So maybe this would work?

Read this? What do you think? Should I try this?

My thoughts:

Son no. 1: Mmm worth a try, would probably work better if I hid some food somewhere.

Son no. 2: Nope. Is definitely not going to work. He would read, smile, write a really really funny response back and go on his merry way.

Son no. 3: Might work, he would spend only the necessary on food and save the rest to add to his clothing allowance.

Sigh

Cleaning frenzy in a teenage household

Yesterday I had a -rare- day of instant-gratification-clean-the-house-NOW! So while enjoying my first cup of coffee I made a list (hah, how typical! Don't you love crossing off items on your list?).

First the downstairs... tidying, picking up things and deposit them on the stairs, hanging the first load and loading the second laundry, vacuum, mop.. Climb to the second floor, vacuum, change the beds, open windows everywhere (what the heck is that awfull smell in teenager no. 2's room?***), fold two baskets of laundry and distribute.

Take a deep breath.

Up the second stair where the lairs of the remaining two teenagers are.... Grab stuff from the stairs on my way up. (Because they just step over it a hundred times or think the stairs are just 13 open drawers).
Room Son no. 3 is a mess. This fashion puppy will go to the trouble of carefully composing his outfit plus the hair but nevertheless throws his stuff on every single flat surface. Plus the annual international gathering of dustbunnies takes place in his room this year. I get the swiffer from downstairs and sweep. I don't pick it up and just pile it up for him to see.

Enter son no. 1  's room. The student one who is still living at home. We think. According to the knee deep mess in his room he is very agile. He must be because he couldn't reach his bed otherwise.
His desk is almost invisible under all the junk. So is his desk chair.
In a burst of anger I take the sheets off of his bed and sweep everything that's on the floor, his desk and the chair ON his bed. HAH! That'll teach him when he comes home tonight!****

Although..... scroll back to the above picture... I think that is what will happen.


*** the gruesome smell is located. My fear was that one of the cats couldn't get to the litterbox in time but all evidence points to his sportsbag.... Yes. I don't want to know either. Soccer shoes. Note to self: buy Fibreze.

**** Aaarggghhh!!!   I crumbled! Discovered that he wouldn't be home until very late. Like past bedtime late. Because he started rock climbing. Which is a good thing. So. I eh. sort of backed up and put all his stuff in a big laundrybasket, made up his bed with fresh sheets. Yeah I know. Not good right? I did put the laundry basket on top of his bed though....
Do you think he got the hint?
No me neither.

Bread Baking Babes do the Twist; Pretzels

As much as I twist and turn to make everyone happy I couldn’t get the twist on this dough…

Elle as our Head Master of Kitchen table said the following: “let's gather around the kitchen table as the fabulous Bread Baking Babes delve into the past...610 AD in fact...and we can decide if we believe that these bread morsels were used by monks of that time to teach little boys to pray or to reward them for staying quiet during Mass...or both. That's the story behind Soft Pretzels, called Bretzels in German. The traditional shape resembles hands folded in prayer.
I really don’t dare to say it out loud but I’m afraid I made B…!  Try again: B…!  Honestly I tried but they became B… instead of pretzels! Pinched of pieces of dough, rolled them out in ropes, even got as far as to make a horse shoe shape and then somehow they coiled up into BUNS! *shudder*

There. I’ve said it. Buns. Not pretzels. 

Feel so ashamed.

But boy did they we have fun that night! I bashed late into a party that was going on for a while in G+, all their breadies were done and the girls were ankle deep in conversation/wine. That’s the atmosphere I came in and had to bake. Yeah I can see you feel so sorry for me… Not!

Never mind their shape, the boys here ate them anyway! I feared the dipping in boiling water and the inevitable wrinkling afterwards (I cried out for help and from 4 girls around the globe came the answer that a really short stay in water evens out all the wrinkles. Now girls, think of that when you run your hot bath!)

Our girl Elle over at Feeding my Enthusiasms will have the recipe up for you shortly, I wish you words of wisdom, wines of fun and happy channeling cinnamon when you bake and become our Bread Baking Buddy! See Elle for the details and bake with us!

ABC; Cheese Blintzes

 

This is our September challenge for the ABC Bakers where we bake recipes from Flo Braker's "Baking For All Occasions". This time we bake page 130: Quintessential Cheese Blintzes.

 

To my Dutch ears this does not exactly sound delicious. Now try to seduce me with: Crèpes filled with a lemony creme fraiche and raspberry sauce…..Aaah! Much better.

