As seen by Kristine

Today's guest photojournalist is my niece, Kristine. (Kristine KELLET, to be exact) She will be four this summer. My brother Chris and his family stopped overnight on their way to Milwaukee last weekend. While they were here, Kristine took lots of photos with my digital camera.

This is what the world looks like to a four-year-old. We gave our boys disposable cameras one vacation long ago. We got back pictures of the inside of the minnow bucket! Also lots of pictures of frogs and the knees of adults.









I gave Kristine a pink feather boa. She thought it would look nice on my head, and then wanted to take a picture. This is how we got started. Quite a "look" isn't it?











She took many pictures of the family photos on our walls. This is our wedding photo. She took pictures of Nate and Nick's school photos. She didn't want to take pictures of the actual guys, because she said, "Your brothers are too big and scary".








Kristine's mom, Nicole, and I enjoying the evening on the deck.













Kristine is a Daddy's girl and loves to take pictures of him.












Lucy had quite a photo session, including some "arty" shots of unidentified furry bits.













It was Friday, so we had pizza.













I really like this one, it would look good in a frame.













Seriously, I've seen worse art at galleries. At least you know what this is! We saw piece of art once that had actual live worms in it. It spun. Being science majors, Paul and I of course did not "get" the significance of the piece, but he didn't make it to please us.







I took this picture of Kristine's big brother, Sawyer, because he is such a cutie. He is also really smart (and my Godson!).


Our guests brought us a smoked whitefish from Morey's. It was delicious with crackers and it was so big I made a pate' type deal with it. Also yummy!


Try giving your kids a camera, it is fun to see the world through their eyes.









Smoked Fish Pate'

1/2 pound smoked fish, such as whitefish, trout, mackerel or cod (carp? eelpout?)
1/4 cup butter, room temperature
6-8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
juice of 1/2 a lemon
3 tablespoons (or more) fresh chives, finely chopped
Freshly ground black pepper to taste (1/2 tsp?) Don't skimp.

Remove any bones or skin from the fish and flake it with a fork. Beat the butter and cream cheese together in a mixer and then mix in the rest of the ingredients. Eat this with crackers or thin slices of toasted bread. Probably it wouldn't be horrible in an omelet, either. Just don't try to keep it too long. Eat it up!

Roadtrip!

Paul and I took a roadtrip to Milwaukee on Sunday. WE LEFT THE BOYS HOME ALONE! Everything was just fine, despite my worrying.

We went to Milwaukee for my Aunt and Uncle's fiftieth wedding anniversary. Think of that! (They don't even look 50 years old, how can they have been married 50 years?) This was a celebration of pure joy and thanksgiving for all their blessings. This is a picture of my cousin Tracy and me. Tracy is Darlene and Richard's second oldest. See the family resemblance?

My brother Erik and his wife came to the party. If you recall, Erik is recently home from Iraq. I love this picture. You can see how much Renee loves him. I am looking forward to their 50th anniversary. Maybe Erik will wear that grass skirt again.

I was glad to find out that the 50% divorce rate is an invalid statistic. It has been repeated so often that we thought it was true. I can't wait until I can go to a golden anniversary of a wedding that I actually attended.


Here Richard and Darlene cut their cake. This part of the celebration was held at their son Mike and his wife Brenda's
house. Brenda deserves to go to bed for a week after all her hostessing duties. Every member of the extended family worked their hardest to make this weekend a success. It was all well organized and fun. They should write a book!

One nice thing was to have all the family photo albums out to look through. You know you are with family when you find pictures of yourself in their albums! I always feel so loved here.

Another nice thing was that they wanted to share their good fortune by having guests bring items for the parish food pantry. Darlene said, "We have everything we need and more, let's help someone else."




My cousin Tana is on the left, my sister-in-law Nicole is on the right. All three of my brothers were able to make the trip so our family was well represented. We were sorry that our mother (Richard's sister) was not able to come due to her healing hip.









