I 

I made some bread a couple of weeks ago. It all came about because I was out of bread and too lazy to get dressed and go to the store. I had yeast in the cupboard, so I started looking online for recipes that didn't seem too hard or time consuming. I used the Pioneer Woman's recipe for cinnamon bread, found here:http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2010/08/homemade-cinnamon-bread/.

I made one loaf cinnamon and one loaf plain, and oh, my, did my kitchen smell heavenly!

I stored half of the plain loaf in the freezer for future reference, since I knew I wouldn't be able to eat the whole thing before the dreaded green stuff appeared on it.

I took the frozen bread out to thaw a few days ago, and sadly, it had dried out too much to make good sandwiches. So, I cut it up into big chunks, added some eggs, milk, sugar, vanilla, and cinnamon, and made bread pudding.

It was wonderful on the first day, warm with whipped cream for dessert, and even better the next morning, with maple syrup for breakfast.

Lily

Lily girl. Silly Lily. Lily Vanilli. My sweet baby girl. So many names for one small dog.
I adopted Lily in November 2010, just a couple of weeks after losing my fifteen year old Buster. I had actually looked at a totally different dog on the shelter's web site, but when my grandson and I went to take a look, the dog was not in his kennel. But Lily was in hers, just a few doors down, and she stood on her hind legs, wiggled her butt and whined until we came to see her.

It was love at first sight. I paid the deposit, and later that evening, I came back and took her home. I remember the hopeful yet somewhat bewildered and scared looks she kept giving me on the drive home. I didn't have a kennel yet for her, but she eventually curled up on the passenger side and settled in to sleep.

Some things I remember about Lily girl:

If you were petting her, and decided to stop, she would reach out delicately with one paw and gently draw your hand back to her.

I often would wake in the middle of the night and find her sleeping right behind my shoulders...solid little comfort.

She loved fighting the invisible hand monster under the blankets.

When I would take her out to my son's place in the country, she would run insanely around the grass, leaping into the air over the retaining wall, mouth wide open, tongue out, for the sheer joy of unrestricted motion.

No matter how I arranged my living room furniture, I had to keep one sofa by the front window. She would lie on the back of the sofa, staring out the window, and erupt into frenzied barking whenever anyone walked by. She especially loathed the gardeners and would bark relentlessly until she chased them away.

After I introduced Annie to the family, Lily was determined to show her that she (Lily), although smaller by 30 pounds, was still the top dog. She would lie on the sofa or the edge of my bed, looking down at Annie, and grumbling in a strangely human way.

She had the softest silkiest fur, and when I would stroke her between her eyes, she would close her eyes in ecstasy.

Sometimes, she would find something in the grass that enchanted her, and she would roll in it, on her back, wiggling back and forth. Several times, she rolled right off the edge of the curb into the street. One time, she rolled in cat poop. I was not pleased.

She always seemed to know when I was eating cereal and would sit right beside me, waiting til I was finished and would put the bowl down for her to lap up the last bits of milk.

How small her sweet head was, compared to the rest of her body.

She loved to go out in the garage and lie next to the garage door, which i would put up about 8 inches. She would stick her nose in the opening, and watch the neighborhood comings and goings.

Even as many times as we had done it, she still resisted letting me put her collar on when it was time for walks. I would have to hold her muzzle in one hand as I slipped the collar over her head with the other. But once it was on, she was more than ready to head out the door.

If I was sad and crying, she would hop on the bed or into my lap, put her paws on my shoulder and lick my face. Probably only wanted the salt, but I like to think she was kissing me.

When I would sit in the recliner or at my desk in the morning with coffee and toast, she would stand on her hind legs, front paws on my thighs, staring at the toast until a crust would magically fall off and into her mouth. She and Annie watched me intently to make sure I shared my crusts equally.

I love my laminate floors, but the click click click of her toenails on the floor...not so much. But oh how I miss that sound now!

She loved to chew on metal...straight pins, safety pins, ornament hangers. She would steal doll clothes, if the grandkids left them unattended, and carry them off to her kennel or under my bed. There, she would chew the snaps off. I would find her with slobbery wet paws from holding the tiny snaps as she chewed.

When we went for walks, she liked to be on Annie's left side. Annie meandered as she walked, and Lily was constantly weaving back and forth behind her, to stay on the left.

She loved her kennel, which was in the kitchen by the counter. She would sleep in there, even if I was in another room. She liked to eat lying down in it, and I would put her food pan just outside. Annie always finished her dinner first, and would come nosing around Lily's dish. Lily would growl and warn Annie off, but once she'd had her fill, she'd crawl out, head for the sofa, and let Annie have the rest.

When I was upstairs in the spare room sewing, she would curl up under the table. As the sewing machine foot pedal would slide backwards on the carpet as I sewed, it would run into her, and I'd reach out my foot to pull it back and find warm soft fur.

The last time she actually slept on the bed beside me, I remember waking up as she settled in right behind my neck, and thinking to myself how comforting it was to have another living presence there.

