July: The month of making stuff.

I was busy learning new things this month. Maybe "busy" was code for "getting my mind off things"...and if so, it worked!

First, I'm late with my Daring Bakers post, which is sad because I've actually had this one done way in advance for a change. The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

I also wanted to do something a little different this month (see aforementioned "getting my mind off of things") so I decided to tackle a vegan version of the recipe (found online here at Vegan Cupcakes' site, and a thank you to The Peaceable Kingdom for posting a link to the recipe in The Daring Bakers forum). Many of you know that baking is a bit of a science, so consider vegan baking the organic chemistry (that deal-breaking pre-med class) of the baking sciences. It's hard to make stuff rise and shine without dairy!

My first batch of vegan milano cookies was good, but thet spread even less than I expected as they baked so as a sandwich cookie they were thick and maybe a bit too much cookie. (I never knew there could be too much cookie, but it's true!)

So for the next batch I decided not to make sandwiches, and I also subbed spelt flour for white flour, and mint extract for orange zest. And folks, we have a winner.

These were delicious. There was a constant stream of people at my office door the next day, and it wasn't to tell me what a bang-up job I did on the 340 piece mailing. Those cookies disappeared quicker than emails to a SPAM filter. That said, I just visited Lisa Michelle's blog Parsley, Sage, Desserts and Line Drives and literally had to pick my jaw up from the keyboard when I saw what she made. Please go visit her...on a full stomach.

I also started private sewing lessons this month (at M. Avery Design Studios), so I think I'll finally get my fear of the sewing machine under control.I've also been embracing my inner seamstress, thanks to M. Avery Designs, making a cushion cover from fabric scrap:

And just look at this...I can sew in a straight line finally. Most of the time.


I used an end piece scrap of fabric the studio had in case I screwed up, but it actually works well with the purple wing chair in our city apartment:


And I also made a skirt. A wearable skirt!

I believe the fabric is vintage barkcloth, typically found in places like...your grandma's curtains. Which means I've also embraced my inner Maria Von Trapp. I love it! I started private sewing lessons this month, so I think I'll finally get my fear of the sewing machine under control. I need to work on the new-to-me backstitch:

Ooops. At least it's in a tiny corner that no one can see.

I was supposed to take a jewelry making class last night but it was cancelled due to the weather (we have a bit of a floods and pestilence thing going on here again).

Another thing I made...was a lot less room at the shore house, thanks to oodles of things I've bought lately, and some that I've picked out of the trash (I'm not proud. Actually, scratch that -- I am pretty proud of the things I've plucked from the trash come to think of it!). But more on that later. To make room for these new/old items, the shore house will be having a yard sale this Saturday (August 1). If you're in the area, please come on by! (Click here to email me and I'll send you the details.) I'm teaming up with four tasteful friends, so there should be some good stuff in the mix.

Let's just hope I don't buy any of it myself.

Remembering Dottie

The planet lost a wonderful person this weekend.

Dottie was someone who cared more about the happiness of others than her own, and whose broad smile and feisty spirit (hoo boy was she a tough cookie! Loved that about her.) lit up a room.

On a personal level, Dot gave me one of the best gifts of all: Her son.

We'll miss you, sweet Dottie. I'll take good care of your boy. Rest in peace.

Click here to learn more about Alzheimer's disease, and here to learn more about a wonderful organization called Valley Hospice. Hospice workers are definitely angels among us. Be well, everyone...I'll be back soon.

Where'd she go?

Little unexpected break. Be back soon! In the meantime, there sure is plenty to keep busy with in the shore house neck of the woods this weekend, should you find yourself in the area...

Thanks to Lauren for telling me about the auction at the old Asbury Park carousel on Saturday. Preview begins at 2:00 p.m., auction starts at 4:00 p.m.



Speaking of auctions, it’s hard to resist an auction at the estate of a man they call Mr. Monmouth County. “George H. Moss, Jr. was a widely known, highly regarded author, consultant and historian of, predominately, 19th Century Monmouth County, NJ. He had amassed highly specialized collections of early 19th Century Monmouth County, including books, illustrations, ephemera and memorabilia…” His bio’s pretty fascinating (click here to read) and certainly sounds like some fun objets d’art will be up for bid. Saturday, July 25, starting at 10:00 a.m. (preview Friday), 39 Rumson Road, Rumson, NJ.

