Bookstore Trip & Comic Epitaphs

While perusing Pinterest, I've learned about a town in Wales called Hay-on-Wye.  It's also known as the town of books.  It has over 300 hundred bookstores!!  Just this little town full of books!  Katie and I took a road trip recently and spent the day in a small Minnesota town, shopping for used books.  There were at least three really great book shops (I can't imagine over 300!)  The above photo is Katie in the back of a shop that just kept on going.  When it seemed like you were at the back of the store, there'd be some little doorway and then here's this whole other room full of books.

This is the front of that same bookstore.

You know how there are stories or movies where characters get locked into some fun place overnight; like a department store or a candy store or a museum?  What would be the most fun place for you to be locked in overnight?  I guess I don't have to tell you mine - you're looking at it.  Especially if I had light and caffeine.  Here are some of my fun finds of that trip:

In the book of epitaphs, I learned that Benjamin Franklin used the pseudonym Poor Richard or Richard Saunders to write Poor Richard's Almanack.  I feel like I should have known this but...I didn't.  Interesting.
The Bat-Poet is a book illustrated by Maurice Sendak - one I'd never seen before.  And the blue book is full of fun-to-read-out-loud poems - try this one - then try it fast.  It's fun...try it...

Thinking About Writing Again

Maybe you don't remember...it's been awhile... but I was writing a book.  The main character in my book is named Claire.  I've been working with Claire for years but we keep hitting these spots where she starts driving me crazy.  Well, not her exactly but the whole process.  So, then I put all my files away.  But, always, things come around again, start nagging in the back of my mind.  Do you have something like that?  Something that you know you're going to do, you want to do, and you know you should just buckle down and do it already and yet you don't?  I called my writing pal a few months ago and said "I'm done.  I'm hanging up my hat".  This past weekend, though, I pulled my files out and...I'm very tempted to start in again even though I know it'll drive me (and everyone around me) crazy!
I made a coffee cake and, of course, some coffee and read through some of what I've got already.  I still like it.  The coffee cake I made was from a recipe, written on an old fashioned recipe card by a co-worker from college.  She made this cake often and brought it to work.  I've tried making it before but it just never turned out.  This time, though, it turned out perfect and was delicious!  Here's the recipe:
Irish Tea Cake
1/2 cup butter                  1 tsp baking powder
1 cup sugar                      1/2 tsp salt
2 eggs                              1 cup sour cream (1/2 pt)
2 cups sifted flour             1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
Let butter soften.  Cream butter, sugar, eggs.  Sift dry ingredients.  Add 1/3 flour mixture to butter/egg mixture.  Then add 1/2 sour cream an ix.  Repeat.  Add last 1/3 dry mixture.  Blend in vanilla.
Topping--
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
In greased & floured pan, put topping over butter.  Repeat twice.  Bake at 325 degrees for 50 minutes.

Savoring Sunday Afternoon

I had double discount on my membership card at the bookstore this weekend and so bought The Bookman's Tale - one that I've been eyeing for awhile but was trying to wait for my birthday!  An this afternoon we sat in the living room, reading and having snacks.  Last time we were at the grocery store, Kate found this Door County Cherry Cheddar Cheese - I know, it sounds weird but it is VERY good!  The book is so very much what I want to be reading right now.  You know when you start reading a book and you just want to lose yourself in it?  I almost (almost) want to stop reading - to drag the experience out longer.  The story starts with a man, a bookseller, in a used bookstore.  He finds a book that he flips through and a picture, a small painting, flutters out from the pages...and there the story starts.  I love it!  And I've found treasures in books before.

These are little tiny photos that were stuck in the pages of a book I got at an auction years ago.  Another book (I can't remember if it was the same box of auction books or another) had these photos and postcard in it:

Ad the inscriptions in old books:

The inscription above is from a copy of Julius Ceasar.  The inscription below is in a book, a copy of Beau Geste,  I found in the chicken coop of my grandparents farm.  It must have been a Christmas gift to my great grandfather.

Is Summer Over?

It's almost October.  I guess, officially, summer is over.  I'm looking back through photos and...we just had such a nice summer.  Our friends, the Nash's, came all the way from Maine to visit us in August.  It's funny how we rarely do the touristy things in the town where we live.  When we have guests, we take them out to "see" Minneapolis and we discover so much of our own hometown!  This is the Stone Arch bridge which reaches over the Mississippi River.  All over Minneapolis, there are these neon green bikes that you can rent, ride and return at any other bike stand around the city.  After we walked with all the kids across the bridge and partied a little at a Polish Festival, we decided to ride these bikes back across the bridge.  It was so fun, we kept riding alongside the river before returning the bikes.