This is my brother Chris and our Grandmother Louise. Louise, Aunt Necie and Uncle Don came from North Dakota for the occasion. It was great to see them all looking so well. People came from at least 4 states for this weekend. It is important to celebrate the good things, don't you think?














As the night wore on, some of the guys played "Texas Hold 'em". My brother Gene, (on the right) was the big winner. That is Paul in the (new, periwinkle) shirt. Paul has been a member of our family for over 20 years. He knows most of the family legends. I heard him telling Erik and Gene (who were too young to have been there) about the time Tracy hid in our car when we left to go home to Minnesota after a visit. We tried that every time our families got together. This time (we were about 10) the grown-ups forgot to check for a stowaway. We got scared and confessed before we drove too far!

This is "Hermit Crab Land" at the mall by our hotel. Paul needed a new shirt, he had gotten jelly (a lot of jelly) on the only shirt he had brought with. The clerk said, "You can dress them up, but you can't take them anywhere, can you?" The hermit crabs reminded me of the time my family went for a Milwaukee visit and brought all the cousins hermit crabs. Unfortunately, the crabs did not survive the trip, as they were in the unheated trunk of the car. Not such a nice gift.



When I was a kid we went to Milwaukee to visit these cousins every other Easter. (They came to us the other years). I always looked forward to spending time with them because I learned a lot from them, especially how not to be such a big GEEK! This was especially important during the crucial Junior high years. I took notes! I tried to dress and be athletic like Tracy, and studied the music choices and friendships of all the cousins. Then, back at my own school, I would practice being non-geeky. It helped, and they are still worth emulating today.

My mom would always make these sandwiches for a roadtrip. We loved to crank the food grinder and grind up the ingredients. Sometimes she would add stuff from the refrigerator so it wouldn't go to waste. I swear one time she added green beans! Paul says where he comes from, this is called "funeral spread".

Spam sandwich spread

1 can of Spam
1 small onion (or half a medium one)
1 hard boiled egg (no shell)
Pickles to taste
(optional ingredients include olives, cheese, and any leftovers you want to get rid of.)
1/3 - 1/2 cup miracle whip, depending on the optionals and how squishy you like your sandwiches

Put all ingredients except miracle whip through a food grinder or in a food processor, until it is chopped up into pretty small pieces, add the miracle whip to make a spreading consistancy and make sandwiches. We always used white bread.

Bloom where you are planted, dang it!

It is planting season at my house. I started some plants in the basement bathroom under the grow lights. It must be done in the bathroom because Merlin thinks the grow light set-up is either a well lit litter box or a little kitty tanning bed. Either way, it is bad for the plants. So, I keep the door to the bathroom closed and check for sprouts every day. This year I grew a nice crop of mold! GRR, that's also bad for the plants. They are outside now, Nick had a sleepover and we didn't want the guys to have to crawl over the grow lights all night. Speaking of growing, those skinny kids can sure eat! Five friends plus Nick and Nate ate a whole cake and a half gallon of ice cream. In the morning they ate 3 pounds of bacon, a box of pancake mix, 2 quarts of juice and half a gallon of milk! I'm pretty glad we stopped at two boys, how do big families do it?
Last weekend I went plant shopping! It was freezing Saturday morning, but I was at my friend Deb's house at 7:30 sharp! (That is Deb in the blue.) We started at the Anoka area gardener's sale which is held in the St. Stephens parking lot. This is a great sale, it is all plants dug out of local gardens, so you know they should be able to survive the winter here. I bought a water lily for my (upcoming) water garden, and some nice shade perennials for the woods. Deb has a graduation party coming up so she was looking for plants to dress up her (already fabulous) yard. After that sale we went to the 4H sale at the fairgrounds, the Lord of Life sale (beautiful plants, great prices) and Gorden's Greenhouse. This is a nice greenhouse with very good prices. Even so, I spent too much, I am so weak! We are going to be playing "what's in my freezer" for dinner until payday.
Remember Bear? The dog who came for dinner? I was telling Deb and her neighbor, April, about how we took a stray dog to the Humane Society and still worried about him, and they asked, (in one voice) "Was his name Bear?" He is April's neighbor! He lives with a very nice family and is something of an escape artist. This photo is Bear's back yard. He is in his doghouse (behind the slide). The doghouse is in a chain link kennel. This is all in a fenced back yard, and still he gets out! He poked his head out when I called him, but then pretended he didn't know me. That's gratitude, eh?


