What a Difference Two Weeks Makes!

These pictures were taken Monday--just 13 days after my post of March 25. Here again you are looking at where my flower bed is, and the mailbox that has gardening tools. Looks different, doesn't it? Now we've got to find time to get out and do some yard clean-up!






Sunday morning, my garden was all covered with snow still, but before the evening service I could walk out to it on bare ground and see--rhubarb coming up!!!

Spring Cleaning Surprise

I've been doing a bit of sprucing up in some of my dollhouses. Today I found something that I had found before, but forgotten about. See the little folded paper that was hidden behind the door of this bedside table?

Here's what it says:

Sweet, eh? Love you too, Betsy!

There is a downside to this mini cleaning, though. I've found that, although all my houses have Bibles in them, it appears that the little people aren't reading them; they're covered with dust.

"These two are wedded, and no man can part--dust on the Bible and drought in the heart!"

Any dust on your Bible?

Cookies

Here is a very good cookie recipe. They may look like chocolate chip cookies, but they are not. They are very, very delicious cookies with chocolate chips added. I got the recipe from my Grandma Robbins many years ago, and just added the chocolate chips upon a suggestion from a friend. You could add anything you like to the recipe instead--M & M's, nuts, whatever. (Actually, I believe nuts were in the original recipe, but I haven't been using them because several friends don't care for nuts--and it's less expensive.)

My Grandma's Cookies:

Mix together:
1 cup butter or margarine
1 cup oil
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla
1 tablespoon buttermilk (I use a pinch of buttermilk powder and a spoon of water)
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup white sugar

Add:
3 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 cup oats
1/2 cup coconut
12 oz. chocolate chips

Mix together. Make into balls, then flatten slightly on cookie sheet. Bake about 11 minutes at whatever temperature your oven does cookies best. Makes about 5 dozen.

Long May It Wave!

The flag we ordered to be flown over the nation's capitol on my parents' anniversary arrived here yesterday, complete with certificate. This is my dad's birthday gift this year. His birthday isn't until October, so I'm wondering if we'll give it to him early. So...do I make this an exercise of patience, or do I use a little wisdom and give it to him while the weather is nicer and he can enjoy it more?

No More...

Dirty clothes on the floor for the little people in my brown house!
(Looks like I need photography lessons. This is blurry and doesn't show the texture of the hamper.)

As I was saying before...

It's Springtime in Northern Michigan!



Believe it or not, my flower bed is right out there. That mailbox, if you can see it, holds gardening tools.

Carpenter Judy

Here are a couple bedside tables I've been working on for one of my dollhouses. My little people were starting to complain about their lamps sitting on the floor.

She's getting famous!

Kate's picture was in the paper again. This time she was doing massages at the Ladies Day at the Senior Center.

Springtime in Northern Michigan

Okay, so it won't be spring for two more days--just thought you'd like to see how it looks when it's 'almost' spring!

Birthday Weekend

Last weekend we celebrated a couple birthdays--Dale's and Kate's. Jeff's and Betsy's families came up for the weekend. We had a great time and a lot of laughs.

Here's Massage Therapist Kate 'relaxing' on her birthday. Feast your eyes on those fancy slippers of hers!



Jeff and Josh got in a bit of snowmobiling.

Saturday night, we all went bowling. It was the first time bowling for the 4 little ones. I don't know if they ever realized that the object was to knock over the pins at the other end of the lane, but they did have great joy in taking turns rolling the ball down the lane! Sometimes that ball crawled so slowly that it just stopped midway. The attendants were starting to look the other way when they saw the ball creeping, I believe! Sorry, no pictures of the little cuties.








See the little bunnies on the cake? Kate always had them on her birthday cakes when she was growing up. They were even on her wedding cake behind the flowers on one of the tiers, so she could see them when they cut the cake.

Chocolate Chip Cake

I tried a new recipe today to take to our birthday fellowship tomorrow. It's called Chocolate Chip Cake. I hope it tastes as good as I think it will. It has chopped up chocolate chips in the cake itself. The filling between the layers is butterscotch with nuts. The glaze topping is chocolate. Doesn't look very pretty, does it? I think if I ever make it again, I'll make a little more filling and glaze so it drips down more.

Jeff's Birthday

We spent Monday and Tuesday with Jeff, Karen and the kids, celebrating Jeff's birthday. When Jeff was growing up, almost all his birthday cakes had clowns on them--so that's what he got this time. I'm not sure it was his first choice, but the kids liked it. LOL

Jeff does love cake!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Hey, Look!

Does this picture look familiar? They took it from my blog (with permission). Half of the front page--neat, huh?



Also in today's newpaper--Kate's advertisement:

From My Valentine

Aren't they beautiful?

Building Update

I was just looking over my previous posts and realized I left ya hanging with the church stairway pictures, so here are some newer pictures. We still need to get the chair lift in.

Looks like we need some paint touch-ups here:

Special Treat!

One of the men brought a gift for every lady that was at church Sunday. A big box of chocolates! Wasn't that nice?

Valentine Goodies

I made these goodies to take to our Valentine Potluck at church tomorrow.

These are Petit Fours:

(Last Spring, I took some of these to our Ladies Tea. I overheard someone say that those Little Debbie cakes were really good. Oh, man, all that work and people thought they were Little Debbie cakes!)

You can't see these very well, but they are finger jello hearts:

(several layers--maybe that's why it's so hard to discern)

In Loving Memory

...Of my Uncle Normie who passed away last evening.


This is a picture of my uncles Norman (waving) and Furman watching over 'Furman's Hot Dog Stand' at one of our family reunions.


I think this picture was taken the last time I saw him:


A couple pictures of Uncle Normie as a little boy.






Uncle Normie was the one who took me fishing the first time I caught a fish. (He had to throw it back because it was too small--something I didn't understand for many years. When I asked why he threw my fish back, he said that it was too small. I remember thinking that maybe he thought it was too small, but I thought it was a nice fish. Didn't yet know there were rules for fishing.)

Good-bye, Uncle Normie, with love.

How Sweet It Is!

This evening I went to a really neat program, "How Sweet It is" at the Devereaux Library in Grayling. Chef Larry Meyer was demonstrating special chocolate desserts--just in time for Valentines Day. We had the opportunity to participate and sample!

How about this for an entree? It's fettucini especially for chocoholics. The fettucini is actually made of chocolate crepes cut in strips, arranged on a platter, drizzled first with chocolate, then with raspberry sauce. Instead of grated parmesan, he grated white chocolate over it. After this picture was taken, it was garnished with whipped topping.

Now that we've covered the main course, let's get on to the desserts :) Here the chef is preparing Black Forest Torte.

This chocolate mousse was so light and tasty.


Every well-balanced meal needs its fruit, so here we have strawberries dipped in chocolate.
Shirley and I helped with the dipping.



Everything was so good, but I think these chocolate ice box cookies were my favorite.

By the time we got to the chocolate mocha truffles, even this die-hard chocoholic was feeling like she'd reached her limit--but still, Yum!



The chef's son wants to follow in his father's footsteps and become a chef, too. Here he is assisting his dad.

Sweet Success!

Had a fun day in the kitchen. I made banana pineapple muffins, cookies, homemade pizza and homemade bread. They all turned out. Amazing the difference fresh yeast makes! I needed to bolster my confidence after that other bread I made recently. Thought I'd lost my touch. LOL

Now I need to work on my photography skills. This picture makes the bread look too dark. Sure tasted good!