A look back on 2014

2014 has been an interesting year for me. 

We had the coldest winter we've had in the Mid-Atlantic region for quite some time.  While our pipes never froze, our wood stove got a work out that it hasn't gotten in quite some time!

The Common Room at the Women's Retreat

The girls in my Girl Scout Troop all earned their Gold Awards.  (Girl Scouting's highest award)

I received an award for excellence in volunteerism and leadership.

The women of our church got away for a weekend and went on a retreat together - without our families or our husbands.

We visited a lot, and I mean A LOT of colleges with daughter!  I enjoyed every single school we visited.  The kind of funny thing is that when I was looking at colleges, I was told I had to remain in state.  So, I did.  Many years later, we are letting daughter look wherever she wants at colleges.  We have looked at schools up and down the East Coast.  Ironically, her final choices are in-state schools. 

I spent a day in February lobbying in Annapolis for legislation that would impact the victims of domestic violence.  While I'm glad that domestic violence is now in the national spotlight, I am saddened by the fact that the reason it came to the forefront was the very well publicized incident between Ray Rice and his wife.

I began a new job.  Since 2009, I had been substitute teaching.  I am a certified teacher, and I'd had hopes of being hired back as a classroom teacher.  After 5 years of substituting, I finally admitted to myself that I was not going to be hired.  I had finished my MLS in 2013, with the goal of being hired as a school library media specialist.  In January, I began putting my application out to libraries throughout Maryland.  In April, I began a job - as a librarian- in an academic library.  Not quite the path I had planned on taking, perhaps a less traveled path than the one I had planned on, but I am enjoying the job and the work!  It's a challenging place to work, and I definitely use my brain every single day I'm there!

This summer saw a unique opportunity for my daughter and I to spend some quality time together.  She is taking AP 2D art this year, and her concentration is photography. She had a long list of pictures that she needed to take before she went back to school in the fall. 

We traveled all over Maryland and Virginia, taking pictures and seeing the sites that we normally ignore.  I don't know that we'll ever have another opportunity like this one again, so I enjoyed every single moment of the time that we spent together.

Husband replaced the ceramic tile floor in our hallway with laminate.  He pulled out the huge, overgrown bushes in our front yard, and he diligently worked at cutting down all of the trees and branches that fell down under the weight of the snow last winter.  We ended up with a cord of wood.  Unfortunately, it's going to have to season, so we won't actually be able to burn it until next year.

There were some pretty horrible things that happened this year. 

My son's friend, Patrick, died at the age of 19 in an accident.  So full of promise, so full of life.  The pain that his family has gone through this holiday season has broken my heart.  You can talk to them all you want, and you can be there for them, but in the end, they've lost a child, and there's nothing that is going to make that better.  That hole is going to be there forever.



My mother had a brush with death.  Her colon ruptured - not once, but twice.  She had a massive tumor, just above her rectum.  The doctors put in a stoma.  (A place where the waste leaves the body.  It's on her stomach.)  The stoma failed (it rotted, and turned black - gangrene) and had to be replaced.  A battle with pneumonia, and one with c-diff, and another one with congestive heart failure made her stay in the hospital a constant adventure.  8 weeks later, she came home.  She's very weak, but we all feel that she is better off at home than in the hospital.  No new germs to be exposed to, and she's sleeping better in her own bed than she was in the hospital.  Thankfully, her insurance covers a nurse to come in and check on her several times a week.

GET A COLONOSCOPY!!!  All of this could have been avoided with a colonoscopy....  the tumor would still have been there, but it's possible it could have been caught when it was still a polyp, and if it had progressed to the tumor stage, the surgeries could have been handled laproscopically.

Oldest son had a friend named Shannon who died last week at the age of 23 from the flu.  She was a nurse, and engaged to be married this summer.  Another tragic loss.  The funeral is this afternoon.  Another young life, full of promise, gone.

Such is life.  Full of ups and downs.  Great joys and great sorrows.  Being able to share it somewhere has been a joy.  Knowing that there are people out there who find the time to come back and read what I write gives me great joy.  You'll never know what it means to me.  Thank you for journeying through this past year with me.

Hug your children tight.  Hug your parents tight.  Let the ones you love know you love them.  Tell them frequently and often.  Enjoy the moments and opportunities you have together. 

Best wishes to us all for a prosperous, happy, and joyous new year!

What to do with all that Ham

We had ham for Christmas dinner.  It was a big ham, and we've had some leftovers.

Besides sandwiches, what have we done with all of that ham?

Western Omelets
Cubed Ham
Diced Onions and Bell Peppers
Eggs
Dash of Milk
Shredded Cheddar Cheese

• Saute the ham, onions, and peppers.  When the onions turn translucent, remove from pan and set aside.  Keep the pan on the burner and keep the burner on.
• In a large bowl, crack the eggs (I use 2 for me), add a dash of milk, and whisk the eggs and milk together until light and fluffy.
• Spray the cooking pan with non-stick spray. 
• Slowly add the eggs to the pan.  Since the pan is already hot, the pan should "grab" the eggs as you add them and they should start to cook quickly.  Using a rubber spatula, pull up the edges of the eggs and allow the raw egg to flow into that portion of the pan.
• When the eggs have set, add the ham mixture and the cheese.  Very gently, fold the omelet in half as you slide the omelet out of the pan and onto a plate.

Stir Fry Rice
3 cups of rice, cooked
Diced Ham
Diced veggies - carrots, bell pepper, celery, onion, etc.
Soy Sauce

• In a skillet over med-high heat, add a chug of olive oil.
• Saute the ham and veggies in the oil until heated through.
• Add rice, stir constantly for 1 minute.
• Remove from heat, add soy sauce to taste.

Note- if you want, you can scramble an egg to add to your stir fry.  Do this first, remove the eggs, and then follow the rest of the directions.  Add the egg back in after you remove the skillet from the heat, but before you add the soy sauce.

