Special Room, Special Memories

The doors mentioned below all have the same brass hinges, knobs, plates, skeleton key locks (except the bathroom door). The interior doors are all five-panel.

Height: 83/84 inches

Depth: they're all about an inch and a half deep except for the entry doors which are closer to two inches

Width: 

four 36” – entry  doors w/beveled glass windows

300 each for the three painted ones; 400 for the varnished one

three 32”

200 each

four 30” 

150 each

two 27” – they’re the double doors

300 for both as they go together

And trim:

Trim is about 1" x 4" for all of them – both sides (of doorway) except for the exterior doors/windows; the 'toppers' are all the same design

Trim for interior doors

100 each (seven sets); 150 for double door set

Trim (interior only) for six windows, 65” x 28” 'inside frame' measure

100 each

Trim for two front windows, 65” x 48”

200 each

Trim for double kitchen windows, 53” tall X 67” wide 

200

Also:

Cold cupboard (was a kitchen window at one time) doors and trim

100

Two leaded glass windows, 48” x 19” (or so)

400 each

Clawfoot bathtub (sorry, sold)

100

Retro (1940s maybe?) kitchen sink with cabinet (IF I can get it out)

300

Small bathroom sink (wall mount)

50

Large double wash-sink from basement (IF I can get it out)

200

Assorted window screens

25 each

Two hanging light fixtures for living room/dining room (four bulbs each)

150 each

Two single hanging light fixtures 

50 each

One double hand-painted hanging light fixture

150

Light fixture, gas to electric converted (so I've been told)

200

* There are also a couple of brass push-button light switches, the brass doorbell set (button by door and 'ringer' in kitchen), a few kitchen/bathroom 'accessories', some oil lamps of different ages, several very sturdy counter tops that came out of an old chemistry lab (2'x5'), a wardrobe trunk and camel-back trunk in not so good shape, a screen door, a pair of weights and pulleys from a window that was into a door, and a few vintage theater reels in varying values and conditions from poor to excellent together with two non-functional vintage theater projectors (very heavy) and some accessories.

More photos available on request to vignettes.house@gmail.com

Thanks for taking a peek - please feel free to share if you know someone who might be interested in creating a special room in their home for memories made with love and laughter!

Short Stories,Tall Tales, and Such : Live on Kindle : Amazon

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(or get it on Kindle!)

Rua and the Brownies take on some Pesky Pixies in this book of short pieces.

*laughing*

Got that one finished and thought,'Well, this book is about ready to go now!'

Then had a horrifying thought: I had promised somebody a Tall Tale about Paul Bunyan and Babe - and it wasn't written, let alone in this book. 

So I tagged it on at the end of Rua's story since that file was already open and fomatted for this book. Hurried to get it in, and went to work getting it published.

It was only during the final on line editorial preview that I found I had put Rua's story in twice and Babe's love for salted herring and subsequent thirst was nowhere to be found.

*sigh*

So back into the book's working file I went, got it straightened out, changed the name of the file to avoid confusion, and re-submitted it.

This little book has a lot in it, truth be told.

Elves, 

the first adventures of Renegade, Rebel, Rogue, and Riley 

(and introducing Reckless and her horse Roger), 

thoughts on religion, spirituality, and mysticism, 

a bit of family history, 

some Shakespeare, 

a modern day Sass doing what Sass does, 

a couple of esoteric pieces, 

Giant Worms and Skeeters, 

some French History presented by Sass, 

a bit of an introduction to the PHI Line when Brann meets up with Danann of Perth on the Spiral ... 

and of course Rua's Pesky Pixies!

I'm finally getting a few of these projects filed into the 'Finished' folder, trying to clear my desktop for what's coming up next.

Being as I have a couple of days off from shift-work here, now's as good a time as any to get on with getting on!

And so back to editing I go ... this time I think the poetry book. I keep putting it off because I keep writing poems. That's not really a sensible reason to not get a book published when it's ready to go, you know. There are ALWAYS going to be poems coming, one after another after another. I may as well go with what I've already got, and let the new poems go into a book of their own. What the heck. 

I'm just about back 'on schedule' ... getting closer!

Anyway, look for poetry next I think. Then maybe SNARK if I can come up with enough Snarky things to go into it. I hope I can because the next books of SONG (all of the rest of them, when it comes to that) have to have bad guys in them. Seriously bad. I'm not used to writing such things but ... all I can do is the best I can do with what I have to work with at any given time. I'll give it my best shot.

