What my Kitchen Sees

My kitchen has seen my daughter and I carving a round, planet sized pumpkin on the floor and my bagging the pumpkin seeds up for salting and baking. We eventually snacked on the cinnamon and salt tossed seeds, in the living room, during Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window on Halloween hearing now and then our old fashioned door bell ringer ching. When the door bell rang, I eased opened the door to find children standing on my front porch some in carefully crafted homemade costumes. I filled up the trick or treaters bags with candy and began to close the door when suddenly polite minded southern parents would chime "Say thank y-o-o-o-o-u." to their children.
"Thank yo-o-o-o-o-u" the children held their mouths in a wide circle saying. They'd pop up their heads and give an irresistible milky white smile at me then - these smiles were the reasons I taught preschool for so long.
"You're welcome. Happy Halloween." I lilted feeling like the good fairy princess of my hometown making memories for children and their parents as I waved in my front doorway and smiled with my happy Jack'O lantern standing right there beside me. No one seemed to mind the pumkin seed caught in the middle of my teeth that my husband later told me about.
My kitchen also saw a humble Thanksgiving turkey being hauled out of the oven the day after Thanksgiving made especially for my husband's request for weekend turkey sandwiches. On Thanksgiving Day itself my daughter, husband, daughter and I went out to a friend's house. We drove out to a small Autumn mountain, that day, faced with late November trees some almost bare while many others were still splashed with vibrant fall countryside color. There is where my friend's house is and we enjoyed turkey at her place and a sweet rich Carmel pie after the Thanksgiving meal. Folks in Alabama are so very hospitable and sweet as my friend's carmel pie itself. You are certain to have lots of invites for sparkling holiday parities, potlucks and warm morning coffee and pound cake here. The hardest part of all this is trying to decided which social event you should attend. Sometimes all of the invites sound engaging and time isn't always on your side for receiving all the invitations.
My kitchen saw St Nicholas Day, not that I baked anything in my kitchen on that December 5th day. But, I was most certainly searching for my leather boots that I had lost, in the kitchen. The December sky was becoming whiter out and the air cold enough for boots at that point. And at that point, I was still excited about the North winds coming in more giving me occasion to pull on my fashionable new boots. With colder weather, I can look something as sophisticated as the actress Alley Mcbeal from the classic movie Love Story, all dressed in boots and scarfs. Well....a blond like me could never be a dark beauty like Alley Mcbeal but nice boots are a good start. I eventually found my boots in the kitchen pantry (don't ask why) and went on to our historical Episcopal church downtown that we could practically walk to but I would never try high heeled boots.
A man dressed like a German St Nicholas at our church, weaved the story of Saint Nickolas to small children who listened carefully with thumbs plopped in mouths and were riveted forward with wonder on St Nicholas Day. The German St Nick then gave lovely little chocolates to the children hugging a circle around him. My daughter, just over the tender age of being a candidate for a chocolate, gave St Nicolas such soft, sad eyes that he gave her and her friend a chocolate and they cheered like they were at a school football game. All attendees of Saint Nicolas Day brought shoes in bright, pretty packages, and set them on a table, for other children in need honoring the patriarch that had a heart for children. I latter found a Santa decoration at a local grocery store and took that Santa home with me. This Saint Nick stood in a simply lined but striking scarlet long coat and looked upon an innocent child, with a wrapped pkg. in hand. I love all my other jolly old Santas' with ornate sacks and elaborate sleighs in my Christmas Santa collection but the St Nick I found at the grocery store this year, seem to complete my collection in some kind of very special way.
My kitchen saw me pacing back and forth while I was on the phone with my friend making plans for the evening, before heading out to see a Christmas tour of homes in our neighborhood. My husband and I loved looking inside the historical decorated homes but we especially enjoyed hearing the Christmas bells ring peacefully through the December night air while we went from house to house. My friend had taken my youngest daughter, a dance enthusiast, to see The Nutcracker at our hometown theater that night. She later took my daughter and her family across the street from the theater once the play let out, to a lovely latin restuarant where we all met for dinner. I came home that night saying - "Isn't it nice just to have friends." That was a Christmas gift in itself.
My winter kitchen saw me also stirring cookie dough with my oldest daughter's child. I was bending the bowl down and this wide brown eyed boy licked his lips in concentrated effort looking into the bowl resisting temptation to eat the sweet stuff we were stirring. My oldest daughter, coming to our historical home from a warmer climate and so far away, breezed by the kitchen now and then while her child and I baked. It seemed that her medium blond image passing by brought to me all the warmth of the sunny place that she came from. It felt comforting, that she was close by to call out her name if I wanted to share with her something adorable my Grandchild, her child, this little person that meant so much to us just said or did. It felt so nice to be able to just gab to my oldest child about how our favorite candle store introduced a new scent and to have time and place to do that sort of thing.
When my daughter left, my kitchen was there with me while I teared up alone and grabbed a gooey chocolate cookie to somehow make it a little better. It didn't exactly but hopping on a social network to say "Goodnight, Don't let the bed bugs bite" to my oldest daughter later on brought joy. And even more joy came when my daughter responded with "Alright" as she once did as a kid when we'd say the same nighttime phrase to her. Technology is a miracle.
My kitchen has looked on me this January, pulling back the kitchen curtains over the wide sink wanting to pretend that angelic buds were jumping out on the spinney old tree limbs and the wintry sky I once loved around the holidays, because it made me feel so Christmassy. At that point, I was now wishing the sky were soft summer blue again. For me a Florida girl, winter just sometimes seems to go on a month too long here. Then again.....more winter is what I signed up for in North Alabama. I wanted a change of seasons. You cannot have Easter's overspilling happiness, without Lent and yes, an Episcopalian would say that.
When spring does come, it will be celebrated in such a way, such a deep, wisteria carpeting the ground and returning cardinals flying over head way, that somehow the winter landscape previously, will be pardoned. The boney old arms of the trees will reach out for glad pink and white blossoms in spring, and in summer I will hear my youngest daughter say again - "I've forgotten what winter looks like now, haven't you?"
One thing my kitchen hasn't seen me do of lately is remodeling. The wall paper is still drooping from the walls pleading to be torn off for new fresh paint, while friends here liking the outside color of our home ask kindly to step inside and see what else we have done in our 1930s home. One day I want to invite them in for warm coffee and pound cake like my own southern Grandmother used to make. Until then and until I find more bargin ways to decorate to help pay for those Christmas bills (and I will) - I will put on some hot piping coffee to ease over the cold, winter days and start peeling off more wall paper there in my kitchen.

