New Original Christmas Corgi Art Doll Ornament

A little belated treasure from Christmas In July, my lovelies. Now on Ebay! xo CS ^..^




*Sold!* More original ornaments and other goodies in the works! xo xo -CS ^..^

Happy Tasha Tudor Day!

Today, on her birthday, we remember and honor the life of our beloved Tasha Tudor. This image is from her book "A Time To Keep" for August. The quote at the top of the first page by Christine Rossetti reads, "My heart is like a singing bird." The page continues: "August brought your mother's birthday which we celebrated at night by the river. The table was set with birch bark plates and gourd drinking cups. There wee favors made from walnut shells and families of wooden animals in little baskets and meringues made in the shape of toadstools. But best of all-the birthday cake came floating down the river."

Happy Tasha Tudor Day to everyone who is celebrating the life of this American treasure today and keeping her memory and magic alive! xo xo -CS ^..^ p.s. visit Clarice's Storybook Woods blog for more Tasha Tudor day fun.

Breakin The Law

Scroll down and pause my music playlist to the left of the blog and turn up your speakers before playing this video! It is a riot. -CS ^..^

Another Star In The Sky Tonight

"Kelsey"

3/6/95-8/18/09

This morning, Mary Elizabeth had to say goodbye to Kelsey. Kelsey was the sweetest Corgi ever. Mother to our Indy and Hannah Banana and Grant, she was loved by all and brought little bits of sunshine wherever she went. Click here on our Reinwood Corgis pages, then to 'the girls' to see her in her younger days. Run wild and free, sweet Kelsey. We love you with all of our hearts. xo xo xo

Caught in the act.

Happy Saturday morning, my lovelies! Lest you think that the Reinwood Corgis and other critters (whether the ones who live here with me or with Mary Elizabeth) are always so well behaved, I submit to you evidence which is quite to the contrary.

Here is Mary Elizabeth's tale of woe last evening:

"Apparently during the night Shady the cat must have been playing with my pen that I left on the computer table. While playing it must have fallen onto the floor where Brazen got a hold of it and chewed it and then shared it with Hannah Banana; as the two were seen with the most obvious evidence...blue stains on paws and cheek! I am sure Shady the cat was laughing in the background as I scolded the dogs and cleaned up the awful mess!"

Such wicked, wicked little monkeys!

Enjoy your weekend, everyone! xo xo -C ^..^

White House Puff Balls

I love cookbooks. I especially enjoy reading old cookbooks. My friend Steph stopped in the other night and brought me a fun book for my birthday. It is "The Original White House Cookbook 1887 Edition" Inside it says Cooking, Toilet and Household Recipes, Menus, Dinner-Giving, Table Etiquette, Care of the Sick, Health Suggestions, Facts Worth Knowing, etc. etc. A Comprehensive Cyclopedia of Information For The Home by Mrs. F.L. Gillette and Hugo Ziemann, Steward of the White House.

I'm having great fun with this book. Some of the recipes are a real doozy. Some of the recipes are so intense and things I would never eat in a million years. But some look very interesting, if you can translate them to today's cooking ingredients and measurements. My Mom was here a couple of days ago and as soon as I showed her the book she found this simple recipe for Puff-Ball Doughnuts and decided that we would make them. We didn't know what they meant by 'sweet milk' (we thought of all the sweet milks like condensed, etc) but then my daughter googled it and found that in the 19th century it simply meant whole milk. Perhaps there are other types of sweet milk that were intended but this is what we used for our doughnuts.

Here is the entire recipe.

It is actually written as a paragraph as most of the recipes in the book are:

Puff-Ball Doughnuts

"These doughnuts, eaten fresh and warm, are a delicious breakfast dish, and are quickly made. Three eggs, one cupful of sugar, a pint of sweet milk, salt, nutmeg, and flour enough to permit the spoon to stand upright in the mixture: add two heaping teaspoonfuls of baking-powder to the flour; beat all until very light. Drop by the dessertspoonful into boiling lard. These will not absorb a bit of fat, and are not at all rich, and consequently are the least injurious of this kind of cakes."

