Working to be Green

What to do with squash? New Recipe

2011-12-25T16:39:00.000-08:00

Gesh, it's been some time since I posted. School started again and the harvest swung into fashion. We were able to save quite a few veggies and still have about 1 1/2 bushels of apples in the garage/root celler. (For some reason, I prefer to think of it as a root celler, more romantic!) Part of what we have left are a multiude of squash. Now, I like squash but after a while, they get, well, boring. So I developed a new recipe for Christmas:

Squash Tart

1-2 squash ( I used Delicata and some other type that I forgot the name of, but I think any winter squash would work)
cream cheese (I used 1 1/2 boxes), room temperature
onion
bacon
puff pastry, thawed
spices

Clean the squash and cut into 1 inch-ish squares. Place on a baking sheet, drizzle with oil and salt, bake until soft.

Cook 3-4 slices of bacon. Remove from pan and add chopped onion, saute.

Roll the puff pastry till about 1/2 inch thick. Add spices to cream cheese (I added celery salt and pepper and a little of the bacon but add what you would like)

Place puff pastry on baking sheet on parchment paper. Smear cream cheese on pastry, put squash, onion, and bacon on pastry. Roll up edges slighty to form crust.

Bake at 350 for 25ish minutes, or until done. Enjoy!

"As the Jelly Jar Seals," a canning (soap) opera!

2011-08-29T07:48:00.000-07:00

"Yes, I can!" is my punny slogan. I can and I CAN. This time of year, I CAN. Whatever I can (ha!) get my hands on. So far this year, it's been two types of pickles, pickled beets, and beet jelly. Today I think it will be carrots.

Canning is one of those things that gets a bad rap. Sure, it can be dangerous with the large pots of boiling water and glass, but the sense of accomplishment that a person can get from knowing that they are saving food for the winter, and when you open that jar of lovely summer in the depths of winter, it is a wonderful feeling. I love looking at the jars we've preserved and just enjoying the feeling of accomplishment. I have wonderful memories of helping my mom can green beans (I wiped the top of the jar) and helping my grandmother freeze corn (I held the bag). Each time I can or preserve, I think of those times with loved ones and even though Grandma has passed away, she is still alive in my memory and my heart. I feel closer to her when I'm doing something that I remember doing with her! And I still call my mom to double check things ("How much juice do I need?") Sometimes I already know; I just call to chat about a shared passion.

Canning is making a come-back. As people become more concerned about what is done to their food and where it came from plus as food prices go up, canning will continue to be popular.

I made a zesty bread and butter pickle plus a normal bread and butter pickle for Matt who's not so fond of the the "zesty." The cucumbers came from our CSA plus some from Matt's coworker.

The cukes with red peppers and onions for the zesty. So pretty!

I made 2 quarts plus 4 pints of the zesty and 3 pints of the normal. A quart jar is about the size of a large pasta sauce jar and a pint is about the size of a large jelly jar. Not to be confused with actual jelly jars which are often latticed on the sides to be "prettier" than the normal canning jars.

I also made pickled beets and beet jelly. Beets are almost the perfect vegetable. According to the Nutrition and You website, beets are full of fiber, vitamin C, potassium, and anti-oxidants.

So many people don't like beets and I think they just haven't had GOOD beets. Beets need to be dressed up a bit (my favorite way is boiled with butter and salt/pepper, yum yum!) but when canning, you can use all of the beet. Cook the beets for the pickled beets and keep the juice from cooking for the jelly. The only "waste" is the skins from the beets that you take off AFTER cooking. And you can eat the tops as either a salad or cooked, how wonderful!

The pickled beets in their jar; look at that color! How many purple foods are there in the world? :)

The pickled beets and jelly. Beet jelly tastes like a combination of grape and strawberry, very yummy. I also like that in the background of this picture is my sewing machine; look at this domesticated diva! Canning AND sewing! :) If only you knew the ugly truth...

I ended up with 1 quart and 7 pints of pickled beets and 13 jars of jelly. All sealed, so it was a good canning day! I didn't can everything in one day. I made the pickled beets and saved the juice for the next day to make jelly. You heat the juice up again anyhow so why not save it till the next day. Just be certain that you label it when you put it in the fridge otherwise it looks like a funky type of Kool-Aid and people might try to drink it. (Voice of experience!)

The jelly jars cooling.

There is always one victim when I can, the stove top. No matter how hard I try to keep things clean or not spill, I still do. I think it's part of the gig to scrub the stove after canning, especially if you've been canning something that drips (like jelly) or is a dark color (like beets) or cooks for a really long time (pasta sauce). The stove always looks horrible. Here's proof:

And after some serious scrubbing!

Like new!

If someone is interested in learning more about canning or learning how to start, I can do another post just on intro-canning information or you can check out the USDA or an Extension office near you for more info.

Next time on "As the Jelly Jar Seals," will Merrilee can carrots? Will she ever have enough tomatoes to make sauce? Will Matt come home again to a filthy stove top? And whatever happened to Mr. Stripey Tomato, last seen entering the M&M household and not seen since? Will the mystery be solved? Tune in next time to find out!

I want to ride my bicycle, I want to ride my bike!

2011-08-19T07:29:00.000-07:00

For several years now I haven't had a bike. To be honest when we lived in NW Illinois, there wasn't anywhere to ride a bike to that was safe enough to enjoy. But here in WI, there are beautiful bike trails and most towns have bike lanes on the busier streets. So we began the "let's find Mer a bike" hunt. Now, with the number of bikes in existence already, I couldn't stand the thought of buying a NEW bike. And to me, most of the new ones weren't as sturdy as the older ones or as cute. I wanted a beach-crusier to just get me around town. I'm not planning on entering the Tour de Wisconsin (not a real race); I just want to ride my bike to the library.

Matt scoured Craigslist for me and found the perfect bike (for me). It's probably as old as I am since it has a bike registration tag for a nearby town dated from the same year I was born but it's still in good shape. The lady we bought it from had bought it for her mother who couldn't ride it any longer.

We paid the huge sum of $30 for it plus new tires (and a basket) and in the end, the bike was still cheaper than a new one and is of a sturdier construction.

Now I'm trying to figure out all the places I can ride my bike to. We have a grocery store just a few blocks down from us and when we need just a couple of items, I like to ride my bike. The day I made jelly and bought 10 pounds of sugar, I drove. My basket is only rated to 5 lbs. :) And I didn't want to walk with the sugar and all the other canning supplies I needed!

I take it to the library and use a fun pedestrian bridge across the river and a route that takes me around the big hill rather than over it. The only problem with a beach crusier is the one gear: me and hills can be a killer!

And yes, Mom, I wear a helmet!

My bike!

How Much Would You Spend??

2011-08-01T19:02:00.000-07:00

We're in the wrong profession. Anyone reading this post is in the wrong profession, trust me.

See this lovely tomato? How much would you pay for it?

$3? $4?

These organic, heirloom tomatoes, sold at a "Hole" Foods store, were....wait for it........wait.....

$5.99 a pound

The tomato was 2 pounds, hence the lovely tomato above was $12. $12!!!!!

That better be one heck of a great tomato!

But when you eat out of season, you pay for "forcing" the vegetable to ripen. Personally, I'll wait until the tomatoes are actually ripe and I'll know that they will taste even better than the one above. Don't get me wrong, I'd give plenty for a good ripe tomato and some s/p but the cheapskate in me doesn't want to pay $12 for it!

And I saw people purchasing the expensive tomatoes. One lady walked out of the store clutching a lovely Mr. Stripey like it was priceless. At those prices, it kinda was. So see, we're all in the wrong profession. We should start heirloom organic tomato farms and sell our crops at a high price!

(And yes, I pulled my camera out of my purse and made Matt hold the offending tomato while others in the store stared at me. Oh well, I'm used to be stared at oddly by others, wondering what in the world I'm doing. I am a former CP worker and a current teacher, after all! It's part and parcel of the gigs!)

County Fair Time

2011-07-25T16:19:00.000-07:00

This summer Matt and I are exploring our new region. And anything that we can do that doesn't require much driving is even better. Sooo, we went to our county fair. This fair had all sorts of advantages:

A. Matt's bank sponsors the fair so we got two free tickets (yay!)

B. The fairgrounds are about 4 blocks from our apartment so we walked saving even more on parking!

C. There was the possibility of elephant ears (and we all know how I feel about elephant ears!!!)

D. The intrigue of an activity called "cricket spitting"

So for the family members and friends who questioned the cricket spitting, I didn't actually see any crickets or other insects being spat out, but here's proof. We did see the Mutts gone Nutts, which was really cute and advocated for adopting pets from humane societies, a great idea.

The theme of the fair was "Year of the Corn" so this picture made perfect sense. The corn was yummy too.

I think this picture sums up our fair experience. Matt holding an elephant ear in front of the grandstand while truck pulling was going on (Bret Michaels was there the next night; we didn't go.) I thoroughly enjoyed my biennial elephant ear.

Yay for County Fairs!!!!! Support Local Businesses and Local Activities!!!

Product testing: Soap Nuts

2011-07-15T13:44:00.000-07:00

I tried soap nuts as an alternative to laundry detergent.

There were about 25 soap nuts per box. According to the box, each load needs about 5 nuts (to be placed in the bag provided) and you can get about 4-5 loads from each batch of nuts.

One slightly blurry soap nut. The nuts have this resin on them that isn't sticky but looks like it might be. They don't have any smell to them.

The bag provided for the nuts.

The soap nuts in action.

End result: They worked but I don't think I would get them again. I could get about 3 loads from each batch of soap nuts before they started falling apart and I would have to pick out bits of soap nut from the bottom of the washing machine or dryer. And this is a silly thing but my laundry didn't smell fresh. Yes, I know the "smell" is mostly chemicals but I missed it when I used the soap nuts. For me, they weren't my favorite. Now we're trying a different environmentally friendly laundry detergent.

Kitties and reusable bags

2011-07-10T13:34:00.000-07:00

Gus likes reusable bags.

Who needs a fancy cat-carrier when you can just use a reuseable bag!

Note to self: wash reusable bags....

Organizing the sock drawer

2011-07-01T13:09:00.000-07:00

Hello, my name is Merrilee and I have a messy sock drawer. Very messy sometimes. I am pretty good at matching socks together but my dress socks and hose go everywhere in my drawer.

Solution: toilet paper rolls and an empty tissue box. I put my matched dress socks in a toilet paper roll, one for each pair and my hose in the tissue box. As soon as we empty another tissue box, I'll have more than one box for different hose colors but for right now, I have just one box.

However, the empty toilet paper rolls and tissue box were kinda boring so I decorated them with scraps of fabric and some mod-podge.

Much better!

P.S. Digging through my scrap bag is always fun, remembering what the various fabrics were used for originally. For example, the tissue box is covered in some scrap from an apron I made and one of the toilet paper rolls is from our curtains at our previous house. The scrap bag itself is actually an old skirt that I took off from a dress, sewed up the bottom, and put a draw string through the waistband. Ahh, memories!

Pot Scrubber, updated

2011-06-24T12:37:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to add more to this blog but life has been getting in the way! But that also has given me time to be reusing-crafty. I've made several of these pot scrubbers and LOVE them! They're soft enough to use on my non-stick pans but stiff enough to scrub off stuck-on items. I would be careful in using them on yournon-stick pans for the first time but they work fine on mine.

I love clementines! They're great to toss in my lunch bag and they're the one thing I allow myself to enjoy that isn't local or in-season. AND they come in this great nylon bag that makes lovely scrubbers.

The bag with the labels cut off.

Folded roughly in fourths with the raw edges tucked in.

I used some of Matt's fishing line to sew the edges together. These work really well and don't take long to make. I've also tossed mine in the dishwasher several times to sanitize it and it's worked well after that. I haven't tried anything either than my clemmy bags but it is a great way to reuse nylon netted bags AND get a great scrubber out of the bargain.

Enjoy!!!

New blog title

2011-03-23T11:59:00.000-07:00

After some thought, I decided to change the direction of my blog. In reality, my life isn't interesting enough to blog about! I don't feel comfortable blogging about school life, and with it just being Hubby and I, there's not enough going on around here to be interesting. But, a personal goal I have is to be as green & Earth friendly as possible. I've been working at it but I think a blog might be a good place to share ideas and tips (either from me or from other sources)

So, without further ado, my new blog: Working to be Green, is created!

First tip: Reusing netted plastic bags (from onions or potatoes). Remove labels, fold into fourths, and tie into a loop using fishing line. And now you have a pot scrubber!
Courtesy of MaryJane's Farm

Things I have learned living in Wisconsin

2011-01-21T18:42:00.000-08:00

1. California cows are not happy. Wisconsin cows are.

2. Cheese is a food group. So is beer and sausage/brats.

3. Apparently there's a football team in Wisconsin that is good or something like that. And the Bears are evil/bad.

4. A snowstorm must measure 4+ inches to be serious trouble. 1-3" is just annoying.

5. Snowboots go with EVERYTHING!!! Dress pants, dresses, jeans, sweats, everything.

6. There is nothing wrong with wearing said snowboots all day long or anywhere you go.

7. Winter is just here and there's nothing we can do about it.

8. There's no reason to not be nice to other people; you can be crabby but that's not going to help.

9. There's something wrong with Illinois. No one's certain what it is but the state is just screwy.

10. Shoveling snow in shorts or a t-shirt is perfectly acceptable.

11. No testing, prior experience, or skill is needed to obtain a driver's license.

12. Enjoy the world around you no matter the season! Be outside having fun in winter just as much as you would enjoy summer!!

Christmas thoughts

2010-12-19T15:52:00.000-08:00

Has anyone else noticed that most Christmas stress is created by ourselves? Each year I HAVE to: send cards, make cookie plates, deliver plates, decorate, purchase gifts (includes Matt's help), wrap said presents, figure out our travel plans, and so on and so on. Matt helps with much of this, which is great but I still think, "This stress I'm feeling is being produced by me." What's the drive to do all of this? Why is this important? Why do I rush myself, purchase so much, and try to get all of this completed?

Then, revelation. Singing songs that you only get to sing once a year (Silent Night isn't the same in July nor is Jingle Bells), writing cards to family far away hoping all is well with them, and wishing people a Merry Christmas (and meaning it!). This evening we delivered cookies plates to our neighbors in our little apartment complex. Of the 7 plates we delivered: 2 went to families of four or more living in a two-bedroom apartment in which just Matt and I are cramped, one went to a dad with his two sons and another to a dad and his son that he sees only on the weekend (the son answered the door, saw me and said "Yes, ma'am?" Tough kid...), another went to a lady who has devoted her entire life to God and helping the helpless, a lady who just lost her job, and a shut-in lady. On any other Sunday evening, we wouldn't have seen them. We go inside our apartments, complain about the noise of our neighbors (!), and forget that we all sometimes need a friendly smile. Life can be hard, it can wear you down, but sometimes all we need to make life better is a plate of Christmas cookies!

Thanksgiving

2010-11-29T17:30:00.000-08:00

I love Thanksgiving. How can you not love a holiday that focuses around spending time with family and friends? And pie? I always think that Thanksgiving gets overlooked in the more materialistic holidays but Thanksgiving is great!!!

Matt and I had a marathon holiday with traveling to Indiana for a couple of days, back home to WI, and then on to Illinois. But we were able to see bunches of our family (and eat pie!). It did take us about two extra hours to get through Chicago, but still, it was a good trip.

On our way home, we stopped at a World Market, which we both love. There isn't one near us and it had been years since either of us were at one, so we stopped. I really enjoyed looking at the variety of goods and cool stuff for sale.

Back to the pie, I've cut sugar out of my diet so eating two (2!!) pieces of pumpkin pie was a real treat. But (as I told myself) how often do you get homemade pumpkin pie? And since the answer was "now," I ate the pie. I felt so sinful!

Thoughts on Fall

2010-10-06T18:26:00.000-07:00

Tonight as I was driving home, the sun was shining through the trees and some early leaves were falling across the road. So pretty! I love this time of year with the colors and crispness in the air!

This week has been Homecoming around school. Each day has been a dress-up day and therefore, each day has been a little crazier than the one before. Today one of my students came in wearing a full body suit that covered his head (morphsuit?) and thankfully I could tell which student he was. Gesh. So far my dressing up has only been to wear a red sweater on color day! And super-hero day? I dressed up as an economics teacher. Shocking, I know.

Matt has moved up here so now our family is together again. I really missed him and I'm glad he's home!

Life

2010-09-28T13:59:00.001-07:00

Sometimes it just amazes me at how blessed I am. I try not to take it for granted but I know that sometimes I do.

Teachers are struggling to find jobs all over the country.
I find one in a great (growing) school district.

Houses aren't selling.
We sold ours in two weeks and made money.

Banks are trimming staff and aren't really hiring a bunch.
Matt found a job about 15 minutes away from where I teach in a job that fits him better than what he is doing now.

All of this happened in about two months. We sold our house and Matt found a job in two weeks. How can I not be blessed? Look at my life!

I really enjoy teaching! I wasn't certain about teaching economics but I like it. I like that it can be current and we can talk about current events in an economic setting. Yay!

House news

2010-08-31T11:51:00.000-07:00

We received an offer on our house!!!!!!!! It was only on the market two weeks and even then just a sign in the yard but we received an offer!!!!!!!!!! God works in very mysterious ways which is fine with me! This means that Matt can put in his two week notice, pack up the rest of things and move up here with me!! Unfortunately this means that I will also have to give up sole control of the remote control but I'll do that if it means having Matt closer!!

