Bibingka is a special treat Filipino mamas, aunties, and daughters make for parties and Christmas time, but I had no idea it existed until I was 16 or 17. Mama made suman, a baked dessert made of sweet rice kernels, fresh coconut milk, butter, and oodles of brown sugar. I can feel my teeth melt remembering the taste of Mama's oh so yummily drooling sweet suman. I've made suman a couple of times. Like chunks of cement.  As for bibingka, I've winged making it a few times. Four years ago, I wrote about pumpkin bibingka . Yesterday, I made Kahlua-laced bibingka. Mama's bibingka recipe was in her head. She modified and adapted her recipe each time she made the cake. No coconut milk, use regular milk, for instance. And when Mama made bibingka, she didn't make one pan. Uh-uh. More like three or four long glass baking pans and 1 square glass pan. We'd eat the square pan of bibingka and freeze the rest. Me, I bake one pan. Perhaps one day I'll bake and freeze bibin

I am very thankful for many things and many people, including you, my blogging friends. The Husband, Missy Molly the pinky-nosed (wilde) Cat, and I wish you peace and happiness, and much joy and love.

It was the sweet hour of the sun heading home. I stood in L Studio, my back to the window, taking advantage of the still bright natural light. La, la, la. I snipped away at a strip of red card stock to fit in a discarded book's hanging-for-dear-life spine. I wanted to fortify the spine before sewing in my own page signatures to make an art journal. Fun.  La, la, la. . . . Bzzz. What the heck? Bzzzzzz. Louder. Bzzzzzzzzzzzz. And louder. BzzzZZZZZZZZZ. Over my head and around to my back. BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ.  I turned and stepped to the window.  Striding around the corner of the house and towards the window was our neighbor to the north, his leafblower strapped to his belly like a weapon. I recognized him instantly. What was he doing here? How did he get in the backyard?  Our neighbor is a law enforcement officer. Was something wrong? We locked eyes immediately. Neither of us seemed that much surprised to see each other.  "Your husband said a lot of dust blew over to your side when

A couple weeks ago, my fingers were blackened from playing with charcoal. I wasn't ready to wash my hands, still more playing, you know. I also didn't feel like fetching a rag so I cleaned my fingers some by smearing them on a page of my drawing pad.  Over the last couple of days, hidden animal pixies revealed themselves in that charcoal smeared page. No doubt there are more pixies than what I found. Do you see any not outlined? Remember Highlights for Children ? The hidden pictures page was my favorite feature. Still is, for that matter.

I've blocked myself, from writing that is. Put up a big old red stop sign, I did. Meanwhile. I decided to read our bookcase full of children's and young adult books that are mostly a combination of my collection and the Husband's mom's, who was a school librarian. Oohlala, n'cest pas? I've read six or seven middle school stories and two teen novels. The ones I read when I was a kid I still like.  One of these days, I might just write a post about that. The last several days has been nice, not so hot, not so cool, not so windy, and not so hazy, hurrah! So. I've been tootling around in the back yard, cleaning, trimming, planting, propagating, painting, and so forth and so on. It's good for my soul and body.  Last Saturday, we had a surprise visitor, for us and her. A sweet hummingbird flew into our house and proceeded to make her way up to our bedroom. It took about an hour, more or less, for her to tire out so that we could finally catch her and re

 It was a long wait at the ophthalmologist's office the other day because of an emergency, as well as the office being down one doctor. So the impatient ones in the waiting room snarled, fidgeted, and sighed. Me, I pulled out a receipt from my purse and doodled.

The late great Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was an example of someone who had unconditional love for humanity. We were fortunate to have her serve on the highest court of our nation. May her Spirit soar in joy and peace through the Universe! Cheers, Notorious RBG! I love you.