Tribute to a Lovely Lady

A wonderful woman we've had the joy of knowing for the past 30 years or so passed away Sunday from pancreatic cancer. She will leave a huge hole in the hearts of her family and friends. She was always friendly, always upbeat, always ready with a smile and a warm greeting.

Along with my memories of time spent with her is this recipe for oatmeal cookies. One of my theories of cooking is that if you want to be a good cook, find a good recipe. This recipe is a keeper. I've used it for years and the results are always delicious.

Here is the original recipe:

Refrigerator Oatmeal Cookies

Cream together:

1 cup shortening
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar

Add:

2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla

Then add:

3 cups oatmeal
1 1/2 cups lfour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

Shape into a roll and chill. The dough is very stiff. Bake on a greased cookie sheet for 10-12 minutes.

Last week, Clovis and Raquel's Father (aka Little Man's Father) used this recipe and made some variations:

Use 1/2 cup shortening and 1/2 cup butter
Use 2-3 tsps vanilla
Add 2-3 tsps cinnamon
Add about a cup of dried fruit - raisins, currants, craisins, dried apricots (chopped)
Add 1/2 to 1 cup chopped nuts.

All I can say is "WOW".

Monday I decided to try another variation:

Use 1/2 cup shortening and 1/2 cup butter
Use 2-3 tsps vanilla
Add a 12 oz bag of chocolate chips.

Again - WOW is the word!

So, farewell our friend, and thank you. You are alive in our memories.

Bigger 'n Bigger

What a difference. The first picture was taken on July 10. The other pictures were taken today, August 29.

WOW!!!

Clovis and Raquel are today's featured kittens on The Daily Kitten. (www.dailykitten.com) I only submitted them yesterday on a whim, and didn't expect to see them for months. How exciting! the first thing I did was call the vet and ask the receptionist to call up the site and show our vet that her patients hit the big time! Now it's time to tell our friends and family via email. We are just grinning ear to ear about this!!! What Fun!

See How They've Grown

Growing Up!

Last night Clovis & Raquel had their 2nd round of shots. Clovis now weighs 3 lbs 9 oz (up from 2 lbs 4 oz a few weeks ago.) Miss Raquel now weighs 3 lbs 15 oz, up from 2 lbs 8 oz. Her coat is like black velvet and when you pick her up, she feels like a beanie baby. Clovis, on the other hand, is a lean, mean playing machine. There's not an ounce of flab on him.

Both of them meowed all the way to the vet. On the way home they were quiet. How do they know?

Too Soon!

There have been back-to-school ads in the Sunday paper for the past two weeks. At work, we received our first Christmas card catalog in the mail today. Then I received an ad for buying year-end tax forms. YIKES!!!!! We haven't even had a ninety degree day here yet and already we are preparing for Fall and Winter.

More fun with Photoscape

I entertained myself for a long time last night applying various filters to pictures in my files. Flower pictures work especially well with the color and monochrome engraving filter. Sometimes also the cartoon filter. People do NOT work at all with these. I will have to do more experimenting, but I suspect that learning about color manipulation will be useful in pictures of people. The cat pictures really lent themselves to the monochrome engraving filter. The brown cats worked well with the cartoon filter. On the other hand, Raquel, being almost solid black, was not a candidate for the cartoon filter. The impressionist filter worked well with any photo that had interesting areas of color.