In a Barbie World

In 1993 and 1994 I participated in Bayshore Mall's Jean Jacket Auction which benefited the Milwaukee Aids Project - back when Bayshore was still a mall and not a "Town Center."  Anyway, they distributed 40 or so jean jackets, donated by the Gap, to area "designers, artists, celebrities and craftspeople" to creatively "modify."  There were some amazing entries painted on and embellished in unusual ways by art galleries, design students, local news anchors like Marty Burns Wolfe (whatever happened to her?) and Nancy Chandler, Bo Black from Summerfest and even Laurencia Bembenek.  Run Bambi Run.

The first year I embellished my jacket with a cherry theme using vintage cherry buttons, cherry appliques, and a 1950s cherry tablecloth.

The second year was 1994 and that year I remember a lot of buzz that Barbie was turning 35, so I decided to employ a Barbie theme.  Specifically, I wanted to show how Barbie's style had changed over the decades.  On the front yokes I embroidered, "The evolution of Barbie - from June Cleaver to Peg Bundy."  It was the 90s, remember...

I searched for outfits that represented the 50s (Barbie debuted in 1959), 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s and applique them on the front right, around the back, and ending on the front left.  Imagine my shock one day when I tuned into the morning news and there was Gus Gnorski from channel six doing a story on the Jean Jacket Auction and he was holding up MY jacket and explaining the Barbie details.

The first outfit was the June Cleaver shirtwaist dress complete with pearl necklace and cat eye glasses.  Various Barbie accessories such as boots, purses, curlers, and of course, high heeled shoes were attached to dangle within the vintage chenille bedspread fringe.  Opposite June was a 90s outfit - synthetic, skin tight, spaghetti strapped, purple mini dress with ankle boots and elbow length black gloves.

Let's not forget the three decades on the back.  First up was the pink 60s Jackie Kennedy jacket dress with clutch - oh how I looked for a pillbox hat!  The 70s was represented by a pair of bell-bottomed overalls and the 80s with lime green leggings, silver metallic shirt and jeweled belt.

The auction was a hit and I was honored to do my part to contribute... but what about Barbie?  She turned 50 this year.  I don't feel like I'm hearing so much about her anymore.  What's she wearing these days?

Jack-O-Lanterns

People do amazing things with pumpkins at Halloween.  I am blown away by the creativity and talent I see in jack-o-lantern carving nowadays.  Pumpkin is a great medium for carving and the possibilities are endless.

We carve pumpkins every year.  Usually it's a fairly quick and dirty routine.  Often just in the nick of time to display so the trick-or-treaters will know to stop at our house.  Every single solitary year with out fail, my husband carves a Cyclops jack-o-lantern.  It's the easy way out - one less eye to carve.  That's what I think, but perhaps he is a little fixated on Cyclops.  Here's an example of one of his lone-eyed, Polyphemus pumpkins.

That's just one big giant eye above the mouth.

My husband is always the first one done.

Usually, I like to get off-color pumpkins - sounds like a bad joke... a little off-color.  Anyway, I guess they aren't pumpkins - maybe gourds, I suppose.  Last year I got carried away with teeth.

 

A recent favorite was a couple of years ago.  I saw a guy on Regis and Kelly who did this and I thought it was pretty gross, but appropriate for Halloween - so I gave it a try.

The big mean pumpkin is chomping down on the puny weak little pumpkin who is so frightened he is vomiting pumpkin seeds and innards.  Sorry if that is a little much for any of you, but I thought it was funny.

Some Years it's an Obsession

Time is running out.  

Are you ready for Halloween?  

Got your costume?

Not every year results in an ambitious Halloween costume.  My kids know this.  It's really hit or miss what they'll get out of their mother.  Keaton's "Link" from Legend of Zelda costume above was one of those ambitious years when I was obsessed wandering around the Goodwill store to find just the right sweater that looked like chainmaille and just the right purse to cut up and slap around his forearms for wrist gauntlets and just the right belts for those strappy things.

All that from a cartoon picture.

Yes, there were plenty of years where we just "made do" with what we could find around the house.  Here's Princess Chelsea with the 50,000 yards of red tulle we had laying around.  Next we have Lars who was obviously on his own that year with his plastic knight's helmet, clown wig, leather cowboy vest and red satin shirt all dug from the costume boxes.  Don't know who the mummy kid is, but the one next to him/her is Nathan and he's wearing a store bought (gasp!) Tick costume.  Anybody remember the Tick?  If I recall correctly, it was a short-lived cartoon character from the early 90s.

Nathan often came up with a good costume idea that didn't take a ton of work on my part, dear boy. Here he is  striking a pose as a 70s disco guy complete with polyester pants, wing collared quiana shirt and gold chain necklace.

And here's Nate again (with Carly) in a granny wig wearing authentic dress, hat, sweater and purse dug out of my vintage stash.  Yep, some years were easier than others.  But  let's not get too past tense about it.  I'm not off the hook yet, I still have pending requests... let's see... for a full blown Matrix Neo Nehru collar long black coat... and a Star Trek uniform as previously stated, and a LED studded light up jacket for Keaton to do some cool dance moves in... the list goes on...

Anonymous Letters

I cannot begin to count how many times I have thought about writing an anonymous letter.  Maybe a letter to inform someone that they are severely incorrect about something or maybe a letter to blow off some steam or maybe even a letter to tattle on someone else.  I've thought about it so many times, but I have never followed that impulse and actually pulled the trigger.  Maybe just the act of fantasizing about it is enough for me.

