Under a Blue Moon

Tour Eiffel

This is my last Eiffel Tower – I swear. This one was too cute to resist though and look how adorably it came packaged. I ordered it from Inspire Company and for a dollar extra I could have it gift wrapped. Who doesn’t like a present? So even though it was for me I had it gift wrapped and had a little card attached. From me to me.

It’s going into my Paris room. It’s not really over the top with the Paris theme – just a few Eiffel towers and my favorite – a picture of moi in front the the real Eiffel Tower taken circa 1969. That’s me with the red coat on the right.

I try not to get to locked into a theme when I’m decorating – or be too timid either – just mix it all up. I wouldn’t know how to describe my style – it’s a little bit of Rachel Ashwell, Trish Foley and my Mother all rolled into one. I have an addiction to decorating magazines. I lament the dearly departed Victoria Magazine. Gah! I loved that magazine. Right now I read Cottage Living, Country Living and Country Home (I can never remember which one it is I like better so I buy both when they come out), Martha Stewart’s Living, Romantic Homes – which was fabulous, then their Editor Eileen Paulin (no relation) left and there was a year or two where the magazine went rapidly downhill. Now under the tutelage of editor Jacqueline deMontravel they seem to be getting their mojo back. I also like Domino and Home Companion.

I like having an open door policy with the things that make it into my house – I’ve never cared for a house that is totally decorated in one style and one style only. All Shaker all the time. Or all Asian. I’m sure for the people that live there it must be very comforting and soothing. For me I like to rest my eye on a beloved object and just hope that in the grand scheme of things it works in my little abode.

Edited to add a picture of the room just so you can see it’s not dripping in Eiffel Towers. I’m not entirely sure how it got the Paris room moniker in the first place. I just bought the vintage chenille bedspread. I’m going for Grandma chic in the room even though it doesn’t look like I’ll be a Grandmother anytime soon. I just want it to look like the kind of room you would stay in when visiting your beloved Grandmother. I have got to get rid of those stupid round little tables. They were meant as a temporary bedside table and it’s been about three years now. On my to do list – find nice bedside chests. And the cliched Monet print – okay time to move on from that. Sheesh – nothing like putting your house on view to make you notice all its flaws.

Food

I keep meaning to do a food post. But then I get ready to cook dinner and the next thing I know it’s over with and I haven’t taken a single picture. I think my posts need pictures.

And I didn’t cook Brussel sprouts. God no. My niece*, who is willowy and pretty much fat-free, and would actually eat such a thing, brought them to cook for my father. What I did make was a fabulously easy – embarassingly easy – quiche. My sister’s recipe, actually. The niece’s mother – who was off aprender español for the evening. Anyway – the recipe couldn’t be easier and it is a fool-proof quiche.

*Growing up my niece was the ANTI Miss Clark. All she would eat was white food. It amazes me the things she will eat and claim to actually LIKE – like raw cow tongue. And brussel sprouts. And she writes about food now. Who would have thought?

Buy a prepared pie crust. Unless you feel strongly about making your own, from scratch, pie dough. This quiche is all about the easy so prepared works for me. Pre-bake it for about 10 minutes. Meanwhile mix the custard. Two whole eggs plus two additional egg yolks. 1 cup cream, 1 cup milk. Salt, pepper and a pinch of nutmeg (I hate when recipes call for a pinch. What is that exactly? The nutmeg container had a top with holes in it and I shook it three times over the eggs and milk). Whisk together. Grate 4 oz. of Jarlsburg or Swiss cheese (about a cup). When the crust is done pre-baking take it out of the oven and layer sliced tomato and onion rings (and by onion rings I mean the battered, frozen, Ore Ida variety) in the crust then top with the cheese. Pour the custard over the top until it is about 1/4" below the edge.

Since I have never made a quiche that didn’t have extra custard I decided to take a shallow ramekin and make a crustless quiche (for the willowy niece). I slightly buttered (I SWEAR – it was the teeniest amount of butter) the ramekin and layered tomato, onion rings and cheese then poured the left over custard mixture over the top.

I placed both quiches on a cookie sheet and baked at 375 for about 45 minutes.

Since I never can manage to take an after picture of anything I cook – here is the before:

Trust me when it came out of the oven it was golden brown and lovely looking. You can tell when it’s done by inserting a knife and having it come out clean. I also kind of poke at it make sure it’s not too jiggly.

The Brussel sprouts – heck I have no clue. I think they were quartered and tossed onto a baking sheet and put in the oven for a while. Someone ate them all but it sure as heck wasn’t me.

