Category Archives: day job

Lettuce Was Ahead, Tomato Had To Catch Up

Ah, the busy-ness. The lack of posts last week was due to my being called in to work on-site at a client’s office. Which I enjoy, especially for that particular client, but it does take a bite out of my post-writing time. I’m playing catch-up this week, so the posts will likely be brief while I try to get back into the swing of shooting/measuring/counting/posting items in the shops.

Catch-up? Get it? Whether you spell it catsup or ketchup, here’s a recipe for you all to get ahead on, as I plan to bake up a batch later this week. It comes from a 1938 copy of The Household Searchlight Recipe Book. If you follow me on Instagram (@ampersandwich), you’ve already had a peek at this one.

Raisin Catsup Cookies
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup shortening
31/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 Tbs catsup
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 cup raisins, chopped
1 egg

Cream shortening and sugar. Add catsup and unbeaten egg. Beat thoroughly. Add raisins. Sift flour, measure, and sift with baking soda and salt. Add to first mixture. Mix thoroughly. Turn onto lightly floured board. Knead thoroughly. Form into roll 2 inches in diameter. Chill overnight. Cut in thin slices. Place on well-oiled baking sheet. Bake in hot oven (410°F) about 10 minutes. 24 servings.

Hmmm, I think I’ll perhaps post recipes all week. I have a fruit-flavored marshmallow recipe in one of my Jello-O cookbooks (go figure) that I’d like to try. Maybe I’ll do that this afternoon. Instead of the 20 other things I should be doing. :)

 

Leave a comment

Filed under day job, food, the office, vintage

Thoughts on Things

All y’all seem to like the more personal posts, so here are a few thoughts running through my head (and boy, are they getting tired):

  • I have 3 T-shirt designs that are in varying states of being worked on: 1 for Tiddleywink Vintage, 1 for the race team, and 1 just for fun. They’ve all been back-burnered for the time being, but you can order some way-cool shirts I designed for Church of Cupcakes from their online “Church Bazaar.”
  • Speaking of the race team, here’s a video clip of my beau zipping along at a speedy 190 miles per hour, as seen from the roll cage. If you’re reading this at work, turn down the volume first.
  • If you enjoyed that clip, here’s one of his brother making a similar pass in a different dragster, later that night. Again, with the volume.
  • I need to order new business cards, for both the vintage side of things and the design side. (Also: a couple of rubber stamps.) I’ve been saying that for weeks. If I were one of my clients, I’d be SO frustrated with this procrastination!
  • I’ve an ad due to a publication soon, and I could run the same darn ad I’ve been running for, like, 2 years now, but I’d really like to change it up. Heck, I wanted to change it up last year. However, this requires things like willing models, a photographer who actually knows what he/she is doing, a time that’s convenient for everyone, and some method of payment that I can afford. Which means I’ll be running the same old ad again.
  • I have to move tiddleywink.com to a new host. I tried to do it the other day, and bunged up the whole site and its accompanying email addresses. Which includes all of the email addresses associated with each of the3shops, as well as the Facebook fan page. I was able to undo what I did, but that means I still need to move it. So consider this a warning, I guess.
  • I seem to have hoarded a bizzarre quantity of ladyfingers in the pantry, so I decided to make tiramisu tonight. I even plan to make it the real way, with whipped mascarpone, although I’d considered faking it with Bird’s custard. Which I realize is nothing like mascarpone, but I always have a tin of Bird’s on hand, so there’s that. You know what? It turns out mascarpone is pretty expensive! This had better be tasty.
  • Speaking of Bird’s, I was just introduced (via Instagram) to the southern hemisphere treat of Yo-yos (which are, apparently, referred to as Melting Moments if made with cornstarch instead of custard flour). I look forward to making a batch, and introducing them to my mouth.
  • I like turtles.
  • Just checking to see if you’re still reading.
  • So the other day? With the centipede?* It’s been more than a week and I still can’t sleep. I told a friend it was like having the feels-like-bugs-are-crawling-on-my-skin side effect of bad drugs, but without any of the fun bits.
  • My friend Owen has suggested that Traumatic Centipede Experience needs to be the name of a band. I agree.
  • My dad is coming to visit! Yay! I need to unearth the guest room, which hasn’t been inhabited in many months. This may take the assistance of Mike Mulligan.
  • I have more fun stuff to scan for this here blog, but you folks are being so quiet about everything I’ve scanned thus far. Have you enjoyed any of it? Do you like seeing the old advertisements, or the old sewing patterns, or the old recipes, or is there anything specific you’d like me to seek out for posting? Please comment below!
  • Related: Many of you are coming here to read posts, then going back to Facebook or Twitter to comment on them, instead of commenting in the handy comment field below. Why is that?

I’ve taken too much time to blather about here and need to get back to taking photographs of beautiful clothing soon (eventually) to be seen at Tiddleywink Vintage. Au revoir!

_________________

*If you missed The Traumatic Centipede Experience, you’ll have to visit the Facebook page and scroll down to June 19th. I was sort of live-blogging it.

9 Comments

Filed under collections, day job, family, food, life-threatening clutter

Prominent Designer Series: Interrupted

Whoops! I forgot to queue up the next installment of the Prominent Designer Series of sewing patterns before I left the house this morning, and I neglected to store the images in Dropbox so I could reach them remotely. I promise, you will see Part 3 later today. Thank you for your patience!

Leave a comment

Filed under day job

Conundrum

The dry-erase markers I use to make my whiteboard To-Do lists have dried out. I’d put “Buy new dry-erase markers” on the list, but…

1 Comment

Filed under amusement, day job, the office

New New New (and slightly less-new)

Hi, I’m Troy McClure and you may remember me from such educational films as… no, wait, that’s not right.

But I am Tiddleywink (Design, Vintage) and Winkorama Vintage Sewing. Happy to fulfill your vintage clothing, vintage sewing, and freelance print production dreams. Not necessarily in that order.

As of today, I’m also Tiddleywink Retro. It’s not really a big deal, just a little shop for the misfits: the items of clothing, etc. which don’t qualify for my Etsy shop because they’re not truly vintage, but are too nice and/or expensive to simply toss in the donation pile. Trust me, there’s plenty in the donation pile already. These are things that I either bought for myself but never wore, or bought as vintage for the shop only to find upon close inspection that they’re not as “vintage” as may have been advertised. And so here is where those items will be posted, hoping for new homes. The listing prices will be set at whatever I paid for each item; no more, no less. No markup. No profit. No sales. No discounts.

Tiddleywink Retro. It looks an awful lot like this.

Due to the nature of the store contents, I hope I won’t be updating it very often. But, you know, things happen. Maybe a dealer missed a dead-giveaway label hidden in a side seam. Maybe a dress I bought online is a few inches shorter than I’d hoped. Maybe I ordered two pairs of identical shoes planning to return whichever pair didn’t fit, only to have the store go out of business before I could send a pair back. Um, you know, for instance. Hypothetically. (Yeah, that once happened.)

So stroll around, take a look, tell your friends. Buy stuff that deserves to be worn, rather than hanging in a dark closet with no foreseeable future.

You can get to all of the above links, and more, from this one swell page:

Swell, innit? Click to visit.

Leave a comment

Filed under collections, day job, design, fashion, jewelry, life-threatening clutter, shopping, vintage