"Pride and Prejudice"



Jane Austin didn't know what she had done when she wrote "Pride and Prejudice". How generations of readers would enter the home of the Bennett sisters Jane, Elizabeth, Mary, Kitty, and Lydia and see all that happened in the middle-class of England in the 18th century. Or how people would enjoy all her characters from Mrs. Bennett to Mr. Collins and Lady Cathrene de Burgh to Charlotte Lucus. She had such a wonderful story that it has been made into many different movies.



My first look at "Pride and Prejudice" on the screen was about a year ago when I first watched Elizabeth Garvie as Lizzie Bennett in the 1980's version made by BBC. I absolutely loved the story and all of the characters, the costumes, the whole atmosphere of England in that period.



The next version I saw was the black and white with Greer Garson as independent Elizabeth. I enjoyed that version very much but they cut out a lot of the story and the costumes didn't have the empire waist dresses that is in all of the Jane Austin stories.



I am now watching the version made by BBC in 1995 with Jennifer Ehle. The costumes are gorgeous and all the characters are very well casted in my opinion. I think Elizabeth is perfect but that Jane was not as I imagined her. It is a very well made movie and has given me a different look at the story.



I have not yet seen the Keira Knightly version but I can hardly wait to. I have just ordered it since we have looked so many places and none of them seem to have. I have heard that it does not stick to the original book as much as some of the others but I think that I will love it. It looks like it's beautiful and I've heard the music and it's very good. I think that Keira Knightly looks like a very good Lizzie.



I have seen every "Pride and Prejudice" that I've otherwise heard of but if you know of another vresin that's good I would love to see it!

I took a several pictures of Walker the other day and I thought I'd post them. He sucks his fingers all the time! Some of these turned out pretty funny!



Feel the Wind blow!

Natural Cleaning Detergents.

We have been making a few natural cleaning detergents, Dishwasher detergent, and bathroom cleaner. Here are the recipes:


Dishwasher Detergent:

1 cup of borax

1 cup of baking soda


We made ours in a jar, you only have to fill one of the holders up, use two tablespoons.
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Bathroom Cleaner:


1 3/4 of a cup of vinegar

3/4 of a cup of water

We mixed ours in a empty cleaner bottle after rinsing it out really well.
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Mama can't remember how you make the laundry detergent so we Will post that later!! These recipies are about as easy as you can get!

~Caroline

My Grandma's Sour Cream Coffee Cake

This is one of my favorite coffee cakes for special days. My Grandma's Sour Cream Coffee Cake! It's more of a cake than breakfast food because it's so good. I love the brown sugar and nuts and usually add more than the recipe calls for. Our family loves it!


Sour Cream Coffee Cake

1 1/2 cups Butter
1 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla
3 eggs
1 1/2 c. sour cream
3 c. sugar (we use about 2 1/2 to cut back a little)
3 c. flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 c. brown sugar
chopped nuts (about 1 c.)
Cream butter and sugar well. Add eggs one at a time. Add vanilla. Sift dry ingredients and add alternately with sour cream, beginning and ending with flour. Pour half of the batter in a greased tube pan and sprinkle half of the brown sugar and nuts (mixed together). Then pour the rest of the batter and sprinkle the remaining brown sugar and nut mixture on top. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour and 10 minutes. Hope you enjoy!





Yum!

Here are some new pictures of us on our rope swing. It's really fun! Here's Caroline swinging. Some of them turned out fuzzy because I was trying to get them while they we're moving!
Caroline

Baldwin
Caroline giving Baldwin a push!


We are having so much fun on it! It was kind of hard for me to take pictures of them because they we're always moving! I got a few good ones though!

~Layne

rope swing

Our Dad put up a rope swing in the yard, it is SO Fun! I will probably post some pictures of us on it tomorrow.



~Caroline

I have several good pictures of Walker so I thought I'd go ahead and post them!
I Love to take his picture!
Mr. Blue Eyes

I love close-ups of Walker that show how blue his eyes are. He dosen't have much patience though! But I really like to though!

~Layne

Faith and Caroline in Faith's basement singing in her microphone. That was so fun!
I like this picture of them. I love black and whites. I look tons of them!
Reading from their sheet of musicHere are the other pictures from our spend-the-night with our cousion Faith. They were singing "Just a Closer Walk wtih Thee" but we didn't know the words exactly so they had a sheet of music that they were following. There are some really funny ones! Happy Birthday Faith!

On Thursday we spent the night with our cousin Faith for her birthday. We had so much fun! We took tons of pictures. I got a lot of pictures of them singing in their basement with Faith's boom-box. I tried to video tape them but they kept stopping and messing-up so I deleted them. They were singing "Just a Closer Walk with Thee". They were doing really well but they would laugh or do something that would make them stop and want to start over. I was going to sing "In the Garden" but we ran out of memory card so I didn't get that either. But here are lots of pictures from our spend the night. Thank-you so much Faith! We had so much fun sharing your birthday celebration with you! Love you so much! This is Faith opening one of her birthday presents surrounded by Caroline, James, her brother, and me.
Faith and me decorating chocolate chip and m&m cookies very late at night! That was so much fun.......and very delicious! We tried to make diffrent colored frostings by adding food coloring. We had pink, blue, green, and we tried to make purple.......but it turned out kind of an unappetizing gray. But the rest turned out well!
Then we had a cookie contest. Caroline won the award for most festive, Faith won the award for most creative, I won the Sandra Lee award, and then James won the most beautiful award. he couldn't believe it! He kept asking my aunt why he had won. He was so cute!
This is a picture of Caroline and Faith with their aprons and bandanas on.

Caroline and Faith singing their hearts out. I love the words to that song,

"Just a closer walk with thee. Grant it Jesus is my plea. Daily walking close to thee, Let it be Lord, Let it be!"

I need to go to bed now so I'll post the rest of the pictures later!

~Layne

A Blue and White Gown

One of my favorite things is old-fashioned clothing. It's so fascinating. I love the Victorian era of clothing because It's so ladylike, feminine, and pretty. I would love to be able to wear flounces and bustles.......although I don't know if I could endure the corsets! The whole style of that era had such detail and beauty. I love to make dolls clothing partly because it's less time consuming, and partly because they don't call for as much fabric and trimmings! I made this Victorian style blue and white doll dress that fits one of my favorite dolls. It has white ribbon running down the front of it and a white bustle in the back. I like the blue and white colors of the dress. I think they look nice together.

I really like the bustle in the back. I've tried to make a bustle on a dress like that before but it didn't turn out as nice as I would have liked it to. The skirt was too big for the doll. I hate it when that happens; although most of the things I make turn out too small!

I usually make things for my family so I like to get a lot of pictures of it! Hope you enjoyed!
~Layne~

Back to Ballet!

Caroline and I were able to take a summer session of ballet which was a lot of fun! We will begin the new term in a couple of weeks. I was able to help teach a 3-4 year old ballet class last year which was so much fun!! I am hoping to be able to do that again this year. This is a picture from our spring recital in May.