Save-A-Step Cooking, Or, Economic principles come to the home kitchen.

We're excitedly getting ready for Nick's wedding, and I don't have access to any interesting pictures at the moment. But I wanted to tell you that alert reader Cora pointed out that my link to Worksheet V wasn't doing the right thing.

{BUT-- now further updated to link to an actual post!}

I am happy to tell you that now it is!! So my deathless prose, so long awaited by all (although, if so, why was only Cora concerned that the link wasn't right? Hmmm??? People, you are missing the sidebar!), is now available.

Talk amongst yourselves until I get back in the saddle. Get some sleep, wake up, exercise (but don't ask me how to fit it into your day; I'm sure I don't know), do some laundry, and do some efficient cooking!

XOXO
Leila

My secret to getting up on time. Not for morning people.

So. How much do you hate waking up in the morning?

Me too.

If you live for jumping out of bed and are an amazing morning person, I love you, please go away.

If you drag yourself out from under the covers every day, late, can't function until the second cup of coffee, feel paralyzed by the nursing baby and overwhelmed by the messy beds, and never even get dressed until noon, read on.I will help you. Because you can't possibly be as averse to the morning as I am.

Everyone else will tell you to get up on time and take a shower, but I will tell you HOW to do that! It's my secret, and I'm sharing it with you!

First of all, decide what is on time for you.

Never mind your neighbor who wakes up in an hour that begins with a "five" and works out, prays, and cleans her house before her family even stirs. We will never be like her and we are just going to try not to hate her.

No, you and I have to change our thinking. Let's figure out what is the latest possible time you can get up and be ready for the fixed point in your schedule.

What would that fixed point be? Hubby leaves for work at 7:15, and you'd like to kiss him goodbye?
{Did you know that men who kiss their wives goodbye in the morning have a lower rate of heart disease than men who don't? Fact.}

Kids have to catch a bus at 6:50? Mass starts at 7?
For me it was the latter that finally made me figure out what to do with my sorry sleeping-in self.

I wanted to get to daily Mass.

Let's say for the sake of argument that you've been getting up at around eight...fifteen, and your kids often get up earlier than you and sort of run amok, spilling various liquids while getting their cereal, playing dinosaurs in the living room, maybe even (gasp) watching TV. You never even get to schooling until after lunch, when you've dug out of the mess.

So even when you do get up, there's sort of a mountain of chaos created, as it were, while you were sleeping; as if it's not enough to face the one from the day before.

You feel grubby, milk-stained, bleary, and disoriented. There is a vague sense of guilt tinged with defiance as you face, day after day, the knowledge that your husband's last look at the house has been...this, with an admixture of relief that at least it wasn't...you in your present state.

What to do?
You've tried setting alarms. You've tried not caring. But you know that you need to get up at your "on time" -- for the sake of argument, let's say 7. And you just can't do it!

{And note that I'm not saying that each and every one of us should get up at 7. I get up at 6:15 -- an unthinkably early time, for me --your "on time" might be 9 or noon -- maybe you are a nurse with a night shift-- or 6 or 4:30 am.

Maybe you just had a baby. Don't stress out about getting up. Please use your common sense here.}

Here's the secret: stop thinking of your target time as early or even on time. Try thinking of it as

actually a little late.

Now in the next week, start trying to get up at, for example, 7:45 instead of 8, and think of 7:30 as pretty darn early.
The first day will be terrible, because likely you aren't going to bed at a good time either. Struggle through and do what you have to to get to bed "on time" -- probably an hour earlier than you have been (I'm basing this all on me, you realize, so adjust accordingly). If you have trouble falling asleep, I have a few suggestions:

1. Cut out all caffeine (including coffee ice cream) after 10 am. (By the way, it recently dawned on me that perhaps my nursing babies' trouble with sleeping was all the caffeine they were getting from me. Sigh.)

2. Don't take a nap for the adjustment period.

3. Work in 15-minute increments rather than going all cold-turkey. You have a sleep cycle that's hormonal and you have to work with it.

4. Relax your jaw as you fall asleep. Make an effort to open your mouth with your lips together, if that makes any sense at all!

5. Try to take 20 slow, deep breaths in a row. This is amazingly hard to do. Relax your jaw and breathe slowly. After about 5 you will realize that you are as tense as an adder. Start again! Keep trying, and soon it will be morning!