And, of course, rides at the Mall of America - so close and yet...we never go!

Mark and I spent an evening at the zoo listening to Robert Cray (opening band was Lamont Cranston).

And, finally, the the great Minnesota get-together - the State Fair.  Now, we know summer is truly over.

Blueberries for All



We went blueberry picking at the river last weekend.  I now realize that I've probably riven past thousands of blueberries in my life without even knowing it.  They were right there - just a few feet off the road and way back into the meadow/swamp.  I couldn't see them from the road but as we walked in, they were everywhere!

I had many recipes in mind as we brought our buckets home; blueberry cream cheese crumbly coffee cake, moist bluberry muffins, a blueberry ice cream swirl cake with graham cracker crust...But these little berries were such a perfect combination of sweet and tart, we ate them all, straight up, right out of the bucket.  Remember the childrens' book, Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey?  We read it many, many times when the kids were little.  As I crouched down, reaching for more berries, hearing them kerplunk into my bucket, I couldn't help remembering the small bear we saw in the driveway on the river last fall and that little bear in the story - the one who kept eating berries out of the mother's bucket in the story.  We saw no bears though and came home with lots of berries.

Just Floating Along

Baseball is over.  Music lessons are on hiatus.  I refuse to print school supply lists or even think about school shopping and sports physicals.  It is summer and we're at that beautiful point of just floating along.  Things will pick up soon, I know that.  But I don't have to worry about it now.  Right now, I'm loving my time spent with my favorite people.  Spent last weekend on the lake again.

 The loons were teaching their babies how to dive.  They're diving and swimming under water yet but they are diving and staying under for a little while.  We had the radio on in the boat and Louis Armstrong's What a Wonderful World came on.  John asked, "Is this Yoda singing?"  He was kidding but still...pretty funny!
Back at the cabin we played Mexican Dominoe Train (where does that name come from?!) and then just laying in the grass looking at the sky.  Again, ahhhh...

New Asparagus Recipe

I love asparagus.  So I don't really need to find new ways to make it.  But every recipe looks so good!  Last week, we drizzled some olive oil, salt and pepper on asparagus and cherry tomatoes and then grilled them - yummmm!
A while back John spent the evening at a friend's house, had supper there, and raved about the meal for days; asparagus wrapped in ham with a light cheesy sauce.  I asked my friend (John's friend's mom) how to make them and she told me but...you know me...I forgot.  So, when I was on Pinterest the other day, I found this delicious looking asparagus, wrapped in ham with cheese sprinkling out from the sides.  I pinned it.  But when I clicked through to the website and recipe, I found this:

• około 150 g mrożonego gotowego ciasta francuskiego (najlepsze jeśli jest zrobione na maśle) lub własne z tego uproszczonego przepisu
• pęczek (500 g) zielonych szparagów, 12 sztuk
• szynka, cienko pokrojona (np. gotowana, suszona parmeńska lub serrano, użyłam szynki paczkowanej gotowanej - prosciutto cotto)
• tarty ser (parmezan, grana padano, cheddar, użyłam gruyere)

I didn't even know what language that was!  I copied and pasted it into Google Translate, hit "detect language" and "to English" and viola! I (sorta) had a recipe.  The language was Polish and it wasn't a great translation but it was enough to work from.  The wraps were delicious.  I think I'll include 3 spears of asparagus (instead of 2) next time.  John tried them and agreed they were good but...not as good as the others!  I'll ask again for that original recipe.  Here's how I made these, in English:

Ingredients:

1 pkg. (17.3 oz) puff pastry sheets

24 spears asparagus (36 if you want to put 3 in each)

24 pieces thinly sliced ham (I used Hillshire Farms prepackaged smoked ham)

grated parmesan cheese

egg yolk and 1 tsp milk

extra virgin olive oil

salt and pepper

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Thaw puff pastry according to package.  Rinse asparagus, snap off woody ends and discard.  Place asparagus in a plate and season with olive, salt and pepper.  Toss to coat.

Unfold puff pastry sheet and cut each sheet into six rectangles, place on baking tray. 

Cover with one slice of ham, sprinkle with grated cheese. Repeat.  Place asparagus spears in center of ham slice.

Wrap both pieces of ham around the asparagus.  Then wrap the puff pastry up around the ham/asparagus bundle, pressing together at seam.

Brush tops of bundles with egg yolk and milk mixture.

Bake at 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes, until golde brown.

Makes 12 bundles.

