Antiperspirant on My Ankles.

I have been drinking in every last second of summer, truly dreading the end of my second favorite season.  I love the ice cream, hot weather, lemonade, the long relaxing days.  I didn't think there was a single thing about summer I didn't like.

I was wrong.

Last night, in an effort to cram as much outside air into my weekend as possible, I went to an early evening concert with my husband and youngest son.  And I got eaten alive by mosquitoes.  They completely feasted on me as if they had never eaten before.  In between the itching, I counted the bites today.  Sixteen on one leg alone.  Sixteen, unbearably itchy bites.  I scratch, I itch, I curse, I complain.  I smack them, I obsess over them, I scratch them some more.  I can't think about anything else but the unbearable itching on my legs that won't go away.  I applied two different creams, took a hot bath, tried to pretend I didn't have the bites at all.  But the itching won't stop.

This evening, I complain to my mother.  Now here's the kicker.  My mother tells me to roll antiperspirant "not deodorant, that won't work" on my bites.  Sounds wacky to me, but at this point I am willing to try just about anything.

It worked.

The itching stopped immediately and I am amazed.  She also tells me to carry a Bounce dryer sheet in my pocket when I am outside and I won't get bit in the first place.  I don't know where she gets this stuff, but I can assure you, as foolish as this sounds, I will have a dryer sheet stuffed in every pocket from June through October from this day on.

And I'll also have antiperspirant on my ankles.

Dinner and Ménage À Trois.

Went to a wonderful dinner party last night.  And I'm not usually a fan of these kinds of nights.  But this one was spent dining under the stars in a truly beautiful garden.  Good food, new friends and out of this world cookies.  The hosts are heavily involved in the historic town we live in and it was interesting to hear them talk about the history of the homes and people in the area.  A very nice way to spend the evening.

And, of course, there was wine.

Ménage À Trois by Folie À Deux  has been on a long list of wines to review for my "Cheap Wine with a Pretty Label" series.  So I was thrilled to see a guest bring it to the party.  The label isn't all that interesting, but I still wish I had taken the picture earlier in the night (the caption under this image should read "hurry and take the photo before my hand catches on fire").  The name is catchy and led to dinner conversations about things I had no idea were happening in my neck of the woods.

The wine?  Frankly, I was surprised by how much I liked it.   Actually, everyone at the party mentioned how much they enjoyed it.   Very, very good.  And as my husband said, "wine always tastes better when you share it with a group of friends".

Running Out of Summer.

Beautiful day here today.  And I'm spending as much time as I can outside enjoying it.  Football games in the morning, pool in the afternoon, dinner outside this evening.

I tried to capture the warmth of the sun on my face at the pool today, but the iPhone view just doesn't give it justice.

Here's my feeble attempt:

I did have a wonderful "Sunshine On My Shoulders" YouTube video link here, but boy, was it slowing my blog down.  Unfortunately, I had to delete it.  It's a pity as it captured the sun far better than my photo did.

Hope you are able to squeeze in a bit of sunshine into your weekend.

What I'll Serve My Worst Enemy.

Well, the good news is if I ever invite my worst enemy over for dinner, I know exactly what I am going to cook for them.

Oh, you know there's gonna be a picture of the dish.

Give up?  It's a spinach dip.  And I know what you're thinking--how can you screw up a spinach dip.  Oh, you can all right.  Tonight I mastered that skill.

All day long I've been craving a nice, hot, gooey, cheesy spinach dip.  I don't have a good recipe, certainly try and try to find one, but nothing compares to the dips I have eating out.  So I google and find this awesome knockoff claiming to be the same as the one they serve at California Pizza Kitchen.  I have had that dip.  That dip is delicious.  Now, I don't know who came up with the recipe I tried tonight, but it was no California Pizza Kitchen.  It was just plain nasty.  I can't get the smell out of my house, the taste out of my mouth, the memory out of my brain. 

So if you happen to have a dip you are willing to share, I am willing to try it.  It needs to be hot and cheesy and I don't want any monkeying around with fresh spinach.  That's just silly.  If I like it, I'll let you (and everyone else) know.  If I don't, I won't rat you out.  

Let's see what you've got.  It has to be better than the one I made tonight.

Location, Location.

The little info box in your Etsy shop with your location name?  Fill it in.  

Here's why:

About 6 months ago, the editor of our town magazine "Hudson Life" contacted me.  She was writing a story on local artists with shops on Etsy and wondered if I would be interested in appearing (seriously, like I'm going to turn this down).  How'd she find me, you ask?  By doing a "Shop Local" search on Etsy.  And she would never have found me if I hadn't filled in my location box accurately.

In any event, a very nice article was written and just released this month.  Complete with a photo, a link to my website and a lengthy interview.  The magazine was distributed to over 10,000 homes in my area.  Pretty awesome free press, if you ask me.  

Thanks, Hudson Life!

True Love Always.

I was at my son's football practice last night, and noticed this carving on the picnic bench I was sitting on.

As I traced the worn letters with my finger, I couldn't help but wonder who K.B. and S.G. were.  The carving was worn and old and I wondered if they were still together, and if not why weren't they?  I tried to guess their ages, what their names were, were they together as they carved the letters.  Or was he thinking of her while she was somewhere else?  Maybe she was the one with the knife?  I wonder if they even remember taking the time to do this in the first place. 

Now I'm not one to condone defacing public property, but I am going to start taking photos whenever I see such an image.  I'll post them when I do and I'll call the series "True Love Always" (we used to call it "TLA" when I was in high school).  But anyways, I'm waiting for the one person to come on my blog, recognize the photo and let me know they carved that heart.  I'd love to hear that they're now married with 2.2 kids, the dog and the white picket fence.

Probably unrealistic that this will ever happen, but wouldn't it be cool if it did?

A Butcher, Two Bakers, A Crazy Homemaker.

That was my family growing up.  My dad was the butcher and my mom stayed home with me and my siblings (we would have made any person crazy).  Luckily for us kids, both my parents were fond of baking.  And very good at it.

One of my favorite childhood memories was baking cookies with my dad to pack in our school lunches.  We'd pick a recipe from the old blue cookbook, and if we didn't have all the ingredients it required we would search and find a different one.  It was always a challenge to find a recipe on a day you didn't have eggs in the house.

Luckily for me, the baking gene appears to be hereditary.

Nothing like a warm chocolate chip brownie and a glass of milk after a long day at school.