After I shared the easy spiffed up Jiffy cornbread recipe, you were probably expecting some real cooking coming from my kitchen. Well, that hasn't happened yet.  I'm still in quick and simple mode. Too many other fun things to do. We had family here for several days for the long Presidents Day weekend. Little Sister (who is now 13) sang a solo at our church while they were here visiting. They headed home on Tuesday. And came right back on Thursday to see Itzhak Perlman in concert. He was as good as when we saw him perform 20 years ago. A true master of his instrument. A legend. I'm so ..read more

  Goodness! How did two months pass without me posting here? Time seems to go by faster as I get older. And we've been crazy busy. But I do have a new recipe I want to tuck into my "online recipe box"—that would be the recipe index here on the blog.  Since my last post we have celebrated Christmas, New Year's and three birthdays. Had family in residence for most of those big days. Who has time to write with toddlers in the house? I spent a long weekend at a knitting retreat. And I had a mother/daughter weekend away for an early milestone birthday. More doing. Less writing. Yeste ..read more

Busy days around here. We made an early Christmas visit to see the smallest ones  and to attend their school  Christmas program. Little Brother calls these his "ho ho toes" pajamas.  Excellent description. See what you learn when you help fold laundry? I delivered a couple of new caps for the littles. We took apart a nativity nesting doll set  and then looked at the tiniest Jesus that was in the center. It was a good chance to talk about the Christmas story. ~~~~~~~~~~~ Tbe older set will be here this week for Christmas. So many things to be squeezed into our tim ..read more

My hat loving youngest grandchild.  Our house was full to the brim last week. Five grandchildren, ranging from 22 months to 23 years old. Daughters. Son-in-laws. It was loud, messy, chaotic and wonderful. The youngest set was here for over a week. The others were in and out for several days. And to top it off, the day after Thanksgiving, we had 15 men on our roof replacing the shingles. It sounded like Santa and his eight tiny reindeers plus his reindeer B-team. For almost all of my long life, Thanksgiving was a big extended family affair. I remember years when there were 40 ..read more

This is as far as I've gotten with my Thanksgiving prep. We will have a full house next week—a toddler, a preschooler, a 4th grader, a teenager, the recent college graduate and the parents of these children. I should have menus planned for the entire week by now. But I don't. There's still tomorrow. But I decided today that on Wednesday night we should have a snacky kind of supper. The little kids eat really early. The rest of us eat later. And I'm not even sure who will be on hand that night. Appetizer foods should give us a lot of flexibility. And hopefully keep the kitchen relatively fre ..read more

Sock Pumpkins I got home last weekend after staying with the middle grandchildren while the parents traveled. At ages 9 and 13, they are easy to care for. The hardest part is all of the chauffeuring that age requires. I had forgotten at that stage of mothering how much of the day is spent in the car. But on the weekend we stayed put. Before I left home I saw a craft I wanted to try with the girls, The first morning while they were at school I made a trip to buy supplies—one pack of kids socks, some cinnamon sticks, heavy duty thread and long tapestry needles. I brought a small bag of ..read more

Finished with love. ❤️ This little heart marks where Bev's knitting ended and the new knitting started.  We will mark each project like this, to honor the work she did. I am moving in slow motion this morning after an intense—but totally wonderful—weekend. Two knitting friends drove up from Atlanta to help make and carry out a plan to deal with all the yarn left when our dear friend Bev passed away a couple of years ago. We had all met at a knitting retreat years ago and attended other retreats together. Knitting retreats are meant for learning new skills and making new friends ..read more

Pumpkin Baked Brie En Croûte The older I get, the faster my days are flying by! I have so many things I want to do—and I do a lot of them—and there isn't time to ever get to the end of my list. I was happy that I got back here before I hit the one month mark since my last post.  In the last month, we have had houseguests and spent some time at the beach with family. One houseguest brought me a car load of yarn. His wife was a dear friend whom I met at my first knitting retreat years ago. We attended several retreats together over the years. Now I have become the "executor" of ..read more

Tuscan Garlic Chicken  I've been sitting on this recipe longer than I intended. I had the photos all ready to post. Then life happened. All good things...but busy things. I've made this twice in the last few weeks. Once for family. And a week or so later, I wanted to take a meal to a household that I knew was gluten-free. Often when I take a meal to people it involves pasta or bread or breadcrumbs or cream soups. But this new recipe was perfect. And perfectly delicious. It's a pleasant change of flavors from my usual dishes. If you are an Instagram user, you can find the origin ..read more

Salmon with Lemon Dill Sauce Still catching up here. This recipe goes back to early summer when Jessica and her littles arrived, minus their dad who was traveling. We were looking for easy meals and this one checked all the boxes. Quick. Easy. Delicious. And it was flavors that Jessica would never do at home. We have to be real and acknowledge food dislikes when cooking for a family. Lucky for her, in our house we LIKE lemon and dill! I'm including the baking directions for the salmon, but this is really all about the sauce. You can prepare the salmon filets by your favorite method ..read more