At 10:30 this evening, I realized with shock that I hadn't given our cats their evening treats (a couple of teaspoons of wet food). Normally Rusty, our 12 year old boy, is reminding us starting around 6:30 that treat time is coming up soon. But not this evening. For some reason my coming home at 7pm and doing dishes seems to have thrown him off and he just slept. So, I let him know it was treat time, like I do every night: Rusty, treat time! And he me-eowed vigorously and loudly, albeit a bit groggily from still being half asleep. He followed me into the kitchen and let me know he was there waiting. But when I put the food down he just sniffed it and sort of stared at it. Mansi on the other hand scarfed her food down. Normally, Rusty eats his first and tries to eat what is left of Mansi's too. Not this night. He sort of licked the food, looked at it some more and walked off. I sat there on the floor crying because my cat is getting old and I don't want him to die. He can't die until after the baby is born. We already lost his brother almost two years ago. I lost my mom almost a year ago. I'm tired of losing people I love.
This last weekend Mr Siili and I did absolutely nothing. Well, almost nothing. We spent the weekend catching up on tons and tons of TV shows (Lost Girl, New Girl, Dexter, Unforgettable and probably more I'm forgetting). We didn't go food shopping on Friday, nor Saturday nor Sunday. We munched what food we could find in the house on Friday evening and Saturday. Sunday we went to a very late brunch (more like a late lunch) at the Crazy Reindeer restaurant. We did wash one load of laundry. I did fill the sink full of dishes with hot soapy water and then left it there the rest of the day so we ended up draining before we went to bed. Mr Siili did make me laugh!
Last Wednesday I sent Mr Siili a text message:
Where are you at? I think I forgot my keys at home. (And I proceeded to sit outside our door for about 30 minutes waiting for Mr Siili to come home from work and let me in.)
Then on Saturday afternoon, Mr Siili must have noticed my message, because this is the reply I got:
I am home, watching tv with the old lady.
Two hours later:
Fine, don't answer. (We were still sitting right-next-to-each-other, watching tv a couple of hours later.)
Then, I got a bit bored with one of the shows we were watching and I played with my phone a bit and this is the message I got:
How is the quality time with the hubby?
The first two recipes that where shared with me when I came to Finland, were
Potato bread (perunarieska) and Mamma's berry pie (
Mamman marjapiirakka in Finnish). I still make them to this day and will continue to do so. Both of these recipes are easy to make and more than delicious!! A couple of weeks ago I made a twist on the Mamma's berry pie and it was so good that I wanted to make it again, but I've been so lazy after that that it took me until this evening to make it again. Here's the basic recipe, with my changes and comments at the bottom.
Mamma's berry pie (Mamman marjapiirakka)
Dough:
3/4 cup butter (or margarine)
1/3 cup sugar
1 egg
1 1/4 cup flour (can be half and half of what ever combo you like, we sometimes use graham)
1 tsp baking powder
Mix all the ingredients together, spread on the bottom and sides of a
pie pan.
Filling:
1 cup sour cream (or non flavored yogurt)
1/4 cup sugar (more or less, depending on your taste and the berries/fruit you use)
1 egg
1 tsp
vanilla sugar (or extract)
2 1/4 cup berries (strawberry, blueberry, raspberry, rhubarb*, etc)
Put the berries on top of the dough crust and pour the filling on top of everything. Bake at 400F for 30-40 minutes.
(*With the rhubarb, put it in the mix a little bit before pouring onto the crust.)
My notes: We love rhubarb! And sometimes adding strawberry!
This last two times, I've made it with apple, but I've switched up the dough and made a cheesecake crust instead of the traditional one. And because we don't have graham crackers here and I don't like digestive cookies, (crispy) oat cookies will do, but what I found I really like are
Bastogne cookies by Lu (crispy cinnamon cookies - although, the generic brand works well too). I think the apple cooked better when I shredded it instead of thin slices, but no matter how you chop your apple, it is very yummy!