One of the Best Stores You’ll Ever Find

Halloween is here. They say that fall color will begin to peak, earlier than usual, this week on the roadways leading up to the top of near by Monte Sano.
The leaves looked dreamy in the morning mist while my husband, Eric, and I drove up to the Habitat for Humanity Home center to look around for goods to use in our kitchen. We stepped out of our car while the leaves crunched under our feet. My husband and I breathed in the crisp, perfect for Halloween air, before going inside to shop. Habitat for Humanity stores offer home items that are donated by contractors, organizations and local residents for resale and the prices there are easy on the wallet.

Eric had watched the film Wuthering Heights with me and a bag of popcorn, the other night. I pointed out the rustic, sweet old kitchens in the film. Think my husband liked the rustic aspect of the old English kitchens the best. Today at the Habitat Home store, Eric pointed to a couple of thatched wooden chairs, defiantly on the rustic side.

“I like it!” I said.

But then, we both grimaced when we saw the weave in the chairs was ripped, more than we wanted to deal with anyway.
We walked on in the store “Hmmming” in consideration when we saw a shelf that looked fabulous and sighing in disappointment when we discovered a large nick on the piece.
We’re buyers who look for low maintenance, even in a second hand store. That’s just how we are. Maintenance to us sometimes means just as much money to repair, or at least more work than we want to make time for.
But all our careful browsing often pays off in stores some call junk stores. There is always true treasure found even for we buyers in search of low maintenance. In the corner of the store, for exsamle, I thumbed through a stack of prints and paintings. Pulling out 2 farmed prints nicely done, I gave an “Hmmmm” and then I didn’t sigh in disappointment instead I smiled...widely. The prints showed pewter flasks keeping company with rich purple grapes and bright tomatoes all in simple honest still life from. Simple, honest, rustic sweet - those were all the things I wanted in my Moors style kitchen.
I put the prints under my arm and took with me also another great Renoir print for our home kitchen. The still lives would cost me $2.00 a piece and the money I was going to give for the paintings, would go to a good cause to help build homes for families in need. That's how the Habbitat for Humanity stores work.
At the check out for the Habitat for Humanity store, a large man came in totting 2 remarkable chairs right past my husband who was about to make our sales final with his wallet. Then my eyes went big and I gasped looking at the chairs - “Are those just coming in?!” I asked the man carrying the chairs. I think I practically stepped on the poor mans heals following him. As soon as the Habitat worker set the chairs down I picked them up and inspected them. I could feel the real nails planted into one of the chair's upholstery. There wasn't a staple found on this small sweet chair done in Old English style. I taped the curves on the little chair and my tapping donated it was real wood.

