May 11, 2013 |
My Baked Frittata is one of my most popular recipes. It’s my favorite quick Go-To Combo, and my best lazy weekend morning treat. It’s never the same twice, and that’s just how I like it!
Baked Frittata Italian Style
Easily altered to suit your Mom’s flavor buds, this dish offers an incredibly delicious dining experience whether you’re making it for breakfast, lunch or dinner.
Start with a basic mixture of eggs, milk and cheese, then add your own preferred additions to truly make it your own one-of-a-kind creation. For Mother’s Day, I chose ingredients sure to please her pallet: mini pepperonis, diced onion, mushroom, seasoned tomatoes and a shredded cheese blend. You can add finely chopped herbs and seasonings, green peppers and other vegetables… whatever your Mom’s heart desires.
Ingredients
- 8 large eggs
- 1 cup milk
- 3/4 cup shredded cheese
- 1/2 cup mini pepperoni (or other diced meat)
- 1 can diced, seasoned tomatoes, drained
- 1/4 cup mushrooms, diced
- 1/4 cup fresh spinach, cut
- 1/2 small onion, diced
- salt
- pepper
- seasonings (Italian mix, basil, garlic salt)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350.
- Scramble eggs in bowl.
- Add all other ingredients.
- Mix well.
- Spray 9 x 9 inch glass baking dish with non-stick spray.
- Pour mix into baking dish.
- Bake for approximately 55 minutes, until eggs are cooked and edges are slightly browned.
- Serve big or small portions.
- Top with a dollop of marinara sauce.
- Enjoy!
3.1
https://franklymydearmojo.com/2013/05/11/mothers-day-frittata/ (c) 2012 Frankly, My Dear... New Inklings Press
Frittata
Doesn’t that look delicious?
Serve with a cup of coffee or juice, and make your Mother’s Day complete!
You can find this and other easy, inexpensive recipes in THE UNEMPLOYMENT COOKBOOK, SECOND EDITION, available through New Inklings Press.
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
This post is my contribution to NerdWallet’s ‘Mother’s Day Your Way Contest’. Click on the graphic to visit their website and see contributions from other bloggers celebrating Moms in their own way!
May 4, 2013 |
Friday was “Bring Your Frog to Work” Day.
Okay. Not really. But it should have been. For me it was. Maybe I’ll start a trend. Yup. It’s already on my iPhone calendar. Every First Friday in May shall be “Bring Your Frog to Work Day”.
I had intended to spend my lunch hour at the Park behind my office, taking photos of flying hawks and scurrying ground squirrels. Instead, it evolved into me taking photos of Nippers every chance I got.
It started with him accepting his role. That is, being the Frog that I took to work today.
Bring Your Frog to Work Day
When I won the monthly office contest, he helped me celebrate.
Red Robin…. yumm!
Then he joined me for lunch.
Tacos and Frogs. Do they really go together?
Later in the afternoon, we did the daily bank- and mail-run for the office. He wanted to check our P.O. Box. Sadly, other than himself, it was empty.
Postage Due?
Shortly after, it was time to wind up the work week and head home. But not for long – I won tickets to the local minor league baseball game for tonight. Nippers and I took Dot, my Second Daughter, and my Second-Second Daughter to see the High Desert Mavericks wallop the Lancaster Jethawks. It was quite the game! Back and forth, strike outs, errors, runs, outs… it was intense! And oh, so fun.
Nippers at Stater Bros. Stadium. My little photo-bombing frog.
Mavericks Warming Up
After a while, the girls and I got hungry. Every Friday home game is Family Feast Night: hot dogs and sodas for just a dollar each! Nippers certainly likes his foods…
Ballpark Food. Yummm!
In keeping with my Luck lately, halfway through the second inning, a Mavericks staffer walked by and handed everyone a card. Okay, sure. Everyone got one. But if I hadn’t won the game tickets, I wouldn’t have been present to get this ticket. Am I right?!
Bowling, anyone?
And then of course it was time to document the humans. My Second Daughter Elisa Jo took this wonderful photo of all of us.
A new kind of Family Game Night.
We sang the Seventh Inning Stretch. We sang “Sweet Caroline”. We ate dollar hot dogs and drank ballpark beer (well, two of us did!). We freaked out, multiple times, when a moth the size of Calcutta decided it really loved Dot and Elisa Jo. And we were laughed at, often, by those around us who experienced our girlish screams.
