Kitchen doings

I really don't enjoy shopping but I do like fresh vegetables and fruits. Here are some of the things I have learned in my 27+ years of homemaking so we can eat healthy and still do it on a reasonable budget. I like to keep things that will spoil where I can see them so I will remember to cook with them. We eat lots of onions, I think most every main dish I cook uses at least one chopped onion. The red onions are for salad. We have mostly been eating brown russet potatoes so the little red ones will be a nice change.

If the vegetables are fresh when you buy them, they will keep longer in your fridge. When I went to Wal-mart yesterday, their produce did not look as good as usual and I did not buy any there. So today I went to another store, IGA. I was pleasantly surprised to find not only fresher produce but that was also very reasonably priced. I bought 2 kinds of leaf lettuce and Romaine. They were de-cored, then washed and dried. Most all vegetables get stored in Tupperware or other plastic containers with the lids on tight.
Inside the fridge.
Just in case you think I sound so very healthy, this is the 10 pound slab of bacon I bought at IGA. Yes, it is a LOT of bacon. We only eat cooked breakfast on weekends and when we have house guests so I am not sure why I thought this looked like such a good purchase. I did repackage it and put it in the freezer.

Armed Forces Day

Today is Armed Forces Day in the USA. My husband, father and all 6 of my uncles are veterans.

Old Glory is always beautiful but I think this one is especially nice. It is a "Real" flag, pieced together with embroidered stars. I bought is just this morning at our neighbor's garage sale for $1. It is flying proudly right outside our front door.

I love bargains but to me, this flag is much more valuable than just a buck.

Backyard decorating with a tiny budget

Our budget is just a bit stretched right now, with Nina's wedding this summer and knowing we will need to help out Jimmy when he starts graduate school. We moved to this house almost 5 years ago and have spent very little time in the backyard except when Jeff is cooking on his barbecue or smoker and when we play with Theo, our dog. This pergola was put in by the previous owner but as you can see, there is no concrete or wood deck underneath it. And we have been having a drainage problem as seen in a previous post but we are working with the owner of the land behind and uphill of us to try to take care of that. So the deck or patio is not going to happen this summer but I wanted to make the backyard prettier.

I spray painted the old Rubbermaid plastic chairs white and covered the table with a cloth from the linen closet.
These are Morning Glory seeds that have been planted just about 2 weeks. I hope they will climb up the home-made stick trellis onto the pergola posts.
I spent very little money, just on some spray paint and flower seeds. It is still not what I would prefer it to be but it is a very nice place to sit with my morning tea and read a book in the evening.

I hope to just bloom where I am planted and be happy about it.

Just a fraction of my Mom's stash

Jeff and I took a weekend trip to the Piney Woods of East Texas to see our parents for Mothers Day. None of our kids could go but our parents were pretty happy to see just us.

My mother has been a seamstress and crafter just about all here life. She also thinks more is better and has huge amounts of supplies for all kinds of projects.

She sent me home with massive amount of Christmas fabric yo-yos. I don't know if the picture shows how many there are but I think there is easily enough for 2 quilts.

Mom also insisted we go through her fabric, not her quilt fabric and fat quarters but just her general sewing fabric. I probably came home with about 10% of it. These pieces are all at least 1 yard, some as much as 5 or 6 yards. The stack on the left is all Christmas fabric and I plan on making criss cross coasters and pot holders as gifts for my friends.
The rest, I have no plans right now but as soon as we done with this wedding, I hope to get back to my regular sewing patterns.

Eyes and Noses

I was downtown today getting 2 wedding gifts at the store where all our town's brides register. It just so happens to be right between the hospice thrift store and Goodwill.

I only spent 50 cents on a bag full of these eyes and noses for stuffed animals. I have no idea why I bought them except they were a very good deal. It looks like I could start a toy business with them though.

