Last Minute Holiday Gifts

The last Saturday before Christmas-of course I am not ready. We went over to my parents toting a tree & outdoor decorations-they are 84 & my Dad needs a knee replacement so they were not up to decorating. By the time we left the tree was decroated and wreathes were hung and garland surrounded the door. Time for a quick bite & some last minute shopping. Here are some ideas I came up with for those last minute gifts.

Last Minute Gift Ideas

Italian Dinner in a Basket
I can shop almost anywhere! A quick trip to the grocery store turned into Christmas shopping & I checked one more name off the list. Here is what I purchased to make an
Italian Dinner in a basket for friends of mine who both work with limited time to cook.
4 jars of gourmet-style pasta sauce
Assorted pastas: linguini, fettuccini, ziti, penne-get creative & choose some spinach, tomato basil or whole wheat varieties
Parmesan & Romano cheese
A jar of minced garlic
Balsamic Vinegar
Salad Dressing-red wine vinaigrette
Olive Oil
Cooking Spray-olive oil
Peppercorns in a self-contained grinder
Whole Grain Crackers
Breadsticks
Gourmet Cookies
I bought a red check tea towel to line the basket and arranged the ingredients. I also put in a bottle of red wine, a package of my pesto mix and a quick bread mix. Wrapped it all in cellophane and tied it with a raffia bow & wooden spoon. I collect baskets through out the year at yard sales & thrift stores. If you don’t have one on hand a quick trip to your local dollar store should yield a serviceable container. Another great container for this gift would be a big, ceramic pasta bowl. Nothing in this basket is perishable & doesn’t require refrigeration.

Christmas in a Basket-Know someone who is celebrating their first Christmas? Give them a basket full of ornaments to decorate their tree. I went to my local dollar store & found some lovely ornaments for $1.00 each. Just as pretty as the department & craft stores were selling! I included a box of ornament hangers, a box of popcorn-(to string for the tree or to munch on while decorating), a tin of cocoa mix, a bag of mini marshmallows, two mugs & a box of pirouette cookies-yes at the dollar store!

Holiday Housekeeping Basket-My cousins gave me this basket as a thank you gift when they came to stay for Thanksgiving. It was everything I needed for a houseful of guests right at my finger tips! The basket included dish soap, hand soap, counter spray, Laundry detergent & softener, rubber gloves, sponges & scrubber & room spray all packed into a lovely sea grass laundry basket. All the products were geranium scented by Mrs. Meyers. It has a delightful fresh smell that wafts through the house when you are doing laundry. I am now “hooked” and won’t buy anything else. The fragrance was so perfect for me because it smells just like my house when I am drying scented geranium leaves in my oven. They also make a Lemon Verbena, Lavender, & gingerbread fragrance that are just heavenly. Check your local grocery store or look them up on line.

Tea Lover’s Basket-All the ingredients for this basket can come from the grocery store as well. I purchased mugs, assorted teas, cookies, & candies. You can take this a step further with a stop at a gourmet store & add a tea cozy, spoon rests, unrefined sugar, & tea bag squeezers. I popped into a favorite antique mall to pick up lacey linens & silver tea spoons. I placed all my goodies on an elegant silver plated tray & wrapped it with a yard of netting I bought at the fabric store. You could use the same “formula” for the coffee lover on your list too!

For The Gardener-As I so love a garden, this one was easy for me. I went to my local garden center, Home Depot or Lowe’s will do too & purchased a pair of sturdy, comfortable work gloves, several bags of assorted spring bulbs, Miracle Grow, Bone Meal, some essential hand tools with padded grips, some plant markers, & knee pads. This basket is easy to get carried away with-you could add a garden ornament, wind chimes, garden statuary, watering can, etc. I put everything into a brightly colored plastic tub tied with raffia & a garden-themed ornament for the tree.