Split Pea Soup
6 cups water
4 chicken bullion cubes
(see my recipe for bullion cubes here:http://mini-van-mom.blogspot.com/2013/06/blog-post.html)
2 cups split peas. dried
1 small onion, diced
1 carrot, diced
1 stalk of celery, diced
1 clove of garlic, minced
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp thyme
1 Bay leaf
1/2 tsp pepper
1 ham bone, make sure it's got meat on it.  If it doesn't have enough meat, chop up some leftover ham and add it.

• In the slow cooker, add all of the ingredients listed above.  Add the split peas, and make sure that the ham bone is snuggled down in the beans.  If the water does not completely cover the soup with two inches to spare, add more water.  For every extra cup of water, add another bullion cube.
• Cover and cook on low for 6 hours.
•  Stir well before serving.

There are those awkward ends and chunks of ham that are too small for sandwiches.  What to do with those?  I diced a lot of ham and froze it in one cup servings in sandwich bags.  1 cup is a perfect size to add to most recipes.  The end of the ham, I chopped in half with the help of a butcher knife.  The ends have been frozen and added to the "stuff" for future soups.  I have bones, ends of meat, etc, that I save in vacuum sealed bags in the freezer.  I label the outside of the bag, because while it's easy to tell what kind of bones I have from the outside, it's very difficult to tell what the contents are when I pull out a frozen mass.  Chicken bones?  Beef Bones?  Two soups I approach very differently!  I actually have a section of my freezer set aside for soup "stuff'.  You know that basket that sits across the top of a chest freezer?  That's where I keep my soup stuff.

With just a little pre-planning, you can set yourself up to have things on hand in your freezer that will save you time and money down the line.  Even though you might have to remember to pull stuff out the night before, it's well worth the effort!

What did you do with your leftovers from Christmas?

This Year's Flu Strain

The flu seems to be hitting our area very hard this month.  It's a strain that is not covered by this year's flu vaccine- so if you did have the shot, don't assume you are covered, you are not.  The disturbing thing about this strain of flu is how quickly it is turning to pneumonia and killing people.

A young friend of ours, age 23,was admitted to the hospital Christmas morning. She had spiked  a fever and had a cough that she thought was "wrong".  (She was a nurse.)  She died Friday night.  Keep in mind, she first began presenting symptoms Christmas Eve around noon.  Shannon was the picture of health, a runner through high school and college.  She was a fantastic young lady who had dreams of going places, doing things, and changing the world.

I heard that last night, our hospital was so full of people with the flu who were having trouble breathing, that the wait time to be seen was 9 hours.

This year's strain is a killer, and it is our responsibility to stop the spread of this flu in it's tracks.

Signs of the Flu

• A fever of 100* or higher, and feeling feverish.  (not everyone with the flu has a fever)
• A cough and/or sore throat.
• A runny or stuffy nose.
• Headaches and/or body aches.
• Chills
• Fatigue
• Nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea.

Symptoms of the flu are more intense than those of a cold.

When Should You Visit the Emergency Room

Seek medical attention immediately if you experience any of the following:

• Difficulty breathing or shortness of breath
• Purple or blue discoloration of the lips
• Pain or pressure in the chest or abdomen
• Sudden dizziness
• Confusion
• Severe or persistent vomiting
• Seizures
• Flu-like symptoms that improve but then return with fever and worse cough

Source for the above information: http://www.flu.gov/symptoms-treatment/symptoms/

Treating the Flu

STAY HOME

Don't go to work.  Don't go to school.  Don't go run errands, or go to the grocery store.  STAY HOME so that you don't spread this!  If you really need groceries, most grocery stores now offer home delivery.  If you need a pick up from the pharmacy, call a friend to pick it up for you and have them drop it on your porch for you.  Some pharmacies offer a drive-through pharmacy.  You can still pick up your meds, but you don't have to go into the store and risk picking up a secondary infection while your own defenses are down, or infecting other people.


Keep in mind, the flu is a viral infection, not a bacterial infection.  As a result, antibiotics will not work against the flu.  Tamiflu does work, but it must be taken within the first 48 hours of the onset of the flu.  Even then, you have to be able to find a pharmacy with Tamiflu in stock.  From what I heard yesterday, all of our pharmacies were OUT of Tamiflu.

You can treat flu symptoms without medication by:

• Getting plenty of rest
• Drinking clear fluids like water, broth, sports drinks, or electrolyte beverages to prevent becoming dehydrated
• Placing a cool, damp washcloth on your forehead, arms, and legs to reduce discomfort associated with a fever
• Putting a humidifier in your room to make breathing easier
• Gargling salt water (1:1 ratio warm water to salt) to soothe a sore throat
• Covering up with a warm blanket to calm chills

Source: http://www.flu.gov/symptoms-treatment/treatment/

Prevention

WASH YOUR HANDS.  Every time you pass a sink, wash your hands.

DON'T TOUCH YOUR FACE.  Even if you did just wash your hands, don't touch your face.  The mucus membranes around your eyes and nose are a prime entry point for germs.

Be careful when touching shared surfaces.  Use a paper towel to open bathroom doors after you wash your hands.  Wipe down shared keyboards.

At the grocery store.  Yep, I wipe down my cart handles, and I pack my own groceries in my bags.  However, I also wear gloves when I shop during flu season.  Yes, it looks a little odd.  They're the magic stretchy gloves that I picked up at the store end of season several years ago.  I wear them in the store, remove them when I get in the car, and wash them when I get home.  I am a germophobe.

Sleep.  Stick to your normal sleep schedule.  Make sure you are getting 8 hours of sleep a night, and go to bed and wake up at the same time each day.

Cover your mouth when you sneeze.  Have you seen the vampire sneeze?  You sneeze into your elbow.  If you use a Kleenex, throw it away as soon as you finish blowing your nose or catching your sneeze.

Stay hydrated.  Your body is a well oiled machine, but only when you keep the fluids topped off!

Exercise.  Okay, this time of year, people head to the gym.  But stop a minute and think about it - if the flu and other viruses thrive in enclosed places, the gym might not be the place to go.  If you can, get outside and get some exercise.

