Another bunch of pictures

This past weekend was my husband's high school reunion. The family part was a picnic at the New River, second oldest river in the world. The park is split into two parts, the top, where you park and enter the river if you're tubing or canoing, and the bottom, where you get out and take the bus back up to the top to do it over again. The picnic area was set up at the bottom.

My husband and son rented tubes and tubed down the river. I went the dryer and seemingly safer route: canoe. The river looked pretty flat so my plan was to go down solo to the picnic area and get my daughter so she could canoe too. On the way down I start to panic with visions of the times I got thrown out of a raft on the Lower Youghiogheny. But then I got the canoe unstuck from the rocks without tipping over and I was fine the rest of the way.

My next time down the river was uneventful, except Fern was in the back steering. And we almost went over some rapids backwards. Rapids being kind of flat given the low river level.



A view over the bow.

 

Kitchen renovations started Monday. I'm doing OK with some decisions, but I have two kinda big ones left: chrome or satin stainless faucets and the color of backsplash tile. I wanted to go with chrome, but the instant hot water dispenser only comes in the satin finish. Which means either it won't match the other chrome pieces, or I change everything. Again.

This the the "before" picture.



This is what we came home to after day one.



A very large box was waiting for me when I got home yesterday. My husband greeted me (before I saw it) and said he thought it was my new Harry Potter book. It was the kitchen sink.

 

The last picture today is of my son in the pool at the hotel at twilight.

I heard an ad on the radio this morning for a new service from OnStar: step-by-step directions. With the gaining popularity of GPS devices and now this new service, I wonder what happened to maps.

My dad tells a story of me reading a USGS 24K quad sheet (topography map) at age 3. I love maps, my college degree was in geography. I'm a visual-spatial person, I need to see where I am on a map and how it relates to everywhere else.

A couple springs ago we took a cruise out of Florida. The traffic getting down there was horrible, standstill traffic the whole length of Georgia. Checked the map and hopped over to the state route that parallels the Interstate. The state route was empty. What? don't people know this road is here? Not that I minded it being empty, but still, our van could not have been the only vehicle taking the alternate route.

It baffles me why the sudden need for a service to help you get somewhere, how did you get there before? Maps. Every utility/repair van had a map book of the metro area on the front dash. (Yay maps!)

I just can't get that lady's voice on the OnStar step-by-step directions commercial out of my head, "I use it all the time." Are there that many carto-illiterate people out there who need this service? Are people that lazy?

Do you use a GPS for directions everywhere you go? How do you feel about being dumber than a computer?

On the way back from my husband's high school reunion, —I'll post pictures later—my daughter announces she has finished reading HP7. It was 2:13 pm. Less than 30 seconds later my husband starts reading the book. (I was driving.)

I'm waiting for my preordered (February!) my copy from Amazon.uk, but it has yet to arrive.

Now it's almost 10:30 and 400 some pages later my husband says to me, "I'm not giving away anything from the story, but the the witches could benefit from the Internet."

If you can't stand the heat...

Stuff is finally starting to happen on the kitchen front. The deadlines are forcing me to make the decisions I've been having trouble making. (Maybe I should go back to therapy for this indecisiveness, I really don't know why it's so hard for me. Maybe because I've been burned by bad color choices before, maybe I'm afraid I have a longevity—will it look dated in ten years—fear, maybe I want to make sure everyone else likes what I pick, maybe I don't have a clear vision of what I want my kitchen to look like or feel like or the mood it should exude so I can't pick things to go with this absent vision.) I finally picked a sink and ordered it. I finally picked a faucet and ordered it. I'm very close to picking a counter top color. I going with glass tile as a backsplash, I just don't know what color yet.

B, my builder is coming on Monday to take the base cabinets out. Then the floor guy comes on Tuesday to repair the floor and put down new tile where the old cabinets were. There's no turning back now.

My living room is starting to look like a yard sale. I've started emptying out the base cabinets into boxes. I know I'm going to get overwhelmed and I hate that. Too much in there, and too much stuff we never use, I know I'll have to be make more decisions, this time about what to purge. And, I'm not looking forward to not having a kitchen for a couple weeks.

On top of all this, I haven't lost the 10 pounds to get down to trophy wife status for my husband's thirty year high school reunion this weekend. (So I won't be at home emptying out cabinets! Argh!) I'm kidding (really!) about being a trophy wife, I'm a little too old, and I think I look pretty good as it is. But I gotta figure out what outfit to pack. Sheesh, another decision....

Ever have one of those weeks?

You just don't feel in top shape,
you're still feeling sluggish from having eaten too much party food from the weekend and the scale still reads several pounds up,
you're able to sneak in a rare nap, and you still feel tired and try to go to bed early,
you think about making an appointment at your doctors office,
you hardly laugh during a comedy on TV,
you make it through a day of work but you're not sure how,
then you go to the bathroom and when you turn to flush you notice the liquid in the bowl is not the usual color, but is now twinged brightly with pink, and you're really panicking now, should I go straight to the emergency room, make arrangements myself with the funeral home,
then you remember you had beets for dinner last night?

Interesting thing happened today when I gave my son a pair of swim goggles. He put them on.

For most of his life he's had issues with anything on his face, the most prevalent thing: water. Shampooing was a big problem for a long time. Within the last two years he's gotten over having water on his face and has started going under the water voluntarily. His swimming has gotten better, evident by his medal at the Special Olympics this past winter.

This afternoon the three of us were playing in the pool, my daughter and I are trying to teach my son how to do a handstand in the water. He puts his hands on the bottom, but can't get his feet straight up, keeping his knees bent. After a while he lost interest so I got out to get my daughter's goggles for her. I grabbed a second pair and handed them to my son just to see what he would do. Much to my surprise, he put them on and headed straight for the lap lane, (thank goodness there wasn't anyone already using it,) and he swam several laps, obviously very proud of the goggles on his face and of himself.

