Still Crazy in Love?

Still Crazy Sign for your Valentine 

Still Crazy in Love After All These Years...
The Husband and I are working on 39 years married
and 41 together.
How many years have you and your love been together?

On my second cup of coffee and will be heading up to the shop soon. 

Appears the warm up is on it's way. Just need to make it through today.

Working on some new "Love" designs...for Valentine's Day, Weddings or
just for the one who is forever in your heart.   
As soon as I get the finish sprayed on I'll take some pictures and share with you. 

Hoping you will be getting a little bit of warmer air in your little corner.

photo:pinterest no source

Paul's Mother's Crumb Cake

30+ years ago,  I worked in the Visual Merchandising Department of Montgomery Wards.   We always worked on Christmas Eve, as every single piece of tinsel needed to be removed from the store before we left that day.  I worked with a wonderful group of people and we all brought in a different food for a breakfast buffet.  If we had to work on Christmas Eve, at least we would take a bit of time to enjoy the holiday together.
All those years ago, Paul, one of the young men who was part of the department,
brought in a crumb cake, made with his Mother's recipe. 
 

My family has been enjoying this buttery crumb cake every Christmas morning since.  Last week I made a gluten free version of the cake for Darlin' D as he has a problem with wheat/gluten.  I used Pamela's Baking Mix in place of flour and the only difference was that the crumbs just weren't as "crumby".  They just didn't clump the way they do with flour. The cake did however taste the same.  I use a fork to mix...you don't need to pull out the mixer.

This morning I had a request from the Husband for another cake.
Sharing the recipe with you...

Paul's Mother's Crumb Cake

 1/4 lb of butter
2 eggs

1/2 tsp of salt

3/4 cup of milk

1 cup of sugar

2 tsp of baking powder

1 tsp of vanilla

1  3/4  cups of flour

Cream butter, sugar and vanilla.  Beat in eggs.  Add flour, salt and baking powder and mix.  Add milk and mix.  Pour into a greased 7x11 oblong pan. (do not flour).

Sprinkle crumb topping over cake and bake at 350 for 35 minutes.

Topping

1 cup of flour
1/2 tsp of cinnamon

6 tbsp of melted butter 

3/4 cup of sugar

2 tsp of vanilla

Combine ingredients and sprinkle over cake.

 For those wanting to make the cake gluten free...use Pamela's baking and pancake mix.  I use this for waffles, pancakes, muffins and more when the grandchildren are here.  I get it from Safeway but I'm sure it can be found at most grocery stores.

Baby It's Cold Outside...

 Good Morning Snow Friends...

 

 Lovely Sunrise and Bitter Temperatures

 But Beautiful in Our Little Corner...

and Lucy is Blowing in the Wind.

www.countryworkshop.net

My Christmas Present

...in 1959. 
She was blue and had a bell and we traveled many miles together. 
Wish I still had her.
 

Memories

The Old Saying Be Careful What You Wish For

For years...ever since our daughters were young, I have always wished that one
Christmas Eve, the sky would open and drop 3 feet of snow so we could stay home all day.
Lou and I are blessed with lots and lots of family. 
That means we are usually on the run from the afternoon of
Christmas Eve until late Christmas night.

 

This year I got my wish...however it was not because of piles of the white stuff.  Our darling son-by-love has been working lots of hours on a project with a deadline.  Daughter Holly asked if it would be ok with me if she and the children  came on Monday and stay until after Christmas so Lou and I could give her a hand with getting
the grandchildren ready for all the visiting in case Daddy got held up at work. 
I jumped at the chance to have them all here for Christmas. 
We did however need to let Santa know where
to find Darlin' D and Riah J. 

Monday morning the children woke up with fevers and coughing.
A trip to the pediatrician found that they both had  RSV. 
Very contagious, especially affecting small children and the elderly. 
That made it not a good idea to go to any Christmas family gathering. 
We also had to cancel our Christmas morning breakfast here at the house.

So we all stayed in for several days.
Hand sanitizer, Clorox wipes, Lysol spray were were in use continuously. 
Even with the house filled with sneezes, coughing, fevers, snotty noses and germs,
Santa was brave and came down the chimney and left goodies for 2 very sick grandbabies.  

 The children had a fun time until the children's motrin wore off and the fevers shot up. 

 We had happy times...

 and melt down times.

 

  Darlin' D and Gramps followed Santa's progress on the computer.

Santa left boot prints on the floor when he can down the chimney
and made his way out of the fireplace.

 

  

Grand dog Dre and Lucy enjoyed their gifts...
even some that weren't meant for them.

 Both children are feeling better now, after a week.
The cough and runny noses are still lingering

It was still a wonderful Christmas...

The house has been oh so quiet since the crew left last Friday.

When You're Having Fun...Time Flies

The month of December just flew by...as did every month in 2013.  The end of November and beginning of December are always busy for us as the orders start to fly in for Christmas.  I always hope to be more prepared, having finished signs stock piled so we can just pull an order and ship it.  But with 400+ different designs and each of those designs having multiple color choices it's very hard to determine what people may want.   But we persevered and had all orders out by the 19th. 
 

The family did have our annual "Cookie Weekend" in early December.  Using my Great Grandmother's Sugar Cookie Recipe, a weekend of making cookie dough, rolling, cutting and baking happens every year.  All the women and children gather at my 2 Aunts condos, located in the same building on the same floor, so both ovens can be used.

 

Lovely time but had to make a quick exit that Sunday as it started snowing and the roads covered quickly.  The last several batches of cookies were all cut with the largest of the cookie cutters so we could get all the cookies baked before we got snowed in.