While continuing my New Year’s quest to ‘Feng Shui’ our house by getting rid of clutter, I finally worked my way upstairs to the master bedroom closet. Since I’ve always followed ‘Mother’s Closet Rule’ which decrees that when you buy a new item of clothing you must give away something to good-will; the closet wasn’t as cluttered as say, the old boxes of Christmas ornaments in the basement. Still, it was rather messy, and a few dozen new items had managed to find their way in, without my taking time to discard any old ones.
I started with the pajama section of the closet, and it wasn’t pretty. The first item to go was a pair of pink silk pajama bottoms with a large hole in them. I hadn’t worn them for months and had tried in vain to repair the hole. Though it was terribly difficult to let go of them, I held my breath and tossed. ‘Holey’ pink pajama bottoms were followed by two fuzzy-ball cotton sweaters with no elbows, and a pair of red silk capris whose fabric had grown embarrassingly thin in critical places. The reason I hesitated before tossing my beloved pajamas was simple. It had become truly challenging to replace them. Maybe you’ve noticed this too?
I like to sleep in long-sleeve cotton t-shirts and silk pajama bottoms because silk is slick and doesn’t get wrapped in the sheets, and the cotton shirts are warm and soft. For a long time, I purchased new pajama bottoms from Gap Body®, or from a now-defunct gift shop on the Oregon Coast. Since my sources have dried up, I’ve spent hours searching the internet, reading the small-print on worn pajama labels, in hopes of locating a new pajama-bottom supplier. Now, having bravely tossed my old pajamas – like it or not – it was time to buy new ones.
Since my time was limited that day, I decided to replace my old pajamas by shopping local in the somewhat limited selection of stores in our small city. I remembered a sign I’d passed dozens of times for a ‘pajama outlet’ a few miles from our house. I decided to give it a shot. After following the arrows into the industrial area of town, I finally located a shop with a small, hand-lettered red sign in the window that said Lazy One®. I stepped inside the surprisingly crowded shop, and began to peruse the racks.
The store sold pajamas for men, women and children. The pajama bottoms and tops were nicely made, of cotton knit, and when I held them up, they were well-cut and long enough for my longer-than-average legs. There was just one problem: they weren’t silk. Actually, there was another problem too: they were emblazoned with large colorful animals which was not my usual taste in nightwear.
Because I was somewhat desperate, I selected a pair of hot pink pajama bottoms with black-and-white zzz-ebras on them. Cute – if I were four years old, but I’m not. Still, they were soft, nicely cut, and when I tried them on, they fit perfectly. I continued scanning the racks and discovered a yellow pair with pink, purple and coral starfish printed on them. I put them in my shopping basket, and then for good measure I selected one last pair of soft, baby-blue pajama bottoms, emblazoned with somewhat tasteful white butterflies.
That night, as I dressed for bed, I slipped into the hot-pink zebra bottoms and a new white cotton t-shirt. Though the jammies weren’t silk, and they glowed in the dark, I was amazed at how comfortable they were. Sometimes, it’s surprising what we can discover in an unnoticed shop in our own neighborhood. In fact, the pajamas felt so wonderful, I decided to make chocolate treats and have a pajama party in them. See the recipe below, for decadent party treats:
Chocolate Peanut Bars
1/2 cup light corn syrup
1/4 cup brown sugar
Dash of Salt
1 cup peanut butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 cups crisp rice cereal
1 cup (half a pack) of chocolate chips
1) Combine syrup, sugar, and salt in sauce pan; bring to a full boil.
2) Stir in peanut butter. Remove from heat.
3) Stir in vanilla, cereal, and chocolate chips.
4) Press into a 9x9x2 inch pan. (I usually double the recipe and use a 9 x 13” pan).
Chill and cut into 1” squares. Yummy!
As I sat in my favorite television-watching chair and popped in a favorite ‘chick flick’ I realized that cleaning out closets can have unexpected benefits. In addition to improving the ‘Feng-Shui’ in my bedroom, I was enjoying new pajamas and decadent chocolate too!
Mom-Mom
Friday, February 17, 2012
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Messy Bookshelves
When my husband asked me what I wanted for Valentine’s Day this year, I told him, “I want a new bookshelf.”
Shaking his head he said, “That will just give you more room for new books.”
“Actually, it will give me a place to put the books that are stacked under my bed and in the closet.”
Unfortunately, on the day we drove to Costco to buy them, the tall stack of bookshelves-in-boxes had completely disappeared. So instead, he gave me – romantically enough – the $$$ I would have spent on new bookshelves as a present instead. That means, I’m shopping for new shelves, and I haven’t yet found a set that were as nice, or fit the room as well, as the set I had originally planned to buy. It also means my present bookshelves are getting messier and messier.
A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog about my New Year’s resolution to ‘organize’ my life; one drawer, closet, and filing cabinet at a time. While I have made some progress, the process has been slower than I imagined it would be, so clutter and disorganization are still running rampant behind closed doors and drawers in our house.