Would we do it again? Quicker than you can say, “Yes!”
The Mavericks won. It was a wonderful game. Not slow and draggy as some baseball games are. At first it seems the Mavs had no kick and were gonna go down without a fight. But by the third inning they snapped to and gave the Lancaster Jethawks a run for their money! In the end, the Mavs won 7-9.
Friday’s over. “Bring Your Frog to Work” Day is done. But the memories of this nearly perfect day will remain. Can a frog bring you luck? I’m pretty sure mine can. Does. Has.
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
May 3, 2013 |
If you follow me on Facebook, you already have an Inkling what this post is about. On Tuesday, I posted the following status:
“Netflix offers us the opportunity to see all our shows from the very beginning. Dot and I are working through Grey’s Anatomy. At times cute, endearing, vulgar and heartpounding. Tonight we saw an older episode that suggested it’s harder to ignore someone if you know Five Things about them. My Five Things are in the first comment. What are yours?”
There weren’t too many comments on that post, but I did get a few messages that it started a few people thinking. Is it harder for you to ignore someone if you know more about them?
As a writer, I love learning more about people. I love hearing what they have to say, knowing what makes them tick, discovering personality traits… all of it. Knowledge of people inspires me, creates characters, provides background. It’s wonderful. I just love stories.
That is, of course, the subject of today’s post. Stories. But what kind of stories? Well, that’s as unique as the person telling it. Give me the same story told by five different people, and I’ll have five different stories!
I have a plethora of family stories: The chipmunk in the dryer vent. Dad’s bear rug. The turned-over potato truck and more deer than we could count. Mom asking for a Second Hand in the Kitchen. The snake under the stairs that was actually just a box of fishing bait rattling around. Moving cross-country, then back again, in one week.
And an assortment of personal experiences. Most of these are being compiled for my writing project: Broken Girl and Other Tales of Redemption: A Collection of Parables, Poetry and Prose.
Broken Girl cover
I love well-told stories. A gifted writer can hold your interest on subjects you’d rather not study. A well-written resource paper is far less mundane than a bulleted checklist, don’t you think?
In keeping with today’s theme, here are my Friday Five: Stories.
1. Jo March, the narrator of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women is a character I fell deeply in love with because she resonated my young life. “Settled into a temporary poverty”, this tomboy is more comfortable with a pen than most people. She feels more deeply, loves more intensely, and lives more rambunctiously than I have… yet! She inspires me. I used to tell people I was named after her (my middle name is Jo!).
2. Award-winning Stephen J. Cannell, the magnificent writer-creator-producer of many television shows. I used to watch so many. The Rockford Files was my dad’s favorite. I was enamored with shows from the 80s: 21 Jump Street, The A-Team, Riptide. I used to tell my family, someday he’s going to know who I am. They laughed. In 2007, I sent him an email, never ever ever thinking I’d get any sort of response. Boy, was I wrong! Not only did I get a response, but he turned it into a video response for his international website [you can see his advice to me about writing here. It’s still the first video that shows on this page!] He was the first writer/mentor to call me by both my first and middle name. So for three years we had a quasi-mentor friendship online. Facebook and twitter interactions, mostly. And then in 2010 the planets aligned and I was able to meet him in person for a book signing! It was the day after my birthday, which made it that much better. And six months later he died. I saw the post on Facebook and it took me fifteen minutes of online searching to verify his page hadn’t been hacked. I couldn’t believe he was gone. My heart broke. I remember calling my mother, crying, and blurting out, “Stephen’s dead! Stephen’s dead!” As if he would somehow remember me, remember how important he’s been to my writing career. And then there was the email incident. If it hadn’t happened to me, I’d be very skeptical. But it was me. It did happen. And so I try to write. Every day.
Me & SJC
3. Louie L’Amour has such a style of writing that leaves me breathless. I wish I could read fast, quick, without blurring the words, without forgetting what was on the previous page. I wish I could swallow up every story of the Sacketts and all other characters he’s created in one afternoon, and then start over again. I’m still currently reading his Collected Short Stories. I’m a slow reader, lately. But when I do read, I love it! I even named my 2011 annual Christmas Nutcracker after him!
Louis & Louis
4. I have a hard time writing fantasy. I’m very much a logical, linear thinking; which is quite oxymoronic for being a creative writer. Still, I try. My desire is to be read. To be a quality, best-selling, recognized writer. And still be able to go to Disneyland without getting mobbed.