I'm still recovering from Fern's Birthday party. Friday she had a gaggle of friends over for a pool party at our club, then to the theater for the late showing of Harry Potter 5, followed by a sleepover.

Kevin doesn't like to go to bed until every one else is in bed, then will come and check on us. thus, at 3 in the morning I was greeted with"Hi," and he won't go away until you say "Hi" back, thus waking you up.

Saturday night I went with AM to the adult party at our pool club, featuring the local rock (cover) band, the Crayfish. One of the members lives in our neighborhood, so there were a lot of neighbors at the party.

My husband took Fern to the Orioles game for her birthday, complete with her name on the scoreboard.

I got to sleep in a little late, but still the bad eating all weekend from party food is making me feel sluggish. Argh.

Now it's back on the straight and narrow...

But, darn it, I can't walk in the morning, I've been called for Jury Duty and I have to be there at 7:30. yikes.

Fave Five

I'm just curious, how many times do you visit a blog before you blogroll them, if they are just a few clicks away?

Kate commented on my blog the other day. I sometimes wander over to her blog from Greeny's. The other day I wandered over and clicked on one of her 'rolled blogs, 25 Year Plan. He had been visited by Michele who does a blog of the day. A couple clicks later I found some new and interesting reads. Blogs I'd go back to, blogs worth going back to.

So, do I follow the chain of links every time I want to visit or just blogroll them myself? If you bring a new blog into your life, how long do you date this new read until you invite it to stay, as it were.

I don't want to list any old blog I've read once or twice. I guess I want to be careful about the fiends I pick. I kinda think your list of regularly read blogs reflects on you, or does it?

If a blog you like is just one click away, if it is listed on a tried-and-true friend's blog, do you need to list it yourself? What if that friend "breaks up" with that blog, no longer reads it and removes it from their list?

I've recently added VariantE to my list and 1000 Days at Sea is listed there, which I read sometimes. How many times do I visit before I list them, too?

Do you wait for them to add you before you'll add them?

Or, is having a long list of blog friends like a badge of honor? But wouldn't it be the other way round, having a lot of friends who list you, be the honor?

Who's in your fave five?

Curried Chicken Salad

This is what I took to AM's pool party last week, I got a request for the recipe, so here goes.

I'm not into measuring, I just eyeball it.

• drain two 12 oz. cans of cooked chicken, (mine came from Costco) reserving some liquid (of course you can cook your own chicken, but I didn't for this party)


• Put the chicken in a mixing bowl and use your fingers to mush the chicken hunks into smaller pieces, you can chop it up with a knife if you really want to, but it takes longer.


• add
  
  
  • a large handful or two of golden raisins and/or grapes cut in half, champagne grapes are good, too, for this if they are in season
  
  
  • a very large handful coarsely chopped pecans
  
  
  • a chopped crunchy apple or two
  
  (other fruit could include chopped dates and pineapple, add to your taste, I think I used dried cranberries last week, too)
  


• put about 1/4 cup of the reserved chicken stock in a pan and stir in 2 or 3 teaspoons curry powder, I used sweet curry.


• bring to a boil and simmer, stirring, until you have a thick paste remove from the heat and let it cool for a bit.


• when you can stick your finger in there without burning yourself, add about a cup of mayo and stir until smooth


• add the mayo to the chicken & fruit mix and stir thoroughly


• refrigerate for about an hour to let the flavor intensify before serving

let me know how it turns out!

More Photos

These were waiting for me at the restaurant last night at dinner...

Fern's cousin, Rose, came to visit last week. One evening we went to the pool. Not only did Rose work up the courage to dive face first off the high-dive during the time, she'd gotten pretty good at flips.

This is the Rt. 17 bridge going into Charleston, SC shot through the car windshield.

The entrance Camp David

Seventeen years ago, today, I married Dan.

I love you, Hon! Thanks for all these wonderful years.

I'm a bit overwhelmed about the kitchen right now, and I need to vent. I hate being overwhelmed. The cabinets are sitting on the back porch, in huge massive boxes. Waiting to be installed. Haunting me, mocking me.

B, my builder has been on vacation this week, so I've been unable to contact him to discuss the procedures. I'd opted to save $12k by going with him, rather than a independant contracting company, but that meant I'm doing my own general contracting, coordinating all the pieces to this puzzle. All those project management classes I took last year should be coming in handy.

The tile on the kitchen floor was put down two years ago and sometime later it developed a crack that runs the width of the cooking area, right over a joint of subflooring. So, I'd like that fixed. And the best time to have it fixed is when the base cabinets are removed. However, I need to coordinate the tile company's availability with B so they can work together, and B is on vacation. Furthermore, I'm having quartz counters put in. Can the floor structure handle the extra weight if it cracks under normal walking? B will have to put supports in the ceiling downstairs, but he doesn't know that, because he's on vacation this week.

I picked the backsplash tile. It's a beautiful blue mottled pattern. I look at other choices and keep coming back to this blue. So, if I'm so stuck on this blue, I need to pick my countertop color accordingly, but I don't have all the samples form all my available choices, just pictures on the web. I want to be happy with the countertop for a long time. I've made color choices in the past on other things (permanent things, like bathroom tile and floor tile) that I regret, and I don't want to do that again. I want to make sure the countertop goes with the backsplash, and the cabinet color, and the color doesn't overwhelm the room, make it too dated, trendy, or institutional looking.

I need to pick out, order and buy a sink, a faucet, instant hot water dispenser, and under cabinet lighting, and I'm sure I'm forgetting a thing or two, oh, like the knobs (how many and I going to need?). I'd really like a new fridge and a new over-the-stove microwave, too.

