Last Minute Easter Dinner

Of course, as usual, our life is crazy and I don't think ahead about any details as I am usually just trying to keep my head above water with a million or so things on my plate, so holidays always tend to sneak up on me. Every year I swear I'll plan better next year..... uh huh....sure I will.

I had the revelation (Saturday) maybe I should dig the Easter stuff out? Fortunately, I at least had the presence of mind during the week to plan a simple menu and make a grocery shopping trip Friday, but I had forgotten all about the decorations! Seems like every year I forget about many of the small treasures I have accumulated. I find stuff in July and think, oh wow, I forgot we had this (again) - I MUST remember this for next year.....

Maybe if we ever get out of the "renovation" stage of our house, I'll get things slightly more organized, but until then, it seems impossible. I suppose it's because nothing can be put away properly - things end up being moved around, and I can't seem to keep up with where it all ends up getting moved to. Plus, we don't have much storage space to begin with (800sf remember?). We certainly do not have enough space to store all holiday decorations in one place - so we have things in closets & cabinets...in the shed....and in our storage room we rent. I try to keep track of it in a notebook.....but it's no easy task (esp. for ME)

In previous years I have forgotten about using my good china, so I was determined to remember this year. We have never used it for a meal since I bought it. Well, only for coffee and cake a couple times. I did not opt for china when we got married, I went for nicer everyday dishes, because my mother and her mother and her mother all had gorgeous expensive china which was always packed up and never used! Maybe Great Grandma used hers sometimes, but not in later years. Her's might actually be worth something today as a collectible, it was Haviland Limoges, purchased around 1915, when she got married. Both her parents and my Great Grandfather's parents were big landowners, legislators and business owners, so they were well to do and the china was expensive for those days. However, it was lost or stolen (probably by one of the kids) after being stored above their store for years. I have no idea what happened to my Grandmother's china, and my Mother's was lost in storage during one of the many moves we made as I was growing up. I decided, what is the point to buy it, never use it, then lose it.


The catch is....we (the females in my family) all LOVE DISHES. My mother and sister in-law love them as much as my family. There is just something about dishes that calls to me. Beautiful objects which are as useful as they are decorative. Having just the right piece for each course etc. Collecting....or as Stefan says...."nesting". My sister-in-law always shops for china, during one of her quests, she got me looking on ebay for the same brand of china, made in a small factory nearby where her mother grew up in Germany. I was into ferns at the time. I still love ferns - and I found these dishes. No bidders. I couldn't let them go unloved. The shipping was more than the dishes...but the total amount was $100. There were 12 complete place settings and many extras were included: berry bowls, bread plates, serving pieces.....etc... an AWESOME deal. I would not have purchased such a thing at full price, but for $100? why not? I do not think it is the finest china, but it's delicate finely made porcelain and in excellent condition - almost no wear, no chips and the gold painted trim was still almost like new. I have one wall of cabinets, floor to ceiling with plenty of room to store them.....so why not? But I vowed to myself, "as God is my witness, we WILL USE THIS CHINA!"

I had thought last year at Easter, DARN - why didn't we use the china? It's perfect for Easter.....I told myself......ok, next year. I even planned to buy a new mint green hemstitch table cloth to use with them, but never got around to it. Then, I almost forgot AGAIN! But, at the last minute while I was beginning to prepare dinner....it came to me! YAY ME!!

Darn, no hemstitch tablecloth. Place mats just would not do, ugh, I have to iron the damask table cloth I have. So, while waiting on the potato galette in the oven I dragged out the ironing board and the damask table cloth & napkin and ironed them. You know, I always dread doing this, but in reality it only took about 10 minutes.

I then remembered....duh....I HAVE BAMBOO GOLD flatware I have been acquiring specifically to go with this china, which I also found on Ebay a few years back. (oh if you only knew how much bamboo flatware I have now, but that story can be for another day). I also remembered I had recently acquired some mix-matched vintage glasses that were given to my Grandmother as wedding presents in the early 1940's. There were only a few left, not a complete set, so my fussy mother and grandmother didn't want them.....oh well....their loss! They wouldn't use them anyway.


While cooking, I sent Stefan to the field near our house to pick a few wildflowers for the table. Shhh, don't tell the neighbors..... of course, the city will come mow the field soon anyway :( but actually, that's a good thing...sad for the wildflowers, but they'll be overtaken by taller weeds soon anyway.

