Going Home....

G
oing home is something I've longed to do but just could not afford.
My son said, "I'd go back in a heartbeat except my kid is here!"
 "Me too" I replied.
The dry weather would be so much better for my spine.
I spent a good portion of my life in Utah and half my heart is still there.It is my home just as much as New Jersey.
My daughter who travels a lot for work just went home to Utah and saw our extended family there...
all 50 of her first cousins and even more of the next generation as well as her grandma.
Seeing photos of my tiny 5 ' 1" daughter tower over her grandma was such a hoot.
Yup, Grandma is teeny tiny.
 She brought back messages, wishes, love and photos to share with me and now I will share just a few of the hundreds of photographs with you.

My sweet little girl climbing around in Provo Canyon.

And she took a little video for me inside the Tabernacle in Salt Lake during organ rehearsal which is always open to the public.  As I am an organ fanatic, I love this stuff and this organ is one of the finest in the world.   The acoustics in the tabernacle are perfection itself.

Friday Foto Friends #51

H
appy Friday friends!
I am joining with Debbie's Friday Foto Friends once again this week.

Autumn is in full swing and even makes an appearance on the kitchen table.

Signs of autumn appear on the back road into the pines...

 I love mugho pines  and the scent of the fallen needles on the sand beneath them.

The salt marsh begins to grow yellow and orange as we get deeper into autumn. Deer still munch the grass, otter and mink still swim until it gets too cold.

The setting sun creates a sun path on the water...

And as night settles on the cove everything takes on a brilliant red hue.

Phragmites framed on the sky..

Have the nicest of weekends.

Some Fun Stuff

 



T
 he Austenite Prayer:

 Lord, Grant me the good sense of Elinor, 

 the patience of Anne, and the wit of Elizabeth.

 But mostly, please grant me Mr. Darcy.





~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I found various questions on the net that look interesting and decided to blog my answers.
Want to join in?



1. Have you ever fell for someone you didn’t expect to?
 Yup.

2. Don’t tell me lies, is the last person you texted attractive?
    Gorgeous! It was my daughter.

3. What are your favorite  TV shows?
     Rosemary and Thyme is a current favorite.
     Perry Mason is great.  I love Poirot and Miss Marple series too.

4  Do you believe in God?
     Yes.

5. Where do you buy groceries? Why?
Shop Rite because it has good prices is clean and neat and is very close to me.
I used to shop at the A &  P. I loved the British foods they had available.
When I lived in the west I shopped at Alberson's and Alpha Beta.

6. Can you taste the difference between Coca Cola and Pepsi?
Yes absolutely. Pepsi is far sweeter. Coca Cola has a snap to it.

7. What’s the oldest thing that you own?
   An inlaid  table and 2 Victorian velvet dining chairs  that are over 160 years old.
They were my mother's and were last recovered when I was a child.  They need to be recovered again as they are very faded now.

8. What is the most interesting piece of Trivia that you know?
The Lone Ranger's nephew's horse's name!
( Victor )

I hope you will join in and answer these questions on your own blog.

♫Autumn in New York ♩ ♬

A

favorite quote from "You've Got Mail".

The screenplay by Nora Ephron had 

so many quotes that just seemed to come straight out of my head.

So, I cobbled together a little graphic.

Friday Foto Friends # 50

Once again I am joining in with Debbie for Friday Foto Friends.
It's a wonderful and refreshing way to get away from it all and see some lovely scenery.
We've been very warm for this time of year.. too warm and it has been terribly humid too but temps are supposed to return to normal soon.
It can't be too soon for me.
We had sunny skies for most of it but rain very early today and a storm the other day as well.
Here is a photo record of those days...
as always, you can click to see photos full sized.

looking out to the open bay

 Leaves are beginning to change color little by little.

Peeking out into the woods  behind me.

Pines, swamp maples, scrub oak and holly

The rain and wind made the chimes sound so pretty

the little pond

The high wind blew things over around the little pond. Plants are done blooming. Black Eyed Susans have gone to seed.

Inside things were cozy.
The big pond, below, weathers storms with grace.
It is pretty deep and the fish can seek refuge in the depths. It's plants are rooted deeply as well and keep the water fresh and clean.