Two weeks!! Hard to believe!! And the couple who is buying it fell in love with the house's charm (like I did. I knew it was the house for us when I walked into the pantry and saw the floor to ceiling original cabinets) so since they love the house's charm this means that they will probably work to keep it that way, not gut it and put in modern walls that look out of place in a 1910s Craftsman. (This is what I'm telling myself since I'm a little heartbroken that we're selling it but that's life and I don't want to commute four hours each day.)

Now to tell the cats that they're not going to be able to sleep all night on Matt's side of the bed anymore....

School daze

2010-08-25T08:20:00.000-07:00

I have now been officially employed for two days! Yay!!! It's been a while since I was officially employed since subbing is just a bit unofficial! I've been in my classroom for more than two days since it takes a bit to get through everything and to make the room look inviting. I've been hanging posters, pictures, and anything I can get my hands on to warm up the room. If anyone just happens to have some economics or women's studies posters out there and isn't certain what to do with them, feel free to send them my way!

I'm a little overwhelmed at the amount of info tossed at me in the last couple of days but it had to be tossed. I can't start the school year and not know certain procedures (well, I could but it wouldn't go well!) I had my second "start of school" nightmare last night. It's not really a nightmare but more like "worst case scenario" for a teacher. My econ. class wouldn't get to work and no matter what I said, how loud I said it, or with so much force, they wouldn't work. Even the threat of not graduating wasn't enough to get them to settle down and start working. Hence the nightmare. My first one dealt with students somehow leaving my classroom to sit in small groups and chat. I tried to give them a detention but it was the first day and I didn't know their names to give them detentions. Hopefully I won't be giving out detentions on the first day!!

Tomorrow I meet the rest of the social studies department. Wish me luck!!!

All moved!

2010-08-20T09:31:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm in the new apartment but Matt is still in NW Illinois. It's only been three days and yet, I don't like living away from him. I miss him so I guess it's a good thing that we're married and kinda supposed to live together. It was a traumatic move. It took 5 hours to load the moving truck, 2 1/2 to drive up here, and another 2 1/2 to unload the truck. Needless to say, we were all pooped by the end of the day. The kitties didn't fare so well though. While we were loading the truck in Illinois, I put them in the bathroom with all the kitty necessities: food, water, litter, a comfy place to sit, and an open window. Once we were ready to drive, we got the kitties in their travel containers (aka kitty jail) and drove off into the sunset, the entire time listening to cat yowls from the back seat. About half way there, I noticed a strange odor coming from the back seat: someone had had an accident. The odor got stronger, making me think that maybe TWO someones had had an accident. Once we reached the apartment, my suspicion was confirmed: two accidents in two kitty kages. So out came the cat shampoo (once it was purchased from the store:)) and after we got things moved into the apartment, Matt and I bravely went into the bathroom with two smelly cats and gave them both a bath. There is nothing more pathetic than a dripping wet cat yowling at the top of his lungs. Thank goodness they're declawed otherwise we would be in shreds. Now, I know that there might be some people who think that this treatment of the cats is inhumane but you do the best you can at the time!

So now I'm at school trying to get ready for the first day of school, which is September 1st. I'm feeling ok about some things and completely overwhelmed about others, which is probably pretty typical!

Almost...

2010-08-11T14:34:00.000-07:00

Our house is crazy right now!! We have packing boxes and boxes and boxes everywhere!!!! We're almost packed. All that we have left are the items we use everyday: plates, cups, coffeepot, etc. and since we're moving Monday, I have a few days to get those packed. I've already packed the excess plates, cups, etc., but still....

Matt and I are completely backwards. Normally people rent and then buy a home, but we're going backwards so we are also downsizing. Now after 4 years of marriage we don't have as much stuff as say my grandparents after living in the same house for over 50 years, but we still have accumulated a lot of "stuff" and we are sorting through it while keeping Goodwill busy! There are some things we don't really want to part with: Matt's grandparent's kitchen table, my great-grandparent's butter churn (we are moving to Wisconsin for goodness sake. The churn might come in handy!!) but there are other things that we know we can live without: the spare room dresser, the recliner, the cats, no, I'm kidding, the cats are coming with us. I think the cats know something is up or at least not right. They keep over-eating and then getting sick from over-eating. I think they're nervous. I'm just ready to be in the new apartment!!!

Apartment hunting

2010-07-26T12:00:00.000-07:00

Ahh, the hunt. Wanted: 2 bedroom apartment/house with storage, kitties must be ok, dishwasher would be nice, washer/dryer please. And we found it!!!!! It is in the next town over but it's only about 6 miles so that's good.
We found it after looking at:
the third floor walk-up with no elevator
the former grow house for pot
the kitty-smell apartment
and many more that I don't want to go into. I'm excited about starting soon except I keep thinking about all the things I need like bulletin boards, classroom rules, a working syllabus, etc. The to-do list is like the Energizer Bunny, it keeps going and going and going.......

About time I wrote a new post!

2010-07-16T09:23:00.000-07:00

I know that it's been a long time since I posted. This spring was pretty stressful for me and I was afraid that all my posts would be along these lines:

I need a job
I need a job
I need a job
Please, I need a job.

All spring I subbed in our local schools which gave me some pretty neat stories, but I was still concerned that all my posts would revolve around the above-mentioned theme. So I didn't post anything, trying to keep my sanity and stop obsessing about our future.

But I have good news:

I HAVE A JOB!!!!!!!!!! I'm the new social studies teacher in Fort Atkinson, WI. YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I start in late August which gives Matt and I time to move and sell our house. We really like Fort Atkinson and it's close to Madison, which gives us access to great culture! The only hitch is that currently the position is for a one year contract due to the previous teacher taking a new position but wanting to leave her old position open just in case so she took a one year leave of absence. But she might not want her old position back and even if she does, I then have one year's worth of experience at a progressive school to add to my resume. To me, it's a win-win. And Matt is excited because he was getting pretty tired of his current position. The only ones who might not be happy would be the cats, who don't like to travel.

So we're happy and now I can post again without sounding like an obsessed fool. That and my to-do list just got a whole lot longer!!!!!

In now unrelated news, I'm still working on my Illinois license. It's been 4 months and I'm still not licensed. But now, I only need my Wisconsin license!

One License!!

2010-03-01T19:05:00.000-08:00

I finally received my Wisconsin teaching license! According to one state, I am a teacher!!! Yay!!!!!

Bureau"crap"tic Blues

2010-02-16T10:19:00.001-08:00

Have you ever thought that people are trying to make you crazy? Or that by trying to simply a process, it becomes more difficult to complete the twists and turns created by "simplifying" the process?

I'm trying to apply for my teaching license. My paperwork in one state is completed and is being processed. The state in which I live (and contrary to popular belief, it's not "confusion") has a completely different process for licensing applications. And different tests I have to take, different paperwork, and always, always more checks to write to pay for various "fees." Honestly, who came up with this process? M.C. Escher? Up one flight of steps, down another into a white duck, no, a black duck, no, a white duck..... Good grief!!

I will get my license, I will get my license, I will get my license, come on, chant with me. I will get my license....

What to do with a cabbage?

2010-02-05T09:52:00.000-08:00

About a week ago, I impulse bought a cabbage. Some people impulse buy shoes, clothing, or jewelry, I impulse buy vegetables. Go figure.

Anyhow, the cabbage sat in our fridge for a week or so with Matt asking every couple of days, "What are you going to do with that cabbage?" to which I answered, "I haven't decided yet."

I know that cabbage lasts a long time but I knew it wouldn't last forever. So I looked in my cookbooks for a cabbage recipe that sounded palatable. So many of them had odd ingredients or just sounded icky. Eventually I found a recipe that sounded good in a Depression era cookbook. Cabbage casserole: ground beef, onions, cabbage, tomato chucks, and rice, all baked together in the oven. The recipe said two hours but our oven is slow, so it took more like three hours. It was very yummy but there was one downfall: it makes a ton!!!! There is no way that Matt and I can eat all that cabbage and still be welcomed in public!

So what to do with the 2 1/2 quart dish full of cabbage casserole? Matt said that he thought it would make wonderful pasty filling. Pasties (pronounced pAAsties) are meat and veggie pies associated with Cornish miners who moved to this area for the lead mining. You can buy them frozen in the grocery store. I thought about it and I agree with Matt, it would make good pasty filling. However we have so much filling, it is going to make multiple pasties.

After deliberating for a bit, I'm going to make the pasties but freeze them. The filling is all cooked and pie dough freezes, so why not? We'll see how this works! This is the benefit of only working part time (I'm subbing some but not five days a week!) So I have time to make pasties. I'll let you know how it turns out!

Home Life and Organizational Blues

2010-01-22T13:35:00.000-08:00

Have you ever started one chore to create more for yourself?
Last week while I was washing the sheets, Matt and I decided it was time to flip the mattress.
Which led to...
A discussion about replacing the egg carton foamy thing on the bed. It was a split decision. Mer: nope; Matt: yep. It hurts my back but Matt's back needed it.
Which led to....
Matt cutting the foamy thing in half, replacing his half and leaving my half empty.
Which led to...
Matt putting the leftover foamy thing on the couch overnight where it was immediately welcomed by the furry members of our household. Mac didn't leave it for about 12 hours.
Which led to....
I found a blanket given to us by the Humane Society that was a little too small for comfort. However, it was just right for a pillow case. I sewed up three sides, added some buttons, cut the foamy thing into three parts, and presto chango: a kitty bed. It has been inaugurated by both kitties and seemed to pass with flying colors, or more like snoozing colors.

Back to the mattress flipping (one chore led to several, like a flow chart)
After I took the dust ruffle off the bed, the several clans of dust bunnies that were living under our bed suddenly became very noticeable.
Which led to...
I removed and sorted and tossed gazillions of milk rings and swept the underbed clean!
Which led to...
Re-organizing the underbed storage so it was more, well, organized. I was so inspired by the reorganization that I kept going.
Which led to....
I completely organized my canning jars. They are all packed carefully in one footlocker and one Rubbermaid tote. Each jar is wrapped in cloth (some leftover socks from under the bed). All my lids and rings are packed too. There is even room left for the few jars we're still using!
Yay!
Which led to....
Sorting through the pantry. I haven't tackled the 'food' side but the storage side is nicely organized, in my opinion. Especially now that the empty canning jars are out of the way.
Which led to....
Matt and I cleaning out our closets. We're getting there. Organization is always on my "to-do" list, which now has a couple of more things crossed off!!!!

I just wanted to flip the mattress......

A New Year

2010-01-13T13:20:00.000-08:00

This year so far has gone well. I'm substitute teaching in a couple of our local schools. I put my name on our regional district list and called the schools to introduce myself. One school I called said "Great, thanks for introducing yourself, what are you doing on Friday?" Job conquered. My goal is to make enough to pay for our heating bill during the winter and maybe a little more.

I have decided though that being a housewife is exhausting. We don't have kids but I'm still pooped at the end of a day. Of course, I doing more, like making our own bread and today I baked scones and a jam tart but still, I'm tired. But I'm enjoying it and enjoying working on my ever-growing list of "to-do's" like: clean out the junk drawer, somehow organize my canning stuff so it's not all over the kitchen, clean out three closets, etc. So far I haven't taken anything off my list, only added more!

We had a great Christmas!!! Matt and I headed to Indiana for a few days and managed to see lots of family members and spend great time with Mom, Dad, John, Leah and Daniel. It was fantastic, especially spending time with Daniel. An 11-month old makes Christmas fun!!!

Well, off to start supper. I think today is a great meatloaf day!!!

DONE!!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-12-22T08:22:00.000-08:00

Today was supposed to be my last day of student teaching. I say "supposed to be" because we're having a snow day instead. I was brushing my teeth this morning when the phone rang at 6:15 which is never a good sign. It was my cooperating teacher informing me of the snow day to which my reaction was "Really?" as I looked out the window. We'd had about 3 inches of snow which isn't enough to call off school in Northern Illinois but the coming ice storm/freezing rain/rain/blowing snow/Holocene Ice Age complete with woolly mammoths (basically the weatherpeople have no clear idea of what is coming, just that it is coming and it could be a doozie) was enough for the superintendent to cancel school. So today is very anticlimactic. I had expected to finish strong. I wasn't expecting cupcakes like the 5th grade gave me on my last day (yummy!) but still, some type of closure. This, dear readers, is like anticlosure.

Actually I had a problem. I am currently one credit short of earning an geography endorsement so I've been taking a class online to fulfill that credit. (Which is the topic for another post) Since students have been taking finals, all the grading is caught up, and there was nothing for me to do, I brought my textbook to school with me so I could study. Yesterday I left it at school thinking that I would studying this morning. Hence the problem. So I drove to school after leaving a message with my cooperating teacher, hoping beyond hope that maybe, just maybe the secret back door entrance would be open, I could sneak in, and grab my textbook. And guess what??? Today was my lucky day because the back door was open!!!!!! I grabbed my book and cleaned off the rest of my desk. Still anticlimactic but better. So as soon as Wisconsin decides that yes, I'm a teacher, Illinois and Indiana can make the same decisions. Then I can find a job, start getting paid again, and basically become a productive citizen (again.)

The rest of the afternoon will be devoted to Christmas cookies. Today: fudge, both chocolate and peanut butter. Maybe as a reward for finishing student teaching, I'll let myself lick more than just the spoon.....

Yay for Snow!!!

2009-12-10T12:41:00.000-08:00

We had our first snow and received about 10 inches. It's hard to tell because it started blowing everywhere. Now it's beginning to look like Christmas! Of course, it's also very cold but that's ok.

We haven't had school for two days now: Wednesday because it was still snowing and today (Thursday) because it was still blowing and minus double digits temperature.

The best part is that I don't have to make these days up. They are an extra vacation for me!!!!

Do I have the Christmas spirit or just a cold?

2009-12-06T16:12:00.000-08:00

I can't tell!! I think its Christmas spirit though!

Our tree is up and decorated. Our nativities are out, and both cats have pretended to be presents by sitting under the tree. I figure those three things make it Christmas if we don't have any snow yet.

I have two and 1/2 weeks of student teaching remaining. I figure I can make it. It's also kinda hard to think that after this I can teach. This is all I need to be a teacher. I keep thinking that there must be more! But thankfully there isn't!!

We had a good Thanksgiving. My parents came up for a visit and it was wonderful! We had both sets of parents over for Thanksgiving dinner and between all of us bringing food, we had a great meal and even better conversation and time spent together.

I love this time of year. It's so much fun and such a happy time of year. The anticipation is everywhere. Today was the hanging of the greens ceremony in church today and it always puts me even more in the Christmas spirit. Our church goes from bare to festive in an hour! Yay!

Today

2009-11-19T13:07:00.001-08:00

Today was not so hot in the realm of student teaching. I can see that classroom management is always going to be a problem for me. It's been really dificult to walk in to the middle of class and manage the class. At least with the middle school I started the school year with them. They knew from day one that I was teacher.2. These high school students don't. They are starting to recognize me as "instructor" but not all of them. Some of them are really good kids and I like them; others I could kick.

I keep thinking, this will be so much easier when I have my own classroom. But will it? How do I create a classroom that a) functions b)is open and supportive while c)maintaining control? I don't know and if someone does know, can you please tell me? I would really like to know!

Also, if you hear of any job openings, let me know: middle/high school social studies!!!

Worst student teacher ever!

2009-11-18T13:27:00.000-08:00

Today in 7th period (luckily one of my better classes) I was instructing them on how to complete their homework. I wanted them to finish filling out the worksheet. So I said "And please finish filling out your sheet." Only I didn't say "sheet." Another word, very similar, popped (or pooped) out of my mouth. The class burst into laughter and I know that I turned bright red. I apologized for my language and predicted that I would fail student teaching. The students continued to laugh at me for about the next 5 minutes. Travis ( my cooperating teacher) wasn't in the room at the time but I told him after school JUST IN CASE someone commented on my language. These things happen but I wish they wouldn't happen to ME!

I'm still here!

2009-11-15T16:57:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the lack of blogging. Life has just been kinda crazy. Good, but crazy. I've been student teaching since August and then I'll be done before Christmas. Whereas my Wisconsin fellow students will be done mid-January! Ha! I'm not gloating, well, maybe a little.

Matt is now the ancient age of 31. Of course, in a few months, I'll be the same age but for right now, I'm still the youthful age of 30. I don't know what 30 is supposed to feel like but I certainly don't feel 30. Maybe like 24-25. I might feel that way because I'm in college but even when I wasn't I didn't feel my age. I suppose that's a good thing but I have to remind myself of my actual age sometimes. However, when dealing with teenagers, I often think, "They're 16 -18 and I'm 30. That means I'm almost twice their age and heck if I'm going to let them beat me!" It's my little peptalk and it does a pretty good job.

Ok, back to Matt's birthday. Here is his cake that I made. It's a red velvet cake with orange frosting and Scooby Doo decorations. Yes, he turned 31 but he is definitely a kid at heart and I love that about him.

Here he is with his cake.

Interior shot of the cake. I must admit, one of the most unusually colored cakes I've ever made, seen, or eaten.