So after buying all these plants, I had to plant them all. I was also happy to have been given many nice annuals for Mother's Day, so I got busy! This is the flower box/bench on our lower deck. That is going to look really nice in a few weeks.









Some of my plants needed friends so I spent a gift certificate at Green Valley Greenhouse. There are a lot of good (but not cheap) plants there. I bought a cherry tomato to live on the deck. Tomatoes always taste better when you grow them yourself.

"If you're gardening for the economics of it, you're missing the whole point." Wendell Berry










Cherry Tomatoes with Feta and Parsley

1/2 pound Feta Cheese
1 Tbls chopped fresh parsley (fresh oregano would also be good, and more greek)
1-2 Tbls milk
1 pint cherry tomatoes

Combine cheese, herb and 1 Tbls milk in food processor. Process until smooth, adding more milk of needed. Cut off and discard top quarter of each tomato. Scoop out seeds. Put cheese into tomatoes, using spoon or pastry bag. Eat at room temperature. If you chop up the rest of the parsley (not too fine) and set the tomatoes on it, they will not roll around as much. (And what else would you do with that parsley anyway?)

Keep your eyes open!

I like to ride my bike to Elmcrest park. It is a soccer field/park not too far from my house. There are lots of interesting things to see, if you are paying attention. These flowers are Marsh Marigolds (Caltha palustris) also called cowslip. They are a wildflower that blooms for a short time in the spring. According to my "Edible Wild Plants" book, you may cook and eat the leaves ,or pickle the flower buds for a caper substitute. (I don't know why you'd want to do that, capers are not nice food.) Under no circumstances eat this plant raw, as it is poisonous when raw. I won't give you a recipe for a poisonous plant.

These are female Cowbirds (Molothrus ater). They are "co-wives" of one male brown-headed cowbird. (He looks like a blackbird with a brown head.) They are indeed in the same family as blackbirds (Icteridae). Female Cowbirds lay their eggs in other bird's nests. The other birds then raise the baby Cowbird, who usually dumps his foster siblings out of the nest (more food for him!). I am trying not to draw mental comparisons with certain renegade Mormons who have more wives and children than they can feed, so they go on welfare. I don't actually care how many wives, husbands or kids someone has, as long as they mean to provide for them. Paul says that if you get caught in polygamy, you should get an automatic insanity plea. I think I should be insulted.

This is a Cooper's Hawk (Accipiter cooperii) or maybe a Sharp-shinned Hawk (Accipiter striatus). They are so similar that it's hard to tell, especially when they keep flying away! We have Cooper's Hawks that live in the Scout Camp and swing through our yard all summer. It gets very quiet then, because all the songbirds know these are bird eaters! Also squirrel eaters, which I encourage.











This little girl is a Tree Swallow (Iridoprocne bicolor). Just about all the nest boxes are full already. They eat bugs, especially bugs that live by wetlands.

There are tons of things to notice at the park, you just have to LOOK!












