MY POTPOURRI

I love the smell of fresh citrus! It reminds me of my grandma a whole bunch, that and honey. A few months ago I decided to wing it and try and make potpourri! After eating the orange

This might have been the grapefruit that inspired it all

I ripped the orange peel into pieces and curled them.

on the cookie sheet at about 200 degrees for several hours (okay, until Mom remembered them!)

Of course you can’t stick them into the potpourri holder still wet because they would mold and ruin!! So you have to dry them. Drying them was easy because our oven actually has a dehydrator.

PERFECTION!

Here is a actual recipe on how to make potpourri.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/57761/making_homemade_potpourri_for_the_holidays.html

hmmm, perhaps we need to eat some more oranges to fill up the bowl

The Lady comes out again

We were lucky enough to have a second showing. What a pleasant surprise!!
“The tuberose, with her silvery light, That in the gardens of Malay Is call'd the Mistress of the Night, So like a bride, scented and bright; She comes out when the sun's away”------ Thomas Moore

Mom's turn:Queen of the Night

Epiphyllum oxypetalum (commonly known as Lady of the Night, Queen of the Night, Night blooming cereus, and Dutchman's Pipe) is by far and away the most popular and widely cultivated species from this genus. We live in Louisiana where the climate keeps us from planting our treasure in the ground, so it has to come inside every winter. To those of you who have never owned or seen a cereus....it is one of the ugliest potted plants you will ever come across (people will wonder why you have it, and why you don't put it out with the garbage),

beauty is in the eye of the beholder

but the rewards it will produce are very much worth your defending it's place in your garden or house. It has the most fragrant, beautiful, magical flowers you will ever see...or smell!

A few facts about the “Lady of the Night”, she’s actually a cactus! (my pictures, information from J. Dougherty @ Ecology.org)

“Jungle cacti are at the pinnacle of cactus evolution... having left the mundane process of growing on the ground and moved into the treetops to exploit that unique environment. They are not parasites, merely passengers hitching a ride up out of the gloomy understory of the forest and into the bright light and clear air of the canopy. "Epiphyllum" literally means "upon the leaf," in reference to their habit of growing in the crowns of tall rainforest trees.
Long stems ("runners") can snake through the forest canopy, producing flattened blade-like "leaves" along their length. If severed, the runners have the ability to form new independent plants, provided some portion of them is gripping the host tree.
Like all true epiphytes, they take their nourishment from the environment and not from their host plant (which would make them a parasite, not an epiphyte). Falling leaves, bird droppings, dead insects, etc. are trapped by the tangled root masses of epiphytes, or collect in catchments of moss and other plants at the crotch of large branches. This becomes the source of nutrients for the epiphytes.
The leaves of epiphytic cacti are actually modified stems, adapted to cling to their host tree, as well as to serve photosynthetic and storage functions. Flowers are produced from the nodes near the ends of these leaves. The flowers are quite large when compared to the leaves that support them. The buds can be as large as a man's hand in some species,

The bud that will open tomorrow night

a bit smaller in others (in other, closely related genera, such as Hylocereus, the buds are even bigger and the flowers may be as large as a man's head).Her majesty...truly a site to see AND smell. Ours were rather small this year compared to previous years - lack of regular watering

Most of the true species bloom at night, since they are predominantly pollinated by bats and large moths. They have large white flowers to help their pollinators locate the blossoms by moon or star light, and many have very lovely fragrances. The flowers of the true species typically last only one night, this transience only adds to their appeal and mystique.”

etheral beauty

Always a much anticipated family night...then we cut the flowers and bring them into our rooms to enjoy the scent throughout the night in our dreams.

Blood Moon

The lunar eclipse is usually very pretty. My mom, dad, and I watched this past lunar eclipse on August 28th , and it was kind of boring because clouds were in the way and the sunrise interfered with the total viewing.

in the beginning...4:10a

We had to set the alarm and get up at four am! The nickname for the lunar eclipse is the “blood moon”. The reason for this is halfway during the eclipse, in the umbra stage, the moon turns rust red. The lunar eclipse happens when the sun, the moon, and the earth are in total alignment. We also saw a VERY pretty star that was flashing rainbow colors! Very pretty and lots of fun family time!

Mom says, “Night photography was very tricky. Obviously not my forte!”

4:17am

4:20am

4:23am

Blood Moon 4:35am

Mom's Turn: viva la MEXICO

Thanks to my friend for a fabulous idea…I’m so lucky she’s a creative genius or my scrap books would never get done! We have a monthly meeting where she teaches us a new technique and incorporates it into a double layout. Of course this is preceded with food – lots of food! Then we all visit half the night away and I never manage to finish my layout before the night is through. So here it is!!! Thanks again for the wonderful ideas…keep ‘em coming!

her idea was a "punchy" night...we used different punches to make tabs
i had some stickers that i added...hmmm, maybe too much.

SOCCER SEASON BEGINS

Christina was excited about her TENTH soccer season and her new team...The ROCKETS! Unfortunately, however, she has fractured her right ankle in the third game of the season and will be out at least 4 weeks for recovery! Please keep her in your prayers.

Click to play Make your own Smilebox

Mom's Turn: Special touches

Adding unique things in little nooks and crannies around the house is what makes it a home to me. It’s like adding earrings to an outfit to complete it. The special touches personalize it and tell your friends a little bit more about you. My favorite so far is the sun catcher I purchased in Colorado – it makes rainbows all over the kitchen and dining room that I can chase with my imagination and it makes me smile every day!

a windchime Teeny got me for Mother's Day


a purple beaded candle holder - birthday gift from a friend Colorado sun-catcher

i found the end of the rainbow

Mom's turn: Dinner anyone?