A day in the life of a student teacher

2009-09-18T17:56:00.000-07:00

7:30 Arrive at school
7:31 First sip of coffee
7:32 Finish grading/post grades/prepare for days lessons
8:00 Students arrive
8:01-3:19 Blur of activity, talking, collecting/passing out papers, talking, answering random questions, talking, reminding students of homework to be turned in, talking, more questions "Yes, you may go to the bathroom, No, you may not go to your homeroom, Yes, that is the right answer, No look at it again, Stop (Pick one) talking, cheating, talking, hitting your neighbor, talking, poking the balloon (long story), talking, grossing out your neighbor, talking, eating paste, etc."
3:20 Sit down and try to remember what happened but mind is oozing out of ears

I really enjoy student teaching but it is exhausting! Occasionally I have moments where I think, "Yep, this is right for me." Yesterday we were discussing Native Americans in Illinois history and one of my students came up to be later and pointed out in a book that she was reading that the book talked about Native Americans too. Now this might not sound like a huge connection to make but she's 10. To be able to connect something that she is reading for fun with something we are studying is great! It made me smile.

Monday I start teaching math. Luckily for me, we're doing rounding decimals. I think that I can handle that!!!

As for my window project, I have: (drum roll) 2 left!!!!! Yep, 2!!!!!!!!! Out of 24! I've done 22 windows so far!!!!!!!

Student teaching

2009-08-30T15:59:00.000-07:00

This week is week 3 of my student teaching and so far, so good. The students (fifth graders) are pretty good and I know all 60 of their names! Yay!! I've only had two snarky comment to me, which must be some sort of record. So far I'm kinda working into the classroom and taking more responsiblity. I like it. Hopefully it continues to go well.

Last weekend, Matt and I went to the Madison Zoo and had so much fun!!!! We forgot our camera so we don't have any pictures but it was fun. We got so close to a tiger I could have touched it (but I didn't). And the Madison Zoo was free, even better!!! We needed a fun day out and we got it!!

A good weekend!

2009-08-03T07:45:00.000-07:00

I hope that everyone had a great weekend. Matt and I did. Part of my window project this summer has been to replace broken glass. Now, I can do this in theory but then, I can also do a back handspring in theory too, (meaning I know what I need to do but the true question is: Can I do it?) I had been putting it of and putting it off until I just had to do it. So I went to our local lumber yard and told them the size of glass I needed, they cut it, I came home, removed the broken glass, glazing and old points from the window, and replaced the glass with new, uncracked glass. I have to admit, I'm pretty proud of myself. I replaced three windows and Matt and I worked on replacing the fourth. That one was a bit of a struggle but we got it replaced. The new windows look pretty good and you can't tell the difference! The only problem is that I can't wear gloves and handle glass, even broken glass. For the first three windows I didn't have a problem but with the last window, I sliced my middle finger which began to bleed profusely. Now parts of our new glazing have little bits of red in them from my blood. Blood, sweat and tears. (I haven't actually cried over this project yet but I have definitely sweated and now bled.)

Saturday evening Matt and I went to go see "The Proposal." It's a very funny movie with a happy ending. I like that. Do all movies have to be thought-provoking or awe-inspiring? Sometimes, I just like a few laughs. Anyhow, this one is good. A little risque in parts, but still funny. Both Matt and I are Sandra Bullock fans which made us like it even more.

Before the movie, we had about 45 minutes to kill so after we purchased our tickets, we headed over to the mall from the movie theater (about 100 feet). Now, the best part of this mall is the humane society adoption center. They always have cute cats and dogs in there. As always, we headed for the shop to say hello to the animals. In the front window they had two kittens who were just going nuts with playing. They were very cute and one of them looked like Gus when he was a kitten, about 35 pounds ago (ok, not that many, more like 12) They had supercute dogs, rats, and even more cats. For each animal, they have a card next to it with the reason the previous owners brought it in and generally it's something like: couldn't care for, moving, too many pets, new baby, etc. One of the cats, a longhair domino cat, according to it's card, was brought in because of "unrealistic expectations." Now, this made Matt and I wonder what sort of unrealistic expectations might an owner have for a cat? Did they expect the cat to feed itself? Scoop it's own litter box? Maybe balance the owner's checkbook? "I thought this cat would know nuclear physics but I don't think it knows where it's tail is!" "You told me that this cat would change my life but I still have trouble with the can opener!!! Take it back!!" And so on. I had to leave the shop because I was giggling so much at the idea of "unrealistic expectations" and how Matt and I perceived it. It probably means that the owner thought the cat would get along with other animals and didn't or something like that. But the phrase "unrealistic expectations" could mean so much more....

I have unrealistic expectations for our cats: that Mac won't jump on the bed when I'm trying to make it and that Gus will realize that there are more comfortable places to sleep besides purring loudly between our heads while we're trying to sleep. Or there is his litter box issue, namely his misuse of the box. Yes, very unrealistic....

More Random!!!

2009-07-30T10:33:00.000-07:00

Apparently, my life is random. I'm certain that others reading this would agree that their lives are also random but since this is my blog, I'll discuss my randomness. Feel free to post your random in the comments (must contain PG-13-rated randomness because occasionally my grandmother reads this blog (when I remember to print it off and send it to her:))

Random update: Fairs: We didn't go to the Great Jones County Fair because it was a great 75 miles away. I mean, I like elephant ears but I'm far too practical/cheap to justify that much gas/time/energy just to reward myself with yummy gooey dough coated in cinnamon sugar, all dripping and warm..... Oh sorry, where was I? Right, the fair. So instead Matt and I went to the Dubuque County Fair which does not have a descriptive adjective in front of it so we didn't know what to expect. It was ok. I did have some complaints thought. First off, not enough cows and mostly Holsteins, no goats, and only a few rabbits. Come on people, where are the farm animals??!? Second, NO ELEPHANT EARS!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was dismayed, to say the least but I managed to keep my despair to a quiet howl on the midway, "Where are the ELEPHANT EARS!!!?!? I WANT AN EAR!!!!!!" while Matt quickly steered away from his deranged, somewhat psychotic, fair-food demanding wife. (This incident may or may not have happened. I leave you to judge) However, I have found that funnel cakes make an acceptable though not equal substitution. We did enjoy the pig racing and the BMX trick bikes doing flips in the air. Only at a Midwest fair would you have pig, actually piglet racing, and bike tricks about 20 feet away. FYI: the pigs were not greased. I checked.

Kitty randomness: Some of you might be tired of reading about our cats but they are funny and keep Matt and I giggling. Pets of all kinds bring so much joy to a house that I like to share it. Our cats bring a particular type of joy, namely, weird because that's how our cats act. The other night we had cantaloupe. It was delicious. Matt cut it up and we partook. About a hour later, I noticed Gus (you knew Gus was coming into this story, didn't you?) acting oddly, even for him. He was shaking and pawing at his head. I tried to grab him but he ran away from me. Eventually I tracked him to his kitty hide-out (a cat cube) and grabbed him out of it. He still wouldn't let me look at his head so I had to forcibly turn his face towards me. According to the sticker stuck on the corner of his mouth and whiskers, he is a delicious home-grown cantaloupe. While his belly is the size and color of a cantaloupe, I can't tell if he's ripe or not. And apparently when Matt threw the rind in the trash, he missed one part. Ahh, Gus, our special kitty....

It's time for Random time!

2009-07-23T11:15:00.000-07:00

#1. Yesterday was the first Annual "Normal Gus" day. Actually we don't know if it was the first Annual but we certainly hope so!! As we all know, Gus is normally not normal. But yesterday, we had a breakthrough. First sign of normality: Normally at treat time, if 5 cat treats are given out, 4 are quickly eaten by Mac, the treat addict, and one sits in front of Gus while he thinks about whether or not he wants the treat. By the time he has come to the conclusion that yes, he wants the treat, it has been snarfed by Mac "Give me treats or I'll give you death" Lee. Yesterday, the total treat count: Mac 2, Gus 3!!! Gus ate more treats yesterday than he has all year. Matt said that Gus just went cat-wild over the treats! Good for Gus. Second sign of normality: Gus wasn't afraid of the plastic bag when I put it away. Normally, he runs in terror from the sound of lightly crinkling plastic. Not yesterday. Third sign of normality: He sat like a cat, tummy tucked in, paws parallel to each other and not like an old man, paunch hanging out, legs all askew. For one day, we had two normal cats. It was bliss......

#2. After much consideration, I believe that Belted Galways replaced Jerseys in the coveted spot of "Merrilee's Favorite Cow." While I will always have a soft spot for Jerseys in my heart, Belted Galways are funnier. (And yes, dear readers, that was the sole criterion) Not that I have actually met a Belted Galway but there is a herd near us. These are black with a broad white "belt" that goes around their middle. And I'm assuming they are from Galway. Many of the cows near us have the belt in the middle. Some, however, have the belt closer to their hind end, reminding me of boys who wear their baggy pants much lower than they should. These are the gangster rappers of the herd, the nonconformists, the hip, and the "cool ." They make me chuckle because I always tell them "Pull your belt up" again proving my oddity in talking to cows. However, since we're are driving by these cows and Matt already knows I'm strange BUT still consented to marry me, I feel safe in saying it. And I laugh at my horrible joke at the cows' expense. Also, about 2 miles down the road is a small herd with 2 Belted in it. We (Matt and I) have decided that these are the rogue spies of the bovine world, the "Beef, James Beef." (Portrayed by Roger MOOOre)(sorry, couldn't resist) Cows are funny....

#3. Our tomatoes have blight. Again. Stupid rain. It's been so wet they haven't had the chance to dry out. Stupid rain. I haven't been able to work outside because of the, well, you know.

#4. We might go to the Great Jones County Fair this weekend. It's in um, Jones County, in case you weren't certain. And I'll let you know if it is truly "Great," "Good," or just "Okey-dokey."

Well, I think that's all my random thoughts for today.

Updates, updates, updates

2009-07-21T12:01:00.000-07:00

This weekend my dad finally had knee replacement surgery. It only took Mom years of nagging for it to happen. No one in my family is stubborn! Anyhow, Dad is doing well and at home, enjoying his new armchair (which I also enjoyed and must admit that it is quite comfy) Dad, I'm glad you had the surgery and I know that in time, you'll be glad too.

Also, as for my classroom vents, we changed rooms and now I (along with most of the class) sit on the opposite side of the room from the annoying girls. The professor is doing what he can to get them to keep up but they need to learn that this isn't high school; no one is going to hold your hand. One of the girls has now missed two days of class, which is equivalent to 2 weeks of a normal-schedule class. So I sit next to three other girls and we help each other work out problems and discuss topics. Ahh, productive students....

I'm less annoyed with the world now and feel better about things (i.e. I'm not going to start yelling in the grocery store about the quality of crackers available.)

And, I think that this weekend, I might get another elephant ear!!! I'll keep you posted!

I'm mad and I'm not going to take it anymore!! No, not really...

2009-07-14T11:34:00.000-07:00

Recently I've been getting annoyed with the world. I don't have a clear reason why, just a general "ticked" feeling. Here are my current top three pet peeves: (I'm glad that I'm typing that because I'm not so certain I could say it. Just tried and nope, can't)

Anyhow,
Issue #1. Our neighbors left for several days. From Saturday until Monday evening, their cat was in an open upstairs window yowling nearly constantly. It broke my heart. Their cat is kinda "borderline" domesticated and feral. He'll let you pet him and then hiss at you. Keeping him locked up doesn't help much with the "feral" issue.
Potential Solution: Tell them the next time I see them that Paws really missed them and that he was yowling for nearly 3 days straight in the open window. Offer to go over and check on the cats since their cats can't do anything differently than ours. If it happens again, call animal control (too harsh??)

Issue #2. The girl behind me in class back talks to the professor who doesn't do anything about it but it annoys me for him. Greatly. (Am I getting old?? Or just wise enough to know not to back talk professors. It's not cute or clever.) She is also very immature, which shows through almost every day. Uggh, I'm getting annoyed just thinking about it.
Potential Solution: Tell her to be quiet!!! No, that's what I WANT to do. I don't have any but does anyone have any thoughts.

Issue #3. Annoying lady at church. I won't go into too much but let's just say that she's THAT lady, the one who looks/sneers at you when you come to church 5 minutes late.
Potential Solution: Avoidance has worked thus far, why change? Also, wake up 5 minutes earlier.

So all of these petty annoyances have made me wonder what is going on. Is the world changing or am I? Does anyone else ever feel this way? This morning on my way to school, a car turned left right in front of another car who had to stop to let the first car go by so it wouldn't hit it. The second car beeped it's horn at the first car who flipped off the second car. Why? For not hitting it?? For letting them know that they almost caused an accident??

Sorry this post is a downer. But, since life is a constant process to improve, I have decided what to do to counter-act all these annoyances: something unexpectedly nice. Hold doors for people. Let them go first. Do what I can to help them. I know that I'm not the first to think of this but I do feel that if by making my world a little better, then I help the entire world. Pass it on!!!!

Things I learned this weekend:

2009-06-29T07:36:00.000-07:00

1. Even when you are standing in the shade, you can still get a nasty sunburn. For proof, look at my lobster red shoulders.

2. Husbands can be quite shocked to learn that their wives have apparently never realized the validity of #1. (Matt was in disbelief that I didn't know that and my excuse of "But I was in the shade" didn't help my case)

3. Old glass breaks pretty easily. Especially when you're chipping away old window glazing. So now I have two more windows to replace. Oh well.

4. Free musical concerts bring a crowd. On Saturday we went to a free big-band concert and it was fabulous!!!!!!! Really enjoyed it but unfortunately there was no dance floor. Not that we can dance but we really like to give it a shot.

5. I'm in a minority of women whose husbands FORCE them to buy clothes. Matt made me buy more teaching clothes this weekend. We were looking through the store and I had one item to try on; Matt had 6 for me to try on. He's very good at shopping for women's clothes because of all the time he spent with his mother and sister shopping for clothes when he was a little boy.

6. We need a backwards dictionary or one that lists the definition of the word and then gives the word. I need it because I usually can think of the definition of the word but not the word I am looking for. Here's my quandary: Last week as I was driving into a neighboring town, I ended up following an Amish buggy. This town has been trying to crack down on people speeding into it and has set up those "Here's your speed" digital read-outs on the edge of town. As the buggy passed by, it was going a whopping 8 miles an hour. But just the sight of the buggy passing the speed-monitor was .....and here's where I need my dictionary. The word I want is not: ironic, oxymoronic, but more like "out of sync, out of place, seemingly backwards from the norm" Can anyone help me with this??

Happy Father's Day, a day late...

2009-06-22T08:04:00.000-07:00

Happy Father's Day to all the dads in the world!!!! Thanks for being our Dad!!!!

I know that most people think that their father is the best in the world, which is perfectly acceptable, but I know that mine is the best!!!

Top ten reasons why my Dad is the best:

10. Willingly taught me to drive a manual car and didn't get upset when I "killed" the car numerous times or ran stop lights because I didn't want to face 1st gear again!

9. Understood that math and I are not friends even though he is friends with math.

8. Accepted that sometimes I brought home stray cats and dogs because they either a. needed a home or b. our pet was "lonely" and clearly needed a friend.

7. Helped me refurnish a corner cabinet that had been through a fire and had had blue paint spilled on it even though others said we should just get rid of it. It is a family heirloom and turned out to be solid cherry. A true diamond in the rough!!

6. Is always willing to answer my home improvement questions.

5. Is patience exemplified.

4. Even when I was out of college and technically grown up, he would wait for me to come home after being out with friends before going to bed. He wasn't upset that I was out late, he just wanted to be certain that I got home safely.

3. Drives 14 hours to see Matt and I whenever he can (Mom comes too, but this list is about Dad, sorry, Mom) And with driving, a Dad wisdom nugget: When traveling, if you put it (casserole, paint can, milk jug, etc.) on the floor, it can't fall off.

2. Continually shows how to be a good person and how to use the correct tool for the proper job. As he says, "If you have to force it, you're probably doing it wrong."

1. While he will always be my dad, he is now and forever more my friend.

I'm smarter than a tub of window glazing!

2009-06-15T07:25:00.000-07:00

This weekend we had beautiful weather, so I decided it was time to tackle the windows. Well, not literally "tackle" because that could be very painful and/or destructive. On Friday, I started on a window that no one will ever see because it is at a very odd angle and location. Scraping and scraping old window glazing, old paint off the windows, and the flaking paint off the window sills is a great, yet productive way to spend your weekend!!

I figured out the glazing process and now have two windows scraped and reglazed. Only 22 more plus 5 basement windows. I love all the windows in our house but now I'm starting to wish we lived in a cave...

We also went to a one-year old's birthday party this weekend. Matt's cousin Eric and his wife Katrina threw a party for their son who turned the big "1." It was so much fun. He is a very happy baby but he really didn't like playing with his cake very much. I don't think he liked the icing on his fingers. It was supposed to be a Curious George cake but it looked more like the losing monkey from a monkey knife fight, missing an ear and his tail. It was the joke of the party. Luckily Katrina didn't make the cake so we could just make fun of it without hurting anyone's feelings.

