Missouri weather and garden things

Every year I hear people around me talking about the strange Missouri weather; one day we're wearing shorts, the next day it's snowing.  All of us mention it, but we actually expect it, because it almost always goes that way in March and April.  We talk about our allergies.  Some folks think changing weather causes colds, but that isn't true.  The way you get a cold is from somebody else's germs.  However, allergies feel like a cold sometimes.

Already this spring has given us a couple of 80° days, but this week has highs in the fifties, and possibly 29° Sunday night.  If there's frost, I may not have any peaches this year, since the peach tree is in bloom now. 

All the seeds I planted will be able to stand some cold, and they are doing well.  I was really surprised to see the asparagus was coming up a few days ago, some as big around as my thumb!  I'm not supposed to harvest them for two more years, but if I'm still alive next year and still have half my mind left, you can bet I'll be eating some anyway.  I've never grown asparagus before.

All the radishes are up; about half of the spinach and pea seeds have germinated.  Oh yes, and all the onion sets are up.  In the past week I have carried many, many buckets of goat manure to the garden for fertilizer; I never imagined two tiny goats would give me so much poop!

The grass is green and growing from the few times we've had a little rain, and yesterday I tilled most of the rest of the garden to mix the fertilizer into the soil.  Thanks to the  tilling I've done, my fitbit tells me I made 12,538 steps, so there was no need for me to go for a walk yesterday.

The grandson had a couple of long dog leashes he wasn't using, the kind that lets dogs have plenty of space to run and yet they are tied up so they can't run away.  They are now goat leashes.  When both Arick and his wife are at work, their two dogs can be put up in their barn kennel and I can tie the goats out to eat grass.  They were tied out yesterday for more than an hour while I was tilling, and were eating all that time.

That's it for today.

Unique and Butch

Old men love old tractors.

That's the grandson trying it out.

Tuna Noodle Casserole

When I signed onto my blog this morning and saw the last post I made, the sight of that picture of the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook took me back to one of the simple recipes I used over and over, especially when I was working away from home all day: Tuna Noodle Casserole.  We all loved it, and I'll bet I made it almost once a week.

I should mention why I had that cookbook, though.  My sister had one.  I thought she was the best cook next to my mom and my Aunt Ruby that I knew, and I often saw that cookbook opened up on the counter when she was cooking or baking.  In later years, not so much; many of her later recipes were shared with her by others.  I'm pretty sure the cookies she makes for all her grandkids and great-grandchildren was a recipe her son's elementary teacher made for her students at some point.  Larry liked it so much, he brought home the recipe.  I have many of her recipe finds, including one she saw in the Kansas City Star on Dear Abby.  However, Abby put meringue on it.  My sister Maxine and I don't like meringue, so we put Cool Whip or whipped cream on it instead.  But I digress.

I just figured if Maxine used that cookbook, it should make me be as good a cook as she was.

Anyway:  Now that I've thought of it, I just have to make Tuna Noodle Casserole for dinner today.  It's frugal and easy, as long as you have some canned tuna in the house.  I have several of those Better Homes books from different years, and there are some variations in each.  I remember when I was working in the 80's, I often used a recipe that had me using Campbell Cream of Mushroom soup or Cheese soup for the sauce, so I could serve it quicker.

I asked Cliff how many years he thought it's been since I've made tuna noodle casserole; he had no idea.  I doubt I've made it since the last century ended, though. 

I can't wait.  I think we'll have peas with it.

Welcome to the once-a-week blog

Having not one thing of interest to talk about, I decided to show you what my daughter put on Facebook that made my day. 

Rachel Fierro is  feeling peaceful with Donna M. Wood.

Stsdoronpea90M7t2l16h1:t 43hMm7l iP8a49t1c90h0cramtm6  3394u  · 

When I was growing up, this was what the word "cookbook" meant to me. It never occurred to me that any others existed. When mom cooked, this was open on the counter.

I got mine out to make gumbo today and memories came flooding in. Mom's cookbook was dirtier than mine. Not because I'm a more tidy cook (ask Kevin) but because she cooked every day, multiple times a day. I bet she's had more than a dozen editions, too.

She didn't make the processed stuff that I have often served for convenience, she made food with real ingredients and real care. The ingredients were often even grown in her crazy-large garden.

Thanks for the love of cooking, mom.

----------------------------------------

One thing that made me smile was the several "likes" from some of her childhood friends from school, some of whom had eaten things I made at one time or other.

