almost too easy

For fish I often get cod - it isn't heavy, and you can get it ready very quickly.

Salad dressing is perfect. Pour some on, and bake it twenty minutes or so at 375 and that's it. If I have a strongly flavored dressing that's enough, but the other day I had Italian, so first I spread mustard (Gulden's Spicy Brown, if you must know - totally forgot I had some dijon in the fridge) overall, then some Italian seasoning, and then plenty of dressing. Just right.

church bells

I'm in my room with the windows open. It's a beautiful, warm and sunny-but-not-humid day. Perfect, with a breeze. And birds chirping, etc., outside.

I'm trying to paint a picture here - now you may add to it the sound of a bell ringing. Behind our house, on the street parallel to ours, is a Lutheran church and they have a bell in front near the road. It's ringing as I write this.

from Google - it doesn't really look like this

It's electric - this is an American suburb, not London - and they've had it for many years. How many times this Anglophile has listened with such enjoyment every day at noon and six (pm)! Years ago I counted the tolling; sixty four, I think it was. It broke more than once and there've been spaces where nothing was heard. I've called and written more than once to assure them someone was enjoying it - even sent money to help with expensive repairs. 

Of course, in winter with everything shut up you don't hear the ringing and you forget about it. Especially since I don't think it's been working in recent years. But the other day there it was! I'm not sure it's ringing sixty four times any more. Whatever. I'm just thrilled to be hearing it again. 

open up your petals

Listen, my faithful children: open up your petals,
like roses planted near running waters;
send up the sweet odor of incense,
break forth in blossoms like the lily.

Send up the sweet odor of your hymn of praise;
bless the Lord for all he has done!

Proclaim the greatness of his name,
loudly sing his praises,
with music on the harp and all stringed instruments;
sing out with joy as you proclaim:
The works of God are all of them good.


                            -  Sirach 39:13-16a

at her ease

I guess it's safe to say she's comfortable here.

some Alabama stitching

After seeing so many beautiful creations on Anna's blog, I am trying the Alabama Chanin techniques for myself. A very basic and familiar a-line skirt pattern I've used many times, cut down the front and back centers to make another seam, which I've hand stitched.

Dark grey fabric and ivory thread. No other embellishment - I'll finish the elastic at the waist and see how I like it.

FM Dolly

When I headed for the bathroom this morning, my radio was on AM - when I came back, it was on FM.

Hail the day that sees Him rise

Today!

John Singleton Copley's The Ascension

Hail the day that sees Him rise, Alleluia!
To His throne above the skies; Alleluia!
Christ, the Lamb, for sinners given, Alleluia!
Enters now the highest heaven!  Alleluia!

There for Him high triumph waits; Alleluia!
Lift your heads, eternal gates!  Alleluia!
He hath conquered death and sin; Alleluia!
Take the King of glory in!  Alleluia!

Lo! the heaven its Lord receives, Alleluia!
Yet He loves the earth He leaves; Alleluia!
Though returning to His throne, Alleluia!
Still He calls mankind His own.  Alleluia!

Lord, though parted from our sight, Alleluia!
Far above the starry height, Alleluia!
Grant our hearts may thither rise, Alleluia!
Seeking Thee above the skies.  Alleluia!

There we shall with Thee remain, Alleluia!
Partners of Thy eternal reign, Alleluia!
There Thy face forever see, Alleluia!
Find our heaven of heavens in Thee, Alleluia!

                              -  words here a little different from Charles Wesley's, but a wonderful hymn

"The meaning of Christ's Ascension expresses our belief that in Christ the humanity that we all share has entered into the inner life of God in a new and hitherto unheard of way. It means that man has found an everlasting place in God... Jesus himself is what we call 'heaven'."

                                     -  Pope Benedict XVI

so what

After a nice, quiet Memorial day, tonight finds Dolly groovin' to this  -

Miles Davis' So What, on his 88th birthday anniversary.

rain

Today, among the book donations that regularly appear at the library, was a small book of poems by Thomas Hardy. I took it.

This evening, a thunderstorm with driving rain has been taking its time about leaving.

On the Doorstep
     by Thomas Hardy

The rain imprinted the step's wet shine
With target-circles that quivered and crossed
As I was leaving this porch of mine;
When from within there swelled and paused
               A song's sweet note;
       And back I turned, and thought,
                'Here I'll abide.'

The step shines wet beneath the rain,
Which prints its circles as heretofore;
I watch them from the porch again,
But no song-notes within the door
               Now call to me
        To shun the dripping lea;
                And forth I stride.

the child I never had

Cindy is adjusting to her new home pretty darn well. She has made herself acquainted with every little corner of this place that she's wanted to.

