kt40

Recipes stuffed in the cupboard drawers and inbetween cookbooks

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I have this quirk. I go to the library and xerox recipes or cut them out of my magazines. I say quirk because I have so many of them and I have actually made about two in the last two years. A librarian once said to me "Oh you must have the best meals at your house" I just sort-of meekly smiled in return while pushing the copy button on the xerox machine. One day I sat down and categorized and glued the recipes to nice card-stock, it took up a full weekend, Jason wander by and nodded a couple of times, his "Katy and another full-steam-ahead project" nod. I know it well. Well this week I finally pulled out the recipes and started making them, one of my early New Year Resolutions. Below in the following post is a photo of one of the recipes I made and the names of the others I took on this last week. Small reviews and the links to the recipes. In case you are wondering, Jason hasn't wander by yet.

Recipes on cardstock

Originally uploaded by kt40

These are Pumpkin and Cream Cheese Muffins. I really liked this recipe. Make sure you read through the directions first, they are a bit hard to follow especially if you have family members wandering in and out of the room "What are you doing?"

"Did I just add one or two cups of flour....and why am I using the 1/4 cup measurer... I knew it would throw off my count....ugh!!.....Please leave the kitchen!"

"Alright jeez.." whispering, just loud enough for me to hear, to the next kid "Don't go in there, mom is grouchy"

The recipe ended up making 15, regular sized, muffins for me and I had a lot of the cream cheese filling left over.

Shrimp coconut soup, wonderful and super easy recipe. I couldn't locate any Thai green curry paste, Jason suggested adding some red pepper flakes instead he was right, fantastic little soup.

Barbecue Apricot Chicken, I think the next time I make this I won't add so much apricot jam it was a little too sweet for me. Easy recipe if you need to make something that doesn't take a lot of work.

Hellman's Parmesan Crusted Chicken, EASY, Easy, Easy, and the kids loved it. You could always put this some good bread and add mayo(this is not an ad for Hellman's by the way it was just in a magazine I was reading) tomatoes, red onions, avocados and baby lettuce. It would be a nice simple chicken sandwich.

Spike

Originally uploaded by kt40

We are a family that lives in the city but really should live in the country. We have three guinea pigs now and one dog. If I could, I would throw in a couple of donkeys, some chickens and probably adopt another dog. Spike is Iris's guinea pig he has been living in her hands since Christmas morning and leaves them only when Jason and I insist that he needs to eat and drink.

Our X-mas table

Originally uploaded by kt40

Jasmine wanted to help set the table for Christmas dinner this year. She also put together the cheese and cracker platter. These might sound like little things but not to me, to me it means she is getting older and that she wants to help, that means a great deal to me. Can you see my proud face.

Candle holder from Liz

Originally uploaded by kt40

When I walk around our house I notice the presents we have received from friends and family. They are used and are meaningful to us. This little sweet candle holder is on our Christmas table every year it is from my friend Liz. Once in a while I am going to post something that has been given to us and makes our house a home, I think this will be fun way to share pieces of our home and give credit to those who help make it a home.

Our nativity set-up

Originally uploaded by kt40

A Christmas experience that stays with me happened here overseas. When we lived in the Azores we were invited to two different families houses to see their Nativity set-ups. They take this very seriously there. They actually clear out a room and fill it with dirt, moss, branches and rocks that they have collected from the mountains. Then they place small houses and churches that are replicas of their village on this land they have created. It is incredibly beautiful. They have chairs in the corner so you can sit and look at it as long as you want and neighbors do stop by just to do that. I was baptized catholic but I don't practice catholicism. This doesn't stop me from loving the beauty of a nativity set-up. I actually feel thankful that I don't have one religion that I practice, because for me personally, it allows me to see some of the beauty in all of them and incorporate what I want from them in my own life. I was privileged to be a part of a family's Hanukkah one year, that is something I will never forget. So this set-up of ours has pieces made in Portugal and I have brought some things made here(Italy). As our life continues to grow I will add what I will..... like this year the cactus with angels in it.

