Hats

I have loved hats ever since I read Bartholomew's Hats. And when I went to Art in the Pearl I fell in love with Lauri Chambers' hats. So, I tried a few on.

How 'bout you? Do you love hats too?

Help the Shelters

Midnight is the Deadline!


I don't usually post on the week-ends, but my friend Anne at Piedmont Writer found this at The Eagle's Aerial Perspective. And it's a worthy cause. I have simply pasted up what The Golden Eagle has on her post. If you can join in before midnight, you will be helping a dog. And that's a pretty nice way to say Happy Labor Day!

Pedigree is resurrecting its insanely successful Write a Post, Help a Dog program. In 2010, 391 bloggers wrote about the program and with each post, Pedigree donated 20 pounds of its Healthy Longevity dog food to shelter animals. In all, 7,820 pounds of food was donated to two shelters renowned for their care of senior dogs: Muttville Senior Dog Rescue in San Francisco and Castaway Critters in Harrisburg, Pa.

How you can help in 2011

Simply spread the word about Write a Post, Help a Dog 2011 and once again Pedigree will donate 20 pounds of food for each blogger's post. Here's all you need to include in your post:

The Write a Post, Help a Dog program is aimed at raising awareness and food for the more than four million dogs that wind up in shelters and breed rescues each year.
For each blog post mentioning the Pedigree Foundation from now until midnight ET on September 3, Pedigree will donate 20 pounds of its new dry Pedigree recipe food for dogs -- its best recipe ever -- to a shelter, because every dog deserves leading nutrition.

The Pedigree Foundation -- a 501 (C)(3) nonprofit organization is committed to helping dogs by providing grants to shelters and rescues and encouraging dog adoption. This year the Foundation has already raised more than $376,570 against its goal of $1.5 million to carry out its work to fund grants that not only help shelters operate, but to further shelter innovations.
The Pedigree Foundation depends on charitable contributions from individuals to carry out its mission to help dogs find loving homes. In addition to writing a blog post, here's how you can help:

Donate online at http://pedigreefoundation.org/donate.aspx
Apply for a shelter grant from the Pedigree Foundation by completing a form at www.pedigreefoundation.org
Purchase Dogs Rule Gear at www.dogsrulegear.com where the proceeds go to the Pedigree Foundation to help loving dogs find a home. SPECIAL OFFER: Get 10 percent off Dogs Rule Gear by using the promo code BlogPaws10 from August 22 - September 30.


Now, the deadline for this is TONIGHT, and the link is at The Eagle's Aerial Perspective blog. So please go there, link up, copy and paste, or blog what you can to help this fabulous cause

Flowers for Friday

Nothing could make the sun seem to be shining - even when it's raining outside: nothing but sunflowers.

And nothing could reflect the moonlight like orchids gleaming on the table


So, if you need a little sunshine or moonlight to help make you happy, simply add a couple flowers around the house - they will bring the bloomability back into your life.

Pints to Pasta

Once again it's time to sign up for the Pints to Pasta run and it's for a couple good causes.

This is one race worth running because it's giving a portion of its proceeds to The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's Team in Training AND The Boys and Girls Clubs and there are more than a couple great sponsors to help kick this off.

The Old Spaghetti Factory and Widmer Brothers Brewing are a couple of the tastiest sponsors - thus the meaning behind the name: Pints to Pasta.

It's a fun 10k run that starts at Adidas (another sponsor) and the run begins on a downhill slope :) then it's off to the waterfront and finally the runners are making feet to the festive food at the Spaghetti Factory.

Plus for those who don't want to chug a beer at 10 in the morning, there's always a cold glass of Jamba Juice waiting at the finish line.

The run is on September 11th so you still have time to sign up. I hope to see you there and I've got my fingers crossed that the weather will hold out and we'll have a little more sunshine for our run.

Wonderful World of Words

The English language is a complex assortment of letters that weave their way into unusual rules, protocols and exceptions.

For example: the prefix "re"

such as in:

reinvestigate
reuse
reinhabit
release

re-
 
It's, according to dictionary.com, "a prefix, occurring originally in loanwords from Latin, used with the meaning “again” or “again and again” to indicate repetition, or with the meaning “back” or “backward” to indicate withdrawal or backward motion: regenerate; refurbish; retype; retrace; revert."

But then there are the exceptions that don't fit nicely in with the rule.

Such as:

resume. . . what is a sume. . . ?
reduce . . . what is a duce. . .?
remit . . . what is a mit . . . ?
resist . . . what is a sist. . .?
require. . . what is a quire. . .?

It's apparent that English is a difficult language to learn.

Tasty Tuesday

Whenever I get nervous I want to eat something warm and comforting. In fact whenever I get sad I want to eat something warm and comforting. Heck whenever I'm happy, excited, anxious, . . . I just like to eat. And, Sunday was no exception. I felt the first tinges of a cold coming on so what did I want...? Yep...something warm and comforting.

So I made a homemade lasagna and garlic toast. And, I finished it off with a mango brulee'. Here's how I made the mango brulee' - thanks to Martha Stewart for the idea - but my husband being so handy, I even had a torch to use. It might not have been a kitchen torch but no matter, it worked just fine. (I had to flip the video - my husband filmed it sideways)

Ingredients:


Six mangoes

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cube of butter

Directions:

Half the mangoes, taking out the seeds
put a pat of butter on each side of the mango
sprinkle with sugar
Bake at 425 for about 30 minutes

Then I took the mangoes out of the oven and used the torch to intensely heat up the brown sugar (in this clip I used a little white table sugar) and butter to caramelize the tops of the mangoes.

Then I served the warm and comforting mango brulees. Of course this wasn't your typical custard brulee or creme brulee but it was a fun twist to try for a change.

Movie Review Monday - Priest

Priest is a movie based on a Korean comic that my daughter thought I might like since I'm like graphic novels and am such a fanpire. So, my husband and I watched it. But what I realized is that one of the reasons I enjoy vampire movies is setting. I love seeing the castles, the moors and shadowy figures. It's all about romantic illusion.

Not so with Priest.

It was an apocalyptic show about the human/vampire wars that caused the end of the world -- almost.

So, this is one show I wouldn't recommend - even though I like (most) vampire movies.