Happy All Saint's Day!

Greetings from Guatemala on All Saint's Day (Dia de Todosantos)!!! We'll be in the cemetary today for sure. This is a special day here. Families gather in cemetaries; they clean and decorate their family/loved ones graves and picnic there all day. The traditional dish of the day is a funky mix of up to 50 ingredients called, Fiambre. Flying kites is a popular past-time on this day; creating a link between life on earth and the lives of those that have passed to the other side. This will be our 2nd year participating in the tradition. =)


These giant handmade kites are just amazing.

Fiambre. Putting a 'blue flower' on top is super popular fancy!
We've yet to have the pleasure of sampling some local Fiambre.

(Already walking around today more cars than not that have gone by me have someone with a big ol' dish of 
 Fiambre in their lap! It's kind of awesome! )

Happy Halloween!

I may very well live in another culture with a whole different way but, that doesn't mean I don't think about my own cultural going-ons. Here we are on Halloween and I have so many fond memories of dressing up going trick or treating and I will cherish those forevs. I wonder what the most popular costumes will be this year?? However, as an adult I don't exactly miss Halloween but, I do wish everyone especially all the kiddos and my friend and family with kiddos a huge safe and Happy Halloween!!

putting together a daily dishware set of pyrex.

My family (grandmothers, many aunts, countless cousins, my mother and now brother) adores dishes from across the ages. My mom and brother are in the midst of a pyrex frenzy and I've caught the bug. I won't be 'collecting' per se but, am in the process of assembling a daily set of mixed and matched white and turquoise pyrex. My darling brother has started for me! He is a lucky duck living near a bunch of dope thrift stores in Pasco County, Florida. You can see his finds and part of my mom's collection on my brother, Stephen's flickr: PyrexScout. He's a total dream pie for gathering pyrex pieces for me. He's scored 6 plates (white with a thin turquoise ring around outter edge) and 2 oval platters (white with a sweet turquoise band around edge with white leaves and pretty detail) for me. Here they are:



I like the idea of being open to mixing and matching. Maybe I'll just keep it to different pyrex as long as its basically white with colour detailing. So after browsing all the lucious pyrex on etsy, I've made up my mind. I am going to mix up white & turquoise/aqua, brown & white AND red pyrex pieces!!!

Here are some pieces that I think might go together nicely for my set:

To go with the ovals plates above.

These ramekins are listed for a song on etsy! & will be adorable with pyrex's woodland pattern!

Aren't these square bowls the bomb?!

Woodland mixing bowls-2 of them as a set.

Love red & turquoise together...these fridge dishes are so useful!

These can be used for a zillion different things.

These plates just to mix in more red.

I can't wait to have a decent looking set of dishes. For being a dish-head, I've survived a year without my beloved Fiesta Ware (at my Mom's house, safe and sound) and have used the motliest crew of lame dishes. Well those days are numbered and I couldn't be happier!!!!!!!

My super power: I disappear when I read!

I remember very clearly in grade school being assigned my first book report. I can see it all in my mind like an old movie; standing next to my mom at the kitchen table going through Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary together with her telling me what was important about the story. Of course, that's not when I first starting reading and being thouroughly sucked into books like a vacuum. That happened when I was 14 and got Chicken Pox for a 2nd time, lucky right?! It was the middle of a stiffling hot Florida summer and all I wanted to do was escape. That is when I discoverd the ultimate escape for me is reading. I get lost, I go away, I don't exist here, I live in the story. I stayed buried in books* for those miserable two weeks and have since then used books as my true hiding place. It's amazing and am grateful beyond belief that I have reading!
                                                      

*books I read during my chicken pox summer o' hell: The Stand by Stephen King, The Dead Zone by Stephen King, Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway, and finally The Shell Seekers by Rosamunde Pilcher which I have re-read countless times and given as a gift time and time again. It just has to be one of my all time favourite books on earth. It's even my Nana's favourite book and I think my mom's too.

                                              

guinea pig fever!

                    

Earlier this year I got my 1st guinea pig, Esme. I'd been pining for one ever since we saw some in Antigua the first month we moved to Guatemala. They had them at my favourite little pet supply shop there with a sign calling them Raton de India! That really cracked me up and was the ultimate kickstart to my love for guinea pigs. Now, I mostly refer to them by their Spanish name: cuyos.

Enid & Esme hiding out on their 1st day in their new home.

Upon bringing Esme home I started reading all about cuyos online. Maybe that's the reverse order that I was supposed to do those two things but, that's how it happened. Pretty soon into my reading I found out that they aren't meant to live alone. In Sweden, by law you have to buy two at a time. So of course there I was back at the market that day to get another one.  I chose another girl from the another bunch of pups that were a few weeks older. I was happy to have 2 sweet as pie girl guinea pigs!

                                   

                                         Esme & Enid. Their 2nd day together.

