My Daughter's Craftsman Home

Yesterday, Julia from Hooked on Houses asked a question about this Sears Bungalow
and what 5 changes would you make?

I made my comments but also noted that I hadn't really posted about my daughter's Craftsman in Upstate NY
(at least I couldn't find anything in my history).

Tif's family moved to their home when her husband graduated from medical school.
They are only there for 3 years for his residency.

They snagged this house from a medical student
at the same hospital as Doc.
She was built in 1910 and will celebrate her
100th Birthday next year!!

Here she is from across the parkway.

We don't have any photos of her original exterior.
Or interior for that matter.
I would love to know which kit number/name she is.
I read about a FourSquare
and found some photos
and she may be similar.
But there have been many changes made through the years.
The first you see are the stone siding
and Jalousie windows porch enclosure.

Here she is in Winter:Both side yards:Doc rebuilt the cute little white picket fence
but hadn't painted the new posts in these photos:

One of the strange things about this neighborhood
is the odd lot shapes.
The fence line follows the property line.

(note this little white sided section for later)

There is another identical garage to your left but is the neighbor's.

And the property goes all the way back through the alley
to about 3 feet from the garage you see beyond.

View from the front porch:

This home is in an Olmstead Brothers designed area.
Their street is the entry way to the Olmstead designed park.
What a blessing to have such a huge greenbelt.
Note the stone walls marking the entrances to the Park.
(There's their house again)

And there's the Park up the hill and to the left.
Home to the New York State Zoo,
now housing only indigionous animals. I practically kissed this front door when I first spied it.
It's gorgeous!

The hallway and stairs.

The coffered ceilings are original.
However, there used to be windows on each side of the fireplace.
They have been drywalled over.
If you scroll back up to the side yard pics,
you'll see that the windows are still there, with Venician blinds and all!

Oh, the French doors!
~ sigh~ So beautiful!
And the windows:
Not a lot of changes have been made other than paint so far.
First room painted was Nicolee's:

Nicolee's floor was stripped and refinished too.

Nicolee has the BEST view in the house:

Imagine a generation ago when
lions and tigers and bears were residents of the zoo.
Growls and roars were regular sounds of the night!
Nicolee's view:

The attic is a storage and playroom.
Some sort of composition board covers the ceilings
and Tif and Dave have decided to just leave it as is for now.

It's a great place for cousins to play dressup!

The biggest change so far has been painting the cupboards
and changing the hardware in the kitchen.
If you remember the white siding from the backyard view,
it is the extension of the kitchen.
Beyond that header is what used to be a covered porch.

Note the funky hanging glassfront cupboards suspended
from the ceiling and then take a scroll back up
to the dining room as it is now.
These lost-in-space boxes have been removed.
And now: (Hi Tink!")
Next the question is what color for the kitchen walls?
Laura Ashley Cowslip 2 or Sand 2 were my recommendations.
Do you have any suggestions?
They are leaning toward a yellow hue.
Doc just began his last year of his residency
and then will go active Air Force next year...
and they will have to say goodbye to this centenarian.

Thanks for visiting my daughter with me!

Mom

One year ago today my Mom passed away.
Here she is with Tiffany.

This is how I remember her.
Beautiful, fun, full of life, ornery, active, Bunkco and tennis.

Photo with her husband Robert in their beautiful home in San Clemente, CA.
Circa late '80's

My mom went to college when college wasn't cool for women.
This is her resume photo when she was looking for employment after graduating.
She worked up to 3 jobs while going to school.
I was 14 when she finally graduated.

We traveled to Paris together.

And Ireland. This is Waterport, Ireland, her father's birthplace.
She never met her grandparents because her parent both emigrated from the Fair Green Isle.
Her mother from County Cork.
They met and married in Boston where she was raised.

Mom loved the ocean and especially saltwater fishing.

After her husband passed away she came to live with us.

Missouri is not near the ocean.
(in case you didn't know)

But she got to spend time with family.

Mom with Sweet Hubby.
They have always been great buddies and fishing partners.

One of my favorite photos.
Mom and H when she was a baby.Mom loved good food, having supported us while she attended college

by waiting tables in some fine restaurants.

Her in the photo are also Jay (on the right) and LJ
who had been so much unbelievable help with Mom.
LJ was my support and right arm helping with Mom.

When she moved in with us we tortured her
by taking her photo at Bass Pro in Springfield.
She was a good sport.




LJ's 21st Birthday:Did I mention that the college she went to was UCLA?
She had an undergraduate degree from the graduate Business department. In the middle of her education they moved the undergraduate program out to the Valley to San Fernando Valley State but she was able to finish her degree under her old catalog at UCLA. BTW, I graduated from Valley State after it changed to California State University Northridge. Funny huh?

She used to tell about the professor who regularly chastised her for "taking up a man's seat" in his classes.
She even remembered his name. (I can't)

She loved mussels!
And Olive Garden serves some fine mussels.

For Valentine's Day one year we had the university men's ensemble come sing to her. They were handsomely dressed in tuxes.
But the next year, the school wouldn't travel all the way to our little town, so I had the choir teacher and a couple students come and sing to her.Mom loved music and theatre.
She and Robert had season passes to the Opera and the Broadway Tours




We managed to get all the family together for
Thanksgiving the year she moved here.
I'm so glad we did.
This was taken the day before she passed away.
I used to drag her away and take her for rides in the countryside in her cute little car.
She did NOT want her photo taken, as you can see by how prettily she is smiling at the camera~~not!


