Little Treasures

After a family illness imposed hiatus, I am finally back in action.......sort of.  We are nearly there; a bad nappy rash lingering on, a few slightly runny noses, the end of the chesty coughs and one eye infection almost cleared up.
I've been waiting all week for the chance to sit down at the computer and tell you all about this wonderful little treasure Rita came upon this week.  She spotted this little unassuming book on the bookshelf and came to show it to me.  I have no idea how this ended up in my hands because I don't remember it at all but it made me so happy.  I opened it up to find my grandmother's maiden name written inside and as I looked through it, I realized it was a French book with a variety of short stories for language students.  My grandmother had marked in pencil throughout the book, little notes about the stories and translations of the vocabulary.  I had no idea she spoke French!  And just as I start my new French class, Rita digs out this priceless treasure!  It was copyright 1924 and seeing that my grandmother had written her maiden name, Genevieve Mendonse, in it means that she probably would have used it around that time.  She also had written a quote on a blank page inside the cover, 'music is love in search of a word'.  What a beautiful little book indeed.

My husband also proved to be a bit of a little treasure himself this week.  A few days ago Pete left work early to come look after the kids so I could go to yet another doctor appointment for this damn eye stye.   When I returned about an hour later, Gigi was down for a nap and Pete and Rita were in the kitchen making a quiche for dinner, homemade pastry and all.  He had out the Ballymaloe Cookery Book and was following a recipe for quiche lorraine, despite the fact we didn't have cream or bacon or half the other ingredients it called for.  I watched trying not to give too much advice as he rolled out the pastry, blind baked it, filled it up with his improv filling and baked it.  Well, voila, who would've thought he could produce such a fine quiche?!  The pastry wasn't too thick, nice and buttery, quite short; the filling delicious despite using milk and cream cheese instead of cream.  A little treasure of a man I'd say.