Mid Summer Check-In

Summer was a little late in arriving, here in the Northern State.  But, ahhhh...it's here now.  And we're savoring the long days - never mind that they're getting shorter each day and the school supply lists were just published, we're not paying any attention to that.  We're soaking in the warmth of the sun and living outdoors.  Fourth of July weekend was spent at Mom and Dad's lake cabin with all the grandkids (except one, ahem...).  The mess of all those kids was beautiful - life jackets, flip-flops, beach towels, bottles of sunscreen and bug spray, foam footballs and butterfly nets, dog bowls and tackle boxes.  Katie learned a new game while out with a friend and she taught it to us.  We played many rounds of "Ricky-Ticky-Bear", with even my youngest nephew joining in and almost keeping up.

Every fourth of July, the grandkids put on a holiday pageant.  They arrange lawn chairs in rows in front of the deck for us, the audience.  Then they perform; they sing songs, perform skits, tell jokes, and end with a dance-off.  As each cousin gets older, they seem to gravitate from center stage to side stage.  My oldest neice was the "applause" sign holder this year.  There's something for everyone in this show!

Yesterday we explored the Dakota Rail Trail, a thirteen mile paved bike path near our house.  Mark is a mountain biker and he loves off-roading.  But this - nearly-zero-elevation paved path winding around the lake and through wooded sanctuaries - this is my kind of biking.  After all that biking, however, we returned home feeling guilty that Rocco hadn't been able to go...so Mark and I walked him around one of our city lakes, Calhoun, stopped at the pavillion for a glass of wine and a beer as the sun set and called it a good day.

Living Room Change-Up

Here is our new "lighter" wall color and new couch covers.  There's white base trim but "we" haven't completed the door trim yet.  The crown molding is stained wood and I think we should leave it that way.  I really like the combination of stained wood with painted white woodwork - it's just trying to find the right balance that says, "it just kinda fell into place" vs. "we're still working on it".
We used to have framed photos over the couch that I got tired of.  So, I've been working on these canvases - trying for a cleaner, sparser look.  The canvases, themselves (photos from at the river), are beautiful.

But a little too sparse.  So, today, I took them down and put the Molokai, Hawaii Photos back up and I love them again - they look right.

I used the rest of the thrift store denim to make a few couch pillows.  I sewed the seams wrong-side out so that, after a couple washings, they'll fray.  I'm happy with the way they turned out.

Vegemite and Meal Planning

So many things to say...where to start?  Okay, well, I have been planning, for years, to start a meal planning habit, with week long charts filled in with what we're going to eat (and make) each day, with grocery lists an recipes and...just has never happened.  It feels so overwhelming and, I know, I know, it really isn't.  And, in the end, it will be so much easier, so less stressful, so less expensive, so much more healthy.  But still.  Never happened. 

And so, everyday about 4:00, I stand in front of the fridge and/or the pantry and wait for an idea (an easy idea) to reach out and punch me in the nose.  Also...never happens.

And now I started back to work, outside our home, fulltime, and...I NEED a plan!  I've reached out to a few friends and have started collecting their weekly menus.  And I've started listing what we have every night.  I'm going to try to pull together all this valuable information and see if I can't come up with a system that works, for me, at least.  And I will share.  Soon.

But yesterday, as I should have been grocery shopping, I was hunting down a jar of Vegemite.  We have a Mom's Book Club meeting this coming week.  We read What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty, which is a story taking place in Australia.  We always have dinner at our meetings and the dinners have started to tend towards some type of theme - the last couple were in relation to a location in the book.  So, this week, we're trying Australian dishes.  Remember that Men at Work song, Down Under?

Buying bread from a man in Brussels
He was six-foot-four and full of muscles
I said, "Do you speak-a my language?"
He just smiled and gave me a vegemite sandwich

I'm bringing, to the book meeting, Vegemite sandwiches.  They sound quite disgusting but I'm so curious to try one!  Here's the description on the Vegemite site (I can't paraphrase better than this):

Vegemite is considered as much a part of Australia's heritage as kangaroos and the Holden cars. It is actually an Australian obsession that has become a unique and loved symbol of the Australian nation.  A Vegemite sandwich to an Australian kid is the equivalent of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich to an American kid - but the taste is QUITE different!

Vegemite is one of several yeast extract spreads sold in Australia. It is made from leftover brewers' yeast extract (a by-product of beer manufacture) and various vegetable and spice additives. It is very dark reddish-brown, almost black, in color, and one of the richest sources known of Vitamin B. It's thick like peanut butter, it's very salty, and it tastes like - well let's just say that it is an acquired taste!
Australian children are brought up on Vegemite from the time they're babies. It is said that Australians are known to travel all over the world with at least one small jar of Vegemite in their luggage, for fear that they will not be able to find it.