Cover your mouth when you cough.  Again, the vampire cover.  If you don't have a tissue handy, use the crook of your arm to cover your cough.  Those tiny little droplets are filled with germs, and they travel a very long distance before they stop.

Source: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/protect/stopgerms.htm


My friends, stay healthy out there.  Do what you can to stop the spread of this strain of the flu.  If we all work together, we can stop this killer in it's tracks.

Merry Christmas!

Poinsettias in the library!

Beautiful angel sitting outside of the church sanctuary. Hark!  I hear the angels sing!

Music from our cantata. This is from my favorite song!

My mom has given me these ornaments over the years.  They are from the White House Historical Society. The barn that they are sitting in is made from wood salvaged from the barn on the family farm. 

The Christ Candle is lit!! Christ is born!

It's our Christmas tree!  There's a cat hiding under that tree, surrounded by boxes. 

Resolutions

I will be posting sporadically for the rest of this year.  My kids are home, we've got stuff going with family and friends, and I still need to get the last of the baking done.  Keeping that thought in mind, I wanted to take one last look at my resolutions for 2014.  All in all, I am pleased with the job I have done keeping my promises to myself.  I'll set another round of goals in 2015.  Keeping track of my goals publicly has done a fantastic job of keeping me honest over this past year!  I am wondering what great things I'll be able to tackle next year!

1) 365 Grateful.
2013 was a very stressful year for our family.  I finished graduate school, middle child graduated from college, and DH was in an accident that totaled our car. I had an abnormal mammogram screening, and there were the consultations that surrounded that mammogram.  We still have not replaced that car yet.  That is on the MUST DO list for next year!  At the end of last year, I found myself stressed out about the things that had happened, and the what might have happeneds.  I made a vow to myself to focus on the good, and the positive, and work to find that happy place - even in the midst of tribulations.  It was worth every minute.  While this year has been no less stressful than last, I have found myself searching for the positives in some pretty heinous situations in order to keep myself sane.  Negative: Mother has a colon rupture not once, but twice?  Postive: She's still here.
Negative: It took me a year to find a job after I finished grad. school, and that was only a part time job, with no benefits.  Positive:  It's a job in my field, and I'm gaining some pretty concrete skills.

2) Lose 10 pounds
I lost the original 10, and lost 12 more, for a total of 22 pounds.  For right now, I am attempting to keep those 22 pounds OFF for the holidays.  That is some serious progress!  I can't wait for the results of my blood work to come back after my check up next month!

3) Run/Walk
This was a massive fail.  I am walking, but not a lot.  Running never happened.  I will not cut this goal out next year, but I will find a way to make this goal attainable!

4) Get out of Debt
Working on it.  I even set up a fancy new spreadsheet over this past month that has helped me tremendously.  I now know where my money suckers are coming from! 

5) Finish Cleaning Out the Basement.  BWah-Ha-Ha.  I should just bring a dumpster in and dump it all.  I sent a van load full of stuff to the White Elephant sale at the church, another to Goodwill, and still another to the dump.  I also burned out the motor on my shredder.  I'm going to have to get a new shredder so I can keep going!

6) Finish Oldest Child's Quilt.  The top is finished.  I added a border to it in order to make it long enough to fit him - all 6 feet some inches of him.  I pieced out the back, and purchased the batting to go inside.  I am going to have to find a big space of floor somewhere to pin it all together soon.  I still don't think I'm going to finish this before Christmas. It would take a miracle.  Update: this quilt is currently folded away, in a bag in my closet.  I'll get back to it after the holidays.  I still need to add batting to it, and I need to pin it.  For that, I need a lot of space.  Like a church floor.  I won't have that kind of space available until after New Years.

7)  Spend More Time With my Family
With 2 kids in college, and a Senior in high school, finding time to do this is a priority.

8) Finish that Book I Keep Saying I'm Going to Write.
Done!  I began working on this in 2008, when I was still working in the public library!  Building Blocks for School Success has been released on my Lulu author site.  You can find it here:  http://tinyurl.com/l76245p.  Wow... it was a thought I had one afternoon while working the public information desk in the children's section.  Who would have thought it would take this long to research it?  The first time I finished it, Common Core was introduced, and I needed to go back and revise way more than I care to acknowledge.

9) Finish The Hallway Bathroom.  Okay, this is a post for another day.  I've found the money suckers.  I'm beginning to save money.  It makes me wonder what's going to break next?  Update:  it's been a month since I wrote this post.  Nothing has broken yet.  I'm beginning to get very concerned.

10) Get Back into my Music.  Have done.  I sing Alto, but NO SOLOS!  (Ha... I sing solo no one can hear me! hahaha!   Alto joke...)  Our church has been advertising for a flute choir. I haven't touched my flute since I was in high school.  I've been debating whether or not to even try and join.  They've set the lower age limit at 10.  I wonder what the number of years without practice will be set to?

How have you done with your resolutions over the course of 2014?   Are you ready to join me in setting and KEEPING some resolutions in 2015?

Cash vs. Plastic

Last year, three of our credit cards were compromised by various data breaches.  One was compromised twice.

As a result of this, husband and  I decided that we were going to switch to paying everything we possibly could by cash.  It's been an eye opening experience in keeping us well within our budget. 

With our credit cards, we were able to charge when we didn't have the cash on hand.  If we couldn't pay the entire balance, that was fine.  We could carry it over to the next month, and with a fee, we could pay it off later.  Unfortunately, we were tending to let that amount that we carried over from month to month grown a little bigger each month. 

That's the danger of credit cards.  Easy money, and no immediate consequences.  Sure, the bills keep getting a little higher each month, but bottom line, they allow you to fudge your finances.

With the coming of the data breaches, we had a wake up call.  Our accounts were frozen while everything was worked out, and we were forced to switch to paying cash.  We'd been working towards it for a while, but then once the accounts were frozen, HEY, we had no choice anymore.

Our cards continued to accrue interest while they were frozen, though.  And the balances still needed to be paid off.

