It Arrived!

The real exciting thing that happened this weekend is that my copy of our new Celebrations Cookbook arrived on Saturday!! Oh how wonderful to hold the final product in my hands after the months and months of planning, cooking, perfecting, cooking again, photographing, photographing and more photographing. Then there was the initial editing before it went to the Editors. Maybe now you get the picture as to how wonderful it is to hold the book in my hands finished and ready to share.

Our author royalties from our new book will all be going to a Clean Water WASH Program in Africa. Our author royalties from our first book will continue to go to the Good Shepherd Shelter in the Ukraine funding the new greenhouse. Make sure and check our MGCC blog as there are some giveaways in the works. We are looking forward to several book launch events in British Columbia in early May and more events in Winnipeg in early June.

Now more everyday news back in our humble dwelling in the Pacific Northwest. We actually saw blue skies around fluffy white clouds today and we had to pull out our sunglasses! We don’t count on this lasting so we headed out to finish up the mowing I started on Friday. Don’t you just love a freshly mowed lawn? I know there are a lot of you out there that are still looking at snow and I hope that changes soon. Some of you had ice storms and were without power, like Rosella and other weather blasts like Vee. I’m sorry I use my fellow bloggers to be thankful for our clouds and rain when I hear about what’s going on in your neck of the woods. I’m sure like us the excitement of the beauty in our world and good weather days are that much more appreciated!

One more thing before I go scrounge something to eat…

We (Dear and I) were on the speaker phone with 2 of our kids (Josh and Laura) and we made some initial plans for a trip together. When we hit the purchase button together it was exciting and scary all wrapped up in one click. Now to decide on all the other details. I’ll share more later!

Have a wonderful week and oh my don’t forget to file your tax returns if you haven’t already!!

The Winner is…

…Pam!

Pam’s blog is Abiding With Love.

Thank you Pam for entering my giveaway and for being a faithful follower of my blog. I’ll email you for your address and will mail off a copy of our new book as soon as they are published and in my hands.

A Small Interruption…

…to my Christmas table decor.

While working on my recipes for our Celebrations Cook book being published at the end of April in 2013 I had to redo one of my recipes which meant I needed to change out my Christmas table. I chose to set the table using my pewter pieces since my entree was a traditional English recipe. Some of my pewter pieces were acquired in England in the 70’s.

The pewter wine goblets and the Coffee service with creamer and sugar containers along with the salt and pepper shakers are from England. I decided to use the coffee pot as a vase on this occasion. The candle holders are Revere ware and the flatware is Gorham pewter. The chargers were gifted to us from our son and DIL for Christmas one year.

The runner is a gift from our son and DIL, too. I liked adding in the green goblets with the pewter.

The dishes are Royal Stafford and I think I purchased them at Marshalls.

I enjoy this table but soon it will be reset to our casual Christmas setting.

Now I need to get busy getting our Christmas cards ready to send out. Do you send out Christmas cards and do you add a personal note or do you type one Christmas letter to be included in all your cards?

We received good news yesterday from North Carolina! Our son-in-law is now a Marine Corporal. We are so proud of his achievement. I’m hoping to get an updated photo of him with his new blood stripes and pins along with his sword soon. Congratulations Marine Corporal Andrew!

Speaking of Celebrations…

…Menno Press has released our new Cookbook Cover and you can see it on the MGCC Blog. Head on over and leave a comment to be entered to win our new cookbook when it is released May of 2013!

And because I like food and eating food and celebrating with special people around the table here are some more photos from our time in Atlanta with Katie and Andrew.

On Sunday morning we caught a taxi to Ria’s Bluebird across the street from Oakland Cemetery. I was so pleased to kill two birds with one stone, eating good food and visiting a very cool old cemetery.

I ordered the small stack of buttermilk pancakes with Georgia pecans. Dear ordered an omelette with grits. We split the items between us except he ate all the grits himself.

Andrew had the Meyer Rum dipped brioche with caramelized bananas. Katie had the same omelette Dear and I shared. We all had good cups of coffee. Dear and I ordered the “shot in the dark” and Andrew and Katie had mochas. I’m always happy when my internet choices for a restaurant in a city I’m not familiar with turns out well, especially when I’m dragging 3 people along with me.

