Beachfront Bargain Hunt

I've never been much a TV watcher, but when the temperatures are in the single digits, it's dark at 5:30 p.m., and the streets in our neighborhood are a sheet of ice, it's all too tempting to just spend the evening in front of the fireplace with a warm Labrador retriever in my lap watching mindless TV shows on HGTV and DIY:

Sometimes we do more napping than TV watching:

Although my all-time favorite show is Addicted to Rehab--I love Nicole Curtis and her determination to rescue old houses and use every last board, window, and cabinet she can find on the property--I have to admit that I have a new cold-weather addiction:  Beachfront Bargain Hunt.

Each half-hour episode takes me away from the ice- and snow-encrusted northeast to a sunny beach with beautiful water views and endless expanses of sand.

Bliss.  

My apologies to those of you who love snowboarding and skiing, snow-covered mountains and evergreens draped in white.  There is no beauty in any of that for me.

So until I can get back to this--my own "beachfront bargain"....

I'll keep watching other people get excited about finding their own little piece of paradise at the beach.

How many days until spring and my buddy and I can get back to our favorite place?

Industrial Kitchen Island

After renovating his grandparents' house last year, my son Alex decided he was ready to take on even bigger reno project of his own--a late-19th-century row house in Baltimore's Locust Point neighborhood that he bought in September with his fiancee Ashleigh:

The house was outfitted with disgusting carpet and tacky mirrors and featured a chopped-up floor plan. But Alex had a vision, and the gutting began.

Doug had a vision too, and when Alex and Ash broached the subject of an industrial style kitchen island, he got to work.   

We started out by visiting Brandywine View Antiques in Chadds Ford, Penn. Doug quickly spotted what he wanted, a factory skid, and shop owner Lisa just as quickly stepped in with all kinds of ideas for constructing the island. Lisa is awesome--she's a creative business woman who knows how to sell her stuff without being pushy. We left with the skid, two wooden crates from a Delaware-based dairy, and some vintage tin roof tiles.

A visit to a local salvage yard turned up some old beadboard planks and a true 2x4 (Doug has informed me that 2x4s are no longer actually 2 by 4, so why they're called that is a mystery to me).  An online source yielded some great vintage wheels:

The piece de resistance was a piece of rock maple that Doug salvaged when the lab tops were being modernized in the department where he worked as a machinist at UD.

After much sanding and sawing, gluing and screwing, with a little help from me and some paint, Doug had a finished product, which we delivered to Alex and Ashleigh's not-quite-finished-kitchen this weekend:

The soda crates house spice and sauce bottles, while pull-down doors reveal bins for trash and recycling:

At Lisa's suggestion, we included a panel for a chalkboard at one end:

And a niche using the space not needed for the trashcans features hooks for utensils and is accented with two of the old roof tiles painted black:

As always with a DIY project, we had lots of fights--not with each other but with the elements--snow, ice, temperatures too low to paint, delayed delivery because of the floor refinishing project at their house etc.

But yesterday, the island was safely installed in their kitchen, outfitted with some of the utensils, sauces, and spices we bought at Target during a fun little shopping spree.

It was all worth it when Alex said it would be the best piece of furniture in their house.

Now we're just waiting for our first invitation to dinner in the new-old kitchen.

Laundry Room Envy

For years, I've had laundry room envy.

I covet things like this system from Pottery Barn:

And I'm really envious of Ashley's laundry-room makeover at Domestic Imperfection:

These scenes make it look like doing the laundry could actually be fun!  (Well, let's not get carried away--Ashley has two toddlers, and at this stage of my life I might envy her laundry room but not her laundry).

But when you do your laundry in the basement (cellar would probably be a more accurate term) of a 1930s bungalow, it's tough to orchestrate an attractive setup.