This is Chloe. She lives at a house that was having a garage sale. Strangely enough, I went to this garage sale. While I was there, a man arrived to browse, bringing his German Shepherd. This was unwise, as Chloe went apeshit. She chased the dog down the driveway, yowling and spitting. The dog RAN! Dog in car, cat in house, shopping continues. 2 minutes later, the cat is back outside (she has her own exit), and she starts the unholy yowling again. The next thing we know, she jumps on the dog owner, hanging with her claws from his beer belly! (Still yowling!) Then the man yowls! I am not making this up! They locked the cat back up and I paid and ran away. I went back yesterday to get a picture of Chloe for you (you're welcome) and her owner said the guy deserved it! (By the way, Chloe likes me, and let me pet her.)
How is the "ugliest garage sale item" contest going for you? I saw this the other day. It is a broom with a stuffed-animal mouse on the bottom. I don't know why the mouse is wearing a dress and glasses. Did this look nice in someone's kitchen? Whose? Beatrix Potter's? Crazy.

So, one of my favorite movies is "Ferris Bueller's Day Off". At the end, Ferris says something like, "Life moves pretty fast, if you don't stop and look around sometimes, you might miss something". Exactly. Keep your eyes open, you don't want to miss any of the cool stuff.

What recipe do we need to keep our eyes open? Carrots, I think. Do we still tell kids that carrots are good for our eyes? I can't remember. This recipe got mixed reviews at my house, I loved it (and anything else containing sour cream) but the boys only like their carrots raw, so they are biased.

Carrots with Sour Cream-Cilantro Sauce

1 pound carrots, peeled if necessary and cut into bite-sized pieces (pennies or julienne)
1 Tbls chicken stock or water
3 teaspoons chopped cilantro leaves
1 tsp honey
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup sour cream

Microwave the carrots with the stock or water until they are as done as you like them. Mix the rest of the ingredients and stir into carrots. The carrots will heat up the sauce enough, and the sauce will cool down the carrots to eating temperature. Serves 4

Take that, Swine Flu!

It's grilling season! Actually, we grill all winter, too, as long as we can get to the grill over the snow. It is more fun when you can stay outside with the grill and have friends sit outside with you.

We got together with some friends a week ago. Thankfully we went to THEIR house, and not mine! This was during the height of the H1N1 (the flu formerly known as swine) flu hysteria. So we ate pork! Now I know that eating pork has nothing to do with catching the flu, but lots of people are now avoiding anything pig-related. Egypt killed all the pigs they could find, China locked up anybody with a Mexican passport, people generally freaked.

I don't really blame them, we live in a world where anything can happen at any time. For a while it felt like we were on the brink of the worst thing that ever happened, just like right after 9/11. I'm not forgetting that for many people 9/11 is and always will be, the worst thing that ever happened. The people who lost family in this flu outbreak are heartbroken. What I'm saying is, this was not a pandemic (YET). The historic flu outbreaks came back with a vengeance 6 months after the initial outbreak. We'll see. In the meantime, we control what we can (wash your hands, cough into your elbow, etc.) and keep going about our business.

That means a party! Pete and Chris hosted, Bill and Jen and our family brought sides and dessert and we had a great time.
Chris was kind enough to share the pork loin recipe, so you can make it too.


The guys tried out the deck for leaning. Works pretty good! They consulted with Peter about boat repairs and home improvement. We've all been friends since the early 1980's. Peter and Jen (and Bill?) went to art school together. (Peter and my Paul are cousins) It's great to spend time with people who have known us so long. We have partied together, grieved together, moved away and moved back and now we're all navigating parenthood. Peter's mom, Ginny, was back from Florida, so we caught up with her, too.



Here is Jen with Chris (the hostess with the mostess). Chris actually likes entertaining and makes it look easy. She marinated the pork and had everything ready before we arrived. For some reason, we all wore black (great minds think alike?). After dinner we inspected Chris's gardens. They have just moved in, so we helped her decide which sprouts were perennials and which were weeds. All too soon it was time to get all the kids home and ready for school the next day.