It was the same with the larger more ornate chair - all real wood, no staples. Eric shook his head looking on the larger chair though - “”What will you do with that?” he wondered. Then he eased on a smile – “We’ll take both chairs” he said to the check out lady. With Elre's wondering and my own hesitation, I was ready to put the large chair back, but everything happened so fast. Before I knew it, both chairs were in the back of our vehicle ready to become part of our family.
On the way home, I knew where the little chair belonged, in our kitchen. The large Victorian style chair, for now, sits in our dinning room just off our foyer and will be spied by Trick or Treaters tonight. It does add elegance or as Eric puts it - fru, fru to the house. Somehow, I think, that chair will one day add even more to our dinning room.... in some way. That time will come when over dinning room is worked over more. Right now, we focus on the kitchen.
My husband just went back to Habitat for Humanity, one of the best stores in the world, we think anyway. He is purchasing a window to place in our attic upstairs. The window that once hung in a house the was demolished, will hang over a window box and face our leafy street finding good use....again.

Pumkin Place

Still roadside waterways lead travelers into our town after ramping off of a hurried hwy. In this season along the water ways, a pumpkin stand with glowing pumpkins, Mums and pear shaped squash finds a place on a patch of grass. Drivers, giving long glances at the colourful stand as they drive by, often pull into the pumpkin stand that has also caught my interest. I want to go there soon to replace the lone pumpkin I slid off our porch to carve for a pumpkin carving contest, held during a party recently with my newly made Alabama friends.

It's always a treat to go out to the water ways leading into town. When the temps drop, the cold icy air kisses the trees there leaving a streak of red and gold through out the tributary. In time with colder yet November air, the streak will fill in with solid color. The pumpkin stand only highlights the beauty that is already there.

I know there are lots of pumpkin patches advertising hayrides in the valleys below the mountains in North Alabama and Tennessee. But, the water way pumpkin stand just calls out to me the most for Halloween pumpkins. No matter how often I drive through the roadside water ways that lead into our town, I often remember the first time we rode through there with our moving van. The arms of the Tennessee River reached out to me that day welcoming me in.

October Kitchen

On my kitchen stove today, I was tenderly frying red russet potatoes, onions and garlic in Jack Daniel's whiskey from the Tennessee distillery close by. It is October now, and while I was working on a hodgepodge of sweet simmering vegetables some people just call hash, the autumn sun was casting a golden light through the wide kitchen window. The warm house heater roared while I rambled softly - “Whiskey Hodgepodge … no, maybe Autumn Hash…. Hmmm, Red Russet Goulash” Trying to decide what I would call my fried up work of culinary art, I took down some plates from the rickety old kitchen cabinets that I hope to soon replace, and spooned my recipe onto plates for my daughter and I. All the alcohol in my recipe had evaporated with the heat on the stove earlier.
Whiskey isn't just a vice in the Deep South. New mothers slid it on their teething baby’s gums. Grandpas gargle with it to keep ailing bacteria at bay and of course cooks, like me, like to lace deserts and spice up hash with the drink.
Warm, happy fall foods like red russet potatoes, pumpkin anything, cobblers, apple and peach pies are all twice as wonderful with comforting baking scents enhanced by the cool mountain zone air in North Alabama.
My daughter and I watched the movie Vertigo, starring Jimmy Stewart, while we enjoyed our Hodgepodge of vegetables. Jimmy Stewart is one of our favorite actors. Somehow he reminds me of my husband with his quiet, sweet side intermixed with an almost cranky but charming gentleman's air.
I noticed silky red walls in a restaurant that Jimmy Stewart’s Vertigo character, a romantic lead, is meeting beautiful Kim Novak in for dinner. (Mr. Stewart was 50 or so in the film Vertigo playing a romantic lead man most convincingly) “Oh, that restaurant is so… Oh, Wow!” my daughter’s eyes twinkled watching the film. Yes it was, and for a moment I think solid about adding the alluring red restaurant of Vertigo, seen several times in the film, somewhere in my home's decor. But I certainly would not work it into not the room I am working on now - my kitchen. My kitchen is too small for something so glam, though it is endearing.
If all goes as planned, my kitchen will have all the simple, dreamy vibes of a great Jane Eyre classic made into a film that some people state was perhaps one of the most captivating films ever made - that film being the 1972 version of Wuthering Heights. If you don't remember this version of Wurthering Heights, you haven't seen it.

