Reuben Sliders and pretzel rolls

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Has anyone tried those new pretzel rolls that seem to be all the rage? I have seen them on a couple of fast food commercials and they just look yummy. So when I was cruising on the Internet looking for football snack recipes, imagine my surprise when I paused at a photo of a Rueben slider on a pretzel roll. Quickly wiping the drool off my computer keyboard, I slammed the print button. No one likes fun food more than our family … especially during football season.

I found “Sister Schubert’s” Pretzel Rolls in the frozen bread section of my local grocery store. One bag of 6 mini rolls cost about $3.00. The frozen little rolls thaw quite nicely several different ways. I loaded each up with pastrami, Swiss cheese, sauerkraut and some spicy mustard. I know … Rueben sandwiches demand Thousand Island or Russian dressing. We just like ours with spicy mustard. Oh, and then pop the little darlins’ in the microwave to melt the cheese. Be prepared to make them often!

The original recipe was adapted from eatathomecookes.com

Not Sleeping in Paris

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Last year when we traveled to Paris for our 40th anniversary, we poured over Rick Steves’ travel book planning our trip. As he suggested, we stayed in the Rue Cler neighborhood and booked a room at the Hotel Relais Bosquet (www.hotel-relaisbosquet-paris.com). The hotel is close to a Metro station and within easy walking distance to the Eiffel Tower. The Rue Cler area is filled with quaint little restaurants. A gelato shop and French pastry shop (complete with bees buzzing amongst the pastries) were our top favorites, although we had to leave the cheese shop when we started to drool. There was also lots of great boutique shopping.

Did I mention the hotel even had a lovely breakfast? Not being a coffee drinker, I had my own pot of hot chocolate every morning. Hubby had his pot of coffee.

Try booking a room on the ground floor. It was small but newly renovated and very modern.

There is one negative aspect of European travel I have noticed and just have to mention. The beds tend to be hard as rocks. Haven’t slept on one that you could minimally sink into yet and we don’t hang out in hostels. I mean if you love sleeping on a board, you will be right at home. But that may be the point … who wants to sleep when there are art museums that make your eyes glaze over from all the eye candy, sidewalk cafes to linger in and people watch, and architecture that will knock your socks right off your feet!

Paris in September

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It has been my experience that September is a great month to visit Europe. The weather is mild, the college kids are all back at school, and generally, lots of people are back at work dreaming about next summer.

Our favorite way to travel is the “Rick Steves” way. With the help of his books, we make our own itinerary, book our airline tickets and even our cute little hotels. And when we get to our destination, take ourselves generally where his guide books lead us. My husband and I are not seasoned travelers, but we adore the adventure of depending on each other, exploring on and off the beaten path, and celebrating with high-fives at the end of the day that we actually make it back to our hotel!

Last year for our 40th wedding anniversary we traveled to Paris, the City of Lights. Did you know that the Eiffel Tower puts on a glittering light show starting at nightfall during the first ten minutes of every hour till 2 a.m. in the summer, 1 a.m. in winter? Basically, the tower is grand during the day and breathtaking at night!

Paris a very walkable city and also home to the imposing Notre Dame Cathedral and The Louve. I still pinch myself when I think about attending Mass in Notre Dame. Did we really do that?

And yes … we even learned how to use public transportation! I’ll never forget purchasing our Metro tickets in the underground subway station. Half of the tickets didn’t work and the Metro dude in the cage just shook his head at us like we were the dumbest tourists he had ever met. I remember sitting on a bench on one of the Metro platforms. The Metro map was incomprehensible. We had no idea how to get to Notre Dame from our hotel until we befriended an English-speaking family of four. I could tell by his haircut he was military. Turned out the husband was stationed in Germany and traveling around Europe with his wife and two children. After he gave us our subway lesson we were experts, only getting off at the wrong stop once the rest of our trip.

Next time … our favorite hotel/neighborhood in Paris!

Is it too early for Halloween?

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frankenstein
I just started reading the gothic novel “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley. I don’t know what took me so long. I still recall watching the 1931 movie version starring Boris Karloff, and many other versions, so the monster story is very familiar.

Back in the ‘60’s when I was a kid there was a television program called “Creature Features” that came on every Saturday night that played all the old vampire, lagoon creature and “Frankenstein” movies. It was an awesome way to spend an evening around the popcorn bowl with the family.

I have to say Shelley’s writing has me hooked. She doles out just enough information to let your imagination go wild. I can tell I am really going to enjoy it.