Meanwhile, we were attempting to pay cash for everything.  It's a rough switch when you go from paying credit for gas in the van to having $40 in cash to fill the van, and that might not be enough to get you back and forth to work every day during the week.  (So thankful gas prices have gone down this past month!)

So, yeah, we had frugal economies shoved down our throat a little faster than we wanted.  We had been working towards it for a while, but now we HAD to do it.

Eventually, we did work out the issues with the credit card companies.  They deleted all of the disputed charges, and sent us new credit cards.

New cards, that we could immediately start charging on - even though there were still outstanding balances on the other cards that had to be paid.

We talked it over and decided we weren't going to be sucked into the entire credit card scam again.

We've continued paying cash for everything since then.

It's been an interesting experience in cash handling & budgeting.

All of our Christmas presents were paid for with cash this year.  We set a budget and stuck to it.  I've been buying items since the beginning of November.  Several clerks in several stores have looked blankly at the cash I've handed them and asked me "What is this?"  When I reply "cash", they have had to call their store manager.  In one particularly memorable store, the manager asked if I could please pay with a credit card.  I replied no, I would not, and told her that I no longer wanted the merchandise and they could void the sale.  They then agreed to accept my cash, but I had to wait for the manager to get the change out of the safe in the office.

I've also had to teach several clerks how to count change.  It's becoming a lost art.  Because we have become so dependent upon credit transactions, many in our younger generation do not have a clue how to count change.

In the meantime, living within the very tight budget that we set after the last credit card breach, we've slowly gotten more of a cash flow- actual cash- than we've had in quite some time.  The first few weeks, we were lucky if we had $20 left over at the end of the pay cycle.  We ate a lot of soups, and a lot of beans, and cooked very creatively in order to cut our grocery bill back to the bone and free up more cash.  I honestly think we're healthier now that we're living lower on the food chain.  I'll find out for certain when I go in for my check up early next year.

Cash vs. Credit.  Living well within your means vs. living on borrowed time.

I'm a convert to the cash lifestyle.   
 

I Love Clifford, the Big Red Dog!

source: http://tinyurl.com/npc4nhu

 

 

I love Clifford.  I grew up with the Clifford books.  Emily Elizabeth was one of my favorite characters, and I loved the gentle world of Clifford and Emily, where problems were presented and solved with some thought and a little humor. Through first, second, and third grade, I would purchase a Clifford Book every time the Scholastic Book orders came home with the option for a new Clifford Book.

Eventually, I grew up and had children of my own.

When I was pregnant with my oldest child, I was teaching.  One of the Scholastic orders came through with the option of purchasing Clifford.  Clifford was the first thing that I purchased for my as yet unborn baby.  When we has just a tiny little thing, Clifford sat in his crib, watching over him.  The stuffed dog wasn't that big, but he was just about the same size as my tiny little newborn.  I have a couple of pictures of him with that stuffed dog that I am going to have to dig out and post on here. 

As the next two children came along, Clifford became one of our favorite sets of storybooks.  I could count on Clifford as a great story that would captivate their interest and keep them interested in the story.  The Clifford books were among the first books that they all read independently.

In 2000, something magical happened.  Clifford, the Big Red Dog became an addition to the PBS Kids line up.  I hadn't let my kids watch television up until this time, but... this was Clifford!  Voiced by the incomparable John Ritter, Clifford came to life in our living room every morning, sharing lessons about friendship, love, and problem solving.  Oh, how we loved Clifford, the Big Red Dog!!!

Eventually, we left Clifford behind.  And yet, my oldest still keeps his Clifford tucked into his dresser drawer.  I walked into the living room over Thanksgiving to find my kids - ages 17, 19, and 21, watching Clifford, singing along with the theme song, and reminiscing about the time they spent looking at maps, attempting to identify the mysterious Birdwell Island.

Norman Bridwell, and his characters, had a huge impact on me, my children, and countless others around the world.

He passed away last weekend at the age of 86 on Martha's Vineyard.

I will miss you and your characters, Norman Bridwell.  You had such a gentle way of teaching our kids about the world around us.  I hope that your life was truly as gentle as the one you portrayed in your books!

Christmas Presents

We work very hard not to go overboard on the Christmas presents at our house.   Christmas is about the birth of Christ, not the lining of the pockets of various large corporations.

To this end, our goal has always been to have Christmas week together, as a family, spending that most precious gift of all - TIME.

We go to church and have our big Christmas Dinner on Christmas Eve.

We make at least one present for each person.

Anything we buy, we buy from a small local business.  I have fewer problems supporting our locally owned businesses than I do with, say, Wal-Mart.

We spend a lot of time together.

We go into Washington DC to visit the museums, the Kennedy Center (for the free performances), and visit the national tree after dark.

(We come home exhausted, too.)

We play very long games of Monopoly, and Spades, and Uno.

We plan a movie marathon.  (This year, it will be the Hobbit movies before we go see the Battle of the Five Armies in the theater.)

We laugh a lot.

We spend time with extended family.  Maybe not on Christmas Day, but sometime between now and New Year's Day, we will spend time with all of our extended local family.

We drive around and look at Christmas Lights.

This year, I splurged and bought tickets for a play over break.  It will be a great chance to get dressed up, head into the city, and spend time supporting the arts. We're meeting up with friends while we're there, and we are going to go out together for dinner after.

Our kids will still get presents.  There's a pile under the tree, consisting of books, clothes, and kitchen stuff for the kid who will be moving out into his own apartment this year.

But the memories of the time spent together.  NOTHING can replace that!

An Ode to the Tree

Bright, shiny, filled with light.

Toys dangle enticingly.

Claws sharpened against a rough trunk.

Branches climbed, the behemouth conquered.

Surrounded by boxes, ribbons and string.

Playthings for paw, tooth, and claw.

Surrounded by family,

Center of all.

My tree is my fortress, desire, and delight.