And during all of this, the construction time, the time when we have no sink, or cabinets, or counter space, for who knows how long, I'll need to live in my house. With my family. And eat decent meals. Sheesh.

Overwhelmed, just a bit. Thanks for letting me vent.

I'm home right now, in the middle of the day, bread in the toaster for a sandwich, waiting for the delivery guys with my cabinets. They should be here soon, my window was noon to 6, now it's 11:30 to 12:30.

I need to clean up the kitchen a bit, empty the dishwasher, etc., and get some before pictures taken before my builder starts the work next week (I think that's when he's coming, he's on vacation this week). I'm not looking forward to a week or two without a kitchen. I wish he could have done with work while we were out of town, but the timing didn't work out that way.

Mmm, good sandwich, peanut butter on wheat toast. need some chocolate milk with this. Ah, that's better.

I was thinking about making more chicken salad for lunch today, but decided it was too much work. I made some for Miss Kingsfield's Independence Day Pool Party yesterday. I make it curried with raisins, apples, and pecans. It disappeared in a heartbeat and I got complements on it, so that made me feel good.

The party was fun, and my kids seemed to have a good time, for the most part. Thanks CG!

I fell prey to an infomercial. I bought stuff that is supposed to get rid of fine lines better than anything else because of the super antioxidants it contains. OK. Why not?

The box came in the mail the other day. Here's the before picture of my eye (self portrait). Remind me to post a 30-days later picture. Or not.

I'm back to work after a two-week vacation and I have a boatload of email to catch up on. I had checked it a couple of times while I was away, just in case there were any disasters. Most was boring stuff, except this. One email was from a collegue who had photos of what happened in our office garage.

Apparently someone forgot the difference between "Drive" and "Reverse."

I got a birdie! I got a birdie!

I got a 2 on #11 at Tupelo Bay with a beautiful newsreel chip from off the green.

Yay me!

Ah, the quiet. Once again I've got hard-to-come-by quiet computer time, The kids are still asleep and Dan's off at the first day of a two-day golf school I gave him for his birthday. I copied the Christmas present he had given me. It was a great gift, so I had to copy. I hope he gets a lot out of the lessons.

Yesterday we loaded the kids into the car for a drive down to Charleston. I tried to take artsy pictures that didn't turn out as well as I hoped. I'll post them in a separate blog entry so I don't have to fiddle with editing the code now.

When we got back, Dan went off to play 9 holes of golf and I took the kids to the beach. We're renting a house in a "village" where the beach is about a half mile away, but there is a private parking lot at the beach, which is handy. This is also a golf cart village, where a lot of tenants/residents have carts. What do you think when you're following a golf cart that pulls way over to the right? It's ok to pass, right? That's what I thought until I almost hit the guy when he started to turn left!
Aye yai yai! Use hand signals for goodness sake. sheesh. The guy glared at me like I did something wrong.

Well, I better get these kids up and fed so I can get a parking spot at the beach.

Polly and Molly just left for the pool, Wally had already taken Ollie so I finally have some computer time to myself. I'm sitting in our rented beach cottage in the south Myrtle Beach area. We got here yesterday, Dan and the girls got here about an hour ahead of me, I had to go to Camp David to pick up Kevin from camp.

It's really Camp Greentop which is about a half mile down the road from Camp David up in the Maryland Mountains. Camp Greentop is a camp run by The League for People with Disabilities. Kevin has been going for about 6 years now and loves it. When you first drive into the parking area you are met by a staff member whom you tell what camper you have. Then you drive around to the next "station" where a large group of staff wave and cheer at the arrival of your child. My eyes always well up when I see them standing there, then manage to steady my voice before I have to speak to the next person, it takes about 10 seconds for this drive. It gets me every year. The staff all seem to love having the campers there, very enthusiastic and caring.

Kevin had a great time, so the staff told me when I picked him up yesterday, ate well, particiapated in activities, and had fun. Then we hit the road for the drive to South Carolina. I tried to get him to tell me his needs on the drive, but he never says anything about his needs on his own, just answers "Are you hungry? Do you want to eat?" questions.

We left Curaçao Thursday and picked Fern up from her camp on Friday. Wow, we've done a lot of driving. Now we get to relax in one place for a while. Except for the drives to mini golf, the batting cage, the movies, Charelston, golf, and where ever else the kids want to go.

Another boring day in paradise. We went to Playa PortoMari again, but this time I rented a snorkel set and got to see a lot of cool fish. PortoMari is also a dive site. The water is about 3 meters deep at the end of the swimming area, then just drops off into oblivion. I was paddling around in the "shallow" part looking around and saw some divers and freaked out a bit thinking I'd gone too far from shore, but I hadn't.

This little guy was haning out on the rock wall behind the sun bathing area.

Then we went back to Jaanchi's for Dinner, but this time I had the shrimp and the grouper. And this time I got pictures. This is Jaanchi.

And this is my dinner.

There are a lot of churches here, all brightly painted, even the cemetaries were painted.

Tonight for dinner we at at Jaanchi's Restaurant in Westpunt. There are no menus, Jaanchi (I'm guessing) has a seat at your table and tells you what's available. I chose the shrimp with garlic and my husband chose the grouper. My shrimp was in a creamy sauce and was served with beans and rice, fries and some mixed viggies. It was good. I didn't bring my camera in to dinner so you'll just have to imagine it.

Before dinner we played golf at Blue Bay. Yowza. Windy. Hard, fast greens. Forced carries on several holes. Bad swings. Bad putts. We were almost ready to quilt after nine, but we stuck it out and things looked better. I didn't keep score the whole game, it got too bad, but I was better than my husband by several strokes for 4 holes, then there was hole number five. I'm standing in the tee box, and that's the green over there, on the other side of those rocks. Yes, that's the ocean down there.