I really think this will make an excellent –if rich- dessert for a nice showy dinner party but since we don’t dine this exquisite during weekdays I decided to do dessert for dinner and serve these. My family thinks I’m an A-list Mom right now. (I’ll enjoy it while it last ;-))

Basically you make small really thin pancakes (crèpes), fill them with a heaped table spoon of fresh cheese mixture**. Roll them like you would roll an eggroll and carefully bake them again in a skillet with a little butter. Serve warm.

I used cream cheese I had in the fridge, mixed it with egg, some sugar, vanilla extract and lemon zest. No quantities here because I winged it and adjusted the other ingredients to the amount of cream cheese I had left. (Flo would like you to add a little salt to the mixture, I didn’t). My mix was a little runny and I added some custard powder to even that out. Turned out to be just right, a slight tang from the cream cheese very nicely balanced with sugar and lemon zest.

The raspberry sauce is just that; fresh raspberries from the garden, flash cooked in a sugar syrup. Yum!

Absolutely my kind of dessert!! (Or dinner..)

** (Flo mentions farmer cheese and I have no clue what that is, substitutes are ricotta cheese or something similar like creme fraiche or indeed cream cheese).

Side note for the savoury lovers: I had some creamy leek-mushroom ragout left over and filled a couple of crepes same style. Can we all say “stroke of genius”?

Black and white

Next project; a nice thick jersey and a new-to-me pattern magazine. I went and bought two fabrics yesterday and spotted the latest edition of the Ottobre in the store as well.

This is going to be a first for me, I usually stick with Burda and Knip but as of late I am not too happy with the fit of Knip; shoulders all of a sudden too narrow, I’m forever making adjustments for arms, hips and waist.

There are quite a few nice patterns in this magazine, I sort of like the bell bottomed coat (my sewing friend goes Eeeeek!) there’s a nice basic t-shirt, the dress on the first page is fun, and I wonder if I can pull it off to morph the high waisted winter bermuda  into regular pants. 
To start I am sewing one of the dresses although it’s not very fortifying to see they call this: “Old School Teacher….”. Mean ol’ School Marm anyone?

Yeah right. (Actually they say Old-School teacher as in retro/fifties style. Or so I make myself believe). Well I am not fazed, I will proceed because I like this shape a lot.

The patterned fabric proves to be equally difficult to cut as a stripe/checkered. First of all I have to take into account where the white parts will go because they will bring forward your , let’s call it your good and your bad? Edit to say:
I cut into the fabric and the dress is almost finished! Yay! Not so yay is that I had to have the fabric open and position the paper pattern pieces so that I would have everything exactly as I wanted. That took quite some time. In the process of doing exactly that I forgot to pay attention to the fact that next to the pattern there’s also a stripe in there…. resulting in my side seams not matching. UGH!! Terribly out of practice I am!!

On a happier note; very satisfied with the fit and design of the pattern.

Favorite things!

Probably the one necklace I wear most because it is so versatile. See how the colors shimmer? The stone seems to adapt to the colors you’re wearing. Green, purple, blue… (I never wear pink but I can see it would go with pink as well).

The story started with the bracelet; a present from Tanna and Sue when they visited us eh… way back in 2007? Needless to say I was thrilled! That visit continued in discovering London together and lo and behold, I found a matching necklace in one of the artist jewelry shops in Portobello market: love at first sight!

Fast forward to August 2011, holiday in the US for the first time since the boys were tiny toddlers, strolling through –very very touristy but oh the scenery!- Sedona.

We found lots of stores selling native American jewelry and I remembered Sue telling me they found the bracelet in a similar store…. you could have heard my brain clicking. So now I was an a mission… to find a pair of matching earrings! As you can see I succeeded!

Disclaimer: of course you are going to ask me what kind of stone it is and for the life of me I really cannot remember! I know I thought that I should keep the note that was in the box but can’t find it anymore. Grrrr!

EDIT: Thanks to Linda (Hi Linda!) who in her comment suggested that this could well be abalone shell I now know it is!

“The abalone is a mollusk shell that has been used for personal and ceremonial adornment since early times. Abalone has been considered sacred by many Native Americans.”

“Abalone Shell has the colors of the ocean in it, blues, greens, purples and yellows. It is soft to the touch from repeated tumbles in the sand and water. It has slight ripples on it like the patterns left in the sand as the waves lapse over it. It is comforting to hold it and rub the softness like you would a worry stone”

I also found some information on line discussing the healing properties, associated with women, motherhood, emotional balance…

I smile when I read this…. That’s exactly what I do when I wear it. I seem to always –almost absent mindedly- fiddle with this jewelry, just holding it or feel the softness with my fingers. Isn’t that intriguing?