often things are done a certain way for a reason

    One morning while visiting my mom i found all of the ingredients for making blueberry pancakes waiting for my on the kitchen counter.
My brother makes the BEST pancakes ever, but mine are certainly fine for home consumption so i got to it.

Then it happened - i had an IDEA.
Oh, how many misadventures here in the Nikiverse start with me suddenly having an idea?

It really annoys me that blueberry pancakes only have blueberries every here and there because they are added after the batter is poured.
    You get bites with a lot of berry and bites with no berry.

It tweaks at my love for food homogeny.

What if i added some of them during mixing so that they would break apart, scattering blueberry bitletts throughout the batter?
Then i could still place extra berries where needed as they cooked.
Double the berry goodnes!
BRILLIANT!
It is so obvious, so easy.
Why has no one done it like this before?

sigh... this is why.


Too much berry caused the top cakes to cook unevenly and be, well, you can see for yourself.


I added more batter and placed the berries as is common and got the delicious bottom cakes.




sigh... foiled again by dratted reality

Proof of Life

       Squeaky Monkey has been retired as the co-pilot of my car.
Though not elderly per se, he has reached the point in an inflatable's life where constant exposure to the sun and temperature changes has not only begun to change his color, but make him a bit more brittle. It would be terrible if one day i got in my car and found him all deflated and pathetic in his seat belt from popping, so inside he went.
He was not amused by the term retired and had declared himself Sargent at Arms for the living room. No, i have no idea what that even means, but he seems satisfied with that so who am i to question it.

      After driving alone for a while, a new co-pilot happened along.

His name is Cyrano.

Margaret H gave him to me.

He is very quiet, 

rides in the console,

 and loves snickerdoodles.

      Those specific snickerdoodles were bought at a cookie and brownie stand that two girls had set up on the corner in Suzanne's neighborhood and we all know that i can not resist enterprising children. The cookie were overpriced, but were some of the BEST snickerdoodles i have ever had, They must have been made in muffin pans instead of on a cookie sheet because the bottoms were rounded up and crunchy.

There is only one more weekend of pet-sitting and then the busy season is officially over.
Then starts festival season.
I have been getting a lot of new jewelry made and hope to have an Etsy update (or 2) in the next month.

      Another new crockpot recipe has been marked off of the list. Last Friday i adapted a traditional slowcooker  roast  recipe to make beefstew to celebrate the official beginning of autumn. Cassie and Mike joined me for dinner and we all agreed that it turned out really tasty, though the quinoa never fully cooked up.

The previous Friday Lydia and I went on mayhaps the greatest Friday Adventure ever.
 It involved glassblowing.
Pictures to follow.

snippets

With this crazy, swirly summer i have taken a few days to visit my mom in Ohio, which reminds me that i never posted a fun post that i teased months ago.

So let's re-tease this picture:

Hopefully i will actually get to that post before something else crazy happens.

Yesterday i had brunch with my mom and sister.

It was relaxed and wonderful

There are no pictures because there were mimosas instead.

I have seen my sister and brother both in the last two months and they both made me sausage and biscuits.

Their recipes were very different, but both were incredible.

I don't remember really having that for breakfast growing up so i find it funny that all three of  us love it.

Speaking of my brother, here is a picture of me at the shooting range we went to when i was visiting:

Why?

Why not.

I have updated the 101 List and added a day counter to the sidebar. 

We are 8 months into the 43 and i am mostly pleased with myself. 

There has been progress on 31 of the goals. Considering that i took the last few months off from, well, everything that is pretty good.

I think there is only one goal that i might not be able to make up in the remaining time: #64, give blood 16 times. 

The Red Cross has really strict rules about how often you can donate and my original goal was really ambitious.

To see the list you can click on the page below my header or click here.

Miss Miriam came over for dinner and i tried a new crockpot recipe, which helped 2 goals at once.

I made crockpot eggplant lasagna, adapted from here.

