10 FUNNY (and not so funny) THINGS ABOUT ME I'LL BET YOU DIDN'T KNOW!

Here we go:

1. I'll use any excuse I can to dress up in a costume. Really I will--probably because it gives me the chance to be "somebody else", just for awhile. And be really silly. Here's a photo from a Halloween party a few years ago--Big Daddy and I were The Cowardly Lion and Glenda the Good Witch, for a Wizard of Oz themed bash. Can you guess who I voted for in the election that year?

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Last year, at a Horror themed party, we really went all out: I was the Clown from "It", and Big Daddy was a Satanic Wall Street Banker (aren't they all?). Only look at this photo briefly, because it's gonna give you nightmares, fer sure:

This last photo was from my high school days, at a toga party. I'm the one in the middle, with the really great legs!:

Be looking forward to photos from our upcoming annual St. Patrick's Day Parade (here in Old Forge),coming soon. I never, ever miss that chance to make a TOTAL fool out of myself, green afro wig and all!

2. My favorite movie of all time? Dumb and Dumber. REALLY! No movie has ever made me laugh harder in my entire life.

3. I gave birth to a 10 lb. baby, 20 years ago on Sunday. My own father was about 12 lbs., so I should have seen that one coming! And you wonder why we only have 1 child?

4. My favorite season? Autumn. My least? Winter. The other 2? They're just paving the way, once again,  up to my favorite!

5. I'm a TOTAL neat freak. It's so bad, I've been known to rake pine needles off of my lawn and roof, sick as a dog with pneumonia and a 103 temperature. Been known to vacuum my entire house the day I was discharged from the hospital, after a hysterectomy. It's a sickness, I know, but I'd rather die than wallow in filth. So sue me! 

6. I do the BEST baby squirrel voice imitation, ever!

7. I've been told I do an awesome Cyndi Lauper impression by more than one person.

8. I am just about the most uncoordinated person you'll ever meet. Despite years and years of ballet and dance classes. Sorry Mom and Dad; did you guys ever consider piano lessons?

9. My ultimate dream? To own a small farm in the countryside, and to house a gift shop in an old but remodeled barn on the property. A place where my dogs and cats and goats and chickens and 1 cow and 3 horses and 2 pigs can roam freely and mingle with my customers. And these lucky customers from my dream will enjoy sitting on my front porch, sipping sweet tea and maybe a piece of peach pie.

10. At a campfire, I like to roast my marshmallows until they catch on fire, then blow them out and eat them, soot and all.

Now, tell me something about yourself that I don't know, please! Have a wonderful day!

PORK CARNITAS AND A LIL' SUMPIN' SUMPIN'!!!

Okay, I think I had the best Valentine's Day, EVER, this year! I made a wonderful pot of Wild Rice and Kielbasa soup for dinner, a fantastic and from scratch Lemon Cake with Glaze for dessert, and sent Big Daddy a pretty plant for his office, where all living things go to die.  In turn, Big Daddy came home from his day bearing gifts, and since there's nobody else living in this house except me and the dog and cats and the spiders, I suspected they were all for ME ME ME, and boy was I right! Big Daddy did a little shopping, it seems, while he was away on business last weekend--he gave me a bottle of my favorite perfume (Donna Karan's "Delicious"--the bottle is shaped like a darling little apple!), and the biggest surprise of my life. A camera. A "real" camera--a Nikon L110:

I'm over the moon, because he knows how much this little blog means to me, and how frustrated I was with my piece of #*@T digital camera. So now, after I've kissed his face about a gazillion times,  I really have my work cut out for me--hopefully by next week I'll be up and running with more professional looking photos. It's gonna take me that long, because the user's manual is about 45,823 pages long, and kinda technical looking. But I"m a smart girl, and a motivated girl, so you should be expecting something great!

