Drumroll, please!

Today, I put all of the contest entries together and a winner was drawn. Here's how it went!

I love it when everyone's animal friends get involved in drawings so I notified my trusty sidekick, Pip that she would be in charge of drawing the name. Feeling the pressure of the spotlight (and remembering how close she came to being part of the prize package), she immediately went into hair and makeup and meditated for a moment.


Okay, SEVERAL moments. That cat went into the zone!


Her wits gathered, she then took charge of the task at hand. She reached in and drew out a name!



After she chased the name around the room and under the doormat , I was able to get control of the situation and properly reveal the winner!



Yay, Millie Motts! You are the winner of our first annual Ranch Dressing drawing! I hope that you like your prizes. Pip sends her regards and says, "You're welcome. Don't mention it."

Thanks to everyone who entered and to those of you who shared your memories of eventful birthdays, anniversaries and moves! It was fun reading them! And stay tuned...I LOVE contests so I am certain that there will be more in the future!

Until next time..
x's and o's,
Eartha

Shrapnel From The Thrift Store Trenches - #1

In my hunt for lovelies for the ranch, I am always scrounging around in thrift stores. A lot of days, the pickings are slim and I go home empty handed - but I hardly ever go away devoid of crazy stories of things that I have seen or perhaps overheard. I would like to include a regular feature on Ranch Dressing compiling the photos and stories of things that I see or hear that tickle me. Or stump me. Or make me whip out the antibacterial hand wash. Or on a really good day, all three.

If you are a thrift store patron, I am sure that you know that sometimes, it's the stuff that you DON'T buy that is really the meat in the stew.

The first installation in this series is something that I'd like to call, "When you babies get a paying job, THEN you can waste toilet paper!"

Enjoy....






Okay...so....and....Let me add that this was a large one too. Not something that someone could hang behind the bathroom door and never notice. Someone had to really commit to this piece to bring it home with them.


Can you imagine what photos hit the cutting room floor if THIS version made it to print?




First off, you have this poor little guy who is clearly being tortured. Didn't he have a parent on set? Were they on such a tight schedule that they couldn't have taken a minute to dry his tears and perhaps, explain the concept of the photo shoot to the little lad so that he could truly understand the character that he was playing? It's obvious that he had lost his creative vision.




And my gosh, look at little Oscar the Grouch back there, wedged into that trash can like a crusty, discarded Kleenex! And what about HIS parents? When they heard that their baby son would be shoved into a trash can and propped up next to a bidet, did they picture this as being the first step towards great fame for him? This whole thing is starting to make me feel like a better parent - and I don't even HAVE kids!


Forget those pageant babies...I wish that the Learning Channel would do a behind-the-scenes "Where are They Now?" show on the bathroom babies!

Who was the mastermind behind this shoot? And my god, were they so cheap that they couldn't find another baby to wedge into the bidet?

And more importantly, who donated this piece to the thrift store and did they have it hanging in their home for many years? Did the threesome of babies make them giggle every time that they passed it?

These are questions that we will never know the answers to. Questions that will lodge into our psyches as shrapnel from the thrift store trenches.

Until next time...
x's and o's,
Eartha

Come on-a My House

Hey y'all! How has your weekend been? I hope that things are just as you'd like them to be!

Things here have been really fun. Mister Kitsch and I were fortunate enough to be able to get together with some good friends. Friends who make me feel very fortunate AND who make me laugh until I gasp for air. We decided to put down the hammers and dust masks and throw our first dinner party at the house - and it was easy for me to pick a theme: Grandma Meal.

For quite some time now, I have been wanting to make an enormous Southern, smothered-in-butter meal. I think that it's something that's ingrained in a lot of Southern ladies. My Mom does it. My Grandmothers did it. And every woman before them did it. There is something about seeing all of those casserole dishes and platters lined up and ready for guests that does our hearts good. Something about nurturing and showing our love with food. A Sunday never comes that I don't feel like something is undone - like there is a longing for something in my soul. Yep, Grandma meal.

When I first started dating Mr. Kitsch, I took him home for his first Christmas at my Mom's house. There, he saw that the food stretched across the room and that there were at least a dozen dishes and no less than four desserts. He's from the Midwest and not used to "the spread". Upon witnessing the great wall of food, he asked me if there were a lot of people coming and I looked at him and replied, "No. It's the South." I'll never forget how sick he got by the end of that trip. He lay in the hotel bed on our way home, groaning in agony. Honestly, we both did..but I'm used to it. You've got to pay to play and if you don't eat that third helping of coconut cake, someone else will.

