Month: October 2007

We took a short trip to Talladega this past weekend, and saw some of the loveliest homes there. Here are just a few:

I’m so excited – we’re getting all our plans together for Halloween! Shug’s costume is here (I really wanted to make it myself this year, but instead found someone to make it for him and is it ever *so* cute! I’ll post pics of him in it on Wednesday), and we’re going to get all dressed up and go trick-or-treating at different friends’ homes, then be with Leslie to give out candy to the trick-or-treaters that come to us.

I’ve got this scarecrow out on our porch. I got the idea from one of the first Mary Engelbreit Home Companion magazines, and even though I can’t draw, I was able to paint his face:

Happy Fall!

Just last month, I heard about a new program for people who want to donate their hair for a good cause – it’s called ‘Pantene Beautiful Lengths‘. I’ve donated my hair twice before to Locks of Love but this time I decided to send my ponytail to Pantene instead.

Pantene sends donated ponytails to a company that puts at least six of them together to make a wig, then the wigs are made in different colors, textures, and lengths. They get sent to American Cancer Society wig banks and are distributed (free) to women undergoing cancer treatment. They’ve made 2000+ wigs so far. So nice!

There’s a group for before & after pics on Flickr here.

Av took us and our friend Leslie to the beach this week as a little early birthday present for me! We had a great time and even spent the first afternoon in Pensacola to take Shug and Leslie to McGuire’s for their first time, and to get some fish from Joe Patti’s.

This is the fifth time we’ve stayed at The Beach Club. I had told Leslie about how beautiful all the condos had been, and this time we somehow got one that wasn’t decorated anywhere as nice as the others – which is **really** weird, because it wasn’t furnished like how it appears on their website for this particular unit, either.

The beach was beautiful:

…and here are my two favorite boys!

Pictures from the last four condos we’ve had at The Beach Club are here: one, two, three, four.

In November of 2005, I posted about how I used fabric to change the look of a couple of bookcases. Since it’s been a couple of years, I was thinking it would be nice to do it again — and at just the right time, there was an article in…I think it was the last New Orleans Magazine but I might be wrong…about a shop on Magazine Street that carried this wonderful custom toile with scenes of New Orleans.

The shop is called Hazelnut, and one of the owners is Bryan Batt, who plays Salvatore Romano on the AMC show Mad Men (I love that show! And Damages on FX too. But they both just had their season finales and now there’s nothing on tv until Lost. Well, except Curb and The Office. But anyway.).

So anyway, the New Orleans toile came in and it’s just beautiful. Here are the bookshelves with the old fabric:

…and here they are with the New Orleans toile (it comes in different colors – I got the ‘magnolia’ shade because I just thought it would make that end of the room appear lighter):

I made this mayhaw glazed chicken last week and it was *so* good. Just wonderful. And sooo easy.

This is based on a recipe in the October 2004 issue of Martha Stewart Living for apricot-dijon-glazed chicken, but I thought I could make it my own by using a local fruit, like mayhaw jelly. I had a small jar of it in the pantry, so I gave it a try — perfect. Mayhaws grow mostly in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana so it’s in most grocery stores here, but if you live far away, there are places you can order it online and have it shipped. Of course, if you don’t live here in the South, you probably have some other wonderful local fruit that would be good.

Oh! And I used some honey I bought from the Pond Store (601.888.4426) in Pond, Mississippi (about 15 minutes from Woodville). The very, very nicest lady, Liz Chaffin, runs it. The present store has been there since 1881. Inside the store she has a dollhouse that her uncle or cousin or ?? made for her, and here are some pictures of the interior:

Isn’t it great!?

Okay…back to the chicken…

Ingredients:
4 pieces chicken
1 small jar mayhaw jelly
2 tbsp honey
2 tbsp Dijon mustard
salt, pepper

Preheat the oven to 425*. Wash off chicken pieces, dry, and arrange them in a baking dish. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

In a small saucepan, bring the jelly, mustard, and honey to a boil then reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer for about twenty minutes so it’s thickened. Spoon this mixture over the chicken pieces, and place the baking dish in the oven.

Every ten minutes or so, baste the chicken with the juice from the bottom of the baking dish. The chicken should be cooked through at 30-35 minutes.

So good!