Come for Tea: Ginger & Orange Drop Tea Biscuits

It's Victoria Day here in Canada, and with the long weekend comes the unofficial start to summer. Some of us are camping (or glamping!), or hitting the garden centres, or digging in the dirt, or kicking back and seeing that new Avengers movie. I slide to the more lazy side of the equation, which involved a getting up way past the time I usually get up, making lemon ricotta pancakes for my guy and I, sitting outside in the sun with my second cup of coffee, watching my cats eat grass and chase bugs. It's been a good day, so far. Like many of you, I'm hustling all the time. When a day presents itself with no immediate work to do, I almost don't know what to do. I think regular folks call these "days off", but for someone who has work hustles and side hustles and all the hustles, taking a little time to sit in the sun and watch robins dance in the bird bath is a glorious way to spend a few hours of the day.

Anniversary Present: Maple Bacon Biscuits & A Giveaway

Can you believe it's been two! whole! years! since I started this little blog?  Holy man, where does the time go?  163 posts later and I'm still in awe that people other than my sister and a handful of close friends read these pages on a fairly regular basis.  Many of you, okay, most of you are complete strangers and you've welcomed my words, recipes and photographs into your world.  It's humbling, let me tell you.  Never in a million years would I be here unless you guys were too, so thank you so very very much for hanging out with me through the joys and sorrows; the cat talk and mom talk; the cake and the kale.  Thank you for every kind comment and encouraging word - they go straight to the heart.  Thanks also for letting me know when I goof up (it happens! - I'm not a robot!).  Lately I've been trying to surround myself with things that make me happy (tea, chocolate, cats, books, food mags, Bruce Springsteen, Downton Abbey, Bradley Cooper - oh to be surrounded by Bradley Cooper!) and you know what?  This little blog makes me really, really happy.  It's a joy to sit down in my den, with slippers on the feet and a cat on the lap, and share a little piece of my world with you.  Thank you for two wonderful years.  Let's rock the heck out of year three, shall we?

Apple Butter with Whole Wheat Buttermilk Biscuits

 One must maintain a little bit of summer even in the midst of winter.  

~ Henry David Thoreau

Food in jars.  Are you doing it?  Are you pickling anything pickle-able?  Do jars of jam rest on your windowsill?  Does the pop pop pop of the lids make you happy?  I'm not huge into preserving - though I wish I was.  If I were granted a few extra hours in a day and a few extra square feet in my kitchen I'd totally be pickling and jamming and boiling glass like no body's business.  But I'm tight on time and storage space so I just leave all that stuff to my sister, who's preserving anything she can get her hands on right now.  Poor thing accidentally dropped a jar of dills on her gorgeous hardwood the other night, so if you all have any tips on how she can get the smell out of her floor, let me know and I'll pass them along! 

Better, with Butter: Biscuit Cinnamon Rolls

 

Good news:  I'm beginning to feel human again.  For the better part of the last ten days I've been knocked out by this horrendous flu making the rounds.  You know the one.  Starts innocently enough with a little tickle in the back of the throat, then progresses to incessant coughing, followed by the chills and the sweats, and a trip to the drugstore to stare blankly in front of the cold and flu meds, only to plead with the pharmacist please, please tell me which one will let me sleep at night.  When none of that helps, you find your bad self in your doctor's office, only to be told you have a chest infection and to take it easy.  Prescription in hand, you drive home in a daytime-decongestant-daze, propel yourself onto the couch and miss almost a week's worth of work.  Throw in a heavy dose of self pity, and you've got my life, lately.