At the supermarket as we were buying groceries for our dinner party, I told him to grab another box of butter. After he replied that we already have lots of butter at home, I answered again with those three words: "It's the South" and he knew that there was no need to argue. Ditto on the huge jug of whole milk and my argument of, "There are NEVER too many dinner rolls!"

So, I got to cook that big meal full of grandma dishes and everyone ate lots which made me quite happy. It all happened so quickly that I didn't even take any photos. Just know that there were a lot of foods that our cardiologists wouldn't approve of. And banana pudding in a robin's egg blue, snowflake pattern Pyrex dish. Have mercy. I may not have walked through Heaven's gates but I think I may have swung from them. (And I'm not too shy to admit that I had that same banana pudding for breakfast this morning too.)


Here are some shots from the rest of the party. After my previous post about wanting to hoard Penny, the feline aerobics instructor piñata, you might be surprised that I brought her out for the party. She met her fate there....and I hate to admit it, but it was lots of fun hitting my first piñata. Admittedly, it was nerve-wracking being blindfolded and spun around and around. I mean, I'm pretty accident prone on the average day when I'm NOT blindfolded and spun around - but other than that, a good time!

Everyone got to take some turns before she was finally taken down:




Whoa, mama.




The carnage.

Bless her.


On a bright note, piñatas hold a LOT of candy. Chocolate, just like promised.





And I got to keep her head (try to type THAT without feeling like a serial killer):



I also didn't know that her legs would contain "It's A Boy!" balloons. Thankfully, nobody at the party got excited and thought that it was our way of telling them that we were expecting a little baby Kitsch from Mr. Stork. Of course, it WOULD be an easy way to explain away why I eat enough for two.

For the dinner, I set the table with some of my favorite stuff, including some old tree squirrels and flower arrangements of rosemary and crape myrtle from the yard:






We listened to some tunes including the late, great Eartha Kitt. Purrrrrr....




Before the movie, we watched a short video by the also late and great Dixie Carter showing us how to feel better by relaxing with an exercise called "The Lion".



It worked too because laughter is the best medicine and this video is hilarious!



I miss that Dixie Carter. She was a Southern gem. I also think she'd be all up for a grandma meal and a piñata beat-down in the back yard. In a lady-like fashion, of course. Believe it or not, there IS a genteel way to take down a piñata.

The feature film for the night was an amazing documentary called "Off The Charts: The Song Poem Story".




It's about people who send their original songs in to small recording companies (you know the kind that you see advertised in the backs of magazines?) in the hopes of having them hit it big. Of course, they never do. The film also shows the people whose business it is to produce and record the songs. It's an amazing little film and it has some really hilarious moments in it as well as some heartbreaking and mesmerizing stories. I wish that I could adopt most of the songwriters in this film and have them come live with me. They are THAT earnest and good-hearted.



This guy is my favorite. His name is Caglar Juan Singletary and he has the BEST song about bicycles, Jehovah, Priscilla Presley and of course, Taekwondo:




I LOVE him!

The documentary was originally shown on PBS's "Independent Lens" and is on YouTube in it's entire form of about an hour. I'd highly recommend watching it if you haven't seen it already. I think I've already seen it four times and never get tired of it.

We ended out the night with funny stories, drinks, dessert, and gift bags:



Does anyone lose it for gift bags like I do? And aren't these bags cute?? They were given to me by my friend, Averyl who has mad taste for cute stuff. The gift bags included scads of hard candy (back to that whole "grandma" theme), George Jones playing cards (because "The Possum" is the stuff), and copies of some of the best songs from the documentary.

And once again, Marlene Deertrich was dressed to the nines:



Lordy. That deer has more outfits than I do!

I'll leave you with a little Dixie and "The Lion". Come on...try it. Even if the baby is sleeping. It really does lift the spirits.




Until next time...
x's and o's,
Eartha

How It Went Down

Hello everyone! First off, let me thank you all so much for stopping by Ranch Dressing. Secondly, thank you for all of your great comments and well wishes. It's been a busy couple of days around the Kitschderosa but I'm finally able to sit down and tell you about my birthday/blog birthday/anniversary/general day of glee. I had such a great day!

