Saturday, February 13, 2010

Been bowling lately????


We are at this wonderful place called St. Simons Island. This is the first time Mr. W and I have been here and are guests of two of our best friends Cindy and Sykes Sturdivant who own the King and Prince Beach and Golf Resort. www.kingandprince.com Let me tell you. This place is B-utiful!!! Larry and Kathy fun Acardi are also here!.
Here to play golf. Now, every time Cindy and I try to play golf somewhere, it rains. And I'm not talkin sprinkles, I mean a monsoon. So why would I expect any different for this trip???
Most of the south has been COVERED in snow. Not here, just rain, cold, wind. The high here is usually 67 for this time of year. Right now, we're checkin in at 37. So yesterday we went bowling......
This is kinda how it went......

First gutter ball...
then Sykes got a strike!
and did a dance
and I had to act like a pro and put my hand on that little air thingy
and gotta strike!
and did a happy dance...sort of
and then there's Mr. W the pro....{who I beat by the way}
OMG what did that ball do?????? (it was the balls fault)
Great pic of Kathy and Larry huh????
....and we had an audience
Cindoo got a hold of the ball for a strike!
and that was The End

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

My pathetic attempt at Valentine cookies


I'm not a baker. Actually far from it. I always envied my mom for the beautiful Christmas cookies she would make (and decorate) at Christmas time. Every time I tried however, they were just pathetic looking. I could bake them, but the decorating part....oh my, just ain't my thang. This year though I was bound and determined I was going to make some Valentine cookies, you know like the ones that are delivered on a stick that are so darn yummy that you eat the WHOLE thing. and I mean the entire arrangement. Well, this was my pathetic attempt at making a "Cookie Company" cookie on a stick. This recipe was easier than easy....decorating? not so easy. Here is my attempt.

add sugar, eggs, and butter together and blend until smooth


slowly add flower and mix on "stir" setting


use only the best vanilla. This is my favorite, I even give it at Christmas!!!


Dig it all outta the bowl and plop the dough on some saran wrap. Be sure to eat half of the raw dough like I did for a possible case of salmonella. It's really some of the best dough I've ever had. Sort of a salty sweet taste. oh yummerlicious.


doesn't this look a little like a slab of meat???? ewe. The recipe calls for this to be refridgerated for 1 hour to overnight. That was weird, I mean that's a pretty large span of time. It needs about 3 hours in my humble opinion.


flour your surface, and your rolling pin


roll the dough out to 1/4 to 1/2 thickness and cut out those cute little {or big} hearts!


I inserted the sticks on top and then used the little ones to sort of cover up the stick. Or you can smooth the dough over the stick. It worked well...and then bake for 6 - 8 minutes!


the yummy outcome.


Here we go chickies.....
I told you!!! how pathetic is this???? I mean seriously. I think I can paint pretty decent, why can't I paint a simple little cookie???? just plain pathetic.


So , I refused to give up!!!!! I tried again and these weren't too bad!
(and they were fun! and yummy)

Let me tell ya ...these really, really do taste like the Cookie Company cookies. They are oooooooooh SO good!

Recipe:

Ingredients;
1 1/2 cups butter, softened (3 sticks)
2 cups white sugar
4 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

Directions:
In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt. Cover and chill dough for at least one (not) hour (or overnight).

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into shapes with cookie cutter. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven. Cool completely
Now chickies, do a better job decorating than I did!!

New Wrapping Station


I am SOOOOO excited.....

I just have to show you my plain wall.......

which was perfect for my new wrapping station!!! oh how happy the installation man made me!!!
It's not quite finished yet as the hooks are on backorder, but I'm still OVERJOYED!!! no more digging around for my wrapping stuff and dragging all the stuff into the kitchen to wrap! I just had to show my chickies my excitement!!!

And to top it off, Mr W surprised me with the cover to my RED washer and dryer!!!
(It doubles as a changing table)
If you want to wrap on a changing table.....hum.

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Have I told you enough about Spotlight on Art? at Trinity School in Atlanta


Well....if I have, I'm telling you again!
This WuNderful group of ladies are amazing!!!
I've never, ever been so impressed by the organization of these moms.
The Artists Market lasts 6 days, February 15 - 20 with 350 established and emerging artists with over 2,500 items to ponder! Sure to please the "palette" of everyone's taste of art. Some of the artists include Annie Butrus, Marie Turko Garcia, Steve Penley (did I mention he's my idol) along with jewelers Mickey Lynn and Elyssa Bass. And ME!!! (I am SO lucky to have been chosen as one of the newest artist). They have graciously let me add two new paintings (after the deadline) Enjoy chickies!!!

Here they are!

"Green Trees"
36 x 36 Mixed media on block canvas
1,200.00


"Red Trees"
36 x 36 Mixed media on block canvas
1,200

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Girl Food, Boy Food, just in time for Super Bowl Sunday!


Betza's Guacamole

Girl.........OK Chickies, when I say this is THE BEST guacamole EVER, I mean it. It is the way my previous and wonderful housekeeper from Mexico made it. Oh how I miss her....

I'm makin a BIG Batch and I may eat every bit of it all by myself! Just ask my friends. THE BEST guacamole EVER!!!

6 Avocados (of course taken out of the shell and the seed removed) I used the California avocados because the Florida ones weren't soft enough. (idn't that just irritating?)

Fresh Cilantro finely chopped

1 red (only red) onion finely chopped (really just use half)

Chopped by my nifty Williams-Sonoma chopper

3 cloves of fresh minced garlic
minced by my nifty Williams-Sonoma mincer

Smash up the avocados with your [clean] hands and mix it all up with your [clean] hands

About 3 limes squeezed

Add a dash of tabasco and chopped tomatoes (optional) (in season)

I like to eat my guacamole with Tostitos scoops

Oh man, I'm SO glad Mr. Wonderful dudn't like this stuff.

P.S. the garlic, limes and cilantro make this guacamole special. I have found that most mexican restaurants don't use enough of any of these.


Boy..........Junk Yard Rotel Dip:

1 large block of Velvetta cheese

2 cans of rotel
1 can of Hormel chili (no beans)

Heat cheese and rotel in a double boiler until melted. If you don't have a double boiler you may heat it in a medium size pot on low. DO not burn it or you will hate your gorgeous self.

WARNING-WARNING-WARNING,,,,VERY HIGH IN CALORIES....but whose counting???

Dump in the Hormel chili (looks gross dudn't it???)

Eat with Fritos - oh be still my hungry heart!!!


Guaranteed to make Mr. Wonderful kiss the ground I walk on.

Thursday, February 4, 2010

I had no idea what I was doin! Then I got obsessed......


Obsessive/compulsive part 1

Some of you have asked me where I got the cute little felt flowers that are on my makeup bags. Well, they actually came from Tinsel Trading www.tinseltrading.com Their website is cool but less than desirable when it comes to ordering SOOOOO, of course I've gotten obsessed and decided to try to make them myself. Since normal felt is too thin I had to come up with another idea.

So, this is what I came up with. New to knitting (oh, how I wish I could knit beautiful things like my friend Barbara) this is about all I can do!

A square


Then I needed to felt it. SO, I washed it in VERY hot soapy water


This is what I got!

a piece of felt...

Then I had to cut out the flower

Well that didn't do it for me.

Soooo I found the COOLEST website!
very, very, very cool
Called
and this is what they sent me:

the bestest, thickest felt ever!

so.....I cut out my own little flower

and added a little pompom
to my plain little flower

I "felt" my cosmetic bag needed a little pop

So.....I added my cute little flower. Better huh!

Can't wait to see what else I can do with my Filzfelt!!!
Gotta go chickies!