Knoephle Soup

No I'm not a German from Russia, not much German at all when it comes to that ... but boy do I love knoephle soup!

I looked on line for recipes and found a bunch. They're all pretty similar but each has its own take on the basic recipe. People add and change all kinds of things to suit themselves, so feel free to to likewise.

Because my daughter reminded me only just this morning, I figured now would be a fine time to add my own take to the mix.

First of all, the best chicken broth comes from *are you ready for this?* boiling a chicken, preferably pre-plucked and gutted and washed. 

Second of all, nothing can really replace rich thick cream and real butter - nothing. The cream goes in last of all, by the way, after the neffles even.

Third of all, valley reds are better potatoes for this than Idaho baking spuds.

Fourth of all, chopped or coarse grated carrots add a bit of color.

Fifth of all, the 'neffle' (my own term, beg pardon) dough is supposed to be droopy and you better be quick with your kitchen shears when you're snipping those little bits of it into the boiling soup.

Sixth of all, since you have a cooked chicken sitting right there, put some into the soup.

By now you've got the gist of what knoephle soup is all about. It's rich and creamy and filling - and totally delicious.

But here's the method behind the madness:

1/ Boil a chicken 
2/ While the chicken is boiling make your neffle dough out of a beaten egg, a few tablespoons of milk, and flour added until the dough is formed enough to halfway handle. It's going to be sticky as all get-out so flour your hands. Form it into a ball, cover it, and set it aside. How much you want is how much you make; might have to use two eggs and yada yada.
3/ Cube your potatoes to about a half inch. If you leave the skins on they're healthier but then you've got bits of potato skin in your soup because, you know, they don't stay on the potatoes when you cook them.
4/ Chop or coarse grate a couple three carrots if you want them in there for color or nutritional value.
5/ When your chicken is done boiling, use a strainer and put the broth into your soup kettle. You can add canned broth (Not Water) if you want, depending on how much water you used for boiling the chicken and how much steamed away in the process. Cover the chicken in an appropriate bowl and set it aside.
6/ Into the broth put the potatoes (and carrots if you used them) and cook them until they're done (when you can easily poke a fork into the potatoes).
7/ By now your chicken ought to be cool enough to get the meat off the bones, so do that and cut the chicken into small pieces (whatever size you like). Put however much chicken you want into the broth and do what you want with the skin and bones.
8/ Your neffle dough has been patiently waiting its turn for all this time so roll it out into a snake, hold it up pretty high over the boiling soup kettle, and start snipping like crazy because if you don't that whole snake is going to droop right down into the soup and you'll be screwed. The thing here is to snip as fast as you can so the neffles start cooking at as close to the same time as possible. They'll first sink and disappear into the broth and stuff but they'll pop back up pretty quick and get in the way of the ones you're snipping, so HURRY!
9/ You can turn the heat down a notch or two right about now so you don't burn your soup, and give it a stir once in a while to keep the neffles circulating. You'll have to test them now and again. They're done when they're all floating around in there and are little funny looking dumplings of various shapes (but should be all about the same size if you've done your snipping right - about a half inch up to an inch or so - you are not going to be able to get them uniform so don't worry about it). When they're dumplings, they're done.
10/ Take the kettle off of the heat now and stir in as much butter as you think appropriate - about a stick for a normal batch, more if you're making more.
11/ You'll notice that the only milk called for so far has been the few tablespoons that go into the neffle dough. That's because we aren't using milk but thick rich cream, the thicker the better. And now, just before you're going to serve it up, you add about half as much cream as you have soup broth (or more if you want it creamier), give it a good stir, ladle it into bowls, sprinkle parsley for decoration, and serve it up. It will be thick and creamy, not thin and watery the way some are, with hopefully lots of potatoes and neffles - YUM!
NOTE: you may have noticed that I didn't include any salt or pepper - that's because different people like different amounts and some can't have any salt at all - so make sure there are salt and pepper shakers within everyone's reach so they can use what they want.
ALSO NOTE: if you're one that has to have specific amounts of ingredients, this recipe is obviously not for you.
ONE MORE NOTE: you can cut your prep time down significantly if you've done some pressure canning ahead of time and have your broth and your chicken (sans skin and bones and cut into bite-sized pieces) already canned. A couple quarts of broth and a pint of chicken ought to do you for a normal sized batch.

Fourth of July Celebrations

I risk offending a few folks here but am going to go ahead with this anyhow, because it's on my mind and in my heart.

It's just past eleven in the evening of this July 1, 2015. America celebrates her Independence Day in just a couple of days and a couple of hours.