It's Beginning To Look Like Christmas

Snow flurries have been flying and so have my fingers -packing lots of Christmas Confetti Cheese Spread, Night Before Christmas Soup, & Country Christmas Bread. You can find them all on my website-www.victoriangardengourmet.com, at Annie B's in the West Shore Farmer's Market, PABrown's Orchards in Loganville, PA or online from The Victorian Trading Company.

Hot Mulled Cider

There definitely has been a chill in the air lately and frost blanketed the grass like new fallen snow. I stopped by the farm market on the way home and picked up a jug of fresh-pressed apple cider. Just felt like a warm cup of mulled cider in my favorite transferware cup, wrapped up in an old quilt with my head in a book by the fireplace. Our Merry Molly's Mulling Spice is back for the season. It is a quick, delicious way to treat yourself to a favorite fall beverage. One package goes a long way. Made with natural spices, fruits,& sugar. Packaged with a lovely 19Th century engraving-you can find it on my website-www.victoriangardengourmet.com.

Happy fall!

Mums The Word

I love fall-the colors, the scent of the woods, fireplaces with that first curl of smoke, apples, pumpkins & spices. Shaking out those wool sweaters from the blanket chest & throws to wrap up in with the scent of lavender sachets still clinging to them. Earthy buckwheat pancakes for breakfast with hot apples, carmelized in maple syrup & hearty baked pumpkin oatmeal. Changing the flowers to the frost-kissed, mop head hydrangeas that I'll dry later to decorate the Christmas tree.

We took a drive in the country to our favorite road side stand for pumpkins & mums to finish decorating. The colors looked like patches in a quilt. It was so hard to decide-but there's only so much room in the car! I love all the funky gourds-especially the ones with all the "warts".

On the way home we stopped for a leg-stretch at the Haldeman Mansion. The Haldeman Mansion, is on the Pennsylvania & National Registers of Historic places. It was the birthplace of Professor Samuel Stehman Haldeman and was completed in 1812 by his grandparents, John and Maria Brenneman Haldeman. The style of architecture is vernacular German combined with Federal elements. When it is restored, it will be the first historic structure in the Bainbridge-Conoy Township areas, and will serve as a museum house, community landmark and meeting place. It was a lovely day and perfect for a stroll!

I always get a bit nostalgic this time of year. When my husband & I first went "house hunting" 23 years ago, the first two properties we looked at were stone farmhouses. I love my Victorian-(it is after all my first house), but I am always drawn every fall to a stone house.

Fur Ball

Every year our local Humane Society sponsors an auction & gala to raise funds for the animals at the shelter. It is called the Fur Ball-(little play on words for us cat owners!) since Micky & Pee Wee were fromer shelter mates, the Humane Society is one of my"pet" -(no pun intended) charities. This is the gift basket I donated from The Victorian Garden this year. I truely have a great time coming up with a new basket each year. This one was an autumn theme-(my favorite time of year) with soup mixes, herb sugars, tea, pastas, Dansk cutting board, tea towel, mugs, plates, napkins... I just love the basket-it reminds me of a country French market basket. When it was all put together it weighed about 20 pounds. Even though times are tough & we have to make every cent count, we can't forget about those who need our help. Donate to your favorite charity-it just makes you feel warm & fuzzy all over!

Everlasting Flowers

I love fall-even that it blends into winter, but I will miss my roses and hydrangeas. I love to create silk arrangements. They don't take the place of real flowers, but are lovely stand-ins. Here are just a few.

I love the deep blue of the hydrangeas against the silver chalice with the apple green ribbon.

Apple Picking

Wednesday was the perfect fall day-the air was crisp, the sky was a brilliant blue, and you needed that jacket or sweater. My Mom has been going to the same orchard for over 20 years-she just celebrated her 84th birthday last month. She and my grandmother and aunt used to go-what a wild bunch that was! Grandma was in her nineties, my aunt her late seventies with mom just a few years behind. Now it is just me and my mom bounching over the country roads our bushel baskets at the ready. We brought home some lovely delicious-(my husband's favorite), some crispin-(they make delightful dumplings) and blush-skinned Jonagold. Couldn't resist a home-baked apple dumpling to take home & more gourds & mums. I just can't help myself!