Unbeknownst to me, I was going to hear something a couple of days later that wouldn't be good news, so it was nice to have something like this to think about while I digest the bad news.  We took my dog Gabe to get his usual yearly appointment yesterday.  Our vet looked in his mouth to check his teeth and just happened to see something else in his mouth:  A melanoma.  

He said he wanted to remove it as soon as possible; there's a good chance that will be all he needs to live a long life.  I scheduled that.  I asked how much it would cost, and he said probably $250 to $300, which is doable for us.  I took the news pretty well yesterday, but this morning I woke up at 2 o'clock and realized that there's a chance I'll lose my almost eight-year-old Schnauzer to cancer.  I finally got out of bed an hour later.

He goes on walks with me.  If I would allow it, he would sit in the chair with me 24 hours a day.  If he lived to be twenty years old, it wouldn't be enough time to suit me.  If I pet one of my cats, I have to pet him at the same time, because he's so jealous of them.  

I just hope the vet gets it in time for me to have a few more years.

Gardening again

I am tired, but it feels good to know I have a good start in the garden.  The noon dinner dishes haven't been washed, and right now I don't know if I'll get to them until tomorrow.  Cliff has been working on the neighbor's tractor all day and finally got it started for the first time since he's had it.

I don't usually plant all my potatoes on St. Patrick's day; every year I mention here that my father sometimes planted some on St. Patrick's day, but planted more on Good Friday because that is always in the right moon sign for below ground crops.  I think most people just toss the whole seed potatoes in the ground; Cliff's sister used to live in Wisconsin and worked in the potato fields.  She said that's how they did it.  But I like to do certain things like my parents did in their garden because that's what keeps our elders alive in our life after they leave the earth.  It's the same when I'm cooking noodles (thanks, Mother) or cinnamon rolls (Hello, Grandma).  So I cut pieces of the potatoes, with two eyes in each piece like Mother did and put them in the row six inches down and twelve inches apart.  This year the seed potatoes were pretty big, so I did another one of my mother's tricks: I saved the parts of the potatoes that had no eyes to cook tomorrow, even though I had plenty on hand.

  My father believed in the moon signs, but not in the zodiac.  However, I googled it out of curiosity last Friday and saw that today happens to be a good day for below ground crops on all fronts:  the zodiac and the moon... and as a plus, it's also St. Patrick's day!  I don't really believe in the signs, but I did it just for fun.  If anyone is interested, you'll find the signs HERE.

The cats

I haven't mentioned the cats lately.  Butchie is still a loudmouth and wants me to let him let him in and out often.  I like to argue with him:  He meows loudly while sitting at the door, and I tell him "NO!"  Often he will give up and go take a nap on a chair, or on the seat of the stationary bike.  Actually, Unique is the one who first decided to nap on the bike, but Butch watched for awhile and decided to make it his bike.  Cliff often has to make them get off so he can ride.  

Both cats are getting better about not clawing furniture, and they seem to be learning they can only sleep on two different chairs.  They still want to play in both bathrooms, and try as I might, I don't always shut the bathroom doors.  Unique used to like to tear up the plastic liner in our tubs or play in the commode water, but she watched Butch and learned his favorite trick, which is to climb in the sink and take the little draining thing out, then take it to the kitchen and play with it.  As I was sitting here telling this story, Unique came to me carrying that thing.  It's a game to them, and they want me to know they've won again!

They still spend a lot of time in their back porch.  We have warm weather right now, and they like to climb up the cat tree to look out the window, which I am now keeping open for them.

Butch and my dog Gabe are fast friends now, and they wrestle almost every day at some point.  The dog doesn't bite, and the cat doesn't use his claws.  In the following video, they were wrestling on top of the heat register on a chilly day to see which one would get to warm up.

Oh, and one more thing:  It's time to start the garden.  I planted a few early vegetables yesterday.  Today I'll do some more tilling.

Look where the kids are now.

Shopping for groceries

The only things we do to get off our property are these:  going to one of our doctors, going to get groceries, and when Cliff takes me to church, two miles away; he takes me, then comes back to get me.  

We have a Costco card, but we only go there when we are already in the immediate area so Cliff can visit one of his doctors.  We don't buy much there, but it's an interesting place to go anyway, and they feed you along the way while you are shopping.  It's only a bite at each place, but I get to try things I never eat at home.

I do get excited when Price Chopper has meat of any kind on sale, though.  Today there's a three-day sale starting, and they have chicken breasts for $2.49 a pound.  I hope to bring home around 10 pounds, which I will divide and put in the freezer.  And there's butter for $2.99; they will allow me to buy three for that price, thank goodness, because I only have one pound of butter left, and I really want to make the oatmeal cookies my family loves, now that I have an oven that works properly.  I'm also out of eggs, and the cookies I make demand three.  Unfortunately, there will be no eggs on sale, but my family has gone without cookies too long.