SPEAKING of something great--I made one of my favorite and easy crock pot recipes last week, my Pork Carnitas Tacos. You simply cannot find an easier recipe, and all you have to do before you eat them is shred the meat with a fork, and maybe throw together a side dish (I served mine with refried beans) and some "fixins". Big Daddy LOVES this recipe, Card-Carrying-Mexican-Food-Loving-California-Boy that he is:

See that--he's shoving his face full, then licking his fingers! If you want to lick your fingers, too, then make these Carnitas for supper. Here are the ingredients you'll need:

Just throw all the ingredients in your crock pot (well, gently place them in, actually, and NOT the tortillas!), first thing in the morning--it'll look something like this, before cooking:

Cook on "low" for 10 hours, then shred the pork with two forks:

The flavor of this pork is INSANE, and so very tender! I serve mine with shredded lettuce, sour cream, guacamole, tomatoes and cheese, and let everyone put their own tacos together at the table:

Like I mentioned, I served mine that night with refried beans, but some Spanish rice would be good, too. And before I forget, this recipe makes a lot of cooked pork, so I usually freeze what we don't use and use it later in Tortilla Soup. I'll be sure to share that recipe with you, soon. Here's the Pork Carnitas Taco recipe:

PORK CARNITAS TACOS

Serves 6-8

2 lb. pork tenderloin (or, you can use a less expensive 2 lb. boneless pork roast)

1 10oz. can Rotel tomatoes, drained

1 4.5 oz. can chopped green chilis

1 16oz. jar green salsa

1/2 tsp. cumin

1 tblsp. chili powder

flour tortillas

Serve with: shredded cheese, cilantro, avocado or guacamole, tomatoes, shredded lettuce and sour cream, if desired

Combine all ingredients in a slow cooker. Cook on "low" for 10 hours, or until pork shreds easily with two forks. Serve using a slotted spoon in flour tortillas. Serve with desired "fixins".

TOP 3 THINGS I'M GRATEFUL FOR TODAY:

1. I'm grateful that my wonderful husband of 23 years encourages my creativity.

2. I'm grateful that our daughter received her Valentine's Day care package ON Valentine's Day (instead of after!), and that NONE of the delicate cookies broke.

3. I'm grateful that our "handyman" Marc, who will be spending the next week or so in our house for some necessary construction, is so easy to be around, and so neat! He even asks to mop up his snowy footprints!

THE HEARTS OF MY HOME.........

Well, a very happy St. Valentine's Day to you! I hope your day is just filled to the brim with love; love from your family and friends and sweethearts and everyone else you may encounter during your day. I just adore Valentine's Day, and decorate for it in mid-January, usually. Here's a garland that I made last month that I have hanging on my front porch (I also made one for our daughter's dorm room--she should be opening that care package right...... about....NOW!):

I just have this thing for anything heart shaped--always have, always will. Here are some photos of some hearts that I have just hangin' about La Casita De Willard:

Please come back and see me on Wednesday--I'll be preparing a fabulous new recipe for Pork Carnitas Tacos! To die for--really.

                              TOP 3 THINGS I''M GRATEFUL FOR TODAY:

1. I'm grateful that my husband will be home later on tonite--just in time for Valentine's Day, and JUST in time to shovel some snow!
2. I'm so grateful for the recipes that keep coming my way, whether it be via e-mail, blog or just old-fashioned snail mail. Keep 'em coming!
3. I'm grateful that our days here, so far far north, seem to finally be getting longer. Bring on Spring!

A WALK WITH MY SWEETS, AND SOME SWEETS FOR YOU, SWEETS!

