Last night, Halloween night, I whipped up some vegan pumpkin cupcakes as I waited for trick-or-treaters. I thought I might get quite a few visitors. See, I’d gone to our Quincy CVS earlier in the evening for some Hershey’s cookies ‘n creme candy skulls, and …
Last Sunday I cleaned up the Vine House, our little tin-roofed shelter on the north side of the yard. I washed all the furniture (periwinkle-colored chairs and a matching table) with bleach, and I dusted the decorations—wind chimes and sun catchers and a collection of Christine Sibley sculptures that I bought years ago when I lived in Atlanta.
Christine Sibley was an Atlanta artist whose work I first fell in love with in the ’90s at the Atlanta Botanical Garden, where she had created the beautiful ceramic facade that adorns the Ferst Fountain. My favorite part of the fountain was the trio of naiads, in bas relief, peering out from behind a waterfall.
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| A picture I took of the Ferst Fountain in 1995 |
Soon after my trip to the botanical garden, I discovered that Christine Sibley had a studio/gallery in town, very close to my house. It was the neatest place, called Urban Nirvana, surrounded by funky gardens full of crazy, colorful sculptures and murals, banana trees, and sunflowers. There were even ducks and chickens! While it was open, Urban Nirvana was my favorite place to shop, and I gave everybody in my family Christine Sibley plaques and vases and planters for their birthdays and Christmas.
Anyway, on Sunday after I dusted my Sibley sculptures, I rearranged them and spent some time just admiring them. Then I tried to get Rob to admire them with me. He was in the house sweeping up cat fur and singing this rather un-catchy song:
People say cats are clean, but they’re not.
Their reputation is unearned!
“So, did you notice the Vine House?” I said. (He’d walked past it several times while I was working.) “Did you notice the Sibleys?”
“Um . . .” he said sheepishly.
We went outside and stood in front of the Vine House, but I could tell he was still baffled. I started laughing as he tried to guess what he ought to be complimenting me about.
“They’re in completely different order!” I said. “The whole display looks completely different!”
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| One of my Sibleys |
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| And another |
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| Purple furniture |
A little later, Buntin, our spoiled but adorable tortie, sneaked outside, and I decided to take advantage of the situation and turn her outdoor adventure into a photo shoot. I took a bunch of pictures, and then we sat in the shady grass for a while, near the front steps, and I petted her. We had the nicest time together. We were both watching butterflies as they floated from ironweed to ironweed. We forgot all of our cares and just watched the butterflies.
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| The gorgeous Buntin |
Here are some little fun things that have been happening around Spruce Pine Cottage recently. About a week before school started, Sophie (my niece) got her braces off. I couldn’t wait to see her new teeth, so I arranged a visit with her as soon …
About a week ago, I ordered Carl a cat-sized collar and tie from a lovely Etsy shop called ChariotsAFire. The combo arrived in the mail on Tuesday. The tie is olive green with tiny gold dots, and Carl looks great in it (it really complements …
The yard is emerald green and wonderfully jungly this summer because it’s actually been raining. For the first time in years, it seems, we’ve been getting daily afternoon thundershowers in the proper summer pattern. Rob and I spent Saturday taming our backyard jungle (just a bit) and rejoicing.
Early in the morning, Rob mowed the lush, overgrown lawn with our little quiet battery-operated push mower while I did the edging. Edging involves about 10 minutes of running the edger and then about three hours of crawling around, hand-pulling the weeds that have encroached into the beds. While I was crawling, I saw a box turtle taking big bites out of an overripe sand pear Rob had tossed behind the vegetable garden. I came across a snake skin too (rat snake), and the cutest mushroom (it was as red as a strawberry).
We picked the last of our tomatoes from the old, worn-out plants, so tattered and faded (they remind me of scarecrows). We filled a basket with Romas, Arkansas Travelers, Cherokee Purples, Amish Pastes, Debaros, and Tasty Lees.
About 11, we went to Tallahassee Nurseries and bought a decorative arch to support the heavy, fruit-laden branches of the satsumas that grow on either side of the steps to the utility room. Since Rob doesn’t like the branches to droop down and block the path to the steps, we thought we’d put up an arch and let the branches rest on top of it. Tallahassee Nurseries was a madhouse because a snowball truck was parked among the birdbaths and free snowballs were being given away with every purchase. We chose a large pagoda-style arch with a pointed top and lots of metal curlicues—oh, and we got a couple of pink champagne snowballs for the road.
The arch was kind of hard to put up. It kept wanting to lean to one side. While we were working, Rob was “swearing” in his dorky Rob way. He kept saying “Crappersnaps!” whenever the arch went crooked. But he wasn’t mad; he was smiling.
Buntin, our spoiled tortie, ran outside a million times to celebrate it being Saturday. (She’s not supposed to go outside.) Around three, she booked it down the path through the meadow, chasing butterflies as I ran after her and called, “Bunters, come back here! You’re getting your little toepads dirty!” I thought this might slow her down because Buntin has a superiority complex and would never want to be a “common” cat with dirty toepads.
Though it’s still technically spring, Saturday felt like high summer. The air was sultry, the cicadas were roaring, and the yard was jungle-y green. Rob and I spent the day weeding and mowing and planting, but it was so hot we had to keep taking …
On Saturday morning I made Vegan Thumbprint Cookies. They turned out just perfect—sweet and salty and cute, with a spot of pink icing in the middle and lots of cheery sprinkles everywhere else.
Buntin, our temperamental tortie, assisted me in the kitchen as she usually does. I let her lick a butter wrapper, but when she tried to lick the dough, I had to discourage her—and she got so mad she went and hid in a cabinet among some canned goods.
Rob shut the door behind her, smiling. “It’s the only place she can be herself, she says.”
She was in the cabinet about a minute. Then I got the cookies in the oven and she and I went and sat on the floor in the sunroom in an inviting little sunbeam. We were soon joined by several other cats, because cats find sunbeams irresistible.
Maggie was rolling around in the warm, yellow light, reveling, looking chubby and cute.
“Oh, Maggie Rollarounder,” Rob said when he came by, “a sunbeam sure is great, isn’t it?”
She responded with another roll. He was right. The sunbeam was so great I decided to have my breakfast in it. While the cats enjoyed some heart-shaped treats that looked like valentine candy but smelled like sardines, I served myself a nice little plate of Vegan Thumbprint Cookies.
Vegan Thumbprint Cookies
Ingredients:
Cookies
1 cup vegan butter, softened
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
Sprinkles
Icing
2 tablespoons almond milk
2 teaspoons maraschino cherry juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
11/4 cups powdered sugar
Directions:
Whisk the flour and salt together in a medium bowl and set aside.
Beat the butter, sugar, and vanilla at medium speed with a handheld mixer until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce the speed to low and add the flour mixture, mixing until incorporated. Wrap the dough tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour.
Heat the oven to 325 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Roll a heaping tablespoon of dough into a ball, then roll the ball in sprinkles and place it on the baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining dough, spacing the balls about 2 inches apart. Using your thumb, make an indentation in the center of each cookie.
Bake for 10 minutes or until slightly firm. Remove the cookie sheet from the oven. Using your thumb, press into the center of each cookie again. Return the cookies to the oven and bake until golden brown, about 13 to 15 more minutes. Cool on a wire rack.
To make the icing, combine all the ingredients in a small bowl and stir until smooth. Using a spoon, fill the center of each cookie with icing.
Note: I started with this lovely recipe and veganized it.
