Halloween Pinocchio

Happy Halloween!!

Vegetable Casserole

I just have to share this recipe because it is one of my most favorite dishes.  And this is the perfect time of year to make it. I am not sure of its origins -- it was passed down in the family.  My Aunt Barbara back in the 70's brought it over for a pot-luck meal with the recipe and it has been a family favorite ever since.  Well actually, I didn't like it at all as a small child, but sometime over the years, I grew to really love it.  I have changed it a bit to suit my own tastes and certainly, you could do the same.  I make it once a year because all of the vegetable chopping is a bit time consuming.  Plus, it makes two large casseroles -- one to freeze and one to eat now.

1 large eggplant, chopped

2 zucchini, chopped

2 carrots, chopped

1 package mushrooms, chopped

1 green, pepper, chopped

1 large onion, chopped

2 tablespoons parsley, chopped

1/3 cup plus 4 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons wine vinegar

2 tablespoons course salt, if table salt use 1 tablespoon (I know this seems like a lot, but trust me on this)

hot sauce to taste, I use Louisiana Crystal

3/4 teaspoon black pepper

5-6 medium to large tomatoes, sliced

2/3 cup uncooked rice

1/2 cup water

grated Monterey Jack cheese

Lightly oil 2 large 3-quart casserole dishes.  In a large bowl (I use a stock pot for lots of room to mix), combine eggplant, zucchini, carrots, onions, peppers, mushrooms, and parsley.  Season with 1/3 cup olive oil, salt, hot sauce, black pepper, and vinegar and mix well.  Using half the tomatoes, line the bottom of both casserole dishes with tomatoes.  Pour 1/2 the vegetable mixture between the two casseroles.  Sprinkle in 1/3 cup rice in each casserole, layer remaining vegetable mixture and layer the remaining tomatoes on top.  Drizzle a couple of tablespoons of olive oil over each casserole, then pour 1/4 cup water in each. Bake covered in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for 1 1/2 to 2 hours.  Remove lid and cover the top with cheese and place back in oven to melt.  If you plan on freezing one casserole, don't add the cheese -- just cool and place in the freezer until you plan to use it.

Of course, there is a lot of flexibility with this recipe -- you can add and take away vegetables as you like.  Sometimes I add potatoes, but usually not.  It is about ten million degrees when it come out of the oven, so I make it well in advance of dinner to give it time to cool a bit.

She Sends Me Rainbows

It was a hard morning, a hard moment, so much remembering.  While all avenues of thought lead back to Josephine, it is hard to say why those strongest pains come on suddenly -- maybe this time it was the angle of the sun, or the way the breeze blew an insignificant brown leaf across the grass, or the twittering of the birds.  As we walked back to the house Rudy told me to look up at the rainbow.

In the days before Josephine died Rudy, quite out of the blue, told us that after Josephine becomes an angel, we must look for her when we see a rainbow -- a strange idea for one so small to come up with on his own, but one of those precious moments of wisdom in a child.  Since then I have held onto these rainbow sightings -- the first on her birthday, then next on Mother's Day, a few others -- often at particularly difficult moments.  But a rainbow today?  Isn't there a season for rainbows?  Certainly this is not now.  And besides, there had been no rain, in fact it had been sunny all morning with so sign of rain coming on.  But Rudy was right -- here on this bright October morning I looked up and there it was --  this little sliver of a rainbow right over our house.  It stayed for about 20 minutes and then was gone.

Update on Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 01:52PM by Claire

And as I was writing that post yesterday evening, Ed called me outside.  There was another one -- this time after a brief shower.

Jack-O-Lantern Gourds

This birdhouse gourd jack-o-lantern project has been a long time in the making.  It started last summer (2008) when we planted a birdhouse gourd vine in our garden.  We got the plant into the garden too late in the season to get any gourds large enough to make into birdhouses, but we saved them and dried them in the garage for more than a year for whatever project they might inspire down the road.

I was just waiting for the Halloween season to arrive in order to see if my idea would work.  The gourds, when dried, looked like this:The discoloration and mold is normal.  The preparation for painting was a bit more labor intensive than I had planned on -- it required soaking and scrubbing the outer waxy layer off with a heavy duty scouring pad and a lot of "elbow grease".  Rudy was not able to help me with this step, which was a disappointment for me.

Rudy was, however, able to help a lot with the layers of orange paint and the faces.  After the last orange coat had dried, I drew the outlines of faces in black Sharpie marker and Rudy and I then filled them in with a couple of coats of black paint.  It was harder to paint the faces than I had anticipated and I was surprised to find that I wasn't much better at it than Rudy was.

We then sprayed them with a glossy indoor/outdoor sealer.  Lastly, we added some string and some wire to attach them and so now have a really cute jack-o-lantern garland for our front porch.

Flannel Pajamas

Here are Rudy's new flannel pajamas for the fall.  I used the same pattern as his spring pajamas seen here.  You can see that I embelished them a bit from the spring version and even more from the original pattern from New Look seen here. When I was originally looking for pajama patterns last spring I was very annoyed at the scarcity of kids' pajama patterns out there.  This particular one was the best I could do.  When I got it home, I realized it was a great starting point and I could add my own touch simply because it was so simple.

The original pattern did not call for the front facing lining on the button placket nor did it call for the contrast trim, but I think it really adds a lot and really makes the project special.  It is difficult to see in this picture, but I also added bias cut cuffs and trim to the sleeves.  This would have been super for the pants cuffs, too, but I didn't have enough fabric. 

It was a very good lesson for me on how sometimes the simplest patterns are the best because they give you such a basic framework that they allow you to embellish things and make them your own.

And yes, I do plan to sew two more buttons to the cowboy set when the local chain fabric store restocks their shelves (urgh!).