These days Cliff  helps me shop; otherwise I will miss something on my list.  Two old heads are better than one.  We've always done most of our shopping at Walmart, and my dear husband really doesn't enjoy it, but he knows I need his help.  He is happy to be in Price Chopper, though; he thinks it's a "fancy" store, compared to Walmart.

I've been buying 80/20 ground beef at Price Chopper for a long time, but I have noticed lately there is water in it.  It tastes fine, I suppose, but when I see the water going up into the air as steam before I can see the 20-percent fat, I know that must be happening so they can sell me some water with my beef.  I'm thinking about going up the hill and getting all my ground beef at the local butcher shop, less than a mile down the road.  It costs  $6 a pound if you buy 10 1-pound-packages, but it is all beef with no water.  

The only other thing I have against Price Chopper is the smell of rotting fish.  They don't sell rotting fish, but they don't clean under the floor of the cooler that lets them show off their meat to customers.  I know this because Cliff once worked at a grocery store in the meat department for a short time.  When there wasn't anything else to do, he cleaned under that "floor"; he said the stink was unbelievable. 

Well, this is grocery day for me, and we'll be going to Price Chopper AND Walmart.  Wish us luck.    

I seldom worry these days

Well, here I am, no worse for the wear from talking about dementia.  I realize I have it, but I feel just like I always have, it's the same old me.  I do what I want to do and don't do what I don't want to do.  I talk to Jesus and take one day at a time.  At my age, I could die in my sleep any given night.  I could have a stroke or heart attack and maybe I'd get over it... but maybe not.

I live one day at a time just like all of us do.  If you are looking ahead at what terrible thing might happen, you will ruin the rest of your life.  Please don't pity me.  I am still enjoying my life on this earth.  This day is all we have.  So don't expect me to worry.  I might be gardening any day now.  I'm looking forward for the grass to grow so I can walk my goats out to the pasture to eat.

I have a devotional book I just love; there is a page for each day of the year, usually just one or two paragraphs.  It's astonishing how many times the words I see are exactly what I need.  The author always puts the scriptures at the bottom, so you know where her ideas come from.

The words for today were perfect.

 

Cooking with a worn-out brain

There are many methods of figuring out you have dementia, but there is a time when you realize it's true.  In my case, that time was in July when we had relatives here:  I was fixing dinner and suddenly didn't know what to do... about anything!  I'm being very careful about cooking these days, because I have a few times left a very important ingredient out of the recipe.  For instance, forgetting the bananas in banana bread.  

Every morning before Cliff, the dog, and the cats are awake, I go into another room, read a portion of the Bible, and pray.  I pray for Keith across the highway, who is in a wheelchair due to a stroke.  I pray for Janice, and her daughter who is probably in her sixties and has had several strokes and is in bed most of the day:  Imagine being a caretaker for a child of yours when you are 86 years old.  I pray for friends taking care of foster children, and pray for anyone else who is a good foster parent; so many of those children are broken vessels.  I couldn't do it!  When I'm done praying for others, I ask God to help me with my day, things like:  Help me that I don't make anybody sad today.  Help me in the kitchen, especially when I'm cooking, so I don't leave the oven on or forget to check the timer.  This morning I told him I was going to make a pumpkin pie, and asked Jesus to help me do it right.  Now, I'm not preaching to anyone here, or trying to sound "holy".  That's one reason I don't say a lot about my faith.  But I am not embarrassed to mention my walk with Him.

I went directly to the kitchen and made the crust, then started mixing the pie filling.  I consider pumpkin pie the easiest pie to make, because you just put all the ingredients in and stir them up.  (By the way, it took me three tries before I spelled "easiest" properly; that's why it takes me so long to do a blog entry any more.)

Yesterday I mentioned the eggs I got from the Amish last weekend and told Cliff I still had a few store-bought eggs to use before I used the good ones.  Cliff really likes fresh eggs, and asked if the yolks were a bright orange.  I told him we'd have bacon and eggs for breakfast and see!  All these eggs are very small, so instead of putting two eggs in the pie, I put two of the Amish eggs and the last one of the store eggs.  I put them in a cup, then thought, "I'll take a picture for Cliff, to let him see the difference."

And that's how easy it is for me to make a mistake when I'm cooking.  I put the pie in the oven and started the timer.  About three minutes later, my eyes landed on the cup with three eggs in it, and I felt like crying.  I had done it again!  Then I wondered if I could just pour it out of the crust, since it really hadn't started cooking; I knew it would be a messy situation, but I figured it shouldn't ruin anything too much... just the outside edge on half the pie.  

