Mom's Butterscotch Pie Recipe and Ellie's Halloween Costume

If you've been around here long enough, you'll remember that I went on a 21 day diet where you ate categories of foods in different sized boxes. You were allowed plenty of boxes of vegetables a day, but there was a TINY box for fats, including cheese, and you only got one of those a day. I did lose some weight, but really, I ask you, who can live long term with only a tiny box of cheese a day? (If you missed those episodes of fleeting nutritious eating, read Part I here and Part II here).

Most importantly, you know what they didn't even have a box for?

Pie. 

Really.

I can't live in a world without pie. 1) Pie makes me happy. 2) Happy people live longer. 3) There has to be a box for pie, people. And there's no better pie than my mother's butterscotch pie recipe, which obviously will lengthen my life, making me happy and all. 

Seriously. It's the bomb.

I can't give up my mom's recipe without a proper introduction...Some of you may remember I've mentioned my grandmother, MomB, and how she was a character? (If you missed it, read about her here). Well, my mother, Lana, doesn't fall far from the tree in that regard, although she's a character in different ways. She's fun, sassy, and is always on the go. 

Mom and I at a Mother/Daughter Banquet several years back. I know, isn't she pretty?

When I say she's always on the go, I mean it. A few years back I called and said we were coming for a visit for spring break (she lives 12 hours from us). She paused and said, well, that'd be nice, honey, but I'll be in Spain. Most ladies her age are not dropping everything and running off to Spain. I don't have half her energy, but she keeps telling me she's just 29, so what do I know?

However, she does slow down long enough to cook when she's not jet setting off somewhere, and anything she makes is a treat. She is constantly entertaining and this is one of the favorites. Her cousin teases her that he's going to keep her locked up in a closet and only let her out to make this pie. (He's a little sassy, too, haha).

Here is her famous Butterscotch Pie Recipe, a perfect fall dessert. Delicious.

LANA'S BUTTERSCOTCH PIE RECIPE

Ingredients:

3/4 cup light brown sugar
3 tsp. Cornstarch
1/4 tsp. Salt
2 Cups milk
3 beaten eggs
3 tsp. Butter
1 tsp. Vanilla extract.

1 unbaked pie shell

Meringue
3 egg whites
1/4 tsp. cream of tartar
1/2 tsp. Vanilla extract
6 Tbsp. Sugar

In saucepan, combine sugar, cornstarch, & salt; gradually stir in milk.  Cook and stir over medium heat until mixture boils & thickens. (Warning, if you don't thicken enough, pie will be runny!) Cook 2 mins. longer.  Remove from heat; in a separate bowl, stir small amount of hot mixture into beaten eggs; return eggs to hot mixture.  Cook 2 mins over medium heat, stirring constantly. Remove from heat.  Add butter &vanilla.  Cool to room temp. You can pour directly into unbaked pie shell, or I like to bake my shell 10 mins. first, cover edges so it will be crisp.

Meringue: Beat egg whites with cream of tartar & vanilla until soft peaks form. Gradually add sugar, beat until stiff.  Layer meringue on top of pie filling and bake at 350 degrees for 12 - 15 minutes.

PIN IT FOR LATER!

Hope y'all enjoy the pie!

Love,

Elizabeth

P.S. I need help choosing Ellie's Halloween costume...I'll show you the choices over the next few posts. Let me know what you think.  Choice #1:

Queen Ellie does have a nice ring to it. 

And I couldn't resist posting a pic of Mom a few years ago on Halloween.

I told you she's a fun gal.  She says this year's costume is a surprise...I'm almost afraid to ask, haha

Come and Dine

There once was a ten year old boy who was being raised, along with his brothers, by his grandmother. She tried her best, but she was disabled and times were hard.

Their tiny rented house was literally falling down around them and he would never invite friends over to play, because he was too embarrassed for them to see where he lived. 

The boy's clothes were too small and too few. There were no toys in sight, as these were only luxuries that his friends had, but never him.  

Until one day, a beautiful lady entered the house. Like a fairy godmother, she helped the family find a more suitable home. She cleaned it, mowed the grass, and filled the home with special touches.

The house was almost ready for the family to move in. When the lady asked the boy what he would want most in the house, assuming he would ask for toys and such, she was stunned by his answer.

His one wish - a dining table. 

His family had never had a table to eat on. He wanted to gather his family and sit around a table to have their meals, to laugh, and to share about their day. Mostly, to have a time of coming together.

That wonderful lady fulfilled his wish of a table, and in addition, a complete house of furniture and all bedding needed for the house. Some she bought herself, and for the rest, she worked and worked until she had enough donated for the cause. She even brought toys and clothes for the family. When the family moved in, they were incredibly thankful.

The little boy spoke few words, but you could see he held his head a little higher after that day.  And he gathered his family around that wooden table.

How long has it been since we've gathered our families? Held hands and said grace? Laughed and cried together?

Never underestimate the power of the gathering of a family around a dinner table, big or small, fancy or plain, especially in the eyes of a child. 

Or the magic of stopping our busy lives to notice someone else.

Love, 

Elizabeth

This is a true story that happened several weeks ago and Elizabeth has the honor of knowing the beautiful lady and the boy..  The pics are not the boy's dining room, (it's Elizabeth's), but can't you picture him gathering his family at his table? Go gather your people.  

THE PORCH AND A TOTALLY TUBULAR LOVE STORY

I know a few people that don't like their husbands. (I mean, I am a divorce mediator...). I don't know why this is or what to do about it, but I get a little teasing because not only do I love my husband, I really like that guy. I gush about him even. When I tell you our story, if you're rooting for me, you'll be a little on the fence about him but hold on until the end, it gets better. 

