When the men are away, the gal does play!

I've been having the most glorious summer vacation since August 20th. All of my men have been in Hawaii, and I have been deliciously alone, alone, alone! Except for our 3 cats and 2 dogs.

This year I've been in the mood for landscaping, not art. I'm in one of my rejuvenation periods, which means no art, because my artistic side is tired. And the yard was really primed for me to get in and finish off some projects. Cody and his friends have been yearning for money all summer, so I put them to work in the yard, doing all of my tendon-killing projects that would take me years to do, and only takes them hours to do. So, I was able to spray all of the new flagstone that we laid in my favorite new spot in the yard, with a color enhancer/sealant, and it really looks great now. Then I went on to our little Japanse garden. First I dug up and relocated two azaleas; one was doing poorly and the other was being buried underneath some overzealous groundcover. Then I had the big, strong 18 year old next door move a couple of potted plants for me. Next on my list was acquiring a quantity of polished black Mexican rock for our little Japanese garden in the side-yard. I talked a buddy into going with me for that one. And we oohed and aahed at all of the gorgeous rock before we loaded up with 250 pounds of polished black Mexican rock, which now looks spectacular in our Japanese garden, and should save me from doing a lot of weeding in that area.

This past weekend was Airshow weekend here, and although the weather on Friday and Saturday was less than ideal, yesterday the skies cleared up and they had nothing but blue skies and perfect conditions. So I was out in our cul-de-sac with my cameara, and here are the shots I got.

It's ridiculously hot in the Pacific Northwest

OK, so the temperature was down to 104 degrees in my backyard today, in the shade, under the filbert tree, near our little pond and waterfall. (My Mom swears that everything important happens under 'the famous filbert tree', and she isn't too far off the mark.) Now, if you really stop and think about it, that's an absolutely ridiculous statement for someone to make if they live here in the beautiful Pacific NW. We haven't had a heatwave like this since before my oldest son, Dan, was born, and he's 25 now and all grown up! Crazy! So, I'm pulling out all of my salad recipes, and always on the lookout for more. This night, I wanted to make a salad with beef, maybe Thai-oriented. I searched the internet, and got some ideas, but not a solid recipe that really spoke to me. So, I went shopping, and winged it. Now, I'm really liking the way this salad turned out, so I thought I would share. It's healthy, has interesting flavor combos going on, and even satisfies the meat eaters out there. I'm not going to get exact on proportions here, because I really just did what looked right for the folks I was feeding.

Andi's Steak Salad

1/4 lb beef top loin steak per person

grill seasoning

1 bag of iceburg lettuce mix with carrots and red cabbage

some fresh spinach, thinly slice

fresh cilantro, chopped (unless you hate it, and then use flat-leaf parsley)

bell pepper, preferably red or yellow, chopped

cucumber, peeled and chopped

bean sprouts

salad dressings of your choice

Assemble the greens in a big bowl as follows. First, put a generous amount of iceberg lettuce mix in the salad bowl. Then add the spinach, cilantro or flat-leaf parsely, bell pepper, cucumber, and bean sprouts. Mix well. Cover and refrigerate until your're ready to serve.

The steak can be bbq'd, broiled, or pan-fried. Cook it to about medium rare and season with grill seasoning. Let the steak cool and rest. You don't want to slice it until it's close to room temp or the juices will all run out. Slice the steak very thinly on a platter of its own.

Each person can assemble their own salad: first greens, then meat, then dressing. I served this salad with some good crusty Italian bread.

New items for sale at my Etsy shop!

Well folks, I finally got around to accomplishing something on my 'Artistic To Do List'. I have opened a new section in my shop for handcrafted greeting cards and notecards. Today I listed three sets of Thank you cards, very reasonably-priced I might add, for the budget-minded shopper. I plan on adding more cards to the shop this coming week, including some for baby congrats, love, friendship, and even Christmas cards. Some of these cards will be accented with my hand-done embellishments, for a more artistic look, and a slightly higher price tag of course!