The big pond

Salmon Patties for Lunch

D
elicious is a good word to describe  salmon patties.


I'd like to share my recipe for them with you.

I use a lowered sodium canned salmon but you can use a cooked fresh salmon if you like.
I don't use measurements really but eyeball everything and so I hope that is alright with you and that you can make these yourself with my ingredients.

You will need 1 can of salmon...16 oz size
about 1/4 cup of Panko bread crumbs or any other bread crumbs that you like.
1 beaten egg
mayonnaise and brown or Dijon mustard enough to flavor and help hold the mixture together.
chopped onion and celery
a few shakes of Crystal Louisiana hot sauce
  dried dill weed,  coarse ground pepper to taste.
a sprinkling of white balsamic vinegar for more flavor.. not too much. You don't want the ingredients soupy.
Crumble the salmon and add the rest of the ingredients in amounts to suit your taste.  It's just like making a meatloaf. The results should stick together nicely in patty shape.
You want it to hold together and not fall apart too much when fried in the pan.
If things are too dry you can add more egg or mayo or mustard to the mix.
You can see mine fell apart a bit, but, they were absolutely delicious anyway!
Form them into patty shape and fry until golden brown on both sides in some olive oil.
Lemon wedges, Cranberry-horseradish sauce or mayo mixed with brown mustard are all tasty toppings for these patties.  I personally use a mixture of mayo-brown mustard.
I served these up for lunch with greens sprinkled with Parmesan/Romano cheese and  a light drizzle of Raspberry vinaigrette.
You can serve potatoes with it but   this was enough for me.
The recipe made 6 hamburger sized  patties.
If you make them let us know how it went.

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Literary Pearls: Emma by Jane Austen

Chapter 10

One morning, about ten days after Mrs. Churchill's decease, Emma was called downstairs to Mr. Weston, who "could not stay five minutes, and wanted particularly to speak with her."-- He met her at the parlour-door, and hardly asking her how she did, in the natural key of his voice, sunk it immediately, to say, unheard by her father,

"Can you come to Randalls at any time this morning?--Do, if it be possible. Mrs. Weston wants to see you. She must see you."

"Is she unwell?"

"No, no, not at all--only a little agitated. She would have ordered the carriage, and come to you, but she must see you alone, and that you know--(nodding towards her father)--Humph!--Can you come?"

"Certainly. This moment, if you please. It is impossible to refuse what you ask in such a way. But what can be the matter?-- Is she really not ill?"

"Depend upon me--but ask no more questions. You will know it all in time. The most unaccountable business! But hush, hush!"

To guess what all this meant, was impossible even for Emma. Something really important seemed announced by his looks; but, as her friend was well, she endeavoured not to be uneasy, and settling it with her father, that she would take her walk now, she and Mr. Weston were soon out of the house together and on their way at a quick pace for Randalls.

"Now,"--said Emma, when they were fairly beyond the sweep gates,-- "now Mr. Weston, do let me know what has happened."

"No, no,"--he gravely replied.--"Don't ask me. I promised my wife to leave it all to her. She will break it to you better than I can. Do not be impatient, Emma; it will all come out too soon."

"Break it to me," cried Emma, standing still with terror.-- "Good God!--Mr. Weston, tell me at once.--Something has happened in Brunswick Square. I know it has. Tell me, I charge you tell me this moment what it is."

~excerpt from Emma by

 
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Friday Foto Friends # 49 Homemade Magazine Covers

H ello friends.
I hope your week went well.
Here we are at another Friday and didn't the week fly by quickly? It did for me but it was a very nice week.
Joining with Debbie and friends,  I have some Photoshops that I did using my blog name for the magazine title and some personal photos  to make magazine covers.
 I made up some headlines to go with the photos and make believe magazine content.
It was a blog challenge back in 2008 and it was a lot of fun.
I hope you enjoy them. They were fun to make.

This is my triple chime clock and my shell collection on my dining room buffet . My grandmother did the crochet.

This is a favorite photo of mine taken among the mugho pines and looking out onto the open bay.