Rock-n-roll legend Leon Russell plays the Wonderbar in Asbury Park tonight. Wild horses couldn’t drag me away. Doors 7:30, show time 8:30. Tickets $30.

It’s Art on the Boardwalk in Ocean Grove, Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., rain or shine. Featuring 74 artists displaying and selling their work. Oils and acrylics, pastels, watercolor, mixed media, pottery, sculpture, photographs, paintings on floor cloths, jewelry, etchings and paper collage.

“Volare…oh oh oh oh.” Bobby Rydell and fellow former teen idols Frankie Avalon and Fabian take the stage at Ocean Grove’s Great Auditorium on Saturday night. Tickets are $40-$45 and available at the door or online.

I can’t wait to see the documentary Herb & Dorothy and am thrilled that The Showroom, the new indie theater on Cookman Avenue (Asbury Park), will be screening the NJ premier of the film on Sunday at 5:00 p.m. A post-reception follows at the very cool Parlor Gallery across the street. All that for $10.

With the exception of Mr. Monmouth County's house, it’s all within a ten minute walk of my front porch.

And this is why I love the shore house.

Mantle love.

Look who's coming home to the shore house! And -- the man of the house gets all of the credit for this. We were walking through the old carousel building in Asbury Park, which is now home to a flea market on weekends. He spotted it almost immediately and thought it would be great for The Pool Room. He wanted to put up some sort of "drinking ledge" in the room, to which I responded by crinkling up my face like I had just caught a waft of dead fish. The mantle, with its compact size and seven inch ledge, would be the perfect perch for a pint -- and fit in with the character of the house. Sold! We still need to pick it up this weekend, so we'll see how it goes in it's new home.

The prices are a bit on the high side at this new flea but very negotiable. Take the mantle, for example. With no back-and-forth whatsoever we got it for $200 off the asking price (for $295). And -- the mister was also the negotiator. Who knew he had such flea savvy?!

Interestingly, when I suggested getting a mantle for The Napoleon Room several months back he thought I was nuts. "Mantle?...No fireplace?...Huh?"

He's come along so nicely. We're very proud of him.

Beach reads and surprise shore house guests.

The Fixer Upper is a new book by best-selling author Mary Kay Andrews that sounds like a good beach read for me. It’s about a woman’s quest to, “redo and old house, and her life.”…

“…Dempsey is in for a surprise when she arrives in Guthrie. ‘Bird Droppings’ would more aptly describe the moldering Pepto Bismol–pink dump with duct-taped windows and a driveway full of junk. There's also a murderously grumpy old lady, one of Dempsey's distant relations, who has claimed squatter's rights and isn't moving out. Ever. … All Dempsey can do is roll up her sleeves and get to work. And before long, what started as a job of necessity somehow becomes a labor of love and, ultimately, a journey that takes her to a place she never expected—back home again.”

For those of you in the Jersey Shore area, you can meet Mary Kay tomorrow, Monday, July 13, at the Spring Lake Library (1501 Third Ave.) 7:30 p.m. The library is a gorgeous Tudor building that is definitely not a fixer-upper. It's stunning, and was built in 1923 to serve as the Spring Lake community center, which it serves as to this day.

I've learned when owning an older home, you're kind of in a perpetual state of fixer-upperness. There are so many times we wonder about the history of the house, and about what might it might have looked like one hundred or so years ago.

So imagine our surprise last Sunday night, when two women came up to us..."Excuse me...our husbands were born in this house, and our mother-in-law is in the car...she drove by earlier today..."

Stop the presses! Grab mom and come on in!

Pat and Lenny bought our house in 1972. Apparently for $16,500. But let's try not to dwell on that. OK?!?! They've long since relocated to Georgia and were sadly in town for Pat's sister's funeral. It was their first time back in years and years. They were reluctant to knock on the door but when they saw us outside, they pulled over.