                                                  -Luna the Cat

Saltine Cracker Candy

I first found and fell in love with this recipe back in 1996.  There was an event at one of the preschools in the area entitled "A Taste of St. Johns".  Every year, the preschool parents assembled a cookbook.  One day a year, they would make every single recipe in the cookbook.  On the day of the event, you went to St. Johns, and in exchange for your ticket, you received a copy of that year's cookbook, a pen, a paper plate, a fork, and admission to the tasting event.  Every single dish in the cookbook was out on tables, in warming dishes, and on plates throughout the hall.  Slowly but surely, you'd wind your way in order through the tables, taking a bite here and there of the dishes throughout the hall.  The more motivated people would make detailed notes in their cookbooks, detailing how the dish tasted.

I just went for the food.

However, in 1996, I ran across this fantastic recipe for saltine cracker candy.  It was delicious.  It was addictive.  It was so memorable.

This was the first and only time I ever actually opened up the cookbook in the hall and made notes.  My note was simple:  LOVE THIS.

The recipe was super easy, requiring minimal ingredients and time.  Over the years since then, this has become my go-to dish when I need to take a desert in a hurry.  Last night was the art show at the high school, and the art parents were asked to provide snacks.  3 hours before the scheduled start time, I began this recipe.  I did have to stick it in the refrigerator to set the chocolate, and I was breaking up the candy 20 minutes before we left the house, but breaking up the candy was quick and easy.

You can find this recipe anywhere online.  This is my version.  

Saltine Cracker Candy:

Saltine Crackers
1 small bag semi-sweet chocolate chips.  
(Or 1 big bag, if you are like me and end up eating half of the chips before they actually make it onto the finished product.)
1 stick of butter
1 cup of brown sugar  (light or dark, doesn't matter, use what you have on hand.)
1 cup pecans, chopped  (optional)

Pre-Heat oven to 350*
Line a 13 x 9 cookie sheet with aluminum foil.  Spray with cooking spray.

Lay saltines out on the cookie sheet.  Snug them up, side by side, to get as many crackers on as possible.

In a saucepan, melt butter and brown sugar together, stirring constantly.

When the mixture reaches a boil, continue to stir for 3 minutes.

Immediately remove from heat and pour over the cracker mixture.  Use a rubber spatula to spread evenly out to the edges.

Bake tray in the oven for 5 minutes.  (Keep an eye on this part... the butter can burn easily.)

Remove pan from oven, let sit for about a minute (maybe 2). 

Spread the chocolate chips evenly across the surface of the saltines.  As they begin to melt, use a rubber spatula to evenly spread out the chocolate.

While the chocolate is still warm and melty, evenly spread the chopped nuts over top.

Put the entire kit and kaboodle in the refrigerator for 30 minutes so that everything will set.

To serve:
Pull the foil away from the cracker mass.
Use your hands to break the crackers into smaller pieces.
Serve. 

Variation:
I make this with gluten free crackers.  Just as good as the wheat filled version.

Daughter is allergic to dairy, so I make her batch with soy/dairy free chocolate chips and vegan butter.  The cook times are the same, but the "butter" did look a little different than full dairy butter looks.  According to her, everything tastes amazing!

Quinoa Pilaf / Quick and Easy Meals for College Students

I noticed I had only finished 4 of the 5 "Quick and Easy Meals for College Students" series that I was writing.  These are recipes I taught to my oldest son over the summer.  He wanted to add some variety and nutrition to his meals.

This is a Quinoa based meal.  Quinoa is a high quality protein, complete with all 8 essential amino acids.  It's also an ancient grain.  It's also gluten free.  Quinoa itself comes from South America.   BONUS- it's very easy to cook.

I want to start with a side note on Quinoa.  I've read differing reviews on whether or not to rinse quinoa.  I've cooked it both ways- rinsed and unrinsed, and I prefer the taste of rinsed Quinoa.  To this end, I have a fine mesh strainer that I found at a yard sale.  Quinoa is such a tiny grain that if you attempt to wash it in a regular strainer, it will fall through.  (Sad experience on my part.)  This fine mesh strainer that I picked up holds 1/3 of a cup of Quinoa and lets me give it a quick rinse.  I have seen fine mesh strainers in the kitchen area of stores.

With this particular recipe, I also pick up a container of the pre-cooked veggies at the grocery store.  They are diced finer than anything I can dice, and contain peppers and onions.  Our grocery store calls it the fritata blend.

Quinoa Pilaf:
1 cup Quinoa, uncooked
1 small box fritata blend veggies
1 1/2 cups water
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
1 cinnamon stick
1 bay leaf
1/2 cup dried cranberries

In a deep skillet, brown the veggies in olive oil. (stir frequently)  When the onions look translucent, add Quinoa and toast for 1 minute.  Quickly add the water.  Bring the water to a boil, stirring ingredients frequently.  Add the cinnamon stick and bay leaf, cover and lower the temperature to med-low.

Cook covered, stirring occasionally for 20 minutes.

Remove from heat, stir in sunflower seeds and cranberries.  Let sit for 5 minutes, remove cinnamon stick and bay leaf, stir and eat.

*Note: pecans, almonds, walnuts, or pine nuts can be used in place of the sunflower seeds.  If using any of these heartier nuts, you are going to add them to the skillet with the Quinoa at the beginning and toast them. 

Even with the added cost of the pre-cut veggies, this meal still comes in under $5, and it will serve one hungry college student about 2 meals.  (Depending upon the size of their appetite.)

This House

*This is another post from my old blog.  We spent the weekend working on the basement, and we were reminiscing about the time we pulled the freezer out of the basement.  This post originally ran on  Jan. 7, 2010. We bought our house from our in-laws in 2008.  When they moved out, they didn't clean out. We've been working on it ever since...

Cleaning out the basement in our house has proved to be a greater challenge than we were anticipating.

Once we finally got up the nerve to go into the basement, we wanted to run back upstairs again, screaming for our very lives!  Armed with trash bags, rubber gloves, and dust masks, we went down and began sifting through the piles of stuff in the basement.  The mind-numbing job of cleaning out the basement blurs in my mind.  There is one particular episode that stands out very clear.