Made some Orchard fruit dip for the cut-up apples-mmmmm!

Added to the outdoor decorations and in a few spooky weeks it will be Halloween. Time to bring the spiders down from the attic and polish up the silver treat bowl. I wonder if the clock will chime again this year. We bought it at auction four years ago and it never ran. Wound it-jiggled it-nothing. Last year when I was filling the treat bowl the clock started running and went through its repetoire of chimes, ran for half an hour and stopped. Spooky! Whose ghost was it-maybe this year we'll find out! Mickey was not impressed-he continued his afternoon nap on the ottoman.

Fall Decorating

It is so much fun at the start of a new season. Replacing the quiet colors of summer with the rich jewels of fall. I draped the mantles with bittersweet, filled baskets with hydrangea blooms and lavender. Replaced bowl fillers with apples, pears, & gourds. My husband found a perfect, dried gourd, a cast-off from last year. I varnished it. It turned out the most marvelous color like aged stucco. It was such a wonderful surprise that now is part of a still-life on my back-door cupboard. I filled a great, green basket with silk sunflowers, hydrangea & bittersweet to put outside my front door. Poor Pee Wee is just "decorated out". He had to take a qucik cat-nap.

Fall is here

These past few mornings it has really felt like fall. When I poke my nose out the door, the scent of fallen leaves is in the air. It is cool on my feet-(still in sandals). There are still a few late-comer tomatoes hanging on the vine and two lush purple eggplant to be picked. It's time to toast marshmallows by the fire. The days are shorter and time seems to travel by just a little bit faster.

Time to pick Hydrangeas for drying. Replace all the faded summer blooms with the jewel-tones of fall. Pumpkins that come in all shapes and colors. And time once again to bring Miss Witch down from the attic to reign as queen of the porch.

Apple cider is fresh at the orchard. Time to go and pick apples. Yes, fall is here.

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Pancakes for Breakfast

Despite a rainy start to the weekend, we awoke Sunday to pleasant temperatures and bright sunshine. Hubby offered to make breakfast-(buckwheat pancakes) so I set the table. I cut up the last peach from our peach picking trip & garnished it with a bright pansy. We ate on the back patio. It was a delightful morning, the air had just a little crisp to it-a harbinger of days to come.

Musing for the Day:

Think how fast a year flies by,

A month flies by

A week flies by

A single day

How fast it flies

How fast it goes. Mary Ann Hoberman

Picking Peaches

Good Morning,
What a perfect summer day! The sky is the color of a robin’s egg dotted with cotton candy clouds. My mother & I set off on our annual peach picking trip. She has been going to the same farm to pick peaches (Red haven) for over twenty years. We use our vintage bushel baskets & pick till we have a trunk-full. I am making a double crust pie tonight. I found some delicious peach frozen yogurt for a la mode. This day truly embraces “find joy in your journey”. It is a delightful drive through the country on miles of twisty, turn-y back roads. We stopped on the way home at an antique mall & thrift store. I bought a delicate, little enamel painted vase & found a lamp that my neighbor had been looking for. Something for everyone – what a successful trip!

Peach Pie
1-1/4 cups sugar
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice (sprinkle & toss with the peaches)
4 cups fresh peaches, peeled & sliced
2 tablespoons butter
Pastry for double-crust 9-inch pie
Preheat your oven to 375°F. Combine the sugar, flour & cinnamon in a mixing bowl. Stir in the peach slices, folding to coat with the sugar/flour mixture. Pour peaches into a 9-inch unbaked pie shell. Dot with butter. Cover with top crust, seal edges & crimp. Cut vents in top crust with a sharp knife. Bake for 40 to 50 minutes until crust is golden brown.

New In the Shop...