Barbecued Pork Tenderloin

1/2 cup strong brewed coffee
2 Tbls cider vinegar
1 Tbls spicy brown mustard
1 Tbls dark molasses
2 (1 pound) pork tenderloins, trimmed
1/4 cup finely ground coffee
2 Tbls sugar
2 Tbls paprika
2 Tbls coarsely ground black pepper
1 1/2 tsps sea or kosher salt
1/4 cup barbecue sauce
1 Tbls cider vinegar

Combine first 4 ingredients and use to marinate pork for 2-24 hours. Remove pork and discard marinade.
Prepare grill, heating one side to medium and one side to high heat. Spray rack with cooking spray.
Combine coffee and next 4 ingredients and rub over pork. Let stand at room temperature for 15 minutes.
Combine barbecue sauce and vinegar, reserve 2 Tbls.
Grill pork 3 minutes over high heat, turning pork on all sides.
Move pork to medium heat, grill 15 minutes turning pork occasionally. Baste with 3 Tbls BBQ sauce, grill 5 minutes or until thermometer reads 160 degrees.
Remove from grill, brush with reserved BBQ sauce, tent with foil and let it rest for 5 minutes. Slice and serve. (Yield is listed as 8 (3oz) servings, but we ate a lot more then that!)

I'm a Lucky Mama

That is video from a busy mom!

What are you doing for Mother's Day? I only need one thing - breakfast in bed! This hasn't always been easy to get, as Paul is a fisherman and was often gone on Mother's Day for the walleye opener.
When my boys were little, I settled for a cup of coffee and a snuggle, but then they learned how to work the toaster. One year, I was presented with a bagel loaded with peanut butter, cream cheese, jelly AND cinnamon sugar! They were so proud! I ate every bite, with a smile. Now they both can cook, so I'm a lucky mom who gets a good breakfast in bed. Sometimes I get poetry or a musical performance, too.


Tomorrow is Nick's birthday. He will be 14! I can't believe it. I know every woman since Eve has been astonished that their kids grow up, but man, I spent Mother's Day 1995 in bed after giving birth to Nick and I remember it like yesterday!

I really am lucky. Maybe I appreciate my luck more because I lost 3 babies, but I bet you all love your kids just as much as I love mine. My children are healthy, (knock on wood), what more could I want?

If you want breakfast in bed or just an easy morning, I have a couple of recipes for you. Set it up the night before, set the timer on the coffee pot and rest easy, mama!

Banana Dressing

2 ripe medium bananas
1 cup sour cream (regular or reduced fat)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp lemon juice

Yeah, whomp it in the blender! Blend until smooth, chill until needed. Serve with fresh fruit; especially good with pineapple, melon, mango and berries. This would probably be a good dressing for a fruit salad, too. Maybe with coconut or walnuts......

I LOVE eggs benedict! This is an eggs benedict egg bake. At least keep the recipe for the hollandaise sauce, it is good on so many things, like asparagus.

Eggs Benedict Casserole

6 English Muffins
2 (10 to 12-oz) pkg Canadian Bacon (ham works just fine, too)
8 eggs
2 cups milk
1 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp paprika
Easy Hollandaise Sauce (recipe follows)

Cut the muffins into 1/2 inch cubes, set aside. Cut the bacon or ham into 1/2 inch squares, mix with muffins. Whisk the eggs with the milk and onion powder. Spray a 9x13 pan with cooking oil spray, place the meat/muffin mixture in the pan. Pour the egg mixture over the top. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 8 hours (overnight) to allow bread to soak up the eggs.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Sprinkle paprika over top of casserole, cover with foil and bake 40 minutes. Remove foil and bake another 15-20 minutes until eggs are set. Let stand 5 minutes before serving with Hollandaise sauce.

Easy Hollandaise Sauce

(Makes about 1 1/2 cups) This can be made the night before and microwaved on half power for 3-4 minutes to reheat.

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
4 egg yolks (pasteurized is safest, but I'm cheap, so I use regular eggs)
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 Tbls lemon juice
1 tsp dijon mustard

Nuke butter until almost all melted in a glass bowl. Stir until all butter melts. Whisk yolks into butter. Stir in cream and lemon juice. Microwave uncovered on high, until just slightly thick, about 1-2 minutes, stopping every 20 seconds to stir with a fork. Remove from microwave and stir in mustard. Boiling is always bad for this sauce.