Maine 2009

You can see just how bad the weather was in these photos. The rain had actually stopped, and it was just foggy. So foggy that even the lobster boats weren't going out! This year I took my Maine trip early. Usually I go in late September or early October, when the kids are back in school and the tourists are gone, just before everything closes up for the long, cold winter and I can see some gorgeous fall color and eat lobster. But this year, I wanted to take Cody, my youngest son. He doesn't remember my Mom and Walter, or my sister Kathy, and he'd never even met Kathy's husband Stan. My husband Dale has been to Maine, and even Cody's older brother Dan has been to Maine. And Dan does remember my family. And I love Maine, for many reasons! Cody was feeling a bit left out, and I really wanted him to have some good memories of family back there, especially since Mom and Walter are in their early 90s now. And it gave us a chance to do something together, just the two of us. An adult-type trip. We flew into Rockland airport in a tiny Cessna that holds 9 passengers and the pilot. It was cloudy, of course, so we couldn't see all of the islands that can make this a wonderful flight. But, it wasn't windy or bumpy either, so at least the flight was smooth. And boy, this was one small airplane! And Rockland airport has no control tower; all landings are visual only. The first few nights we stayed at my favorite B&B, Ripples Inn at the Harbor, with my friend Sandi Dillon, who owns and runs Ripples. I love staying there and I love Sandi. It really is like being at home, only much better! You can literally walk into town from there, and you're only a block from the waterfront. Every night after dinner, Cody and I took a walk down along the docks and the waterfront. Then we headed to my sister Kathy's in nearby Owlshead. She and Stan live right on the water, in a gorgeous craftsman house that they had built for them. They're very isolated, and I love their place too! They are between two lighthouses, Rockland and Owlshead, and you could hear the foghorns talking to each other, non-stop, the whole time we were there. The Owlshead lighthouse. Rain or not, we did have a good time. Cody taught my Mom a new card game, which she was thrilled about, because Mom loves to play cards. My sister Kathy and I checked out the new Jamie Wyeth exhibit at the Farnsworth Museum, 'The Seven Deadly Sins'. Kathy and I always go to the Farnsworth and check out the latest Wyeth exhibit. Cody got to watch his Aunt Kathy get rid of a red squirrel one morning after breakfast, in her pjs and bathrobe, and Cody was really quite impressed! (We'll just leave that description right there!) Cody played pool with his Uncle Stan and they watched baseball together and talked sports. Walter amazed Cody with his imitation/comedy Hawaiian 'chanting'. And I had a great time with my family and at Ripples with Sandi. Did I mention how much I truly love Sandi and her B&B? We weren't in the place 5 minutes, and Cody said to me,"I can see why you two are such good friends!" Thus end my epistles of Maine. Who's coming with me next year? It may be a 'Girls' Trip'. Unfortunately, the northeastern part of this country had record-breaking rainfall in June this year. And boy did they! It rained like hell most of the time we were there, which changed some of our plans, but at least we live here in the rainy Pacific NW and not Arizona or some other horrid desert climate, so Cody and I weren't really bothered by the rain too much. My sister Kathy was not a happy camper!

Upon consideration of a shorter viewpoint

When I started this blog, I envisioned afternoons of bliss and wine, happily writing away, putting my thoughts on paper. Obviously, reality has been very different! Would that my thoughts could instantaneously be transformed into written words. I would have published volumes by now! So, as many of you know, I have a very big dog, a mastiff named Shadow, and a very small dog, who is fuzzy and white with Maltese ears and tail, and his name is Stuie, short for Stuart Little. Stuie chose us; not the other way around. And now I am in the process of trying to understand how he thinks, so I can train him. Training Shadow was much easier in some ways, because Shadow very obviously tries to understand what I want; he is very in tune with me. Stuie on the other hand, just looks rather clueless and cute. But that nasty high-pitched squeal that little dogs do, that has gotta go! Now, I have been reading a book I got for Christmas, "Animals in Translation" by Temple Grandin & Catherine Johnson. It's an amazing read, and I highly recommend it. It has gotten me to try and think about things from Stuie's point of view, literally. So, I've actually gotten down onto the floor and looked at the world from his vantage point. And I can tell you, the world looks pretty scary from down there. You really have no idea what's going on. I might be yapping my fool head off too if that's what I was seeing! The boy needs a stool; that's all there is too it.

Recent Jewelry Productions

I have discovered recently that the path of an artist in the throes of a design dilemma is not a straight one. I'm working on the beaded collar that I'm hoping to enter into competition this year. I have the 'centerpiece' of the design done, I think. Unless I get too picky and rip a part of it out again and redo it better. Now I'm working on the supporting designs. And after a few attempts at a flower design, I ripped out all traces of the flower and went for paisley instead. Then I looked at it, and thought to myself, "Almost!" And I ripped it out again, one last time, and redid the paisley with a bit of a tweak. And I liked it so much, I'm almost done with the corresponding one on the other side of the collar!

Disaster Averted! (for a price)

Just about the worst thing that could happen to me computer-wise happened. My relatively new hard-drive went, shall we say delicately, feet up, deader than a door nail, mechanically non-functional, and impossible for my guru Dave to do anything with at all. Oh, and did I mention that I hadn't backed up anything since 2006? Which professionally speaking wasn't too bad, although I did lose a couple of great newer shots. (A lot of my pro stuff was backed up onto CDs.) However, most of the family photos were gone. And then I realized how much of Cody's sports I'd lost, and animal photos of pets no longer with us, etc, etc etc I collapsed into a pile of mush on the couch, and cried and cried and cried and ...Well, you get the ugly picture. And to my rescue, my hubby came roaring in on his white charger. He had a plan! There was hope! I calmed down. First, the hard-drive went to a local guy that does data recovery, one of these twenty-something whizz kids. It was a no-go with him too, but he had another plan as well. He sent the hard-drive off to a clean room in Milwaukie, Wisconsin; we don't have any here in Oregon for data recovery. I was in luck, because my problem was entirely a mechanical failure, with no data corruption of any kind. Sooo.... for a fee, a rather large fee, I got all of my photos back. And at less than $1 per photo, I'm very grateful to have all of our memories back!

And backed up!