6. Make sure you take your iron and vitamin D or cod liver oil.

After a few days, start thinking of 7:30 as a little late and and 7:15 is quite early, hopelessly so. You can set your alarm for 7:15 and enjoy sleeping a bit late -- until 7:30!

You get the idea?

As you do this, start pondering the issue of the shower. If you can find a way to get yourself in the shower first thing, do it! Do you need a hook for your towel? Do you need a good bathrobe?

Don't make taking a shower an adventure -- a daily safari!

Don't force yourself to make a brand new decision every day to take a shower -- do you know what I mean?

"Okay, well, it's ten o'clock, the plumber is coming, maybe I better get in the shower, although he might get here before I'm done, gee, what should I do..."

Be showered without undergoing this kind of decision-making process, which is exhausting, daunting, and paralyzing! Figure out what you need, make it handy, and take a shower before anything else happens. Make it a habit, not a decision.

That way, you are ready for the plumber as well as the unexpected visitor, not to mention your husband and kids!

It's all very well to be a disheveled mess every morning when your kids are little. But you kind of want standards as they grow. You want them to know that you like to look good around them; that you are not okay with being a disheveled mess in their presence, just because you are close to them.

The most important thing you can do to be a more loving mom, a happier wife, a more efficient housekeeper, a more intelligent homeschooler -- is being rested, clean, and dressed! (Well, don't forget meals and laundry over there on the sidebar---->)

Now, that's not so much to ask, is it?

{You know, I'm all for talking about the ideal of the vocation of the wife and mother, but at some level it's sort of a job. It is at least a responsibility. What would you think of a worker who was consistently late and ungroomed for her job? Ouch.}
Is your hair a problem? Does this seem like a random question?

When my kids were little, my hair was long, thick, and curly. It took all day to dry and made me so cold in the winter that I became somewhat immobilized.

Could a perky, easy haircut make things run more smoothly? If so, the expense is incredibly worth it. A trip to the hairdresser in this case is the equivalent of a new vacuum cleaner, a running car, a deep freezer. While you are at it, buy a blow dryer and some good products.

Wouldn't everyone be happier if you didn't have the same tight ponytail every day? Not to sound all What Not To Wear-ish or anything, but do what has to be done to not hate looking in the mirror every morning.

Are clothes a problem? Sometimes stay-at-home moms don't get up because they dread looking in the closet. Think about what you wish were there and get it! Maybe you need a few more very practical items. Maybe you need some inspiring cute items. Maybe you have only one outfit to nurse in!

Don't let it stop you that you need clothes. Go to Marshall's and get some. Just a few, good, attractive things to put on, already.

Buy yourself some nice foundation make-up, very sheer; eye liner that is appropriate for your coloring; a little blush; a nice lip gloss. You already have a whole extra half-hour to work with! Get dressed, gel your hair, put on a smidge of makeup, and --VOILA!

What about the baby? Can I suggest a playpen? You need a safe spot to put the baby while you go to the bathroom. Playpens seem all last century, and someday I'm going to write a post about how it's a shame they went out of fashion.

Oh well. If you can stick the baby in bed with an older kid while you shower, do it! If your husband can take the baby out of bed so you can get up, let him!

Eventually you will get to the point where you consider your "on time" time a little on the late side, actually. You will not mind getting up because you will feel more in control of your fate and less like you are battling a rogue force from the jungle, complete with strangling vines. You might even make your bed before you leave the room :)You will never really like it, but you can do it! If I can, so can you!

Tomorrow I'll tell you a secret. Today I'll tell you about chicken taco salad.

Do you realize that even though it's high summer right now, in two weeks it will be time to be ready for school? This is a state of affairs that comes once a year, finding me with the same exact sense of astonishment I had the previous year.

So you are readier than I am, most likely.
But I'm going to tell you a secret that will make things a lot better, even if you don't have your curriculum all planned out or your notebooks all bought.

Hint: it's about getting up on time, and I will tell you how. Tomorrow.

Of course, you've already committed to making menus using your very own tailor-made family menu master plan, right? Because "they" -- and you know who "they" are!! -- have to eat, every day, often more than once!

You have time to get on it, don't worry. A refresher is over there on the sidebar.

People scoff at the idea that you can plan a week or more's worth of menus, or that you need to, but I scoff at them!