New in the shop…
I’ve just added some gorgeous things from Fringe Studio. I love the graphics! They encompass everything I love-nature-the color blue-anything French. They remind me of the French country side or maybe Provence.

Also have a few architectural pieces just in. Lot’s of fun to decorate with-a little shabby-a bit cottage. Stop by and see what’s new!

Just Started a new book-

Paris to the Moon - By ADAM GOPNIK

Musing for the Day....

"For yesterday is but a dream, And tomorrow is only a vision; but today, well lived, Makes every yesterday A dream of happiness, And every tomorrow a vision of hope"

Always find Joy in your Journey

Always find Joy in your Journey...Time for a little mental health day-a drive through the country to visit a lovely town full of art & history-Mount Gretna. It was a picture-perfect summer day with miles of blue sky & white puffy clouds. With lots of shade & light breezes, we walked the town, had lunch & of course ice cream at the Jigger shop, browsed through a couple shops & took the long way home.

Walking through this lovely Victorian town is like stepping back in time. Life moves at a slower pace here. How can you help but relax on one of those inviting summer porches? There was a jazz worship service in the open theater that morning. The annual arts festival is two weeks away & the town is bursting with people then. But today was quiet, peaceful & relaxing.

A cottage windowbox over-flowing with blooms...

Serendipity-Shared Ideas

By definition serendipity means: "the gift of making fortunate discoveries by accident ". I'd like to share some of my personal discoveries. Some I've learned from family or friends or even complete strangers. Some I've discovered through my own trial & error. Savor those sweet, simple moments that happen on even an ordinary day.

Recycle
Don’t throw out those wine bottles!
Cleanse thoroughly & use to make your herb vinegars.* Decant large cans of olive oil for easier handling. Mix fragrant oil for dipping crusty bread. Use a clean cork available at most hardware or craft stores.

I like to use the empty bottles-especially the cobalt blue ones on my tables as centerpieces for outdoor parties. They look great with a single large bloom – especially a Dahlia, Hydrangea or Sunflower. Tie with a raffia bow, embellish with charms, buttons or shells. I found some stars & stripes ribbon at a local craft store for the 4th! For a wine-tasting party I leave the labels on.

Musing on a Summer's Day

"I thought I'd give you a little bit of sunshine to brighten your day. I bet no one ever gave you sunshine before".

Life Happens

"Life is what happens when you are busy making other plans".

Had so many plans for this lovely summer day. I started my morning in the garden and stopped to check the nest for the baby birds. The nest was empty, but there they were peeking back at me sitting on a branch - oh - next they will be learning to fly! Grabbed my bag and I was off to the antique mall. Put the key in the ignition & nothing. When my husband came home from work, he & my neighbor jumped the car & we were off to the auto parts store -(not exactly the shopping trip I had in mind). All was going smoothly till we had to stop for a red light & the engine died. Luckily we were on a slight hill & we coasted into the parking lot into a parking spot right in front of the store. If you ever doubt there is a God or a Guardian Angel, I didn't today. What are the odds? We had to cross traffic without power steering or brakes & landed a primo parking spot. I laughed like crazy. It was just too impossible.

Back to work tomorrow but maybe I will have better luck on Thursday. Aren't these two hand painted china plates lovely? I found these out treasure-hunting Monday.

Zuccinni Tart from the Garden

There is a little grey Catbird who follows me whenever I am out in the garden. When I am pulling weeds, sometimes I find a tasty morsel for him & toss it on the walk where he can see it. This year he has brought his mate & they have "Gone Housekeeping" - (as my grandmother used to say) in our Bridal Wreath. They are proud parents of two fuzzy-headed babies. Our cat Tasha spent the morning on the brick path beneath the cherry tree while papa bird kept a watchful eye on her. When I went inside to grab a cup of tea, I surprised a little grey furball-(PeeWee) having a siesta on my dining room table.

I picked my first zucchini today. I know most folks have them by the bushel-full, but this is a real accomplishment for us as our property has very few hours of direct sunlight I found this fabulous recipe in one of my British Homes magazines. It is just divine!