This morning I woke early, and began running lists through my head like buzzing bees. The sound of the bees was soothing, so I fell back to sleep for a while, then woke with a headache from the tension of thinking about the mountains of things on my list. Fortunately, I had no early appointments, so I lay in bed for a while to see if the buzzing bees would come back. What came to me instead was an idea that was almost as comforting as the buzzing bees: Japanese concept of ‘wabi-sabi’. Wabi-sabi means embracing and appreciating the beauty and imperfection of life, instead of trying to neatly contain it. As a reforming crazed perfectionist, I am still struggling to accept that messiness and imperfection can be beautiful. But just then, I happened to glance at the bookshelves in my bedroom.
In the early morning light, I saw the informal arrangement of books and photographs on my crowded shelves through fresh eyes. My books aren’t arranged by color. They aren’t in alphabetical order. I tend to group multiple books by the same author together, and I have informal sections of books on the same topic: yoga, feng-shui, decorating, or memoir. And occasionally, I have tossed a book or seven horizontally across the tops of the vertically-stacked volumes – because I’m running out of space.
This morning, for the first time, I finally understood what wabi-sabi really means. My bookshelf, though informally arranged, possessed a quiet and unexpected beauty. It was, in fact, a collection of the books I love most in the world, stacked next to each other, interspersed with other favorite treasures: family photographs in silver frames, hand-written notes from a daughter, and a heart-shaped box holding silver earrings that were a Christmas gift from my sister. Though my arrangement was informal, messy and crowded, it possessed a strange and beautiful spirit that no neatly-organized shelf could possibly compete with. So, although I will continue with my great ‘organization’ project, I have decided that I’ll continue it with less rigor. Instead, I’ll remember that I don’t need to rush or force the process. My home will never look like Martha’s – simply because I’m not Martha, or anyone else. I am myself. I like an occasional dust bunny and I leave my silver candlesticks unpolished because they look better that way to me.
After my wabi-sabi moment, I took an informal tour of the rest of the house and noticed an unexpectedly lovely arrangement of rainbow stacked plates in the dining room. I stopped to admire a pile of my son’s well-lived-in shoes in the mud room. And I saw the beauty of our life together as a messy, imperfect family living in an elegantly disarranged house that will never (thank goodness) be perfect. And though I am still continuing my search for new bookshelves, for now, I’m okay with having books stacked in odd places – on tables, inside drawers, and under the bed. For now, they are a part of who and what we are as a family and it helps me remember that while life may be messy, it is also strangely beautiful – and often it is the very flaws and imperfections that make us wabi-sabi – stunning in our imperfect humanity – messy bookshelves and all.
Mom-Mom
Shaking his head he said, “That will just give you more room for new books.”
“Actually, it will give me a place to put the books that are stacked under my bed and in the closet.”
Unfortunately, on the day we drove to Costco to buy them, the tall stack of bookshelves-in-boxes had completely disappeared. So instead, he gave me – romantically enough – the $$$ I would have spent on new bookshelves as a present instead. That means, I’m shopping for new shelves, and I haven’t yet found a set that were as nice, or fit the room as well, as the set I had originally planned to buy. It also means my present bookshelves are getting messier and messier.
A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog about my New Year’s resolution to ‘organize’ my life; one drawer, closet, and filing cabinet at a time. While I have made some progress, the process has been slower than I imagined it would be, so clutter and disorganization are still running rampant behind closed doors and drawers in our house.
This morning I woke early, and began running lists through my head like buzzing bees. The sound of the bees was soothing, so I fell back to sleep for a while, then woke with a headache from the tension of thinking about the mountains of things on my list. Fortunately, I had no early appointments, so I lay in bed for a while to see if the buzzing bees would come back. What came to me instead was an idea that was almost as comforting as the buzzing bees: Japanese concept of ‘wabi-sabi’. Wabi-sabi means embracing and appreciating the beauty and imperfection of life, instead of trying to neatly contain it. As a reforming crazed perfectionist, I am still struggling to accept that messiness and imperfection can be beautiful. But just then, I happened to glance at the bookshelves in my bedroom.
In the early morning light, I saw the informal arrangement of books and photographs on my crowded shelves through fresh eyes. My books aren’t arranged by color. They aren’t in alphabetical order. I tend to group multiple books by the same author together, and I have informal sections of books on the same topic: yoga, feng-shui, decorating, or memoir. And occasionally, I have tossed a book or seven horizontally across the tops of the vertically-stacked volumes – because I’m running out of space.
This morning, for the first time, I finally understood what wabi-sabi really means. My bookshelf, though informally arranged, possessed a quiet and unexpected beauty. It was, in fact, a collection of the books I love most in the world, stacked next to each other, interspersed with other favorite treasures: family photographs in silver frames, hand-written notes from a daughter, and a heart-shaped box holding silver earrings that were a Christmas gift from my sister. Though my arrangement was informal, messy and crowded, it possessed a strange and beautiful spirit that no neatly-organized shelf could possibly compete with. So, although I will continue with my great ‘organization’ project, I have decided that I’ll continue it with less rigor. Instead, I’ll remember that I don’t need to rush or force the process. My home will never look like Martha’s – simply because I’m not Martha, or anyone else. I am myself. I like an occasional dust bunny and I leave my silver candlesticks unpolished because they look better that way to me.