Sweet gift from sweet hubby

I casually mentioned the last time we ate Asian food that I had always liked the soup spoons that all Asian restaurants seem to have. Sweet Jeff was in Oklahoma City last week and found these at a specialty store. Even Jeff is getting in to the pink things I seemed so drawn to anymore.

My family is so sweet that I have to be careful ever saying I want something unless I really want it because they will try to get it for me.

I won a Blog contest

Don't you just love this rose covered mousepad? I won it a blog contest from http://casualcottage.blogspot.com/2007/03/we-have-winner.html

It is truly beautiful and so well made.

Thank you so much, Marilyn.

Garage Sale finds

DD Nina and I got up early Saturday morning hoping to find some good sales. We think we hit the jackpot. She was mostly looking for vases for the centerpieces at wedding and big glass containers to use on the candy bar. She found at least 6 beautiful vases and 2 jars (I lost count)

After shopping for 2 hours, we had a nice breakfast at Panera Bread.

It was really nice morning and I think we both burned off some of our wedding preparation

tension.

8 blue napkins were 50 cents

Pampered Chef chopper 25 cents

patchwork potholder 10 cents!!!

vintage salt and pepper shakers 10 cents each

airbake cookie sheet 25 cents

table cloth, red checks, new in package for $1

The chairs and mirror were all $1 each and I think they give our front door some charm.

Brand new His and Hers embroidered pillow cases, 50 cents each. I think they were a wedding gift but the couple did not appreciate them. But I sure do.

This little table was $5 and I will probably paint it white. The frames and silver jewelry box were all 25 cents each. I think the silver frame will be even more beautiful with a picture of my sweet Nina and her John after they get married.

Whats new at my home

Fresh baked banana pecan bread on a cutting board made years ago in Vacation Bible School by son Jimmy . He will be graduating this week with his second BA and starts law school in August.

The pretty aqua tea pot was a gift from my Secret Sister.








New sofa pillows.














The tree is not new but we have never had a flower bed around it. The flowers are all pink,
hydrangeas, impatiens and dianthus.



The bush in the corner is called a blushing bride hydrangea and is covered with buds, the picture just doesn't show them.







A hydrangea up close.
The mulch is Oklahoma Cedar and smells as good as it looks.

Kaleidoscope

KALEIDOSCOPE
by
Vera Long


The greenest green I ever saw was not a patch of spring grass, a lizard or a grasshopper. It slithered along on top of the okra vines, onto the fence, and over the gate. It stopped and looked at me to see if I was going to catch its long, stretched-out body.

“It’s a garden snake, harmless, eats bugs, and aphids. Leave it alone,” Mama said, in answer to my screams. “Kids used to catch them to play with.”

The bluest blue came not from a tub of blue rinse-water as I wrung out the washing, or an artist’s paintbrush, nor my dotted Swiss prom dress, or your new necktie, nor any summer sky. I saw this bluest blue the first time I looked into your eyes.

The reddest red I ever saw was not a strawberry, not a hummingbird throat, not a ruby ring, not the scarlet berries of a haw bush, and not a rose. It was your lips, smeared with my lipstick, our first kiss.


The pinkest pink was the cheek of our first-born in her tatting-trimmed pink piqué dress and bonnet.

The whitest white was the snow on our first Christmas together.

The blackest black was the day you had to leave me.

Where did the time and colors go?



Vera Long is the winner of the 2006 Anderbo Poetry Contest. Now a widow, she has been writing Country Poetry for sixty years, living in rural Oklahoma. She has written poems about life and love, time and place and family life. Many of her poems can be found in various anthologies and on-line. She is listed in Who’s Who of American Women for her poetry. Vera and her late husband, Othadell Long, were married almost 57 years. She still lives on their farm near her two children. She belongs to the Oklahoma Poetry Society and is Secretary of Stillwater Writers Group.


Mrs. Long lives in my hometown and our newspaper just ran a feature story about her. This poem is so sweet and yet so sad. May God bless you, Mrs. Long.