When they walked in the front door I could see from the looks and smiles on their faces that it was like stepping back to a happy time in their lives. (In fact, they had just been married and it was their first home together.) We thanked them for not painting over the gorgeous woodwork. They told us that in fact, they had to redo some of the woodwork when they moved in. So we thanked them again!

We decided not to gut the older kitchen, and instead opted to scrub, scrub some more, and do quickie updates. As we’ve lived in it over the past year and change, we’ve come to like the layout and the wood cabinets are so well made I’d hate to rip them out.

Well, turns put Pat and Lenny had them hand crafted by Amish carpenters over a nine month period! No wonder they’re so solid. I’ve been searching for someone to strip and refinish them, so if anyone has any recommendations in my neck of the wood, please let me know.

Pat’s also responsible for the toaster built in to the wall. That’s right; toaster in the wall.

Apparently it cost $250 in the 70s! But they wanted to be hip and modern so they went for it. We look at it and see “fire hazard” but it’s such a conversation piece I think it stays (but will remain unused, despite my friend Spence’s insistence we have wall toaster grilled cheese night).

The daughters-in-law were anxious to see their husbands’ nurseries…and I can’t tell you how cute I thought that was. Turns out the babies were in what is now the green room.

Pat apologized for the other small room they paneled. But reminded us it was the 70s and all. She seemed to like that we whitewashed it, but I was also glad to learn the original walls were under there should we decide to eventually take it down.

She asked if we still had the claw foot tub. Yup!

How about the gorgeous marble sink?

The WHAT? How anyone could have kicked that to the curb I’ll never know.

We told them of our plans to re-renovate the attic that had been “renovated” by the owners we bought from. The room was done a bit on the cheap, with bad laminate flooring and moldings fashioned from simple 2 x 4s. When Pat and Lenny lived in the house, apparently the attic had original woods floors and moldings, wainscoted walls, and an old skylight.

OK, that one hurt. And I was still smarting from the sting of the marble sink news.

We chatted a bit more, and wound up having a bit of a reunion in our front yard when they recognized another neighbor they’d lost touch with since moving. It was so lovely meeting them, and hearing in great detail what they did to and/or knew of the house (I could have easily made this a three-part post!). Pat gave us each a warm hug as she was leaving, and her husband thanked us for turning what started as a really awful day into something beautiful. At which point I got a little teary.

We plan on being in our home for a long time, but most importantly want to be good stewards for the next generation that will call it home some day. Like Pat and Lenny before us.

Cheers to good fixer uppers everywhere.

A kazoo is not a toy.

But it sure is fun!

Getting to march in the Ocean Grove 4th of July parade with the now-famous Days Ice Cream Kazoo Band was sort of the cherry on my sundae this past weekend. Who knew waking up early on a Saturday could be so much fun?

In fairness, I'm a seasoned kazooist. I marched in the Staten Island St. Patrick's Day Parade for several years in a kazoo band with my mom. I'm a bit of a natural.

The Ocean Grove band was the brainchild of Heather, who appears in many local theater productions and can be seen tableside on weekends at The Starving Artist, our favorite local haunt for breakfast (three words: breakfast potato skins. Yum! OK – that’s four words…). The owners also operate the popular Days Ice Cream in the same building, where lines can stretch for miles (or at least several yards) on a hot summer weekend.

Our fearless leader was Heather, capably backed-up by her equally fabulous boyfriend Mike. Here she is, rounding up the troops in the morning:

And here we are, off to the side learning the play list:

Once the march began we really got into it...

In fact, here I am below with a rare triple-chin laugh. That’s quite something.

The beautiful weather (finally!) brought out crowds of happy people...

...and the parade's eye view was also a great way to see the houses of Ocean Grove decked out for the holiday:

I hate to play favorites, but I think my favorite band member was Mister T. Mister T. was very recently saved by a rescue group from a kill shelter in North Carolina. He’s half basset, half black lab. (Try not to think about the logistics of that too much!)

Is he handsome, or what?

