Eat Eat

...and the night is young-we're expecting lows between -21-24 degrees F. Fun times. I hope your New Year's Eve is warmer than mine! See you in 2018.

Thank you all for your kind words for Danny. He's very excited and relieved to start a new chapter in his life. Coming at his 13th birthday, and the new year, the timing was perfect. I've been blogging so long (since 2004) many of you have watched him grow up. As far as I'm concerned, you're family.  Thank you again for being such a great group of people. What have we here? An outfit post? My goodness, I nearly forgot how to do one. sorry about that-got hectic around here in December. I've worn these Star Wars leggings on the blog before. For some reason, I always pair them with a sequin mini dress. I don't know what that says about me that I own several sequined mini dresses, but eh, at least I'm not hard to find in a crowd. This was last year. The leggings are too big/baggy, but I don't care-I love them.  This time around I wore a gold and silver flapper-like dress and an oversized 80's jacket. We had a flock of starlings visit our feeders this wee...

Danny finished his last nut challenge at the allergist today and is officially not allergic to peanuts or tree nuts. We celebrated by taking him out for ice cream, which is something he hasn't been able to do for 10 years due to cross-contamination fears. He was incredibly lucky. Given the severity of his initial reaction, and the subsequent positive scratch tests, we never imagined he wouldn't be allergic to nuts. His former allergist didn't want to do a challenge, but when we switched doctors last year, it was brought up immediately. We didn't expect much, but here we are. That's not to say all scratch tests are false positives-I know for certain cashews and pistachios are deadly for me, but I have had reactions where I knew exactly what I had ingested-with Danny it was always uncertain. We'll never know what it was, but we now know what it wasn't. We haven't eaten in a restaurant in ten years. I grew up seeing enough kitchens to know that the only nut...

Only about 90 days to go until Opening Day! So, we had a little snow for Christmas??. It was great. The cold freeze that followed has been less fun, but you don't live in Nebraska if you can't take a little cold. Our snow is so dry you can't make a proper snowball out of it. The jacket I'm wearing is a fun vintage piece by Nolan Miller part of his Dynasty Collection. He designed the clothes for the show, and I could just see Joan Collins wearing this as she throws around a baseball in the snow. "Here Krystal-CATCH you bitch!" Anyway, I adore the jacket big sequin trimmed shoulders and all. Santa brought our Cubs fan some new attire. He also brought him a peanut allergy challenge that was negative, which was the best gift of all. So no peanut allergy at all, and we need to go back and do the almond one, but then he's clear. We'll never know for certain what he reacted to in the tahini all those years ago, but it wasn't sesame or peanut (mould? Pesti...

Well, we made it! Thanks to everyone for your wonderful comments and insights during this holiday brooch special. I had great fun doing it. I hope you have a lovely holiday, or day off if it isn't your thing. I plan to spend the day sleeping. Merry Christmas Everybody

I have owned the Donald Duck on skis since I was a small child. While not strictly a Christmas brooch, that was when I received it. Santa was purchased a few years ago at Goodwill.   This snowflake is very delicate made of a thin, tin-like metal. As it bends easily, I tend to wear it on hats, or places where it is unlikely to get bumped by a shoulderbag or coat.

I was at Big Lots today stocking up on sparkling apple juice for mocktails (not for me, obviously) when I spotted a four pack of Mitchum Deodourant elaborately packaged for holiday gift-giving. Uh, yeah! That says, "Merry Christmas" allright. I just can't. I mean, who would you give that to, even as a joke? Anyway, it gave me, and another shopper a good laugh as we pondered which executive thought they could sell more B.O. protection if they wrapped it in tinsel? It all felt very Reggie Perrin.  This would make a lovely holiday gift. Did you see the news story about the elderly couple driving a van full of weed across the country to give as Christmas gifts to family back East? I immediately thought of this fragrance. It smells strongly of patchouli, but yeah, it also has that smell of a pipe that has ten year's worth of residue on it burning away like incense. I was never as interested in drugs as the people around me, which is probably for the best. I can barely stay...

 I have a few brooches today as time is running out before Christmas.  This tree sat in my repair pile for two years until I finally glued the red bead back on. I have this identical reindeer in white. We are in the home stretch now. I need to do a final photo with all of the brooches, which might prove challenging.

That green tomato mincemeat I made and froze back at the end of summer? I knew it was a good idea. Having small packets I can defrost and use as-needed has been a great time-saver. I really  want to make mincemeat tamales for Christmas morning, but I suspect the boys would prefer their usual limpa bread and stollen. Anyway, from now on it is frozen mincemeat for us-worked great! I also baked Pulla buns. The cardamom buns are topped with a mixture of butter and sugar, then glazed and scattered with psrlsocker-in case they weren't sweet enough??. I froze two dozen which should see us through winter along with the frozen panettone.  Finally wore the crushed velvet palazzo pants. These are once-a-year trousers, so I got that out of the way. Outfit Particulars: Trousers-Bloomingdale's, early 90's Poloneck-Can't remember Lace jacket-Goodwill Belt-? Boots and hat-Both K Mart Fragrance-L'Origan  sooner or later I had to wear the plaid walking shorts. To avoid re-visiting an...

Lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with flu  you. I love all the details on this brooch from the hats on the riders to the holly on the sleigh. No markings, but it looks suspiciously like the sort of thing I'd buy at Woolworths in the 70's. I miss Woolworths at Christmas the most. I don't remember where this dove came from. And it wouldn't be Christmas without a few bows to wrap presents. See you tomorrow.