She's got a funny habit, though.

This is what I came home to one day last week. And it isn't the first time. I can't keep a tablecloth on the table for long - she drags one end over into Dolly's water bowl.  The first thing she did here was seemingly try to cover up the bowl.

She does this every time there's a cloth on the table. We first noticed this behavior during her early days here, when she was sleeping in the basement. My brother saw one morning that she'd dragged her bedding into the nearby water bowl. We're still trying to figure out why she does this.

You can see here that she's not really trying to cover it, but she wants to dip it in the water. Why oh why, Miss Cindy??

It's hard to photograph her at any time, 'cause she's such a busy little person. 

So far, she hasn't pitched in with the laundry. She must still be perfecting her game.

I like it

Well, I had a birthday gift to wrap the other day, and I used my wrinkled "kraft" paper -

A bit of ribbon, a sticker - I like this look!

a bit on Christian contemplation

"We are not asked to acquire new insights, though these are, of course, useful. We are asked rather to expand our hearts by affective prayer and by remaining close to Jesus, as Mary did for long periods, often of silence, and to feed our spirits with the interior affectivity that is so important for perseverance on the spiritual journey."

                               -   Perseverance in Trials: Reflections on Job,  by Carlo Maria Martini

zip-up greenhouse

I bought myself a plastic, zip-up greenhouse. Forty dollars on Amazon and definitely worth every penny.

Five feet high with four shelves. You put something heavy on the bottom to keep it from being blown over in high winds.

We have no good place indoors for seedlings, and the growing season here isn't terribly long. Certainly nothing like what I see on the Australian blogs I read.

It has hard plastic pieces on the sides, with metal pipe to keep it all together, and a plastic cover.
The shelves are cheap and don't lay flat, but it was a simple matter to lash them to the piping.

They'll be fine.  There isn't much in there now, but I have plans.

Someone gave us this Tomato Berry.  It's a start.

bog people for dinner

I think it was last year when I cooked a dish with small tomatoes in it. My brother said the wrinkled appearance made him think of the bog people.  So I kind of avoided cooking smaller tomatoes with skins on.  

But it's time for going through all recipes in my box, and finding out what sinks and what swims. And who can resist something called Provencal Chicken and Tomato Roast?  So, it was the bog people once again for dinner.

I didn't follow it exactly, but basically I roasted some chicken thighs with cut-up potato, and later added the tomatoes and olives. With plenty of herbes de Provence, olive oil, salt, and onion and garlic powders.  It was good.

But he did say that the olives made it look even more like the bog people.

St. Margaret of Scotland

I think I've found a patron for this blog - Saint Margaret of Scotland, a queen.

"Her biographer, Turgot, gives us a sense of Margaret as a woman with a developed sense of beauty and proportion; she transformed every aspect of her environment, from the garments of the priests to the furniture and wall-hangings of the palace." 

                                -   Magnificat, May 2014

at the end of the day

bluets across the brook

Yesterday Susan lamented not seeing any bluets on her spring nature walks. I am seeing them whenever I look out the kitchen window - there is a "field" of them across the brook.

Here are your bluets, Susan; until you come upon them where you live.

everything lush

from so much rain lately.

dinner, courtesy of Pinterest

I finally gave in last week and joined Pinterest. I still have my clippings, but it is incredibly handy - I've accumulated so much gardening information already. And just yesterday I found two recipes which I was able to use today, both of which I found on Margo's pages. For some leftover pasta I got the idea to add yogurt to the spaghetti sauce, which I have done, but would never have thought of today, and to use up rhubarb, cooking it (sweetened) under chicken parts - very nice.

leftovers

a conversation

my brother:  "Dolly has more personality than the other two [cats] together."

me: "She has more personality than the two of us!"

free wrapping paper

I ordered two good sized things from Amazon, and they came today with so much packing paper that I just couldn't fathom stuffing it into the recycling bin.

And then I noticed that it was really just wrinkled-up looking craft paper, and why would I want to get rid of that anyway?

About two feet wide, and - I don't know - twenty feet long??  And two pieces of it!

My first thought was, Can it be ironed?  You can iron tissue-y pattern pieces, must be able to iron this stuff. I went to Pinterest and searched under brown packing paper. I saw many photos of gifts wrapped in craft paper, but there was one which used wrinkled paper!  It looked cute to me!

 I started folding.

and this is all one piece!

I'll use it on the next gift I have to wrap and report back here.