The basement had turned into a repository of dead and unused appliances.  As we cleared out the trash, we were stunned at what we found underneath.  One freezer, circa. 1959.  One free standing stove, circa. 1962.  Two concrete sinks- you know, the laundry tub kind that your washing machine drain into.  The sinks were broken, but they were still in the basement.  Two old microwaves: One from 1978, and another from 1988.  One old stereo, four old speakers, and two old, broken television sets.  And three dehumidifiers. Somehow, these appliances needed to get out of our basement.
We borrowed a heavy-duty hand truck from my brother-in-law, and we borrowed a pick up truck from a friend.  My husband took a Friday off work, and we were ready to run to the dump.
The first things we hauled out were easy.  The microwaves, the dehumidifiers, the televisions, and the old stereos.  We had no problems hauling them out of the basement and out to the truck.  We loaded up our first load and hauled it off to the dump.

The large items in our basement presented more of a challenge.  The stove and the freezer.  Due to the odd turn at the top and bottom of the interior stairs, we could not take them up through the house.  We were going to have to use the walk-up from the basement.  It's a tight turn from the door up the stairs, but the basement door opens towards the concrete wall, so we thought we could get everything out through that door.  Husband managed to get the stove out and up the stairs with minimal help.  My job was to stand at ground level and hold the storm door on the basement open from above while he attempted to get the stove out and turned up the stairs.

And then came the big challenge.  The freezer.  That monster was heavy.  Much heavier than what we were anticipating.  We attempted to move it towards the door, but it was too heavy.  Husband pulled out the tool box and took the door off the freezer and hauled it out to the truck.

The freezer was still heavy, but with the two of us- we managed to get it onto the hand cart.  John took one handle of the cart, and I took the other and we carefully moved it over to the door.

Now, there's a problem we hadn't anticipated with the back door.  The door does not open all of the way.  When my in-laws finished the basement, they put a wall next to the basement door.  The interior door only opens up 90* from it's closed position.  It doesn't open all the way.  Try as we might, we could not get the freezer through that door.

We looked at each other, aghast.  Were we going to have to chop the freezer into tiny bits with the sledge hammer in order to get it out of the basement?  As we sat on the floor and pondered our options, we looked again at the door opening and the freezer.  It looked like we could get the freezer door through if we pulled the door off the hinges.  So, husband pulled out his tools and we took the basement door off the hinges and set it aside.

Once again, we wiggled and waggled the freezer, trying to figure out the magic angle to get it through the doorway.  No matter how we worked it, we could not get the freezer through that door.  It kept catching on the freezer hinges that had previously held the door.  Muttering unmentionable things under his breath, husband took the sledge hammer to the hinges on the freezer and pounded them into submission.  After 10 minutes, both hinges were pounded flat against the surface of the freezer.
Before we decided to attempt moving the freezer again, we took a good, hard look at the storm door.  It did not look as if we were going to be able to pull the freezer out of the basement without doing serious damage to the storm door.  Our biggest fear was that if we dropped the freezer while we were hauling it up the stairs, it would go hurtling down the steps and destroy the storm door.  Once again, out came the tool box and husband took the storm door off the hinges and gently set it inside, next to the door.

Muttering silently, we managed to pull the freezer out of the basement and turn it so that it was ready to be pulled up the stairs.

Heaven help us-- we were not prepared for the weight of that freezer.  I'm not certain how much it weighed, but I am willing to say it weighed at least 300 pounds.  It took two of us to pull that freezer up the basement steps.  We tilted the hand cart back until it would go back no more.  And then, we pulled it up a step.  Panting, we looked at each other.

"What do we do next?"  I asked.

"Slowly"  husband said, looking at the freezer and back at the 12 steps we still needed to haul the freezer up.  "Shift yourself up a step.  I'll hold the freezer while you move.  Then you hold the freezer and I'll shift up a step."

We moved ourselves around and then, on the count of three, we pulled the freezer up the next step.  We continued on in this slow and painful manner until, two hours later we finally pulled the freezer up the last step and onto the level ground.  Too tired to even talk to each other, we pulled the freezer over to the truck and stopped dead.

We were going to have to lift that freezer over 2 feet at once to get it into the bed of the truck.

"I've got an idea" said husband.  We live on the top of a hill, and the driveway slopes down steeply from the carport to street level.  Husband had the truck backed up the driveway.  He pulled the car part way down the driveway, until the back of the truck was only a little above the carport.  He then found a heavy duty piece of wood that he used as a ramp to cover the short distance from the carport pad to the truck bed.  We pulled the freezer up into the bed of the truck with minimal effort and tied it tightly down to the bed of the truck.  He left the freezer on the hand cart, and put blocks under the wheels of the cart.

Once we got to the dump, we used the same board to make a ramp from the truck bed to the ground, untied the freezer and pulled it down the ramp.  When the freezer was halfway down the ramp, the wood splintered, and the freezer came crashing down to the ground. 

At that point, the staff took pity on us.  They took charge of the freezer and the splintered wooden ramp.  We put the remains of the hand truck in the back and headed back home.

But what about the basement doors?  We so desperately wanted that freezer out of our lives that we left the house with the basement doors sitting in the middle of the basement!

Virtual House Cleaning

I have a lot of pictures that I have stored online.

I'd like to tell you that I organized them all when they were uploaded.  Organized by year and activity, I've been able to access all of the photos at need whenever the fancy strikes me.  Any time I go to work on an album, or to print pictures, I've been able to find the pictures with minimum effort, and complete my projects quickly and easily.

That would be a lie.

I have a jumble of pictures online that I have to shuffle through every single time I attempt to do anything.  It can take me hours to track down a handful of pictures. 

Uploaded willy-nilly over the years, the biggest culprit appears to be pictures I have uploaded from the cell phone.  I'm never certain which folder those pictures are going to land in.  You'd think they'd land in the album labeled "cell phone".  Not so.  They fall into everything from girl scout pictures to "cat".  There appears to be no rhyme or reason for the pattern in which they upload.  Okay, I admit, there is one common factor - me and my slip shod methods when I go to upload photos.