Yum, huh?!  I saw the Chocoshrooms in the next aisle and had to grab them also -had to even snap the photo when I got in the car 'cause I opened the box right away to eat them - truly nummy!  So much for grocery shopping.  Maybe tomorrow.

Baseball and a Loss

Have I mentioned how much I love going to a baseball game?  When I know there's a game, I look forward to it all day.  I don't watch baseball on TV.  I've nothing against it and I might like it...I just don't.  Most of what I watch is Little League, mostly, of course, John's team.  While waiting for John's practice to wrap up the other night, however, I found myself drawn into some other team's game, cheering them on.  It's such a great game!  John plays a good second base, or shortstop.  He's a good pitcher.  But he really likes playing outfield.  He is always moving, running in to back up bases, dancing right and left to cover the gaps in that expansion grassy outfield.  He stops the ball and gets it into the infield. 
I remember always preferring outfield when I played softball, very briefly, in my childhood.  But I liked it for very different reasons than John does; reasons that remain true today.  I like to see everything coming at me.  I like to be distanced enough to see it coming.  I need time to react, even if it's only a fraction of a second longer.  I'm a planner and I like to be able to see the whole picture.  Having only the baseline on either side of me gets me a little jumpy.  Being in the center of the diamond would freak me out.  And being behind the home plate, fenced in by the towering ump and knowing that everything is coming at you fast with every single pitch - I can't even imagine.
Here's John flying to first base. 
Oh, I love watching this game!

Changing gears...Mark texted me this morning with some sad news of a MN loss.  Vince Flynn, a Minnesota writer died today, of prostate cancer, at age 47.  My youngest brother introduced the Vince Flynn collection to Mark just this past winter and Mark has totally enjoyed the titles he's read. 

Serialized Story

Certain things just feel romantic - not in the love way but in the old-fashioned, quaint way.  Like serialized stories; bits of a story being told in increments each ay or week or month.  In a world of excess and allowance, there's something very intential and rationed about a serialized story.  You get what you get and you must wait for the next one.  Well, actually you can usually go online and buy the e-book if you can't handle the discipline but...try.  You'll be so much more happy.
So, serialized stories/books can be found online, immediate an in abundance but finding them in the daily newspaper is the ultimate.  Last Sunday was  the first installment of a serialized ghost/love story by Minnesota author Mary Logue and was featured in our Star Tribune newspaper.  Today is the fifth day of the series which will run every day for seven weeks.  I set my alarm a little earlier today, eagerly anticipating a walk to the paperbox, a cup of coffee and an intentional read with my breakfast.
If you on't have access to the daily Star Tribune, here's a link to the story"  Giving Up the Ghost

No More Dewey Decimal

We just returned from a trip to our public library.  John was looking for books about WWI aircraft and Kate was trying to find a particularr book about fairies.  She looked the book up on the computer catalog, wrote down the number and then searched the shelves.  I tried helping her but the shelves were all in this crazy order that made no sense to me.  Every time I thought I'd deciphered it's madness, I lost my path.  So...I asked for directions.  Apparently our library system is no longer using the Dewey Decimal Classification system.  I know!  Look at these biographies - not "921"!!  And poetry is no longer in the "830"s.  Everything is now shelved according to the Library of Congress Classification system.  I don't know if this system will be taught in schools now or if it will be like the American use of the metric system and we'll spend more time trying to translate back to Dewey than we would trying to just learn the new one.  Here's a little cheat sheet of how this all makes sense:

Finally...Chicago

Last October, my mom, Kate and I had a trip to Chicago planned and this past weekend we finally made that trip.  In all my previous trips to the windy city, I've always stayed on the north side of the river.  But the hotel we always stayed at has been turned exclusively into residential apartments.  So we stayed south of the river and saw so many things I've never visited before.  Like the Art Institute and the Bean and the highest building in the western hemisphere - the Skydeck at the Sears Tower (I know, I know...it's called the Willis Tower now but, for me, it's always the Sears Tower):

We took the El from the airport to within a block of our hotel and, as we zipped along, I caught glimpses of this building with big green wings.  As soon as I would tell Kate or mom to look, however, it was too late - we'd passed the corner and they couldn't see it.  Then,...on our third day, as we walked from Millennium Park, I glanced both ways while preparing to cross a street and...there it was, the building with the green wings.  I don't know what the building is (our feet were too tired to walk the extra two block and find out!).