She was truly a rare and special dog, so affectionate and sweet tempered. I don't know why she chose me to live with, but I'm so glad she did, even if it was only for three short years.
Sleep well, sweet girl. Mommy loves you.

I was re-reading "Travels With Puff", (by Richard Bach) the other night. This is a marvelous travel book full of full color photos of Richard and his ultralight plane, which he named Puff. I got to the chapter where Richard decides, against Puff's judgement, to taxi through some lily pads. Puff says quite distinctly, "Let's don't do the lily pads." But Richard does it anyway. And of course, when they try to take off, there's 30 pounds of lily pads clinging to Puff's tail, making it impossible for them to fly.
     I can't help but wonder? Do you have lily pads keeping you from flying? My personal lily pads are the fear of success. I know that sounds silly, but I think I really do fear being successful as a writer. Already, with only two books out, I have a few (very few, mind you!) people asking for the third, which is only 1/4 of a way finished. This same fear of success is why I've never wanted to sell my knitting or cross-stitch samplers. Part of the problem is, the minute someone is paying me for something, the minute it stops being fun and interesting and creative, and becomes work. There's an old saying, 'do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life.' Um. Well, only in the sense that what I love to do isn't paying the bills!
     But more importantly, if I were to become a success at my writing (a financial success, let me clarify) I'm afraid of how my lifestyle might have to change. I cherish my private time, my quiet house, my dogs and my garden. Would that be compromised if I suddenly (or even gradually) became more well-known? Am I subconsciously sabotaging my own success out of fear?

Desert Gold

A sweet, slow trumpet was easing its way through a brassy little song about a citrus fruit. The wine in my glass was cool and mellow. Trace and I slow-danced in perfect synchronization around the edge of the aquamarine pool, with only the light of the neon moon out by the street for illumination. As the song trailed off into silence, I felt myself being pulled into strong arms, and I tilted my face to meet his lips.

Instead of the spine-tingling kiss I was expecting, my senses were assaulted by kibble-scented dog breath. Dog hair tickled my nose, and I sneezed explosively.

“Darn you, Holden!” I grumbled, pushing my little black and white dog off my chest and onto the bed, “How many times have I told you, no doggy kisses before breakfast?”

Holden didn’t answer me. Instead, he hopped off the bed, and I heard the click of his nails as he wandered out into the hallway.

I turned on my side and snuggled my face back down into my pillow, hoping to slip back into sleep and, with any luck, back into that lovely dream. As images from the dream flashed in front of my closed eyelids, I tried to recapture the warmth and sweetness of being in Trace’s arms.

Trace’s arms? My eyes flew open, and I swore both loudly and creatively. What on earth was I doing, dreaming about Trace Bloome, while Will Benton’s shirts still hung in my bedroom closet?

Sometimes I wonder if it's too late to be an only child.

I was born the second of four children. I grew up in a traditional family, with traditional values and traditional differences of opinion. I might not have agreed with the political viewpoints of my siblings. We might have differed in our religious beliefs. And we certainly didn't share the same dreams for the future. But one thing I never doubted we shared was love. I didn't always like my siblings, but I always loved them.

After my mother died four and a half years ago, my brothers stopped talking to me. It happened gradually, over a six month period, but once both Mom and Dad's ashes had been poured into Monterey Bay,  Joe and Doug disappeared as thoroughly as if they, too, were at the bottom of the sea.

My sister followed suit, nursing some imaginary hurt. She and I had exchanged some heated and hurtful words after Mom's death. She had stabbed me in the heart, and made me question whether any of the past 59 years had been real.

But several years later, she finally responded to one of my barrage of emails and phone calls, and decided she wanted to be friends again. The only rule was, we weren't to talk about what had happened. No explanations, no apologies.

Whatever. Fine. Things went all right for a while, but then, last summer, I pissed her off again. I wrote about that in the first post on this blog. We got past that, and after her granddaughter was born, things seemed fine.
But apparently they weren't.

The last time I heard from her was just before the Super Bowl this year. She didn't answer my next two emails, and she didn't respond to the card and letter I sent at Easter. I figured I'd annoyed her again.

But I figured she'd get over it, right? As the weeks wore on, I sometimes thought of her, but mostly I just went on with my life.

Until April 15th. Yes, it's tax day, but it's also my birthday. This year, there was very little discussion of my birthday. No one asked what I wanted, or what I was doing that day, or if I wanted to go somewhere. My daughter said if I wanted to do something the weekend before, to let her know, but I really didn't.

The truth was, I was nursing this secret hope that there was a surprise in the works. I thought maybe my sister's silence was because she was planning on flying out here for my birthday and was afraid she would blow the secret if she called or emailed. In my mind, that explained why there was no card from her, much less a present, and why no one was pushing me to make plans with them.

I waited all day. I checked the mail, I checked my phone, I kept looking out the window. What a fool I was.
I cried myself to sleep that night.

