I just learned how to do this – I am a techie queen this morning – unbelievable – seriously unbelievable – obviously I’m a moron with just enough knowledge to be scary!) print it on cardstock, cut it into postcard size and mail it to family and friends.  You can use my idea for the backside.  If you are truly a sweet, never greedy person you could make a list for your kids with chores you would like them to do.  Maybe send it to your significant other with a list of things you would like for your relationship.  It’s not that I’m going to call you a liar to your face if you don’t get a case of the gimmes.  But come on,  if financial executives can spend thousands of dollars on shower curtains and office trash cans then we, the little people, are certainly entitled to unleash our greed monster on occasion.  He’s only scary when you keep him in the dark!   Share your list – there might be something on yours that I want to add to mine. 

 And here is my personal list:

• five-year diary saw this on Molly’s blog.
• VOLUTA - a gorgeous laser cut hanging sculpture.
• fuji instax camera - the mod version of the Polaroid camera.
• 50 mm lens
• A subscription to UPPER CASE
• An Amy Rice original.

• At least 10 Japanese craft books/magazines and fabric and ribbon (this is a list of greed after all, why limit it to just one?)
• An immersion blender for making yummy fall and winter soups with.
• A large basket filled with handcrafted cheeses and complimentary wines.
• A gathering of you all – to eat the cheese, drink the wine, gab, craft, admire my Voluta sculpture and have your picture taken with my new Fuji Instax camera.