Next time i will add about 30 more minutes to the cooking time, but overall i would call dish a success. Plus it went really well with the watermelon daiquiris. 

This is the most cheerful pair of foo dogs i have ever seen.

I am not sure i would trust them to protect much.

Pikachu, i choose you! made of Peeps:

Disaster. Decisions. Delicious.

When Amy and i got to our sushi place on Monday we were distraught to find it closed.
I mean, closed closed.  Like closed forever, no-furniture-inside closed.
DISTRAUGHT, people!
For a moment we both stood with our foreheads resting on the window, filled with melancholy and woe when she suddenly stood up straight and said, Well, there's always Honey Pig.

{blink-blink} {blank stare}

Haven't you ever been to Honey Pig? she continued upon seeing my dazed expression.
It's by Enchanted Forest. I'll drive.
      Just a few miles later we arrived at a wonderful Korean BBQ with K-Pop videos on multiple screens and a fire in the middle of the table where they cooked our yummy lunch.  I had pork belly and spicy buckwheat noodles which were fantastic -and spicy; when they say spicy, they  mean spicy- and immensely enjoyed having everything cooked right in front of us.
     It was lovely to have such a fun and different lunching experience after the shock of the no-more sushi buffet. There are 5 Honey Pig locations in Maryland and Virginia, plus one in Taiwan.
I will admit that overall fantastic, the location in Ellicott City, MD that i visited did have one small idiosyncrasy:

i am a rule-follower, but i really
wanted to open this door just to see what happened.
i mean it's not like there is such a thing as a load-bearing door.

random brain bits

I love visiting Florida.
Living there? Not so much.
But a nice week in the sunshine is just what is needed to relax, clear one's mind and start to shake off those winter doldrums.
There are record high temperatures this week.
The AC broke, so that's a bit unfortunate.
Still, i don't have to shovel heat.

Two weeks ago i couldn't close zip-top bags.
I use them every day in the studio.
I have never had any issue before, but suddenly, no matter how many times i slid my fingers down the top ridge, it wouldn't seal.
I tried different sizes and brands, but i was stymied.
What the what, people?
Then just as suddenly, last Tuesday i could close all of the bags again.
Sometimes i think my house must have been built over toxic waste and the fumes are making me hallucinate large parts of my life. It would explain a lot.

Going by someone's house yesterday on my constitutional, i saw small decorative piles of rocks placed as yard art and said, Oh look -  Inukshuks! to the no one riding along with me.
Then i paused to think, Why in the world do i even know that word? Inuit sculpture isn't something i encounter in my every day life.
It was from an episode of due South.
Betcha haven't thought about that show in a hot minute.
Who says tv isn't educational?
Upon closer investigation they were less traditional Arctic tribal art and more tiny little adorable  rock people.

i want them in my yard

Mental Morsel: the plural of inukshuk is not inukshuks as i thought, but rather inuksuit, which i have no idea have to pronounce.

Recently i heard some less than good news of a medical nature (not about me).
For the next 36 hours or so i had the Time For Your Checkup song from Doc McStuffins stuck in my head. A 43-year old woman with no children should not have to endure It's okay if you giggle; this will only tickle a little for that long.
Great. Now it is stuck in my head again.

Bonus Mental Morsel: despite sounding like most of the noble gasses (neon, argon, krypton, xenon and radon) the coolant Freon is not really a single chemical, but the trade name of a bunch of different chloroflourocarbons used as refrigerants.
Generally, Freon is four times heavier than air.

I can't believe it took me the last 25 minutes searching the internet to find that this guy's name is Sir Scoopsalot.

You know i can't resist a costume character and this guy was in Hampden, hon, handing out coupons to The Charmery.

If you haven't been to The Charmery in Baltimore, you need to go now.
They make all the ice cream in-house from local milk, invent interesting flavors and try to capture the spirit of our charming, quirky city.
I highly recommend the salty caramel.
Every day is the right day for ice cream, even if it is only 30 degrees.
Or you can get hot chocolate with house-made marshmallow.