What makes me "ME"?

It would be impossible, I think, to reach this point in my life without at least once or twice questioning who I am and why. Oh, sure, there's the easy answers: I'm my parent's child, my children's mother. But I'm thinking of the other questions: am I an honest person? Am I compassionate, funny, a good friend, a deep thinker?

Before I answer, let me explain why it's on my mind today. Roughly three months ago, a friend was in an accident. Now, mind you, I've never met this person, only read his published works and exchanged emails and chat posts with him. I don't know if he considered me his friend, but I considered him mine. His name is Richard Bach.

In the accident, Richard suffered a head injury. There was doubt for a while that he would live, and once it seemed he was safely on this side of life, there were questions as to how much he would regain of himself. Eventually, he recovered physically enough to move to a rehab center, and recently was staging a hunger strike to be allowed to go home. I don't know if he's made it home yet.

One of his children posted a comment on Facebook, which I am paraphrasing, since I can't find the original. He said his father didn't know who he was, and had forgotten most of the philosophies about which he had written. This confused me at first, because I was pretty sure the same child had posted that Richard remembered who he was, and remembered his children. But in thinking about it, I suspect that what the son meant was that his father no longer knows what it means to be Richard Bach.

I know that personality changes are often a by-product of TBI's, or Traumatic Brain Injuries. Once gentle loving people can become hostile, rude, withdrawn. Personality changes are also sometimes a by-product of a near-death experience, although that usually is a change for the better.

It all makes me ponder the idea of who I am. If I look at myself, I find flaws, lots of them. I'm not 100% honest, although I try to be. I'm a sucker for a sob story, I have too much faith in the people I love and too little respect for the rest. I'm not careful enough with my money, my time, or my love. But I always thought these were traits that were born within me, set in my genes, just like my inability to lose weight and keep it off. But if a TBI can change a personality, cause someone to forget a life's work, then what really makes us us? 

For most of my adult life, I believed that my body is just a vehicle for my soul, that my soul is eternal, and that I chose this life for the lessons I needed to learn. I believed that who I am is who I will always be, and that although I can learn new things, (and unlearn some old things) I can't change my basic 'me-ness". Now I question that. Now I wonder if all along, I've been wrong.

The more I think about it, the more confused I get. If our basic personality really isn't set in stone, then what excuse do I have? I've told myself for so many years that I'm not an extrovert, that if I could be a hermit, I would be. I don't like crowds, loud noises or pushy people. And yet, having written a book and self-published same, I know I may have to develop a thicker skin, and reach outside my comfort zone if I want success. Is that part of the problem? Do I unconsciously not want success because it would force me to change? Can I be a hermit, and a best selling author at the same time?

What do you think? What governs our personalities, where does our self-ness really reside? Can we ever really lose it, and if so, is it possible to find it again?

A fun weekend project

     I thought I'd give you all a look at my latest "stash-buster" project. I have, as some of you know, a huge stash of fabric, in dozens of prints. Cottons, flannels, fleece, wool, felt, velvet, corduroy. You name it, I probably have it. Some of it I've had for years and years, moved in boxes from one home to another. Some I inherited from my mother. 

      Last weekend I rummaged through the stash and picked out three fabrics to make a baby quilt for the soon-to-be-born daughter of my nephew. I discovered an quick and easy, and yet adorable, quilt pattern on the internet, and I made the quilt and sent it off. 

      But once it was finished, I started looking at other things I could make using my stash and that quilt pattern. Several years ago, I purchased a cute border print fabric (see above) and used some of it to make aprons for my two granddaughters for Thanksgiving. (I think they worn them just long enough for pictures.) 

      I don't know what I was going to do with the rest of the material. I suppose I could have made yet another apron, or hemmed it and used it for a tablecloth. But yesterday I decided to use the motifs along the edge as squares for a table runner. I picked out two other fabrics, and started cutting. The brown is leftover from my grandson's dinosaur costume of two years ago, and the tiny acorn print is something I bought thinking it would make a cute blouse for fall. I've had it at least five years, so its chances of ever becoming a blouse were rapidly slipping away.

After cutting out the pieces, I put together all the smaller individual pieces, then pieced each block. I joined the blocks, then instead of using quilt batting, which would have made the runner too thick, I used a piece of leftover flannel. I backed the runner with the pumpkin print from the middle of the border fabric.

I think it turned out really cute! It's on my table right now. I have enough left over to make another one, but I'm currently working on a couple of Christmas presents. Maybe when I'm done with those, I'll make another. Might make a cute present, huh?

Oh, and I also made this: banana bread. I added a bit of orange peel and nutmeg, and since I didn't have walnuts, I used some sliced almonds from the freezer. Don't usually make banana bread (I don't really like it.) but I had the bananas, and I'm a firm believer in 'waste not, want not'. It will be good for slicing and toasting in the morning, especially with a little bit of butter or peanut butter.

So, that's what I did this weekend. How about you?