Well who knew…I can actually cook thanks to The Supper Studio. This has been a fabulous experience that has put “fun” in the kitchen for me and enticed me to actually use my phenomenal stove that everyone tells me I have.
Menu items:
Oven baked BBQ chicken
Grilled chicken chiladas
Chicken stir fry

Pecan crusted chicken
Lemon rosemary pork chops
Adobo pork tenderloin
Shrimp & andouille griller (notice I even broke out the fine China for this meal!)
Jazz fest crawfish
Tilapia in caper butter sauce
Beef scallopini n sherry beurre blanc
Feta & sun dried tomato meatloaf
Pesto kabobs
Ravioli with sun dried tomato marinara

These were from the August menu – it changes every month. The concept is unique: 1) choose the menu items you want ahead of time 2) make and pay for session appointment 3) show up for session time and assemble food 4) take home and freeze to be enjoyed when you are ready.

The way the store is set up is each customer has their own refrigerator full of the meat necessary to prepare the items they chose and store the prepared meal until ready to leave. And then each menu item has its own station full of all of the ingredients necessary to prepare that meal. So you may need something unique to a gourmet meal, but with this model you don’t have to buy an entire product to get the little amount you may need for the recipe and have the rest go bad because you wouldn’t be able to use it in a timely manner. And everything has turned out scrumptious!!

Most meals come complete with one side like a pasta dish. But I have found each one easy to complete with a side of veggies, roll, or salad and the petit dozen makes plenty to feed three very athletic and hungry adults!

This is actually a picture of a meal I made myself...I'm gaining confidence!

Lucky Kitty

My mom found this AWESOME website called Canon. It is full of different things, but my favorite is the 3-d paper building section. You can make all kinds of things. I made a maneki neko.

my good luck cat I made for my Japanese themed loft

Here is a little bit about the maneki neko. The maneki neko is thought to bring good luck. He is not waving he is beckoning. Meneki’s beginnings, however, are unclear, and different people tell different stories, or slightly different versions of the same story. Some versions come from China and others from Japan. All of the stories agree on one thing though, this little cat is lucky. ;-)

Here are the three most popular versions of the Maneki Neko.

The Temple Cat
This story tells of a poor priest who lived in poverty, in a run down temple in Tokyo. What little food the priest had, he shared with his cat. One day, during a bad storm, a rich nobleman rushed to take shelter underneath a large, old tree that was growing near to the temple. Through the rain, though, the nobleman saw a cat beckoning him to go into the temple. Fascinated by the strange cat, the nobleman left the shelter of the tree and went to take a closer look at the animal. At that point the tree under which he had been sheltering was struck by lightning. Feeling that he owed his life to the cat, the nobleman was so grateful to it that he befriended the priest and the temple became prosperous. Neither the priest or his cat ever went hungry again.

The Courtesan
In this legend the cat belonged to courtesan, who also lived in a district of Tokyo. The courtesan was called Usugumo and she loved her cat very much. One night Usugumo was about to visit the toilet when her cat stopped her by pulling on the hem of her Kimono. Usugumo tried to chase the cat away, but no matter how hard she tried she found that she could not get it to stop and she became frightened. Seeing all of this, the owner of the brothel, thought that the cat must be bewitched, and he rushed over and cut off its head with his sword. Once severed, the cats head flew up to the toilet ceiling, where a large snake was poised, ready to strike Usugumo. The cat’s head fixed its teeth into the snake and killed it, saving Usugumo’s life. Usugumo was devastated by the loss of her cat, especially under such circumstances, and one of her customers made a wooden likeness of her cat, and presented it to her as a gift - the first Maneki Neko.

The Old Woman
This story is also set in Tokyo, this time in the district of Imado. There was an old woman who had a pet cat. She lived in extreme poverty and finally had to get rid of her companion because she could no longer afford to feed it.
That night her pet appeared to her in a dream and told her to fashion a likeness of it out of clay, telling her it would be sure to bring her luck. The old woman did this and soon sold the figurine. She made more and sold them too. In fact the clay cats became so popular that the old woman soon became wealthy.

Not only are there different stories about the origins of Maneki Neko, there are different opinions about the relevance of which paw is doing the beckoning. Many people believe that the left paw is for wealth and that the right signifies luck. Some people believe it is the other way around, while others believe that the left one is for fortune and the right one is for health.

Modern day Maneki Nekos come in a variety of colors too and different colors are believed to signify different things.

ZOO LICIOUS!

I love the zoo! My dad, my mom, our friends, and I went to the zoo this past Monday. Although this time we went for fun and not learning I did find out something interesting. There are two different ways that organisms can look alike. The first way is mimicry. An example of mimicry is when two snakes in the same region look similar, usually one non-venomous and one venomous. The reason behind this evolution is so that pray will leave the non-venomous one alone as well as the venomous. For instance in our region, southern Louisiana, the scarlet king snake and the coral snake show the mimicry trait. The coral snake is the poisonous one. So since the scarlet king snake looks similar to the coral snake predators will stay away. Another way organisms are compared is through parallelism. Parallelism is when two species look and behave similar but are in different regions of the world. Here are some pictures we took at the zoo of two spcies of boas exhibiting the obervable fact of parallelism.

The emerald tree boa, Corallus caninus, is a green snake with white bands. It lives in trees and shrubs near water (like swamps and marshes in rain forests). It is found in the lower Amazon basin (in Brazil) and in Guyana and Suriname. The Green Tree Python is found in New Guinea, various islands in Indonesia, and the northern tip of Eastern Australia