Jasmine asked "Do other people have something like this in their nativity scene?"

"I don't know but we do"

Happy Holidays! I won't be blogging for a while, last minute shopping to do and just plain hanging out with my family during this vacation.

A close up of manger

Originally uploaded by kt40

We hot glued roses to the manger's roof and found a silver shooting star to place on top.

Mushy Love letter

I have been looking over some of my posts and quite a few of them struck me as mushy love letters, to my husband, my kids and my life. I'm not regretful of this fact, quite the opposite really. I didn't realize I had all these mushy love letters in me until I started writing for this blog of mine. I have never been one to write. My writing career, if you want to call it that, ended in JR High. My papers were always marked with red pen.... Run-on sentences!...Fragment!...Fragment!...Run-on sentences!... Fragment!!!!, you get the picture(the exclamation points were added to try to recreate a self-conscience teenager's reaction). I just couldn't figure writing out. Even as I write these post now, I end them thinking "There have got to be some fragments in here somewhere". The difference is that now this is not going to stop me from writing. I'm not perfect, my life is not always perfect and my family is certainly not perfect and I couldn't be more in love with all of it as it is. Jason has said on more than one occasion "I think we took the "Fun" out of dysfunctional today." My life runs smoother when the fun is intact and that is how I prefer it but for those times when it sucks, take yesterday for instance, when I was driving my kids home from swimming lessons. They were engaged in fight number 567,894,001.... and I really lost my cool. They settled down for five minutes then started fight number 567,894,002. That is when I felt like putting my head on the steering wheel making the horn blare out and causing the car to run off the road into a nearby fruit-stand, but instead I took a deep breath and chanted and counted down to myself "14 more blocks"....."13 more blocks" and it sucked but I made it through. So here I am, today, writing what I consider to be another mushy love letter.

Pinwheels and windowsills

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There are many times when I will see something that makes me tilt my head to one side and grin my crooked grin and I think I'm saying "ohh... would you look at that" to myself in my head. This was one of those moments but this time I had spoken my thoughts out-loud to my daughter. The weather is cold now and the flowers are on their way out but this person wasn't going to let that stop them from having their window boxes make a statement. Giving a little winter cheer to those who happened to pass by it, like us, the forty year old and her eight year old daughter out on one of their "Lets go exploring" walks. These always end-up inside, somewhere warm, with me, the forty year old drinking a cappuccino while watching the eight year old I adore, eat a cone filled with gelato.

Captured this morning

Originally uploaded by kt40

These three following photos are for my friend Mary who asked for more decoration photos. I have the chandeliers all gussied-up. The windows have garlands from my favorite odds and ends store here, only 99 cents each, a steal really. The light comes in through the window in the morning and has them shining. It feels very festive in here,  even a bowl of cereal seems extra special when you eat it surrounded by bright balls of color.

Morning light

Originally uploaded by kt40

I have mixed my ornaments with my dried roses in the dining room window. I inherited them from my step-grandmother she loved decorating her home for Christmas and she boy was she good at it. They have managed to survive four moves now, on a boat over the Atlantic Ocean and a boat across the Mediterranean sea and in some bumpy trucks around Europe. I love their bright colors and I love that they are something that I have that was hers. My kids always say to me, each Christmas, when I open up the box they are in "Are those your special ornaments from Gigi June?"

"Yes.......yes they are." I respond in a bittersweet tone.

Window wreath

Originally uploaded by kt40
The little straw angel is from some German friends of my parents, the glass beaded wreath from my sister Tracy and the colored glass ornaments are from Gigi June's collection.

Buone feste!

