The Secret of How to Braid Bread Without Having One End Fat and the Other Thin.

Do you ever make a loaf of bread and feel like the texture just isn't what you would like it to be?


 
Somewhere in the middle of the loaf (which is where your best sandwich slices would come from if things worked out properly) it's a little too crumbly or lacking in heft to stand up to slicing and spreading...whereas at the ends it's a little too low to make a good-sized sandwich at all?

Long ago I realized that I like my bread braided.

Honey Do, or the psychology of the individual, revealed.

I need these bright images, because today is the gloomiest, coldest day that could be experienced in late May. Except for tomorrow and the next day... We can't talk about discipline all the time, because it takes too much out of me. By now you know me and you know that I will try to get to the particulars of these questions of raising children. Heck, I haven't even finished all I wanted to say about the laundry! But you are so patient...

Instead, let's look at my compost pile. You don't see that on everyone's blog.But, on to today's main topic:

I don't know how my husband gets me to do things, but I get him to do things by making a Honey Do list.

Somehow, if it's written up there, he will get it done.

If it's not, it becomes one of those things that just is part of the landscape...you know the kind of thing?

Like the bare bulb at the top of the stairs...when you move in, you say, "Wow, how could those people have lived with a bare bulb at the top of their stairs? I mean, every day they saw that thing, didn't they? What was wrong with them?"

Then, ten years later, you go to sell the house, and you think, "We could just say 'as is' and then we wouldn't have to deal with stuff like that bare bulb..."

-- if you even see it any more, which is unlikely.

Usually those things "disappear" -- except they don't. They are there, for all to see and wonder, "What is wrong with them, that they live like that?"Well, when we moved in here, ten years ago, we hiked up this lamp with a little chain connector thingy, because it hung down too low. At first I hated this lamp and was sure that I would soon find something that went better in the room. So I just ignored it.Now, after things in here have warmed up a lot, it sort of goes, and I don't hate it. I never thought I'd say that about it, when it's so...orange...and fake-Tiffany... and all.

If I found something better, I would replace it, but for now it's fine. There's just too much else to think about...
But that chain...how dirty. How lame. How mocking!

Now, the thing about the Honey Do list is that I don't always remember how well it works! So, yes, it took me at least 7 years to think of putting this chore on there! But... at last I did!And he fixed it, fairly promptly. When it came down I gave the glass a good washing. (Fortunately I took a before picture, because we couldn't remember how the parts went back together, and I even thought that piece at the top went down, rather than up! So now you see just how out of it we are...) (and you see by these pictures how dark it is...)
Back to sunshine now!

Dear Aristotle, he's so clever.

Since the temperature got up to 90* the other day, I (re-) deployed that apotheosis of intentional decorating, my kitchen window mistreatment (nod to The Nester).





You just have to imagine it let down. It's too hard to take a picture of that way.

When I first conceived this solution, I wanted to use this fabric:

 But darling as it is, it's not bold enough for this spot.

This little embroidered tablecloth is perfect!

So much satisfaction from a problem solved...it's not so easy when it comes to raising children, is it?

Who wouldn't want a darling CorningWare refrigerator dish or classic bee book? A giveaway!

{The comments are closed! We'll have the results soon! Thanks so much to everyone who entered! XOXO!}

It's Like Mother, Like Daughter's first giveaway! It's very modest. But heartfelt.
I hope you don't judge me by my giveaway. We're not talking free cameras or any glam stuff you see on the other blogs.

Let's visit a friend of mine!

I have learned so much from my friends, some of it not very visual. I mean, I couldn't do a blog post about them that wouldn't be quite wordy, with no pictures! Yet what they have taught me comes through everything I say.

(So, friends, if your house isn't featured here on LMLD, it doesn't mean I haven't learned from you! Because I have!)

But I have one friend whose house I have wanted to show you. It's humble, compared to some houses you see on other blogs, but the inside is bigger than the outside (just as if it were a house in Narnia)...

...and that's because there is a lot of love there.

Chew on this.

A few years ago I was asked to give a talk on disciplining children.

Of course, I was all for it, as I am always one to give advice (blogging is the perfect form for me :).

Dare to repair: shabby beats none at all! -- and a book recommendation.

What can compare to the joy of having two sets of sheets for your bed, so that rather than making the poor tired hunter/gatherer wait at 11pm for the dryer to run...

because you spaced the laundry...

because you were cooking an extra batch of ground beef/cleaning windowsills/checking your blogs/rescuing a frog/reading an interesting article about the housing crisis/tuning the violin...

and the bed is naked?