The fountain in the lake in front of my dad's house goes off at 11:47 pm or, as my dad informed me when i pointed it out, 10:47 pm before daylight saving's time.
Nice round number, yeah?
It gives me pause.

Recently -maybe the last two months-  i have been using "totes" instead of totally when speaking.
Hello 2010, what are you doing here?
I didn't use that term when it was popular.
Why in the world would i suddenly start now?
I didn't even realize i was doing it until i heard one of my charges -a kindergartner no less- use it in a sentence and realized she had to have picked it up from me.
Now i am hyper-aware of when it slips into conversation and am really annoyed with myself.
So to all of the people with whom i might have had a conversation of late, i am sorry about resurrecting this lame slang.
I think i need to go with the snapping-rubberband-around-the-wrist aversion therapy to stop myself.

And finally, to end this stream of consciousness, kittens:

Spring 2014 with Erin, Caleb, Cameron and Collin

what's in my brain today?

My new favorite misspelling of my name is Nickie.  It is so random.
A very nice lady wrote that on my Christmas card.


Kathleen Turner suddenly jumped into my brain last night as i was falling asleep.
Whatever happened to her?


Last week i took a broken chair to the dump and saw this:

It was only 4 days after Valentine's. 

Someone hated it enough to take it to the dump, but loved it enough that they just couldn't throw it in.

You know there has to be a good story there.

I am a lot older than i think i am.
I have now known most of my friends for 20 years or more.
In my head i am really not old enough to have known people that long unless we met in kindergarten.

Speaking of fast time flies, last spring Dash and I went to the library after school. There is a brick divider wall in the parking lot and i had the idea to put him into the "decorative" openings to take a picture of him peeking out of it.

Two weeks ago when we passed the same wall leaving the library, he said I want my picture taken in there. He could almost climb into it himself, but then needed i little help because he barely fit:

 Andrew took me to the Gem and Jewelry Show.
I was expecting gems and jewelry.
There were plenty of both, but he didn't warn me that there would be BEADS FOR SALE, dirt cheap.

Oh, so many pretty beads. Some of them had to come home with me.
Also, this lovely, understated purple ring came home with me as well, thanks to Andrew.


What happens to those beads?
I think we all know the answer to that.
It sounds so impressive to say, I worked hard all day and got 80 pairs of Quirkees designed, plus another 60 pairs pulled for design.

The picture doesn't make it look that impressive though.
That's the problem with creating little things.








In case you didn't realize it, i have been updating my 101 progress every week.


Learning never gets old; i love the tingle of new neural pathways being forged in my brain.
Last night i was reading a book and came across a word i'd never seen before: gainsay. From the context of the sentence it seemed like it would mean " to agree with" but in fact it means the opposite - deny or contradict.
Let's all try to use gainsay in a sentence this week, shall we?
And in case you are wondering, yes, gainsaid is the past tense. That makes me smile and i don't even know why.


There are no pictures for it, but i did use one of the neglected kitchen gadgets that is on my 101 - the electric skillet.  It has not been plugged in for at least a decade, but it provided a nice, evenly heated surface for the pancakes i made over the weekend.
One down, three to go: immersion blender, bread tube and my pop chef.

great tastes that don't taste great together

Sometimes completely by accident we stumble upon cool combinations that we would never have thought to put together like spaghetti and corn or chix noodle soup and corn or corn omelettes.
Unfortunately it also happens that by accident we stumble straight into a combo of nasty like moni cheese, Tabasco, bourbon and butterscotch pudding.
Don't do that, people.
Just don't.
Trust me on this.

brain dump

The jewelry show this weekend went well - meeting new customers and catching up with previous ones. 

It was fantastic to put a newly remade bracelet on its owner. 

She had some wooden letter beads from a broken bracelet that she wanted me to salvage so i added two sizes of jade beads randomly, creating a double wrap that she loved.

Last night while i was brushing my teeth i suddenly realized that the ABC Song is to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. 