I bite my thumb at them!

How are you going to go shopping, efficiently, if you don't know just what to make? And how will you know just what to make if you don't figure out, once and for all, what you and your own particular family actually likes to eat?



It's true: sometimes the menu doesn't work, no matter how careful you were to plan it with your day's activities in mind. Someone gets sick, you forget to defrost, you ran out of a key ingredient -- these things happen!

So you do need a few things up your sleeve and in your freezer -- "anytime" menus that can be relied upon to fill the gaps. Not every meal should be one of these quickies, because families need stewed, simmered, and roasted foods that have had a lot of time put into them -- but some can!

You really don't need recipes, which are all around you -- you need menus!

Ideas? Pasta with sausage slices, green beans or peas, and a creamy sauce, Italian or pita bread to go with.
Steak! Some nights speed is more important than cost, yet steak is cheap if you buy a sirloin cut when it's on sale and freeze it. And even if you pay full price, it's cheaper than eating out!

Make sure it's at least an inch and a half thick, panfry or grill it, salted, 7 minutes per side, and slice it thinly. And it's fast. The key is the sides: plenty of baked or twice-baked potatoes (quick in the microwave, no different from oven-baked if you finish them off there) or oven fries, corn, a big salad, and garlic bread.
Even though I encourage you to check out recipes from places where they are well tested by professionals (like Gourmet), my aim for the fall is to have frequent posts for you on how I get menus done, with specific directions.

Meanwhile, I'm posting photos of a supper I pulled together very quickly using a few sauteed chicken breasts I had set aside in the freezer after making a big batch of chicken parmesan a few weeks ago. {Ever wonder what to do after you run out of bread crumbs (there are never enough bread crumbs)? Just saute the rest gently and freeze. Another day, when you've cleverly made too much rice, have some somewhat sub-par tortilla chips, and a couple of avocados, you will have a quick taco salad.}

I go into the details of refried beans from the pantry and homemade salad dressing to which you add cumin and coriander because I find it stifling to think in terms of a recipe for a dish and liberating to think of a menu. Maybe you do too?
The key to a meal like this is to use your pretty thrifted dishes! For some reason there is always enough food if it's laid out attractively -- yes, on a regular week night when it's "only us" -- and everyone gets to choose the elements on their plate. Starchy sides like rice and refried beans are a must for kids. Salad alone is not enough! It's enough for you and for me, but not for them.
Condiments are just festive, you know? If you stock up on marked down canned goods, you are all set with your pantry items when the moment comes to make that chicken go farther than it's gone before!

Thanks to Jen at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam for the link! Oh, and you've worked on the laundry too, right? Make sure before school starts you take a day to clear out the laundry room, getting all that camping stuff put away and towels washed (with 1/4 cup of bleach in the water).

Read up on how to organize, finally, your laundry system. Even if you have more than four kids, you can still be on top of laundry with one day a week of focus and two loads on the other days.

Tomorrow I'll tell you about how I got myself up in the morning, at last. If I can do it, so can you!

Quick homemade baby gift, frugal and bright!

A friend's baby was baptized on Saturday. I would have loved to make her a quilt, but I'm a little behind on quilting at the moment!

But I have a fun gift to make that couldn't be easier and in some ways is more useful than a quilt that I thought I would show you.
You know, hobbies can be expensive! If you love textiles, like I do, you might end up spending the grocery money on things that aren't even in a finished form...

...you aren't even eating beans because I bought you a cover for your bed; you're eating them because now I have something on a shelf that some day, when I'm not spending all day figuring out low-cost meals using beans, I'll make into a bed cover for you!

Not good.

So I have learned a couple of things about this craft of mine. First, you need a stash. The stash is your friend, if you visit it often and know what is in there! The stash does not help you if you simply add to it in that mindless way you have of doing. I mean me.
Second, you must limit yourself to buying fabulous fabric on sale only, unless it is just too truly breathless to pass up, in which case you must punish yourself by foregoing its cost in some other area, which is hard, because you probably don't spend money on yourself in any other way. Well, maybe in ice cream, which would be hard to give up.

But most of all, you have to keep your eye out for good fabric at yard sales and thrift stores. You have to know that the back of a shirt you would never wear can yield a fat quarter of cute material.