The bluebird of happiness...

...is in your back yard -- did you ever hear that saying?

{I think I scandalized my children with my mint julep post :) Can't a girl have one drink a year? (Not counting the mojitos.)

Honestly, it was just the dumb day I was having up until taking that refreshing restorative that made me giddy. Had it not been Derby Day, I would have been more than content with a glass of iced tea!

Plus, I'm what they call a cheap date. Half a drink and the pictures are all of invisible mint.}

Mint juleps and making a rusty refrigerator respectable.

As we all know, Saturday was Derby Day. Now, we are not Southerners and Lord knows we are not up on our horse racing.

But for some reason, it has always been our tradition to celebrate Derby Day. Could it be...

I mean is it...

do you think...
Yes! The Chief makes a mean mint julep!!


He uses Tennessee bourbon, not Kentucky, which seems inappropriate. But it's g.o.o.d. :)

Thanks to the hot weather (not obtaining today, no, not at all) the previous week, we had plenty of mint, not pictured here.

In fact, I forgot to record this auspicious day at all until I was suspiciously auspicious myself, if you know what I mean. Not that I could have said that. At the time. It's a fabulous libation, I tell you!

And much appreciated after the day I had had, which involved an hour plus drive each way, pounding, repetitive Irish music, and intense sitting around on my part, punctuated by frantic bobby-pinning, safety-pinning, and shoe tying. Feis day in Step-Dancing Land, otherwise known as Celtic purgatory.So you see how important that glass is? (Alas, we don't have the requisite silver cups. You can tell we are not comme il faut. Not even a flower-bedecked straw hat in sight...)

On to more mundane activities.

On Sunday, we found a replacement for the outside fridge that died. (Its death was unnoticed by us. It seems that the cold of the garage was chilling our food. One warmish day I couldn't help but notice that although the motor was running, the contents were...warmish. Hmmm....)Craigslist seemed only to offer $100 models at the cheapest, so when the Chief found one for $40 in someone else's garage, he pounced.

You know us. We just have to do things cheap. And, that's okay. There is no point spending money on stuff that is going to be in the garage -- and you know it's not a CAR in there I'm talking about, anyway.I told you before, your standards are higher than mine.

It was not super clean. It was rusty. But it worked. The lady took $25 (really, she should have paid us to take it, but we needed it and she had it -- so the free market ordains).

Also, the handles were on the wrong side.
Do you know what I mean? Study the above diagram of the garage of death carefully (see there on the left, down the stairs from the mudroom?) and then check that picture.

Every single day of my life (or the life of one of my slaves*cough*kids) was going to be a little worse off for having to open this fridge on the wrong side. As I've said before, I'm all about efficiency. My middle name is Conserving Steps. Names are.

So instead I made one hour out of his life quite a bit worse -- he had to change the handles!

Not easy. Much cursing and throwing of broken tools. Some going to the hardware store for replacement bits.
But he did it! He's a good guy!


Meanwhile I scrubbed.

And I spray painted with a can of paint I just happened to have lying around! And now I have a BIG, clean, conveniently opening fridge! (I hope the rust doesn't come back, but if it does I will sand, spray with primer, which I didn't have on hand, and spray again.)

Senior Spring

As my mom mentioned last week, I just finished my senior project. Up until this past week, my head has been spinning with classes, coordinating rehearsals, editing scores, practicing piano, performance schedules (my own as well as my classmates'), writing papers, working, tutoring, etc. etc.

But now classes are over! Spring is here!



Now, of course, this means that finals week is here. In past semesters, that might have meant something like this:


But this semester, at long last, I'm a senior, and almost all of my courses are finished. So instead, this finals week looks like this:



(The weather this weekend was actually rainy and dreary. The picture is from a trip to South Carolina last year. But it shows about how I felt!)

This weekend consisted of church (I taught a CCD class this year at my parish; the kids received their First Communion yesterday), reading, and cleaning. I did hand laundry, scrubbed the bathroom, and mopped the floors--all things I've been wanting to do and haven't had time for. Today after Mass I decided to do some baking; I went through all the options in my mind--cookies, muffins, cakes--I even thought up a chocolate-raspberry pie that I'm still going to have to make at some point--but finally settled on bread. I haven't made bread in quite a while, but I was pleased with how it turned out.