The course finished up with a par 4 along the ocean:

Before golf, we went to Playa Knip. Nice, quiet, just a few other people there, even though a tour bus stopped there for 10 minutes while the tourists got out and took pictures like this:


Be sure to check out my husband's blog, he's posting his own version of our vacation.

Our rental car is a low-end 5-speed Toyota Yaris with hand crank windows and manual door locks. And air conditioning. The temperature control goes from light blue to dark blue. I guess no heat. Never seen that before. The steering wheel is configured in such that every time my husband made a hard turn, like into a parking space, he honked the horn.


We probably drove over 100 KM today. Our first stop was the beach at Porto Mari. We managed to leave the hotel without beach towels, so we had to dry off in the sun. It was hard for me to get oriented at the beach. We're below the Tropic of Capricorn, and it's almost summer solstice, which means the sun could be to the north at noon, something not seen in the states.

Our next stop was at a grocery store. We have the cutest little kitchen in our room. It's the size of a wardrobe. It has a sink, stove, microwave, toaster, coffee maker and a fridge. Breakfast was very expensive so we stocked up on bread, butter, water, coffee and other things; we just moved right in.



Now, for beach towels, found some in the tourist district of Willemstad, had lunch and headed off to another beach, this time Seaquarium Beach. Much more crowded than the morning spot. These beaches both had changing rooms with showers and snack bars.

Back to the room for a break and change of clothes and now off to dinner.

I'm sitting in the business center of the Kura Hulanda Lodge checking my blog replies and email. We've got Internet in the room but we need an ethernet cable. This browser has blogger set to Dutch so I have to remember where all the usual clicks are to do a posting, since I can't read it. Well, I can figure out "Bericht Publiceren" because it's surrounded by a large orange button.

We arrived late last night because we sat inches away from the jetway in Miami for over an hour. Lightning had closed the ramp, the area outside the airport where the workers drive the baggage carts, and we couldn't get off the plane until the storm cleared. Since all flights were delayed, we made our connection and here we are.

Now for some breakfast...

Meet The VanDegas

Fern has a friend from school and when they get together they become Molly and Polly VanDega. The last day of school was yesterday, so Polly came over today to hang with Molly. I have been informed I am now part of this charade: I am Holly, my husband is Wally, my son is Ollie, and we now have a collie named Dolly.

About 7:05 pm last night my lights went out for a second, then came back on and I heard a bang from across the neighborhood. Then they went out again. There were thunder storms in the area but nothing really close, so it was a surprise, really, we lost power.

Kevin was cool about the lights. Fern's iPod had power so he hung out in her room with the music and the battery speakers. Good thing she wasn't home.

There is something pleasant, comforting, about the quiet house, no droning TV, no humming AC compressor, and the porch door open with the breeze blowing the trees outside, no washing machine agitating, no dryer tumbling, no laundry getting done mere days before the kids go off to camp. Sheesh.

Photo Recap of recents events

Kevin got an award for perfect attendance at the 8th grade ceremony. He wouldn't sit with the rest of the students, but sat with me in the audience. He knew what to do when his name was called. I'm so proud of him!

Fern's band concert was last week. She played in the 6th grade band as well as the Saxophone Ensemble. She's the only 6th grader in it, the rest are boys from the 8th grade. I'm very proud of her too!

A couple of weeks ago I posted about being worried my girls wouldn't get their bridging requirements done. "My girls" being the sixth graders in my daughter's Junior Girl Scout troop who were moving on to Teen Scouts (formerly known as Cadettes). They made it! And their ceremony went well, I'm proud of all of them.

Fern gets her last Junior badges with the secret handshake from the leader to follow.

The bridging Juniors before...

... a little musical interlude...

... and finis!

This past weekend we made our way to the promised land. The place we have been promising to take Kevin for months. The land of killer steps and huge smiles, the promised land of Great Wolf Lodge in Williamsburg. Check-in time is 4:00 pm and that's exactly when we got there. On this visit we got a "Wolf Den Suite" which has a "cabin" in the room with bunk beds and a separate TV. Our room wasn't ready yet, but we got our waterpark passes and changed into our suits in the locker rooms.

For two hours we played and had fun and around 6 pm I went back up to the lobby to get our room keys. Room wasn't ready yet. When will it be ready? I'll be right back. When the woman finally came back she told me 45 minutes, around 7:00 pm. She was very sorry, and they would take 15% off our rate. Uh, thanks. By now the girls are hungry (we took Fern's cousin, Rose, with us), so we dry off and pile the kids in the car and head off for some supper.

When we got back, our room was finally ready. Whew. At check-out the following morning, I looked at the bill. We were credited $122 for the three-hour delay. That was way more than 15%! I'm glad they made an effort to make us happy campers.

Abstract shot looking up the Howlin' Tornado ride

Kevin in his beloved tube

Fern and Rose in the lazy river

I finally converted my blog template to the new version. I picked this template design, mostly because I haven't seen a lot of other blogs using it. I've gotten blogs mixed up before, reading one, thinking I was on another because of the same template colors. I don't want anyone to credit my brilliance to anyone else. Looking at my new page is like looking in the mirror after a drastic haircut, yeah, it's me, but I'm different. do I like what I see?

I spent some time going back to old posts and adding labels so they show up in the label list. Wow, I ramble a lot. It's interesting to look back at old posts, to remember what was going on back then, and how we're moving on all the time.

Let me know what you think of the new design!

Why must my son use my deodorant when his runs out? I think the "Tropical Breeze" scent is lost on him. He's been taking baths in the shower again, instead of in the bathtub. A couple of years ago he too such a big bath in the shower it was raining in the dining room. I don't want another new dining room ceiling, so I'm trying to get him to bathe in the tub or just shower in the stall, no playing. It's hard to get him to understand stuff like that, that it's not good block the shower drain and make the water flow out the door. I curbed him a bit last night by securing a drain cover over the drain so he couldn't stick a cup in there to block the hole. He still tried to block the drain, but there was no water on the floor. At 14, he's too old to monitor his bathing, so I've got to figure out a way to get him to understand he can't flood the house.

deja vu?