Did you know that? How did i not notice that before? 

I stood in the bathroom, mouth full of foam singing both of them to verify my epiphany. 

Incidents like this convince me that i should both have a personal photo/videographer to capture the insanity and that i should never ever let anyone see what i am like at home alone. Not sure how to get both of those things to exist simultaneously. 

42 days into the 101 challenge and i am already happy that i have over 2.5 years to get some of this stuff done. It has focused me, but there are still daily/weekly things that i haven't managed to work in yet. It is nice to know that i have the time to ease into some of these things.

Speaking of the 101, #77 is Blog caught up, which doesn't sound hard until you consider that i have two whole vacations to do, as well as pictures ranging from last week to last year to four years ago.

Ridiculous, Niki.

So i am going to aggressively try to clean out the A BLOG photo folder by doing random posts like this one, combining several small posts into one larger one.

Jason loves BBQ - i mean, that boy loves barbecue - so last year he was stalking a local food truck called The Smoking Swine. 

a picture of Kate taking a picture of JP and DJP

When it was at  Catonsville ArtVille the family went to try it. 

My pulled pork was very good, but the stand out was the Slap Yo Mama Mac and Cheese. Three cheeses, two noodle shapes, a touch of heat and goldfish on the top add up to a moni cheese that easily makes my top 5 list, possibly my top 3. 

The only disappointment was that the prices were seriously jacked up for the festival, not even close to the advertised prices online.

The older i get the more i appreciate what a fine job my parents did raising me; I was blessed to have both my mother and father actively involved. 

Recently i have been dealing with people that have no idea how to be adults; self-absorbed and clueless, it is obvious that their parents were indulgent or clueless themselves. Both personal and professional activities are conducted with only their best interest in mind and with the maturity of a high-schooler.

Don't get me wrong: in no way do i think i am perfect. 

Please, on a good day i am scattered, nuts, judgmental and vain-glorious (though honestly, who wouldn't be if they were me?). 

But there are good parts as well and i can see that they were created or nurtured by my parents.

The more i realize how much of me is a reflection of them, the less angry i am with these ridiculous people i encounter. In fact, i kind of feel sorry for them because the entitlement and resulting inability to cope with reality didn't come from out of the air: someone fostered it in them.

So if you are reading this Mommy or Daddy, good job.

This hunk of blue glass was in a garden that was the setting for a party i attended last summer.

Does anyone know what it is, how it was made, where i can one?

I am intrigued by things that defy my explanation.

Does anyone remember the slice of carrot cake that defied explanation? 

It was from The Pub in Gettysburg. Ron and I ate there again during our stay at the Lodges in August. This time i ordered a calzone.

It was the size of a small house.

Anytime something is served with its own gigantic knife you know you are in for an experience. 

Gosh, it was good.

 All four meals that it took me to finish it, it was good.

The Dessert of the Week was Fruity Pebbles Cake.

You read that right.

It also was fantastic and lasted for three days, being the densest cake i have ever eaten. 

As well as the pinkest.

 

balancing living at home and working at home

My house is a mess.

A MESS.

Not dirty, mind you; there is just stuff everywhere.

No, not like hoarders, either: it is useful stuff that gets used on a daily basis.

Consider that it is my apartment and a full papercraft studio and a full jewelry studio.

It is not uncommon to have the dining room table set up for beading, a card table up in the living room for card making, Makes it tough to have people in for a visit.
Plus, i hate my tiny kitchen.

Over the summer, Amy and I were going to get together for tea and i decided that by jiminey i was going to host it, mess or no mess, crappy small kitchen and all.