I've had some time on my hands recently, so I've been organizing the photos.  I began by making folders for every year.  As I open the messy miscellaneous folders, I add an album under the appropriate year, and then move the pictures over to that album.  Thankfully, the online software is intuitive and easy to use.

Photos that I thought would take me a year or more to organize are now organized.

Ten years worth of photos, organized by year and activity.  (Like I said, I've had some time on my hands.)

Looking back through the old photos has been wonderful.  I've enjoyed looking back over what we've done for the last 10 years.  Good heavens, my kids have grown up so fast.  Where did the time go?  My daughter was 8 when we moved out here.  Next month, she'll be 18 years old.  She has grown into an amazing young woman in the time we've been here.

I used to keep up with the photos and scrapbook an album at the end of every year.  It's been a while since I've done that.  Now that all of the photos are organized, I'm going to have to go back through our albums and see how far behind I am, and work towards catching up on the albums.

Once I figure out where I need to start, I will have my husband's Christmas present.  The boys get home from school soon, and I'd love to have them add their memories to the album as I go!

Now, if only cleaning my basement was this easy.  I still haven't made a lot of progress down there, but by God, I am getting the rest of the house cleaned in my quest to avoid cleaning the basement!

Brave New World

I ran across this book the other day.  I vaguely remember reading it before.  I believe I read it at the same time I read 1984 and Animal Farm.  All 3 books are about Dystopian societies.

I had a little time to spare, so I thought I'd tackle it once again, and see what, if anything, I got out of the book.

Funny thing.  Aldous Huxley wrote this book in 1932.  He was writing about an imaginary society that existed 600 years in the future. At that time, Huxley postulated a world in which people had become total wards of the state.  They were bred in a laboratory, hatched in the warmth of a laboratory, and brought into the world.

From the time that their embryos were fertilized, their entire life, from their physical features, to their caste, to their mental capabilities were determined for them by the scientists in the laboratory.

Raised within the facility by the state, divided by caste, these infants are indoctrinated into the philosophies of the state through negative reinforcement, as well as sleep teaching- where a voice droned on and on throughout the night that teaches them the "official" views that they are to keep.

Raised to live alone, these people are also trained to value a hedonistic lifestyle that puts their own pleasure and comfort above all else.

If anything uncomfortable faces them, why, they don't have to deal with these uncomfortable feelings.  The state issues them an official drug, Soma, and they are encouraged to use it whenever those messy feelings get in the way of them pursuing that hedonistic lifestyle that is condoned by the state.

Life and death are meaningless.  No value is placed on life.  Children are conditioned to death in order to make it seem like "no big deal".  With the advances in genetic engineering, the residents never age.  They stay in a perpetual state of youth until they "expire" and are taken to be decommissioned.

There's more. Oh, so much more.  Aldous Huxley wrote this book to disturb.  He intended to shake his audience up a bit, show them what horrible future awaited them if they didn't wake up and realize that their choices - and what he saw at the time in the rise of Communism and the Soviet Union - could easily become the official way of life, with no choices and no free will to make choices in front of them.

I remember back when I originally read this book in 1982, I thought how ridiculously far fetched these ideas were.

Reading it now, over 30 years later, I begin to wonder because so much that future is not only before us - it seems to be coming a reality.

We live in a hedonistic society that places materialism above all else.  Doubt me?  Take a look at the video footage of crowds stampeding on Black Friday to get the best deals. 

Advertisers on television and the radio encourage us to pursue a materialistic, me first mentality that ignores the needs of others or the less fortunate around us. 

Genetic Engineering is here.  It's a reality.  With the advent of test tube babies (now known as IVF fertilization), we began to cross that uncomfortable line.  While we do not yet have the ability to "design" a human being (read infant) to meet our personal needs- hair and eye color, intelligence, we do have the ability to get into the cells of an embryo who will have mitochondrial disease and change the DNA of that individual before birth. 

Cloning.  Huxley didn't even dream of this reality in his novel.  Instead, he spoke of manipulating an ovum so that up to 90 viable embryos could result.  Instead of recreating the ovum, scientists have skipped that step entirely and are capable of taking the DNA of an organism and recreating this organism exactly.

Soma.  In the novel, Soma was used to pacify the masses.  When they experienced feelings, they took drugs to supress the feelings.  By supressing the feelings, people never questioned why and never looked for deeper meanings of life.  As a result, they turned away from all religion.  What need is there of religion when the state can guarantee you will never feel the need of anything but the pursuit of pleasure?  Not quite so far fetched, now.  Marijuana is legal in Colorado and Washington State.  Beginning next year, it will be legal in Washington DC and Alaska.  (What really is the driving force behind approving mood altering drugs, anyway?)

If you are up for a read that is going to make you look hard - very hard - at today's society, take the time to read Brave New World.

It's not a "Feel Good Book".  It will make you think, and think hard, about our world today.

Remember, Huxley wrote it to upset his audience.  What does it say that 80 years later, it is still upsetting and angering people?  Why is it still a relevant read?

Just Because I Can, Doesn't Mean I Should

I've lost a little over 20 pounds this year!

HOORAY!

I've gone down a size!

HOORAY!

When we first moved out here 10 years ago and I put on all of this weight, I put away the clothes as I went up a size.  Over the weekend, I pulled out the bag of clothes that is the next size down.

I began putting them on, and experienced a fashion flashback from the middle of the 2000's.
An interesting decade in clothing.

Pants were of an interesting cut back then.  Not bad, but they aren't the same cut that they aren't now, and it's very obvious that they are ten years old.  I think with most of them, I can wear them again.  Well, except for the herringbone pattern.  That's a VERY dated pattern, and it's difficult to find anything I can wear that will go with those pants.

Then we get to the tops.  Yeah, the tops.  This is where fashion has changed most drastically over the last ten years.  I can salvage the sweaters.  Even if they are a little out of style, they're not the ugly sweaters from the 90's (That's another bag, a little farther back in the closet that will fit when I lose 50 pounds.)  The polo shirts can be worn again.  I can layer them under another shirt, or wear them with a sweater.  Those aren't a problem.  However, there are a few Hawaiian type shirts of questionable colors that I will not be sporting anywhere, anytime soon. 