I have a wonderful college friend in Chicago who picked me up from the hotel on Sunday morning so we could go to church together followed by a long brunch and catch-up.  Way back when, cities were divided up into parishes.  A parish was your community and the church was where you were if you weren't at home or at work.  After mass, we had a cup of coffee in a basement area of the church which used to be the pub/bar/restaurant.  The church is very old and in constant reparation but the craftsmanship of every detail is amazing.

After we had our chance to chat, she and her husband had all of us out to their house the next day for a beautiful afternoon meal before our flight.  With a bottle of Chianti we were served cantaloupe wrapped in thinly sliced prosciutto, thick slices of buffalo mozzarella on tomatoes with olive oil and sea salt followed by a delicious pasta dish (sorry, L, can't remember the name!) with onions, pancetta, and red sauce.  And then...Nutella brownies (to die for!) served with hand whipped cream and fresh organic strawberries with hot coffee in delicate white cups.  Perfect.  Such a wonderful trip.

The Kindness of Writers

For the past several years, I have taken Kate and a few of her friends to the annual Young Author's Conference.  It is organized and put on by Success Beyond the Classroom and held on a local college campus.  As an adult, I've been to writer's conferences and am always amazed by the kindness and generosity of other writers.  I don't know why.  Maybe I expect everyone to be secretive or protective about their own ideas.  But that's not the case.  Overwhelmingly, there is an overflowing of sharing and helping and just plain friendliness.  At the YAC last week, as I sat in a central "chaperone" location, I overheard some 4th graders trying to locate their next session.  These 10 year-olds seemed so much littler than the 13 year-old (going on 28!) girls that I had with me.  The campus is sprawling and the sessions can be very spread out.  So, these girls were carrying their maps in front of their faces, glancing up at these color-coded zone signs (a session might be labeled "Basics of Editorial Writing and Cartooning - Sky Blue 337).  These two students, strangers to each other, noticed each other and here's the conversation I overheard:

Is this way Magenta?

Are you Magenta too?

Yeah.  Hi, I'm Amy.

Nice to meet you.  I'm Chloe.

I love your shirt.

Oh, thanks.

And off they went together, to learn new tips and share ideas, in their "Magenta" poetry session.  The level of maturity these kids exhibit when put into a situation where they are treated like adults and really have to fend for themselves (in a very organized and safe environment) is incredible.  They network, they rely on each other, and they grow!  So cool.

This is a scene from a book I recently bought, with beautiful sepia-toned illustrations punctuated by a red fish.  the little red fish by taeeun yoo begins with the line:

JeJe's grandfather was a librarian at an old library in the middle of the forest.

What a wonderful beginning!

The Morels are in Town!

Mark just sent me this photo.  He spotted this morel mushroom on a walk today.  Morels are a gourmet mushroom that appear elusively for a very short time in spring.  Those who hunt morels keep the location of their hunting grounds top secret, so...mum's the word here.  The mushrooms are delicious cooked fresh but can also be dried to use later.  Guess what we'll be doing this weekend?!!

Katie went on her first morel hunt when she was five - John was napping.  When you pick a mushroom, you drop it into a mesh bag (like the ones potatoes come in) so that they shake gently as you walk, releasing the spores back onto the forest floor to grow more next year.  Sometimes they're easy to find, standing right out in the middle of a clearing (bottom-ish center of photo):

But more often, they are hiding behind downed/rotten pieces of tree (right in the middle of photo):

One year, my mother-in-law gave me a bag of dried morels for my birthday and I've been very stingy with them as I was unsure when we would find more.  I guess it's time to bring out the birthday bag and re-constitute the 'shrooms!

Rain, Caffeine, Books, ahhhh....

It's sunny today but for many, many days past, it has been raining. (This is a typical Minnesota conversation opener - a comment on the weather - there's always something to talk about when you start with the weather!)  On Tuesday morning, I filled my coffee mug, pulled on my rain boots, switched on the windshield wipers and hit some local used bookstores, as well as, the book aisle at a thrift shop and oh, what a haul!  I bought books for everyone in the family plus a few gifts for friends.  I found copies of our next couple book club selections and...AND...see those books right in the middle back?  See the two on the top with mainly yellow spines?  They are Geronimo Stilton books.  Kate had nearly the whole collection when she was younger.  She loved them.  They formed the person she has become (in a good way).  And at some point, on a day I was actually cleaning house,...I got rid of them.  I can't believe I did it.  I don't know what I was thinking.  And I so regret it.  The books are so funny and clever and FULL of personality.  So, I will buy them when I see them.  I will get her collection back (even if it ends up being a graduation gift...from college!)