{ corn, cookies and crustaceans }

Corn on the cob, cookie style! The perfect take-along treat for a crawfish or lobster boil, picnic basket, or barbecue in the back yard. Pick your summer occasion, and it pretty much works.

So, let's talk corn cookies. I started out with a full-size corn cutter.

Then I cut the cookie dough corn in half, a la crawfish boil style.


I outlined and flooded my baked "corn", and let it sit overnight (but a few hours would do).


I then piped in white corn-size dots randomly throughout the cookie, and filled in the remainder of the space with yellow "kernels."


Voila! The perfect size snacky snack ... and not too heavy, not too frozen, no seeds to worry about spitting -- just summertime sweet cookie goodness.

{ strawberries & blossoms }

It's that time of year -- strawberries galore!


(inspired by Bake at 350)

heart palpitations

I still get age-inappropriately giddy over pretty much anything to do with my Twilight ("my", because the saga was written just for me, don't you know) -- blame it on my whole Forks experience. And the fact that I could eat RPattz with a spoon ... but I digress.

It's been a while, so take a gander at the newly-released Breaking Dawn poster.

Yippee for wolves and golden-eyed vampires, and the old people (ahem) who love them.

{ breakfast at home }

I can't even count how many times I've woken up over the past year up in New Hampshire craving breakfast tacos from an authentic Texas taqueria. And trying to replicate them in my own kitchen, while filling a temporary void, just doesn't come close to adequately cutting it.

So my morning taste buds have been in Heaven while I've been home on a 2-week visit, while I get my fill on breakfast tacos (and more breakfast tacos ... and more breakfast tacos ....).

This morning's offering -- bean and cheese on flour tortillas with pico de gallo and sour cream, and beef fajita with onion, cilantro and lime  -- all from Casa de Leon on Long Point in west Houston.

¡Que Delicioso!

{ commencement cookies }

We're home in Texas (yippee!) for my sister's graduation with a doctorate degree from Texas A&M University.

I made cookies for the occasion -- including beer, for those who don't like champagne.

Sugared shortbread with royal icing.

bloomin' awesome

The tulips are blooming!

Through the snow. Through the ice. Through the long winter. The tulips in our front yard have finally awakened and decided to brighten my days ... and my yard.

Quick recap: Last October, Aidan and his grandmother spent an afternoon lovingly planting tulip bulbs for us to enjoy in the spring. But after a winter marked by record snowfall, and then a late and unexpected mini-blizzard in April, we sometimes doubted whether or not the young bulbs would make it.

They did. And they're here! And they're glorious.

{ cinco de mayo cookies }

I made a big batch of color for the Boston Coast Guard Spouses' Association bake sale.

Tequila optional.

{ kennebunkport, maine }

It seems rather fitting and somewhat appropriate to learn today of the death of Osama bin Laden, taken down by some of our nation's finest -- the U.S. Navy Seals.

Not only was today a perfect spring day, but also full of fresh memories from my weekend excursion to beautiful Kennebunkport, Maine -- the family vacation home of former Presidents Bush.

It was a special trip on its own merit, but even more so now, peppered with the knowledge that the most evil man in the world is no longer able to mastermind attacks against the innocent.

"We will not tire, we will not falter, we will not fail." -- George W. Bush