The leaking in the basement from the AC was not from a misconnection from the furnace installation in February but the failure of the condenser coil pan, it rusted out. So: new air conditioner to be installed on Friday, 14 seer, up from the 20 year-old 8 seer unit that's out there now. That should save us some killowatthours this summer. Our electricity rate is going up 50% next month. sheesh.

When it rains, it pours

Saturday was a gorgeous day. Hot. It hadn't rained in a while so I set the sprinkler out for several hours. Sunday it rained, over an inch. Now the lawn really needs to be mowed. I coulda mowed on Saturday.

Memorial Day weekend I turned on the AC for the season. Later I heard some crackling noise from the basement, went to inspect and found water dripping on the electronic air cleaner. Hmm. I called the company who put in the furnace last winter. Service call, please. How's Tuesday? Over the weekend I went downstairs for something and the basement is flooded. I'm guessing they didn't hook the AC drain back up properly when installing the new furnace. And I won't pay for the service call if they try to charge me.

Sunday morning, getting ready for church, I find a puddle around the fridge. I pull the fridge out from the wall to take a look. There is a drain line from the icemaker that is not connected. I reconnect it, and, while the fridge is pulled out, I mop back there, yuck. Later in the afternoon, I hear the icemaker fill with some additional dripping, more like pouring, sound. hmm. I pull the fridge out again. Hey! the floor is clean back there, woohoo! Oh, and the drain line is disconnected again. So I'm thinking the icemaker is clogged, frozen shut, or something, it's on the blink. (I want a new fridge. The current one is twenty years old....) So I've been trying to figure out how to get hot water up in there to thaw the innards of the icemaker to see if I can fix it, or if it really is dead.

Last week I promised to work on Fern's quilt, so I have been. And hand quilting it, too. I decided I'd finish the pattern I'd already started by hand, then use the machine to quilt the border and maybe augment the current pattern. It was then, during the initial excitement phase of working on a new project again, I remembered I owed some birthday blocks to women in my quilt guild. And top of that, I've been hired to make four 91" drapery pannels out of moss green velvet. I'm trying hard not to crush the velvet in the process. I'm also trying to figure out how much to charge my client. Too bad I can't charge her the amount of a new fridge.

It's like the Nationwide commercial: Life comes at you fast.

I'm so excited, I was invited to be a charter member of a new quilting bee. We had our first meeting last night, two main activities were working on a Christmas quilt for our guild's Quilt Bingo night in the fall and coming up with a name for our new bee. It's got to be repeatable in front of a priest. Rockin' Bobbins is a front runner. Any other ideas?

I'm glad to be in this group. I've been in a rut creatively lately, so just working on the group quilt last night has started the juices moving. They are not flowing yet, but the winter of my rut is over.

I pulled out a quilt I had started for Fern. I began it ten or eleven years ago. It's a Irish chain in white and green with a beautiful Hoffman grape vine print border. I started to hand quilt it, and quit working on it probably 7 or 8 years ago. Except for the border, its about five-sixths done. So close, yet so far away. The girl wants a quilt and she said I didn't have to finish it by hand. That's a load off!

And now I have a goal for the month of June: Finish Fern's quilt. Stay tuned.

Scans

I've been meaning to post this for a while. It is my first attempt at a fabric postcard. After I made it, Fern wanted it, of course, but it was for my mum. She said it had been processed like regular mail and not hand canceled. Here's the scan before I mailed it: (I don't have the after.)


Mostly I was trying the stitches out on my sewing computer and these are just a few of them.

Here is a scan of two of the counter tops I'm considering.

The top one is called Sopporo, compare it with the company's image from a couple days ago. It's interesting how different they are. The bottom is called Sedona. Decisions, decisions!

Pea Diaries - Day 57

A moment of silence, please. The peas are dead. What plants made it past 2 inches high were nibbled off by Flopsy and her gang. I should have been celebrating a harvest soon, but it just didn't happen. Good thing I didn't plant that second half pound bag of seeds this spring. I'll look for another place to plant them for the fall.

On a happier note, I have two of my four tomato plants in the ground with a dozen smashed egg shells for the calcium. I've been eating a lot of scrambled egg whites for breakfast. But I'm not done yet, two more plants to go. Now I've got to figure out how to support these new babies, cages, stakes, more copper structures? Maybe I could solder a copper pipe cage. Hmm... This calls for a trip to the hardware store!

Today, besides it being Memorial Day, I want to wish my college roommate, NJ, happy birthday. I have fond memories of spending her birthday weekend with her at her folk's house, her dad edging the lawn, and her brother yelling at the basketball refs while watching the NBA play-offs. I guess it was just coincidence NJ's dad was edging the lawn as we pulled into the driveway two years in a row. But, hey, memories are made of strange things, right?

Now I have my own edger. It came with the gas powered string trimmer I bought recently. I haven't used the edger part yet, but the thought of it makes me smile, for some strange reason.

Well, anyway, NJ, Happy Birthday!

NJ
OJ
OK

I just spent another hour in a large American home improvement center with the kitchen designer. This is after I spent two hours with him on Tuesday. Then we got the cabinet layout done and I got initial pricing. Today I went back for "what ifs?"

What if I chose the square panel door style instead of the slab style? (-$)
What if I took out the spice cabinets and made the peninsula base cabinet 6" longer? (-$)
What if I added the storage center under the sink base? (+$)
What if I went with all plywood construction? (++$)
What if I went with a premium glaze finish? (++$)
What if I went with cherry instead of maple? (+$)

Ah. It just so happens the pricing is exactly the same for the maple and cherry in the door style I'm considering. really?

