Pi(e) Day Pie

It turned out great! And the weather was perfect, too! Hope your March 14 was also delicious and lovely.

Pie Day Preparation

March 14 is Pi Day in these parts. My family celebrates it as Pie Day, because mmmm, pie. The past few years we've gone out to a bakery for pie, but this year, I am going to make one at home. I let the children choose the recipe from my recipe collection, and they selected one I have never tried: Lemon Blender Pie. Here is the recipe, in case you want to celebrate Pie Day at your house, too.

Lemon Blender Pie

1 medium lemon

4 large eggs

1 1/2 cups granulated sugar

10 T butter, melted

1 (9-inch) deep dish pie crust, unbaked

Preheat oven to 325 F.

Wash the lemon, leaving the peel on; cut into small pieces. Remove and discard the seeds. Place the lemon pieces in a blender, add eggs, sugar, and butter. Process well on high speed. Pour into unbaked pie shell and place on baking sheet.

Bake 40-45 minutes or until set. Remove and cool on rack. No meringue is needed because in baking, it forms its own light crust on top.

We shall see how that turns out!

We had our first truly spring-like day yesterday, with clear skies, sunshine, warm temperatures, and no wind. I like to use that first beautiful day in March to go outside and cut back the ornamental grass, the lavender, and the Russian Sage. I did yard work for two hours yesterday, and when I was done, I felt sweaty and dirty and tired. Lovely! As of now, Wednesday (Pie Day) is forecast to be clear and in the low 70s. If that is indeed the weather we get, it shall be a beautiful day for Lemon Pie!

Ginger Lemon Tea

This is one of those oh-so-simple home recipes that you all probably already know about it, but it's new to me, so I'm sharing!

I saw a video recently on using ginger. One suggestion was to make tea. I was intrigued, so I hunted around and found a few recipes, most of which were just slight variations on a theme. Here is what I came up that works for me:

1/3 cup peeled and thinly sliced ginger

6 cups water

Put the ginger in the water and bring to a boil. Simmer for 10 minutes. Strain the water into a mug. Add a spoonful of honey and one lemon slice.

That's it! Simple and delicious. The 6 cups of water will make about 3-4 mugs full, so you can save the rest of the ginger water in the fridge and reheat it as you need it, adding the honey and lemon when it's hot.

This version of a homemade ginger tea, which includes cinnamon and cloves, also sounds yummy, but I'm not sure how lemon would go with that, so I'm holding off on trying that recipe until I am out of lemon!

February 29!

I had to get a post up on this very rare day of February 29!

We are having every kind of weather today. Snow, which quickly turned to freezing rain, which is now plain rain. This morning the neighborhood was covered in frozen rain drops, just enough to make everything sparkle in the gloom.

I finally made the crocheted Swedish heart I've had my eye on for awhile:
I didn't block it. I used worsted weight yarn because it's easy to work with. If I get my courage up, I might try with a thinner yarn. These would be cute Christmas tree ornaments.

The original pattern is here, with a lovely English translation (UK terms) here.

First Grade

I'm going through old photos, and came across this one. I couldn't resist sharing it here. This was on a first grade field trip, and the photo was taken by another mom. All of the children put seed in their hands to try to coax birds to eat, and my daughter was the first to get one to land. She was the tallest in her class, so the birds kept coming to her. Finally her teacher told her to put her hand down so the other kids could have a chance! I think everyone fed a bird that day.

Valentines

February! Time to sprinkle the house with hearts!

I love the Sweethearts-as-photo-frames more than I can say. I blogged about those a few years ago, if you want to read how to make them (it's really easy!). My children are 9 and 6 in those photos. Now that they are 14 and 11, it might be time to make another set.

I saw this paper chandelier at Pottery Barn Kids:
It made my heart beat fast, but that little voice in my head said "you can make one of those." I did give it a try, using an embroidery hoop, yarn, cotton baker's twine, and vellum paper hearts.

The result was underwhelming:
So disappointing! When Pottery Barn Kids put theirs on clearance, I snapped one up, because I needed cheerful dancing hearts floating in my family room.

My children are past the age of passing out Valentines at school, so we don't have anything to do on that front (sniffle), but I am making preparations for things for them here at home. I've already molded some chocolate candy hearts for them. The rest of my inspiration has come from Pinterest.

I planned to make them this popcorn treat , but now my daughter is getting her braces tomorrow, so she can't have popcorn. I think I'll still make it for my son, and just give her the M&Ms!

I am also doing an embroidered version of the alphabet card featured here for my husband. I haven't had much time to work on it, but hopefully I can make some headway while I sit in the waiting room at the orthodontist's office tomorrow.

I'd also like to try to make this crocheted heart, and send it to my mom if it turns out cute.

I am running out of time for all of this! I'd better get to it.

Book Review: The Scrapbook of Frankie Pratt

I don't do many book reviews here, but this book is worthy of a mention because of its fun format. The book is presented as a scrapbook of a young woman, beginning in 1920 when she is 17, and ending in 1928. Every page is filled with ephemera of the era: postcards, food wrappings, ticket stubs, advertisements, photographs, souvenirs, fabric swatches, and more. The story is fairly interesting, too. Even though I never quite made an emotional connection with Frankie, I still wanted to know what would happen to her next!

Here is one of my favorite pages in the book, with souvenirs from her visit to the Eiffel Tower:
I find little trinkets endlessly fascinating.

Here is another page from the book, when Frankie sets up her first apartment in Greenwich Village after college graduation:

The author, Caroline Preston, used her own collection of ephemera, and bought lots more on Ebay, to make the book. What a fun and creative endeavor! If you want to read more about that, here is the author's web site.

Another thing I like about this book is that it demands you read the actual physical book. This wouldn't translate to an e-format very well.

I've been thinking about books and e-books a lot lately because I got a Kindle Fire for Christmas, and I have to say, I'm still on the fence about the whole thing. While I think it's wonderful that practically any book I might want is immediately available to me at any hour of the day, I am so hard-wired to use the library that I just cannot pay money to read a book! On the occasions that I am willing to pay to read a book, I'd rather have the book in-hand to put on my shelf when I'm done. I just cannot bring myself to pay $12.99 for an e-version of a book.

I do admit the e-reader is convenient. I've downloaded many of the free classics, and I am taking advantage of the Amazon lending library available to Prime members (although the lending library selections leave something to be desired). I've even bought a few of the less expensive books available (I haven't paid more than $3.99 yet), but I am going to be a slow adapter to this. If my local public library ever makes the borrowing-of-e-books process more streamlined than it it is now, I will be one happy person.