On Tuesday...

Sunset Maple March 23

Worked in my artroom on collage all day yesterday. A good day! When Mark came home from work, we walked the dogs and then back out to walk ourselves! Leftover corned beef and cabbage for an easy supper. The maple tree, in my backyard, is exploding with buds!

All too soon the day was over and out my other window was this beautiful sunset.

"Bobbling on the Baltic"

Working on my collage today for my class tomorrow. Satisfying a theme of "a culture collage of a particular civilization, part of the world, or period in time", this will represent my little voyage on the Baltic Sea, which was one of the adventures we had during a wonderful trip to Europe in 2004.

My canvas is 8x24. My memory is of the big white ship, the beautiful blue water and sky, the orange sun and maybe orangy fish and my orange Land End's raincoat that I almost lost, and the white gull who flew the entire time next to our ship.

I hope I can capture those memories in my collage.

Irish Soda Bread by request

Irish Soda Bread

3 cups flour

2/3 cups sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 Tablespoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup raisins

2 eggs, beaten

2 Tablespoon melted shortening or oil

1-3/4 c. buttermilk

Sift flour with sugar, soda, powder and salt.

Stir liquid into flour mixture until moistened only. Bake at 350 for 1 hour. Remove from pan immediately.

For buttermilk, I use 1 Tablespoon vinegar added to make one cup of milk.

I used oil, but have used the melted butter in the past. Either is fine.

The recipe says you can use 2 cups buttermilk to make it moist, but I have only used the 1-3/4 cups and it is very nice -not dry.

Family Day

Yesterday, we finally had our St. Paddy's Day dinner. Everyone is finally well. Corned Beef, Cabbage, Carrots, Little Red Potatoes and homemade Irish Soda Bread (below). Oh...and my chocolate cupcakes with green buttercream frosting. Before dinner, Danielle created a wonderful little dinosaur, colored with tissue paper glued on. (Thanks again to Deep Space Sparkle)

After dinner, Danielle and Aunt Julie and I went for a walk to look for signs of spring.

We are sure this is a rabbit hole. Is this the one where Alice went?

The robins were singing and the buds bursting!

And even this little spider decided to take a stroll today.

First Day of Spring! Brrrrr. Oh, but it's raining; a good sign for the green coming...
ooops! It's snowing.

It's Friday!

Friday and poetry day. I'm having my coffee in my "poets mug" this morning for inspiration.


A "toughie" assignment for homework this time. Using a noun, a verb and an adjective that each of us chose, we needed to write a poem with all of those chosen words included. These were the words of choice: elongated, yellow, glorious, dirty, smooth, wispy, garden, clock, ego, log, lake, poetry, walk, runs, sings, gives, save, sways (in any tense or form of the word). "Go for it, Sue!"

And then, helping to get ready for Lois' luncheon on April 27th at The Center on Pop-Up Books, these are a few of my favorites.

" The Movable Mother Goose"
"My Fairy Treehouse"
"Haunted House"

"The Night Before Christmas"
"Winter's Tale"
"The 12 Days of Christmas"

"Dinner Time"
"Oh My a Fly!"

And tiny pop-up books too!

Today's happenings

These sweet little snowdrops greeted us at The Center this morning for art class.

And here comes the cupcakes! It was Denise's birthday yesterday, so I made my special birthday cupcakes with green frosting. I forgot what day it was yesterday, so tried to make-up for it today. I even forgot to wear green yesterday!

Here she is...the birthday girl!

And just look at this cutie little bear that Audrey carved for Danielle. She is going to have quite a lovely collection of carvings, between "Grandpa" and Audrey!