There will be gatherings, and picnics, and fireworks, and Flag waving going on every which way from Tuesday, all of which I happen to love a lot.

I posted photos of some of our Founding Fathers on my Facebook page, and a few of our National icons - the eagle and the Flag, the Liberty Bell, the Statue of Liberty ... people and things that every American ought to be familiar with.

But why is it that I seem to be the only one who is posting this type of thing? 

With all the hoop-la about flags these days, our Flag is everywhere - and that's a good thing, don't get me wrong here - but that Flag didn't just happen, folks. It didn't appear out of nowhere, and the Nation it represents didn't just fall down onto the North American continent out of thin air.

While everyone is planning their picnics and fireworks, how many of us are thinking about WHY we're having picnics and fireworks? I mean really thinking about it, not just kind of knowing ... 

Back in the day those guys did what they had to do when they had to do it in order for us to - WHAT? Have a picnic? Shoot off fireworks? Yes. Indeed yes. That we are able to do so in safety and freedom would no doubt please them immensely. Other things, probably not so much.

We're reaping the benefits of what they did over 200 years ago.

Do we not get it that their choices clear back then are impacting us TODAY?

Do we not get it that our own choices are going to be impacting the generations who will be living here more than 200 years down the road?

So, as we're eating our steaks or hot dogs, munching on potato salad, and seeing who can spit watermelon seeds the furthest, maybe the thought ought to cross our minds that doing these things, having the safety and freedom to do them, might be something we want for our future generations to be able to enjoy doing too.

We can say, 'Boy, I'm sure glad those guys did what they did way back more than two hundred years ago!'

Two hundred years from now, will Americans be saying those words about us?

Who Are Alaric and Mamm Without One Another?

And who are Mamm and Dannan of Perth?
Who Alianora and Forr?
Who MammTwo and Ethan?
Who the Warrior Twins?
Who LittleMamm and David?
Who Mamm and Alaric?
Who Joan and Davidson?
Who the Cousin Twins?
Who Julia and LittleEthan?
Who Galla Placidia and Ataulf?
Who Honoria and Gowan?
Who Sidhelagh and Danann?
Who Alianora and Drustann?
Who Sass and Thann?
Who Caileen and Talorc?
Who Aine and Kalann?
Who Tinne and Nion?
Who Saille and Coll?
Who Ullin and the Queen Harp?

These are the Warriors of Mamm of Dunnottar.

Having spent a great deal of time with them just lately, I know them pretty well.

They are individual Characters, make no mistake about that.

Yet you will never find one without their partner nearby, in spirit if not in life.

Now I may be slow, but I do catch on.

These couples are inseparable.

Each and all of them are living love stories.

You can't take any of them away from their partner; each would be incomplete without the other. 

They need each other.

And their love for each other changes history, creating a new future.

At the hearth of Dunnottar Mamm tells her own Story, hers and Alaric’s. It twines in and out, over and under, the Stories of them all.

The family is busy by day, but of an evening it is the Story they want. It connects them with their heritage, reminds them of the Legacy that is theirs to Protect and Preserve, and teaches them that they do indeed have within themselves all that they need to do what they have to do when they have to do it.

The Legacy?

Faith

Family

Friends

Freedom

Future

I have no fear of using the ‘F’ words.

So Glad Mamm Isn't All Alone!

Watched the movie 'Frozen' with my daughter and grandboy ...

We cherish our together time; it's all too limited.

On this evening we chose to watch one of their favorite movies, one I had heard about but hadn't seen yet.

Z-Bug snuggled in with me and we munched our popcorn as the beginning of the movie unfolded.

My daughter's facial expressions cued me as to what sort of scenes were coming up - smiles, a serious sort of concentration, a frown - so I wasn't as taken by surprise as I might otherwise have been.

Part of the joy was hearing them sing along with the songs of the movie.

Another part of the whole thing was my own reaction.

At one point we took a mid-movie break. My daughter told me that she and her husband had discussed their own reactions to this movie, had been kind of surprised at the intensity of those reactions and wanted to understand them.

She told me their observations and conclusions, and they confirmed something I had recognized in my own self as I watched and listened to the movie.

The two of them had been taken back to a time they remembered from their younger days, a time when the movies had been more like some of the original fairy tales, with dangerous obstacles for the characters to overcome, bad guys for them to defeat, and the romance of a happy ending to look forward to.

My own time being even further back than theirs, the memories evoked by this tale were more of reading than of watching movies.