After my wabi-sabi moment, I took an informal tour of the rest of the house and noticed an unexpectedly lovely arrangement of rainbow stacked plates in the dining room. I stopped to admire a pile of my son’s well-lived-in shoes in the mud room. And I saw the beauty of our life together as a messy, imperfect family living in an elegantly disarranged house that will never (thank goodness) be perfect. And though I am still continuing my search for new bookshelves, for now, I’m okay with having books stacked in odd places – on tables, inside drawers, and under the bed. For now, they are a part of who and what we are as a family and it helps me remember that while life may be messy, it is also strangely beautiful – and often it is the very flaws and imperfections that make us wabi-sabi – stunning in our imperfect humanity – messy bookshelves and all.
Mom-Mom
Monday, February 13, 2012
Pink Valentine Cookies
Today is the day before Valentine’s Day; a holiday my husband likes to call a ‘chick holiday’. But I love Valentine’s Day because it falls in the dead of winter, just about the time everyone is cranky from being indoors for too long. It doesn’t require expensive presents. It is just a fun celebration of love. And unlike the credo of the ‘chick flicks’ that depict glassy-eyed, sad singles who hate the holiday because they aren’t in a serious relationship, I believe that Valentine’s Day is about fun, it’s about silliness, and it’s about not taking life too seriously. It’s one of those days when you can make someone happy with a bouquet of pink balloons, or a bag of ‘Be Mine’ valentine hearts. You can make memorable valentines with red paper, lace doilies, and a glue stick. You can even make valentines out of flour, butter and sugar. The recipe below is from my son Matt’s recipe files. They are without doubt, the best sugar cookies I’ve ever tasted. What makes them great is butter – the ingredient that makes all cookies and frostings great. They are an amazing and decadent treat for Valentine’s Day. Make them for the people you love:
Matt’s Amazing Sugar Cookies
6 cups flour
¾ teaspoon salt
4 sticks (2 cups) salted butter, softened
2 ½ cups sugar
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
3 large eggs
4 tablespoons milk
1) Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2) In a medium bowl, whisk together the flower and salt. Set aside.
3) In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar with an electric mixer on medium speed. Add the eggs, milk, and vanilla extract, beat until well mixed.
4) Add flour mixture to the creamed sugar mixture. Beat on low speed just until combined.
5) Divide dough in half and form into two balls. Flatten the balls into a disc shape and wrap
lightly with plastic wrap.
6) Refrigerate for one hour.
7) On a floured surface, roll out dough to a ½ inch thickness.
8) With cookie cutters, cut dough into hearts of desired size and shape and place on ungreased
cookie sheets.
9) Bake for 12 minutes. Do not brown. Immediately transfer to a cooling surface.
10) If decorating with the icing below, wait until the cookies are completely cooled.
Makes about 60.
Buttercream Frosting
½ cup butter (1 stick) softened
3 cups powdered sugar
3 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 drops red food coloring
Combine ingredients in a medium bowl. Mix with an electric beater until well blended. Use to
frost valentine sugar cookies above.
And remember, as Matt says, “The key to this is the butter, don’t skimp; lots of butter in the cookies, and lots in the frosting.” Enjoy!
Mom-Mom
Matt’s Amazing Sugar Cookies
6 cups flour
¾ teaspoon salt
4 sticks (2 cups) salted butter, softened
2 ½ cups sugar
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
3 large eggs
4 tablespoons milk
1) Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2) In a medium bowl, whisk together the flower and salt. Set aside.
3) In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar with an electric mixer on medium speed. Add the eggs, milk, and vanilla extract, beat until well mixed.
4) Add flour mixture to the creamed sugar mixture. Beat on low speed just until combined.
5) Divide dough in half and form into two balls. Flatten the balls into a disc shape and wrap
lightly with plastic wrap.
6) Refrigerate for one hour.
7) On a floured surface, roll out dough to a ½ inch thickness.
8) With cookie cutters, cut dough into hearts of desired size and shape and place on ungreased
cookie sheets.
9) Bake for 12 minutes. Do not brown. Immediately transfer to a cooling surface.
10) If decorating with the icing below, wait until the cookies are completely cooled.
Makes about 60.
Buttercream Frosting
½ cup butter (1 stick) softened
3 cups powdered sugar
3 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 drops red food coloring
Combine ingredients in a medium bowl. Mix with an electric beater until well blended. Use to
frost valentine sugar cookies above.
And remember, as Matt says, “The key to this is the butter, don’t skimp; lots of butter in the cookies, and lots in the frosting.” Enjoy!