After our delicious breakfast and good coffee we walked across the street to explore the Oakland Cemetery. I’ll share more photos of the cemetery another day but I did want to share one more photo of a Seafood Pub and Restaurant that was directly across from a side entrance to the cemetery.

The name made me chuckle as I stood amongst the gravestones looking out the gate…

Hope you are having a good week. Things are busy around here and the weather has cooled. We are promised a dry night tonight for which I am happy because I’m going to another soccer game with Josh and Laura tonight. Blessings…

Announcements, Announcements, Annou-ounce-ments!

The Mennonite Girls Can Cook are happy to announce that our second cookbook will be released Spring of 2013! Click over to the MGCC site to read all about it and to leave a comment for a chance to win our 2nd cookbook.

AND…while I’m making announcements, don’t be surprised if the look of my blog changes this week.

Happy Thanksgiving Canada!

Oh Happy Day!

My Case of Mennonite Girls Can Cook books arrived on Monday!!

Stay tuned because soon you’ll have a chance to win a free copy of the book here on my blog!

You can order a copy at Amazon here.

If you are wondering what to do with all those hard boiled eggs you made for Easter head over to the MGCC Blog for a recipe for Eggs a la Goldenrod on Tuesday!

Photobucket replaced all my photos with these blurred out versions and they are holding my photos hostage until I pay them lots of money. I’m slowly going through all my posts and trying to clean them up and replacing some photos. Such a bother.

FFF ~ Fun in the Midst of Slumps…

Time to get your favorites together to share. Susanne at Living to Tell the Story is our hostess for this event. Click on over and see what events, products, people, books, made the list!

I shared earlier this week that I’m in a bloggy slump of sorts but even in the midst of slumpiness there are lots of good things around me. The Light always shines I just need to see it. So here are my favorites from this past week.

1. Soccer is my favorite sport in general but I have to say that the Seahawk football game against the Saints makes it on my favorites this week. Mostly because of this unbelievable run that you all probably have heard about already. The Seattle fans even made the Seismic charts.

Seattle is all a-buzz and on Sunday they’ll play the Chicago ~~Bulls~~ Bears to see if they keep their amazing run alive.

2. I’m happy to report that my big toe was not broken last week but just bruised badly so I was able to go to Zumba on Monday morning. I’m really enjoying this form of exercise and have met some fun ladies my age and younger who keep me going. Here’s how Zumba is described: “Zumba Fitness^® is the only Latin-inspired dance-fitness program that blends red-hot international music, created by Grammy Award-winning producers, and contagious steps to form a “fitness-party” that is downright addictive”. At first I felt like I had 2 left feet but the routines are the same every time you go and before long you can do the steps automatically.

3. The blower/fan in our fireplace insert died. Dear had to take the whole thing apart to figure out what part we needed. We ordered it online because it wasn’t available locally. It finally arrived on Wednesday and Dear put it all back together and we now have heat in our living room area again. This is our 2nd major heat source so we were pretty chilly for a few days and cuddled up in the family room where our little cast iron stove kept us warm. I’m happy Dear could fix it for a fraction of the cost to replace it. $150 instead of $1500. Now Dear thinks he should be able to buy himself something for $1350. There is something suspect in that reasoning…

4. Dear and I went to our local Mexican Restaurant this week and it was a great relaxing time with good conversation and debriefing on things that were on our minds this week. Sometimes it is just good to get out of the house so you aren’t a slave to your normal routines. We know the waitstaff by name here and they always make us feel welcomed. That’s Carne Asada and I’ll share the recipe closer to summer time on the Mennonite Girls Can Cook Blog.

5. Speaking of the Mennonite Girls, we’ve had fun news about our upcoming cookbook this week. A few weeks ago the cover was released. This is what the cover will look like. Some of the gals have been interviewed by their local papers and this week one of the T.V. stations in Canada is interviewing a couple of the gals on their Sunday show. We keep pinching ourselves. Our Royalties from the sale of the book will be going to an organization in the Ukraine that feeds children. You can click on the cover to see more information on the book.

~~~

Hope you are doing well. I’ll be coming around today or tomorrow to see your Faves…

Photobucket replaced all my photos with ugly black and grey boxes and they are holding my photos hostage until I pay them lots of money. I’m slowly going through all my posts and trying to clean them up and replacing some photos. Such a bother.

The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b.

To honor and encourage

Tag Archives: Cookbook