Scotch Broth, homemade

If you are middle-aged, you may remember this:

We sometimes had it when I was a kid - my mother always liked lamb. She was quite a good cook but when it came to lunches, it was often Campbell's to the rescue.

When I was looking for lamb chops at the supermarket before Easter there wasn't lots of it, so I picked up some shoulder"stew" meat, just in case. Well, we didn't need it for the holiday but I've got lots of barley and I suddenly thought of Scotch Broth yesterday. I found an old Gourmet recipe on the Epicurious website - basically the lamb, the barley, a bay leaf, some chicken broth - I could see what I had to do. I par-cooked the meat to avoid so much grease in the soup. Then cut it up, along with a chopped onion, several stalks of celery and some carrots, a bay leaf, some other herbs, lots of water and some beef and chicken cubes - whatever seemed good. Later, I poured in some of the now degreased lamb cooking juices and simmered it a good long while.
A bit of salt, and - so good!!

Made some rolls, too.

grape hyacinth

they always like to come up next to the roses.

magnifi-kitty

She didn't know what she was laying her little head on, but there could be no better caption for our Dolly.

small patches

While I think about whether I'm going to use buttons or ties to finish my button quilt, I've picked up this other one which I pieced about a year ago.

I'm quilting a line down the middle of each row of squares with floss. It'll take a little while, I'm sure.

still life with cat and pillow

well, still because he was sleeping.

two vegetables and a starch

Making sure you serve an extra vegetable plus a starch does make a difference, doesn't it?

During the week I often serve our main dish with just one veg, and maybe bread, rice, whatever. But on special occasions and for company I am reminded of how helpful it is to stretch the meal with more sides. Yesterday, any worries that there might not be enough of the lamb came to naught. I sent our guest away with some and we will have leftovers for after-work tomorrow.

a Happy Easter!

for dinner -

• braised lamb chops
• roasted carrots with mint and honey
• haricots verts with herb butter
• small red potatoes, boiled, with butter
• homemade applesauce
• Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies

Henry's tail

the fur is different on different parts of his body.

Holy Saturday

"Holy Saturday is the day of the 'death of God', the day which expresses the unparalleled experience of our age, anticipating the fact that God is simply absent, that the grave hides him, that he no longer awakes, no longer speaks, so that one no longer needs to gainsay him but can simply overlook him...Christ strode through the gate of our final loneliness; in his Passion he went down into the abyss of our abandonment. Where no voice can reach us any longer, there is he. Hell is thereby overcome, or, to be more accurate, death, which was previously hell, is hell no longer. Neither is the same any longer because there is life in the midst of death, because love dwells in it."

                                         -   Pope Benedict XVI

     It is over now, O Lord, as with your sufferings, so with our humiliations. We have followed you from your fasting in the wilderness till your death on the cross. For forty days we have professed to do penance. The time has been long and it has been short; but whether long or short, it is now over. It is over, and we feel a pleasure that it is over; it is a relief and a release. We thank you that it is over. We thank you for the time of sorrow, but we thank you more as we look forward to the time of festival. Pardon our shortcomings in Lent and reward us in Easter.

     We have, indeed, done very little for you, O Lord. We recollect well our listlessness and weariness; our indisposition to mortify ourselves when we had no plea of health to stand in the way; our indisposition to pray and to meditate - our disorder of mind - our discontent, our peevishness. Yet some of us, perhaps, have done something for you. Look on us as a whole, O Lord, look on us as a community, and let what some have done well plead for us all.

     O Lord, the end is come. We are conscious of our languor and lukewarmness; we do not deserve to rejoice in Easter, yet we cannot help doing so. We feel more of pleasure, we rejoice in you more than our past humiliation warrants us in doing; yet may that very joy be its own warrant. O be indulgent to us, for the merits of your saints. Accept us as your little flock, in the day of small things, in a fallen country, in an age when faith and love are scarce. Pity us and spare us and give us peace.

                                 - prayer of  Blessed John Henry Newman

trials

     "We often feel oppressed, exhausted, frustrated by something vague about our trials. The Lord urges us to give our troubles a name, list them, and then learn how to face them with him. For it is a basic element in human and Christian wisdom that we should understand the usefulness of trials and weather them faithfully.
      In addition, the more we love, and the more we serve and make ourselves available, the greater these trials are.
      If, on the other hand, we lock ourselves up in our own little world, if we become misanthropes, if we do not emerge from our self-centeredness, we shall experience only the trial of personal frustration."

                              -    Perseverance in Trials: Reflections on Job   by Carlo Maria Martini