5. I have many Cookbooks that I like to read and study. But rarely do I cook from them. I’m too afraid of spending money on groceries for a recipe we may not like, and then it’s money down the drain. Someday I’d love to write a series about a Chef who solves mysteries. Sort of a “Murder, She Wrote…” with a Julia Child-type protagonist. Well, now. I’ve written the idea. I guess I better start working on it.
*Bonus Story* When I was 9 years old, I read a short story in Cricket Magazine. Rosemary for Remembrance. To this day, I remember that story, but have been unable to find it. It was the story of a lonely girl who found a playmate in her grandmother’s backyard… with a surprise ending. Oh, how I wish I could find that story! It inspired me, at the age of 9, to write well. It showed me how to build suspense and deliver a twist. That little short story that I can’t find anywhere continues to inspire me to this day.
And now it’s your turn. Leave me a comment with Five Things about Stories. They can be your favorite authors, your favorite memories, your favorite books. Anything related to stories. You don’t have to be a blogger. There’s no link-up. Just share your Friday Five Things. Be sure to check back frequently as others leave their FFTs as well!
As always, Happy Reading (and Writing)!
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
You may also enjoy reading:
Falling in Love With Louis
Self / Public / ation
Why I Don’t Go To Carnivals in October
A Good Name
I Want to Write in That Style
Amara’s Light: Book One of the Grenalia Chronicles
Apr 30, 2013 |
I have a great writing partner. The kind who knows timing. She knows when it’s a good time to write, and when I’ve too much on my plate. She knows dialogue timing and action writing. She is my perfect writing partner. She. Is. Awesome!
We’ve been working on our series for nearly two years now. “Working” is quite the misnomer, however. The last year has kept us unavailable. But now we’re back on track. We’ve been editing and creating new characters. Ever heard of a Sleight? Or a Marnavo? What about a Weonae? You’ll meet them, in good time.
As a bit of an instigation to keep us on track, and to keep you interested, we’ve decided to post little teasers on Twitter. That’s right: a short, succinct storyline in 140 characters or less. Like this:
We’re tentatively naming our series The Grenalia Chronicles. Grenalia is an imaginary land I made up as a child, where my stuffed animals came to life and ruled over neighboring kingdoms, protecting the weak, fighting with swords and casting magic. I told Megan about it and she liked it. So until (unless) we come up with something better, our series is now The Grenalia Chronicles.
Our first story, Amara’s Light, is the first novel. Accordingly, it’s where you first meet our characters. Humans, dragons, a few Elves and Dwarves, and a few other creatures you didn’t know existed.
Amara is our heroine. I can’t tell you much about her now, but I can tell you she’s worth knowing! Megan brought Amara to life long before we started writing together, and her fullness of character and determination are strong and lifelike.
Now that the Cookbook Project has wrapped up, it’s time to get back to the drawing- err.. writing board. I say, bring on the dragons! And the Elves! And the Sleights! And other mystical, magical creatures who will, in time, introduce you to worlds you never knew existed… and will never want to leave.
Follow New Inklings Press on twitter and Facebook for updates and, you know, other fun stuff!
~From Grenalia,
Molly & Megan
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
Mar 18, 2013
On the successful heels of my Cookbook Project Campaign via Kickstarter, I’ve already begun another. Kickstarter is turning into a wonderful avenue for my readers to pre-order their own copy of my newest project.
A Study on the Ten Commandments began with my own personal notes as I chose to take just one Commandment each day and break it down to answer some basic questions I had:
- Why was this important for God to be specific about?
- What was His target audience?
- Is it still applicable today?
- How can I apply this to my daily life?
- How can I use the writing gifts God gave me to share these lessons with others?
The Book (or rather, booklet, as it’s only 36 pages including daily notes sections), thus evolved over two years of proofing, rewrites, and much prayer. I’d tucked it away for quite some time not sure what to do. When I formed New Inklings Press last year, that still small voice let me know this would be one of my publications. And I believe its time has come.
I invite you to take a look at my simple Kickstarter campaign by clicking on the cover sketch below. I ask you to pray for my family and this project’s success. I believe God has called me to write for Him. I hold fast to His promises to provide for me and my family when things look bleak. I have faith that I am doing the Right Thing and I am confident His Word will reach many. I’m humbly honored to be just one instrument in an orchestra of millions.
I’m just an ordinary woman getting through an ordinary life with an extraordinary God. These are just some of the lessons I’ve learned.
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