I got the ingredients out and started pouring everything back in the bowl, mixed in the eggs, and poured it all back into the crust.

And believe it or not, I said, "Thank You Jesus".

I'm baking again

The first morning after we brought my used kitchen stove home, I made biscuits.  The second day, we had meatloaf.  On the third day, I made cornbread to go with our pinto beans. 

This is the fourth day, and if I can make myself get out of my easy chair, I might make some raisin/oatmeal cookies.  

We have had some nice weather over the last week.  I took my walk four days, and might go again today; yesterday I walked almost two miles in the pasture.  I two days ago I went to the garden and started getting the trashy dead plants from last year piled up to burn or take away; it really felt good to be working in the garden.

By the way, the entry right before this this one was a repeat from 2010; apparently some of my readers thought it just happened, although at the top I said it was from 2010.  Sorry about the confusion.

Now I have to decide:  Shall I go walking, or should I make cookies that will cost me five bucks for the tiny eggs that were supposed to be large eggs, according to the words on the carton, and over a dollar and a half for the butter? 

Maybe we'll just eat those Oreos I got on sale last week.  

An entry from 2010

When my daughter was about four years old, she went through a time where she was having frequent nosebleeds; I don't really know why; perhaps because, like most little kids, she picked her nose.  Usually I'd have her lie down and be quiet, and the nosebleed would stop.

One day, though, the profuse bleeding would not stop, and I became worried; I called my mom and asked her to pick us up and take us to the local doctor, who had just opened up a clinic in Oak Grove.  Once Rachel and I were in an exam room, younger-than-me Doctor DeBlase came in, asked what the situation was, and rather gruffly showed me where to apply pressure to my daughter's nose (up around the bridge of her nose, I believe).  Then he stated, "Anyone can stop a child's nosebleed; it's not hard."

And he went on to another exam room to see another patient.

I sat there obediently holding on to Rachel's nose for at least forty-five minutes; when he finally returned, he said, "OK, you can stop.  It should be all right now."

  
As soon as I took my hand away, the nose started gushing again.  "Ha," I thought, "that's what you get for being so short with me."  He then cauterized a place inside my daughter's nose, which stopped the bleeding. 

 
Down through the years after that, there were various doctors we patronized, but I always remembered that young smart-aleck who had tried to brush me off.  
As old age approached and I realized I needed a regular family doctor, I went back to Oak Grove Medical Clinic, but I chose Dr. Deblase's partner as my physician.  No way was I going back to that punk who had been so rude to me thirty years earlier.  It never occurred to me that the man might simply have been having a bad day. 

 

Then my husband had a four-way heart bypass, and I said, "Cliff, I think you should use Dr. Deblase as your primary-care doctor now; he's had a heart attack himself, and I think that would make him more sensitive to your needs."

  
Oh my goodness, how glad I am that I came up with that idea, because Dr. Deblase was as sweet and caring a man as you would ever want to meet.  On our visits, we'd swap motorcycle stories:  the good doctor rode a Harley, we had our Honda.  He regaled us with stories of riding to Sturgis, and told us of times he shipped his bike to the west coast so he could ride out there.  His wife didn't really enjoy riding, he told us.

  
One time we were discussing Cliff's Lipitor (don't ever stop taking it, he said) and Doc talked about a new study that hinted at some possible new benefits of the drug; he looked at Cliff and said, smiling, "We're going to live forever!"

  
Unfortunately, he was wrong.  A couple of years ago, he woke up one morning and couldn't feel his legs. 

 
I never saw Dr. Deblase after he was diagnosed with brain cancer, but I inquired about him when Cliff and I visited the clinic; I could tell by the answers I was given that he was going downhill.  Yesterday Cliff was scanning through a two-week-old copy of The Odessan and saw the obituary; even though we had expected the news for some time, it hit us like a ton of bricks.  

I've spent some time reading the doctor's guest book; he left his mark on a lot of lives.  Dr. Joseph Deblase, you will be missed more than you'll ever know.  You were a prince among men.  Rest in peace.  

Another good day

We recently found out our car insurance we've had for many years was going to go up by $200, making us pay over $700 every six months.  Cliff hasn't had an accident for many years, and we don't go on long trips.  I googled a couple of things about car insurance and landed on a page that said, "Get an auto insurance quote." 

Cliff was outside in the shop, so I couldn't ask him it I should do it.  Finally I just decided to do it; the worst that can happen is I start getting a lot of phone calls for awhile.  