But I was so surprised how the novel began. It starts out with a self-absorbed man looking for the North Pole. During his voyage into icy waters littered with sheets of treacherous ice, he comes across a man, and one remaining dog attached to a sled, that have fallen through the ice. There is a rescue involved and the waterlogged gent recovers to tell a long story about his interesting life.

The family name of “Frankenstein” is finally mentioned on page 76 and that is where things get interesting. Need I say more?

The quilt has a name!

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Mimi's flower garden quilt
I had lots of great suggestions for a name of the quilt I made that will be donated to The Village Learning Center (www.villagelac.org) in November. I loved all the suggestions! Loretta was the one that tied Mimi to the donation and I believe best fits the quilt. So “Mimi’s Flower Garden” it is!!! Why didn’t I think of that?

Name that quilt!

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I need some help naming a quilt. For you non-quilters out there, just like books, quilts need a name, or a title, if you will. Short and sweet words work best. It’s for a quilt that I’ll be donating to my special needs daughter’s day center. They have a fundraising gala each November and it’s something personal I like to contribute.

So several years ago I purchased a collection of thirty Kaffe Fassett fat quarters. The man is an amazing textile artist that does the most interesting things with color and pattern. If his use of color doesn’t cause your eyes to dilate, the designs will knock your shoes and socks right off your tootsies!

Earlier this year I used part of Kaffe’s collection to make a quilt for our special needs daughter’s room. I used a scrappy pattern entitled “Spider Star Quilt” from Edyta Sitar’s book “Friendship Strips & Scraps.”

Mimi's Spider Star Quilt

With all the leftover fabric from Mimi’s quilt, I made the simple quilt below with 2-1/2” strips. The beige print really makes the colorful blocks pop!

Some of my thoughts about the quilt title include: Kaffe’s Windows, or maybe Garden of Delights. Any thoughts?

Macarons, marshmallows and mini cupcakes … oh my!

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I’m getting a new kitchen floor this week so I have to stay out of the house. Twenty inch ceramic tiles … it’s gonna be awesome. At least it will be very nice right about Wednesday afternoon when the refrigerator makes it way out of the living room and back into the kitchen!

It’s one of the reasons I wound up driving all the way into Houston today. I got to play with my daughter Katie. On one of our stops we wound up at Petite Sweets for like two hours just hanging out and catching up on life. I love days when I get a little “Katie time.” It is so soothing to my soul.

If you have never been to Petite Sweets (www.petitesweetshouston.com), it is located at 2700 West Alabama. It is a mini cupcake, macaron, whoopee pie, cakeball kinda place, and oh, so much more! Kendall was the sweetie pie behind the counter that gave us the grand tour. Personally, I so respect a place that makes homemade pistachio marshmallows. Don’t you?

After making our selections, Katie and I settled down at a table with the small assortment of sweet delights. My personal favorite was the salty caramel macaron and the oatmeal whoopie pie. I took home a chocolate toffee cakeball and a red velvet macaron for hubby. Next time I’m loading up on some of their mini cupcakes.

Life … it doesn’t get any better than hangin’ with your daughter and sharing a whoopie pie.

My happy place is a quilt shop

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One of my New Year’s resolutions many months ago was to make up several scrappy quilts to have on hand. That’s so I don’t look like a deer in bright headlights about to get creamed by an eighteen wheeler when someone asks for a donation for their next fundraiser. I know what you are thinkin’. What is up with the Christmas fabric? It’s nearly the Fourth of July. I like to be prepared. Part of my Girl Scout training.

So this particular quilt was created with a disappearing nine patch pattern from my stash of Christmas fabrics. Easy and breezy! I promise to blog about the pattern in a future post. My friend Debbie demonstrated the pattern one day at Prayer Quilt Ministry. She is awesome! It’s my new favorite pattern if you need to create a quilt top quickly.

So last night I pulled out some of the larger fabric pieces from my personal stash that would be enough to bind the quilt. For you non-quilters, the “binding” is the edging that finishes off the quilt. One-half yard is about the right size but my options were limited. I didn’t like the all-over candy cane fabric for the quilt. And the batik with the red and white berries wasn’t speaking to me either.

It’s why today I traveled to The Quilt Room, http://www.thequiltroomhuffman.com, to purchase some binding fabric. The ladies are so nice at The Quilt Room and are always up for pulling down bolts of fabric for auditioning purposes. Adela helped me pull some Christmas fabrics over to the cutting table so we could figure out if any had potential. Laura, who also works at The Quilt Room chimed in with a thumbs-up or a thumbs-down. I came out of there one happy Girl Scout camper with a half-yard of dark green foliage and tiny red berry fabric. Let the binding begin!