My mother-in-law (as I mentioned) is German, and it is typical to have a decorated Easter tree (she usually uses pussy willow branches, which might be traditional, but that takes far more effort, finding and buying them....somehow it seems to elude me every year)

We have two little trees which produce some type of very sour cherry, so I have been cutting branches to use at Easter the last couple years. Last year, Easter was early enough the blossoms were still blooming! I decorated them with little Easter ornaments I bought at Target in college (you can see, I am in the process of recovering our dining chairs in white leather - I have one and a half done so far - I'm taking photos of that process to document soon)




I also managed to dig out my "Easter" bin from the shed, so I laid out a little spread of all my little Easter treasures I have slowly collected. I thought I had given that blue/green basket to Goodwill (I made that bow YEARS ago), but it was one of the items I found through the year. I had been storing it at my Grandmother's house and forgot all about it.

Next, I died some Easter eggs. Now if I were organized, I'd have made some fancier ones.....oh well, maybe next year. At this point, I was glad to have anything. Many past years I haven't bothered.

Note the black egg - actually just made a mistake when trying to make purple, but it's Stefan's favorite color, so it's especially for him!


One year, when one of my nieces was about 6 years old or so, she spent a few days with us before Easter so we made these little bunnies and chicks out of cotton balls. I saved them and put them out every year.


Ok....now for the food.

Ham with Apricot-Mustard Glaze
Potato-Leek Gruyere Galette
Asparagus-Pea-Radish Medley

VOILA



Impressive...if I do say so myself!

but, honestly....looks can be deceiving....and presentation is EVERYTHING

How 'bout those bunny napkin folds??

While Stefan was out picking wildflowers, I quickly looked up how to fold them....a new addition to my Easter repertoire.

The most difficult thing about this meal was..... buying the groceries and digging out all the decor/china/linens etc. Thank-you Martha Stewart for the menu which came straight to my inbox the week before.

A big time/mess saver: I didn't follow the recipe for a big ham...it would have been too much for the two of us anyway, so I decided to buy one of those pre-cooked hams where all you do is slice and warm. The glaze was simply apricot preserves and mustard powder, and was quite tasty. I served it warm on the side. The potato-leek galette, while it looks very impressive, was merely a matter of slice/shred and assemble. I used a Zyliss mandoline - a slicer I got a couple years ago at Bed, Bath and Beyond - which is AWESOME and will cut perfect slices (including your fingers, so use the finger guard gadget!) super fast. I used the thinnest setting. If you don't have one, I really think it's worth the investment of about $50, mainly because of the time it saves. Use your BBB coupon, and it will be 20% off! Also, check ebay!

Just a note:

If you go for another brand, just be sure to get one with various thickness settings, a sturdy stand and get one with a hand protector thingy!!! Yes, I have sliced my finger. Luckily not too severely, but enough to make me really careful now. I was not using the hand protector thingy, now I ALWAYS do.



Here is the galette fresh out of the oven, before it was flipped onto the platter

I even sliced the leek on the mandoline.



To serve, I flipped it out onto a plate, then took a second plate (the one you will actually use to serve it on) and flipped it again (if you try this, be sure to do it over the sink and have a cloth ready to wipe the drips off the bottom of the plate so you don't get the juices on your table cloth)

The veggies only required steaming. The peas were frozen. I sliced the radishes on the mandoline also.



Now for Dessert

I didn't plan this too well....ok...I didn't plan this at all......but it worked out beautifully.

I had some fresh raspberries intending to make a cake or cupcakes to serve them with. Well, I didn't have time for all that.....I spent half the day Saturday with neighbors in the park killing poison ivy, then some good friends stopped by for a quick visit.....then I had an Ebay issue come up (have been selling on ebay on the side), and finally decided decorations had priority over cake. So, this afternoon after dinner (yes, as in after Easter dinner) I wondered what the heck I could make that would not be too complicated. I was kind of thinking some type of pudding like thing. I remembered how much I like sabayon, it definitely should be good with fruit. Is it hard I wondered? Will I need 25 ingredients that I don't have? So, I pulled out my trusty "Joy of Cooking" and discovered - WOW - 3 ingredients! Sugar, egg yolks, and champagne..... I can do this

So this brings me to one of my PHILOSPHIES FOR LIFE

I know many people don't usually have champagne on hand - but YOU SHOULD.

.............becuase life is too short NOT to have a bottle of champagne always chilling in the refrigerator!

Seriously!