Originally uploaded by kt40

I'm in the mood, the decorations are up. I have this sad little Christmas jingle stuck in my head:"Christmas is coming the goose is getting fat, won't you please put a penny in the old man's hat? If you haven't got a penny a hay-penny will do. If you haven't got a hay-penny god bless you." Happens to me every Christmas. I can remember when I was younger..... okay wait....... I confess that I actually still do it....I end up always singing the last line very slowly and less cheerfully because it always seems so sad to me "Haven't got a hay-penny" now that is sad especially in today's world, isn't it? Yes I know hay-pennies don't exist anymore but just the thought, the embarrassing random thought I had while driving around a roundabout looking at Christmas decorations out my window, probably wearing a half sincere, sad expression but it is not going to get me down,  matter-of-fact it makes me happy in a twisted sort-of way  I guess.....it is sort-of my Christmas theme music if you will. Yes,  I love the drama, the stories and songs of giving,  happy endings and even the tragedies that all go along with all the great Christmas stories and songs. Every year I get wrapped up into them all over again as if it was the first time I was hearing or seeing them. I watched the 'Tin soldier' one of my favorite Christmas stories with my kids the other day, the ending had been changed to a happy one where the bad jack in the box gets thrown into the fire instead of the tin soldier, so I told them the original ending where the soldier actually gets tossed in the fire then the wind knocks the ballerina in after him and the maid finds a blacken tin heart in the hearth the next day, now I know it is tragic but if you read the original version the writing is beautiful, 1) because it is flawless and 2) it is about love enduring...... that is what Christmas means to me.... I just realized that as I wrote this out today...funny....hum....

On her own

Originally uploaded by kt40
First off for those of you who sometimes check out this blog you know that I am not into putting photos of my kids on see this post for my reasons on this matter, with that said I thought this one was okay because it is Iris's back.
This is Iris waiting for her brother and sister to return home from school.
She has her own room now, it has been two whole days now and she is not scared but she can get lonely.... this is what she tells me every couple of hours since the big change.

Yellow and pink that is what I want

Originally uploaded by kt40

Iris went to the linen closet and this is what she came back with these are her colors that she choose for her room and she wanted us to squeeze her bed back into this nook so it is cozy.
Only "Happy" gets to sit on the bed the other stuff animals are in an old doll bed. We are still working on Jasmine's room. She is a collector and her knick knacks are in big piles on the floor and deciding what to do with them all... well you can imagine being eleven and every single one is too special to even think of parting with (my idea that was strongly rejected). So where will the colored sand bottles go? Next to the mirrored owl or the glass peacock wait what about the little wire chair..... ahhh.....decisions.... decisions...........

You need to look up

Originally uploaded by kt40
Iris asked me to come lay down and look up "You are going to love it!" Yes I do I do.

The little things

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Well there is only two weeks until x-mas and I am in the middle of changing the bedrooms, subconsciously I must be procrastinating, big time. I told myself it was an early X-mas gift to myself each kid in their own room no more "The brush is touching my side!!!" fights to listen to. Jason and I have moved down to the basement where it is actually cozy, romantic and quiet...... ahhhh Peace and Quiet...... I love those words. I have managed to organize some baskets that always drove me crazy. They have my sewing stuff in them and I could never remember what was in which basket and would pull one down only to discover it was the wrong basket(welcome to my world). I finally put labels on them, that only took two years to get to ........Ughh! The best news is that I have an art space in Iris's room. Her room is huge and she loves the idea of me sort-of sharing it with her she wasn't quite ready to go out on her own.

Yes, my desk space sees daylight

Here is my sewing space

Project pick me up

Originally uploaded by kt40

I have been thinking about this project for one year now. My children and I have collected shells, beach glass and rocks from the Azores, Antibes, France and the beaches of Tuscany. I have had them in jars and bowls thinking that one day I wanted to hot glue them onto string and hang them in our bathroom. Well this weekend I gathered them up and and cleared the table and got down to work. It was so relaxing and fulfilling. I have three more photos of them below.

Window with shells

Originally uploaded by kt40
I am so happy I finally made these.

Here is a closer look at the shells

Originally uploaded by kt40

The window is facing north so there isn't much light but that is why I am so happy that these shells are now hanging in the room because they capture what little light there is.