Thirty minutes later I got a call from a lady offering to see if State Farm could help us.  From what I told her about our insurance, she said she thought she could save us some money.  I told her to give me her phone number and I'd have my husband call her.  Then I went to the shop and told him about what she said.  When I mentioned she was from State Farm, he said, "My nephew Scotty's son sells State Farm insurance, so if I'm going to get that, I'll get it from him."

After our noon meal he made the call, and signed up over the phone.  We will save almost $200 every six months.  It's still a lot, but I'm happy.

I'm getting back to my walking now.  Starting back after the cold and snow was very painful, but this morning it has started getting easier.  Oh, and when I reached the spot where my cabin in the woods used to be, I saw an eagle flying over the riverbottom just north of our place, probably looking for a rabbit or mouse to eat.  I love seeing eagles.     

I have a working oven

This is an interesting story, at least to me.  

Cliff and I decided to look at places that sell used appliances, including Mr. Fixit, fifty miles away from our house.  None of those places we talked to had any kind of a gas stove, let alone a propane gas stove.  I would have been happy to buy a used one to save money.  I've also been watching for a kitchen range on Facebook Marketplace ever since mine bit the dust, and only saw one for propane.  The seller had just sold it before I got to her.  

The guy in Blue Springs, though, told me a story about Samsung stoves:  there is a class action lawsuit for that stove because of oven failure.  When Samsung noticed this, he said, they took away the warranty.  Also, he told me all the new appliances are junk, but I remember hearing that quite some time ago on the news.

So we went to Home Depot, where we buy all our junk appliances.  They only had one gas stove on the floor, so if you want to buy one, you can't really see it in person; you have to order it on their website.  There one they had was a very basic white stove, and it was cheap for a new one because evidently they wanted rid of it.  The cost was $499, plus $45 sales tax.  Then there is the gas to propane conversion kit at $29.  And because of my last stove failing after only four years, I added $135 to the total so if anything happened to it, they would have it fixed.  I did not feel good about it, but I WANTED AN OVEN!!!!!  They told me it would arrive on Monday.  I handed the guy my credit card, and we left after being told it would be at our house on Monday.  As we approached Oak Grove, Cliff suggested we eat at the Chinese place there.  It isn't my favorite Chinese place, so I suggested the Mexican place we never get tired of.

We hardly ever eat out any more, so I really enjoyed it.

At home, I still wasn't really happy about spending all that money.  For some reason, I got my computer and went to Facebook Marketplace. Lo and behold, the first thing I saw was a propane gas stove; they had been asking $150 but had just changed it to $100.  Now get this:  It was less than two miles from me, in my little town of Wellington!

I messaged her.  She and her husband were at work, but when she called to tell us they were home, Cliff and Arick went and got it.

First, though, I called Home Depot and told them to cancel our order.

It is a basic stove too, and hasn't always been treated well, so it's sort of like myself, because I'm just about as basic as anything gets.  But the seller told me the oven worked.  The first thing we did was make sure of that by putting a dial thermometer in the middle of it.  It got to 350° in no time.  This morning I made homemade biscuits (at 425°).  No problem. 

I think maybe Jesus was watching out for me yesterday.

Let the sunshine in!

It's 20° now, but we're heading up to 40.  Oh, how nice it will be as we see springtime highs before spring arrives.  Of course it won't last, but I intend to make the most of it.  

Last fall I didn't do much cleanup in the garden, so there is plenty I can do toward getting ready for planting on these nice days.

I am so proud of myself for finally figuring out how online grocery coupons work.  I've been missing a lot!  I sign on the Internet to my-Price-Chopper-dot-com page, see what they have, and click on the coupons I want to use.  A while back I got three two-pound boxes of Velveeta for either $3.99 or $4.99... I don't recall; and I could have gotten five of them!  I just don't have room to keep extra food around.  This week I brought home five 16-ounce packages of Oscar Mayer bacon for $2.99.  We don't always go to Price Chopper; our regular go-to is Walmart at Oak Grove, 15 miles away.  But when they have something we use, if it's a good buy, we drive on five miles.  Also, we go to Blue Springs pretty often, which is another five miles from Grain Valley.  Cliff's cardiologist is there, and his sister lives there.  So a trip to to Price Chopper isn't always a dead end.

Anyhow, if you are near a grocery store that uses online coupons, it may be worth the trouble of learning, even if you're as old as me.  I will admit I had a hard time of it, and came home with something that had a coupon that I forgot to click on, which means I paid the full price.  That's how we learn.  I get almost all of my meat from Price Chopper when it's on sale.  