Home Ec

Click on picture to see enlarged version

Is Home Economics even a required course for girls anymore? I can remember my 8th grade Home Ec teacher quite clearly. Miss Clark. The first half of the year we did sewing arts and the second half of the year we did cooking. I can still hear Miss Clark’s voice in my head every single time I plate up food – admonishing us to make our meals pleasing to the eye, as well as the palate. No all beige food was her credo.

I was better at the cooking than I ever was at the sewing. As is the case these days, still. I want to sew, to embroider, to knit and I do have a basic grasp of the skills but it isn’t intuitive to me. And I’m afraid to admit I’m really impatient. I want the end result NOW. That’s why my projects tend to be small so I can whip them out quickly before my spirit lags.

I’m dying for this line of fabric by Heather Bailey to be available. I might even be convinced to make an entire bed sized quilt with colorway 2. When I look at the pictures on her website I want to crawl right into the picture and rest my cheek on any one of those stacks of fabric.

The picture above is my mother’s Home Ec class some time in the mid to late 30’s. She’s the one mid stitch with her hand pulling the thread taut. She was quite accomplished in the domestic arts. She was a fabulous cook for one and very adventuresome. She was making turkey mole in our 60’s suburban neighborhood when the rest of the kids on the block were eating Chef Boyardee. She took French cooking classes and I can remember sitting in front of our old black and white television with her watching Julia Child. I think the Las Vegas tag line of ‘"what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas" was stolen directly from Julia. There was an episode where she dropped an entire chicken or something like that on the floor and she just looked straight at the camera and said something to the effect that no one needs to be privy to ALL the goings on in the kitchen. Then she dusted off the chicken and put it on a serving platter.

My mother was also a very accomplished knitter. I can knit flat things. Like a scarf. Or a…scarf. She would do entire sweaters. I can remember a sweater she knit for me that I got to design. I selected the yarn, a marled turquoisy green with flecks of all kinds of other color twisted in. I wanted a big daisy on the front of it. She knit the sweater then commisioned a neighbor down the street to crochet the daisy which she then appliqued on. That was one beautiful sweater.

I actually pulled out my knitting last week only to discover I lost one of my knitting needles. I crank out one scarf every 18 months or so. By the time I finish it I am so sick of the yarn I can’t bring myself to wear it. The trick (aside from working a lot faster) is to get really fabulous yarns to work with. The colors and textures have to be swoon worthy in order to keep my interest. My current project is a pale pink chenille type yarn from England that I’m knitting with a carry along eyelash yarn in ivory.

I’ll get right back to this project just as soon as I find that knitting needle.

I would love to learn how to crochet but there aren’t any crocheters in our family. My grandmother tried to teach me but finally told me I was too tense and was making my stitches too tight and that I might consider taking up another hobby instead. I’m also left handed which makes it trickier to learn. Can you teach yourself to crochet? I’m more of a monkey see monkey do learner but I suppose I could try.

The real reason I want to learn how to crochet is because I ~~need~~ want this.

Clean up – Part 1

I think the only way I am every going to get my rose bed in shape is to publicly out myself and my lazy, procrastinating ways. Here’s the rose bed. Yes there ARE roses in there amongst the weeds.

I have very little sun in my garden but have eked out a little around one corner of the deck. I have six or seven rose bushes. The tall gangly one is a Queen Elizabeth. Very regal, that rose.

I went to our local, expensive nursery (since Lowe’s and Home Depot weren’t cutting it, florally ~ and honestly I’d prefer our little local guy get my money even if his prices are twice as high) and bought some stock, decorative cabbage, dusty miller, pansies and marigolds to freshen up the pots on the deck.

Oh and take a look at that bird feeder – normally $120 and I got it for $30 because the little doohickey on the cupola broke off. I’m going to go online and see if I can find a minature weathervane to stick on top. I’m hoping that there is a market for barn decor for the dollhouse set.

Aren’t these Hens and Chicks (Sempervivum) adorable? You know me – I like things for the name as much as the thing itself. I just think this will look sweet sitting in a low pot on our little table out on the deck. The mother ‘hen’ is surrounded by little duplicates of herself, the ‘chicks.’

I saw it in a Sharon Lovejoy book called Sunflower Houses and have wanted to plant it ever since. If anyone has children I would highly recommend Sharon Lovejoy’s gardening books. Or even if you don’t but love enchanted gardens.

Okay ~ I’ll be back…..

I’m not really back – just taking a break before I start on the pots on the deck. I had to jump in and say, though – omibob the world of dollhouse miniatures! It’s fascinating. Did you know you can actually buy an itty bitty teeny tiny jar of LEECHES for your dollhouse? What room in god’s green acre would that go in?

Okay back to the garden….

