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On the Clafoutis bandwagon

I keep seeing blog posting for clafoutis. Must be the proliferation of stone fruit that is in season (I think of clafoutis as being a stone fruit dish) right now.

I love a rustic dessert. Something that doesn't require much fussing. I used this recipe but I substitued sweet, dark cherries for the plums. Because our grocery store, in the agricultural mecca that is California, did not have plums. Can you even imagine? Isn't this prime plum season?

Guests arrived last night, we had a nice dinner and plenty of wine (no sewing as we have a no drinking and cutting rule) and went to bed fairly early so we could get cracking on the sewing first thing this morning.

I've been taking pictures as we go along so I'll post those in the next day or so.

Waiting

Muffins are made. Pillows are fluffed. We are all set for our weekend guests. My sisters Nicki and Kate and my niece Sara are coming up for a little quilting retreat.

I swear the only time the house ever gets cleaned is if we invite someone over.

Of course it promises to be the hottest weekend yet. Temps are supposed to get up to 106 today. I think I might have to break down and turn on the A/C this afternoon.

I have gazpacho chilling in the fridge and watermelon in the freezer (for margaritas). We'll do what we have to in order to keep cool.

I'm not entirely sure what I'll be working on this weekend but I do know that it will be from my list of unfinished projects on the left hand sidebar. I have to whittle that list down.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

Road trip

Yesterday Rick and I decided, quite impulsively, to set aside Saturday's usual mundane chores and go on a road trip. Just a nice drive, end up somewhere pretty, have lunch and then head back home.

I know I apologize for the quality of my picture a lot but most of these were taken from a moving car, through a bug splattered windshield (anyone that travels across the Yolo causeway with any regularity knows what that is about…).

We decided to drive to St. Helena in the Napa Valley, taking the backroads. There used to be a program on television called Bay Area Back Roads that would feature out of the way places to visit. We wanted to do our own version of that.

St. Helena (the entire Napa area for that matter) is just so pretty. Grand wineries, old Victorian style houses, acres and acres and acres of vines. St. Helena itself is a smaller town with a typical Main Street of restaurants, shops and lots of visitors. We just parked at one end and walked down one side and back up the other.

We picked a smaller coffee shop type restaurant for lunch and then afterwards wandered over to Woodhouse Chocolates to buy a treat for a friend of ours. It is the prettiest chocolate shop I have ever been in. Beautiful cream wood work, chandeliers, hanging tapestries. I wish I had asked to take pictures inside but I was all agog at the chocolate selections. Even the distinctive pale blue, round boxes are the prettiest candy boxes I've ever seen.

After lunch we hopped back into our car and drove around town. I think we like looking at old houses more than anything else. If I had an extra couple of million dollars I could see buying a little place here.

If you have 3.8+ million dollars this house can be yours too. There are other, more affordable options but they might not come with their own barrel room.

This may have been a morbid way to end the outing but I made Rick stop at the local cemetary so I could walk around and take pictures. Even in the afterlife you can live in a perfectly charming place in St. Helena.

Charmed, I’m sure

Hmm, I wonder how many times I've used that post title. Seems rather well-worn.

More teeny collectibles. I wish I could say that I've been collecting these treasures over the years but actually I bought them all in one swell foop. I do have a couple left over from a phase I was in about 15 years ago. Back when those pins with all the watch parts and doo-dads were so popular. You used to see them at Art & Wine festivals and I, as I so often do, thought to myself – heck I can make those.

I can't tell you how many watches I smashed to get the little parts.

I am not revisiting that creative phase. I've been using them in my collage pages. I was wracking my brain, trying to remember where I bought them 15 years ago. I don't recall seeing anything like this in any craft or bead store I've been in lately.

A Google search turned up a company that has a gazillion of these charms. Rather low-frills website but the selection is amazing. Any shape, size, design heart you can think of, body parts, bugs, birds, crowns, fairies, animals - you name it.

The detail in some of them is just amazing. The heart in the first picture, for instance. Love that – I think it is my favorite one. The prices are very reasonable – I paid anywhere from 30 cents to a little over two dollars (for the larger, more detailed pieces).

The name of the company is Fancifuls, Inc. and they are located in New York. I am all the way on the other side of the country and I had my order in just a few days.

It was a bit hard to guess the size of some of them because they basically just have a photograph of a page full of charms (hundred of pages) for you to view. The page is 8 1/2 x 11 inches so you can kind of guess. They figured out about 100 pages in to include a ruler or a coin for scale.

Anyway, if you are looking for metal embellishments for any craft project you will not be disappointed in their selection. The hard part is not going hog wild and ordering all of them.

Fruit Pizza

Sorry for the slightly blurry photo – it was taken with my iPhone. We had a grand 4th of July/Birthday celebration (for my oldest) yesterday. He requested Fruit Pizza for his birthday cake. Even though we had it three weeks ago at his Aunt's birthday celebration.

I told him I didn't think people would mind having it again so soon.

I'm sure this recipe has been around for ages and there are slight variations to it but it basically is sugar cookie crust, a sweetened cream cheese topping and then assorted fruits in a pleasing pattern on top. I add an apricot glaze to the top.

Here's the exact recipe that I use – makes two pizzas:

2 packages of refrigerator sugar cookie dough
2 8-oz. packages of cream cheese (allow it soften to room temp.)
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
Assorted fruits
1/2 cup Apricot preserves (or orange marmalade if you prefer)
2 Tbsp. water

Preheat oven to 350 degree F. Press cookie dough into two tart pans (you can just roll it into a circle and bake on a cookie sheet but I like the fluted edges that the tart pans give it). Bake until golden brown – about 18-20 minutes.

Mix the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla and spread evenly over the two cooled cookies crusts.

Arrange the fruit on top of each pizza

In a small sauce pan heat the apricot preserves and water together until it has a thin, glaze like consistency. Allow to cool a bit then spoon over fruit pizzas.

Chill pizzas until ready to serve.

The aftermath:

It's all about getting together and enjoying each other's company. The food is just the cherry on the top.

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