I wish for all of you some great weather!

Well, what a surprise!

I have always wished I had a picture of my grandmother in her rocking chair, but I didn't take pictures inside her house, and I'm not sure anyone else did.  On holidays if the weather was nice, the whole family would go outside for pictures.  What a treasure it would have been if I had pictures of every blessed room.  I would have taken a picture of the upstairs room where she spent hours making beautiful quilts, and every one of the four rooms downstairs.

Grandma sat in that rocking chair to listen to her radio soap opera in the afternoon (One Man's Family), crocheting all kinds of pretty things as she listened.  On Sunday afternoons after church,  she sat there to write letters to friends and relatives.  One of my cousins has the rocking chair now, and she has it looking like new.  

My first blog was on AOL, but they were losing customers by 2004 and decided to drop all the blogs.  They did make a way, however, to move our AOL Blogs to Blogger.  Unfortunately, I had used AOL most of the time for any pictures I put on an entry, so the AOL photos were mostly gone, but a few remained that I had put on a different platform.  However, each word was still there, and that's really the most important thing.  By 2004, I was using both AOL and Blogspot, knowing that AOL might do away with their blogs.  However, I didn't put the same stories in both of them.  I had more stories back then!  

I always wished I had a picture of Grandma sitting in her rocking chair.  

I went to my first blog, My Country Life, to look for a picture I'm trying to find.  Instead, I saw a picture I had totally forgotten of Grandma in her rocking chair, holding me as an infant.  It wasn't in its place in her living room, though; nobody had flash bulbs in 1944, so I'm sure my father carried the chair out so the picture would have enough light to show our faces.

My parents married in 1932.  My mother had at least one miscarriage, and also one boy that was delivered dead, full term, choked in the last two weeks before he was born by the umbilical cord.  That was in 1938, the same year her father died.  She said the baby moved around like they all do before birth until the last two weeks, and she knew something was wrong.  For those of us who have had children alive and well, just imagine how terrible that would be.  I can't even imagine.

But here I am, on Grandma's lap, looking much like my mother did as a baby.  

 

Such lovely weather!

The temperature is 5° now at two o'clock P.M.  I went outside an hour ago and spent 20 minutes doing chores.  The goats didn't come to the water I carried out, but they were glad to see their hay.  They had a big drink yesterday afternoon, and I'll take their water early in the morning.  Believe me, they'll be glad to have a drink by then.

Gabe thought he needed to go outside mid-morning, so I put his sweater on him and fastened his leash; he peed about half an ounce and decided he wanted back in the house.  I took him with me when I did my chores, though, and he got down to business that time.

They say it's going to be zero tonight and seven below tomorrow night, but there are good news for the future:  We are expecting 60° Monday, and it appears like the rest of the month will be much warmer.  March will be coming in like a lamb, bless her heart, but if that happens they say she will go out like a lion.  Tornadoes, anyone?  

I'm hoping to get my glasses back at Costco this week.  I'm also thinking about getting another stove so I'll have an oven, but I'm not totally sure yet.  I've had enough money all along; I just hate to buy a stove after the oven of my current one stopped working after just four years.

It's snowing again now; how much fun can one woman have?  Originally the weather folks said we might get 8 inches, but I doubt that.

Mother Nature is mad at the world, I suppose. 

Mostly family stuff, and the picture Debby wanted.

 Who knows what stuff I'll put on my blog today?  Not me.

For baking, three tablespoons of mayonnaise equals one egg.  My mother-in-law often made chocolate mayonnaise cake, and it was a winner for all her children.  You can read the history of mayonnaise cake HERE. 

I shared my love of Grandma's house recently, so here are some pictures I've shared in other posts.  This is her house, as well as the smokehouse.  I took this picture from the road in front of her place in April, 1963.  All the cars are there because the whole extended Stevens family usually celebrated Easter at her house.

There I am in the middle, with my cousin Betty on the left and Royce on the right.  Behind us is the porch where Grandma kept her African Violets until winter, and that's where people entered and stepped up to the kitchen.  

 

Below is a video I made some time ago to tell the story of the music box my grandfather gave his wife early in their marriage.  I still have it, but the more it ages, the worse it looks.  My Aunt Ruby had it after Grandma died, and later gave it to me.  My children never knew my grandmother, so it means nothing to them.  I hope somebody in the Stevens family will be interested in it.  I have always loved it.  As a child, one of the first things I did when I went there was to listen to the three tunes on it.  

This is something Grandma created.  She did a lot of crocheting sitting in her rocking chair.  

Below are two Afghans Aunt Ruby made for me.  My favorite is the one on the right, and she made it from all the leftover skeins of yarn she had.