The floor is concrete, artfully decorated with colors dripped from the many paint jobs I've done down there using, appropriately enough, an old plastic laundry basket as a "table" for whatever door or trim strips or piece of furniture I was working on at the time. The walls are damp cinder block, and Rubbermaid shelves store everything from light bulbs and Goof-Off to Doug's extensive collection of cheesecake pans (I think he has 35 or 40, counting everything from individual size to the standard 10-inch).

Since I hated the basement so much, I let it get cluttered and I had dirty clothes strewn about on the floor.

But last week I decided I had had enough.  I couldn't have a pretty laundry room, but I could at least have one that was cleaned up and somewhat organized.

So I bought this gem on Amazon for about $65:

I was so excited about my purchase that I ripped open the box as soon as it arrived, dumped all of the parts on the living room floor, and then looked pleadingly at Doug to help me sort it out.  He had it together in less than 10 minutes, and I was off to do battle with the basement.

It's still not pretty, but I do have nice modern machines:

And now my laundry is neatly sorted into Doug's, mine, and household:

I should have mentioned that this lovely basement is also my gym when the weather is too awful to walk or run outside or to drive to the UD gym.  So my motivation to make the area neat jumped a few notches during last week's snowstorm.  If I have to ride the damn exercise bike, I don't want to do it in the middle of a mess.  So as a side project, I organized a little wire shelf with painting clothes, old towels, and rolled-up sets of shorts, socks, and T-shirts for my riding pleasure:

With a John Grisham novel and my reading glasses, I'm off on a 10-mile ride to nowhere, and my laundry is organized.

But I'm still jealous of Ashley and anyone who has the luxury of ordering that laundry set from Pottery Barn.

Christmas Cues from Critters

We had a wonderful Christmas.

I could post dozens of pictures of the gifts we gave and received and the food we cooked and ate.

We are blessed with great kids, each other, and a cozy home:

But like a lot of people my age, I do find myself thinking about how over the top Christmas can be, with young kids on overload, tight schedules, recipes that fail and food that has to be remade at the last minute.

And it occurred to me that we should take some cues from our pets about what's important at Christmas time.

1.  Boxes are free and make great gifts:

2.  Time with your "cousin" is the best present ever:

She's so awesome, you don't mind sharing your bones with her:

3. A nap under a small Christmas tree in a finished attic can be just the thing to relieve holiday stress:

4. That relative you really thought was awful isn't so bad when you relax with him in front of a fire on a rainy day:

So thank you to Doug, Alex and Ashleigh, Christine and Brian, Corey and Kristin, Jesse, and Martin and Jenn for all the great gifts, including new Fiestaware and accessories, heated gloves, a warm wool throw, a bird house (to help me think about Spring), a beautiful sweater and scarf, and gift cards for dinner, movies, and new running tights.

But the best part of Christmas for me was time with all of you.

On Christmas Eve:

Christmas morning:

Christmas afternoon and evening:

And Boxing Day (courtesy of our British friends):

And although this isn't a lesson from a pet, I have to add that sometimes the best gifts are the ones someone makes for you:

Happy New Year!

Cookie Weekend

Doug and I have been baking Christmas cookies together for seven years now, although both of us had been doing it for many years on our own before we got married and began sharing a kitchen.

Over the years, we've added a few new recipes, dropped a couple that we didn't like so much, and changed up how we decorate and package everything.

But there are some cookies that have become treasured traditions, like these chocolate drops that Doug's mother used to make.  They're a favorite of our friend Mike, who always gets a few extras in his cookie box.  Doug's mom used to drop them from a spoon and ice them with a butter knife.  Doug pipes the dough with a pastry bag and uses pastry bags to ice them as well, so they've gotten fancier, but they're still a happy memory for him:

My sugar cookie cutouts are a favorite from the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook, which I got as a wedding shower gift in the 1970s.  I have to say that they never looked quite this good when I made them by myself (see the blue and yellow stars--those are my handiwork; the rest are courtesy of Doug and the pastry bag):

Two of our favorite recipes came from Emeril, whose TV show was one of the first ones we watched together when we first started spending time together almost 10 years ago.  