But, there's this tiny little part of me that really wants to pull these shirts out and wear them to work.  I know they are horribly out of style, but there's a part of me that really wants to strut into work saying "That's right, see this?  I'm fitting into clothes I wore ten years ago.  Just look at this fashion that is screaming TURN OF THE MILLENIUM!!!  Don't you wish you could be me?  Check out this twin set!  OH, oh, look at this flower print crepe skirt that falls at mid-calf!  Look at my ankles!  Quick, check out my ankles!" 

If I actually did wear any of these outfits to work, nobody would notice.  Nobody would say anything to me.  I am pretty sure nobody would think twice about how I was dressed.

However, if I buy a new outfit in the newer, smaller size, I'm pretty sure that somebody would take note, comment, and I would feel good about how I look in my new outfit with my new clothes.

I am not going to give away those new/old clothes.  I am going to wear them at home, to the grocery store, and running errands on the weekend.  This way, I have some "casual" clothes that look nice that I can wear when I am out and about.

But wearing some of this stuff to work? 

Not unless if I haven't done laundry.   And with my track record, I'll most likely be wearing one of those outfits before the end of the week!

My Resolutions and Accomplishments

Thanksgiving has come and gone.  I had a wonderful 4 days with my kids.  It was so good to have the boys home from school for a few days!  (Even if they did spend the entire time working on final projects, it was wonderful to have them all over the house, with their books and computers spread everywhere!  Their semester ends a week from tomorrow.)

I worked that turkey all weekend.  We never had to go back out for food, and that turkey provided us with multiple meals:

1) Sandwiches.

2) Pulled turkey BBQ sandwiches.  I tore up some of the turkey leftovers, and smothered them in this amazing BBQ sauce that I made with the recipe I found here: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/blackberry-bbq-sauce/.

3) Turkey Soup.  After Thanksgiving Dinner was finished, we pulled the rest of the meat off of the carcass.  We then took the carcass, as well as whatever meat we might have missed, and put it into the slow cooker.  We filled the pot with water, and let it cook for about 12 hours on low.  The next morning, I strained the broth out, removing the bones and assorted other stuff and put it into a large pot on the stove.  I added leftover mashed potatoes, leftover carrots, corn, and green beans.  I then cut up and added a potato, onion, and some celery and let it all stew for an hour more. When it was time to serve, I pulled out the wild rice and minced some leftover turkey.  The idea was to put the wild rice and turkey into the bowl, and then cover all with the hot soup.  (An idea I borrowed from the Vietnamese Pho. If you've never tried it, you should.  It is amazing.)

4) Turkey Wreath.  It's an old Pampered Chef recipe.  It requires the use of crescent rolls.  I can't eat it because of the gluten, but I pulled some of the turkey salad out and made my a very tasty panini on gluten free bread.  You can find the recipe here: http://tinyurl.com/mcvvwmg

5) Turkey A La King. The recipe is here: http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/turkey-a-la-king-with-rice.  You can serve this over toast, rice, or noodles. 

I've got a very little bit of turkey left today.  I'm debating whether to make it into a casserole or a Chef Salad.  I only have enough to make one, not both.

With the exception of my spectacular pecan pie, Thanksgiving was a wonderful success!

Blackened Pecan Pie! Look at that black crust!

 

 

 

Back in January, I set a list of Resolutions I wanted to keep this year.  I've been checking back on them once a month, just to see how I'm doing.  Since it's the first of the month, here we go!

1) 365 Grateful.  Check out my Blog Post from yesterday: http://mini-van-mom.blogspot.com/2014/11/an-attitude-of-gratitude.html.

 2) Lose 10 pounds.  I've lost a total of 22 pounds.  I had hoped to lose 3 more in order to make it an even 25 pounds, but that just isn't going to happen.  Instead of stressing out about losing the next 3 pounds, I am going to sit back, enjoy the holidays, and strive to maintain the 22 pounds I have lost, so that I'm not going back and re-losing this weight again in January.

 3) Run/Walk. I'm walking long distances on weekends with my hubby.  In addition to parking on the far side of the lot from my office building, I am taking a complete turn around the lot before going in and after I finish for the day.  I'm not sure how many steps I'm adding, but that does add 5 minutes of walking both before and after my shift is finished.  (Even when it's raining/snowing, I'm still walking around the lot.)

4) Get out of debt.  Working on it.

5) Finish Cleaning Out the Basement.  BWah-Ha-Ha.  I should just bring a dumpster in and dump it all.  I sent a van load full of stuff to the White Elephant sale at the church, another to Goodwill, and still another to the dump.  I also burned out the motor on my shredder.  I'm going to have to get a new shredder so I can keep going!

6) Finish Oldest Child's Quilt.  The top is finished.  I added a border to it in order to make it long enough to fit him - all 6 feet some inches of him.  I pieced out the back, and purchased the batting to go inside.  I am going to have to find a big space of floor somewhere to pin it all together soon.  I still don't think I'm going to finish this before Christmas. It would take a miracle.

7) Spend More Time With My Family.  This month, I have spent time, a lot of time, with my kids, and I have loved every minute of it!

8) Finish the Book I Keep Saying I'm Going to Write.  Done!  I have it uploaded to Lulu, and I'm waiting for my copy to arrive - so I can make certain that the formatting is right and that I didn't miss anything in the way of spelling and grammar before I let it go public.  My goal is to release it no later than Dec. 15.

9) Finish The Hallway Bathroom.  Okay, this is a post for another day.  I've found the money suckers.  I'm beginning to save money.  It makes me wonder what's going to break next?

10) Get Back into my Music.  Have done.  The Christmas Cantata is two weeks from tomorrow.  I'll be singing Alto, but NO SOLOS!  (Ha... I sing solo no one can hear me! hahaha!   Alto joke...)

Lots and lots of progress is being made.  We have one credit card that should be completely paid off this month. More money to add to the "finish the yellow bathroom in the hallway" fund!