I love you and miss you Mom!
73 is too young.

aka Grandma Kathy, selfnamed Dragon Lady

Ga Gas Swedish Pan Cake

Ga Ga's Swedish Pan Cake

Sweet Hubby’s grandmother: Hildur Hendrickson (1900-2000)

This is the dish that Ga Ga always prepared if she knew there would be company, even if someone was just stopping by for a cup of coffee. Lingönberries are traditional,

but you can use raspberry preserves, fresh berries.

Ga Ga liked to make “Blueberry Soup”, which is syrup made with fresh blueberries.

Sure to please.

It's kind of like a custard.

Not at all a pancake.

Ga Ga’s Pan Cake in the oven. Tiffany says,

it’s one of her most favorite smells in the world.

Tiffany prepared almost 200 of these fruit skewers for the Y daycare program.
She brought the leftovers home and we devoured them.
Why is it I seem to always forget to snap a photo before anyone digs in?

Ga Ga's Swedish Pan Cake

4 eggs

4 Tbsp flour

4 Tbsp sugar

3 C milk

Dash salt

2 Tbsp butter

Cinnamon

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450°F

Beat eggs. Add sugar and flour. Beat. Beat in milk. Add salt. Melt butter in baking dish in preheated oven until bubbling and just starting to brown. Pour liquid mixture into dish. Sprinkle with cinnamon. Bake at 450°F 15-20 minutes (should puff up big). Lower temp to 350°F and continue baking until done (15-? minutes) until no liquid, like a custard. If starts to brown too fast, turn oven off & leave until done.

Serve with Lingönberries and whipped cream or Cool Whip. Yes, you should share.

Bruschetta Love (edit)

We love Bella Peppers.
It's a small restaurant in Joplin.
They make a lot of items from scratch,
tastes like home.
I have loved bruschetta for a while but that changed to I totally heart Bella Peppers' bruschetta.

I have been wanting to try to duplicate their Bruschetta at home
and finally attempted it last night.
Must say I did pretty well.
You may want to tweek it a little,
but Sweet Hubby practically licked up every last bit!

Almost Bella Peppers Bruschetta

per person*:

• 1 ripe Roma tomato, diced
• 1 tablespoon Basil Pesto
• 1/2 teaspoon olive oil
  
• 1 tablespoon Shredded Mozzarella
• 1 tablespoon Grated Parmesan
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic
• Salt & Pepper to taste
  

Gently toss above ingredients together.
Drizzle 1 tablespoon* Balsamic Reduction (recipe below) on individual plate or platter
Garnish with chopped basil and shredded mozzarella
Serve with thin-sliced garlic rubbed Italian Bread, broiled or toasted

Balsamic Reduction
Yeild 1/2 cup

• 1 cup Balsamic Vinegar

Reduce by approx a third to half over medium-low to medium heat

• Add 1/4+ Cup sugar and continue to reduce until the consistency of chocolate syrup.

Place in squeeze bottle for future use.

Mmmmmmmm... Enjoy!!!

Edited July1st just because.

Still on the road

We are still on vacation. Been to Indianapolis, Hershey, Boston, the Cape and now in Upstate New York near Lake Ontario.

Will be back to active blogging to post pics of all our destinations when I return home to MO in about a week.

Thought I'd leave you with a "special" photo from the road:

Mission Beach 2006 & 2009 and NO tattoos

Here is Nicolee on Pop's shoulders at
Mission Beach in 2006.
She was almost 4.
This year she is still in NY in school.
First grade is very important.

H was only 6 months old in 2006,
so we didn't put her up on Pop's shoulders.
But here she is, 3½ in 2009!

And Baby J 2009 at 18 months.
Of course she wasn't even around in 2006!

Daddy and Pop and the little grandgirlees.

A man walked by as we were taking this next pic
and just oozed and fussed about
Jay and Christy and the girlees,
"This is "The American Family"!!
He went on and on!
And an odd statement he injected in the middle was,
"And NO tattoos!!!"
We have been joking about that ever since.

We are on our way to Boston

and plan to take photos with
the "Make Way for Ducklings" statues
in the Public Gardens that will "match"
with one taken in 1989 and another from 1999.
Come back and see in a couple weeks...
with NO tattoos!!!

Tea Parties

While out in San Diego, my KSF, Cecilia invited me to tea at The Aubrey Rose Tea Room in La Mesa.

Cecilia worked here as a server for a time before she went back to nursing.

Cecilia boasted that The Aubrey Rose is THE best tea room and she was not wrong.
Of course, Cecilia hates to be wrong, and on this occasion I conceded.

High Tea is not fare for the faint of heart!

And the tidbits were served beautifully as well.

Everything was just a bite of this and a bite of that.

It just kept coming and coming!

Delightful!

And after the last morsel was consumed,
we were stuffed,
as Sandi so willingly expressed here!

Here we are, the 3 troublemakers:
Sandi, Cecilia and moi:

And Cecilia's daughter, Jenn... who is a gem of a young lady!

I love this photo of Cecil with Jenn's impish grin in the mirror!

David, the shoppe owner's hubby snapped a pic before we left.
A small glimpse of the delights the Aubrey Rose holds for visitors.

And then on to another tea party just yesterday!

With 2 of my little grandgirlees.

This was quite a feat for Baby J, she doesn't use clinking dishes very often.
Can you see that lipsmacking going on?

She was quite dainty.

Lots of tea stirring and strawberries.

The only thing missing was Nicolee!
See you on Wednesday in Boston girlee!!!

Baby Jay is enthralled with the kitties, even though they are not thrilled with her!
She is very gentle and thought it very funny that the kitty lays in the bird bath.

So whether you have a tea party with the big girls
or with the little girls, enjoy your cuppa!