That a mismatched sheet or tablecloth can make a good backing. That a skirt in a hopelessly outdated fashion can be transformed into a pillow.

Train yourself to think outside that box!
The flannel of this blanket is from a sale at JoAnn's. I know I will need flannel for baby blankets, and two yards is perfect for a crib sized quilt, so I don't have to have an exact pattern in mind to know how much to buy.

It doesn't make sense to go shopping each time you have a project, and often the cute things aren't there when you do. So when you see something adorable on sale, snap up your pinks and your blues!
The plaid was a huge pillow sham from Linens and Things that I found at a thrift store the mother of the baby frequents as well (in fact, I was there because she had found a gorgeous Pottery Barn sheet there, and I was hoping to come across something similar) -- and it's Indian cotton!

It's so bright and cheery; far too much so for a pillow in any bedroom of mine. I took apart all the seams, which rendered a somewhat narrow, large intact piece. I cut it in half and sewed the long sides together, making it a better shape for a blanket.

For a blanket you don't need batting (so, no quilting) and you don't need binding. You just sew your two pieces right sides together. And every baby needs something like this: bigger than a receiving blanket, soft on one side, cool on the other, grab and go or throw in the crib.

In this case I cut the long sides equal and left the short sides unequal.
Sewing the long sides together, I turned it right side out and then folded over and topstitched the short sides to finish, making a self-binding so that the plaid shows on the flannel side at the ends. Then topstitch the long sides so that the whole thing just needs to be folded when it comes out of the wash to keep its shape!

This bright color matches how I feel about little Phoebe, a bright beautiful baby!

Thanks to Ann Kroeker for the link!

Happy Anniversary, sans pickles

I was planning on posting about my parents' anniversary today, and I'm not going to let my mom lumping it in with her pickles prevent me!

Because thirty years of happy marriage is worth celebrating.



In fact, I'd say that my parents' example of a loving, giving marriage and the happy home that they preside over have a lot to do with the two weddings in our family this summer - they're a wonderful advertisement for married life!


Many of you noticed my wedding veil, which is indeed the same one my mother wore. See? Habou and Mama, thirty years ago today:

Mama and me, five weeks ago:


Happy Anniversary, Mama and Papa - Philip and I are just twenty-nine years and eleven months behind you. I hope we do you proud!

It's because I love you so much that my camera smells like a pickle.

Today is a biggie! It's the thirtieth wedding anniversary for me and the Chief!

What should we do?

Let's make pickles the LMLD way! (Don't worry, we're celebrating for real! I'm just kidding you.)

When I say I over-intellectualize, pickling could come to mind.


This is an activity grasped and carried out by many housewives. Yet it took me many years to get my courage up to undertake it.

I didn't think I'd poison anyone, necessarily (although I didn't discount the possibility, either). It's more the process that just left me feeling at sea. I had questions. And my questions weren't always answered by what I read.

{The book I like best so far is this one:



(in an older edition I found at a book sale, which right there is problematical; you really want the most up-to-date information when it comes to canning).}

Maybe you are one of the ones who grew up watching jars being put up, and to you it's second nature to handle a batch of produce without too much crazy looking up of exactly what you should do.

If you are, now would be the time to read a different blog.

But if you are like me, I have here for you a post on how I make bread-and-butter pickles, just as if you were here at my house when I was happening to make a batch of pickes. I'm not trying to replace the canning website or the reference manual, I'm just here to talk you through what I do.

Not because I don't know very well that there are finer sites with better pictures of professionally tested recipes, all at your fingertips on Google. But because sometimes you need someone a little bit less...perfect...to clue you in that if she can do it, so can you!

First, to prevent excessive over-intellectualization, put on a cute vintage apron.


Okay. So. Question number one. Can you use your dishwasher to sterilize jars? Answer. No.

You can clean your jars in the dishwasher, but you have to sterilize them by boiling them for 10 minutes. (Although I still wonder if using the hi-temp cycle would do it...not for actual canning, but for pickles and jams...)
It's just as easy to set up your sink with a basin of soapy water. I keep my jars and lids out in the garage for the most part. They get pretty dusty and dirty out there. It's okay. Just get a clean dishcloth and your nice hot soapy water ready. When they are washed, rinse them and put them on the clean towel you have ready. There they will stay until you are ready to sterilize them, which also gets them hot in preparation for filling.