Multi-cultural Saturday

I went to the Festival of Nations in St. Paul on Saturday. My mom took my sister and I as a treat for our May birthdays. We used to go when we all lived in St. Paul. I think we went with school or Girl Scouts, too.
My mom is almost completely recovered from her broken hip and walked around all day without a cane or anything. (I'm guessing she had Advil for dinner, though.)
There are several of these photo-op cutouts at the festival. How is it that Sarah even looks good in this? So not fair.









One of the best parts of the festival is the food court! We tried food from all over the world. Everything we bought, we divided into 3 parts so we could all try it. I bought "bubble tea" which is a cold, sweetened tea with large tapioca balls in it. You suck them up through the extra big straw. I liked it, but mom and Sarah did not. We ate sesame balls from China, Dutch cream puffs, Greek spinach pie, Pancit (noodles) from the Philippines, egg rolls, vegetable tempura and banana spring rolls from Indonesia. My mom tried sushi for the first time (and maybe the last.) We tried the Korean combination plate of Bulgogi (stir-fried beef), fried rice and dumplings. It came with Kim-chi, spicy pickled cabbage. We had three kinds of baklava pastry (pistacio, cashew and pine nut), Somali beef pie called sambuza, Pad thai noodles from Thailand and Turkish stuffed grape leaves. To top it all off, I bought Tibetan butter tea. I have read about this in books (most recently "3 cups of tea"), and have been dying to try it. It is a hot tea with salt and butter. I believe yak butter is used in Tibet. I kind of liked it, but it isn't for everybody.
Here my mom is trying the banana spring roll. It was yummy!













There was also a world-wide bazaar, so we went shopping!
I bought an amber bracelet and a "pashmina" shawl. Pashmina is a type of wool, and fashionistas are said to have these in every color. I bought black (goes with everything) but I am not sure it was the same quality fashionistas must have. For one thing, the label was attached with hot glue! Hmmm...

Here Sarah is trying to decide which sundress to get. (She went with the red.)

There is also the auditorium, where dancing goes on all day long. We watched quite a few performances from many countries. The video is a dance from Nepal called "The Yeti". The yeti dancer hammed it up checking its privates and some audience members for fleas (and then eating them! This is hilarious in Nepal.) The music was pretty, though. The Australian didgerido music gave me a headache. It is so low that I think only elephants can enjoy it!


I liked this banner, it kind of shows what I like about this event. I think America is the greatest country in the world because of all our different cultures. We are strong because we have so much to draw on. This event celebrates that, and lets us show each other how proud we are of where we came from.

This is important in my family because we are a multicultural family. My sister came to us from Korea when she was 5 and my brother Gene came to us from Hong Kong when he was 10. Our family is blessed to include them, I can't imagine life without any of my siblings. (I'm not saying this to suck up, only one of 'em reads my blog).






I have this great recipe for Korean Bulgogi. It is good and good for you, low in fat and carbs! The stir-fried meat is eaten in a lettuce leaf. If your grocery store sells Kim-chi (pickled spicy cabbage and vegetables) it is worth adding as a condiment. The lady at the Korean food booth says kim-chi is eaten at every meal. I do suggest the use of "Beano" when eating Kim-chi. 'Nuff said!

Bulgogi Beef

1 1/2 lbs rib-eye or other nice beef. (I don't know why venison wouldn't work, either)
Partially freeze the meat to make it easier to slice. Slice it 1/8 of an inch thick and marinate.