Also, just to continually proof that Gus the cat is special: On Sunday night, Gus was sitting in the window. Having just discovered the "open" window means that he can sit in the window AND be inside at the same time, he was enjoying the evening breeze when he suddenly became hungry. Looking up he saw a paint chip from one of the 22 windows not yet tackled. Before any human could stop him, he reached up, grabbed the paint chip, and ate it. Yes, the cat ate paint. Now, I know that children can eat paint chips but no one ever mentioned that cats might do the same thing. Luckily, we don't have to worry about developmental disorders with Gus because he is already disordered.

So that was our weekend: scraping windows, smushing cake, and a paint-eating cat.
A very destructive weekend!!!!

HELP This Old House, the window edition

2009-06-10T07:47:00.000-07:00

My next goal for our house is to work on the windows on the first floor. The second floor windows were replaced before we purchased the home and the original owner had intended to replace the windows on the first floor as well. Luckily they didn't. The windows are the original and to this history nerd, are super cool!!! But they do need some work. They need to be: recaulked, repainted, and in some places, the glass needs to be replaced. I also need to repainted the stuccoed foundation, which is currently off-white and will stay off-white.

Faithful blog readers, all 4 of you, I need your advice. Here are my window options:

A. Start with the first floor windows and work down, painting the foundation and basement windows last so any drips from the 1st floor windows can be covered up

OR

B. Work my way up starting with the basement windows and foundation moving to the first floor

ALSO:

1. Do those handy-dandy caulk pointer things that you can buy to get a smooth line actually work or am I better off using my fingers?

2. Should I scrape all the old caulk off the windows or just the sections that are crumbling? When scraping caulk, should I use a special tool so that I don't scrape/break/shatter the glass?

A non-home improvement question: I heard somewhere that if you are craving a food item, you should eat it. The craving is your body's attempt to get you to eat that item and regulate your body. So if you are craving veggies, your body needs the vitamins found in veggies.

My question is: Does this apply to donuts? I had a dream last night about a chocolate donut and now I really want one. Is my body telling me that I have a donut deficiency? I'll stay away from the donuts but I'm still curious about donut deficiencies....

This Old House, the gardening edition

2009-06-05T09:03:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of posts. After school ended, I came down with some sort of bug. It wasn't the porky flu but Matt said that I had the Monkey Virus or M1K1 as he called it. It took me a couple of weeks to feel better but now I'm myself again, except for my insatiable appetite for bananas....

Matt and I have been very busy around our house. We decided not to plant any vegetables this year and instead focus on our flowers and pretty gardening. So we laid a brick border around our flower beds and planted new plants to help pretty-fy the place.

Look at our pretty home. I must say, and I'm not biased, that this is the prettiest home I've ever owned (of course, it's the only home I've ever owned...)

I forgot to turn this one, so it's sideways, but this is the brick we laid along side the house and some of the flowers we planted.

Our front flower bed. I just planted 53 annuals, most of them in the front but it's going to take them a while to take root. Also planted: lily bulbs, dahlia bulbs, and a rose bush. The flowers on the front step are pansies. My Grandma Ethel loved pansies and I searched for them last year to plant in her memory. I couldn't find them anywhere but this year we have a lovely memory garden for Grandma. Every time I look at them I think of her. (She would be embarrassed by all this attention in my blog but it's my blog and I'll type what I want!)

This is our dwarf burning bush. It was very hard to plant since it is ON FIRE!!! Hahaha, what a bad joke!!! To dig a small hole, we called JULIE. I don't remember what all the letters stand for but basically it is a free utility-marking service. All our utilities came and marked their locations in our yard, which now looks like a clown exploded because of all the different colors of spray paint on the yard!! Anyhow, where we wanted our fire bush was just fine. Yay!

So I think we're good on the yard improvements for a time. Actually, I think we're running out of yard to fiddle with!

And while all these pictures have been uploading, I've been cleaning out a closet. I really don't need training notes from CP anymore or notes from college. If I haven't looked at them in five years, they're gone!!

Mac is trying to help me clean the closet, investigating all the new smells and climbing into the boxes I'm cleaning. What a helpful kitty.......

S-U-M-M-E-R

2009-05-09T08:19:00.000-07:00

This week was the last week of classes and so far, finals week is looking fairly reasonable. Today is commencement (what university has commencement BEFORE finals week? And this is the normal schedule, not an emergency schedule because of bad winter weather!) I have three summer classes this summer and then student teaching next fall. I still don't know where I'm teaching, but I'm assuming I will find out sometime....

The last class I pre-student taught in (meaning fewer hours and less responsibility compared to REAL student-teaching) was a 5th grade class and they made me "Thank-You" notes. My cooperating teacher (who we bought our house from --it's a small town) dropped them off yesterday. The notes were so cute! Apparently, I "rock" if you're a 5th grader. They were fun and I appreciated my cooperating teacher letting them make the notes. And when I'm having a tough day in the future and think that I'm just standing up in the front of the classroom accomplishing nothing, I will pull those notes out and remind myself that maybe I am.

With the weather improving, I've been trying to take more walks outside (hence the constant run-ins with the vulture) and I really enjoy it. It's my hour or so to myself when I can think and just be. Although thinking while walking up hill is very hard and I do most of my thinking going downhill. During my down-hill endorphine rush, I've decided that we don't walk enough as a society. We are far too comfortable just getting in the car and driving there. When you walk somewhere, you are forced to slow down and truly look at the world around you. For example, the amount of trash on the roadside is disgusting. And people throw out the oddest things: pillows, pizza boxes (who is eating pizza in their car? Can't you wait till you get home?), and more. But on a positive note, I also get to startle cows, which is always funny but then I feel sorry for the cow and I apologize to her. So, yes, I'm talking to the cows. Gesh, am I weird.....

May, Sway!!

2009-05-06T10:15:00.000-07:00

It happened again. I was circled by the vulture while walking. Ok, now it's just getting old. Unless the vulture wants to make friends with me, but I'm not certain how well a human-vulture friendship could happen.

And last week after church, Matt and I were driving home. While we were waiting to turn onto the highway, we were passed by a motorcycle crew. Most of the motorcycles were the typical: black leather, lots of chrome, tough looking guys with bandannas and more black leather with jeans. But one of them was not. He was a tough looking guy but instead of a motorcycle, he was cruising town on a white and red Vespa. So funny! I laughed at him, which I know isn't nice, but it was so incongruous, I had to laugh!!

The end of school...

2009-04-30T11:27:00.000-07:00

Is almost here!!! Yippee!!!!

Then it's onto summer school followed by student teaching followed by??????

I had a tough day Wednesday. In the morning I was talking with a classmate when I suddenly swallowed my gum. I choked a little but managed to keep on talking! Then I was walking to class and tripped over a bit of sidewalk in front of an entire class of 2nd graders on campus for some reason. Always good to look silly in front of 2nd graders.

When I reached home, I decided to go for a walk. On my way home, a vulture started to circle me. Now, I walk about 3 miles and while I'm climbing the last hill, I do sometimes think, "Oh, I'm not going to make it," but death is not really in the picture at that time. I thought that maybe the vulture knew something I didn't and that if this is what impending death feels like, I feel pretty good. Who knew there were so many endorphins connected with death!!

Anyhow, the vulture circled me a couple of times and swooped off somewhere else, apparently deciding that I was moving too much to be dead. Vultures are just ugly, prehistoric looking creatures.

Today in my pre-student teaching class, we made reticules. We've been reading a novel about traveling on the Oregon Trail in which the main character makes a reticule. So I got to teach about 9 5th graders to sew. It was....draining. "Mrs. Lee, my string came out of my thingy!" "Mrs. Lee, the needle is poking me." "Mrs. Lee, I broke my sewing." "Mrs. Lee, now what?" "Mrs. Lee, Mrs. Lee, Mrs. Lee" and so on. The kids had fun and didn't do a half bad job for their first time sewing. And, no major bleed-outs, necessary amputations, or anything else that might happen when you give a class of 11 year olds needles and pins!! It was tiring but fun and some of the kids really seemed to enjoy themselves!!!

A plague upon the Lee Household

2009-04-23T12:45:00.000-07:00

Recently we have been experiencing a plague of biblical proportions. Well, at least with our small appliances.

First, our microwave decided that it would no longer microwave and would only kinda "defrost" sometimes. So we took it out to the small appliance pasture/graveyard (the garage until electronics recycling day) where it quickly made friends with the space heater that blew up, the record player that wouldn't turn, and other small electronics. It reminds me of the Land of Misfit Toys but instead the Land of the Useless Appliances, which is not as musical or Christmasy.

Luckily, my in-laws had an extra one from someone's dorm room so now we can microwave again.

Then, our blender decided that it would rather leak everywhere than blend. Now, the upright members of the Lee household often enjoy a fruit smoothie or occasionally a homemade milkshake, if we're feeling dangerous. So the death of the blender was quite a blow to us. Since we didn't have to buy a new microwave, we decided to splurge and buy a new blender. (No one ever told me that once you're married, living on the edge means looking at new blenders. I probably wouldn't have believed them anyway....)

Our new blender has a glass pitcher, which I will break. It is only a matter of time but even more intriguing is that it is a "digital" blender. Will someone please tell me how a blender can be digital? Does it have a clearer picture? What, are the digital blenders replacing the analog blenders? Do the analog blenders not have as crisp of a blend? No where on the box does it describe how its "digital" (I checked four times).

I think its a marketing ploy. "Oh, this blender is DIGITAL. It must be better than these other non-digital blenders." It didn't work on the Lees. Instead the marked-down price tag caught us!

Because of our small appliance issues, I'm keeping a crash cart right next to the coffeemaker. I will give it CPR (coffee pot resuscitation) if I need to!!!!

Friday fun

2009-04-18T08:32:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe that it's been over a month since I last blogged. I guess that's because nothing really out of the ordinary has happened. Just life, taxes, cat poo, and dirty socks which are the complete opposite of exciting.

However, yesterday (Friday) was a good day. It started out well because my first class on Friday is at 10, which means that I can sleep in until 7:30!!! I went to school, worked, and came home. When I walked in the back door, Matt said that we were going on a picnic since Friday was a glorious day (70+ and sunny!!!) and that he already had the picnic packed! So I changed shoes, got in the car, and let Matt drive to the Thomson Causeway . We had our picnic sitting on a bench next to the Mississippi River while watching geese, ducks, and other birds enjoy the day. Then we walked around the woods for a while, and just enjoyed nature. The last time that we were there, baby garter snakes were everywhere which frightened Matt and might have made him scream like a little girl. And being the good person that I am, I did not remind Matt of this fact several times and tease him with snake-like sticks. Nope, I didn't.....

Then on our way home, we stopped at Matt's parents house to meet their new cat. Well, not actually their new cat. They had a stray that showed up at their house and I wanted to check him/her out! She (I think it's a she) is a black and white kitty that is very friendly. Either she ended up lost or someone dumped her because she likes people! Matt ran home to get some cat food for her (our boys won't miss a cup or two) while I petted her. She is very sweet, very matted, and looks to be in tough shape. She's been on her own for a while. I call her "Diamond" because she has a diamond shape on her back. After she ate some and I combed her a bit, she wandered towards the road. We thought she was headed back towards the farm on the other side of the road but none of us saw her cross. I looked around and decided that she must have crawled into the drainage pipe. I looked for her but couldn't see her in the pipe. About five minutes later, she showed up again and this time I saw her crawl out of the pipe. We left some food for her and headed home. Once we got home, we both immediately changed clothes and showered because we don't want our boys to get sick from her. And they both weregiving us looks like "Where have you been and what other cat have you been petting? Cheaters!"

So, this morning, Matt is taking Diamond to the local humane society to be checked out and hopefully put up for adoption. We would take her but I've never seen boy/girl cats get along very well and our boys are kinda spoiled and set in their ways. I think she needs a home with only her in it. And Matt has some silly rule about pets equaling the number of people in the house. Whatever.... If it were up to me, I would have taken her home last night and let her sleep in our garage.......

About a month ago, a Jewish lady spoke in our church about her faith and she said something that really resonated with me. She said that there is a Jewish proverb about helping animals. Helping animals, in this proverb, is the best act you can do because animals can not thank you or pay you back in any way. You help them out of the kindness of your heart. I like that quite a bit although I believe animals can pay us back. Gus is constantly paying his rent by holding things down, attacking killer milk rings, laying on slippers so they don't wander off, and monitoring the closed window situation....

So that was our Friday. It was a good day.

A beautiful sight.....

2009-03-11T10:34:00.000-07:00

This morning as I was driving to school, I noticed an unusual sight.

Ahead of me on the left (northwesterly) was the full moon.

Behind me (the southeasterly), the rising sun.

At a single point in time, I could see the full moon AND the sun. It was beautiful!! And very odd!! I enjoyed the view all the way to the state line when the moon finally sank.

P.S. We've been combing cornstarch through Gus' (Gus's??) fur and he looks much better!!! Thanks for all the helpful suggestions and Boy.

A cat question

2009-03-06T10:35:00.000-08:00

Yesterday Gus had to go to the vet and while he was there, the vet cleaned his ears (Gus's, not the vet's). I think he must have used mineral oil which is now all over Gus's head. He is not making any attempt to clean himself. What can I do to help him? He is a little sensitive about me touching his ears because of his experience with the vet. Do you think a warm wet washcloth followed by a combing (which he loves!!!) would help??

Suggestions?????

For all the math nerds in the world

2009-03-03T12:29:00.000-08:00

HAPPY SQUARE ROOT DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

3/3/09

Matt's Owwiey and Misc.

2009-02-28T09:13:00.000-08:00

This summer Matt hurt his back and needed to ice it. But he wanted to keep working. So we came up with this arrangement....

Yes, that's a pair of my hose holding an ice bag on his back. It worked quite well and you can see from the location of the ice that it was difficult to hold ice there well any other way. I thought it was quite clever of us to come up with this arrangement.

And now for an action shot....

For Christmas, Matt received the ingredients for sushi. Now, I know that some of you (Mom) are probably thinking "Yuck, sushi??!??," but it's really good as long as it's not made with raw fish. We are more California roll people than anything else. So here is a picture of the sushi that Matt made one night for dinner.

Don't worry, it's imitation crab, avocado, and rice wrapped in nori. Yumm!!! It is all gone!!!!!!

We also made peanut curry chicken soup. Yummmmmy

(But I don't think that soup photographs well. It was much yummier than this picture would imply.)

A Bond question

2009-02-20T11:07:00.001-08:00

I love James Bond movies. I know that this makes me an odd girl, but let's face it, there is plenty else that makes me an odd girl.

Also, does this make me a Bond girl?? Can I introduce myself as "Lee, Merrilee Lee?" Yeah, that won't add to the confusion!

Anyhow, Matt and I are in the middle of a discussion. If you are familiar with "Goldfinger," at the very end of the movie, the army at Fort Knox is gassed. Well, Matt says that they were gassed with something that made them pass out for a while but I say that they were not really gassed at all, and just fell over and played possum for a while.

Comments?

PS. Scotland forever!

A Day in the Life of Gus

2009-02-14T09:53:00.001-08:00

Woke up groggy from a short night, having only slept 15 hours. Proceeded to sit like an old man while trying to have morning bath.

Took brief nap with Mac. Mac got the good spot in the sun. Settled for less comfortable spot on end table.

Took another brief nap with Mac. Now in kitty tube. Appear to be holding paws with Mac. Enjoying faking out human.

Performed important duties such as:

Holding down lotion bottle.

Monitoring movement of TV remote AND pillow AND couch while observing entire living room for any suspicious activities. Very busy.

Supervising baseball cap. Cap has tendency to move around and be found in different areas, almost as if someone else is moving/wearing it. Must watch cap for quick or odd movements. Also is quite comfy to sleep on.

After having performed such important duties all day, humans come home and have the audicity to dress me up and laugh at me. They need a hobby or at least something else to do on a Wednesday night.

Pictures

2009-02-14T09:18:00.000-08:00

I've had tons of pictures to post on my blog but since we have dial-up at home, it takes forever! Well, I finally remembered to take the camera to work so that I can use the super-fast Internet at school!!

These are the lovely flowers that Dad gave me for Valentine's Day. He has always sent me a bouquet and has managed to always find a florist where ever I was living. It always makes my V-Day. This year he sent them to Matt's bank. I had been wondering where he would send them and he always surprises me!!!

Remember my longing for an elephant ear? Well at the last fair we went to this summer, this cart greeted us as we walked in. I was so happy, I started jumping up and down. There were about 6 carts with elephant ears at this fair. Of course, I got one and kinda shared it with Matt. I ate it slowly for the next two days, savoring my treat. Now we know which fair to go to next year when I NEED AN ELEPHANT EAR!!!!!

Our volunteer pumpkins, potatoes, and sunflowers (I planted the sunflowers). Towards the end of the summer, they were growing even more into the alley and Matt had to keep taking the feelers and pointing them towards the garage to keep the alley open. We had a lovely crop of pumpkins and a few potatoes.

Morels grow in our area. I had never heard of/eaten/hunted a morel until I moved here. They grow for a very short period of time in very specific areas and are considered a delicacy. These are some that Matt and my mother-in-law found.

They taste ok. I apparently don't have a taste for items considered delicacies. What a surprise!!

This is some of the sauce that we made with our tomatoes. We like trying different varieties but here is a list of our favorites:

Big Boy

Mortgage Lifter

Cherokee Purple (just because you can sing "Cherokee Purple" to the the tune of "Cherokee People" for the entire summer)

Any yellow tomato (just because they're pretty and different)

Mr. Stripey (the name alone makes this my favorite tomato)

Tomatoes to avoid like the plague:

Roman Candle: They have this tough core that you have to cut out and once you do that, most of your tomato is gone.

