Category Archives: 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons

I love to garden. I love to eat. I love to enjoy the seasons. And home is where my heart is!

So Thankful

1 Christ is All, 2 Mi Familia, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, Stuff I Actually Think, ,

Redemption…a Savior…my lover and husband, Dave…the five children I carried to birth – watching them become the people God intended…Giving Thanks…the 5 grandchildren who call me Nonna and run into my arms in front of people making me look really good…parents who raised me for God…my siblings and the people they married, the nieces and nephews they share with me…music…The Word of God…gardening…tomatoes….flowers and green, green grass…cold water…thunder and lightening to go to sleep by…the smell of a cleansing rain…a harvest moon…Grateful…my amazing American Down and Feather  pillow…So Blessed…caramel…pumpkin spice lattes…long kisses…foot rubs…something that makes me laugh out loud…really good and loyal friends…the 3rd Thursday women…Thanksgiving Dinner…Charmin triple-ply, extra soft…Ephesians…Gavin’s red hair… Averi’s chunky legs in white tights…Gemma giving the dog orders – and being obeyed!…Guini’s soft hugs and kisses…So Appreciative…Hunter’s m&m toes…hot coffee on cool mornings…for over 300 sunny days a year in Colorado…Dave’s dimples…the comfort of the Lord…the healing of the Lord…being loved by the Lord…having enough to eat…getting to eat with friends and family at the convivial table…the quiet God has provided to write and dream and create…the noisy family dinners…the promises of God…Counting My Blessings…the sidewalk that leads to the world’s nicest neighbors…the strength represented by the mountains…the fact that the mountains help me keep my bearings, direction-wise…the artistic, creative types who color my world…getting to help produce Heaven Fest…getting to invite people in to 24/7 worship in the metro-area…the nearly 100 sunsets I have watched this year-the most in my life-because they have been amazingly beautiful and healing…my summer of love…this year of worship…God is Good…new friends…people that stand by you through thick and thin…re-acquainting with long-time friends…having any friends at all…God is Faithful…a song that ushers in the Presence…a powerful sermon…the ministries I am a part of…new mercies every morning…spiritual daughters and sons…a good church home…provision…rescue…deliverance…mended relationships…Jesus – the center of my joy…joy

Bing Crosby & Rosemary Clooney sang this in the Movie White Christmas, 1954

When I’m worried and I can’t sleep
I count my blessings instead of sheep,
And I fall asleep counting my blessings.
When my bankroll is getting small
I think of when I had none at all,
And I fall asleep counting my blessings.

This is what I am singing…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  Be more purposely thankful and grateful, for the love of Pete.  No whining!  I am blessed.

Table of Grace

2 Mi Familia, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, Stuff I Actually Think,

This is a beautiful table.  These are my colors, but it isn’t mine. (Where do you find a pumkin like that?  Ha!)

On mine there’ll be some mix and match dishes because we’ll have a bigger crowd (16 and maybe more?).  And while fresh, sauteed green beans are much better for you, one of my girls will fix that once-a-year-cooked-and-soup-saturated-into-oblivion Green Bean Casserole with the crunchy french-fried onions on top.  It’s just a part of the day.

There’ll be cranberry juice and Sprite spritzers, pretty and festive.  All of the usual food suspects will be here.  We’ll hang our “thankful leaves” on our little centerpiece “grateful tree.”  Even with both leaves in the table (making it 9 feet long), we’ll add on and cover a card table and pull out all the folding chairs we can find for extra seating.  Sometimes I think about getting some fabric chair covers to pull it all together, but then  realize – the beauty of my table won’t have come from Pottery Barn or Williams and Sonoma.

The radiant beauty of our convivial table this Thursday will be the faces seated around it: my kids and grandbabies, good friends, a niece and a nephew (one from South Dakota and one from Montana – on loan to me from their parents).  The beauty will be the abundance of the food (we are so blessed) prepared with love.  It will be the laughter and understanding between strong-willed and passionate people, choosing to honor those all around them.  And for  for Dave and Tara and Hunter who are travelling in the Pacific Northwest this week and next – absent from us physically, they are deeply planted in our hearts and will be missed.

The house will host some awkward transition decoratively speaking with gourds and pumkins adorning various surfaces while the big tree is in mid-decor and Christmas boxes will be marching in throughout the day.  I’m always so excited to see what I got last year on clearance after the holidays.

Today I read David’s words of awe when the LORD established an everlasting covenant with him and his house:

“Who am I, O LORD God, And what is my house that You have brought me this far?”  1 Chronicles 17.16 NKJV

And I concur and wonder the same, with great thanks…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  Give thanks.  Because God is good and establishing my household at a table of mercy, a table of grace.

A Very Happy Thanksgiving to You and Yours!

2 Mi Familia, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, Stuff I Actually Think,

OK. This is what happens.  You spend years making ridiculous amounts of food for Thanksgiving.  Then one day you realize: NO ONE needs that much food at one meal on one day EVER.  So, you say to the now-grown children, “Let’s simplify.  Let’s do less.  L:et’s decide to fix only what we must positively have to create the Thanksgiving feast of our dreams.”

