The Paper is here!

My youngest daughter used to say that desirable interiors, or clothes, or anything that needed to be fashionable, were "magazine" and I think that conveyed her intent very well.  Now that my home has been "published" in the paper does that make us "magazine"?  You know we are still unconventional!  It was such fun to see our familiar surroundings pictured in the Saturday paper.  We thought Ms. Krause did an excellent job too.  Lots of new blog readers showed up yesterday as she put the blog address at the end of the story.

However, I have already changed out the quilts on the quilt-rail.  I am late in doing so as I try to rotate them quarterly and I will have new ones for Christmas.

I have blown my monthly grocery budget.  I discovered that the "Butcher's Block" has a bulk rate, that I can get a sizable reduction in the price per pound if I buy a "package".  So I have spent $99.99 for 30 pounds of meat which just fits in our tiny freezer.  5 pounds each of lean ground beef, thick cut bacon, stew beef, pot roast, sweet Italian sausage, and chicken tenders.  The meat is top quality.   The temptation to chow down on high meat dinners is powerful.  I have already considered that maybe I won't be able to make it last 4 months.  But maybe 3 months . . .
That would mean that my monthly grocery budget will be $167.00 for the next 3 months.  But I haven't figured out how to recoup the extra $100 I've now spent for October!  Read here for further news on that!

We have company coming this week, in spades.  So the menus are patch-work:
Today, Meatloaf, cheesy rice and broccoli, sliced tomatoes, canned peaches.
Monday, double-meat chili, french bread with garlic butter and Parmesan, last of the peaches.
Tuesday, company breakfast:  bacon, sausage, hot biscuits, scrambled eggs, orange juice, coffee,
supper:  hamburgers, roasted garlic potatoes, sliced tomatoes, cupcakes.
Wednesday company supper, beef stew, hot biscuits, salad with blue cheese, apple pie.
Thursday, leftovers.
Friday: company dinner:  Kuliaba, (salmon in pie roll), last of the salad, assorted leftover desserts.
Saturday:  company breakfast:  poached eggs on toast, bacon, orange juice, eat out for supper.
Sunday:  company breakfast: biscuits with sausage gravy, hash browns, yellow tomato omelet, coffee and tea, eat out for supper.

"See my beautiful big brown eyes"?

According to my Mother, that was how I introduced myself to people on the street when I was three or four  In those days we did not call them "strangers"  they would have been "passers-by".  We spoke to everyone.
We were asked to bring a childhood picture to Writing Club Tuesday night.  This was the one I chose.  Then we were asked to write about the picture or to write a letter to the picture.  I wished I had brought a teen-aged picture, if I'd had one, like the others did.  There aren't any pictures of me during high school, even though I did all the things other kids did, Prom, graduation, in the school play.  It was just that my family was disintegrating.  Dismayed, I contemplated something to say to this picture.  As often happens during our writing practice, once I put my pencil to the paper, it just poured out:

"Dear little girl with the beautiful big brown eyes:
     You're so little, sitting on that bench-not yet four years old.  What can I say to warn you about the shoals ahead?  You've already noticed that things are done very differently in Owensboro, Kentucky, where you are now, than in Chicago where you live.  Playing in Grandmother's apartment under the watchful eye of the kitchen maid while Mother and Nana are off doing whatever grown-ups do.  When the fighting began, you hid under the white clothed table.  In Owensboro a flurry of adults around you where ever you go, buying clothes like the little pink organdy dress you have on.  New shoes and socks, a pink bow for your hair.  No fighting here, at least where you can hear  You'll remember this moment all your life-see the photographer age and eventually die-like the women who fluttered  in your orbit for these few weeks.  Take all the loving, the spoiling, the flutter, and keep it, but let the fighting die.  Meanness always exists and loving is sometimes in short supply but it's weightier, so you might get less of it but it'll be enough . . . .. . "

The Hot Brown Sandwich listed on last weeks menu. It was pretty good except the sour dough bread was somewhat tough under the rich Mornay sauce.

We went on our monthly shopping trip last Monday.  Tuesday morning I replenished the pantry.  From left to right:  Powdered sugar, whole wheat flour (not much of it). 5 pounds of self-rising flour, 10 pounds of plain flour, 2 pounds of sugar.  Up above, dark brown sugar, rose hips, light brown sugar, and an extra 4 pound package of white sugar, for when I make the rose hips into jelly.  I bought the rose hips at the health food store, in bulk.


On a sunny day we went to a garage sale just a few blocks from our house.  I bought this wall hanging for $3.  You can see that the quilting is very nice

 And the piecing is very nice too.  When I took it off the frame, I found the edges compromised by light, stretching and staples that had rusted.  But the center is fine.  I have only to add surrounding fabric to have a lovely quilt.  The hard work has already been done!  I have coupons for Joanne's fabric store so I will look for some suitable colors for the borders.  Shall I make it big or child size?

When I boil eggs for us, or for Eliyah to have as an after-school snack, I always put onion skins in the water.  It doesn't look all that good.

Then when they are boiled and rinsed, they look like this.  And one can always distinguish the raw eggs from the cooked.  Besides, they look nice.  We always had brown eggs when we lived in the country.