The only sour note on an otherwise beautifully orchestrated day was hit as we turned the corner on Main Street. Nagles, which definitely would be considered a competitor to The Starving Artist/Days, decided it would be hilarious to soak our kazoo band. They launched a super-soaker attack from the crowd and from the second floor balcony at Nagles. The act was carried out mostly by teenage employees (as noted by their Nagles’ tee-shirts. Nice touch with the branding.) but also by a couple of pseudo-adults who kind of looked old enough to know better. They hit infants in strollers, people with digital cameras. No one in our group was really spared.

What can we learn from this?

Don’t be a jerk.

And eat at Days.


Days Ice Cream
Ocean Grove, NJ
48 Pitman Avenue

(732) 988-3297

Sweet land of liberty.

How lucky was I to be gifted with these amazing Ladies Liberty pillows from Sue at Rue Mouffetard? Her and the lovely daughter were in Hoboken, NJ, to take the quilt class I did (or as I like to call it, Quilt Boot Camp) after reading about it on this here blog. We met for dinner after their class and Sue gifted me with these pillows she made, with photos of the Statue that she took herself (clearly she's a more advanced sewing-crafting diva than myself). Who thinks Sue needs to open an Etsy store? I do!

She knew I love the Lady, because, well...

Her daughter (who incidentally has one of the cutest kids ever) is also super talented, and gifted me with four beautiful vintage dessert plates. They will be making their blog debut soon...I've gathered so many fabulous table pieces over the past few months, I think it's high time to unite them for a party. Frankly, any excuse for a party is fine by me.

Today was a big day at the shore. For one, the sun came out. Secondly, we marched in the local parade. In the kazoo band. That's kind of worthy of its own post.

On the way back from the parade, I stopped at a yard sale (I know you find that shocking) and picked up this photo:

While other people's family photos typically don't "do" it for me (I have my own family, thank you very much) I fell in love with this patriotic picture. Maybe I was caught up in the holiday; maybe I was romanticizing the story of the people in the photo -- how perhaps it was their first July 4th in the States, and this was their first of many patriotic celebrations. Or maybe I was just crazy/dehydrated from blowing a kazoo all morning. Whatever the case, I bought it for $3.

I hope my friends in the States are having a lovely holiday weekend! I'll be back with a kazoo update soon.

It's not always chic at the shore house.

I love to share the "pretty" stories...the ones that involve decorating rooms, thrift store/yard sale finds, baking, beaches, and all sorts of things that put the "chic" in "shore house chic." Some things aren't as eye-candyriffic, but fabulous nonetheless.

The man of the shore house ripped out our basement stairs and put in new ones. I had no idea I had such a handy man! It took him a couple of weekends. Looking back, he said he'd gladly pay someone else to do the honors.

He redid the stairs in preparation for a little mold remediation project (at the end of last summer, our lawn chairs grew moldy *fur* in the basement. For. Real.). Once the stairs were in, we in fact did pay someone else to come in and scrape the mold out of the basement (worth every dime) and to paint with a waterproofing base and two coats of oil-based paint.

Two days after he finished, we got water in our basement for the first time since moving in. Ahhh...the joys of home ownership.

We're attributing the leak to the fact that it RAINS ALL THE TIME. It's raining now, in fact. On my day off. Some "holiday." Hrmph.

We also embarked on a scary home improvement journey...the installation of central air in a hundred year-old home with no duct work. I'm trying to keep my eye on the prize, but when I come home to things like this:

And I can see clear through to the room above...

...I get a little tweaked.

We're trying to maintain the historic integrity of the home as much as humanly possible, but it's hot as a pistol in here in the summer and having a huge window unit in each room last summer prevented us from opening windows on nice days. When we bought the house we figured the cost of the HVAC installation into our offer price, plus the great state of New Jersey is offering rebates and incentives for updating the energy efficiency of your home. So we figured may as well knock out the project now and enjoy it.

I'm not enjoying the clean up, though. But at least it's raining out, so I'm not missing much. (Plus, truth told, I'm procrastinating by writing this blog post.)

Hope everyone stateside has nice plans for the holiday weekend. I'll be marching in the local parade tomorrow in a kazoo band. And no; that's not a typo.