The first one, the Guinness gingerbread, is amazing.  The recipe calls for 8 ounces of Guinness.  Hmm, that doesn't work so well, since it comes in 12-ounce bottles.  BUT, if you triple the recipe, you can use two whole bottles.  You also need nine eggs and two entire bottles of molasses. 

It makes a lot of gingerbread--two large pans, or 18 smaller loaves, which is what we did this year to make it easier for gifting. Our small pans are assorted sizes, hence the inconsistent look here:

We also got our almond roca cookie recipe from Emeril's show--it was the winner in a contest he held one year for holiday cookies.  These cookies are actually almost like candy, with all of the sugar and heath bits in them (we decided that there's just enough flour in the recipe to glue all the sugar together):

Peanut better cookies are always a hit, and the recipe we use comes from the same book as the sugar cookies.  I discovered several years ago that my vintage child's potato masher is the best tool ever for making the criss-cross pattern on top:

We had a great jam turnover recipe that we somehow lost, but in one of our junking trips, we stumbled on this cookbook, which is where the original came from:

We got a real bonus with this book--all kinds of free advice...with 1950s-style graphics.  All of the tips must be urgently important because they're punctuated with exclamation points.

One of the best tips is "Get Your Ingredients Together!" 

Well, we obviously didn't read this ahead of time, or Doug wouldn't have been running back to the store for butterscotch chips for the Special K bars, which his friend Jeb loves, and for the slivered almonds that the rocas get rolled in. Oh yeah, and how can you make Christmas cookies without red and green sanding sugar?  Another trip to the store....

But even with the extra shopping runs, we still forgot jam for the turnovers.  Not to worry--we found a jar of our friend Beth's homemade raspberry preserves on our kitchen shelf, and the jam turnovers were the best ever.

We have a lot of fancy but important cookie-making tools in our kitchen--a large Kitchen-Aid stand mixer, a Cuisinart food processor, assorted silicone spatulas, pastry tips, Sil-pat cookie sheet liners...

But sometimes the old-fashioned stuff is equally important--like this huge dough bowl that we use for the gingerbread.  A dear friend who is now gone gave it to me after she saw my yellow ware bowl collection, and I will always treasure it:

We also have a low-tech floor cleaner:

 My final task last night was to bag the toffee that Doug makes:

Over the weekend, we went through 8 pounds of butter, several dozen eggs, many pounds of sugar and flour, four batches of icing, and several bags of chips and nuts.  Not to mention the two bottles each of Guinness and molasses.

Everything was beautifully decorated, thanks to Doug.

And the kitchen was perfectly clean when we went to bed.  That's the part where my skills come into play.

Family and Friends

Last week, a childhood friend of mine posted a very discouraged status on Facebook, talking about the bitter fights between divorced people over the holidays. I felt bad for her because Doug and I are very blessed at the way things have turned out for our respective families.

As we have for the past several years, we celebrated Thanksgiving Day at the home of his older stepson, Corey, who is married with two small children.  Doug's ex-wife, who is the mother of his two adult stepsons, is usually there, along with her mother, as well as assorted members of Corey's wife's family.  (I apologize for the lack of pictures from this celebration--Doug was too busy frying turkeys to remember his camera.)

Then, some time over the long weekend, we cook at our house and have Thanksgiving number two.  It started out simply enough--when I got divorced, I let my kids, then in their teens, spend Thanksgiving with their dad because he had an extended family and I didn't.  We would then have them over a day or two later so they could celebrate with us and have some of the traditional foods I have always made.

The funny thing is that this event has grown every year--and it now includes my ex-husband and his second wife, along with some very good friends and Alex's fiancee's parents, Monica and Earl, who will someday be family in reality but already are in spirit.