Sooooo, I had some prosecco leftover from New Years, just waiting for the right occasion. Yes, it keeps that long....


for more info, see my post about CHAMPAGNE


Back to dessert.......I literally "whipped up" a half recipe of champagne sabayon (zabaglione if you are in Italy) in about 15 minutes. I had no idea it was this easy. You whip egg yolks, sugar and champagne (or other wine - for zabaglione, it's traditionally a marsala wine) over a double boiler for 10 minutes. I don't have a double boiler (partly for space reasons) so I use a glass heatproof bowl over a pot of boiling water.

I served the light as air concoction over the raspberries in Grandma's lovely glasses and it was a wonderful end to a nice meal.



Maybe next year I'll really plan a little better.....

(naaaaahhhhh)

HAPPY EASTER!

Grand Entrance

Ok, I'm bad.....didn't I tell you I rarely stick with anything? My latest obsession, Facebook, has had me very distracted. I received a post on my blog recently, and realized I definitely have some projects to show off. Time to post something new!

Since last post, nearly a year ago, we have actually accomplished quite a bit! This picture is a representation of "before" we had much done to the exterior of our house. Taken in July 2007 when we had just had the cedar shingles replaced, but they weren't quite finished yet....you can still see some tar paper on the roof peak.

Here is a nice "transitional" photo of the front. We have fixed the fascia, upgraded the trim around the door, replaced and painted the columns. Also, the front door was scraped and sanded. Unfortunately it remained like THIS for waaaayyyy too long. UNTIL.......















TA DA!! House all painted!! The two windows shown have now been restored and the front door finally painted (just last week). Of course we still have lots to do.... I just wish those darn shingles would fade...but the plan is also to add layers of smaller higher quality cedar shakes. This is just the "rough" base layer. Landscape is also needed, of course. Plus our new gutters and lamp were installed summer 2008. It took some time for me to adjust, the lamp seemed so HUGE at first....but most of the lamps we saw while shopping were gigantic like this..... I am have come to accept it and decided it actually makes a bold statement. Landscape will help hide the very unattractive "cement" skirt - common to all these old pier and beam houses. I suppose as a side task I should at least paint that piece of plywood grey - as we just used an old stray piece of plywood to cover it up when we had to tear a hole to get under the house right to replace the water main. We had a great deal of work done July 2007, right around the time we were planning a major trip to Germany (talk about stressful), and it wouldn't stop raining so our contractor was behind schedule. Of course, now we WISH it would rain like that!

Me Painting (proof)

the wrens built a nest so we painted around them and waited until all the babies were raised and left the nest before we could finish

The back deck last spring - looking forward to sprucing things up again this year, it's been awfully dry so hopefully we'll get some more rain to help green things up!



Resident lizard living behind our new Electric Panel - many of may recognize this as "Geico" - but those commercials are incorrect! We have lots of these here - and this type of lizard is not a Gecko - it is an Anole which is related to the Chameleon - and yes, these do change colors depending on their background and the temperature outside.

Below is the new Electric panel - not pretty - but highly important!


Below - more proof I DO actually work on our house! Here I am working on the baseboards - taping and painting. (According to my husband, this is rare, men) I also countersunk all the nails, filled, and sanded all those little holes


Next photos are of the crown molding. Then I'll stop for today! I do have most of the seams filled and sanded, as well as nails countersunk and filled but not quite all sanded - as soon as I finish sanding the molding, I can finally paint it. We have one window complete, which I will post soon, and the 2nd window is in process.


Stefan installing crown in living room

you can see how we layered and built up the crown and the door frames


Here is a corner seem which I then fill with putty and sand - I have already filled and sanded the nail holes here.



and here is a picture of the carport - you can see the new roof also



The newly painted black front door made a HUGE impact!



LASTLY....BUT NOT LEAST

HAPPY BIRTHDAY STEFAN!

I love you!

Ok! That's all for today...stay tuned!

Theeeeey're baaaaaaack!!!!

I had to post again. While I was setting up to glaze a window... lo and behold, what to mine eyes do appear!!! but GOLDFINCHES! They are EARLY! They generally don't arrive until November. Thanksgiving-ish. I haven't seen them in quite some time. Now, there is one recognizable male which leads me to believe they may just be permanent residents. It's not like I have them tagged or anything, but I can tell by a distinct black cap on one brightly colored yellow male. It was so sweet. The male waited patiently on our rod iron table while the female ate seeds. He sat there while she ate for a good 5 minutes or so. She then fluttered to the clothesline & waited a moment for him to eat, but she was less patient and left. He very quickly stopped eating and followed her, not letting her out of his site.

