Valentine's

I finally realize that I've never really gotten over how much fun it is to make a collage.  I find it relaxing to go through the magazines and newspapers finding just the right sayings for my Valentine's every year.  I wish I could make them for everyone, but I try to send them to new people every year.  They take a long time, can't tell a lie about that!  This for my Aunt Jane.

This one is for a friend who needs a little courage right now.

My friend Pam received this one.  We graduated high school together and love us some Downton Abbey!

And this is for my son at college.  The other son at college got a t-shirt from his favorite band.  But I found this picture of the two of us on a ferry to Martha's Vineyard in 1996 and I thought it was so sweet.  I'm holding his milk and he is eating a Pepperidge Farm Goldfish.  Funny how you forget so many things but some are clear as day.

He's off to intern in Texas this summer for an "integrated circuits company", a level of understanding that is clearly over my head...and as happy as I am that he is finding success, I am also happy to have these photos to remind him that once his momma held his milk for him! 

Seeing Red (and white)

We woke up to another blustery snowy day in Massachusetts.  Brrr.  Coffee.  Good. 
Squirrels digging for bird food under the feeder.

This beauty trying to get a snack but has to dig through a little snow first, aww.

Cardinals are ground feeders, I found out.  This was sort of an accidental shot I took as he was ready for liftoff.

And he's been happily settled in the tree for the last 30 minutes probably waiting for some seeds to shake loose and fall on the ground.

Whatever gets you through the snow...

When it snows so much that even your 100 lb. dog can't get over the hill...

and your son the Boy Scout helps shovel out the front porch...

and you are missing your two sons in college in Indiana and Illinois who are too far away to help...
but take this picture so they will feel guilty...

...sometimes it makes you so tired...

that you have absolutely no choice but to eat a brownie batter heart-shaped donut. 

Projects are good!

While snowed-in I pulled out this lovely tapestry kid I received for Christmas.  I asked for it and was so happy when I got it.  And then I never gave myself "permission" to sit down and do it.  It's not that I am obsessed about a clean house or getting all of the laundry done before I get crafting.  I guess it's the whole idea of sitting in a chair and appearing lazy?  I've gotta get over it.

Anyway, I made a little progress.  The good thing about this is it will be around for a while (goes kind of slowly)...and I can work on it 10 minutes at a time.  Certainly I can give myself permission to do that!

Blizzard Breakfast

The past snowstorms this winter have all fallen flat. The local forecasters kind of got them all wrong. So for this storm the drum beat started on Tuesday bum..bum..drum..bum..and by Wednesday, full on anxiety was in place. Fights in grocery stores (not me) and lines at gas stations (again, not me). Perhaps I am getting a lot more organized in my old age because I didn't go into a full on frenzy of needing anything special.

But get it right this time they did.  An official Blizzard.  24 inches or so outside my door (I guess if I went out I could measure) but in order to avoid going out in this...

I stayed in my flannel pj's and made crepes for the shovelers.

It's a pancake recipe from my cooking school days and is a lot more watery than a typical batter.
However, when I made them the kids liked how they spread out in the pan and were a bit thinner than a regular pancake, hence a crepe!

I bought a "foamer" over the holidays but just recently took it out of the box.  Hello!  Love!  Can't live without!  I feel a commercial coming on..."I feel like I am making gourmet coffee at home every morning".  And I really do. 

The yummy crepes.  And no one even asked what time I was headed out to shovel.  Worked like a charm.
So I'm having another cup of coffee (with foamy fat free half&half) and watching Legally Blonde still in my pj's at 12:42 pm when normally I'd be halfway through my shift at work.  Happy girl.