Zebra: once again, considered a delicacy and I totally dislike them. Even mixed in with other tomatoes, they taste disgusting.

We received our third seed catalog this year. We found Seed Savers, which is located near us in Iowa. They focus on heirloom/non-hybrid seeds with trying to preserve the older varieties. You could make a great argument that most seeds, even the heirlooms are technically hybrids since they were developed from a variety of other types, but this organization doesn't like the genetically modified hybrids, and wants to protect the naturally developed types. So we're going to order our seeds from them. Their prices were manageable and I like the idea of my money going to a not-for-profit dedicated to preserving plants, rather than to a corporation. And Seed Savers has a pancake breakfast in the spring. I'd like to see Walmart or Lowes do that!!!

Ok, I'm ready to garden.

Friday the 13th

2009-02-13T10:47:00.000-08:00

Here are some fun facts I learned about Friday the 13th. I hope you enjoy it!!!

1. The British Navy built a ship named Friday the 13th. On its maiden voyage, the vessel left dock on a Friday the 13th, and was never heard from again.

2. The ill-fated Apollo 13 launched at 13:13 CST on Apr. 11, 1970. The sum of the date's digits (4-11-70) is 13 (as in 4+1+1+7+0 = 13). And the explosion that crippled the spacecraft occurred on April 13 (not a Friday). The crew did make it back to Earth safely, however.

3. Many hospitals have no room 13, while some tall buildings skip the 13th floor.

4. Fear of Friday the 13th - one of the most popular myths in science - is called paraskavedekatriaphobia as well as friggatriskaidekaphobia. Triskaidekaphobia is fear of the number 13.

5. Quarterback Dan Marino wore No. 13 throughout his career with the Miami Dolphins. Despite being a superb quarterback (some call him one of the best ever), he got to the Super Bowl just once, in 1985, and was trounced 38-16 by the San Francisco 49ers and Joe Montana (who wore No. 16 and won all four Super Bowls he played in).

6. Butch Cassidy, notorious American train and bank robber, was born on Friday, April 13, 1866.
7. Fidel Castro was born on Friday, Aug. 13, 1926.

8. President Franklin D. Roosevelt would not travel on the 13th day of any month and would never host 13 guests at a meal. Napoleon and Herbert Hoover were also triskaidekaphobic, with an abnormal fear of the number 13.

9. Superstitious diners in Paris can hire a quatorzieme, or professional 14th guest.

10. Mark Twain once was the 13th guest at a dinner party. A friend warned him not to go. "It was bad luck," Twain later told the friend. "They only had food for 12."

11. Woodrow Wilson considered 13 his lucky number, though his experience didn't support such faith. He arrived in Normandy, France on Friday, Dec. 13, 1918, for peace talks, only to return with a treaty he couldn't get Congress to sign. (The ship's crew wanted to dock the next day due to superstitions, Fernsler said.) He toured the United States to rally support for the treaty, and while traveling, suffered a near-fatal stroke.

12. The number 13 suffers from its position after 12, according to numerologists who consider the latter to be a complete number - 12 months in a year, 12 signs of the zodiac, 12 gods of Olympus, 12 labors of Hercules, 12 tribes of Israel, 12 apostles of Jesus, 12 days of Christmas and 12 eggs in a dozen.

13. The seals on the back of a dollar bill include 13 steps on the pyramid, 13 stars above the eagle's head, 13 war arrows in the eagle's claw and 13 leaves on the olive branch. So far there's been no evidence tying these long-ago design decisions to the present economic situation.

Daniel Russell...

2009-02-09T07:42:00.001-08:00

Is my nephew. Sorry for the confusion. I just was so excited that I forgot to explain the connection!!!

Daniel Russell

2009-02-06T09:23:00.000-08:00

A.K.A. The cutest baby ever!!

No offense to those who have babies or nieces/nephews already but in my humble opinion and long-time baby cuteness judge, Daniel wins hands down!

It's tough being a newborn! People expect you to eat, use your diapers, and breathe! All at the same time!!! Gesh, you're not a rocket doctor!!! For heaven's sake, you're only a week old!!

Proud Gramma holding Daniel

See, he's the cutest, isn't he!!!

Ahhh!

2009-01-27T16:35:00.000-08:00

I have a hair on my head. I can't tell if it's gray or blonde. Is it my first gray hair?

I've been highlighting/coloring my hair for a while now and I'm letting it grow out. The difference (my roots) isn't too different, I don't think, and Matt says you can't even tell. Although he's a boy and gets slightly unnerved around makeup, curlers, and the like. So this hair is my natural color but what color is it?

And of course it's on the top of my head right in front so that when I look in the mirror to check that my mascara isn't running, I see this hair.

It shines in the light (not gray)
It's lighter than the others (gray)
Others are lighter than the others and are clearly not gray (not gray)
I'm getting old (gray)
I'm not that old (not gray)

To pluck or not to pluck.....

Punishing Gus

2009-01-27T11:45:00.000-08:00

Do other people put their animals in "time-out?"

Gus aka Sir Chunk-a-Lot, can be a naughty kitty.

Jumping onto and into anything he can. Picking on his brother Mac. Generally annoying all two-legged and four-legged roommates.

Swatting him and telling him that he is a "bad cat" doesn't work because he thinks you're just playing with him. Even squirting him with the water bottle doesn't help because it just riles him up more.

So he gets a time out. He is placed (gently tossed) into the bathroom, the door is shut behind him, and he remains in there for 5 minutes.

This happened Saturday. He was just being naughty and so received a time out. At the end of the time out, I walked over to open the door and nearly stepped on Mac. He was sitting outside the door waiting for his playmate to come back out. And his sensory deprivation time worked! He was relatively calm for the next hour or so. After that, Matt and I didn't care because we went to bed. Mac was on his own!

Once again, Matt and I would make great parents as long as we can: train our children to eat off the floor, use a litter box, put them in rooms along for extended periods of time as punishment, and take them to the vet's office when it's time for their annual rabies/distemper shots!

On an unrelated note, last night Matt made Chinese food for supper. Yum yum!!!! It was chicken with broccoli and other Chinese vegetables in a hosin/ginger/honey sauce! Yum!!! It's amazing to me how "international" American's diets are. One day you might have Chinese for supper, the next Italian, Mexican, Thai, who knows what!!

Last week we made a huge batch of waffles (supper for breakfast again!) and froze what we couldn't eat (about 15 waffles) We've been slowly using them up by: taking them out of the freezer, placing them into to the toaster, and enjoying! You know, it's such an easy thing to do, toasting these pre-made waffles, someone should start a business doing this.

They could name it "Wafflo" or "Toast-ems"....
Oh, right. Eggo....

MIA

2009-01-24T08:49:00.000-08:00

So I didn't end up blogging quite like I had intended to over my Christmas break. Part of the problem: I didn't really do anything worthwhile enough to blog about and no one wants to read random Merrilee thoughts about: life, the world, living with cats, or the addictiveness of chocolate!!

School has started up again. I think my classes will be fine. So far I don't have any classes on Thursday so this Thursday I stayed home. But it wasn't a good day. I had some errands to run and as I was returning home and pulling into the garage, I knocked my right side view mirror off my car. It just totally popped off like a Lego AND the garage is fine, luckily. I took my car to our local garage and for a bit over $200, my car will be like new!
So that was my morning.

That evening, Matt and I were taking out the trash and the recycling. I stepped out of our front door, trying to be careful to miss the ice patches on the front steps. Unfortunately, I didn't know that the entire step was iced over. I tried to keep my balance but ended up flat on my rear. I didn't hurt anything but my pride. Although my bum was a little tender the next day.

Matt and I recently took a compatibility quiz in a magazine that I receive. According to it, we are 100% compatible! We knew what reality TV shows we would audition for (none), what we would order off of an unlimited menu (Matt: anything; Me: chocolate), where we could go if we could (Matt: Vermont, Me: England), and what books we are currently reading. We both agreed, however, to throw out the question regarding toilet paper (under or over) due to semantics and a poorly phrased question. So, yay!

Christmas joy!

2008-12-23T09:57:00.000-08:00

Well, my baking is finished for another year. It was, as always, a ton of fun. For the first time, I tried making peanut butter fudge. I found a couple of recipes online and tried one but it didn't work. So, much to my sorrow, I threw out fudge and tried a recipe of my own. I've always had good luck with the fudge recipe on the back of the marshmallow creme jar so I made that but inside of putting in chocolate, I threw in a bunch of peanut butter. And it worked!

Matt and I already had our Christmas together. I wanted an MP3 player, which I received and Matt, for fun, received a variety of food items. Rice vinegar, hoisin sauce, havarti cheese, and anything else unusual that I could find at our grocery store. Matt's grandfather always liked Limburger cheese and every time we go to the store, Matt smells the cheese, which, by the way, smells like old, dirty socks. Very old dirty socks. So for fun, I picked up a package of Limburger and hid it in the bottom of our refrigerator (behind the oranges, where I knew he wouldn't look because he doesn't like oranges). For the past couple of days, Matt has been commenting on the odd smell in our refrigerator and in our kitchen. "What is that smell?" he's been asking. And I knew the entire time: it was the hidden stinky cheese.
Two days ago we tried the cheese. Opening it slowly and taking brave whiffs of smelly cheese, I watched as Matt tried the first sample. He didn't show any reaction on his face and once he had finished swallowing, he stated, "Ok, that's gross." Then it was my turn. I took a piece of cheese and placed it on a cracker. Being careful not to inhale with the cheese near my nose, I quickly shoved the entire cracker in my mouth and chewed as quickly as I could without choking. FYI: Limburger tastes like it smells. We had been hopeful that maybe it would magically taste like something else. But it doesn't. I quickly chased it with a piece of chocolate, which took the taste right out of my mouth. But not from my memory.
So we tried Limburger. And now there is an extra addition to our garbage for this week.

For Christmas, my mother in law gave us a laser pointer for the cats. It projects a red dot on the floor and the cats go NUTS!!!! Gus runs in circles, chasing this dot that somehow always stays right in front of him (unless something gets in the way, like a chair) He will do figure-8's, a kitty obstacle course around the living room, or just straight circles (he prefers going clockwise). Mac will chase it for awhile but Gus would go all night if we let him. It's great because it's a toy that he can't knock under the couch AND it's hilarious to watch him. What a great toy!

We're headed back to Indiana tomorrow, assuming that the latest snow storm we're expecting doesn't hit us too bad. We already have over a foot of snow on the ground and they're calling for another 6 inches tonight. I'm already running out of places to stack snow when I shovel but this is great weather! I just love winter!

I hope that everyone has a fantastic Christmas and a wonderful New Year!!!!!!

I love the holidays!!

2008-12-13T09:33:00.001-08:00

I hope that everyone enjoyed that post from Matt. Just a few caveats: we wouldn't really eat the cats. I think that joke started as a comment (probably from me) about their behavior and the consequences if it didn't improve. Also, the drier doesn't shrink any of my clothes, only Matt's and only in the waistband, no where else. It's a puzzle....

Finals are finally done! Yay! I had forgotten the joy of the academic calender! Yay for Christmas breaks! I know I've been MIA for a while but this past week I had: 3 tests, 2 papers, and my application for student teaching due so needless to say, I'm happy the week is over! Now I can look forward to Christmas baking, wrapping, and cards and I have more time to work on them than I've had in the past with a couple of days off. Yay! I'm gonna destroy the kitchen with Christmas baking!!!! I'm looking forward to it. This year's cookie list:

Doods
Fudge
Butter cutouts (like sugar cookies only yummier)
truffles
sugar free meringues
spritz/cookie press cookies
TBA

Oh, I can't wait!! My only problem is that I'm a dough eater/spoon licker/professional bowl cleaner (which totally grosses Matt out and makes him question my sanity and potential for developing salmonella) (and that's fine with me because then I get more dough!). Well, it's ok to lick the spoon for one batch of cookies, but with that amount of baking, I just might go into a sugar coma. So I've developed a solution: chew gum while baking. No one wants to have wintergreen gum AND fudge in their mouth at the same time! Ha! I outwitted myself! (having just finished Abnormal Psychology, part of me really wants to dissect that statement, but I'll leave it alone)

For part of my student teaching application, the director of clinical services commented that schools google potential students to see what comes up. So I thought I would google myself and some pretty normal things came up: this blog, my facebook page, some articles I've been quoted in (yes, I'm famous), and other community related items. Then, on the next page of "Merrilee Lee" finds was:
Merrilee Lee, Utah, convicted in 2000 of manufacturing meth.

Crap.

That's not me! I've never been to Utah, let alone manufactured meth. AND, there's two of us in the world! One "Merrilee Lee" was not enough??!?? The only good thing is that she was 34 in 2000 when convicted and I was in college in 2000. For the first time. And, I wasn't Merrilee Lee then! Yay, I have an alibi!! So any of you who knew me in 2000, knew of my whereabouts and the fact that I'm not a crook, I mean, jailbird, I just might need to call on you as character witnesses!!!!

Anyhow, now that school is done, expect more posts from me soon!!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

2008-11-26T09:13:00.000-08:00

If you are reading this entry in the “Blog-O-Mer” then my plan to hack in, infiltrate....I mean.....post a lovely note about my wife has succeeded! Thanksgiving is a time to reflect on the massive amounts of blessings each of us have. I am thankful to be able to share a few thoughts with you. Without further whatever……….I present to you, my 2008 version of “Life with Wife”.

1. Merrilee Lee – Kismit?

2. Our mall in Dubuque was basically off limits. So much retail fluff in there – gives my lovely wife a headache. Big-box, mainstream, mass-consumption, parking problems……..”Honey, I heard that the Dubuque Humane Society has a store in there now, can we go see the kitties?” We now have one mandatory stop every time we are in Dubuque!

3. We have cable for two reasons: Ghost Hunters & British accents. I tend to migrate more to Chicago sports. A television in the Man-cave has been provided for this purpose.

4. You may have seen the ads on TV about the Dannon yogurt that has magical ingredients (bacteria) that is healthier for your digestive system than other yogurts (and more expensive). I was eating that yogurt for a bit of time until Mer convinced me that it is a “Yogurt Marketing Ploy.” I now eat Yoplait…………………it tastes better.

5. 5-POUND TATER TOT CASSEROLES!!!!!!!!!!! YES!!!

6. While we’re on the food issue (amazing that I went there) I have a few more insights. Mer tells me that all my memories revolve around food; where I ate, what I ate…..This just isn’t true…I can remember our first date…..we both wore green tops and jeans on the bottoms, we sat in a booth next to an old picture on the wall, she told me what year the picture was taken and the style of house the people stood in front of. We started our date in Illinois, drove to Wisconsin and then Iowa – our first date – a tri-state date. We had a wonderful time together – I found her wit to be challenging and lovely. She of course pursued me from the beginning, constantly hounding me with calls and love letters. I never once flirted with her – I simply told her in my banker-boy wit “I will attend an evening of conversation with you”. By the way, I had a ham steak (nice and salty pork)!

7. This year she finally did it. Mer got me hooked on canning. She was proud of that accomplishment. She also found an old silver quarter in the change at the museum!

8. We have two wonderful, darling (these are not my words) cats. She has taught me how to personify these cats in all situations. It is like a living cartoon. We love them and they know that. And they know who is in charge. We have made it clear to them that, if their behavior worsens and/or economic times warrant, that they could be a stew-kitty and a roaster-kitty. And they know the difference! We would never eat the cats (or would we mwaa-ha-hah-ha) but we do know that the indoor plants love the spray bottle and the cats hate it. We also know that if it were not for our cats, the couch and rugs would float away from gravity. They have taught us that the soles of our shoes need to be massaged quite regularly for the best comfort and that in every good cat fight (and our cats belong to the UFC – ultimate fighting cats) there is always time for a 2 minute self cleaning break.

9. Did you know that knitting attracts cats? I learned that from my wife.

10. We have a faulty dryer. It shrinks the waist in all my pants. It has forced me to buy expand-a-pants with the comforting stretch band. This has nothing to do with my love of all things dairy and my annual winter hibernation. It has to do with the faulty dryer. My lovely Merrilee agrees with a “Yes Honey”. We both know that ultimately it is Gus’ fault. Gus is the roaster kitty. He takes the blame for many things like global warming, why Saturday Night Live is horrible and of course, FAULTY DAMN DRYERS (sorry for the strong language).

11. My wife is amazing and I am about to tell you why. If you come home from the grocery store with 8 full bags, two gallons of water and a gallon of milk, how many trips from your car to your kitchen would you make? I believe this average would be 3-4 trips. For me it would be at least 4 trips. For Mer, 1 TRIP! She takes pride in this ability to carry ¼ of Wal-mart from the trunk, up the stairs, past two semi-conscience cats to the kitchen. I ask to help…..”No, Honey, I’ve got it”. I am convinced my wife can dead lift the equivalent of 474 large cans of Campbell’s soup (which I don’t like – try Progresso!).