So this is it: I'm opting for no premium finish, the new door style, plywood construction, and the under the sink storage package. And the cherry instead of the maple. That one was a no-brainer. And if I spend $48.45 more, I'll get a $750 rebate. If I don't spend anymore, then it's only a $500 rebate. I just have to order by June 8 to get the rebate at all.

Now, let's talk counter tops. How's this one? The image is pulled right off the Viatera site site. I might replace it with my own scan later.

This evening I sat in the car, window down, waiting for practice to be over, listening to the game on the neighboring field. Twa-ing. The unmistakable sound of a base hit, an aluminum bat against a softball. That's all right ladies, two outs now, any base, any base... I'm a softball mom now. Fern joined the girls' '92-'95 spring Boys and Girls Club league. This is her first time playing a team sport outside gym class, and I'm so thrilled she's having a good time. She's playing catcher so she's throwing the ball a lot, more than the pitchers because they are rotated every couple of innings. And my baby's arm is sore.

It's my first time being a team sport mom. I don't yet know the chatter a parent yells from the bleachers, the nuances of "little league." When do I suggest to the coach my daughter needs to rest an inning? Or do I? So much to learn.

Here she is behind home plate:

Bah-humbug. Lisa wanted seven positive things. In no particular order:

1. I like golf


2. I like my job


3. I'm proud of my kids and husband


4. I lost three pounds last week when I was sick


5. I like to mow the lawn with the tractor


6. I have a good eye for color and contrast


7. I'm pretty good at sudoku puzzles, but not the really hard ones

Ok, there are seven more useless and positive things about me.

I have been tagged. My first ever. Karin in Germany wants seven things about me. I think when she comments on my blog she writes in German and uses a translator to post in English. So her tag is worded strangely and I'm not sure exactly what seven things she wants. But here are seven things:

1. I'm in the planning process of getting my kitchen re-done. There are too many decisions to make. The species of wood for the cabinets, Lowes or Home Depot, Silestone or Zodiaq.


2. I'm in a rut with my quilting. So much fabric, so little inspiration.


3. I think my butt is too big.


4. I wish my daughter would do things the first time I asked.


5. I'd rather be golfing.


6. I'm worried about getting "my" girls bridged. I'm the bridging coordinator for my daughter's Junior Girl Scout troop, and I'm not sure all the girls will get all the requirements done they need to do to become Teen Scouts.


7. I suffer from reality TV withdrawl after season finales are over.

OK, there you have it, seven random, totally useless things about me. Prepared to be tagged.

How weird is that?

I pass one of those fancy developments on my way home from work, you know the kind: the one with a big lit rock wall waterfall/fountain at the corner of the entrance. Yesterday I got stopped at the traffic light in front of the fountain, and I got to thinking about the old juvenile prank of putting bubble bath in the fountain. I haven't seen any fountains with bubbles in a long time. And wouldn't you know it, today, on the way home, there are bubbles in it. I had to laugh at the timing of my thought.

And, no, I don't have a history of sleep-driving, nor am I missing any Mr. Bubble.

I went to the Mecca of gardening centers on Tuesday. All those tomato seedlings I planted? scorched. I left them out in the direct afternoon sun too long. I was so bummed.

So I headed over and bought 4 tomato plants. This gardening center draws folks from southern Baltimore, Annapolis, and eastern side of Washington DC. It's huge. They have everything: vegetables, herbs, perennials, annuals, trees, pond flora, etc. And everything there is for Zone 5. It's not like a catalog where you've got to be careful what you buy, make sure you don't buy something for South Carolina, then it dies in the winter.

I wanted to get some Hostas, too. I've got some shady places in my flower beds that need something and Hostas fit in nicely. However, when you visit Mecca, prepare to pay Mecca prices. I wasn't prepared to spend $25 or even $14.99 for any of the plants I picked out, as pretty as they were. The lady ahead of me in line spent $470 dollars. I got out under $10 for my two heirloom and two regular tomato plants.

I heard on the news radio station which has a gardening "column" to put egg shells in with the tomato plants when you plant them to prevent blossom-end rot. Anyone ever try this? Does it work? How many shells?

I really need to get about 10 yards of mulch. My beds haven't been mulched in years. The weeds are so bad. Some have grown into weed-trees. Sheesh. I really want to hire a gardener. When I was a kid we lived in Okinawa and had a gardener. The image of him tending the hibiscus has stuck with me for years. Now I have a full time job and am often too tired or busy to take care of the flower beds after work. Oh well. maybe some day.

But for now, I need to find places for my new tomatoes and a place for the soon to be relocated lilac bush.

How was your Mother's day? I'm kinda mad. No one in my family wished me "Happy Mother's Day" until 3:25 pm. And then Fern only did it when she heard her friend's mom say it to me. I came down with a cold over the weekend and wasn't feeling too swift yesterday, anyway.

On the other hand, Friday, my son brought home a pot of dirt from his after school program. They promise me there are flower seeds in the dirt. I can't wait to see what grows!

OK, I don't hear anyone laughing about my post from yesterday. I guess I needed to add I don't remember much of my 9th grade Spanish class except "Lima es la capitol de Peru," and basic things like "hola" and "no se." Oh, and I can count to 39. Slowly. So pulling "leche con cafe" out of the air in an instant was pretty good for me.

What do you remember from your junior high foreign language class?

There was a young Hispanic man in the Panera this morning getting coffee. I saw him stir in copious amounts of cream, the contents looked like dirty milk. He laughed when I asked, "¿Leche con cafe?"

Are you Safe Today?

Today is Military Spouse's Day. The radio station I listen to had a bunch of wives in studio this morning. (They have listeners come in every Friday for fun and food and prizes.) The radio guys arranged to call one wife's husband in Iraq, who is a general. She hadn't seen him in a while and the first thing she asked was, "Are you safe today?"