And when all is said and done and everyone has made their decisions – we are still having too much food! 

At least now they all pitch in, so my life really is easier.

We’re pretty traditional.   I am roasting the 23.18 pound turkey.  I’ll just create the fabulous dressing on the side because that whole stuffing-inside-the-turkey thing is still a bit scary…you never know.  I will also mash 10 pounds of real-butter-and-heavy-cream potatoes with just the right amount of garlic.  They are to die for, if I must say so myself.  And I am an amazing gravy-maker.  There’ll be some dips and hors d’eouvres (gotta have the shrimp cocktail with Bookman’s sauce) and that is it!  The rest of the sides and pies and must-haves will come from my kiddos.

What are you eating Thursday?…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  Better check Martha’s website to make sure I’m up on the latest turkey info…

Wind

1 Christ is All, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , , , ,

Threatened by a forecast of freezing rain turning to snow, we are actually hosting a magnificent and sunny day fully lighting the multi-faceted palette and texture of fall.  Fluttering madly in the autumn breeze and dancing to the tune of the wind chime, the once-emerald leaves of the Aspen clump are becoming more golden by the hour.  The burning bushes are flaming as scarlet as they can be and potted flower heads are bowing in reverance to the power of the season as it blows by, sometimes in a whisper, sometimes as a roar.

Psalm 65.9  The Message
O, visit the earth – ask her to join the dance!
…fill the God-river with living water.  Paint the wheatfields golden.
Creation was made for this!
Drench the plowed fields, soak the dirt clods with rainfall…
Set the hills to dancing! dress the canyon walls with live sheep,
a drape of flax across the valleys!
Let them shout and shout and shout!  Oh, let them sing and sing!

 

 I am singing my head off to You, O Lord, and trying to sing as loud as the trees which are clapping their hands and the bushes which are dancing (the twist) for your pleasure.  You have made all of creation so holy, so set apart for Your glory.  Can I live my life as free, as abandoned? 

God and all He has created are glorious!…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  See His glory.

Choo! Choo! Train Cake for Hunter

2 Mi Familia, 3 Celebrations & Festive Events, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , , , ,

  

Whereas last year’s firetruck cake (see here) was about 80 pounds and I toiled in fear over it, I have now realized I am not really “into” novelty cakes and was very relaxed.  It was simple and straightforward (with Dave explaining to me what a train must have) and instead of doing lots of piping and icing stuff, we “glued” Tropical Twizzlers and M & Ms and Dots, along with a couple of varieties of cookies onto this train cake for Hunter’s 4th birthday.  Dave piped windows for me and I came up with mini-Kit Kats as the idea for the railroad ties.

The board it was on was 13 inches wide by 3 feet long.  The engine was 3 2-inch layers of cake at it’s highest part and was 4″ wide by 14″ long. The other cars were 8 inches and 12 inches long, respectively.  The “coal” was a box of Junior Mints.  It was just plain white cake wih the almond-infused buttercream, which, it turns out, Hunter is not a fan of.  He wants his icing (which he prefers to cake) to be plain, old vanilla-flavored.  Next time, Magoo, next time. 

The smokestack was my favorite part: icing glued cookies, and a “Dot” base holding a cocktail pick threaded through popcorn for the smoke.  Pretty cute!

 

I had looked at a bunch of train cakes online and cracked up at them and wondered why people would even post them.  Then mine turned out like theirs.  Ha!  But there wasn’t any sweat and the grandkids loved it. It was quick, simple, easy, fun and in the end the candy was the huge hit!

There are still vats of buttercream here…takers?…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  A Candyland cake!  YES!  Using MMF and lots and lots and lots of candy!

pictured: the cake, the chalkboard in the kitchen;  and Hunter at his house about to blow out his candles!

Fall Frost

1 Christ is All, 2 Mi Familia, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , , , , , ,

I think we had an actual, true frost today.  I know it was 58 degrees in my kitchen when I started up the coffee pot.  And no, I will not turn on the heat, yet.  I am a die-hard.  Can I make it to November?  This is the question. 

Most of the plants seem to be perking back up, even though I have done nothing to save them.  Even the zucchini, whose leaves froze and look soggy, dark and droopy, are boasting some bright new flowers in response to the returning sunlight – after 3 very overcast days.

I am studying and preparing for the Leaving a Legacy Intensive kick-off this weekend, but keep getting distracted by 3, small adorable orange moths of some sort.  Though they are probably depositing some evil larvae all over the garden as we speak, I think I will call them butterflies because they are delightful as they frolic,  alternately swooping and circling and tag-playing, with sunning themselves on the patio and garden rocks  Try as I might, and though I swear I have seen them all in the view-finder at once repeatedly, I cannot seem to get the camera to click quickly enough to capture all three, though they are dancing and prancing about just inches from me here near the glass doors.

Yes, the garden is slowly, but surely shutting down for the year, but it makes each plant that is still showing all the more ravishing, makes me more grateful.  Why, the petunias are practically haughty today, all purple and abundant, flowering with gusto, unaffected by the cold – perhaps even encouraged by it?