Mom-Mom
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Chocolate
During the past few long winter months, my husband and I have invented what we call Saturday ‘Drive-Abouts’. The rules are simple. We wake on Saturday, dress for adventure, and bring walking shoes, warm jackets, gloves, and a small supply of snacks. We usually stop for breakfast somewhere, and then choose a direction and drive the back-roads. Last Saturday, our drive wound north through Montpelier, Idaho. Along the way, we spotted a large bald eagle whose massive white head gleamed in the snowy winter sunlight. We also spotted a colt, the color of toffee – beautiful, leggy, and very new – born well out of season. Our car thermometer read 16 degrees as the colt nursed beside his mother, visibly shaking. The sight of the new colt warmed us for the rest of the morning, and as we circled south on our drive, we stopped in Ogden, Utah, at a small shop on Historic 25th Street – the old railroad town center – to browse. The shop, called The Queen Bee, sold books, chocolate, home accessories, and other small delights. After browsing the bookshelves, I stood in front of the chocolate section. Being a fan of dark chocolate, I picked up several bars and began reading the ingredient lists on the back of the packages.
“Can I tell you a little bit about our chocolate?” asked a young woman with shoulder-length blonde hair.
I nodded, "Of course."
“Most of it is European,” she said. “We carry Milka® of course – that’s always a favorite." I was already very familiar with the brand of melt-in-your-mouth milk chocolate mixed with hazelnuts, raisins, or filled with flavored nougat. Then, she held up a bar wrapped in gold foil. “This is our highest-end chocolate,” she said. “The company that makes it requires that we sell it for no less than ten dollars for the 3.5 oz. bar. There are other companies that sell it for up to twenty dollars a bar."
“Twenty dollars a bar?” I said to myself. “It must be very good chocolate.”
She continued our tour, holding up various chocolate bars, citing cacao percentages, 70%, even 80%. “The quality and origin of the cacao bean makes a real difference in thechocolate,” the young woman continued. “A few days after I started working here, I had to taste each brand of chocolate we sell. It was amazing,” she said. “Oh, and this is one of my favorites.” She held up a bar of Hatchez® chocolate, a 77% cacao bar, lightly flavored with oil- of-orange. “When you bite into this, there is an over-flavor of orange peel, with the under-flavor of deep chocolate. It’s one of my favorites.” She picked up another bar, “But this one is our best-seller from Hatchez®, it’s mango-chili. It has the tang of mango, followed by the hot flavor.
“I’ll take a bar of bitter-sweet orange,” I said.
What I learned, as I carefully ate and savored every morsel of Hatchez® bitter-orange chocolate over the next few days, caused me to toss out my stash of Hershey’s® kisses. This chocolate, made in Germany, by a chocolatier who has been in business since 1890, was best savored one infinitesimal bite at a time. At first, the taste was exquisitely bitter, then the orange flavor kicked in, followed by a silky-semi-sweet after-taste. It was like wearing a 100% two-ply cashmere sweater, after wearing sturdy, serviceable cotton for my entire life. I had entered a whole new realm of chocolate connoisseurship; one I plan to continue exploring.
Later that evening, after having expanded my world-view of chocolate, I wandered into our kitchen. Company was coming, and I needed to whip up a quick dessert. Chocolate, of course. I chose my quick classic: Brownies. The recipe follows below, and makes a 9” x 13” pan. If company isn’t coming, you can halve the recipe to make an 8” round or square pan.
Chocolate Brownies
2 cups sugar
2 squares butter (1 cup)
¾ good quality cocoa
(Note: you can increase the cocoa up to 1 ¼ c. depending on how intense you want the chocolate
flavor to be).
4 eggs
1 ½ c. all-purpose flour
1 to 1 ½ cups chopped walnuts
Note: The recipe is correct; you do not add salt, unless you use unsalted butter, then, add ¼ t.
salt. There is no baking powder or baking soda either; the eggs provide the leaven.
1) Place butter, sugar, and cocoa-powder in a 2 quart saucepan. Over medium heat, warm until
the butter melts and mixes smoothly into the cocoa and sugar. Stir constantly. Remove from
heat as soon as the butter is completely melted. Cool for five minutes, or until the mixture is
warm, not uncomfortably hot, to the touch.
2) Whisk the eggs into the mixture in the saucepan, by hand. Add only one egg at a time, and
stir until it is completely blended, then add the next egg, etc., until all four eggs are blended into
the mixture.
3) Stir the flour into the chocolate mixture by hand, until all flour disappears and the mixture is
well blended.
4) Stir the chopped walnuts into the mixture by hand.
5) Pour into a well-greased and floured 9” x 13” pan (I prefer glass, but metal pans work well
too).
6) Bake on the middle shelf of a 350-degree oven for approximately 25 minutes. Mixture will
be firm to touch when baked, but still slightly soft inside – for best chocolaty flavor.
7) Good without frosting. I sometimes add a light dusting of powdered sugar. Or, if I’m feeling
very decadent, I frost with a can of Duncan Hines® or Betty Crocker® classic chocolate (not the
yucky fluffy) frosting, after the brownies are cool.
There, for my fellow choc-a-holics, to help survive the sometimes long months of winter – two kinds of chocolate: brownies and gourmet chocolate bars. I’ve decided that life is short, so I might as well enjoy really good chocolate. In fact, next time I visit my favorite chocolate shop – I might spring for the ten dollar bar, just to see what the ‘best chocolate in the world’ tastes like. And I highly recommend Saturday Drive-Abouts as well.