Are you safe today?

Wow. Not, "Hi, Hon, howya doing?" But, "Are you safe today?" I found this very jarring, I wasn't expecting it at all. This wife probably lives one day at a time, and the most important thing is her husband is safe. And with that knowledge, she can go forward. Her question also speaks of experience, a long life as a military wife, developed coping methods. I'm only guessing at the meanings behind her question.

War is horrible and I'm not in favor of it. I'm not good at politics, it's one of those abstract subjects I don't comprehend well. I do better at concrete things, like logic, science, and basic math. So my soapbox on why war is horrible stops here.

I just wish wives, and husbands, and families didn't have to worry about the safety of the soldiers in their lives.

Postage is going up to 41 cents on Monday. This really irritates me. A year ago when it when up from 37 cents I questioned this decision. Why didn't they just increase the cost to an even 40 cents? Forty is a nice even number, it makes for nice math in calulating price for a packet. If they only "needed" 39 cents, then they could save the extra cent and stave off another increase for a longer period of time. But NO, no one listens to me. Now it's 41 cents. Not an even number and doesn't multiply well. Sheesh.

A few pictures for your enjoyment

Darth Son waits for big yellow transport

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I took in an Orioles game on Saturday night. O's beat the Tribe 8-2. This is Kevin Millar, Fern's favorite player.

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I like the composition of this one. This is David Delucci, who plays for Cleveland. Mr. Delucci, according to a former co-worker, has the best hiney in baseball. Too bad they can't do anything about VJL (visible jersey line).

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What did you have for lunch today?

Just a quick report: I did my weight training yesterday and today; I piggy-backed my kids downstairs. No, not at the same time.

I guess whatever falls out of the freezer when you reach in for frozen microwave lunch is what you're serving for dinner.

Ever feel like that? No other inspiration for menu creation. When I was single I often forgot to eat. It just didn't enter my mind. I never learned to create a menu, it just didn't matter. Now I've been married for almost 17 years, and I'm still lousy at menu planning. I sincerely apologize to my husband for this void in my skill set. Come to think about it, my skill set is very much like Swiss cheese, more holes than substance. My better skills are with drills and hammers and putting tangible things together. Not abstract things, like menus. Or being a good parent when it comes to dealing with my pre-teen daughter and getting her to do things the first, or even second time I ask. She either irritates me or she's an angel, there is no middle ground in how I handle it.

But I digress. My original point. Meal planning and how I suck at it. I'm toying with the idea of subscribing to a meal planning service, where for $10 you get three months of seasonal menus, five per week along with recipes and shopping lists.

I've been considering subscribing for almost a year, but have been afraid to sign up. Why? I don't know, I'm still working on that. The autistic part of me has a hard time identifying feelings and reasons, but I'll try. Maybe I'll fail, or the recipes will be horrible. Maybe my family won't buy in to the idea. Maybe they won't help. Maybe they will help. Maybe they will help if they have everything available and ready. Maybe they will be thrilled and the service will be a success. Maybe harmony will flow, and world peace will ensue. Maybe I'm asking too much for $10.

Pea Diaries Day 24

I'm not thrilled with the germination rate of these pea seeds. These are the sprouts from a half-pound bag of seeds. Look at the Day 1 Diary entry and you can see how many seeds are there and how many sprouts are growing now. I may have some burrowing animal issues going on in that bed, too. Oh well. I'll see how these grow and decide later whether to move the bed for a fall planting.

So, which is it?

Please explain: why must ducks be in a row?

Waiting

Spinning

I had my "skate mom" hat on yesterday, my rear end planted on cold bleachers in the Ice Arena. Fern's been taking freestyle lessons as well as "Artistry" classes, and yesterday was the spring show. I'm not sure what I expected, but when I saw the program "Sunday April 22, 5-8pm" I knew I didn't expect that. Three hours! What about all that refrigerator food I'd just bought at the warehouse store? The program indicates two selections by the artistry classes, if Fern doesn't skate in the first one, I'd dash home and put the chicken away and come back in time for the second program. Well, she was in the first group, and did wonderfully. She's so wonderful on the ice. I'm a little disappointed with my pictures. I took them without the flash, so they are a bit out of focus. Oh well, maybe next time.

Two forms of ID

Last Friday I went over to the pea patch to check on the status of my emerald delights. The seedlings were just starting to poke through. Then we loaded the car and headed to OC for the weekend.

Monday on my way to work I reach for my work ID, my credential, as I approach the gate. Nada. Gone. It's not in my usual location in the car, in the cup holder tray. I get my driver's licence and check in at the guards' station to get a temporary pass. I then keep my DL handy because sometimes the guards ask for it too when entering the building with a temp ID. By the time I got to my desk the licence was not in my pocket. Hmm. At lunch time I retrace my steps and cannot find it. No one has turned it in to the guards' stations. All the while I'm racking my brain to remember where my work ID might be. Not in my purse, or tote bag. Not in my coat pockets, not in the car. Where could it be, I didn't go far?

How on earth am I going to get another temporary pass tomorrow if I can't find my licence?

As the day wears on, my panic increases. Then I get a call from some woman who found my licence in the hall. She's in her car on the way out for the day. "Can I bring it to you tomorrow?" Aye yai yai. Well, no. I meet her in the parking lot and get my card. Whew.

Monday evening when I get home from work I walk over to check on my peas—did all that rain on Sunday help any? Any more sprouts? And there is my work ID lying in the wet grass.

No such number, no such zone

We got at least 3 calls from "unknown" tonight, maybe it was 4, I've lost track. (I love callerID, don't you?) So I re-registered my phone number with www.donotcall.gov

I hate telemarketing phone calls.

