A New Life for an Old Favorite

Welcome Creative Kristi Readers!  I'm so humbled to be mentioned on such a fabulous blog.  I'd love it if you'd leave a comment and tell me a bit about yourself.  I'm new to the blogging world and am itchin' to make some bloggie friends.  Shout out if you're a new blogger, too!

When Frank and I got married, my mom gave us her mother's china.   It's a dainty blue floral pattern, and it's delicate and lovely and a bit feminine.

I like to use it on occasion, and when I do, I try to be very careful with it.  But, a few months ago when I was moving some things around in our china cabinet, I dropped a small demitasse cup on the floor.

It broke into several pieces, and I was so disappointed!  My father-in-law offered to carefully glue it back together, but I knew it certainly wouldn't look the same, and may not hold liquid.  I saved the pieces in a plastic bag, and after thinking on it a while, I came up with an idea.  See, my mom adored this china.  It was what they used on special occasions throughout her childhood.  I knew I wanted to make something for her.

By using the broken pieces to make a frame, she could enjoy seeing the pretty delicate blue flowers daily, as they frame a cute photo.

I picked up a cheap frame at Michaels.  I think it cost about $4.

First I took the glass and backing out of the frame and laid out my broken china.  The cup had only broken into three or four big pieces, so I used pliers to break it into smaller chunks.

 I played around with the lay-out.  There were some features of the cup that I wanted to translate to the frame, and was careful to place certain pieces in a way that would highlight those features.  For instance, the cups had a few tiny flowers on the inside of the rim, so I placed a piece showing those flowers so it was concave (you'll see this in a pic farther down).   I also wanted the manufacturer's stamp to be visible.

The delicate rim of the cups are painted with a thin blue stripe, so I placed pieces of that rim along the outside of the frame when I could, so the stripe would be visible.  I also wanted to keep the handle in tact. 

I moved the pieces around until I was happy with the layout, then I glued them down.

The Weld-Bond worked great.  I picked it up at Michaels, too.  I had used the superglue to piece the manufacturer's stamp piece back together when it broke into too many pieces.  I wanted it to be as seamless as possible, so the stamp would be legible.

The glue had to set for 24 hours, so the next night I picked up where I had left off.   We had some grout on-hand for tiling on the porch addition, so I mixed up a little batch.  

 It was the consistency of loose clay, I'd say.  It's important to remember, I was just wingin' all of this.  There could very well be a better way to get this project done, but this worked for me!

I smushed the ground into all of the crevices and let it sit for about 20 minutes.

 

 Then I went in with a damp cloth and carefully wiped away the grout that was covering pieces.  This took a bit of trial and error.  From what I understand, if you were to be grouting square tiles, you could swipe the damp cloth at a 45 degree angle to the grout lines to easily wipe away the excess.  Because these pieces were all different shapes, sizes, angles and heights, I had to be a bit more careful.  

This shot gives you a glimpse of that concave piece and the first layer of uneven grout.

After I'd wiped a good bit away, I let it sit for another 24 hours.  The next night I came back and repeated the grouting process, hoping I'd be able to even the grout out a bit.  This is what it looked like just after I thickly applied the grout.

 After 20-30 minutes, once the grout had set a little, I came back in, this time with q-tips, to remove excess.  I would dip the q-tip in water, and this allowed me to be very careful in where and how much grout was removed. It's important to keep your q-tip or cloth damp, pretty wet, really. 

The grout dried a lighter color, and ended up looking like this.

I could have sealed it, but since it won't get wet or suffer any wear and tear, I just left it.

Of course I printed a picture of our favorite little one and assembled the frame.  Here's how it turned out:

Mom really seemed to love the gift.  When she opened it, I don't think she realized that the frame was anything special (that cute pic had her attention).  But, after a moment she recognized that familiar blue flower.  It's bittersweet to lose a precious piece of family china, but I'm so happy to have given it new life. 