This is not true for everyone else.  As a school board president, I get anonymous letters.  Sometimes the letters are from teachers, sometimes the letters are from past students, but usually the letters are from a community member who thinks we are complete idiots on the school board.  Although some people are more than happy to tell us to our faces, there are many who would rather just spell it out in an anonymous letter.

I received this letter from a "Frustrated Taxpayer" this week.  This person was not unreasonable at all.  I don't know why he (judging by the writing) didn't go ahead and sign it.  He made some very good points.  I wish I could sit down with him and talk about it.  I'm sure a lot of the decisions we make look rather stupid to someone who wasn't at every workshop, didn't read all the information and doesn't know all the  mitigating factors.  I get frustrated too -- and I'm supposedly someone with a little power.  Right now my husband and I can't afford another penny in taxes, but pay we must.  The public school system in this country is going to have to be redefined pretty soon if we stay on this current dwindling financial path.  School board members constantly think about educational quality and how to deliver it for less and less money.  There are pressures from all directions.  Everybody hates taxes, but good or bad, we live in a county where we all contribute to the common good and educating children is part of that.

Jack of all Trades

The big moment is here!  My RubyLemon business cards, hang tags and satin labels have arrived.  This means I'm just about ready to launch RubyLemons on Etsy.

It's amazing how many details have to be taken care of in order to do something like an Etsy business.  Maybe I'm just over preparing - that wouldn't surprise me.

But there are so many roles to play just to get started.. graphic designer, supply purchaser, organizer of raw materials, marketer, accountant, set designer, photographer, banker, shipper, and last but most important -- producer of handmade goods! 

So, with the arrival of these cool, sturdy, glossy, bright hang tags, labels and cards, I can check off one more thing on my long "to do" list.  Thank you to Custom Couture Label Co. (on Etsy, of course).

Cookie of the Month - Green-eyed Monsters

It's cookie of the month time again and we are being terrorized by green-eyed monsters (aka chocolate mint) already coming out for Halloween.  I am so excited to report that I made changes to the recipe in hopes of making chocolate cookies that did not flatten out like lifeless pancakes.  And as you can see by the photo, the changes worked!  I have made chocolate cookies a couple of times before and they always went quite flat.  This time I wanted bumpy, fudgy, yummy cookies and I have to say... they turned out PERFECTLY!  I am addicted to Allrecipes.com.  Love that site.  I get almost all my new recipes from there.  I first check the rating to make sure a lot of people have liked the recipe and then I check all the submitted photos.  In this case, I checked to see if the chocolate cookies in the photos were  bumpy, thick and fudgy or flat pancakes.  They weren't all flat.  Then I read the reviews and the different suggestions made by various people who already made the recipe and usually incorporate some of their ideas that  seem to make sense.  Here are the ingredients I used:

3/4 cup butter
1/4 cup Crisco
1 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla
2 cups flour
2/3 cups cocoa powder
3/4 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 12 oz. bag mint chocolate chips
green mint chocolate chips for the eyes

Start out with the butter and Crisco in your bowl.  This is the first place I changed the recipe.  The recipe called for 1 cup of butter.  I love butter.  I always use butter.  My hips will explain that to you.  But, I know Crisco usually makes cookies with more body, so I compromised just a bit.  1/4 cup Crisco -- what did we ever do before Crisco sticks?  I always hated measuring the dang Crisco in the old days when the only choice was the big fat can of fat.

Add the sugars, eggs and vanilla.  Another change to the recipe which called for 1 1/2 cups of white sugar.  I changed it to 1 cup white and 1/2 cup brown.  I just thought brown sugar would add to the flavor.

Beat until light and fluffy.

Add the flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt.  OK another change here.  The recipe didn't call for the baking powder and only 1/4 tsp. of salt.  I wanted pudgier cookies so I added the baking powder.  Also, salt brings out the flavors so I doubled it.

I barely mixed this together in order to keep the rising ingredients active.  At this point it was a fudgy wonderful bowl of yumminess.

Oh, yeah.  There will be some bowl lickin' today.

Now that the holidays are getting near,

the stores are carrying mint chocolate chips.

 

Add the whole bag and gently stir.

Drop by spoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet -- gotta use airbake.  Quite often I like to refrigerate my dough before putting it onto the cookie sheets, but I didn't this time.

Add two green mint chips for eyes.

Oooooh, creepy.

"I always feel like -- somebody's watching me."

Bake at 350 degrees for 9 minutes or so.

Will they flatten out or have some fudgy, bumpy depth?

 

I watched through the window in the oven door as they cooked.  It seemed like they weren't flattening out!  Would they pancake as soon as I took them out of the oven and they hit the cold air?  The answer?  NO!  Yipee!

These little beauties kept their shape!

And the taste was to die for!  Not cakey, crumbly or dry... just yummy, fudgy, chewy, chocolatey, mintness.  I hope Beth and her family enjoy this month's cookie.  Maybe next time I make these, I'll skip the mint and add pecans.  Makes about 44 cookies.

Signs of Fall

 It's been chilly and rainy all week.  Here's a little reminder for myself and everybody else that autumn is a beautiful time of the year.  P.S.  If you have any ideas what to do with all the concord grapes, leave a comment.  P.S.S.  No, I don't know how the jack-o-lantern totem pole came to wear the viking helmet, but it's been his favorite hat for years... and this year with Brett Farve on the Vikings it's especially questionable attire in Wisconsin.