Checks in the Mail

Over 2.5" of rain registered in my rain gauge yesterday. Do you know what 2.5" of rain can do to a package left on your front porch on Saturday? What was left of my package left large puddles on the floor and contained my 800 checks I ordered last week. The soggiest pack was the pack to be used first. Oh well. When they dry I can pay my massage therapist, the lawn service and the golf club dues. I'm thinking about an old milk box for the front porch to keep packages dry. Wonder if the dairy has any?

The family went to OC this weekend. No, not Orange County. Ocean City, MD. We stayed at the Carousel which features an indoor ice rink. Fern loves to skate. She's been skating less than a year and a half and is already up to Freestyle 3. I'm very proud of her skills and amazed at the speed she acquired them. She enjoyed skating at the hotel, but was bothered by the other guests watching her. She was obviously the best skater there this weekend. Our room had a great view of the parking lot. And the rain. We went to OC for the weekend just to get away, even for a little at the end of spring break. We weren't there for the sun and sand so it really didn't matter about the view.

On our way there we stopped at a Sonic in Delaware for dinner. We don't have Sonics in our area of Maryland so it's a treat when we find one. I guess if we had a Sonic, then Taco Bell might be a treat. Uh, no, sorry, scratch that. Anyway, it's fun to enter another territory and get different kinds of food. A couple of summers ago we took our family vacation to Michigan, Wisconsin and Illinois. The hightlight was Wisconsin Dells, a beach town without the ocean. They have Culvers. Home of the butter burger. We'd never heard of Culvers, we must have eaten 4 out of 6 meals there those couple of days. Yum.

So, for the rest of you, what are the chain restaurants you like to eat at that you don't have in your home town?

The computer model shows the possibility of snow on Sunday. A large nor'easter storm could be headed our way. Spring break will be over and report cards are supposed to be sent home on Monday, April 16. Hmmm. I wonder what my honors daughter will bring home?

Everyday Kevin keeps saying "no school! School is over!" I'm going to have to drill into his head "spring break over," so he is not shocked on Monday. I still predict he'll be hard to get up.

Taxes are due on Tuesday. My husband reminded me they took charitable contributions out of his paycheck so I had to adjust the Schedule A. But, yay! now we owe less.

I'm trying to cut back on junk food and eat more healthily. So the phrase that has been running through my head the past two days is: Too much of a good thing will give you gas.

I went to my massage therapist on Thursday last week and when I got my checkbook out to pay her: uh oh. I'd used my last check in the pad several days before. That's ok , just mail me the check. Sunday in church, I reach for my purse to write out an offering check. Darn! I forgot to get a new pad out of the cabinet. Again. Sunday night, a run to the grocery store. No checks.Arrgh! So I reach for my check/visa card. It's in the pocket of my other coat. The parka I've been wearing because the SNOW! AAAAAArrrrrrrgggh! So I have to charge my groceries. I hate that.

So first thing when I get home is to get another pack of checks into my purse, pronto! Well, ok, I put away the groceries first. But there are no more checks. I used the last pack up. I always ignore the warning "this is your last pad of checks ORDER NOW!" I ignore it because the warning is always on the last pad in every box. And there is always another box. Except this time. Box 4 of 4

Say it with me: sheesh

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I went to the web site to order checks, the one I've ordered from before. And have been a happy customer of for a very long time. Very clearly they tell you the price of the number of boxes you're ordering. 2 boxes are $21.90, 4 boxes are $36.80. A little voice starts nagging me: how many check are in a box? I really have to start searching on their site. Several minutes and several clicks later I find it, buried "below the fold," 150 checks. Hmm, I thought there were 200! They didn't "raise their prices," they lowered the quantity. Like a pound of coffee is now only 12 ounces. A bit of quick math: $61.33 per 1000 checks. Then I found another company who still has 200 checks per box and charges $34.75 per 1000. And they are ordered. Now I just have to wait.

I'm Dreaming of a White Easter

It was fun waking up to a blanket of snow this morning.

Where do you throw stuff away? OK, I know, the trash can, but where else? Here in Maryland office buildings are smoke-free. Which means there are no ashtrays turned trash receptacles conveniently located at the elevators in this new building. The other day I needed a chocolate fix and I knew my project leader had a stash in his office. "Help yourself." Thanks. Yum. Except all the way back to my office I'm holding a handful of little foil wrappers because there are no public bins. Furthermore, now there is evidence of chocolate consumption in my trash can!

Pea Diaries Days 1 & 2

Yesterday in the mail I got my box of seeds. I ordered two half-pound bags of garden pea seeds (Alderman & Eclipse), two packs of bell peppers (rainbow mix), and a pack of tomato seeds (Giant Belgium). It's the first time in years I bought tomato and pepper seeds, I usually just buy the plants at the hardware store in June. If I am successful in growing these seedlings, and you live in my town, (I'm not mailing tomato babies), I'll give you a seedling or two. Just ask. (We'll see who is reading this!)

Today I left work early for an appointment and afterward had time to pick a place in the yard for my peas. This house was a model home for the builder when the neighborhood was being built 20 years ago. It's a corner lot and the house faces the intersection (to the southwest) so the front yard is bigger than the back and has better sun, and I usually plant my veggies in in the front. Today I picked a spot of unused soil next to the garage.

Last summer —or was it two summers ago?—I taught myself how to solder copper pipe together and made copper trellises. I made them so the four units are supposed to fit together in a large X formation, but I've never ended up using them like that. Anyway, I prepared the bed for the peas, soaked one pack in warm water (the other variety wants warmer soil so I'll wait a few weeks), sprinkled them over the soil (dirt), covered them up and stuck the trellises in the ground in the middle of the bed. I'm a fan of the "wide row" method of pea growing, instead of one seed two inches apart for the 16 million feet a pound of seed will create. The vines help support themselves this way, too so you don't need to provide a lot of growing support.