I woke up in the morning and came down the hall to find birthday messages from Mr. Kitsch everywhere. They started with this great sign in the hall:



"Whoooooooooooo is turning 40?" Why, that's me! Well, it was. Now I am officially forty plus two days which kind of feels like 39 but with more cake in the fridge and a peaked interest in all of those bladder control commercials.

The notes ended with this message propped up over my computer:



"Whooooooo's our birthday girl?" Guilty as charged! And let me tell you, with the owl theme on everything, I just KNEW that I was getting an owl for my birthday! (of course, I was a little alarmed at the chances of it as our pantry is pretty bare on the carrion front).

Then I logged onto my computer and published my brand new blog! Three cheers! I was very excited, let me tell you! I am already loving my new home here so much.

I then went into the kitchen and immediately spied something through the window on the sun porch. A piñata!! I was stoked. It was my first piñata ever! It's not like the piñata was a surprise because every time that the Mister and I've gone to the local market in the past several months, I would stand underneath the piñatas hanging from the ceiling and twirl while shrieking, "I want a piñata for my 40th birthday!! Please??!" I mean, even the guy gutting fish in the back knew that Veruca Salt was out front and that she wanted a freakin'piñata. I knew that the Mister would make it happen. He's a mover and a shaker like that. He's my piñata sugar daddy and don't you doubt it. The fun part is that I had no idea which piñata he would pick. Would it be the huge green, unidentifiable animal thingie with bulging eyes and a necktie? Would it be the jaunty rainbow with the sparkly streamers? Please, lord...don't let it be Spongebob because I'll have to run over THAT guy with my car...

Turns out it was THIS one!



Glory day! I had never even seen this one before! Will you look at that pastel vision of kitschy cuteness?? It was a big white kitty wearing a pink headband and little smock with a "K" on it. I ran up to it and hugged it and declared that there was no way that I was going to whack it with a stick. I mean...look at those eyes!



Blink.
Blink.
Blink.

Gah! Cute! I was told that I really should do the deed since there was something good inside. Money? No. Mini liquor bottles? No. Chocolate? Yes. There was chocolate inside! He knew how to cut me deep! I told the Mister that I would think about it and in the back of my mind, I imagined a crowd of people at my estate sale after I pass, standing over a dust covered, ratty piñata in the back of a closet. Someone in the crowd moves forward, perhaps dropping a googly eyed knick-knack out of their loot filled arms and removes the piñata from the closet. It is then that the crowd moves away as if one and gasps as they see fifty year old Reeses cups, melted and rotted into a clump on the inside of the fuzzy, yellowed head. A piñata with an ancient linty, cocoa aneurysm would become my legacy...and is that what I want?

Snapping out of it, I smiled and placed the beautiful piñata into the dark recesses of my guest room closet.

Next up, we got in the car and made a run to my favorite exclusive breakfast joint:



You know it. Sonic. Grilled cheese and an enormous sweet tea makes mama happy.

We spent the rest of the day driving all over town to thrift stores - one of my most favorite things to do. We really didn't find anything great which was weird considering we went to eight or nine different stores and with me declaring myself queen of the day, I scoured those shelves as if my life depended on finding the holy grail of birthday thrifting. So, that said, I am going to insert a photo from the day as a stand-in for all of the cool stuff that the thrift stores probably put out on the shelves the minute that we left the premises:



Oh yes, you know that guy don't you? The overpriced, homemade clown that seems to wait in every thrift store? I have a theory that they are planted by the government and have tiny cameras hidden behind their matted pom-pom noses, tracking our every impulse purchase...but as this post has probably already made you antsy, I'll save all of that for another day.

So, let's see...we had a couple of yummy meals. A Greek diner and a Mexican restaurant. Here is a photo of the latter:



That's Mister Kitsch sitting there. You'll probably see very little of him as he is in some sort of witness protection program and abhors me showing him on the world wide webs. He's wearing his "Pickle Party" shirt in honor of the monumental day and probably the fact that my nickname is "Pickles McGherkin". Aww! At the Mexican restaurant a group of "gentlemen" near us were talking dirty so that put a weird twist on the meal. Mister Kitsch said that he never heard them - just more proof that he blocks out everything (including my crazy "did you just hear what they said??" faces) when I am sitting across the table going on and on about something. Bless his patient soul.