STEP 1: consolidate in-progress jewelry projects into containers; stack them neatly to the side of the room

STEP 2: consolidate in-progress paper craft projects onto the dining room table; cover gently with a table cloth; add a pretty teapot to keep with the theme

STEP 3: cover wretchedly small, mismatched counter tops with a matching tablecloth to create the illusion of a buffet; lay out food that was prepared well in advance so that the kitchen did not need to be utilized that day, except to boil water

(from left: chips with Rea's homemade peach salsa; toast fingers with Rea's homemade black raspberry jelly; trail mix customized to my specifications (fruit and nuts have to be a 1:1 ratio, people); cantaloupe and grapes; black and white cookies (made by the grocery store because i don't really bake); 2 versions of toasted party ryes {cream cheese herbed with basil and garlic, topped with tiny tomatoes & cream cheese herbed with garlic and oregano, topped with prosciutto}; zucchini rounds with either plain or chipotle hummus; and green olives)
STEP 4: eat, drink, be merry

Tea turned out so well that i've decided more entertaining needs to happen in Chez Nicole.
Lydia and I were supposed to have a Friday adventure, but i had to cancel at the last minute so i invited her over for home cooking instead.
One of the house specialties is Nik'obo Stew: a seasonally variable stew that is loosely based on jambalaya and a bbq hobo stew a friend made for me 20 years ago.
It always has sausage and/or chicken, a sweet element balanced against a savory element and a grain of some type.

This Autumnal version was kielbasa, black beans, chili beans, sauteed onions and corn cooked in a tomato base with bay leaves as the savory half mixed with the sweet half of eggplant, butternut squash, chopped onions and whole garlic cloves roasted with nutmeg and ground cloves. 

I think it is okay to serve on tv trays as long as you have pretty napkins folded into flatware pockets, right?

surprisingly tasty

I mentioned that while i was in Ohio visiting Rea we made jelly because i had never canned anything before.
The violet jelly was beautiful and tasted good, but the dandelion jelly was INCREDIBLE!
How can anything made from a bitter weed be delicious?
Like the violets, you make an infusion from the flower petals that is the base of the jelly.
It tastes honey-er than honey; it has the bright sweetness, but not the aftertaste.
I was in charge of lidding the jars as i got to use the fun magnetic wand. To see the whole process and get the recipe for the BEST JELLY you have ever eaten, click on Rea's link.
One of cool surprises for me about making jelly was that while the jars cool and you wait for the blessed PING that indicates it has vacuum-sealed, watching the bubbles blubbing through the amber liquid was mesmerizing.

i just noticed that if you embiggen the video

 you can see my lovely BFF reflected in the upper left-hand corner 

floral jelly

While i was in Ohio for my birthday/ Mother's Day i spent 2 days on the farm with Rea and helped make violet and dandelion jelly.
Here is the amazingly hot pink violet jelly.

Notice how is a completely different color from the violet infusion from which it was jellied.
The change happens when you add the lemon juice and cook it down.

It has a light, sweet floral taste that was able to stand up to peanut butter (the ultimate jelly test), but would probably be better on toast.
It was very fun for this City Mouse to do her first canning by helping with the jelly.

When i say i helped, let's understand that i was the photographer, put on lids and did a few other things.

For the full story and recipe, go here.

Hopefully there will be a post about the dandelion jelly which sounds gross and yet is one of the yummiest things i have ever eaten.

the return of lunches with Lydia

I love restaurant week.

Christopher Daniel with Lyds.

Bison and lamb. YUM.

what to do with Thanksgiving leftovers

Eat them.

i love people!

Festival season has been great so far, but I am spending a LOT of time alone in the studio so I am trying to make a concerted effort to spend time with actual people.
Last week I went to see fTM Erin three days before she was going to the hospital to birth son #3.
She couldn't quite bend over to finish packing her hospital bag (I tried not to giggle) and I stayed with the boys while she went to her last doctor's appointment.

Caleb Henry was born late Friday night after a long, somewhat tricky labor.
Congrats to the whole family.
And good luck with three boys under the age of 4.