To top it off, from the opening notes of music through the entirety of the movie I kept having feelings that were borderline deja vu. 

Remember that I've only recently finished a series of books based on ancient times with hints of ancient myths and legends here and there for those who may recognize the (mostly) subtle references. Researched material from the very old days fit well with this movie. 

No wonder it felt sort of familiar to me.

No wonder I enjoyed it. 

I was responding not only with the part of me that has held to the myths and legends I read of in my long ago days, but with the more recent part of me which spent so much time immersed in stories much like the one of this movie.

And, you know, it makes me smile.

It seems there is something within many of us which responds to the ancient roots of this story.

I think it's the same something that led me through the labyrinth of the writing of The Mamm Books.

We want to believe, or to at least spend a little time now then pretending that we might believe, in heroes and heroines who overcome whatever comes into their path, who defeat the bad guys, and who prove that love triumphs over all in the end.

So yeah. It makes me smile to see Faith, Family, Friendship, Freedom, and the Future prevail in this story. I like seeing the components of Choice, the Cycle of Life, Peace, Faith, Healing, Hope, Love, and Unity all come together.

It makes me happy to realize that the Characters of The Mamm Books and the Younglings of Dunnottar aren't all alone, and that the people of our own times respond, intuitively perhaps, to stories of  'ancient times'. 

The old old stories have survived the ages; it's pleasing to know that they're surviving still. 

As the time comes upon me to follow the Younglings of Dunnottar, wherever and whenever their imaginations take them, in the books that are looming on the horizon it's encouraging to realize that I'm not the only one in this day and age that believes in the value of the ancient tales. 

A Lady Where I Work Had A Great Idea

At least I think it's a great idea!

Being unable to implement it my own self, lacking the requisite skills and history, I put out a Facebook post and we'll see what comes of it.

We were talking about the shop, Close To Home/Deronda designs, my sister has invited me to join her with at the local place that will soon be opening, called  ' The Q '  in our hometown.

This was a small group of elder ladies; we were talking about what kinds of shops would be good to have in our little town, and one of the ladies said, 'How about a Norwegian shop?'

The next lady added, 'How about a German one?'

Many of the early settlers in our area were of Norwegian or German origin; needless to say they brought with them their traditions - which are incredible (except for lutefisk) - and my eyes lit up at the thought of being able to see, taste, hear, touch, and smell a collection of the best of the best that the families of our settlers can and do still produce.

Being as I hadn't eaten in more than a few hours, my belly was the first to kick into high gear as I sat down to do the Facebook post - and just the thought of the awesome stuff that are traditional around here had my mouth watering. Minus the lutefisk, of course. 

Since I'm not Norwegian, and only a little bit German, and not at all German From Russia, I'm not the one who has what it takes to produce the wonderful stuff that many in this area kind of just take for granted.

And the smorgasbord my belly craves is only just the beginning.

Into my head popped some of the traditional costumes.

Into my head popped some of the music.

Into my head popped some of the artwork.

Into my head popped some of the sweater designs, and scarves, and mittens.

Into my head popped accents of the languages of those who settled here.

Just sayin'. 

Me, I think it would be an awesome project to collect family stories 'from the locals', and photos if they want, and pictures of stuff they make, and recipes of foods they prepare (with tips and helpful hints), and at least the words to some of the songs, and traditions, and ... and ... and ...

And put it all together into another local book about Small Town USA! 

Think of all the stuff I'd learn in the process! It would be a rare and priceless gift, I tell you true.

So I personally would LOVE to have all the Norskys and Krauts in the vicinity get together and present to the rest of us a cumulative collection of everything they've got to show off - which is plenty, let me tell you! 

I would love to do a full color book of it all, but that's cost-prohibitive in print form so only the cover would get to be colored - BUT Kindle does color without the added cost that goes along with print so a 'match' deal would probably be a good idea for using the color photos ... they'd be greyscale in the print books but full color in the Kindle version ... hmmm ... I think I like that idea.

But it isn't going to be up to me so there will be no getting up of my hopes here.

HA.

My hopes are already up for what could turn out to be so much fun I can't even think of it without grinning - not to mention the heaven my belly would be in if our friends and neighbors can be talked into it. Mmmmmmm ... 

Right.

It's past my bedtime right now.

What do you bet I'll be dreaming of kuchen and knoephle soup and kraut and sausage and krumkake and etc. and end up waking myself up with a growling stomach and drooling all over my pillow? 

WHY can't I write about this stuff in the daytime?!?!