Tomato Pie and Great Views

Aside from the depressing brown tile and behind the times melon and pears wall paper, our historical home kitchen has great stuff in it. For one thing, there is a large kitchen window framing a park like setting of leafy maples and vines hugging our neighbors late 1800s home. The kitchen window view repaints itself with each passing season. The maples turn bright orange and red in Fall. In Spring, the vines wander with buds that look like little wedding bells. Chopping tomatoes now, in summer, for tomato pies was never so beautiful facing a scene of squirrels winding up large trunked trees.
My Mother was overjoyed about my deep as a water well old fashioned kitchen sink. "This will accommodate everything, big pots, whatever, now you have room!" she said smoothing her hands over the sink like it was a Channel gown. But I remember our realtor standing there by that sink trying to sell us this house to us a while back. She was remarking over the sink like my Mother was. I was embarrassed for her. All I could see was the old tile and the unattractive shabbiness of a room in neglect.
Later, in the walk through of our home, I swung open the large kitchen pantry door to spy a little rectangular window inside capturing some more views of the leafy trees out and a patch of blue sky. I closed the door and eased my eyes up to the tall ceilings and wide crown molding above. It was all different somehow that day, while I turned around in the room I'd soon be stirring sweet tea in. I felt like I was standing in a vivid bright country field with the southern sunshine pouring through the wide window over the old fashioned sink.
"I like this kitchen," I told our realtor and she looked at me knowing the look. She had seen it before. I had really fallen in love, it was more than like, and there was no stopping me.

Recipe for taking off Wall Paper

My husband comes back from a Denver/Plus business trip and brings us wines from Denver, Montana, Nebraska and even Missouri to fill up our dwindling wine rack in the kitchen. Well, now that the kitchen wine rack is taken care of, I am ready to take down the dancing fruit wall paper. I have just the right recipe for doing that. Here it is:
The Best Way to Get Rid of Dancing Fruit Wall Paper or any Wall Paper -
1. Wet the wall paper with a sponge.
2. Then, with a scrapper, you take off the paper.
3. For paper that just won’t seem to come off, really stuck stuff, use an iron on steam setting to lift up the paper, and then continue scrapping.
4. Bring in a CD player and listen to old CDs and sing or hum along, makes the time go quicker while you're scrapping.

Money for Disney and Decorating

Sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor this morning, I looked up at the dancing fruit wall paper on my kitchen wall. H-m-m, it’s so early 90s at best, dancing fruit just hasn’t made it into this century. But still, it’s not a tragedy in my book. Showing the dancing fruit the door and redecorating my kitchen isn’t one of those - "I just have to do this or worry what the neighbors will think" - kinda thing. I don’t give a care what my next door neighbor thinks about my drab brown kitchen tiles. (Even if she seems like a very nice lady.) I could walk on icky tiles forever if it were a choice between going to the movies with my husband or redecorating my kitchen. I don't want to redo my house for the neighbors and spend my "what's life really all about anyway?" money.
I do, however, want to redo my kitchen so I can grab a cup of coffee in the morning and look down at my feet just under my PJs and think - “Oh, this floor feels nice.... the color is everything I love.... and it was a beautiful bargain.” For me, having money for a trip to Disney, movie nights (so I can get more decorating ideas) and being able to redecorate my home is just smiling completion. So, that’s what I intend to do – decorate with style that allows me and my family to go to Disney and to the movies often.
With that said - I will probably replace my dated wall paper with something perfect for most any room - paint. What color paint? Well, my colors will come from a movie classic with a timeless and sweetly romantic kitchen. More later.