ZUCCHINI TART WITH TOMATO & PESTO

1 PIE CRUST
2 TABLESPOONS OLIVE OIL
1/2 SWEET ONION-THINLY SLICED
1 CLOVE GARLIC-PEELED & CHOPPED
1 LEEK-CUT INTO MATCHSTICKS-*OPTIONAL
1 MEDIUM ZUCCHINI-SLICED INTO ½” THICK STICKS
1 MEDIUM TOMATO- SLICED
SALT & PEPPER
3 TABLESPOONS PESTO-HOMEMADE OR STORE-BOUGHT
2-3 TABLESPOONS FRESH BASIL LEAVES
3 EGGS
6 OUNCES LIGHT CREAM-1/2 & ½ OR MILK-(I USED SKIM MILK FOR THIS & IT TURNED OUT FINE)
2 OUNCES PARMESAN CHEESE SHREDDED OR GRATED
3 TABLESPOONS TOASTED PINE NUTS

PREHEAT OVEN TO 375. ROLL OUT PASTRY CRUST PLACE IN TART TIN WITH REMOVABLE BASE.
CHILL 30 MINUTES AND BAKE BLIND FOR 10-15 MINUTES TILL PASTRY IS LIGHTLY COLORED BUT NOT FULLY COOKED.

MEANWHILE PREPARE FILLING. HEAT OIL IN LARGE FRYING PAN & COOK ONION GENTLY FOR ABOUT 5 MINUTES. ADD GARLIC, ZUCCHINI, GARLIC, & LEAKS & COOK UNTIL ZUCCHINI IS JUST TENDER. REMOVE FROM PAN & LIGHTLY COOK TOMATO SLICES ABOUT 3 MINUTES PER SIDE. SEASON WITH SALT & PEPPER.

ALLOW PIE CRUST TO COOL SLIGHTLY & SPREAD PESTO EVENLY OVER THE BOTTOM. ARRANGE ZUCCHINI OVER PESTO & TOP WITH TOMATO SLICES. SCATTER BASIL ON TOP.

BEAT TOGETHER EGGS & CREAM OR MILK. SEASON WITH SALT & PEPPER AND POUR OVER VEGETABLES. SCATTER PARMESAN NEXT AND THEN THE PINE NUTS. LOWER OVEN TEMPERATURE TO 350 AND BAKE FOR 30-40 MINUTES OR TILL THE FILLING IS GOLDEN BROWN, RISEN & JUST SET.
SERVES 6-8.

Last Day of Vacation

Today was the last day of my vacation...sigh! We just stayed home & slept in late & went to our favorite restaurant for breakfast. Tonight I lit all the candles on the porch & read a favorite book while my husband watered the garden until daylight faded. A fire fly landed on the page I was reading, so I decided to just sit back, relax & enjoy the quiet of the night. One of our neighbor's cats was enjoying himself in a patch of cat mint & chasing bugs!

Musing for the day - "The day is yours, and yours also the night; you established the sun and moon." - Psalm 74:16

Musing for the Day...

"My lover has gone down to his garden,

to the beds of spices,

to browse in the gardens

& to gather lilies. " - Song of Songs 6:2

Key Lime Dip

One of my newest additions for spring/summer is Miss Lily's Key Lime Dip. It is named for my little third cousin in Tennessee. The artwork is a fabulous hand-tinted French Postcard. Doesn't it look delicious? Just perfect for summer.

Even though home-grown strawberries are over,

the shipped ones work just fine to dip into our

Summer Strawberry Dip.

Follow Your Bliss

What bliss to sleep in with no set schedule. To set out with a destination in mind & then detour to pay an unexpected visit on a friend & catch up over dinner. Just a little metal health day. Miles and miles of mountains to refresh the soul.

Musing for the Day...

"Happiness appears to be a state that comes easiest when unsought." - Henry D. Chapin