12. I know my wife loves me. She lets me run a boarding house for homeless post-holiday Poinsettias. She also didn’t get upset when I planted part of a fallen tree next to our garage. It was from a tree at my parent’s farm that I wanted to re-root and save. She said it would die. I didn’t give up hope. Next to the tree, many pumpkin vines started to sprout. I threw out a bunch of pumpkins there last year. Mer always tells me that the best pumpkins are “Sh-t pumpkins”. Long story short, the tree died, for good this time. But all was not lost. That lil’ baby was the best pumpkin trellis ever!

13. The Sunday Nap. The world would be a better place if we all did the “Sunday Nap”. Mer does it. In fact, she has perfected it. I think she should write further about the wonder that is the “Sunday Nap”. She will show you the way. The cats apply this principal to the remaining 6 days of the week. For me, it is simple….either stay quiet or join the Sunday Nap Movement!

May you all have a happy turkey-induced nap this Thursday! Happy Thanksgiving

Mr. Lee

Another grey day

2008-11-14T09:26:00.000-08:00

Apparently, Wisconsin is trying to be England with grey days full of little spits of rain. What's odd is that the sun will be shining in Illinois when I leave but by the time I get to Wisconsion, it's gone and we have grey clouds covering the sky. Unfortunately, days like that make me want to 1. go back to bed and wait for the sun 2. drink tremendous amounts of tea 3. eat scones in companion with the tea 4. read long British stories involving a wealthy wayward duke, a poor but beautiful woman, and a traumatic event that throws them together. Basically, anything by Jane Austen or a Bronte sister. Please notice that none of the things on my list actually involve anything that I have to get done today or should finish today. Oh well.

Tonight I have an appreciation dinner for one of my tutoring opportunities. I'm helping a very nice lady who's about my age study for her TOEFL test, which is the test that foreign born/non-native English speakers must take to enter grad school. She is looking at attending grad school to study ESL. She's originally from Columbia and speaks/writes/reads English very well but sometimes the little detail rules are difficult (as they can be for native speakers!!). Last night we were working on the difference between "effect" and "affect." I told her that's tough for me too! I get them mixed up all the time. She's a little nervous, I think, but working on being prepared. I hope it works out for her because it would be a great opportunity for her. Anyhow, the organization that hosts the tutoring is having a dinner at a local restaurant tonight. I really enjoy working with my friend and I'm hoping that my schedule will work out so that even though I need XX amount of hours of tutoring, I can keep helping her at least through her test. I think it would be cruel to stop tutoring just because my goal is achieved when her goal isn't yet.

I registered for classes this week and it looks as though I will be able to do my student teaching next fall. So in and out in a year and a half. Then it's onto finding a real job. This stresses me out quite a bit but as Matt reminds me: there are more teaching jobs in the world than there are museum jobs and if I found a museum job, then I will find a teaching job too! I appreciate his support but I'll feel better when I actually find a teaching job that doesn't include coaching football. However, by the time I finish, I will be able to teach: US history, World History, Government & Current Events, Economics, Psychology, and Geography. Surely, someone will want to hire me, right?

OK, faithful blog readers, I have a request to help me (sorry for being selfish!):
What was your favorite part about studying social studies in school and why?

Funny things seen around town

2008-10-24T06:59:00.000-07:00

First of all, canning season is done!! Yay!!!!!! It's officially done when I put away the water-bather pot (I'm sure this has a technical name for it but I prefer my use-descriptive one instead), I stop searching for Sure-Jell rather than any other lesser pectin, stop buying salt and sugar in abnormal quantities, and replace the tongs and jar lifters back into the drawer. I have no idea how much we canned this year but I'm pretty certain that we could live the rest of the winter on our applesauce, pear sauce, pickled beets, spaghetti sauce, and various jellies, although we would probably end up with some type of protein deficiency BUT we would be scurvy-free! Yay for no scurvy!!

We had been freezing our tomatoes as they came ripe so we could "can them at a later date" which made perfect sense every time you popped a tomato into the freezer but after a while, our freezer was only tomatoes and we had no room for ice cream (a true tragedy if you ask me!) So last weekend was "Can or Bust" weekend. Matt and I canned 5 quarts and 3 pints of spaghetti sauce which we cooked down in our Nesco cooker because we don't have enough large stock pots to cook down that much sauce (no one has enough stock pots unless you have an institutional kitchen with 30 gallon pots). We also made 16 jars of beet jelly. We could have made more. I had enough juice for one more batch but I was out of sugar, pectin, and jars. I only had jello and juice. SO, I made the hard decision and dumped the juice down the drain. Still, we have plenty of jelly! But now our freezer is ours again complete with pumpkin ice cream (very yummy!) and now when you open the freezer, frozen tomatoes don't come flying out at you like little frozen Ninja balls of death fruit.

School is going well. I found out that if I take a full load next semester (which I was planning on doing) and some summer classes (what else would I have to do in the summer), I can student teach next fall and then start job hunting/subbing more full time. Most of my classes are fairly easy but a couple (microeconomics) make me want to pull my hair out. But I just have to get through them and I will. (This philosophy comes with age, experience, and grad school, in my opinion. I would not have felt this way in Mer's undergrad experience, part 1, the saga begins)

Ok, for the true nature of this post:

Three funny signs seen this week:
Sign on a quik-lube place "Stop here for your tranny flush"
At a health foods place "Colon cleanse, yay!"
"O-B-A-M-A" spelled out on the sides of hay bales (true sign of living in the country, when you campaign for president using hay)

Matt

2008-10-23T12:17:00.000-07:00

Today is Matt's 30th birthday and in honor of that momentous occasion, I'm going to list my top 30 favorite things about Matt:

30. His green thumb and love of plants.

29. His willingness to water said plants every night.

28. His handiness with a drill.

27. His ability to play the drums and actually make it sound like music.

26. He took me to my first blues concerts: Buddy Guy and B.B. King. Now what?

25. Playing "drums" in the car on the dashboard.

24. His growing historical and architectural snobbiness. (Wonder where he picked that up??)

23. Cooking supper and often having it on the table when I walk in. Can we say role-reversal?

22. His joy of grocery shopping.

21. His "Uh-Oh" sound. Very funny and a clear sign that something bad happened.

20. Constantly losing his cell phone.

19. His patience with all things kitty and Mer-related.

18. Grilling in an old green apron.

17. Accepting that I'm old fashioned and like to sew, knit, and can food.

16. He lets me take Sunday naps and doesn't complain. ( He learned that no Sunday nap makes for a cranky Mer!!)

15. Dancing in the living room. Alone.

14. He can often only remember places or events through food. He likes food, what's wrong with that?

13. His acceptance and eventual love for indoor cats. Even two cats!

12. The look on his face when he is struggling to wake up in the morning.

11. His hands, very distinguished.

10. His chuckle.

9. His enjoyment of life and acceptance of what he can't change.

8. His desire to live simply and close to nature.

7. His love for his family and mine.

6. His honesty.

5. The fact that he wants to help people, and not just because he thinks he should help.

4. When he smiles, it lights up his entire face.

3. His warm, friendly eyes, the first thing I noticed about him.

2. Matt's open, trusting heart.

1. His love of God and desire to share that love with everyone.

I'm still here, I promise

2008-09-23T08:11:00.000-07:00

Hello intrepid blog readers,

I'm still in the land of the living and blogging. Life has just gotten incredibly crazy the past couple of weeks. I'm back in college and so far my classes are going fine. And I'm not the oldest one in any of my classes! Yay!!!! I am, however, I think the only female social studies major. All the others are guys with coaching tendencies.... More on that later.

It took a little bit to get back into the swing of college life/homework. It was much easier when I only had an apartment to take care of. But Matt is, as usual, a big help and the kitties are getting used to being more self-sufficient by holding things down for us like couches, rugs, beds, windowsills, etc.

For two of my classes, I have to do Service Learning, which is a technical description of volunteering. On Mondays and Wednesdays, I help in a special needs classroom with two fun students. Dillion, who needs help with his math, and Tiffany, who needs English help. They are fun and a challenge, Dillion more so than Tiffany. But working with them completely makes my day every time. And it reminds me of why I am doing this. Watching them learn and realizing that I am helping them to do that makes me so happy in a way that really nothing else does. On Thursdays I volunteer at a center that helps immigrants learn English and study for their citizenship tests. I helped a lady named Alexandria who grew up in Columbia. She has very good English and just needs to practice conversation. Total piece of cake!

Otherwise, life is good. Matt and I have been canning like fools. Our motto: Yes, we can!
We've canned: apple sauce, apple butter, pear sauce, pear butter, tomato sauce, pickled beets, & apple/pear jelly. We still have tomatoes and beet jelly to go. Then canning season is done, we can enjoy the "fruits" of our labor, and put away the large kettles and spare jars. And I can mop the kitchen floor, which hasn't happened since canning season started because, why? We're just going to get more dirt on it.

So life is good. Busy but good. I still have pictures to post but we now have dial-up at home which takes forever so sometime I'll have to post them from school.

A funny: My abnormal psychology professor said on the first day of class that after this semester, we will not be able to diagnosis anyone, not our parents, boyfriends, roommates or cats. But I've been using Gus as a test subject and I think that he is either OCD, ADHD, or schizophrenic. Or maybe just plain crazy.

Computer woes

2008-08-20T12:45:00.001-07:00

I have some truly awesome images to share with you of our garden in full bloom, or actually, more like full produce. But we are having technical difficulties with our computer(s). Multiple computers are now not working. We currently have two towers, a monitor, and a keyboard/mouse on our kitchen table trying to get the computer(s) to hook up to the internet. We'll get it resolved. Or we'll go all "Office Space" on our computer(s). Please, please tell me that someone knows what I'm talking about, where they take out the copier into a field and destroy it. We're not quite that frustrated with our computer(s) but it's close sometimes.

Anyhow, since I can't post any pictures, let's paint some pictures with words.

Green leaves growing,
Tomatoes reddening,
Potatoes completely overtaken by pumpkins
Beets just "beet"iful!

I know, I'm a poet, what can I say?
I'm Poet-Laureate of northwestern Illinois! (No, not really)

Ok, what's your favorite Olympic sport?
Mer: Swimming, gymnastics
Matt: Gymnastics, some track and field
Kitties: Greco-Roman wrestling, tumbling (they practice all the time!!!!)

This is why....

2008-08-13T14:34:00.000-07:00

I want to teach.

Overheard today in the museum:
A girl says, "I didn't learn nothing, and I'm glad!"

Now, maybe there's something we don't know. Maybe she had said that the only way she would go to the museum was if she didn't have to learn. I don't know; I stretching here a bit.
Anyhow, she's glad she "didn't learn nothing." And I'm glad for the reminder of why I want to teach.

News

2008-08-05T08:45:00.000-07:00

There has been something that has been weighing on my heart for a while. Even though I love my current job and generally enjoy what I do, I feel as though I'm being called in a different direction. Although topically similar. I love history. There is no denying that fact. Sometimes, it feels like history is flowing through me like my blood. I honestly can't remember a time when I didn't enjoy history. It hurts my heart when I hear people say that they hate history. (now, I hate math but that is a completely different matter. I'm certain that when I say that, it doesn't hurt my dad's heart (math teacher)) Just kidding, Dad!!

History, to me, ties all people together. It is the great connector. History can be great events: war or small events: rising gas prices. It can affect two people in completely different ways depending on those individuals' personal histories. And to me, that is fascinating.

History is more than the study of events; it is the study of the human heart. What makes people react in certain ways to certain events? If you were a recently freed slave in the 1860s, how would you feel? How would you react? How about if you were a slave owner? How would you feel? Regardless of where or when a person lived, we all react with the same range of emotions.
Greed, hate, love, lust, anger, jealousy, kindness, compassion, and pain have been around for millennia. All of human history has at least one of these emotions involved, if not more.

So, after this diatribe on my passion for history, I'm resigning from the history museum and returning to college to get my teaching license. I'm just a few credits shy and it will take roughly 2 semesters of classes plus one of student teaching. I told my executive director yesterday and gave my month's notice and she accepted it well (I had mental images of her yelling at me and telling me to leave but I knew she wouldn't do that!) She agreed, I have to follow my heart and she wished me well.

Matt is completely supportive. He has been wonderful through this entire process. I'm constantly amazed at his supportiveness and can only hope that I return it in some small manner. (He's also excited about being with a college girl and that I now get the student rate at movie theaters!!)

I should have my schedule worked out soon. I also might have an on-campus job already. They need some help in the school museum and the regional archives located on-campus.

So in less than a month, I'm returning to school (again). I'm attending UW Platteville (Home of the Pioneers) and am looking forward to it although I'm looking forward to having it finished more than anything else. I would like to teach jr high/high school history. I think I can help the most in those grades and younger than that I would also have to teach math. Bleh! Hopefully I can help explain that history is not singular, unrelated events but rather a long string of interconnected events. And help to bring it to life for my students: even if that means wearing funny clothes!

So that's my news!

Yay!

2008-07-31T07:27:00.000-07:00

I have some exciting news to share: I don't have consumption. No TB here!! Yay!
I had to have a TB test at the doctor's and I came up negative. Not that there was much of a concern that I would have consumption but I definitely don't. Yay! Now I don't have to move to a drier climate or live in a consumption ward. Goody!

Blog consumer update:

In an effort to be a little greener and smear fewer man-made chemicals on me, I switched to a greener deodorant. Tom's of Maine makes toothpaste and deodorant. I tried the apricot scent which smelled more like peaches than apricots but that's ok. And I found out something very important: if you are going to switch deodorants, don't do it at the end of July when it's 88+ degrees outside. Stick with your Secret powder fresh until the heat of summer is done. Tom's works for about 3/4 of the same time as Secret does. It doesn't have aluminum in it but instead has hops. And no, you don't hop around when you put it on nor do you make some kind of funky underarm beer (which would make for an interesting marketing technique if it did: "In a long boring meeting? Need something to make the time go faster? With Tom's of Maine hop underarm beer fermentation tank, you can have all the beer your underarms can make! Try our ale flavor as well!)

So I switched back to Secret until fall. A lesson learned.........

Last night I went for a walk. I'm not certain why but the everywhere I walked, butterflies were there. You know the little yellow butterflies that always end up on your car's grill? Those. They were right alongside the road in droves and as I walked along, they flew up and flutter along next to me. I think it might have been mating season but it was still lovely to walk along with the butterflies. Made me feel like a Disney Princess albeit a sweating, headphones and tennis-shoe wearing Disney princess.

Deep thoughts with Mer: I thought of something while I was walking last night. We have a country road near us called Pleasant Hill Road. Sounds lovely, doesn't it? Well, you know those treadmill programs that have you walk up an incline, down an incline, and repeat to simulate walking up and down hills? God made a natural one for us here. I personally think it should be called Butt-kicking Hill Road. It's a great road to walk on because of that. And I can say hello to cows, dogs, cats, and more cows. It's just a beautiful road!!!

As I was approaching the last steep incline, I thought, "Self, you know, this hill is hard to climb. Instead of thinking about how hard it will be to reach the top of this hill, I need shorter goals. My new goal is: walk to that mailbox, then the next driveway, then that patched bit after that, and finally that shady part. All I need to do is think about reaching that mailbox. And I do. Then that driveway, and so on up the hill. Suddenly I'm at the top of the hill and I didn't even realize how hard it was to get there. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other, listening to my Wayne's World 2 soundtrack CD, and suddenly I'm there! Goal achieved.

This is kinda like life. We all have long term goals in our minds: debt free, families, living in our dream home, a dog name Louie. But those goals are so far off sometimes that we have to make shorter goals: pay off a credit card, be happy in ourselves, save money to buy that dream home, occasionally pretend the cat is a dog named Louie. One foot in front of the other to the shorter goals and bam! Suddenly you and your husband Fabio have adopted Louie Dog to run free in your mortgage free dream home on 50 wooded acres. Just make it to that mailbox!

A Fair Weekend!!

2008-07-21T08:31:00.000-07:00

Very punny, Mer, very punny!

It was a fair weekend: Matt and I went to 2 (two)!!

Yay for fairs! I love fairs. They are just fantastic!! We went to the fair in our small town (the only community one in Illinois) and had a great time! Last year I entered a couple of canned goods: beet jelly and pickled beets. I won first for my pickled beets (thanks to Aunt Genny's recipe) and my beet jelly took second because some other woman had violet jelly. Violet jelly? What a waste of sugar!!! (Does anyone else remember making sugared violets? And if you have never heard of them, they are exactly what they sound like: boring pieces of sugared flowers) Anyhow, last year I was quite perturbed that I lost. I eventually stopped muttering, "Second, second? Violets, violets?" and started coming out of the basement more and more. Ha!

This year I didn't enter because I don't have too many canned goods to enter and I mistakenly opened the jar of chili sauce I was going to enter. Oh well.

But enough of my contest woes. This year we just went and had fun. The best part is saying hello to all of the animals: sheep, goats, and cows. They also had truck pulling, which is a sport I don't get. But it was still neat.

That was Friday night. Saturday night we went to Wisconsin to a county fair.
Now that was F-U-N!! I haven't been to a county fair in years!!!!! The rides, the food, the exhibits, the carnies (small hands, smell like cabbage) Oh such much fun!!!!!!