Here is Gabe after his grooming.  We don't do the fancy Schnauzer look because he's outside with me a lot, and the long hair on the feet and skirt just get dirty.  So he doesn't look as cute as the full Schnauzer cut would make him, but he'd be tracking in a lot more dirt into the house.  

And there you have it.

Pork chops

I have two Instant Pots:  a small one and a big one.  I really haven't used them much, except for beef roasts, and sometimes a Chinese sesame chicken item... which I'd love to have today if I have all the ingredients!

I know we eat more meat than is healthy, but at our ages we really don't pay much attention to healthy eating.  I buy whatever kind of meat is on sale, and we always have plenty of meat in our freezer.  I buy more 80/20 ground beef than anything, because I can make so many different things with it.  But a couple days ago I was wanted something different, and I dug out a package of six one-inch-thick, boneless pork chops.  I must have felt very brave when I bought it, because I've never been good at pork chops; they always turned out tough!  I tend to worry they won't be done so I cook them too long, knowing pork definitely needs to be cooked well.  Realizing I was going to have to use them sometime, I looked up Instant Pot recipes, found one that looked weird to me, but decided to try it.  I promised myself I would do it exactly as the recipe said, and was amazed at how good it was.  It's called The Best Damn Instant Pot Boneless Pork Chops!  

I only used three of the pork chops though, figuring I'd try a different recipe  for the other three the next day.  It was very good too, and very different from the other one.  The only thing about it was that that first recipe said to brine the chops, which I did.  It was fine for that recipe, but I brined all six of them and left the three I didn't use in the brine until the next day.  Well, let's just say the gravy was very salty.  I had never brined anything before, so what would I know!  The chops were fine, but if we put more than a tablespoon of gravy on our mashed potatoes, it was too much, although the grandson came over and ate with us and thought it was great.  

We are back in the single digits as far as the temperatures are going, so I'm reading a lot.  There's snow on the ground again, too.  We'll take the dog to Bed and Bones today for his haircut, but that's about all the excitement we can stand.

That's all, folks!

The bigger they are, the harder they fall.

Wow.  As a fairly new football fan, I had a strange feeling all day yesterday.  At church when someone asked about the Super Bowl game, I told them I had no idea who would win.  What I didn't mention was that I had a feeling they'd lose.  All day, Cliff and I hardly mentioned the game.  After it started turning out so awful right from the beginning, I went to bed at half time.  But first I told Cliff, "I had a feeling."  He said he, also, had that feeling all day.  

You know, sometimes if you get too high and mighty, you get a hard lesson.  Right before the game I the camera went to Patrick Mahomes; he was yawning and I wondered what that was about.  How could he yawn at a time like that?  And let's face it, the team hasn't had the best season.    

It's time for the fans of another team to have some fun.  I intend to always watch the Chiefs games, win or lose... although I might go to bed at half time a lot!  We've had a lot of fun since I started watching football with Cliff in 2020.  I feel sorry for the team, but they're all millionaires, while we live on our monthly social security .  I know the Chiefs aren't worrying about me!

Peace.

Thinking about the good old days

 Since the oven in my four-year-old Samsung isn't working, I can't make cookies.  Yesterday I was thinking about casseroles I make and realized I can't do many of those, either.  Maybe I could use a crock pot, but I'm thinking those recipes would come out of a slow cooker more wet than I would like.  I know I will eventually get another stove, I've just been putting it off as long as I can.  

We have bought cookies when we're shopping, but that isn't the same.  The grandson comes over, goes in the kitchen, sees store-bought cookies, and is disappointed.  He forgets my oven doesn't work.   

A few days ago I remembered something my mother gave me when she had baked a cake and made too much icing:  It's a simple thing that even a small child could do.  You take two graham crackers and make them a sandwich cookie by putting cake icing between them; you can eat them right then, but I seal them in a baggy or a plastic container with a tight-fitting lid for a few hours.  The graham crackers won't be as hard, which I think makes them better.  They are better than store cookies, but I doubt the grandson would eat them. 

Mentioning cookies makes me think about my grandmother.  Sometimes Cliff and I talk about our childhoods, and wonder if this generation could even stand to live the way we did as children.  No running water, and the only hot water we got was in the teakettle.  Going outside if you had to go to the toilet after dark, hoping there wasn't a snake or spiders in there.  