Marinade:
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 Tbls sesame oil
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
2 Tbls brown sugar
6 thinly sliced garlic cloves
1 Tbls grated ginger

Mix marinade and pour half over meat and half over:
1 green pepper, sliced in 1/2 inch strips
2 medium red onions,sliced in 1/2 inch strips

Marinate for 15 minutes, then stir-fry vegetables and then meat (with marinade). Put it all in a bowl and serve in lettuce leaves. Boston or butter lettuce is best. Use the lettuce as if it were a tortilla.

Artsy-Fartsy Friday

Friday was a highly cultured day for me. In the morning, the preschool (where I am an assistant teacher) went on a field trip to Orchestra Hall. Twelve kids out of fifteen brought a parent so it wasn't too hard to keep track of the kids. We went to attend the "Kinder Konzert". Every year the orchestra sets a children's book to music and plays it for groups of school kids. We have been preparing our kids for months. They know the story, (The Tin Forest), they know piano, forte, staccato and legato. They know high sounds and low sounds and what families instruments belong to. They were all as good as gold. When we asked them what they liked best, many liked the school bus ride to get to Orchestra Hall! Most of them have never been on a school bus and have wanted to ride one their whole lives. As they will be riding a school bus to kindergarten in the fall, this is a good opportunity to try it out. Many of the kids also liked how the trombone player played the theme from"Star Wars" during his introduction.

As soon as the bus got back to school, I hopped in my car and drove to the airport to get Paul who has been in California for the week. He was working in a tomato processing plant. Manwich comes shooting out of there at 700 cans a minute and that is just one line! Who's eating all that Manwich? We were starving so we went back to one of our old college haunts, "Tracey's Saloon" (by Augsburg on the west bank). We split a sandwich and an appetizer. Tracey's makes fabulous fried mushrooms. They come with a horseradish/sour cream sauce that is sooo gooood!


Paul was so happy to be home that he agreed to go to the "Art in Bloom" exhibit at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts with me. Once a year, floral artists interpret some of the artworks in flowers. I get a big charge out of this. I spent several years as a "picture person" volunteer for the MIA. We were taught about several of the pieces of art each year and in turn taught kids at our local school about these pieces with the aid of large photos and props. The pieces I presented still feel like "mine" and I like to visit them. The artists mimic the art by color or shape or feeling. In this one can you see how the flowers dripping down the side of the cube are his legs and the white flowers are the owl? Above the owl is a bat, which is shown by the tangle of moss in the branches over the flowers. I know, it's a little odd and abstract, but I love to see it.

This one has a much clearer shape. The pink flowers are obviously her head coming out of the white ruff above the dark dress. I just think that is cool. The ones that go just by color are nice too, but boring. Big blue bowl, big blue flower arrangement. Blah. Paul was being very patient, even though flowers are SO not his thing! He liked the Rembrandt and the Monet, though. What he liked best was going home to watch his favorite cultural event, BASEBALL! When Joe Mauer hit that home run there was joy in Mudville! I vegged, my brain was all full.


This is the only recipe I have for fried mushrooms, if you have a nice tempura batter recipe, you could also try that. I almost never deep fry. It is so messy and I do not need to mention that fried food is not my friend. These are worth making an exception for, just don't skip the horseradish sauce.

Fried Mushrooms

1/3 cup flour
1/8 tsp salt
1 egg - divided
1 Tbls vegetable oil
5 Tbls dry white wine

1 pound small white mushrooms (wiped but not soaked)

Whisk flour, salt, egg yolk, oil and wine together (you thought I was going to say whomp it in the blender, didn't you?) and let sit for an hour or two at room temp. Beat the egg white with a pinch of salt until it holds stiff peaks and fold it into the batter. Dip the mushrooms in the batter and fry them at 350 degrees for 10 minutes or until they are deep brown. Turn them to get all the sides brown. Drain on paper towels and serve with sauce. Be careful when biting into them, they are hot and so are the drippy juices.

Sour cream/horseradish sauce
Start with 1/2 cup sour cream and 1 tbls prepared horseradish. Stir together and see if it is hot enough for you. If not, add more.