We also went to say hello to the animals! We're just like that. You know those people that actually say "hello" to the animals as if they know English? Yeah, that's us (well, me at least!).
We looked at all the dairy cattle (we're in Wisconsin, so there were a lot. And please ignore those commericals for California cheese, our cows are far happier than any other cow!!!!)
We looked at pretty Jerseys, Guernseys, Brown Swiss, Red and Black Holsteins and who knows what else. I like cows.
Then we went to the goat/sheep barn and a strange occurrence happened. At first it was just the goats. Matt and I thought that it was because I had a gyro for supper. The goats kept coming up to me and nibbling. On my dress, on my fingers, whatever they could find. They would come to me from other side of the pen. We thought since I had a gyro, maybe I smelled like goat??? And my dress was flower print, so maybe they thought it was actual flowers?? Some of them even ran (or trotted) over to me!!!! (I have the same effect on men:)

But then the sheep starting doing it!!!!!!! All of them let me pet them like dogs. It was very funny. And odd. So now my name is "Mer of the Goat People." All goats and sheep were strangely drawn to me.

Except that sheep do call for Matt: "Maaaaat, Maaaaat." According to him.

We also saw the awarding winning Swiss Cheese (remember, Wisconsin)
And I had ice cream (Wisconsin)
Matt had corn (Wisconsin)

All it all, it was a very fair fair!!!!

This weekend there is a fair in Iowa. Wonder if they'll have elephant ears? I am on a years' long quest for elephant ears. I have been craving one for at least 4 years. There weren't any at our fair and only funnel cakes in Wisconsin, elephants being a foreign creature and therefore protected by the Anti-Margarine Code of 1889. We even asked around for elephant ears but no one had any. Some people didn't even know what they were! I could find a deep-fried twinkie or snickers bar but no elephant ear. What is wrong with this picture!!!!!!

Ok, someone please tell me that you have been to a fair recently and have at least seen elephants ears being sold! Otherwise I might go back to the basement......

"E" is for the way I enjoy you
"L" is for the way I love you
"E" is for your yumminess when I eat you.....

and that's enough. You get the picture!
Elephant Ear, Stat!

The wonder of our world

2008-07-15T08:12:00.001-07:00

I'm in the process of reading Gorgeously Green and I'm thoroughly enjoying it. It is also my inspiration for this post. That and Alaina's recent post on the same subject. Sorry Alaina, I don't mean to copy, it's just that I share your opinion on the matter and it has been weighing on my mind recently.

The author believes, and I agree, that one change can make a difference. So as we continue to use up our old light bulbs and replace them with CFLs, I try to remember to bring in bags when I go to the grocery store (why do I always remember in the dairy section? What is it about cheese that makes me think: I forgot my bags!), and we try to use as little water as possible (which means I stuff the washing machine with as much as I can get in there. There's always room for one more towel!) we are working to improve the environment.

However, just because we try to live green doesn't mean that we have to wear only hemp clothing! We can be pretty women too (sorry guys, this book is not really for you) I'm only on the second chapter but it's already helped me to realize that I have no idea what is in my makeup, lotion, shampoo or conditioner. I looked at many of the labels which start this way: water, glyercin, and continue to list chemicals that I can't pronounce. Does anyone know of eco-friendly shampoo, soap, etc, that would be readily accessible? Remember, I live ten miles from the middle of nowhere, so it will have to be pretty mainstream.

Something else that is recommended is to spend 1/2 hour with nature each day, even if it's weeding your flowers. So this morning, I woke up early and took a walk. The world is very new at 6:30 in the morning. I love that time of day except that it comes so early! I also re-remembered how beautiful our area is. It's not that I forget but more like I just recognize its beauty again. I walked along a country road and admired the lovely colors of tiger lilies, chicory, clover, and even the garlic mustard which added a nice yellow. Nature's bouquet, growing in a ditch. We move so fast anymore that we forget to enjoy what we have, whether it be nature or each other. I did laugh at a squirrel. He was about 50 feet in front me and kept running away from me as I walked closer. We did this for about 200 feet. I'm certain that I looked like a crazy woman walking along and laughing but come on, squirrels are funny!

Even if it is a squirrel running away from you or the simple beauty of wildflowers, it is our duty to protect this earth. We shouldn't think, "what can we get out of the earth" but rather "what can we do to help the earth while still enjoying our time on this planet." The earth is wonderful. Just think of all the different animals, plants, insects, and life that co-exist here. The beauty of a sunset or snowstorm. The season cycle with spring teeming with life, summer's bounty, fall's colors, and even winter's promise (and beauty, if you are me!) There is so much to enjoy and appreciate and yet we don't. We blast through hills to pave roads. We speed by nature to get to a jungle of concrete and asphalt. We irrigate our land to grow grass where it shouldn't grow. We trash the planet for our own selfish wants. And we complain about the smell from landfills. But, there is a cure. The other wonder of our planet is that it can heal itself. Much like our bodies, nature, if given enough time, can erase most of its scars. Have you ever not mowed a section of your yard for a period of time? What happens? The grass grows longer, bushes begin to grow, birds and rabbits move in. The same is true for our planet. It is not dead or dying. We are hurting it but we can stop. We just have to be aware of our actions and their consequences. So please, remember to turn off the light when you leave a room or turn off the faucet while you brush your teeth. If you don't recycle, try to begin. See if your community has a recycling program. If you don't, try to recycle at home. Find new uses for items that you would normally toss into the trash. Don't spray pesticides or herbicides on your yard: find homemade, eco-friendly ones. I found one yesterday for pests on plants which was soap, vinegar, and garlic.
We only have one planet and we need to care for it. Just remember, every little action can change the world!

Good luck!

A berry good time

2008-07-10T07:18:00.000-07:00

A riddle:

My hands are stained but my teeth aren't.
I have bramble scratches on my arms.
I'm dreaming of toast and pancakes.

What am I?

I'm Merrilee after picking wild blackberries!!!!

Matt and I picked, are you ready for it? You might want to sit down.

12 cups of berries last night.
12!!
From wild bushes growing along side the road.
12!!!
I'm in shock.

We added that to the berries we picked previously and now we have about 21 cups of berries total. Just from the last week! They are all in the freezer which is a little full right now!

We're thinking blackberry jelly and blackberry syrup. Yum!

We left quite a few on the bushes for the birds and wildlife because we don't have to have the berries to live. We can go the grocery store for food. There isn't a grocery store for birds, although designing one would be really cool. Little shopping carts for birds and aisles of different bird seed and suet types..... Ok, I need a life.

Random Miscellany

2008-07-08T12:06:00.000-07:00

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Fourth of July!!!!!
I certainly did. I was able to head back to Indiana for a long weekend. Matt wasn't able to go so he was sorely missed. Anyhow, I was able to see family that I haven't seen in years and spend time with Mel and Jenny which was great fun. (Jenny made me promise to mention that)

What do Julia Childs, Emeril, and I all have in common? We like to cook!! I think I might have invented a recipe but I'm not certain. Has anyone had White Chicken Lasagna before?
The subtitle to this recipe should be: How to use up those lasagna noodles you impulsively bought a couple of weeks ago. Some people impulsively buy cars or furniture, I buy pasta. Oh well.

Anyhow, in case you are curious, here is my pseudo-recipe. I don't believe in recipes. They're only guidelines for cooking anyhow, not commandments.

Chicken, cooked and shredded. Saute onions. Make roux with onions. Add canned tomato chunks or just a little tomato sauce for some color. Use for sauce in lasagna strata.

Enjoy!

It was good, really good. And the best part is that it makes a ton so I have plenty of leftovers to pack for my lunch this week. Although I think by Thursday I might start sprouting lasagna noodles for ears and ricotta for hair!!

P.S. I do have approximate measurements that I can share if anyone is interested. But they're only approximate!

BOOKS!

2008-07-01T07:10:00.000-07:00

The Big Read is an NEA program designed to encourage community reading initiatives. They've come up with this list of the top 100 books, using criteria they don't explain, and they estimate that the average adult has only read 6 of these.

So, we are encouraged to:
1) Look at the list and bold those we have read.
2) Italicize those we intend to read.
3) Underline the books we LOVE (Or, I'm making mine red since I read them. :)
4) Reprint this list in our own blogs and share!

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Holy carp, I'm a total geek! What is wrong with me? I've read the Count of Monte Cristo but haven't read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?? I love chocolate more than I love sandwiches, what am I doing??

Ok, since I read 49 of them and I'm only supposed to have read six, does that make me a nerd?

Marching Bands and History, Yay!

2008-06-27T09:12:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Matt called me at work and asked what I was doing that evening. Well, I had an exciting evening planned: take out the trash and recycling, wash dishes, and make a grocery list. (I know, I live on the edge!). He asked if I wanted to go to a marching band contest in the next state (12 miles away). We both enjoy marching bands and were in them when we were in high school. Actually we both attended a national marching band contest in Indianapolis when we were in high school but didn't know each other then. (Neither of our bands were in the contest, we just went to watch and be impressed).

Anyhow, we went and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The bands all did a fantastic job. Before the competion, they had the participants of the color guard summer camp perform. Little girls (5-8 years old?) did a routine to Miley Cyrus. It was so cute!
However, the bands were great. The one that I enjoyed the most had a Spartacus theme to their show. The color guard all wore tunics and started the show in "shackles." About half-way through the show, one of the drum majors walked up to a guard girl and "killed" her setting off the slave rebellion which had to be coming at some point since Spartacus led a slave rebellion in ancient Rome before being betrayed by pirates (Never, never trust pirates, even if they look like Johnny Depp!) Next thing you know, the guard members all have spears and shields. Using their shields, they form a testudo, Roman defense trick to protect all members in unit by creating a "tortoise" shell with their shields. I clapped for the testudo and suddenly realized that I was the only one clapping.

Yes, I clap for historical accuracy. I can't help it, I'm a nerd. Well, as you might know, the slaves/guard were defeated by the Romans/band but it was still fun. The end of the true story has all the slaves crucified on the Appian Way because they all claim to be Spartacus and aren't willing to give him up to the Romans. Well at the end of the show, the guard was in the back of the band with their arms outstretched like they were on crosses. I hope someone else got the reference but I did! And I again clapped for historical accuracy.

None of the other bands had historical themes but I enjoyed them too.

Did I mention that we once had a dog named for Spartacus? Sparky was the best dog......

Weekend movie recommendation: Spartacus starring Kirk Douglas, Laurence Olivier, and Tony Curtis. Very good!!!!!!

Baby animals everywhere!

2008-06-26T08:31:00.000-07:00

Well, not quite everywhere....

Here's the story. About three months ago, we noticed a bird building a nest in our carport. Mrs. Robin nested and nested and didn't seem to mind the cars pulling in below her. After a while though, we noticed that she seemed to be gone. I was afraid that she had abandoned her nest. Last night, however, I noticed at least two hungry birdy mouths popping up from the nest. So now we have baby robins in our carport. Yay!!!!!!!

And, our neighbor across the street has a puppy. Matt and I thought we saw a puppy in their yard but we weren't certain. Last night, Rob, our neighbor brought over their 6 -week old rat terrier Sammy. Who is adorable!!!!! Rob let me hold Sammy (worst idea ever because I didn't want to give him back!) and Sammy proceeded to cuddle on me, nibble on fingers, and in generally be a puppy. So cute. Sammy weighs probably about 3 pounds. Rob said that they have a cat but their cat doesn't mind Sammy. At this point, our cats outweigh Sammy by about 3 times, so I would actually be worried for Sammy that Gus "The Chunk" Cat would crush Sammy.

So Matt and I had the dog discussion again, with the continued consensus of "not right now"....
I'll keep trying to teach the cats to play fetch (actually Gus does kinda fetch, sometimes, when he wants to (he is a cat after all)). Both cats do roll over, wag their tails, and both play dead (or maybe they're just sleeping since being a house cat is HARD!)

Gardening, yay!!!

2008-06-22T14:31:00.001-07:00

The long-awaited pictures of Casa de Lee

Our tomatoes behind our house. This year I cut back on the number of plants. Last year we had 19, this year, only 12. (I freeze the tomatoes and can them once I get time. Last year I made chili sauce, "Mer"inara, and just chunks) We also have a pepper plant and two plantings of beets.

(And, how in the heck do I rotate a picture on my blog? Does someone know?)

This is the back of our house. Our garden is right at the base. We added the little border and cleaned up the area for our garden.

Matt's potatoes did come up. And a squash or a pumpkin, we're not certain yet. I think we have some of each which is what you get from a compost pile.

Matt's "Victory Garden" also known as Mac's hangout. We have become a foundling home for poinsettias. I think you can see them in the picture. We have about 12 around the house. Most come from the bank after Christmas and a certain husband of mine can't stand to see the plants thrown away. So enter these scrawny near death plants and I think, "Ok, I can stand have a house full of poinsettias since they are so near death. They deserve a decent place to pass away." Oh but no, that's not the case. After about 2 weeks under Matt's green thumbed care, they thrive. And thrive. And grow into huge healthy plants that completely take over our back room. Oh, goody......

And the front of our house completes our backyard, front yard tour. I hope that you have enjoyed your trip around the Lee household. Please watch your step and pet the kitties as you leave. Thanks for coming!

Rain, Rain go away

2008-06-19T07:03:00.000-07:00

We have had enough rain already. Honestly, enough. Luckily, we haven't had any problems with flooding like other areas have had, i.e. Cedar Rapids, IA which is completely underwater. The only good news is that with all this rain, our garden is looking very nice. Our tomatoes and pepper plants are growing well and my beets are coming up! Matt's potatoes are coming up too!!Yay!!!!!

This past weekend was our Cemetery Walk fundraiser for the museum. We have it at a beautiful cemetery here in town: rolling hills, huge trees, and nice paths. I wore my '86 wrapper for a change (everyone always wears fancy clothing when they dress up, I like to wear oldey-timey normal clothing: proof yet again that I"m a social historian.) Anyhow, when I was putting on my dress, it felt like I was slipping into an old friend. You know that feeling you get when you put on clothing that you used to wear all the time and stopped wearing, only to start again? Yep, that one. I even wore my apron ( I needed the pocket for my keys and cell phone.)

I did have to chuckle to myself though: my dress was the only one with "authentic" wear patterns. Underarms and bodice front issues. Plus bleach stains on the hem!

I'll post pictures of our garden soon and show you all our new exhibit at the museum!

Verminator!

2008-06-04T13:59:00.000-07:00

Well, luckily, we haven't had any more mousey friends here at the museum but we did have another guest of the winged variety. Yes, a bat managed to find its way into our museum. And since apparently I'm the courageous one of us, I got to dispose of it. Thoroughly dispose of it because that was the second time today that it had tried to get into the museum. And I feel just awful. Did you know that bats not only squeak but they also hiss like a cat? I didn't.

This morning our visitor's service staff person found it attached to the broom. She simply took the broom outside and shook the bat into the bushes about 10 feet away from the front door. Then about an hour later, our executive director came to the front door and found the bat under the threshold. Not a good place. So, she used her cell phone to call me to get rid of the bat. Thank goodness for modern appliances! The bat was acting oddly, even for a bat and we decided since it apparently really liked the museum, we needed to get rid of it.

Anyhow, I still feel bad. I don't like things squeaking in pain at me because of something that I'm doing to it. (Note to self: a career option not open to us "CIA interrogator")

I even don't like it when I kill box elder bugs in my house even though I hate box elder bugs.

Such a softy...

Is anyone with me on this??

Umm, what was that?

2008-05-20T11:07:00.000-07:00

We are officially in "school-tour season" here at the museum and I have some funnies to share with you. Now, I know that for all my intrepid blog readers, if you ever had the joy to work at a living history museum or are currently working there, you have far better one-liners than I do, but please remember that I don't have: fires, flies, chickens, or horse doo in the street to spur on some of the best visitor comments.

So here are my school tour comments, 2008:

Why do you have so much old stuff here?

You have nice teeth. I like them. (directed towards me from a middle school girl)

So which one is older, WWII or the war of 1812?

It smells like old stuff in here.

Is that a real man in the mine shaft? (it's clearly a mannequin)

I don't want to look at this junk, I want to go to the gift shop.

And my all time favorite which happened a few months after I started here:

This town is so old, it doesn't even have a Starbucks. (from a cranky 15ish year-old)

Merlock Holmes and the Case of the Kitty Prints

2008-05-14T07:25:00.000-07:00

So, I know that some of you know what I've been doing the past few days: trying to finish painting the basement steps. We have two flights of steps that lead into the basement, one by the back door and the other in the center of the house. Well, we've had the steps pretty much primed for about a month now and I decided it was time to finish the job. So Saturday, I was painting the treads of the center steps with the white primer. Now, all the fun kitty stuff, like food, water, and litter is in the basement. I thought (ha!) that if I left one door open and closed the other, the cats could still get into the basement to their essentials. In a perfect world, this would have worked. I don't live in a perfect world. After painting a couple of steps, a tan blur rushed past me up the freshly painted steps. I, of course, shouted at him "Gus, what are you doing?" which made him run faster because suddenly "shorter, blond one who feeds me" is yelling at him. I yelled at Matt to grab Gus but he missed. So now there was white cat prints on our wood floor in the living room. I reacted in the appropriate manner: paint on floor first, cat second. Luckily it all came up with only a slightly traumatized Gus to contend with.

