Instead of Coffee, Let's Have Dinner in Mitford

A Conversation over Sunday Dinner This Week

Welcome to dinner! I invite you to a unique virtual dinner party every week (usually).

This week’s Dinner theme is inspired by the At Home in Mitford Book Series by Jan Karon.

When I first started teaching I went with 2 friends to the Barnes and Noble in Indianapolis many times to meet authors. Jan Karon was one of them. I read almost the entire series and transported myself to this little town when doing so. Food is a large part of the story including the famous dessert we are having today!

So what’s going on?

This past week I was in Florida to help move my in-laws into a new community. My in-laws have a whole library in one of their spare rooms. As I was cleaning, I noticed the line of books with familiar spines. My MIL has a copy of the Mitford Companion that has little vignettes and recipes from the series as well as the complete set of books.

Welcome to the quintessential Mitford Menu

Our appetizer tonight is deviled eggs. Perfectly hard boiled eggs that have yolks that are creamy with a hint of mustard. Served cold of course.

My Bradbury Trio continues this week.

Here is some of what I read:

Generative Revision Essay

Woven [I come back to this braided essay often.]

Stories from Awayland by Ramona Ausubel

The daily Paris Review poem

I was able to complete 31 drafts for my story a day challenge and I am happy with most of them. They will be revised sometime in June and sent off. The act of combining 2 or more prompts for my writing worked so well I am continuing this practice!

I am signed up for some classes again. I participate in SmokeLong Summer which comes with prompts, feedback and workshops. [I have a workshop today even!] I am also signed up for a 5 week class in August with Sabrina Orah Mark. Her classes come with a reading list and I have already started on those book. One is Story of a Poem by Matthew Zapruder and I am loving it so far.

Our main course tonight is Fried Chicken with potato salad. We are also having green beans with crispy bacon and fluffy yeast rolls.

Cleaning out a house is a daunting task. There is trash to take out, there are heirlooms to save and preserve and there are things to sell because you just don’t need them anymore.

The topic of Swedish Death Cleaning came up several times over the last week among family. Here is an article if you would like to read more about the concept.

With 8 moves in 5 years, I have purged multiple times but always feel I can do more. I recently burned paperwork that I had to hold onto until then. It was a relief to get out from under it. I do need to do something about my clothes.

What area or objects in your house need the most attention?

For dessert and coffee, we are having the Mitford Famous Orange Marmalade Cake

You can find the recipe and step-by-step instructions at this blog.

I am planning an at home residency this month and have been making a list of tasks for myself. One of these is to create a personal revision checklist that I can refer to every time I sit down to work on a story. Number 1 is read aloud the story!

Other things that are happening?

I am having trouble with the Stripe account that is associated with me. If you would like to support my writing monetarily, I have a Venmo account. I have subscriptions paused for now.

Our Sunday breakfast ritual continues! It is an amazing time to share with my husband. I enjoyed my omelet today!

Questions? Let me know!

Thank you for coming to dinner ! I would love to have you attend next time as well!

Want to read my writing? Click here!

As always, thank you for reading all the way to the bottom of the post! Is there a dinner theme you would like to see? Let me know! A Scholastic Book Fair dinner is in the works.