Last night fTM Felicia and I met for yummy quesadillas and then went to a deep water running class.
Yes, all you moms out there, not only did we eat before exercising, we ate before jumping into 12ft of water. Good news, neither of us died.
Deep water running was a much better workout than  I was expecting. You wear a floatee belt since an hour of treading water is too much for anyone, especially while you are doing jumping jacks and cross-country skiers and crunches. Yes, crunches. And there was some weight work as well. My shoulders are still sore.
Tonite I am taking a class on a new stamping product.
Wait, did I mention that I am now a Stampin' Up! consultant ?
I am not planning on actually doing any parties, but got a REALLY good deal on ink that I needed to buy anyway.  If you need any SU! stuff let me know because I will be placing one more order in December and am happy to share my discount.
But between now and then, fTM Amy and I are getting together for tea and to exchange pictures from our adventure to Elioak Farms. Hopefully that means a blog post about it soon.

because i am right

An optimist's life is not as easy-going as her attitude.
People are always trying to convince her that the world is a terrible place.
Well, no duh.
Of course the world is a terrible place. I am an optimist, not an idiot.
However there are moments that validate everything.

This is Emily and Kristen.
They were shopping in the store today and asked if I knew how to get to the ice cream place. I am not from Arbutus, but remembered that fTM Amy gave me and Rachel & Jen directions to the hidden ice cream cottage. I sorta half-remembered what side of town it was on, but it called the hidden ice cream place for a reason, so I gave them my best guess and sent them off with a mazel tov.
Why do you care about this?
See that ice cream in Emily's hand?
It is for me.
They walked all the way back here to give me this homemade peach ice cream because "you were so nice and we like your store." They were all shy about telling me and I squealed with delight when they finally told me that they bought me ice cream.

Take that pessimists!

can corn salsa?

No, this is not a food post.
Yesterday I went out to lunch with Diane B and after dropping her off back at the museum I was behind this truck on Key Highway.

Do you see it?

Look at the ear of corn.

Is it just me?





Okay.
Here, let me enlarge that for you:

It looks like that corn is dancing, right?
As soon as I stopped at the red light behind the truck I started laughing at how all the other produce was just sitting there, but the corn, oh the corn was gettin' down.
In fact, it took a few seconds to realize that those green arms and leg aren't actually supposed to BE arms and a leg, just artfully peeled husks.
You see it right?
I'm not nuts, right?
Right?
Okay, maybe I am projecting because I love corn and music, but I swear that ear of corn is doing a happy jig.
And why wouldn't it be happy?
I'm sure it is on its way to a party with great music, food and friends and lavishly decorated with balloons, streamers and corn-fetti.

Feeling So Random

Went to see Thirty Seconds to Mars last night and ended up on stage this close to the drums.

Will share the story, but realize that I need to tell a story of a story to get to that story because.. well.. i'm me. Keep an eye out; mayhaps all 3 stories will get posted by New Year's.

Sitting here working on another Etsy update - Pink Ribbon earrings for October. They are a mix of cute ones from last year and awesome new ones so there both new and old pictures to go through, but I am really distracted by the fact that my chest smells like tacos from a wee lunch incident.

Had dinner Saturday at fTM Miriam's new apartment; she lives in an actual Baltimore rowhouse.

It is beautiful.

She made Lydia's Stuffed Squash, so named because Miss Lydia had it last year and loved it so much that she has been asking Miriam to make it again.

Stuffing of quinoa, onions garlic, carrots, cranberries, apples and walnuts is cooked inside of a roasted acorn squash.

It is autumn on a plate.

As my first experience with acorn squash like this I am delighted to report it was yummy.

And yes, Lydia joined us for dinner because how can you have Lydia's Stuffed Squash without her?

Last week the hardwood floors in the foyer of my building and the steps going to the upstairs apartments were stripped and sealed. We couldn't use the front door for several days, but they do look incredible.
The down side?
It smelled like varnish and decay, with an under note of natural gas.
I slept with the windows open, fans on and several extra blankets but I think there might have been some long-term brain damage. I mean, nothing that smells that bad can possibly be good for you. Plus, I spent so much time around flammable chemicals  the last 20 years that I was in a state of heightened awareness on the lookout for a non-existent chemical leak.
For three days.
 It was exhausting.