Mom-Mom
“Can I tell you a little bit about our chocolate?” asked a young woman with shoulder-length blonde hair.
I nodded, "Of course."
“Most of it is European,” she said. “We carry Milka® of course – that’s always a favorite." I was already very familiar with the brand of melt-in-your-mouth milk chocolate mixed with hazelnuts, raisins, or filled with flavored nougat. Then, she held up a bar wrapped in gold foil. “This is our highest-end chocolate,” she said. “The company that makes it requires that we sell it for no less than ten dollars for the 3.5 oz. bar. There are other companies that sell it for up to twenty dollars a bar."
“Twenty dollars a bar?” I said to myself. “It must be very good chocolate.”
She continued our tour, holding up various chocolate bars, citing cacao percentages, 70%, even 80%. “The quality and origin of the cacao bean makes a real difference in thechocolate,” the young woman continued. “A few days after I started working here, I had to taste each brand of chocolate we sell. It was amazing,” she said. “Oh, and this is one of my favorites.” She held up a bar of Hatchez® chocolate, a 77% cacao bar, lightly flavored with oil- of-orange. “When you bite into this, there is an over-flavor of orange peel, with the under-flavor of deep chocolate. It’s one of my favorites.” She picked up another bar, “But this one is our best-seller from Hatchez®, it’s mango-chili. It has the tang of mango, followed by the hot flavor.
“I’ll take a bar of bitter-sweet orange,” I said.
What I learned, as I carefully ate and savored every morsel of Hatchez® bitter-orange chocolate over the next few days, caused me to toss out my stash of Hershey’s® kisses. This chocolate, made in Germany, by a chocolatier who has been in business since 1890, was best savored one infinitesimal bite at a time. At first, the taste was exquisitely bitter, then the orange flavor kicked in, followed by a silky-semi-sweet after-taste. It was like wearing a 100% two-ply cashmere sweater, after wearing sturdy, serviceable cotton for my entire life. I had entered a whole new realm of chocolate connoisseurship; one I plan to continue exploring.
Later that evening, after having expanded my world-view of chocolate, I wandered into our kitchen. Company was coming, and I needed to whip up a quick dessert. Chocolate, of course. I chose my quick classic: Brownies. The recipe follows below, and makes a 9” x 13” pan. If company isn’t coming, you can halve the recipe to make an 8” round or square pan.
Chocolate Brownies
2 cups sugar
2 squares butter (1 cup)
¾ good quality cocoa
(Note: you can increase the cocoa up to 1 ¼ c. depending on how intense you want the chocolate
flavor to be).
4 eggs
1 ½ c. all-purpose flour
1 to 1 ½ cups chopped walnuts
Note: The recipe is correct; you do not add salt, unless you use unsalted butter, then, add ¼ t.
salt. There is no baking powder or baking soda either; the eggs provide the leaven.
1) Place butter, sugar, and cocoa-powder in a 2 quart saucepan. Over medium heat, warm until
the butter melts and mixes smoothly into the cocoa and sugar. Stir constantly. Remove from
heat as soon as the butter is completely melted. Cool for five minutes, or until the mixture is
warm, not uncomfortably hot, to the touch.
2) Whisk the eggs into the mixture in the saucepan, by hand. Add only one egg at a time, and
stir until it is completely blended, then add the next egg, etc., until all four eggs are blended into
the mixture.
3) Stir the flour into the chocolate mixture by hand, until all flour disappears and the mixture is
well blended.
4) Stir the chopped walnuts into the mixture by hand.
5) Pour into a well-greased and floured 9” x 13” pan (I prefer glass, but metal pans work well
too).
6) Bake on the middle shelf of a 350-degree oven for approximately 25 minutes. Mixture will
be firm to touch when baked, but still slightly soft inside – for best chocolaty flavor.
7) Good without frosting. I sometimes add a light dusting of powdered sugar. Or, if I’m feeling
very decadent, I frost with a can of Duncan Hines® or Betty Crocker® classic chocolate (not the
yucky fluffy) frosting, after the brownies are cool.
There, for my fellow choc-a-holics, to help survive the sometimes long months of winter – two kinds of chocolate: brownies and gourmet chocolate bars. I’ve decided that life is short, so I might as well enjoy really good chocolate. In fact, next time I visit my favorite chocolate shop – I might spring for the ten dollar bar, just to see what the ‘best chocolate in the world’ tastes like. And I highly recommend Saturday Drive-Abouts as well.
Mom-Mom
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Cleaning Cupboards
It’s February, and this month, I’ve decided to enhance my life by doing some creative organizing. This is not my usual way, but I’ve been inspired by one of Martha Stewart Living’s beautiful new publications I found on the newsstand last Saturday entitled, "Organizing: Simple Strategies to Cut the Clutter" (2012). As is Martha’s usual way, the magazine is filled with gorgeous photographs of entryways, kitchens, bedrooms, baths, offices and utilities rooms, all efficiently organized, like the inside of Martha’s brain. Don’t get me wrong, I am what you would call gently-organized. Everything in our house has a place. It just doesn’t always stay there. And the loosely-organized vignettes in my own kitchens, baths, and offices are sometimes festooned with dust and the occasional cobweb, so I decided to go for it.
