I’ve been manically crafty this week. I can’t help myself at this time of year. My latest silly endeavor is a wreath craft for Claire’s upcoming class party. It’s a modern wreath made of equilateral paper triangles. Nothing too complicated or messy for a class party. It must fit into the party where the kids are hyper excited to have their next three weeks off from school and not prone to concentrating. Also, it must not be overtly Christmasy. There it is…
I miss my hydrangea shrubs back in the US, but today I snagged some blooms from a pile that our apartment landscapers had pruned.
As much as I love hydrangeas I never know how to arrange them in a vase. They are SO BIG and they always seem out of proportion with the vase. Oh well. This bouquet also shows how our weather here in the low parts of Switzerland is so different from the weather that I’m familiar with in Michigan and the Chicago area. Here, in the middle of November it’s chilly but there are still geraniums slow-motion blooming in window boxes. I always find myself waiting the whole winter for winter to start. Waiting for those frigid Midwest days. Brrrr.
I bought a big pickle jar full of costume jewelry three years ago and I’ve finally gotten around to making something out of it. I made a wreath.
It’s not my usual style of craft but I kept seeing examples of wreaths and trees made out of jewels online and there is something about them that I just love. I guess it’s more of my holiday philosophy – more is more.
Sparkle, sparkle, sparkle!
We had our annual gingerbread party yesterday. We had 12 kids altogether. Bea and Claire and I had so much fun gathering the candy, and setting up the table. This was the first year I made gingerbread houses instead of gingerbread men. The kids were very excited and it was lots of boisterous fun. It’s funny to see how kids react to a huge pile of candy and cookies when it is mostly supposed to be used for decorating.
I took lots of pictures.
Brian had a work colleague in town and her husband and son joined her for a little vacation. We had fun taking them to a zoo and to a snowy mountain. After seeing the snow it really feels like the holiday season and today I am making gingerbread houses for our upcoming party.
I tried out a new sewing pattern. It’s the Uniform Tunic from Grainline Studio. I do love a tunic. It’s my first time using a pattern from Grainline Studio and I liked it. I liked how the instructions are printed as a little booklet instead of an unwieldy huge folded paper. It’s just a basic tunic but it has neat on-seam pockets. I’d like to try the pattern with a fabric that has a little more structure. But I was pleased with this first try and I was happy that I got the plaid to line up well over the seams.
How can it already be the 5th day of November?
I’ve been enjoying the cooler weather and looking forward to Thanksgiving. I’m bringing the pumpkin pie for our little gathering of Americans. I rarely make homemade pie crust because I’m always so disappointed in my results. Really everything I make pales in comparison to my Grandma Dice’s pie crust. But… I want to try. I want to get something flakey and golden and not too rich or heavy. So I’ve tried two new recipes.
First I tried one from the King Arthur Flour web site. It’s similar to a rough-puff type of pastry that I see being made on The Great British Baking show (love that show). It uses baking powder and sour cream. I used it to make a chocolate pie (bottom crust) and a chicken pot pie (top crust). And I liked it. It was very rich and puffy and I think it was suited to the chicken pot pie more than a fruit pie.
The second pie dough recipe I tried is from The Zingerman’s Bakehouse cookbook that I bought myself a while back. The recipe included very detailed instructions that I found easy to follow. And again I’m pretty happy with the results. This recipe is more like the basic recipe that Grandma Dice made. I guess it’s one of those things that is all in the technique. So I plan to practice – I’d really like to master this.
For this pie I made a recipe that Jennifer gave me – Whiskey Apple Pie. I can’t remember where she got the recipe. You cut the apples thinly and cook half of them on the stove before putting it all together. Yum.
Who’s that coming down the hall?
All in black with polka-dot socks.
Yikes that can’t be the same girl as this one… can it?
Yes, it’s Claire! She’s a Death Eater from the Harry Potter books. On one hand I love that she wants to be a frightening character from a book. On the other hand I can’t help but totally annoy her when I recall the year she was a cute little white kitten. Lots of eye rolls – sorry love. I do love your costume!
And here are our pumpkins. Happy Halloween to you!
Things are looking a little spooky as we have a spider infestation in our dinning area.
Fall colors, blah blah blah, pretty pretty pretty. I bore myself.
A friendly kitty interrupted my walk and insisted on me petting him. I talked to him in English and he still liked me.
On Saturday we made a campfire lunch at the ruins in our town. Sausages, cheese, cider, some cucumbers and clementines and biscuits! I was super excited to finally use the reflector oven that my dad made for me.
The biscuits turned out great. Especially with a little strawberry jam.
I would have liked to lounge around our campfire a bit longer but we were invited to have hairy crab and hot pot dinner with some Chinese friends.
I had some crab and it was good, but I’m just not used to all that digging and cracking. It was tasty – especially with the ginger sauce that our hosts made. Bea and Claire were not impressed. They sat at the end of the table horrified and barely able to look. The hot pot was delicious – I haven’t had that since before Bea was born.
Stay tuned for some pumpkin photos! Hope you are enjoying a beautiful fall weekend too.
Laowai 