{By the way, if you don't know what I mean by clean dishcloth and clean dish towel, I mean clean. To find out how to clean your kitchen linens properly, read my article about my laundry system on the sidebar -- it's # 8 in the list.

Short version: warm water (at least), bleach, and a hot dryer or the line. And change them every day! If you are not doing this, your towels and dishcloths are not that clean! Our grandmothers were more careful about this than we are.}

Another question: What is a gallon of cucumbers? Recipes say this type of thing, but I ask you: do cucumbers come in gallons? No. They come in...cucumbers.

Of course I forgot to take a picture of my little harvest of somewhat large cucumbers, but try to visualize about 5 or 6 big ones. Now visualize a gallon of milk. See? Sort of the same, right? Right. I guess. And I continue to guess each time I do this pickling thing.
Now cut your cucumbers (after giving them a scrub in cold water) into food-processor-chute lengths. Slice them, using little pressure on the pusher to get thinner slices. Dump them into a handy receptacle. Add your peppers and onions.Oh, I love my trusty enameled pan! Not being round, it is so space-efficient, and seems to hold a bit more than a gallon of cucumbers! But who really knows, because are we talking about sliced cucumbers or whole? Ah, the ambiguities!!Add your pure salt. The reason not to use regular salt is that the anti-caking agents will discolor your pickles.My secret ingredient (well, my ingredient that was suggested by Putting Food By) for keeping the pickles crunchy is grape leaves, of which I have an abundant supply in my yard, which is quickly disappearing under grape vines. It actually sort of makes me have an anxiety attack to think about that, so I won't.

Toss everything together, using your clean (not bleached or line dried, but still) hands.

Cover your pan or bowl and let this stuff sit for at least 12 hours.

Will anything bad happen if it's more like 36 hours? No.

Now, when you are ready, you want to drain all the liquid that will have been produced from this brining process. So get a nice big colander and a clean dish towel. I like to use an old potato sack towel that is actually a bit too thin to be useful for drying hands or dishes, but perfect for draining things like yogurt or brined vegetables.



Wrap it all up and twist. As you do, the water will drain out. You can leave the bundle there for a bit...
...while you prepare the vinegar syrup.Different recipes call for different spices, and exactitude in seasoning, unlike in cleaning or processing, is not important. What is important is that you go ahead and put in seasonings you like!

{By the way, try to get your spices from a place that sells them in bulk. You will not believe the difference in price. If you can find one of those ethnic places with big jars and lots of people (preferably ethnic) buying from them, guaranteeing good turnover, you will have it made. Put yours in little jars that you have saved, keeping any excess in a tight zipped bag in the freezer, well marked.}
This recipe, from The Joy of Cooking, calls for this OR that. I just chuck it all in, except for celery seed, which I never have. I use cumin instead. Turmeric for color.



As that mixture comes to a boil...
start heating up your canning pot (I use a 20 quart pot with a round cake rack in the bottom, which is very make-do): ...get your workspace in order...
...wash some things that are making a mess...

...and start getting the actual canning items in place. Put your clean rings and tops in a pot to heat up (you don't want to boil them).Heat up a kettle of water to add to your pot as needed.

Find your funnel and your tongs and your lifter. Also ladle. Make sure they are clean. When that water is boiling,



chuck the things in for 10 minutes. When you take them out, be careful how you drain them, because the steam can burn you. I tend to use the tongs, braced against the rim of the pot.This is my whole set-up viewed from one angle.


And looking the other way...Just organize yourself as you work, with plenty of cleared-off counters draped in clean towels, and you will be good.

Try to work in a flow, from one side to the other. Flow gives you a sense of calm and control while you get the job done. You can always stop and assess your flow!

I have the spices and the jars on the left of the sink. I'm washing and draining to the right. My stove is to the right of the sink, so my sterilized jars go on a towel on the counter to the right of the stove.During the ten minutes' time that the jars are sterilizing and the vinegar mixture has come to a boil, you can put your brined cucumbers and vegetables into the pot. Now remember, you aren't aiming at cooking your pickles now. You just want to bring them up to temperature so that they will go in the hot jars and then into the boiling water bath without any shocks, which could cause the glass to break.
When I was dumping the veggies in, the corner of my towel got into the vinegar mixture with the turmeric. I decided to go ahead and dip the whole thing in there in case it doesn't wash and bleach out the next time, and if not, this will be my official pickle-making dish towel!