My first project was reorganizing the cupboards that store my dishes and glasses. I was motivated to start with this project because we had gifted ourselves at Christmas with some new French glasses – in three sizes – to replace some that had been badly discolored by dishwasher chemicals, and I needed to find a place to put them. To begin, I removed all items from four separate cupboards and tossed everything that was ugly, didn’t have a lid, or that I didn’t use any more. This reduced my stash by about 50%. I followed two guidelines as I returned glasses, storage dishes, bowls and dishes to the empty shelves. First, no storage dish was allowed without a lid on it. And second, I thought carefully about how I used each item, and I put things back in easily accessible and logically-grouped places.
Though my newly organized cupboards aren’t quite as striking as some of Martha’s gorgeous vignettes, they have completely changed the way I feel when I’m in my kitchen. For a few hours effort – and no major purchases – I can now open my cupboard doors to see rows of sparkling glasses, neatly-lidded storage dishes, and easily accessible plates, saucers, and bowls. Since I collect vintage dishes, it took a while to find a place and space for everything – but the effort was well worth it, and the tossing of my unnecessary and ‘not favorite’ objects was liberating.
With the excess gone, the beauty of the objects I have collected for use in our kitchen was more evident. I remembered how much I loved the ‘starfish’ mugs my sister gifted me with. The stack of white Williams Sonoma® plates that we use for family dinners glowed on their own spacious new shelf, and my grandmother’s crystal glasses sparkled because they now had breathing space around them.
My reorganization created another positive result I hadn’t planned on. My husband, inspired by my own wild tossing and reorganizing spree, took on a project of his own after I reorganized the kitchen cupboards, and spent the following Saturday defrosting the freezer, cleaning out the refrigerator – and creating ‘bread’, ‘vegetable’, ‘fruit’ and ‘meat’ shelves in each of them.
So, like a mid-winter snowball, gathering size and speed as it rolls downhill, I’ve decided to move through the closets and spaces in our house – slowly, one cupboard, one closet at a time, and discard everything I don’t love or regularly use. Then, I’ll return the remaining objects to their spaces with an eye to the esthetic. My small cleaning spree has reminded me that household objects and clothes and lotions and bottles possess a utilitarian beauty and can be artfully arranged if I take my time and enjoy the process. Arranging books and family photographs on shelves can be a living art form. Who knows, perhaps I’ll even be inspired by Martha’s characteristic glass canisters, wire baskets, and labeled magazine holders – and spring for a new set of bowls, or kitchen dishtowels. This winter, I am finding that the ancient art of ‘spring-cleaning’ can be deeply satisfying. Now I’m off to my bedroom closet, to discard some tired sweaters and shoes. Who knows? Perhaps I’ll make room for some new ones.
Mom-Mom
My first project was reorganizing the cupboards that store my dishes and glasses. I was motivated to start with this project because we had gifted ourselves at Christmas with some new French glasses – in three sizes – to replace some that had been badly discolored by dishwasher chemicals, and I needed to find a place to put them. To begin, I removed all items from four separate cupboards and tossed everything that was ugly, didn’t have a lid, or that I didn’t use any more. This reduced my stash by about 50%. I followed two guidelines as I returned glasses, storage dishes, bowls and dishes to the empty shelves. First, no storage dish was allowed without a lid on it. And second, I thought carefully about how I used each item, and I put things back in easily accessible and logically-grouped places.
Though my newly organized cupboards aren’t quite as striking as some of Martha’s gorgeous vignettes, they have completely changed the way I feel when I’m in my kitchen. For a few hours effort – and no major purchases – I can now open my cupboard doors to see rows of sparkling glasses, neatly-lidded storage dishes, and easily accessible plates, saucers, and bowls. Since I collect vintage dishes, it took a while to find a place and space for everything – but the effort was well worth it, and the tossing of my unnecessary and ‘not favorite’ objects was liberating.
With the excess gone, the beauty of the objects I have collected for use in our kitchen was more evident. I remembered how much I loved the ‘starfish’ mugs my sister gifted me with. The stack of white Williams Sonoma® plates that we use for family dinners glowed on their own spacious new shelf, and my grandmother’s crystal glasses sparkled because they now had breathing space around them.
My reorganization created another positive result I hadn’t planned on. My husband, inspired by my own wild tossing and reorganizing spree, took on a project of his own after I reorganized the kitchen cupboards, and spent the following Saturday defrosting the freezer, cleaning out the refrigerator – and creating ‘bread’, ‘vegetable’, ‘fruit’ and ‘meat’ shelves in each of them.