This year, we seated 14 people in our tiny kitchen, which included a second table, normally stored under the guest bed.  Doug suggested putting a second small table in the living room, but I told him there was no way we were going to split up this happy group:

Ashleigh and Doug decided it was easier just to stand up:

My stepson Jesse and his girlfriend brought the total to 16, but since they arrived late, they sat in seats vacated by others who went out to stand by our outdoor fire:

After dinner, we all gathered for a group photo.  Doug put the camera on a timer so he could be in the picture:

In addition to 16 people, we had two yellow Labs, two terriers, an orange tabby cat, and a partridge in a pear tree.

Just kidding about the partridge, but we did have an amazing group of people whose lives have intersected in some improbable but wonderful ways.  Explaining the relationships to Jesse's girlfriend Katie was interesting.

Like the fact that Martin and Doug, who refer to each other as "brothers from different mothers," are the best of buddies but know each other only because Jenn and I have been best friends since the 1970s--when we met through our ex-husbands....

I call Jesse my stepson, but he's really my stepson once removed because he's actually Doug's stepson from a previous marriage. It really doesn't matter because he's a terrific young man whom I'm very happy to have in my life.

So, to everyone who bemoans the breakup of the nuclear family in America, take a closer look.  I'm not recommending divorce--I'm just saying that we should be happy for all of the people who end up being "family."

Like my son, Alex, and his "cousin" Steve, who isn't really his cousin at all but is my friend Jenn's son.  The two boys were born 11 months apart and grew up playing Ninja Turtles and Ghost Busters together.  Now, Steve's married, and Alex is engaged.

Funny thing--Lauren and Ashleigh kind of look like sisters.  In spirit, I think they are.

So, this year, I am thankful for a husband who is a great cook and brings everyone together for awesome food.  And I'm thankful for all of our family members--biological and adopted.

Best-Laid Plans

This past weekend, we had plans to go to Baltimore for a party celebrating the 60th birthday of Earl, my son's future father-in-law.  Since we didn't want to drive down and back in the dark, we decided to get a hotel room through Hotwire.  We found a good deal at a pet-friendly Westin near the airport, so we booked it, planning to bring Jodie along.  We figured Pax would be OK home alone for 24 hours (although he probably wouldn't be happy about it):

We planned to go down in the afternoon, see the progress on Alex and Ashleigh's house, walk around Ft. McHenry with Christine, and go to a cool salvage store called Housewerks.

Well, we all know what happens to the best-laid plans.  Life gets in the way.

The previous weekend, Jodie ate something nasty on the beach before we could get to her and take whatever dead thing it was away from her.

Four days later, when I went to get her out of her crate first thing in the morning, I was greeted with a mess in her crate.  Whatever she ate gave her a nasty case of uncontrollable diarrhea.  We put her on a limited diet for a couple of days, hoping that by Saturday, she'd be OK.

She wasn't.  And we had no one we could leave her with--all of the potential pet sitters were in Baltimore for the party. So on Saturday morning, we sent our regrets and headed for the vet's office.

Jodie is now completely recovered, so this isn't a post about a really sick dog.  It's also not a post about us feeling sorry for ourselves because we missed a fun party, lost money on a prepaid hotel room, and spent more than $200 at the vet because our dopey Lab ate something she shouldn't have eaten:

It's really just about making the best of an all-around bad deal.

Because in the end, Doug and I had a good weekend.

It was bitter cold here this past weekend, so we lit our gas logs early and kept the fireplace going all day.

I made tomato pepper-jack tomato soup with grilled cheese sandwich croutons.

I baked cookies:

We watched the Ravens beat the Jets and saw our UD alum Joe Flacco throw a great touchdown pass.

I finished sewing a quilt for Brian, Christine's boyfriend:

And I painted the inside of our kitchen hutch with two colors of leftover Annie Sloan Chalk Paint mixed together.  We also changed out the ordinary metal knobs for glass ones from Home Depot:

We also just enjoyed being together all weekend in our cozy little cottage.

Life can be good even when our best-laid plans fall apart.