Got Ice, Anyone?

Yes, it was rather nippy here this morning.....38 degrees by my thermometer. And we were the warmest county around because we're surrounded by water. Everyone else was under a hard freeze warning.

It's not very often that can we look out the window in the morning and see frost on the neighbor's yards! It may look very pretty now but I am a little concerned for our tropical palms and plants. I hope this isn't another year of the brown yard!

When Joel got into his car he had to wait while the defroster thawed the icy coating from his windshield before he could drive to work. Does anyone have an extra ice scraper???

Chilly mama,

Deb

Dancing and Dinosaur

Julie and Jarrad broke out in dance as they were giggling about things they used to do during their childhood. Yes, this is what we do at family get togethers!

Jackson was obviously elated with a Christmas present, wouldn't you say?

Nate was tickled to have Dad sit on the floor with him and teach him how to use his Sit N' Spin.

Sydney thought Josh's new toy dinosaur was pretty funny.

And Josh learned how to "feed" his new pet, the trick performing dinosaur.

This guys burps, growls, eats, purrs when you pet him and does a few other things we won't go into here. We're still having a good time.....

Debbie

Boiling

This is not exactly your typical Christmas picture, but, it's an accurate one for our 2010 holiday. On the evening of the 23rd of December I turned on the water in the kitchen and the water pressure had been reduced to a trickle. Hmmmm......the neighbor came over to see if we had any water because she sure didn't have much pressure either. Well, it turns out a 50" water main had broken on Belcher Road north of East Bay....which means about 350,000 people were affected by the break according to the news.

By the morning of the 24th, the news was reporting that we were under a boil water notice under told otherwise. So, the picture above is how we managed to wash all our dishes until the morning of Dec. 26th. One pot for washing and one pot for rinsing. At least the water pressure came back up so we could take showers and wash clothes. Boy, was I ever glad when they lifted the boil water notice! We are so used to all our modern conveniences that you forget how much more labor it takes to go about your daily life when one of our utilities has a glitch.

Thanks to all our camping experiences for helping us take it all in stride. So, this year it was plastic plates and cups for meals. Hey, I might do that next year, too! Sure did eliminate a lot of dishwashing. We still had a wonderful time with our family. Hope you did, too.

Back to running water,
Debbie

Remember Brandy Alexander?

Not a person named Brandy Alexander; an alcoholic drink is what I was referring to. I remember drinking them during the late 70's and thought they must be a very sophisticated drink because it took several types of alcohol mixed together then poured into a tall stemmed glass. And they were easy to consume for a non-drinker like myself.

After I spent the entire weekend preparing for Christmas, I decided to take a break after dinner Sunday night. My guys are out Christmas shopping and I thought I'd treat myself to a special drink. Ta-da! It's an espresso martini! Yum....in our family we call these an adult milkshake. Call it what you want, it works for me. Oh, yeah, and I'm also using my favorite napkin which says, "I'll have a cafe mocha vodka valium latte to go please". Yup, that about says it all for me.

Espresso Martini

1-1/2 oz. chilled espresso

1-1/2 oz. Stolichnaya vanilla vodka

1-1/2 oz. Godiva chocolate liqueur

1 oz. Kahlua

1-1/2 oz. half & half

Pour all ingredients over ice and shake. Pour into a chilled martini glass and enjoy.

Now this is the way to start my Christmas/birthday week!

Debbie

A Quilt for Jo

This beaming gal is Jo, a very dear lady. I've made a quilt for Jo before and she told me how pleased she was with it when it was finished. That quilt is recorded here in the blog October 3,2009 and was made for Jo's niece.

Recently, Jo brought her deceased father's ties to me and asked if I could create a quilt to give to her mother in remembrance of her dad. I wanted to keep the ties intact as much as possible and came up with the idea for laying them horizontally like graphic bars of silk color. That was the jumping off point for designing this quilt. The mottled grey batik fabric was requested by Jo and as I sketched the quilt out on paper, solid ideas took form and most of them ended up in the final quilt.

Jo was wonderful to work with as she gave me free rein to do whatever came into my head. The ties were taken completely apart, the interfacing was removed and then the tedious task of lining them all up began. It took an entire day just to lay them out symmetrically and pin them onto the batik fabric. After I was pleased with the color layout I needed to come up with an interesting way to stitch them onto the batik to hold them in place permanently. So, each tie was stitched with soft grey thread using a different machine embroidery stitch to create continuity but lend visual interest to the finished quilt. Nine hours later that task was completed. Whew!