It didn't take very long for me to realize that Enid was not a girl but, a BOY! This discovery was much to my delight as I secretly wanted to have a cuyo family. I couldn't be happier to have gotten a boy & a girl. <3.

Grown up Enid. A very handsome Papa cuyo!

 In a couple of months Esme was with child, ok, pup. Her pregnancy suited her just fine, she became serene and sweeter than ever. She got huge, I charted her pregnancy on the calendar and she was overdue by 2-3 weeks. She was so big and I just couldn't imagine how many pups she was going to have. Online sources say that the average littler is 5-7 pups! But, alas on June 26th she delivered! Another surprise!! She only have one, not so small, pup. She had him all by herself on a bed of dried corn husks in a house fashioned out of a tipico basket (handles cut off, turned upside down, a little arched door-way cut out and then sunk in the dirt a couple of inches). It was the most dear and darling event to happen in our little backyard courtyard.

 1st litter. One pup. Pup-e. 'Baby' 1 day old.

While Esme was in her final month of her pregnancy we separated her from Enid. They were only separated by a chicken wire divide so that they could still keep each other company. Esme could have cared less but, Enid was a little bummed. In the natural Guinea Pig world the females surround the birthing mother and don't let any males near her for a while after she gives birth. Male pigs want to mate the minute the female pig has given birth and it's very unhealthy for the lady pig's body to get pregnant again that fast.

Esme & her 1st pup, Baby, nursing. So sweet.

Baby & Esme munching on some greens.

As soon as it was safe for Esme to be back with Enid we allowed the little family to be together. It was fun and interesting to watch them mingle. Baby hangs with his mom sometimes and with his dad other times.
We knew that it was only a matter of time before Esme & Enid would get some buns in the oven. And we decided to let this happen in high hopes for a little girl cuyo so we could split them up into two groups. Esme is such a docile darling mama pig. Her 2nd pregnancy was shorter and she was larger by a mile. I knew that she had more than one pup in her belly this time. She gave birth in a rainstorm early on the morning of September 18th to 3 little pups; 2 boys and 1 girl on a bed of shredded carrots.

 2nd litter. 3 pups. The only girl, she's the smallest.

Rosebud, the little girl.

Esme & her one-day old 2nd litter of 3 pups. One is hidden under her.

Cuyo pups are cool. They are born with all their hair, whiskers, teeth and nails. They can eat solid food from the start and can run the first day they are alive! And if you've never had the pleasure of being friends with a guinea pig you are missing out on some of the coolest animal noises ever! They whistle and squeak and eek...it's too cute! We now have 6 pigs whistling at us! Yay!

backgammon

Backgammon is a game I played as a kid and then didn't play for many many moons until this year. My mom gave me an adorable travel set earlier this year that she totally scored on at her local Flea Market, Howard's* for 2 bucks! I can't even begin to say how far that $2 has gone and is going. We play almost everyday and it's so much fun! We one day aspire to figure out and use the doubling cube. Haha!

This game lives on our kitchen table. We play almost everyday. It's so much fun because we are even-steven on skill level and that makes it all a matter of 'luck of the dice'!!

*Howard's Flea Market in Homosassa, Florida is where Mike is from. He was all by himself and that is one of the most precious days of my lives; finding that little guy. What a firey little blessing he is. Talk about a flea market find!

a memoir: Orange Grove Granny

I've lost my last living grandparent. My Paternal Grandmother whom I've called my Orange Grove Granny most of my life. The story goes that I distinctly started calling her Granny in the Trees at a very early age. Orange Grove Granny lived in the middle of the orange grove that my Poppy farmed (as opposed to my Granny that lived in town). It was his parents land that they bought when they landed in the States from Poland.

My Orange Grove Granny was Ruth Hendry Odowski. 
Born in 1919, she lived to be 89.

Eating watermelon on the shore of Lake Alfred in July 1956.

  She survived her husband (my Poppy) Narcys Odowski.

And her 3 children survived her!

Pictured here from left to right: Aunt Judy (Judith Novack) holding 'the baby', 

Aunt Ellie (Eleanor Miles) and my dad, David Narcys Odowski.

I particularly love this picture of her. ...the caption on the back written by
Aunt Judy reads, 'Mom didn't spill her Eggnogg even though she looks
like she did!'....so cute!!! My Orange Grove Granny has always reminded
me of Julia Childs (perhaps a reason of my utter love for Julia??).

Valentine's Day 1974. 

A wee me in the lap of my Orange Grove Granny.

homegrown broccoli

My mom grew this broccoli from organic heirloom seeds. Last time I was at her house, she went and cut/ripped me off 2 stalks to bring home. It stayed crisp & fresh in the fridge longer than any I have ever bought at the stores here (probably because there was no middle man..fresh produce straight from the ground to my house!).

I steamed it up (I should have photographed it after steaming it turned the darkest richest bright green...it was gorgeous!) and it was most delicious. ...sweet, crisp yet tender and just plain tasty!!! Mom's awesome, I like Mom, let's call her.