Here is the last photo of the shells

Originally uploaded by kt40

I made this curtain to go with the shells the color is the same shade as some of the blue beach glass.

Nasturtium foliage with water

Originally uploaded by kt40

This might just be my favorite plant. It is so tough and determined to grow. The less you pay attention to it the better it does. It will trail and spread, give you bright orange, red and yellow flowers again and again sometimes in softer hues just when you needed softness. It's leaves seem so paper thin and tender but they still manage to hold water which makes you cheer for them. Valiant soldiers, they use their green foliage as shields in the garden to protect your plants from aphids. Their flowers brighten up my salads in the summer and add a radish taste for those willing to try. There are some in my garden still managing to bloom with the cold cold weather that has descended upon us. Two small bright orange flowers had rambled their way up our gate. I touched them as I wandered through the gate..... how fortunate.... how lucky....I find myself sometimes.

I've been tagged

Originally uploaded by kt40

My blog friend Melynn has tagged me ( a blog game where someone asks you to answer some questions and then you ask another person to answer questions on their blog) The question was "What are seven random facts about you?" Here are the seven random facts about me, that you might not know.

I. When I was in fourth grade I would walk to school and everyday on my route there was a big gravel parking lot for the university. It had pieces of wood to mark where the cars should park. Whenever I reached this spot I would pretend to be a wild buffalo and run across the lot jumping over each piece of wood pretending that they were about ten feet high. One day I heard a university student say to another student "Look at that crazy kid!" and I thought "Don't they know what a wild buffalo looks like?!"

2. My first car was a 1967 (made the year I was born) American Motors olive green, Rambler. Oh I loved that car!

3. I am a constant daydreamer, yesterday I was driving Iris home from school and was daydreaming and ended up stopping at a green light but was quickly snapped out of my daydream by all the frustrated, honking cars behind me.

4. My site is called kt40 because kt is short for my name Katy and I started my blog in August as a forty year old and quite honestly I didn't realize it would be permanent, no do-overs on your blog name, but that is okay it has grown on me.

5. I have had at least ten jobs with my sister Madeline. How many jobs have I had? Honestly I couldn't tell you. I remember trying to get my first serious job and getting help with my resume from my stepfather, Mark, and he said all of the following very gently and kindly "Oh I wouldn't list every job", my resume was about five pages. "Just list the ones that are relevant." "But I have all this experience." I responded in my twenty-two year old voice. "Yes but they probably don't want to see that you only stayed at those jobs for a couple of months they want to know that you will hang around longer." It was a good lesson. I'm not saying that it sunk in but it was good advice.

6. The first time I saw my husband was in elementary school. My school went to his school to watch a play. He was one of the stars of the play and I remember sitting in the audience thinking "Oh I wish I knew him" and couldn't stop thinking about him that day not in a boyfriend/girlfriend way, I just was pulled towards him didn't really even understand it myself. Didn't realize that it was him to many many years later.

7. I am learning to read Tarot cards. I brought a beautiful deck this summer when visiting with my family in Oregon. Thanks for helping me find them Mom.

I am tagging Sperlygirl

Inspire Me Thursday "Paradox"

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In case you are like me, (I had to look up paradox in the dictionary) here is the definition: A seemingly contradictory statement that may nonetheless be true."

Measuring love

When my husband, Jason, tells me that he loves me I sometimes respond "How much?" knowing that he will say "Oh about a truck full of oranges worth" it never fails to make me laugh. I can't measure love.... don't really know how to wrap my head around it sometimes, simply because it is so powerful. How much did I love seeing my daughter Jasmine at the top of the stairs with her eleven year old hair in curlers, looking at herself in the mirror? How much do I love that my thirteen year old son will search for me in the house before he leaves for school for a hug from me? How much do I love my youngest daughter for pulling out all the vases and filling them with found flowers when it is her turn to set the table? I know there are times when I can say "Oh I love this more than that" but there are also many times where I can't measure love.