Now it was time to quilt the layers together. Jo's mom had written a long list of names and descriptives that told about the life of her husband and I used all those names in free hand quilting to stitch the final layers of the quilt together. Before I could do the quilting, though, I had to construct the back of the quilt.

The back of the quilt was made by using her dad's dress shirts; pockets, buttons and plackets included. In the close-up below you can see the buttons and plackets from some of the shirts. As simple as this quilt appears, it was one of the most technically challenging quilts I have ever made.

As I showed the completed quilt to Jo, we shared a few tears together and I expressed to her that this was one of the most rewarding quilts I have worked on. Jo, thanks for trusting me with the precious momentos of your dad's life. I pray this will bring some measure of peace and comfort to your mom each time she looks at it and remembers her dear husband.

Grateful to be a part of this memory,

Debbie

Christmas Kitchen

So, I've been a little busy lately and finally got our tree decorated a couple of days ago. This morning I decided to get a jump start on the day and got up early, put on Christmas music, lit the balsam candle and fired up the cappuccino machine. When I put my Christmas mug down, it looked so pretty I had to grab the camera and click off a few shots to remember the season before it's gone.

My sweet and very thoughtful friend, Bonnie, knew how busy I was taking care of Joel's mom this year and she baked these yummy cookies for us. (I LOVE the coconut- cherry- chocolate chip ones, Bonnie....would you share the recipe?) Well I'm heading out the door to do something fun today instead of work.....I'm having lunch with Teresa to celebrate Christmas early and then I'll try and do some final Christmas shopping. Hope you are taking a few precious moments to soak up the sights, sounds and scents of this cherished holiday season.

Eight days until Christmas,

Debbie

Decking and Boardwalks

The back of the property: Ok, so while we were at the river we put the finishing touches on the new decking behind the Tin Can Cabin. The cabin had an existing 8' x 22' raised deck attached to the backside and we recently covered it with an insulated roof to give us a place to sit and be protected from rain and the sun. This new ground level area was designed to get us up off the sandy/silt soil and provide comfortable seating around the fire pit. We connected the upper deck and the lower area with a boardwalk so we are high and dry when it rains.

The is the "connecting" end by the stairs. This landing also serves as the forward end of our parking space for the cars. Next on the agenda: landscaping........my favorite!

Boardwalk Mama,

Debbie

Guess where we were?

Yes, after being gone for more than a month, we went back to the river for a brief weekend of R&R. We woke up to a chilly 38 degree morning on Saturday and when I opened the blinds in the kitchen which have a view of the river, this is what I saw.

The warm water clashing with the cold incoming north wind created this most beautiful effect on the river. I hurried to throw on some warm clothes, grabbed my camera and dashed down to the dock to capture some shots before the fog evaporated. Apparently I disturbed this Great Heron because he squawked at me as he lifted up and over to the other side of the river where he took up his perch on a branch and glared at me.

Several other times for two years I've tried in vain to capture the fog on the river, but each time it evaporated before I could get off any good shots. Fortunately this time I woke up early enough to snap a few interesting pics.

Ahhh, it's just so peaceful on the docks all alone except for a few birds searching for breakfast and the ever-present squirrels chattering up in the oak trees.

This was most definitely a cappuccino moment. After this shot I scurried back to our Tin Can Cabin to heat up the espresso machine and thaw out my fingers. Hope you enjoy these snapshot glimpses into our little haven away from home.

The Early Bird,

Debbie

Happy 21st Birthday, Jeremy!

We decided to do something different for Jeremy's birthday this year. So, I woke him up early, sang a goofy birthday song to him and asked him to get dressed so he could "see something" outside. Of course there were a few groans and questions, but he let me lead him out the front door and down the driveway. Hope he wasn't expecting a new car!!!

And this is what he saw when he removed the scarf from his eyes......a flock of crows. Imagine that? They flew in on this cold front during this windy day just to wish him a happy birthday!

Ok, I can finally officially say to him, "I got'cha!" He 's a tough one to fool....

We both got a good giggle from this one.

Then it was time to make him his favorite breakfast, chocolate chip pancakes and yummy crispy bacon. Coffee, anyone?

Just call me....

One satisfied mama,

Deb