Another fun project would be to simply glue and grout the pieces onto a square or rectangle backing, and frame it without glass.  Or, you could make coasters or a trivet.  Lots of possibilities.

Have you guys up-cycled a broken treasure?   I'd love to hear about it!

I'm linking to

Top Project of 2011

Hidey Ho readers!  Rhoda's doing a little link party for us to share our top projects of the year, and I'm here to participate.  Well, you guys know I haven't been blogging for very long, so I don't have a whole lot of projects from which to choose.  But, here's my favorite... the bench makeover (Follow these links for full details: part one and part two).

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I found this old bench at a consignment shop.  It was primed and had the old, but good upholstery webbing, but that's all.

I tightened the webbing, painted, upholstered, and created a slipcover.

 

We are using it as a coffee table now, and are loving it so far.  It's smaller and an inch or two lower than our old coffee table.  And it's safer for our babe who's just started pulling up.  

Thanks for stopping by!  If you're here from Rhoda's party, leave me a note.  I'd love to hear from you!

Our Christmas

It's hard to believe Christmas day has come and gone!  It often feels like a let-down when I wake up on December 26th, like we prepared and waited and celebrated and then so quickly it's all over.  Of course, my birthday is tomorrow, so I have another celebration day coming then.  Anyway, I recently heard of a family who celebrates the 12 days of Christmas, and beginning with December 25th they have special traditions and celebrations for the next 12 days.  They might open certain gifts or bake or watch a movie, but the point is, they spread it all out.  I think this would help keep that magic going for a bit longer, and encourage more reflection and appreciation.  So, maybe we'll give that a try as EB gets older. 

Here's a little glimpse at our celebration this year.  Frank and I gave Elsie an outdoor swing, and he got it all set up on Friday.  We went ahead and broke it in on Christmas Eve.  She loved it! 

 The ridge beam from our new (almost finished) porch extends much farther than it needs to, and Frank left it that way just for this reason.  It makes a great spot for the swing to hang.  The chains are about 13' long, so the swing has a nice long arc. 

We went to the Children's Christmas Eve service at church.  The children's choir sang, and they were so darn cute!  So, later after Elsie went to bed, Frank, Mom and I opened our gifts.  Since I was old enough to understand Santa, we've opened most gifts on Christmas Eve.  We save the stockings for the morning, and of course we saved all of Elsie's gifts for the morn.  So, when she woke, we all headed to the tree!

Wouldn't you know she seemed more interested in the boxes and wrapping paper than anything else!  I'm sure that will change over time.  I can't get over the cool gifts she received!  Our friends and family are so generous and have such good taste!

After gifts we had a special little breakfast treat.  I splurged and ordered these croissants from Williams Sonoma.  I've heard such amazing things about them, and when I received a free shipping email from them a month or so ago, I placed an order.  They come frozen, and you just keep them in your freezer till your ready to indulge. 

 You set them out on a cookie sheet the night before, and when you wake, they have thawed and risen.

 You bake them for about 15 minutes, and this is what you get!

 Oh.  My.  Goodness! 

These were divine!  We served them with fruit and bacon.  Mmmm. 

Mm. 

So good!  So worth the splurge.  They end up costing about what you'd pay for a croissant in a bakery, so to have them fresh and hot out of the oven from the comfort of your home is such a treat!

So, we spent most of the day lounging around, playing with our new gifts.  For dinner I decided to make PW's mushrooms and rib roast along with some other yummies, so I started the mushrooms around 11am (they cook for 9 hours!).   We enjoyed their intoxicating scent all day.

Poor little Elsie is suffering her first real cold.  She's much fussier than usual, has less of an appetite, and her tiny nose is all runny.  Poor thing.  Thankfully she's still sleeping through the night and napping pretty well. 

Once she went to bed, we had our big Christmas dinner. 

That prime rib and the whisky cream sauce and those mushrooms were soooo good!  It's hard to go wrong with a Ree recipe. The evening ended with a rousing game of scrabble. 