  

  

Today I am praising God for: the return of the sun…hot coffee (and decaf for when I have reached my limit)…the 3 fanciful orange “butterflies” performing gleefully outside my window…the grape tomatoes, packed with flavor, my morning snack…the love of a good man: my husband, my friend, my lover-the one who talks me off the ledges…my family, both the one I came from and the one I am getting to create, still…e-mails in “secret code” from grandkids…people who know how to pray…the sweet Presence of God, who joins me on the first sound of a song……First frost-warm home…the wisdom of the Word (I am in Proverbs today!).  And the temp in my kitchen has reached 63 degrees.  I am thankful!

Blessings in all things to you and yours!…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  So glad I didn’t get in a hurry to uproot the sagging sunflowers (see photo here).  Yesterday they were the host to a couple of amazingly beautiful bluejays and I got to watch!  What would I have missed by stripping them away before their whole work was through?  Get back to Legacy notes…

Pictured, top, left to right: the orange “butterflies” sunning themselves on rock and concrete.  Bottom, left to right: the first two were taken through the window on the Dahlia plant that is apparently enthralling the little “flutterbies.”  Finally, the mum, quiet the summer through, has now exploded into this happy hello in its off-the-beaten-path locale.  I snapped  it chasing butterflies.

UPDATE  10.14.08 – I have been informed that my 3 little orange “moths” were actually baby Monarch Butterflies.  I didn’t know Monarchs were ever this small?  I hope they keep visiting!

The Garden Winner

4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, 5 Songs I am Singing, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , ,

It is COLD out today!  It is also overcast and funny-looking and  I fear the rumors of a spittering and sputtering of snowflakes arriving this weekend may, indeed, be true. 

I just went out and walked among the gardens, which are slowly but surely finishing up their work year.  There are gazillions of tomatoes left and just yesterday, bright yellow zucchini flowers were still trumpeting their intent to produce.  But today, all bets seem off and I think the zucchini has resigned itself to closing up shop. 

But they are the winners!  The zucchini wins for the garden of 2008.  I have never had zucchini last into mid-October (I am calling it mid-October even if we are still in the first third – they deserve that).  Usually they are wondrous for a month or so and then get some sort of zucchini-acne-powdery-weird disease and die off, which is why an attentive gardener will do successive plantings and why I am usually kicking myself for not doing so.  But these sweet 5 plants, roundabout the yard, tucked in here and there as if I weren’t expecting much, have consistently outdone themselves, and oh how I have loved turning my nose up at their grocery store cousins!  For I have harvested the best.

  

So, tonight: what shall I do?  Shall I throw floating row covers over the green beans and cucumbers and tomatoes and zuchs – knowing full well that in a few days we could be back into the higher temperatures again (the beautiful, little-known secret of the Rocky Mountain Region)?  Or “should I,” as Doris Day sings in Pillow Talk concerning Rock Hudson, “surrender?” 

The garden – is it over or is it not?…TBD…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  Enjoy the gorgeous dazzling-orange-red Maple leaves strewn about the yard, even though they are from the neighbor’s tree!

pictured: the garden shutting down; see the blackbirds eating the decrepit sunflower’s seeds?

October is Orange

1 Christ is All, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , ,

October is pumpkins and spice, rustling leaves, brilliant carrots and abundant gourds and squash.  It is wool socks, leather shoes and a new pair of dark blue Levi’s.  October is tricks and treats, turtlenecks, Sunday suppers and chimnea fires.  It’s roasted seeds and amber and gold with browns and greens.  It’s spicy, cool mornings and indigo-dark skies.  It’s cinnamon rolls and fresh spicy pies.  It’s blazing color and fried green tomatoes, and caramel and taffy and apples, too.   But mostly, October is orange.

DECORATE WITH ORANGE. 

http://blogs.hgtv.com/hgtv/design/archives/2008/10/fall_into_orange.html

ORANGE (“the color of craving”) AS DESIGN PASSION. 

http://www.whorange.net/

 

1 Kings 8.65 The Message: …”This is how Solomon kept the great autumn feast…Two solid weeks of celebration!…”

 

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds  (modified from a recipe by Alison Aves)
In a 10″ x 15″ baking pan,
mix 2 cups unwashed* pumpkin seeds,
1 1/2 tablespoons melted butter,
1 1/4 teaspoons salt (use a seasoning salt, if desired) and
1 teaspoon (or more to taste…for me? always more) Worcestershire.
Spread seeds out in pan.
Bake in a 250-degree oven, stirring occasionally,
until browned and crisp (about 2 hours).
Serve warm or cool.
Thoroughly cooled seeds can be stored in an
airtight container for up to a week.

So-I am a summer-lover, but fall feels really romantic and lovely to me, too…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF: October is also when I have been called for Jury Duty, too.  Poo.  Jury duty is NOT orange.

*Don’t worry – the orange slime from the pumkin that is still on the seeds will form a deliciously salty, crunchy coating on the seeds.

pictured: a deliciously orange google image-collage