Florence and Nathaniel were hanging out together yesterday afternoon while I was running errands. 
When I returned I found this little piece of art on our coffee table - I loved the paper but was a little surprised at the liberty that was taken on the table top.

 
I asked Nathaniel about it, he said:
'I figured that the table top was covered ugly marks and stains anyway, so why not cover it with the creativity of our daughter?'
Hmmm - He makes an interesting point.

follow up...

So I could hardly believe it this morning when I found a muffin and a half left on the plate. Apparently they liked them.  I am so glad they left one for me! - the muffin was indeed delicious.

I feel rather cheeky that they came out so well considering my out look on them last night.
I wondered if they would know that there is only have a half a cup of sugar and a quarter of a cup of oil? this is the healthiest thing I have made them.
So, I guess to sum up. I love the cranberry muffin at Panera Bread, and I felt like this muffin was just as delicious -  even without the nuts. And probably better for me anyway.
Nice.

I have had a bit of a holiday from Friday morning treats, and now I am back to it and I am a bit rusty.
I poked around my kitchen at about 6.30 to see what I had to work with and it seems that I haven't been shopping in about two weeks.  All I had to work with was oranges and frozen cranberries - yes delicious I know but I feel like the guys have been over loaded with cranberry - And on top of it all it seems I used my last stick of butter last night! I know you are wondering why I don't just run out to the store, but it's a bit complicated.
So I have just put into the oven some muffins that uses the random bits I have here at home and will hopefully taste delicious.

Cranberry Pecan Streusel Muffins from Epicurious.com
so I didn't use any nuts, wheat germ or orange extract as I didn't have them in my cupboard, but pretty impressive huh? I am quite please. and I will say that at the moment they smell absolutely delicious. I will post a picture tomorrow to show them off.

my sweet Florence...

 

She will be 1 year old this month...

what ever did I do without her?

Yesterday I helped my in-laws get a few Christmas decorations up.
While poking around in the Christmas closet, looking for a small floral box that contained the string and clips that have held their christmas cards on display year after year, Lucinda pulled out this or that and would comment:
'oh yes, and this is from my childhood, though I only remember there being two of them...'
or
'someone gave that to us for Christmas one year and I have never none what to do with it, would you like to take it?'
or
'if you see anything you need for your Christmas decorating, be sure to take it home with you'.
It was nice to look through some of the treasures in that closet, it got me thinking about my undecorated home down the hill.

Anyway, today I pulled out our one box of Christmas decorations from the closet.
I discovered that we don't have much decorating work to do until we get a tree - it seems that all we own are two strings of Christmas lights and tree ornaments. Oh, yes and three red and white stripped candles that I think have been sitting unused in the box since we were married.

I kept out the candles and two tree ornaments, then put the rest away till we get our tree.

Its a start...I think later this week I will take Lucinda up on her offer to pick out a few Christmas decorations from their wonderful Christmas closet.

Last Thursday I was cooking Thanksgiving dinner all by myself....it's kinda lonely cooking a big meal all by yourself. I was missing the company of my mom and my sisters and my sisters-in-laws. Throwing caution to the wind I called home - we all know that it is dangerous to cook and talk on the phone at the same time, you never know what mistakes will be made!
After being passed around the ladies in the kitchen I was passed (very smart of them) to Mercy who was not yet on duty and who was actually enjoying a bit of breakfast.  She was eating an all time Newton favorite - Cranberry Coffee Cake.  We discussed it - this is kinda how it went:

me: I love that coffee cake, I wish I made it for our breakfast.
Mercy: Yeah, its pretty delicious...but I just wish it had more cream cheese in it you know?  It's just that I love cream cheese so much.
me: Maybe you should talk to Mom about that...maybe the cake could have a cream cheese icing instead of powered sugar.

Anyway, I don't know if you talked to Mom about that cream cheese idea Mercy, but I was inspired by our conversation to make the Cranberry Coffee Cake for the guys tomorrow for breakfast. I considered, for about 5 seconds, how to add more cream cheese for you Mercy but in the end I figured you wouldn't be here to try it so I had just better stick to the recipe.

Cranberry Coffee Cake:
preheat oven at 350 F 
1 8oz package of cream cheese
1 cup butter/margerine
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
4 eggs
2 cups flour
1 1/2 Tbs baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups of cranberries (sorry, I don't know if these are supposed to be chopped or not...I did a bit of both. hehe. anyone who knows, do fill the rest of us in!)

Cream the sugar, cream cheese and the butter then add the vanilla and eggs.
Mix together the flour, baking powder and the salt then add to the butter mixture.
Once combined add the cranberries and mix until evenly distributed.
Spoon into a greased bundt pan.
Bake for 1 hour, check after 50 min - it's done when a knife comes out clean!

 

isn't this adorable?

(find out all about it here.)

Sunday brunch jacket by Oliver + S

maybe a nice sewing project for these up-coming long winter days & nights.

I'm thinking it could be a lite Spring coat for florence.