So, there's a little glimpse at our Christmas.  I hope yours was filled with joy and love.  Does anyone else open gifts on Christmas Eve?  Do you bake frozen pastries?  Try those WS croissants! 

Fresh Cranberry Christmas Cocktail

Recently I've come across a few cocktails using fresh cranberries.  Yesterday I picked up a bag of them at the grocery store, and when I got home I couldn't put my hands on the recipe I thought I'd seen in a magazine.  So I made one up.  Often you see vodka with cranberry, but we didn't have any vodka, so I used some gin.  The taste reminds me of pine trees, so I think it works for the holidays.  Add that lime twist, and you've got the color palette, too!

I started by making the cranberry puree.  I placed about two cups of cranberries and one cup of sugar in a small saucepan and stirred it up.  I had rinsed the berries, so there was a little moisture, but not much.

 I cooked this on medium-high heat for about eight minutes. 

After a few moments the berries on the bottom started to burst, adding more liquid to the mixture, and eventually it all came to a boil.

 While this was bubbling, I zested a lemon.

Once the eight minutes was up, I removed the berries from the heat and added the zest.

I stirred it up and let this rest for a few moments.  Then I used an immersion blender to blend it all together.  You could use a regular blender or a food processor, too.

Next I strained the mixture through a fine mesh strainer.  Because it's so thick, I used a spatula to push the mixture through.

This made about one cup of puree.  The recipe below is only for two cocktails, so there is plenty of puree left for more later.  It will keep well in the fridge.  This will be a great pre-Christmas-Eve-Dinner drink for Saturday!

I was feeling fancy, so I pulled out my grandmother's Waterford Crystal glasses.  I haven't used these in years, but knowing I'd be taking pictures, I thought I'd use something other than our simple K Mart glasses.  I'm glad I did!

 Here are the other ingredients: Ginger Ale, Gin, a lime, and there's a cocktail shaker and a small measuring glass, oh, and the pint glass is for mixing. 

I poured four ounces of gin into the pint glass.  Then I added about two tablespoons of the cranberry puree.  I cut two lime peels for garnish before squeezing the juice of both halves of the lime into the glass.

Here's what the mixture looked like before I shook it.

 So, then I used the stainless shaker (like you see bartenders use), and placed it on top of this pint glass and shook vigorously.  Here's what it looked like after that.

Next I strained this mixture into the two glasses, divided evenly, then topped it off with a splash of ginger ale and the lime twists.  Of course, you could serve this "up" in a martini glass with no ice if you're feeling extra fancy.

It was delicious!  And pretty easy.  I think it's so much fun to make cocktails (or anything, for that matter) from fresh whole ingredients.  I have a couple of vintage cocktail recipe books that are fun to look through and experiment with.  Ocassionally we'll end up in a restaurant or bar where the cocktails are made this way, and it's such a treat!  I could watch those bartenders all day.  And their garnishes are an art form...sugar cubes, candied ginger, cucumber slices, a variety of olives and onions, endless fruit slices, wedges, peels.  So chic! 

 Fresh Cranberry Christmas Cocktail
Puree:
2 c fresh cranberries
1 c sugar
zest of one lemon
Place the cranberries and sugar in a small saucepan over medium-high heat.  Stir often for eight minutes, as the cranberries burst and the sugar dissolves and bubbles.  Remove from heat, and stir in the lemon zest.  Allow the mixture to sit for three minutes.  Blend with an immersion blender or a stand blender, then strain through a fine mesh strainer or cheesecloth.  Set aside.

Cocktail for 2:
4oz gin
2 T cranberry puree (above)
2 oz ginger ale
Lime peel for garnish
Juice of one lime
Combine gin, puree, and lime juice in a cocktail shaker with ice.  Shake vigorously, and strain into two glasses.   Top with a splash of ginger ale, and garnish with a lime twist.  Enjoy!


Do you guys experiment with food or cocktail recipes?  I didn't used to, but the more I cook and prepare food and drink, the more confident I become.