Today I Made A Pie

Today I watched one of my most favorite movies The Waitress and decided to make a pie.  Watch the movie and I guarantee you'll want to invent your own. Unless you don't like baking or being creative.  Then, I guess you're a boring human being and you can just go buy one at the store and watch your boring prime time tv tonight.  

pastry crust preparation thanks to Better Homes & Gardens

Cutting up berries with a paring knife the way my mom taught me (the opposite of Boyscout knife safety - towards the thumb - although, if you ask Jon to tell you one of his Scout Camp stories, they didn't follow the safety rules anyway) gave me an intense sense of nostalgia.  I always used to ask my mom, "How do you not cut yourself but you cut the whole piece of fruit?"  I can't tell you the secret.  But maybe a Boyscout can.

Mixed berry filling

The waitress in the movie (The Waitress) creates and invents her own pies and gives them unique names.  That was a good enough excuse for me.  It's called Bad Dog Sweet Berry Pie, in honor of my dog's bipolar behaviors today... that, and all I had to make a pie was a bunch of berries and some Icelandic chocolate to melt and do something with.

double crust with swirly vents

Midway through baking, the oven began to seep a lovely smokey smell.  I love the smell of fire, but I don't love the sound of fire alarms, so I decided to put some foil under the baking pie to catch the oozing berry filling juice before the oven caught on fire.  When it came out, I drizzled some of that bittersweet Bjork chocolate on top.
 

Bad Dog Sweet Berry pie

Unfortunately, the results of the pie could not be photographed because they were worse than my bad dog.  Note to self: if you're going to use fresh berries in a pie, learn how to bake a pie.  No one wants to eat runny diarrhea berry pie.  And Chef Jon said the chocolate was a bad addition.  Pie Fail.


Will practice make perfect???

From Last Summer until now

Phineas and Margie became cuddle buddies...

Then, Margie decided it was okay to sit on the cat.  Phineas had no say. 

Last year's summer deck garden was a hit.  Even neighbors complimented it and then competed with their own decks.  Susan can't wait for this Spring.

Oh, let's see...

So much has gone on lately...

Susan painted some flower cards and sent one to her mom (post mom's total knee-replacement surgery) and the others to the ladies she visit-teaches at church:


Raisa, our niece, took some photos shown below at Susan's brother Steve's 1st annual Heathfest (music fest and homemade beer tasting) at his home in Riverfalls, WI this past September:


Sue sang harmony on a couple songs with Jon after he dragged her up there:



Raisa with Luci:


Congratulations to Raisa for managing to snap a candid photo of Jon:


Raisa's bro, Brenden:


Sue posing for Raisa's photo shoot:








Brenden and his dad Steve (Sue's brother) tuning for their band performance:





Raisa's coolest friend, Emily in the background:


Brad & Steve's acoustic group (Steve is an amAzing guitar player and singer):



In other newz...

We moved to an apartment and it is lovely.
Susan is a busy bee working on finishing her "thesis" for her Masters, with the help of Courtney's genius tip of "just do 15 minutes each day" and it is working (which is a godsend after a year of feeling no motivation to finish it).
Jon is awesome and always right.
Margie wears a no-bark shock collar while the humans are away, and it finally worked after a whole day of it not working - whew!
and the cats are weird and meaowy (two of which will find new homes soon, as the apartment only allows two pets total).

that's our update!

peace out.

Fall Foliage & Feistiness

Susan's favorite colors as a little girl were pink & purple... Mother Nature gave her a present this year:


...which the bumblebees partook of gratefully:


vibrant colors in autumn look so lovely along Susan's hand-laid stone path leading up to the back door of the house:


...as the bunny rabbit wind vein points the way to the colors:



Meanwhile... Margie plays a game with our backyard wheelbarrow and her ball to entertain herself when her "sticks" (fallen tree branches) are resting... or boring...


she places her ball atop the push-cart wheelbarrow:


pretends that the wheelbarrow has stolen her ball and begins a repetitive shrieking scold:


she then manages to rescue her ball from the criminal cart:


and then howls at the wheelbarrow for accosting her and her favorite toy:


...a quick pose for wheelbarrow advertisement in Sears catalogue:


...the ball goes to the other side of the wheelbarrow and she continues to bark:


Our neighbours on the other side of the white picket fence (who gave us our pumpkin recently that was growing on their side), came home during this dog game and the lady asked, "Is that Margie barking???!! Wow, I've never heard her bark before!" And Susan laughed and explained the game as best she could over Margie's shrill vocals.

The Art Crawl

Susan was invited to be a featured artist at The Paper Collector Art Gallery & Professional Framing for the Saint Cloud Art Crawl, September 17th, 2010, which was open to the public this evening from 5-9pm...

Jon's mother, Pat Ramsey, attendee of the Art Crawl, is surprised by a painting Susan did of her granddaughter a few years ago with requests to please pass on to the artwork's muse:


Susan painted her "mom's home" as a birthday gift to her mom (September 23rd) which she showed at the Art Crawl before her mom got to take it home:
"

"Smokey" a favorite old painting (painted 16 years ago of pet cat) was shown there:


an artist's Wizard of Oz hand-sewn doll creations:



Susan really liked this artist's sea creatures paintings hung on a different wall:


art viewers:


A tipsy lady married to a lawyer who was interested in two of Susan's paintings:


art crawl wanderers who are probably more interested in the wine and cheese:


The most popular of Susan's work amongst the public:


susan with Ben's friend from high school, Adam Seutter:


artist angst:

Long, long ago (in a galaxy around the corner)...

We, Susan & Jon (awkwardly pictured below) went on a trip to Duluth this past June:



While there, we saw beautiful scenery (Canal Park lighthouse):



(ship coming into Canal Park harbour):



("sea"-gulls):



...and on the way home, Susan played "self-portraits" with their camera, a game which Jon does not love very much:

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...and the sun shined over a field of windmills on the way home:




Later in June, we went to Susan's niece's wedding where there were pretty flowers:




In July, Jon played a beautiful Nina Simone song at his in-law's 50th Wedding Anniversary Party:




Susan inherited her Grandmother Miranda Henrietta Rose Denbrooke Heath's skill for horticulturing african violets (the trick is to not get the leaves wet, ever):




Susan made her ward's YW girl's camp flag:



...and did NOT act like a camp leader - she's the 2nd one in from the left:

(note: Susan got asked daily at camp if she was a leader or a camper).


A Monarch visited the Ramsey house of royalty:



Bonnie Wright stole Susan's face:


(screen still from a new film to be released soon).


Our neighbour gave us our pumpkin that was growing on their side of the fence; it is turning a nice bright orange on the kitchen table now:



and Susan colored her hair red:



In other non-photographed newz:

Susan's art will be published next month in Melvin Lans' online art magazine (Jon's artist friend from Colombia, South America)

Jon has been patiently teaching Susan quantum mechanics (while enduring her lack of basic math skills)

Jon started helping coach his niece Breanna's soccer team

and Susan started leaving fewer carbon footprints on the planet by taking the bus to work, which she likes because it feels like school.