At the Parisian Flea one day I saw this box -Beaver Finger Ring Cutter- and was like what?
Those words make no sense in that order.
Opening the box I found a truly alarming looking instrument:

Beaver. Finger. Ring. Cutter.

Pointy, circular bladed, sharp hooked, wicked looking thing.
Does it cut fingers?
Where does the beaver come into the picture?
I ask Andrew and he told me that it is for when someone has a ring stuck on their finger.
WHAT?
MENTAL MORSEL:
It cuts the shank of the stuck ring so that it can come off of the finger and it is made by a guy whose last name is beaver.
Even knowing the answer I am still a bit confounded every time I see the box.

Earlier I was on the phone with fTM Erin arranging to go visit tomorrow when she uttered, No Collin, you can't be naked in that rocket. I just imagine her 3 year old being like, Well which rocket can I be naked in? because that was my first thought. When I stopped laughing that is.

fun farm party at the farm

How is it even possible that fTM's Matt's baby - Sammy- is already one?
Heck, he is already on the way to being a big brother in January.
What's next? College?
A few weeks ago I went to Hendershot Farms in PA to celebrate Sam's birthday with both Matt and Sara's families. It was great to see all of them, especially some folks that I haven't seen since the wedding.

The food was all farm themed.
I was afraid to ask exactly what was on the ingredient list for the cowpies, but they were super yummy.
Instead of a big cake there were three different kinds of cupcakes and a little smash cake.
mmmmm... cupcakes...

And of course there was the birthday pig full of fruit salad in his custom built cutting board corral.
What?
You've never had a birthday pig full of fruit salad?
Then you, my friend, have never lived.

Matt's brother, Chris, designed and carved Mr. Pig.

The detail was mind boggling: pink snout with raisin nostrils, perfect little rind ears, giant googley eyes, zucchini tops for hooves, a pink candle melted and twisted into a curly tail and lollipops in a feeding trough for the kids. I saw pictures of the birthday shark he did for his niece's birthday; i'm getting this guy to do my next party fruit.
Speaking of fruit... you know who loves fruit?
The birthday boy.

Sitting on his dad's shoulders, Sammy was perfectly content as long as I kept handing him bits of fruit. Of course, if the stream of fruit slowed down he gave me some harsh looks.
It was a beautiful day, though a bit hot, so after eating we all moved outside under the shade trees.

With daddy, mommy and pops (Matt's dad)

All of the kids took turns riding the little four wheeler and the big kids took turns riding the big ones. I have to admit that I sort of started the whole thing. I was lamenting that the kids had wheels and looked longingly at Andrew (Sara's brother) as he rode off to work in one of the far barns. His wife, Tiffany, looked at me and said Do you want me to take you for a ride on mine?
Ummmm... have you met me?
I am very sad that there isn't a picture of me riding behind a rather pregnant Tiffany as she took me through the fields and hills of the 400 acres. It was my first time on an ATV and I think I need one.
When we got back the Hillegass boys started taking turns and then taking the kids for rides.
And of course we had to get back to the serious business of birthdaying.

Matt and Sara stripped Sammy down for his smash cake, which he ate rather neatly.
I think he would have been happier with a fork.
In fact, he was really enjoying the lemon pudding when suddenly he hit messy critical mass; looking down at his cake/pudding encased hands he gave Sara a little whimper with save me from the stickiness in his eyes.

My favorite part of the day -besides seeing people I love- was when the baby drums were opened.
His parents have already taught him to hit things rhythmically when they say Drum Sammy so this is the next logical step.
He'll be on Matt's slightly more expensive DW kit in no time.

As the day wound down and people started to load up the cars for their drives home,
Matt got everyone party favors:
corn picked right from the stalk.





To say that it was fabulous to eat corn that was only a few hours from the field is an understatement.

It was the perfect end to a farm party.