So, like a mid-winter snowball, gathering size and speed as it rolls downhill, I’ve decided to move through the closets and spaces in our house – slowly, one cupboard, one closet at a time, and discard everything I don’t love or regularly use. Then, I’ll return the remaining objects to their spaces with an eye to the esthetic. My small cleaning spree has reminded me that household objects and clothes and lotions and bottles possess a utilitarian beauty and can be artfully arranged if I take my time and enjoy the process. Arranging books and family photographs on shelves can be a living art form. Who knows, perhaps I’ll even be inspired by Martha’s characteristic glass canisters, wire baskets, and labeled magazine holders – and spring for a new set of bowls, or kitchen dishtowels. This winter, I am finding that the ancient art of ‘spring-cleaning’ can be deeply satisfying. Now I’m off to my bedroom closet, to discard some tired sweaters and shoes. Who knows? Perhaps I’ll make room for some new ones.
Mom-Mom
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Cookies for Breakfast
Although I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit it, I woke up this morning craving hot chocolate chip cookies. As a mother and mom-mom, I should know better than to eat cookies for breakfast. But, I have a rule about junk food: if you’re going to eat it, it’s better indulge at breakfast, so you have the rest of the day to wear it off. Luckily, I had some frozen cookie balls in the freezer, so all I had to do was microwave them for about 20 seconds, load the cookie sheets and wait about twelve minutes. Mmmmmm.
In case you’re interested in trying the cookie-breakfast thing yourself, the recipe follows:
Vanilla and Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Cookies
3 3/4 cups all-purpose flour (4 cups at high altitudes)
2 ½ cups old fashioned oatmeal
1 ½ teaspoon soda
¾ teaspoon salt
1 ½ c. butter, softened (3 squares)
1 c. sugar
2 c. brown sugar, packed
3 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 large eggs
3 cups chocolate chips
1 ½ c. chopped walnuts
¾ c. cocoa powder
1 – 2 tablespoons water
1) Cream butter and sugars. Add eggs and mix until light and fluffy.
2) Add soda, salt, vanilla, and oatmeal and mix until well blended.
3) Add flour and mix well.
4) Add chocolate chips and walnuts.
5) Divide dough into two equal portions.
For Vanilla Chocolate Chip Cookies:
Use dough without cocoa. Spoon ‘tablespoon size’ portions of dough onto a greased cookie
sheet, or flour hands and roll into 1” balls. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 – 14 minutes (depending
on doneness preference).
For Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Cookies:
To one of the equal half-portions of dough add: ¾ c. cocoa powder. Dough will be stiff. Add 1-2 tablespoons of water as needed to blend the dough. Roll into balls; flatten with hands or the
bottom of a floured cup. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 – 14 minutes.
Note: If you like the chocolate-chocolate chip cookies best, double the amount of cocoa and add
to the entire amount of dough.
Note #2: This makes a large batch. I usually bake these two dozen at a time, and roll excess
dough into balls and freeze on cookie sheets. After dough is frozen, place in a large Ziploc®
bags (in a single layer, flat) and store in the freezer. I thaw the ‘cookie balls’ before cooking for
about 20 seconds in the microwave, flatten, and cook at 350 degrees.
Mmmm. As I write this, I’m enjoying a warm chocolate-chocolate chip cookie. What a great way to start the day! This is one way I like to ‘treat’ myself and I think that it’s important that we nurture ourselves with small treats on a daily basis. Some of my favorites are:
A mug of chocolate-mint cocoa
Cold Diet Coke® on ice with a fresh wedge of lime or lemon
Orange-ginger lotion
Lemon or cinnamon-scented candles
A hot soak in the tub with bath salts
Fresh white towels warm from the dryer
Crisp Braeburn apples dipped in a smidgen of caramel sauce
A new book
A fresh journal – I’ve become partial to Moleskine® brand
Brightly colored pens – turquoise, hot pink, hot green
Lunch out with our daughter and grand-daughters
A long walk
You get the idea. Now create a list of your own, and enjoy one of the things on the list today – just for yourself. And if you like chocolate-chip cookies, try eating them for breakfast sometime. It makes the whole rest of your day go better – and remember -- they DO have oatmeal and walnuts in them, so they’re almost a health food.
Mom-Mom
In case you’re interested in trying the cookie-breakfast thing yourself, the recipe follows:
Vanilla and Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Cookies
3 3/4 cups all-purpose flour (4 cups at high altitudes)
2 ½ cups old fashioned oatmeal
1 ½ teaspoon soda
¾ teaspoon salt
1 ½ c. butter, softened (3 squares)
1 c. sugar
2 c. brown sugar, packed
3 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 large eggs
3 cups chocolate chips
1 ½ c. chopped walnuts
¾ c. cocoa powder
1 – 2 tablespoons water
1) Cream butter and sugars. Add eggs and mix until light and fluffy.
2) Add soda, salt, vanilla, and oatmeal and mix until well blended.
3) Add flour and mix well.
4) Add chocolate chips and walnuts.
5) Divide dough into two equal portions.
For Vanilla Chocolate Chip Cookies:
Use dough without cocoa. Spoon ‘tablespoon size’ portions of dough onto a greased cookie
sheet, or flour hands and roll into 1” balls. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 – 14 minutes (depending
on doneness preference).
For Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Cookies:
To one of the equal half-portions of dough add: ¾ c. cocoa powder. Dough will be stiff. Add 1-2 tablespoons of water as needed to blend the dough. Roll into balls; flatten with hands or the
bottom of a floured cup. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 – 14 minutes.
Note: If you like the chocolate-chocolate chip cookies best, double the amount of cocoa and add
to the entire amount of dough.
Note #2: This makes a large batch. I usually bake these two dozen at a time, and roll excess
dough into balls and freeze on cookie sheets. After dough is frozen, place in a large Ziploc®
bags (in a single layer, flat) and store in the freezer. I thaw the ‘cookie balls’ before cooking for
about 20 seconds in the microwave, flatten, and cook at 350 degrees.
Mmmm. As I write this, I’m enjoying a warm chocolate-chocolate chip cookie. What a great way to start the day! This is one way I like to ‘treat’ myself and I think that it’s important that we nurture ourselves with small treats on a daily basis. Some of my favorites are:
A mug of chocolate-mint cocoa
Cold Diet Coke® on ice with a fresh wedge of lime or lemon
Orange-ginger lotion
Lemon or cinnamon-scented candles
A hot soak in the tub with bath salts
Fresh white towels warm from the dryer
Crisp Braeburn apples dipped in a smidgen of caramel sauce
A new book
A fresh journal – I’ve become partial to Moleskine® brand
Brightly colored pens – turquoise, hot pink, hot green
Lunch out with our daughter and grand-daughters
A long walk
You get the idea. Now create a list of your own, and enjoy one of the things on the list today – just for yourself. And if you like chocolate-chip cookies, try eating them for breakfast sometime. It makes the whole rest of your day go better – and remember -- they DO have oatmeal and walnuts in them, so they’re almost a health food.
Mom-Mom
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Small Pleasures
This morning, I was looking out my kitchen window, stirring a cup of hot chocolate when I saw Stewart and Maisie walking down the middle of the street, headed for their horse pasture, to water the horses. Stewart is our neighbor, and Maisie is his chocolate lab. And I thought for a moment, seeing Stewart’s familiar forward-learning, fast-walking profile, about how much pleasure I derive from watching Stew and Maisie pass my windows four times a day, on their way to and from their morning and evening watering of the horses. Today Stewart is wearing a brown canvas knee-length jacket – a cowboy coat, and knee-high muck boots. In summer, he rides a bicycle and white shorts, but from season to season, Maisie is there, romping along beside him. I like that I can count on this small vignette each day. I like it very much. It lends a certain comfort to my days to know that some small rituals are repeated again and again in a dependable fashion. Like the sunrise and sunset. Watching Orion cross the winter sky at night. And an occasional morning cup of hot chocolate in winter, that warms me like chocolate soup.
From the kitchen, I can see small finger-smudges on the top of our mirrored table in the living room. This reminded me of other small things that provide joy and comfort in my life. Things like the tiny clues I find in the house after our granddaughters have visited. Rory likes to re-arrange the small resin pigs on a shelf in the den. She also likes to upend a small, silver candle that sits in a shallow crystal bowl in my bedroom, and hide the red flashlight I keep on my nightstand. Her sister, Sam, likes to open the bottom of a pink piggy bank, spill the coins out on the floor, and then carefully replace quarters, pennies, nickels, one-by-one in the narrow slot in the piggy’s back. She also like to stack four brightly colored plastic chairs like Legos® and try to climb on them. After their visits, I smile as I walk around, straightening the pigs, replacing the black circle in the bottom of the pig, and turning the silver candle upright. I like the small signs of their curiosity, the over-turned chairs, and the piles of pennies on the floor. It’s hard not to smile as I gather them one-by-one and listen to them drop inside the bank with a satisfying thunk.
Then, as I finish sipping my hot chocolate, rainbows appear on the walls of the kitchen. We live in a house that was built in 1910 and completely gutted and refurbished in 2000. One of the pieces of the original house that remains is the small panel of prism-glass above our living room and kitchen windows. At a certain time of morning that varies by season, dancing rainbows appear on the walls of the kitchen and living room. They are larger and wider in winter, more elusive in summer. When these appear, I feel a little like Pollyanna – who also loved dancing rainbows on the walls of her house. These small bits of color that regularly appear on the walls of our home are like tangible splashes of happiness that appear and disappear within a few minutes time each morning. Red-yellow-blue-green light like small, irregular pieces of broken glass, gleaming from the plain white walls of the room. It makes me feel like dancing myself – in red shoes – which is really the very best color for dancing shoes.
I rinse my cocoa cup and place it in the dishwasher. I toss a handful of sesame seeds from the top of my buttered bagel outside for the birds to enjoy. And I climb the stairs ready to begin the day. Small graces to our lives. Today – as a gift to yourself, put your feet up for a moment, heat a cup of cocoa, and look out the window, for the wonders that you might see outside – wonders like Stewart and Maisie, or perhaps a stray, surprise rainbow or two.
Mom-Mom
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)