I took a photo of the bay to make this cover. I enjoy taking photos through the Phragmites 

This photo shows a section of my large pond.  

This one features my little raised  pond.

Click any picture to see full sized.
Have a lovely weekend.

Pretty Posts A Dropcap Tutorial

P
osts look nice with a dropcap I think.

I could be fooling myself but I like to think they do.

Here is how you make them in Blogger.

Always back up your blog first.

Go to "template" and there you will post some CSS in the advanced section. template ---customize--- advanced---Add CSS and add the following:

You can change the parts in red to suit yourself and of course you can change the dropcap color to whatever you like.
You can monkey around with padding also if the letter is too close , too far away,etc.
Then just add save it.
Now in the 'settings' go to 'posts' , 'comments' and 'sharing' and you add  this to post template:

this will now appear on every post for you in html version.
Just add the first letter of your first word in the space between ><  like this :

It will look like this:

Hello!

I hope this is of use to someone. :)

Columbus Day!

Happy Columbus Day!

Viva Cristoforo Colombo, ammiraglio Genovese (Admiral from Genoa) Here is the traditional video I post of these darling children singing about the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria.
As we learned in school:

In Fourteen hundred and ninety two
Columbus sailed the ocean blue!

We learned the song in school since most of my hometown is of Italian descent. Schools put on plays and musicals to celebrate the day during the school week. It was a very big deal.
No school today in most of our towns here.

Friday Foto Friends.. a bit late!

I
am very late to the party, but here I am joining in the Friday Foto Friends with 2 short videos I took today.
While hurricane Matthew is still hovering around the Carolinas and has dumbed itself down a good deal you can see the winds and rain the outer fringes of the storm are bringing to the southern part of New Jersey.
It is too windy and rainy on the open water to shoot a video there. I am afraid I will ruin my camera and since I have a bionic spine (LOL) I am unsteady in strong winds so that doesn't make for a steady video during a storm.
The fish love the rain!
The lens on the camera was getting wet so I could not film for long and I was getting wet as well and it is a chilly day outside.





Since the lens was getting pelted by rain the video is a bit wonky and of course the wind was bumping me around as well. But, you get the idea anyway.
If the wind dies down even a bit I will film the bay to show you.

In other news my daughter is home from business trips to New Orleans, Oslo and London. It's good to have her home again.

Childhood Meme

Memes are a fun way to get to know fellow bloggers.
Today I am borrowing Toni's 4 Meme. It is a fill in the blank meme about childhood.

As A Child, I..

1.  As a child I loved to play...?:   Jump rope. I was good at double dutch.
I also liked hiking in the woods of the Watchung mountains with my daddy looking for salamanders in the creeks and climbing hills.
I loved playing in the ocean. My mother taught me to ride a horse which we did a lot of.

2.  As a child I wanted to grow up to be...?:   A cowgirl or a teacher of religion.
I also thought being a forest ranger was a cool job since they got to stay outside all day and that was huge for meas a kid. I never wanted to be inside. I was not fond of meal times since it meant stopping playing outside.

3.  As a child my favorite thing to eat was...?:    Spaghetti served anyway at all!
I also liked chicken gumbo,hot dogs with sauerkraut, lemon meringue pie,  black raspberry ice cream, cup of tea with lots of milk with my grandmother.

4.  As a child my favorite relative was...?:  
 My grandparents.
They took care of me.
My paternal grandfather especially was a favorite because he took me to watch the trains all the time and gave me an allowance each week of 25 cents.
 I just loved that he spent time with me.
Between my little allowance and annoying my much older brother when he was on the phone  made me rich at an early age!  Hehe..just kidding.
  My brother would give me money to go away ;).

This was a fun question and answer. Why not join in?

Our weather by the shore is windy and chilly but humid. Misty rains have been falling for days but today there is a bit of intermittent sun here and there.
Hurricane Matthew is churning up the Atlantic even this far north.
We are praying for those in the Caribbean and the southern coastal states and hoping it goes out to sea quickly.
I am stocking up on water and goods before hand with memories of the icy cold week of Sandy when I had no power for a long while.
Sadly New Jersey is still trying to recover from Sandy and here comes another huge hurricane.