                                                               

 Big Daddy left this afternoon for some important "bidness" in Hartford, Connecticut--about a 5 or 6 hour drive. And so before he left, we thought we should take a nice long walk, so that he could really stretch his legs. Doesn't he look just like a robot in the above picture? Too funny--he's such a ham. Wee Willie Willard just loves his morning walks SO much--there's no way we could skip them. Check out his patience, waiting by the door and then watching Big Daddy lacing up his boots:

And I wish my camera showed motion, because if you could only see Willie's tail going around and around in furious circles from the sheer happiness of such great things to come, you'd laugh!:

I don't know why I'm including these photos, except to show off my unwashed hair and squinting wrinkled eyes and Big Daddy's cool glasses and my ear warmers that I bought at Macy's Herald Square in NYC a few winters back:

Oh brother--I just hate hate hate photos of myself! I do like looking at photos of food, though, and happily, I have lots of those today to share! This Valentine Linzer Cookie recipe is absolutely DIVINE--you can't go wrong making these for those you love. You can also make them for other holidays, like Christmas--be creative! Anyways, let's get started. Here's the ingredients you'll need, and the paddle attachment in your mixer:

(Make sure to use CAKE FLOUR!)

For this recipe, you add ground almonds or hazelnuts to the creamed mixture. I always grind my almonds in my food processor, but you could also use a good strong blender or coffee grinder. You want the nuts ground as finely as possible:

After you grind your almonds or hazelnuts, you will cream butter with egg, lemon zest and vanilla, and then add the ground nuts:

Then you'll mix together your dry ingredients and add to the creamed ingredients. Your batter will come out looking like so:

I like to freeze the dough for about 10 minutes at this point, to firm it up. You can use the time to wash up a little and line your baking sheets with either parchment paper or silicone liners:

Preheat your oven and roll out the cookie dough (You can roll out dough between 2 layers of parchment paper for easier rolling). You will be cutting with your larger heart cookie cutter, then using your smaller cookie cutter to cut cute little hearts out of half of the bases:

Keep re-rolling scraps and repeating process. Bake for about 12 minutes and let cool on a rack. Heat your jelly a little bit, and spread a small amount on your heart cookie bases. Place top layer on bottom, and sprinkle with powdered sugar. Then you'll fill the holes with more jelly. These are really fun to make!:

Be ready for lots and lots of "ooh's" and "aaah's"!!!

I did a little "demo" of this cookie at a recent Women's Club meeting, and these ladies are going to be MAD at me for snapping these!:

We girls sure love our treats!

Here's the recipe!

VALENTINE LINZER COOKIES

Makes aprox. 2 dozen cookies (depending upon your cookie cutter size)

1 1/2 sticks buttter, at room temperature

1/2 cup sugar

1 egg

Finely grated zest of 1 lemon

1/4 tsp. vanillla

1/4 tsp. almond extract

1 1/2 cups finely ground almonds

2 1/4 cups CAKE flour

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

6 oz. raspberry or strawberry jam

powdered sugar

Cream butter in a standing electric mixer with a paddle attachment. Add sugar and continue creaming. Add the egg, lemon, vanilla and almond extracts and mix. Mix in ground almonds. Stir together dry ingredients in a bowl and add to mixer; blend. Form the dough into disks, wrap and chill. Roll out dough to about 1/8" thickness. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cut out the base cookie shapes (large heart cookie cutter). Cut out the centers of half the cut shapes with a smaller heart shaped cookie cutter. Re-roll scraps and repeat. Bake for 12 minutes, or until edges turn golden. Cool on wire rack. Heat jam slightly and spread the base cookie shapes with a layer of jam. Place top layer over bottom, pressing down slightly. Sprinkle with powdered sugar, then fill holes with more jam. Let set slightly before serving.

TOP 3 THINGS I'M GRATEFUL FOR TODAY:

1. I'm grateful that my husband has a job that he loves, and that his chosen career takes good care of us all, especially in this terrible economy.

2. I'm grateful that at this VERY moment the sun is shining outside my office window--my view all day has been similar to being inside of a big snow globe!

3. I'm grateful that our daughter has such a sweet boyfriend at school, who is secretely planning to romance her the way a beautiful girl SHOULD be romanced on St. Valentine's Day!

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