And by the way, the pics in the story are of my back porch, where Hubby strung lights as a surprise for me a couple of weeks ago, after we saw them at a resort and I casually mentioned that would look pretty on our porch.

Who does that? Isn't he dreamy? I'm still waiting on his permission to post his picture. He's cute stuff.

WHERE IT ALL BEGAN...

There he was, in his green and yellow tank top, white Puma tennis shoes and his brown, curly hair cut as close to a mullet as curly hair could get. I saw him across the crowded pizza place/arcade. It was the 80s and hair was a BIG thing. I'm not sure how he missed me with my huge Aquanet helmet of hair, I could've knocked someone out with my 'wings'  but he didn't notice me at first.  Oh yeah, it could have been because he was on a date with someone else.

Not cool. 

We had mutual friends and did finally get introduced. I was a little taken with him at the ripe old age of 14 and have never forgotten the day we met 31 years ago. He doesn't remember the day we met at Pepperoni's Playhouse. Not even a little bit.

Totally not cool, Mr. Right.

Apparently, my braces and huge bangs did not get his attention later either. I threw a going away party for my friend who was moving and invited him. Turns out my friend's older sister, ahem, age 17, also liked him, was it the curly mullet??, so we decided to let him pick whomever he liked better, if either of us, and we'd be fine with whatever happened. At the party, we sat on either side of him, and I'm sure he felt like man of the hour. In reality, he was a quiet, humble guy who probably felt a little uncomfortable with all this attention. But then...

That dude picked her. Even kissed her on my front porch!!

I know!!!

How was I going to eventually marry this guy if he keeps forgetting me and kissing other people on my porch??

So I admitted defeat and a few months went by. We became good friends and he'd tell me his girlfriend woes over school lunch. I didn't have any dating troubles at fourteen, so I was pretty interested in hearing about his. 

Finally, the day came when he realized the girl of his dreams was sitting right in front of him, in some cute, black stirrup pants. We'd laughed and shared enough lunches to become the best of friends. He needed a date to a Halloween party, and finally, it was me.  On our first date, he picked me up in a ratty gray Blazer, so rusty that you could see straight through to the ground in some spots of the floorboard. He drove a few minutes, then promptly ran out of gas, LOL., thankfully beside a gas station. On our next date, again a Halloween theme, we went to a haunted house where his little brother got hit in the eye with a rubber snake, so the date ended abruptly to take his brother to the hospital.

 It was a date with his little brother?? Yes, yes, it was, I took what I could get. 

Thankfully, he didn't view me as a curse, because really, we were pretty nervous about what could happen on date #3, but eventually, we made it to our third, uneventful, romantic date.

The back porch, the night of the surprise...before the fall flowers were added. Bear popped in the pic, reminding me that he also helped with the secret light surprise. He still reminds me every other day.

Eight years later (come on, folks, I was only 14 when this story started)...I walked down the aisle to the man who would become my husband, the father of my children and my everything. I knew many years before what it took him eight years to realize. I should've put on those stirrup pants a long time ago.

Very cool. 

Don't give up on your dreams, sometimes they are right in front of you.

And always wear cute pants.

Love,

Elizabeth 

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: If you see Elizabeth out in public wearing stirrup pants, or any type of stretchy material of any sort, kindly return her to her home unharmed. She doesn't mean to hurt you in anyway, she just doesn't always understand that the 1980s are over and so is her ability to wear said items. Thank you. Love to all.

The Fall Mantel - Don't Give A Hooey

Seasonal decor. I love you. But you come to other people's houses and are awesome, you show up at my house and ....meh, sometimes you're rockin' and rolling, and sometimes you are a single pumpkin on the porch, with some dead flowers left over from the summer...

AND I REALLY DON'T GIVE A HOOEY.

Fabric pumpkins from Burke's Outlet. 

Since I started the blog, I thought it would be best to try to have a rockin' year, but understand, this is not always the case. I used to read blogs and get really inspired and motivated, but occasionally I would also get down on myself because I wasn't that wife and mother with the perfectly decorated porch and welcome signs. Sometimes there were dishes to do and meals to cook and children to raise and work and on and on and on until forget the pumpkins, all I wanted was a hot shower.. 

All there would be on the porch would be those dead flowers. 

Foyer, see full post about it here.

Dead flowers sometimes means that you're busy with your children. They are well fed, bathed and hugged. That your husband or your friend got your attention that day. That you are hard at work so you or your family have a roof over their head or clean clothes to wear. That soup is on the stove. Even that ironing pile got a little smaller. Confession: Okay, I'm kidding on that one. I only iron once a year, then give up and take the pile to the dry cleaners.

'Strength and honour are her clothing; and she shall rejoice in time to come'. Proverbs 31:25

Life will not always be so hectic, young mother, caretaker, wife. It will get easier.

Yes, I know my wreath is a little off. I don't give a hooey.

When my oldest was a baby, I didn't have the time or the money to decorate. Besides the demands of a normal toddler, he was diagnosed with Type I Diabetes (Read about it here). Definitely not my season for decorating. Later, when I was taking care of my sick daddy and two boys, I would probably have thrown a pumpkin at you if you criticized my dead flowers on the porch. Ok, only in my mind would I have thrown the pumpkin, I'm big talk on the computer. 

I was needed elsewhere.

If it's your year to decorate, or tackle whatever else you feel led to do, I hope you find some inspiration here (or at least have a good laugh at my attempts to do so). If it's your season for dead flowers, display them with honor. You've earned it. You're needed elsewhere.

Your season will come, so right now, don't give a hooey.

Hugs,

Elizabeth

Elizabeth is not using 'hooey' properly in a sentence. She knows this bothers me. When I told her, she said, 'I don't give a hooey.'  

Love her heart.