Give the whole mixture a gentle stir, but don't mash the cucumbers. When your jars are ready, so should your veggies be.


Put a couple of paper towels next to your pot in a way that drapes over the space in between the stove and the counter, so that hot sticky vinegary liquid doesn't leak down there, which it totally will, don't kid yourself.
Using your funnel and your ladle, fill the jar with the mixture. Now, here is another question: how will you have the right amount of liquid and solid in there? and how do you know how many jars, exactly?

You don't, even if your recipe says "makes six pints" or something like that. You need a good supply of jars. When I make preserves I am constantly toting jars back and forth from the garage to the kitchen. Those things have been washed multiple times (and gotten dirty multiple times) before I actually use them.

I like to have different sizes. For one thing, sometimes you want a big jar of pickles, and sometimes you are giving some to an elderly person who will not finish more than a pint in a long while. Second, a few smaller jars come in handy at the end when you are not sure how much you have left but don't want to stop or end up with half a jar (which won't process correctly anyway).

You will just keep filling jars so that the veggies are immersed in the liquid. A small spoon is handy for pushing cucumbers down and removing extras that don't quite fit. You can also swap out a few big ones for some little ones that fit better. It's your jar, you make it work! Own the jar!

After running that little spoon around the edges of each jar to get the air out, wipe the rims with a paper towel to make sure that you have a non-sticky surface for the lid. Get your lids out of the pan, making sure that they are not stuck together! Pop a lid on each jar and screw down, not tightly, a rim on each lid. I do these steps all at once, not as a I fill each jar, because I find that I forget something otherwise. I get the lids screwed down and then realize there are bubbles or the tops are sticky.

Place as many jars as will comfortably fit in the pot, put the cover on, and process for the allotted time.

If you are not able to get all your jars in at once, keep the others warm until their turn (or wait to fill them, keeping the jars warm in the oven and the pickle mixture warm in the pot).

These quart jars are technically too big for my pot, according to Putting Food By.

They only just make it with an inch of water bubbling on top, and the water often boils right over. But for pickles I chance it and always get a good seal. I wouldn't use them for straight up canning of, say, tomatoes or pears.In the end you will have a bit of mixture left.
Get a clean jar and fill it with these leftovers and keep them in the fridge. You can add to a jar from a previous batch.
Here is the recipe for my take on delicious bread-and-butter pickles, as adapted from The Joy of Cooking (1975):

Makes about 12 pints (I'm not so sure, JoC! Maybe I didn't have a gallon of cucumbers after all (and I didn't use the 6 onions called for, but if I had had more, I wouldn't have had enough syrup...I'd say more like 8 pints...)

Bread-and-Butter Pickles

5 or 6 big cucumbers, probably too big for salads.
3 large yellow onions
1 red pepper
1 green pepper
3 grape leaves (if you can find them -- feel free to come over here and pick some!)

Slice the veggies in the food processor. You want the peppers and onions to be chopped, or maybe you like them in slices, it doesn't matter!

Put them in a container that can go in the fridge without taking up too much room. Toss everything with 1/2 cup pure salt. The cookbook says to weigh everything down, but I don't think this is necessary.

Chill for at least 12 hours. Rinse. (I didn't rinse, my bad. I don't mind salty though.) Drain thoroughly.

Prepare the syrup:

4 cups cider vinegar (I use white vinegar because it's cheaper)
4 cups white or brown sugar (I use half and half)
1 1/2 tsp. turmeric or allspice (heck, use them both, they're good!)
2 tablespoons mustard seed (I used a tablespoon of pickling spice someone gave me, which has mustard seed in it, as well as a tablespoon of mustard seed)
1 1/2 teaspoons celery seed (I use cumin instead, never having celery seed on hand)
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves or 1-inch stick cinnamon

Bring these ingredients to a boil. Add the vegetables gradually with very little stirring. Heat to the scalding point but do not let them boil. (The point here is that they have to be hot so as not to break or cool down the hot jars, but you don't want mushy pickles, hmmm?).
Pour the pickles into hot sterile jars. seal and process 15 minutes in a boiling-water bath, for pints.

Now, what's not to understand about this recipe? You must think I'm pretty silly! :)

Thanks to Jen at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam for the link!