Further along in the day, we went and saw some glorious ranch houses of the stars. I'm saving those for a future post but just let me say - fantastic fun. We then went out and tagged some buildings with my gang name:



Okay, I lie. The graffiti was already there but we DID crawl over brambles and bricks and a moderately steep hill to stand amongst it so we're kinda gangstas in our own right. Well, not when I started whining about getting chiggers and dying from the heat...but other than that, I am hardcore. Don't cross me. Unless you have syrup and grits. Or a connection to someone with syrup and grits.

So, if you're still with me (and bless your heart if you are), here is a quick rundown of some other great parts of the day:

I got a fabulous horse necklace from the Mister. I am MAD for crazy, old Western stuff. Oh my. Get along little doggies. Oh, he's good! I also got some shopping money from my family (I'll be back, secret agent thrift store clown!) and a box of fabulous gifts from my good friend, Rosy that included a cookbook that I have always wanted. I've always felt like a fake without that gingham covered classic on my kitchen shelf. (There is a recipe for "teenage burgers" inside and I am super excited to find out if the recipe uses actual teens. If so, there is a rude fresh-faced cashier at my supermarket who'd better watch her back..)



The same friend also made this incredible homemade chunk of wonderfulness for me:



It's a Peggy Olson bear from one of my favorite obsessions, the show "Mad Men"! She turned the bear into a Peggy bear with her own two hands - look at that cute sweater and "joint" in her hand! When you press her paws, there are voice boxes inside that play the theme from Mad Men and Peggy Bear saying, "I am Peggy Olson and I want to smoke some marijuana". Hee! The bear is so well done that I thought that she really bought it from a specialty shop. Fantastic. Oh, and if you follow the show, she has a little baby bear fetus in her tummy to represent Pete's love child. Brilliant.

There were also delicious cakes. One was a dog cake that I picked out at the local supermarket. Be glad that you weren't there. There was an entire refrigerator case full to the brim with pitiful dog cakes. Most of their faces were deformed and anxiety stricken.

Shield your eyes now and peek through your fingers.


Come on now...listen to Miss Eartha..it's for your own good:







Oh, my gosh!





Oh, your gosh!





Oh, our gosh!



What fresh cake hell is this?! Okay, let's gather our wits about us and move on, shall we?

As you can imagine, I started freaking out, saying that I wanted to adopt them all and whimpering, "how can I pick just ONE??" (If you stick with me, you'll soon learn that I have this problem where I sometimes give feelings to anything that has a little face on it.) If I win the lottery, you'd better darned well believe that I'm going to have a warehouse kennel full of deep freezers holding thousands upon thousands of pitiful, homeless pound puppy puddle cakes! Luck be a lady..Someone needs to take care of these poor babies! I also plan to start a "Scared Straight" style program for those who work in grocery store bakery departments. Stop the mindless violence, people. Just take some Valium, get those icing hands steadied and make some HAPPY cakes!

In the end, I DID pick just one. This little scamp:



You would have picked him too, right? I mean. He still has two eyes AND a nose so he's the obvious choice.

And if you're like the Mister, you're going to ask me if that is someone's discarded gum at the corner of his mouth...No, you silly! That's his tongue! Yes, he's a really tragic cake but he's MY really tragic cake. And no, I can't eat his face. No matter how hard I try. Add his face to my estate sale legacy. If you come to the sale, it will be in the back of my freezer behind the ice pack and frozen green beans. Knowing that he'd probably taste disgusting (which he did), the Mister got a "back-up" cake and decorated it with an owl design which he described as, "I know...It looks like an angry cat but it's an owl." That silly. I knew that it was an owl. Or an angry cat. Either/or...it's cake and it's ridiculously cute:



So, that's how my 40th Birthday/Anniversary/Blog Birth Bonanza went down! It was such a great day and there were even more fun parts but I'd like to say thanks to Mr. Kitsch for indulging me and for being such a good egg. Thanks as well to my family and to my friends and to you all, some of you being brand new blog readers. You all made my day perfect!

I'll close this post with a photo of my lawn deer, Marlene Deertrich wearing my 40th birthday party hat made by a very special little girl. Sweet!




Oh, and if you haven't entered the drawing in my previous post, please do. Thanks, y'all!

Until next time...
x's and o's,
Eartha