So rather than use lard we used canola oil to fry them up. I didn't have any fresh nutmegs on hand so we used a pinch of cinnamon and a capful of pure vanilla. We used a pinch of salt also, since the recipe didn't specify. We decided that the next time we make them, we will drop them a bit smaller into the oil as they do puff up as they say. I think the size of a Dunkin Munchkin would be perfect with these. You want the oil to be very hot, that is why they do not absorb the oil. We thought that next time we might use a bit of cream with the milk and add more cinnamon or do the nutmeg instead. Rolling them in the sugars was a good idea. The only thing, we did not agree that they are not at all 'rich.' These are not light donuts. Your kids will want a tall cold glass of milk with these for sure.

So here is my Mom whipping up the puff balls. I made her wear one of Natalie's Tasha Tudor aprons while she was making these.

It just seemed like the required couture of the moment.

When they came out of the oil, we put them quickly on paper towel lined plates for a second or two and then rolled them immediately in either powdered sugar, granulated sugar or a combo of cinnamon and sugar.

Then my brother Gary and niece Hayley stopped by for a bit.
They were visiting for the week. My lovely Sister-In-Law Katy was shopping for a dress for a wedding. They live Los Angeles so I miss them.
A lot.

Here's our mom (Grandma Annie to our kids) giving Hayley some cheese.

Isn't she just the cutest princess ever?

Hayley loves her Daddy.

She thinks he is number one.

He's a fantastic Daddy, but he's still a nerd. (I'm supposed to say that,

he is my brother after all...)

xo xo

-Cathy ^..^

Shameless Sleepers and Weekend Adventures

My friend Stephanie came over last weekend and no sooner did she put down her bag then Skittles and Weebles decided it was the place to take a cat nap. Steph and I are actually related by catness. Our sons had rescued two kittens whose mother was hit by a car. She took one (Punky) and I took the other. Goku is ours, the big black cat (not in this photo) who looks like an eggplant from the back when he is sitting.

What a week it has been! My great aunt passed away. It is sad to see all of the old ones in the family say goodbye. The funeral was on Saturday which happened to be my birthday. It was good to see my cousins. Why is it that we don't realize how much you miss someone until you see them?

Later in the day, we did come home to have a little party complete with ice cream cake. My parents gave me the absolute coolest chandelier (it is wildly colorful) for my little studio. I promise I'll show it to you as soon as it is hung up.

Sunday, Mary Elizabeth and I left the house at the crack of dawn to bring a Corgi to Maryland who will be headed to Indiana by way of North Carolina. The weather was wicked. I expected to see Miss Gulch on her bike fly by. There was flooding on the roads and we arrived just in time to have a tornado warning on the radio telling us to get into a basement or under something. Yikes. When that passed, we headed home.I had my muck boots on, but Mary had to take off her socks and shoes to get through the water back into the van. We felt like we were on a log flume ride most of the time because of the way the van went through the water on the road. Then we hit the traffic from people coming home from the Jersey shore. Lots of cars pulled over on the sides of the road, lots of families and kids at the rest stops. At one of the rest stops, Mary Elizabeth opened up her cooler in the back of the van. She brought us a veritable feast! We had a picnic in the car with the rain pounding down. I think she practically brought the entire contents of her fridge with her. We made really good wraps in the car. Mine was fresh mozzarella, tomato, fresh basil, avocado and a spritz of vinaigrette. She even made fruit salad for us in two giant covered Pyrex bowls which we munched on in traffic.

My Brother, Sister-In-Law and niece flew in from Los Angeles too. I even got to spend some time with them on Sunday after the wild ride. My niece is getting so big, she is such a cutie pie, crawling all over the place.

So that was my weekend, my lovelies. How did you spend yours? xo xo ^..^