Clean up – Part 2

Alrighty then. Weeded. Planted. Swept. Now the rosebed looks a bit bare and spindly but the only greenery left in the bed was invited there. I redid two of the pots on the deck. The garden will be quieting down pretty soon but since I’m in mild Northern California I do have another month of roses. I have a long standing tradition of pruning them back on New Year’s day. I think I’ll get one more blooming out them this year.

One is never quite alone in the garden. I have to be very careful when I’m weeding, planting and generally stomping around in the garden because of these little guys. We have hundreds of them. Some of them no bigger than my thumb nail. I was just getting ready to pull out the spent petunias when he hopped onto the edge of the pot.

There is nothing quite as satisfying as spending a day out in ones garden, whether it be a cottage garden, a formal Japanese garden or just some pots on a deck.

Longing

I covet this house. It is an adorable, white farmhouse style house (no farm though) on a pretty piece of property around the corner from us. I drive past our street every now and then just so I can drive by and look at it longingly. Today I decided to drive by and take a picture. Only I feel so ~ I don’t know ~ sneaky or invasive taking pictures of other people’s property. So I’m driving by trying to look inconspicuous (as inconspicuous as you can going 5 mph with a camera stuck out the window). This is the best shot out of the two I was brave enough to take. I’m going to go put on camoflage and walk down there and take another.

Anyway this house is set back on an expanse of lawn. There is a low rail fence that surrounds the property with a big white archway over the driveway and a smaller one over the walkway. The rail fence has roses and lavender planted in front of it on one side and rosemary all along the other side. There is a long, grey gravel driveway to the right that leads back to a garage. There are actually a number of buildings that make up the property. The house itself with its little porch and its pleasing symmetry, a small granny cottage just to the left of the house, the garage and another small building, a shed perhaps. All are painted white and have pale grey shutters on the windows.

It’s just so charming and not overy sweet looking. You can’t see it in the picture above but in the big tree on the left there is a porch swing hanging from one of the large branches. If I lived here I would sit out there every morning with my cup of tea and do the crossword puzzle.

I have an affinity for little, older houses. I love the creaking, sticking windows, the worn floors, the kitchens that are designed for practicality and not entertaining. My favorite house (one I actually owned, not just stalked like my little farmhouse above) was built in the 1940’s. It had two bedrooms, one bathroom with cardboard made to look like tiles on the wall (we did renovate that bathroom), the cabinets in the kitchen were metal (another renovation), it had a hardwood floors throughout the entire house except for the kitchen and a family room that was added on later. All told it was about 1100 sf. When we redid the kitchen and the cabinets were pulled out we found a little toy car and a spelling test dated 1948. The house had a nice sized porch with room for a couple of chairs and table and a hanging boston fern (I am of a mind that all porches require a hanging boston fern).

There was a detatched garage behind the house with a laundry room and I have many memories of making a mad dash back to the house in the rain with a basket of laundry. At the very back of the long, narrow property there was a studio with a half bath which at first was a storage shed then I commandered it and turned it into my home office. We had picket fences and archways laden with Sombruil roses (bring a cut one into the house and it will perfume the entire space). It was truly a lovely place.

We wanted more room and to get out of the bay area so we sold it about five years ago. A decision we tend to regret now and then. The new owners added on to the back but kept the overall look and feel of the place. Then they moved and the people that bought it from them have totally remodeled and the house now looks like a McMansion and "has been totally stripped of any of it’s charm", according to my sister who still lives on the street.

I would love to get my hands on a similar house and lovingly bring it up to date without compromising its origins. I would rather have a small house with a big heart than one with no history or soul.

Candlelight

This entry is really for Mimi – who has her own beautiful, pressed glass goblets that she puts to more traditional use. Mine I recieved from a friend and I thought they were a perfect size for a votive candle. They look so lovely flickering on the window sill. Both from the inside where I’m sitting (at my eating area/where I sit all day working table) and from the outside, greeting people as they come up the front walk.

I love having candles lit around the house – mostly for the ambiance but also for the added bonus of the perfume they add to the air. I’m a bit picky about the scents I’ll burn. My number one favorite candle ever is the Pacifica French Lilac. Seriously ~ stop what you are doing and get one. It is the best smelling candle in the world.

In the Fall my favorite is Sweet Scents Candles "October Gave a Party" – I think I like it just as much for the name as the scent – it’s kind of a woodsy apple cider kind of scent. Not cloyingly cinnamony like most Fall candles. Sweet Scents is an online etailer but their website is under renovation at the moment.

Other notable scents – L’Occitane Lavender – nice true lavender scent, very calming. Yankee Candle Country Linen – not overly dryer sheet smelling, really nice and fresh. And a new one I just found Yankee Candle Halloween Party – smells like pumpkin pie and creamy vanilla. Makes the house smell like something really, really good is happening in the oven.

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