Sometimes if I'm lying in bed sleepless, I think about my grandma's little house in the country and, in my mind, I walk through her house like I did as a child: Through the front door to an enclosed porch with her African Violets sitting in the window in spring and summer; then two steps up into her kitchen.  I can see everything just as it was then:  The stove, the cabinets, everything in it.  I notice the gallon jar topped with a lid, in a window by the refrigerator.  It's full of sugar cookies, and I always ate several of them.

From the kitchen I go to the living room.  In winter there was a big stove taking up a lot of room; my uncles took it out in summer.  When I stayed at Grandma's house, I slept in a feather bed in one of the two downstairs bedrooms; Grandma Stevens slept in the other bedroom.  In my early years, she didn't have an indoor bathroom, but later on my uncles put a flush toilet in the bedroom I always slept in.  It was just there in a corner... no actual bathroom.  They did it for Grandma so she wouldn't have to go outside to the toilet any more.  Upstairs was where she quilted, and there was always a quilt in the frame being created.

I cherished that house.  My parents moved often, I can't even count the times; but my grandmother lived in the same house all of her married life.  Most of those years she was alone, because my grandfather died in 1938, I believe it was.  So I never knew him.  My mother and aunt thought he was a saint, but one of my cousins told me the three brothers had a different story.

Well, this may all be boring to others, but every time I "go to Grandma's house", it settles me down.  I could write a book about it, but it wouldn't be very exciting... just peaceful.  

I wish all of you had that happy kind of childhood, because many people didn't.  If you did, try going back to your favorite place at a time when you had no worries and re-live just a little of it.  Remember the cousins you played with and the holidays when the whole family gathered.

You will be surprised how much you recall.

It's the best meditation I know of.  

Goats

I've managed to get two good walks in after the snow all melted.  Today is supposed to bring us light rain at some point, and it isn't supposed to freeze.  Looks like it will be awhile before we get in the fifties and sixties again, but at least I haven't seen anything about snow.  Oops... I missed something here, because I saw some people on Facebook say the roads are slick in the city.

The lady I bought my goats from said if I want to, we can bring a billy goat over to breed both of my goats, so I'm taking her up on that.  She said I should have him here with my girls for 45 days, just to make sure he gets the job done.  The bad part of the deal is that billy goats stink so bad, and when they are breeding, they get that stink all over the girls by peeing on them.  Yuck.  You don't want to know!  I don't know of anything nastier that a male goat when he's romancing a lady goat.  I don't intend to breed them again, and I may not even keep the babies very long.  But it's fun to watch them play.  I'll give them away if I have to... goats are pretty plentiful around this area.  

That is, of course, if I even live and keep my sanity that long.  

Thelma only had one baby for her first pregnancy, but sometimes goats have two, three, or even four babies.  I sure don't want to buy hay for that many!  We have eaten goats before, but these little dwarf goats wouldn't even be big enough to eat when they're grown!

The Chiefs and the Eagles are down in Louisiana waiting for the Super Bowl.  I don't have any idea how it will go, but it should be a good game.

May the best team win!      

How I feel

Most folks know I do not care for our president.  Maybe you also know I do not care for Joe Biden.  For years, I've not been true to myself because I have been voting for the one who I think is the least dangerous.  I've decided that's like having to choose what kind of poison I'd like to have to kill myself, and I'm done with it.  I am betraying myself when I do that.

Just so you know, I used to be a Republican.  When I first became old enough to vote, I didn't realize it, but I was voting Republican because my parents did.  Later on I saw reasons why I was leaning to the right.  Over the years, with the left looking worse, I stayed on the right.

I don't like to take part in killing babies.  I don't try to convince other folks about that; it's their business.  They have the right to their opinion, and that's how they should feel about me.  I do remember telling two of my granddaughters long ago, "If you ever get an abortion, please don't tell me; I don't want to know."

I don't like people giving teenagers (or younger) a sex change.  Young people don't even know what they want.  I am not talking about gay people.  

Adults can do what they want with their own lives.  I may not like their choices, but that's their right.  They don't scare me and they have their right to live as they want to.  I just don't think I should honor them for simply breathing, but I will accept them.  I don't think anyone should treat a kind, good human being with hatred.  

I would like to have a president who is real and doesn't brag about how smart he is, one who wouldn't make fun of people and lie about everything.

If that's all I have, I'm not voting.

Here's something I've noticed:  When Trump first appeared on the scene, his followers were all trying to change those of us who didn't like him.  This time it's the Democrats doing all the talking.  I know they think they are saving the country, but it isn't that easy to change people's minds.  

This is an unusual thing for me to be talking about, and it's the last time I'm talking politics.  I know I have very nice people who won't agree; I just want you to know what I think, since I've already seen your views more than once and will likely keep reading them. 

Peace.