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Just to be clear, I don’t bake. Whenever I am asked to bring a dish and a dessert is suggested, I wonder ‘why am I being punished?’. I can burn the bottoms of a full sheet pan of cookies simply by shutting the oven door and turning my back for less than a minute. But what are you to do with a rock hard day old WHOLE FOODS baguette that someone forgot and left in its paper bag sleeve in the car over night? Bread pudding. Bread pudding is the homemade soup equivalent of baked goods. You don’t need a ‘real’ recipe to make either one. With the 3 ingredient basics of milk, eggs, and sugar, all you need to do is add stale bread and toss in some handfuls of other tasty bits. No need to measure and whatever sounds good IS good. Today my version was a mushy banana, a few sticky leftover prunes, 3 beat up peaches, and the aforementioned stick of bread chainsawed into slices. Left it all to soak for a short while, plopped it into the oven and ignored it. It’s like recycling in a way. The way I see it, bread pudding is the baked goods version of a collage. Because that’s my thang, reinvention. But just to be clear, I don’t bake….oxoxoxo!!

 Yard sales start waaaaaay too early for this bird. Plus, I’d sworn them off forever after the last one. But when a neighbor suggested we join in since our entire street was participating, it was too tempting to refuse. Plus, it’s an excellent excuse to thin out some of the strays and leftover supplies from past projects and never-got-off-the-ground ideas. Trying to explain my pack rat tendencies, the studio and its contents and what all WASn’t for $ale was a challenge. In a few instances, I just gave up and sold them whatever it was that they wanted. Ripped out pages in that book you bought? Sorrrry. After all was said and done, cute husband has gone back to his former ‘never again’ attitude and it IS always easier to just have a bonfire. But I’m already starting another pile of leftovers for someday. Next time, I’m charging $5 a box with a ‘fill it up with whatever you want’ rule. That’ll work!

Seems like everything old is new again.  I’ve spent the last couple of days making an ‘old’ product I haven’t tried in awhile, Magpie Boxes,as a reorder for a long time customer with a shop in MA.  Meant to inspire like minded collage artists, these are kraft paper boxes stuffed full of collected loot to tantalize collectors. Everyone that looks at them sees something different. But if I’ve packed them properly one thing will jump out as a must have. “Looks like my kitchen junk drawer” accused a studio visitor who dropped by while I was in the middle of construction. Obviously he’s not a believer. Because to a flea marketeer like myself, they’re full of pure gold.