I haven't managed to take down my upside-down goldfinch feeders since spring. Mainly because I kept seeing the little things lingering about. In fact, they made appearances every now and then, even in July. In the past they seemed to all disappear in the spring. I have read while many migrate north for the summer we have some permanent residents in these parts. In fact, I distinctly remember this black-capped male as one of the very few lingering around each afternoon late into summer.

However, I haven't seen them in a while and today they made a reappearance. I had to call my husband at work to tell him.

Below is the female goldfinch eating at the feeder. The upside-down goldfinch feeders filled with niger/thistle seed really are the best way to attract them and keep other birds and SQUIRRELS out. Available at many home improvement type stores and very inexpensive. Except the seed is more than your typical seed but I generally only buy one or 2 small bags per season which run around $8 to 12

Isn't she sweet. As I was trying to take these shots from my bathroom window...a hummingbird flew to the feeder so I quick got a picture of her too, posted below. She's hard to see, but she's sitting down getting a drink to the right of the feeder. It's located next to my mandevilla which has really taken off in the past few weeks.

Allow Me to Introduce Myself......

I'm Melissa....I live in a small house in Austin, Texas. I can't fit all my shoes or clothes in my closet or my dishes in my cabinets, yet I still love our little abode. Well, ok....in all honesty it may be more accurate to say I put up with it because we love our neighborhood. However, there are truly many reasons to feel good about living in a smaller home! (of course, I have to convince myself all the time). For one, our utilities are cheaper. When we painted our house, it only took about 5 gallons of paint. I can clean it all in about an hour or two (depending on just how dirty it is & how thoroughly I clean it, of course). It has forced me to rethink "STUFF" and how much of it I am willing to put up with. I am forced to really think when I'm shopping...do I have a place for this? This saves an amazing amount of money also. Plus, it has a very intimate cozy feel to it which I have determined, through our experience living here, people must like....because they all tend to want to congregate at our place, even so everyone we know has a much larger place. Have I convinced you to downsize yet?

I'm not very good at describimt myself and my life in a nutshell, so I think I'll just unfold slowly as this goes along, assuming I stick with it, because I rarely stick with anything. For now, what finally inspired me to come up with this name and theme is something predominant in my life. I live in an 800 sq ft "bungalow" or "cottage" in Austin, TX with my husband - sans kids. I've been a proponent of small house living since we moved in here 4 years ago, (out of necessity, I must admit).  The concept has really caught on since then. We moved in mainly for the neighborhood, the house might have been bulldozer material to most people. Around here it is quite common to purchase the house for the lot, bulldoze the house and build a McMansion. Not us. We couldn't afford that, for one. Our realtor joked, we basically bought the lot, and they threw in the house for free! It was a great deal, but slightly stretched our budget at that time. The house was in overall good condition except for the kitchen, which needed major work. Structurally the rest was very sound, it just had a big case of the "uglies". It still does. The outside is likely the ugliest house in the neighborhood - definitely the ugliest on our street. But we are working on it.

What floors me, of our families and friends, everyone seems to want to always come to OUR house! I am not complaining however, because this I take as the greatest complement. I like to believe there must be something warm & inviting about our little abode (and/or us?) What's crazier, we seem to always have tons of company and the place is only about 1/2 finished being renovated. We don't even have any living room furniture at the moment and have tools/supplies all over the place.

My theme is not going to be so much about living in a small house....because there are all sorts of blogs about that.....but more about living fully in spite of living in a small home....maybe try to show you can live well regardless of where you live? I love cooking, gardening, crafts, sewing etc. and I'll share our renovating projects as we go. I like to think we LIVE LARGE in our tiny house....I strive to "do it all" in defiance. My family & friends teasingly call me Martha.....and I admit I'm a Martha Stewart junkie. While everyone else loves to hate her, I totally admire her intelligence, practicality (and impracticality), style and her HOUSES. I EVEN STRIVE to be more like her!! (not the mean bitchy part). I'm a really long way off from being anything like her, but I keep trying. I totally buy into her concept of "Living". Martha is very misunderstood. The concept is not really about perfection, it's about doing all those little extra things - like keeping your drawers nicely folded and smelling like lavender. It's about NOT sacrificing form for function with the items you use daily. It's about taking time to hang your linens out on the line! or dining outside with the good dishes and real glasses and silverware! or even adorning your table with some flowers you grew yourself! It's about taking a few extra minutes to send a real card on real paper, and not just sending a pre-bought card, or worse, just sending an email! Lastly, it's not about the price of the wine, it's about serving it in real wine glasses and enjoying it with friends. It's about living well. And, proving that it can be done on any budget.