So last night, I was painting the same steps, only this time with the finish coat. I closed that door and left the other one open for the cats (apparently I don't learn). I had finished and was sitting in the living room. Matt came downstairs from the second floor and I asked him to go look at the freshly painted stairs. When he opened the basement door, guess who came out? A painted Gus. This time he had run up all the steps, leaving nice cat prints on all my newly painted steps. And now there is brown paint on our kitchen floor (which isn't a problem because it needs to be replaced anyhow). So we grabbed Gus and I held him while Matt cleaned his feet. Gus was a very good kitty to let us wash his feet and cut away the painted fur.

We decided that at least Gus did it in the correct order: primer first, then top coat.

So, I doubt that Gus has learned his lesson but I have: close both doors while painting and the cats can just hold it for a bit!

I'm the worst blogger ever!

2008-05-12T18:34:00.000-07:00

Yes, it's official. I'm a horrible blogger. If you look at my blog, nothing has happened in my life for the last month or so. Apparently, I've been doing nothing. Well, as you can imagine, that's not true. I will now post many, many, MANY pictures in a not-so-veiled attempt to make it up to you. And maybe it will tell a story......

Even though we were all happily hibernating throughout the winter, Spring came anyhow. (This is what happens if I don't make the bed in the morning quick enough)

There was much rejoicing and feasting the end of the long hard winter.

Early flowers began to bloom. This is a now domesticated Jack-in-the-Pulpit. It was found running wild through the hills nearby, tamed (i.e. dug up) and moved to the wilderness preserve on Ash Street.

We all took our Spring baths in anticipation of what was to come.

Matt's potato garden. Yeah, I don't see anything yet either. This began as a spot to dump used potting soil, then a compost heap (see the pumpkin shells) and is now a potato hill. We'll see.

We received new toys to enjoy the spring weather.

We're all so excited about it, we just can't contain it.

We're all giddy about Spring! As giddy as schoolgirls, I mean, schoolboys.

THE END

Why is my cat addicted to kitty treats?

2008-04-02T09:59:00.000-07:00

This is a serious problem! Mac just can't get enough kitty treats!! We give our cats Whiskas treats, the soft ones because Gus doesn't like the crunchy ones since he is a truly spoiled housecat and crunching his treats takes far too much energy. Anyhow, Mac is the problem. He can snark 4-5 treats in one sitting and want more. Sometimes, when we aren't paying enough attention, he steals Gus' treats as well. He sits on his table by the back door and anytime we come home, walk through the room, or are anywhere between 5-10 feet away, he is meowhining for treats! He always wants more (hence the addition issue). He eats his food fine, no problems there. But this kitty treat thing, ugh! What I find particularly funny is that his treats sit on his table about 1 foot away from his normal spot. He could open the package and eat all the treats. It's only paper and foil and he does have sharp teeth. Luckily, this thought hasn't occurred to him and I'm not going to mention to him.

Do kitty treats have small amounts of crack and/or cocaine in them? Is this the explanation for the issue?

Mer: 3 (!); Mice: 0(ish)

2008-03-18T13:49:00.000-07:00

Yay!!!!!! Success!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Our curator was upstairs near the collections storage rooms and heard a rustling noise. She yelled for me because part of my job description is official rodent remover. My two missing traps? Found. One with a dead mousey and the other with one still looking at me. I hate that. Both had just put one paw in the trap and had been caught by only one leg. Horrible. I managed to get the still live one outside and the last I saw of it, it was sitting in our front yard licking its leg. I don't think it will last long since we also have several cats in our area and one in particular that likes the pigeons that roost on our building. We found a present on our front porch last week with a tell-tale bloody cat paw print.

Anyhow, success with the mice. I left the traps and we will hopefully have no more unwelcome visitors.

Do you remember my post about hunting? I couldn't even bring myself to kill a mouse, how could I kill anything larger?

What the Bleep!

2008-03-18T09:24:00.000-07:00

Another mouse trap went missing. Same room, same area as before.

I think I need to invest in a rat trap.

I will kill this rodent if it is the last thing that I do before dying of the black death from rat bites. So help me, God, I will get this thing.

Mouse: ???: Mer: 1

2008-03-17T14:05:00.000-07:00

I had a lovely present waiting for me this morning. A dead mousey. Yay!!!!!!

And a fantastic way to start a Monday!

Now, we don't know how many more we might have. But there is one little (actually, he was kinda plump) mousey who is now in mouse heaven.

I recommend these: Better mousetrap
I find mine at Walmart but the principle is the same. And no danger of fingers getting in the way with the old fashioned wire snap traps.

And that is the end of today's session on mousehunting!

The wonder of email

2008-03-14T08:02:00.000-07:00

Email just fascinates me. It has completely changed how we communicate as a culture. Whereas written notes used to contain "frilly" phrases and words like "whereas," now with email, it is cut and dry. There is a meeting at 10 a.m. Did you receive that memo? You're fired. Things of that sort. However, it also allows us to communicate with people that we might not have ever had the chance to meet. For example, on Monday I received an email from the curator of the New York Botanical Museum. He had a question regarding our county. Now, I get plenty of work related emails but rarely from someone like this. We email chatted a couple of times about spring coming, the weather, issues with museums regardless of who or where you are. Now, in my professional life, I will never meet this man. Our paths would never cross. But because he had a question about Jo Daviess County and my email is on our website, I got to meet him. Fascinating.
www.galenahistorymuseum.org If you are interested. info@ is me.

I'm in the middle of war. With a mouse. He or she is leaving mouse artifacts all over our collections storage rooms, the absolute worst place to have a mouse. So far, I have lost one trap and the other was sprung with the bait gone. On the missing trap, it's just gone. I placed it on a shelf and now it's not there. I looked on the floor, behind the shelf, under the shelving on the other side of the room and nothing. If I did catch a mouse, I'll know in a couple of days....

Anyhow, I have yet begun to fight! More traps and PB are on their way!!!!!! The mice might have won this fight but I'll win the battle!!!!! It's Friday and I always feel more militant on Friday:)

A Beautiful Sight

2008-03-10T12:05:00.000-07:00

Yesterday as Matt and I were headed home from church, we passed 6 wild turkeys and at least 40 deer. Deer are such an amazing sight to me. They are so graceful and beautiful. Roughly 25-30 of the deer that we saw yesterday were all in one cornfield and it looked like someone had turned them out to pasture. It reminded me of something that had happened to me last summer.
Last summer, I was picking wild berries on my in-laws property when I heard this odd little moan. I had no idea what it was but it clearly wasn't a cat or dog. Then the bushes about 10 feet away from me started to shake. I suddenly realized how far away from the house I was and the fact that I was completely alone, minus the berries and flies who were not likely going to protect me much! Then I heard the noise again but it was closer this time. The bushes shook again. I tried peering through the bushes and then I caught sight of a pair of brown eyes. The noise I had heard was a fawn calling for its mom. This fawn was all alone walking though the cornfield and fence line when apparently it thought I was its mom and came within about 5 feet of me. I was trying to think of how to adopt a deer when it ran away. It was so cute!! I'm not certain why it was alone. I hope that its mom was alright and that they had just gotten separated. The fawn looked exactly like Bambi!!!
When I see deer, I don't know how a person could hunt it. Sure, I understand all the logical reasons for hunting: food, keep numbers down with lack of natural predators, and while I'm certain I could hunt if I had to, I don't have to. The supermarket does all of my hunting for me. And shooting such a noble looking animal as a deer seems like a travesty to me.

Now, hunting for the boxelder bugs that have somehow survived the winter in my house, that is a different matter!!!!!

I have spring fever. I want to plant flowers and veggies, open all my windows, and turn off the furnace. I am also missing my flipflops, skirts, and open windows while driving. Is anyone else feeling this way or am I just crazy???

If I have one more meeting...

2008-03-06T11:36:00.000-08:00

Honestly, how many meetings can one person have? Yesterday I had meetings at at 4:30, 5:30, and 6:30. That's insane. When I came home, I tried to give Matt an agenda for the rest of our evening and teach the kitties Roberts rules of order. They didn't get it.

On a happy note, our Christmas cactus is blooming. Just three months late. It's beautiful right now. There is one bloom right now and about 6 buds. Gorgeous and nice to see something in bloom right now.

Just in case you were worried, our sidewalk is still clear. No violations there. And, yes, I quoted Alice's Restaurant. It's a family tradition to listen to it at least once during Thanksgiving. And then quote it excessively the rest of the evening.

Last Saturday we had a business trade show in town and the museum participated even though we're not really a "business." We ran the 50/50 and "What is it?" We had three artifacts from the museum that people could try and guess what they were. We, of course, picked the three easiest artifacts, hah! We had an ancient wringer mop, carpet stretcher, and tobacco plug cutter, that I demonstrated multiple times without loosing a digit! Yay for me!

However, I did fail a very easy test: can I change a lightbulb? No, is the answer. I thought there was something wrong with the bulb or the socket but our handyman said he got it in just fine. I must have stronger points elsewhere, I just know it!
We tried to install wallpaper at the museum but it's not going so well. We worked really hard to find pretty, time-appropriate but affordable wallpaper and found the perfect stuff. Unfortunately, when our contractor tried to install it, the wallpaper started curling on the edges. Drat. He tried everything but what it comes down to is, we need to pick new wallpaper. The worst part is we already painted the ceiling to match the wallpaper so we have to stay in that color range. Wednesday was not a good day in the museum.

I know that this post is all about work but it's kinda what I've been all about recently. I called Matt to ask him out on a date for tonight because I've been so busy in the evenings. I have Subway and Pizza Hut coupons so we get to pick from one of those!! Yay for coupons!!!

Spring is definitely here!!

2008-02-29T07:05:00.000-08:00

How can I tell, you ask? Did I have a sighting of the elusive robin? Or perhaps a brave crocus was struggling to lift its head above the frozen soil? No, dear blog readers, it was nothing of the sort.

I was at a local drugstore and spotted the first true sign of spring. It was.......Cadbury Eggs! They only come out at Easter (a fact that my hips appreciate!) and are the first true sign of spring. I think that they are my most favoritist candy in the world. (My grammar has been overcome by my excitement regarding these fabulous chocolate eggs). There is just something borderline addictive about them. Maybe it's the milk chocolate shell or the gooey inside. And I only like the original ones. Cadbury came out with caramel eggs a few years ago, but I only like the "true" Cadbury Eggs. I know that some people (i.e. Matt) find them gross and too sweet. Well, that is fine with me as long as they give me their Cadbury Eggs!!! Well, since I had to buy important things at the drugstore like posterboard and contact solution, I also purchased an egg, completely ignoring the fact that I had just spent 45 minutes on the treadmill at the gym. I figure that one egg is probably equal to 45 minutes walking on the treadmill so I broke even. The egg didn't make it home. It was consumed before I even reached the last stoplight in the county. Yummmmmmmm.
Unfortunately, all this talk about Cadbury Eggs makes me want to buy more. Maybe I need more contact solution and posterboard..........

Sign #458 that we live in a small town:
Matt was in our driveway after work on Wednesday when the police drove by. And circled around, which is enough to make even the most law-abiding citizen a tad bit nervous. The police chief of our town (we only have two police officers and I think they take turns being "chief") told Matt that he ( the popo, E-town 5-0, or whatever you want to call them) had been told to enforce the clean sidewalk law in town and we needed to clean our sidewalks. Now, I had shoveled the sidewalk clean after the last major snow but it had drifted over in a couple of spots, which made us in violation of the "clean sidewalk act of 1927." Please also keep in mind that we are having the snowiest winter in 50 years with a record-breaking 70+ inches of snow. What I find the most ironic in this whole story is that the only crime the police had to fight at that moment was our snowy sidewalk. There were no dead bodies or burglarized homes to investigate, car accidents to report, or even a run-away dog that needed to be found. Oh, no, we were the major law breakers in our area with our drifted over sidewalk.

But you can relax, we're not going to end up the pokey for our unshoveled sidewalk. Or even on the "Group W" bench. I shoveled the sidewalk when I got home. All the way to our neighbor's property line. Who, by the way, haven't shoveled their walk either!!!!!

Friends

2008-02-20T15:01:00.000-08:00

Last night Matt and I visited one of our friends who has been in, as she put it, a "happy depression." She's just been in a funk recently and we thought we'd visit her for a while and maybe cheer her up a bit. We took over some baked goods and canned goods but she beat us in the yummy treats department. Rina, our friend, is a 70 year old Italian lady and she loves to entertain and cook. When we got there we talked for a little bit and then she looked at me and said, "Coffee or chocolate milk?" Well, that's a tough decision but I went for the chocolate milk, which turned out to be the best hot chocolate I've ever had. Rina doesn't simply heat water, or if I'm spurgling, milk, in the microwave, oh no. She got out a pan, poured in milk, and let it heat. She did use a hot chocolate mix but it was darn good. And to round it out, since she's Italian, she got out the Nutella and told us to put some in our hot chocolate. Which we did, since we do what Rina says! Oh, it was good. She also had made something called bumblinoni (not spelled correctly) which were a fried dough flavored with lemon. Very good. And perfect for a chilly evening.

Visiting Rina sometimes reminds me of visiting my grandma. No matter what time you visit, you will eat. Don't fight it because it will happen. We went over after 7 and we still had to have something while we were there. And she sent us home with food, homemade biscotti, yumm. Rina and her husband used to own a bakery and she says that his baked goods were always better than hers, but I find that hard to believe since her's are delicious (he passed away a few years ago).

I hope our visit helped. Rina is one of those people who is just always cherry and full of life. To see her upset is probably more upsetting to me. She's a sweet lady.

Did I mention that 1. She lived in Italy during the reign of Mussolini and 2. she grew up with Pavarotti? And now she lives about a mile from us? Wierd!

Jenny's Meme

2008-02-13T07:19:00.001-08:00

My band: The Regar District

(It's in Tajikistan. Yeah, I didn't know that either.)

First album: Lived One's Life Properly

Cover

So I'm guessing that I'm some sort of Euro-pop band? Cool!

On a different note, I've had some thoughts on winter. I read somewhere that Midwesterners show the greatest amount of hope compared to any other region in the US because we know that regardless of how long the winter is, spring will come. There is no doubt about that. I think it's not just Midwesterners but anyone who experiences drastic changes in weather. We all know that spring will come. It's just waiting for the right time.

True for many aspects of life, just waiting for the right time.

For example, Matt and I would love to have a dog. But we're concerned about how our two cats would react. Matt suggested last night that we get a small herding dog who could herd the cats around. And while the thought did make me laugh and think about "herding cats," I'm afraid it wouldn't work. Oh well, eventually we'll get Scraps and Louie (our dogs, Scraps is a little fellow and Louie is a big silly dog) Yes, we've already named our nonexistent dogs! We need hobbies!!!!

The end is here.

2008-02-08T07:55:00.000-08:00

Our total count: 15 inches in less than 12 hours. That's a lot of snow.
And it's beautiful!!! It's a heavy, wet snow and is sticking to all of the trees. It looks a little like a Currier and Ives print. I'll try to get some pictures this weekend, when we are supposed to get 2-4 more inches. Yay.....

Don't get me wrong, I love the snow. But I need more time inbetween snows to clean up. It still takes me about 3 tries to get out of our driveway because of the snow.

On a side topic: I thoroughly enjoyed my snow day but I think we need to start a sunny day. Here's my thought: we get out of school, work, whatever when the weather is bad. We should also get out of school, work, whatever when the weather is gorgeous. We should close businesses when it is 80 and sunny outside and not only when it's -13 and snowing outside!!! Let's have snow days AND beautiful sunny days!!!!!!!!

Who's with me?????????

Still more snow

2008-02-06T11:38:00.000-08:00

12 inches and counting. It's 2 p.m. here and the snow is going to stop soon.

I hope.

Matt came home for lunch and got stuck in our driveway. Our neighbor and I had to push him out. It's still snowing and blowing. I have never seen so much snow falling all at once. Maybe over a couple of snowfalls but never this much at once.

It's amazing!!!!!!!!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it, well, you get the point

2008-02-06T08:36:00.000-08:00

Forecast for today: 8-12 inches of snow. WOW!!!! That's a lot of snow! Everything is closed (except Matt's bank, poor guy)!!! Schools, history museums, governmental offices, and colleges in a nearby town. I think that in attending various colleges for about 6 years, I never had the college close because of weather. Of course, we never got this much snow in one day either!

So I have snow day and I 'm enjoying it by slowing drinking my second cup of coffee, watching Price is Right (just not the same without Bob) and randomly staring out the window, just waiting until I can shovel the snow.

There's a road in there. Actually a major highway in our county (honestly, THE major highway in our county) If you don't see it, don't worry, I don't either and I even know where it is.

Bird feeder. The poor birds are just so hungry but they keep getting blown off of the bird feeder.

Roads are closed, towns are in snow emergencies, etc... You get the picture.

Last Tuesday we were supposed to have an all county historical society meeting, which was cancelled due to the blizzard warning that we were under. We re-scheduled for today. Yesterday, we canceled it again and rescheduled for April, when hopefully, it will have stopped snowing.

Ahh, winter, how I enjoy thee.

Mer's gardening tips for today: Don't plant in a snowstorm. Also, if you have an apartment on a major street in a small town, don't use a glow light to start plants in front of a window in your kitchen. At night it casts a purplish glow out the windows and it looks like you're growing something other than tomatoes and squash.... (voice of experience)

Ode to the Giants and Jane Austen

2008-02-04T07:02:00.000-08:00

Or, How two TVs saved the Lee's marriage

Oh for a Sunday night
to relax and prepare for the week
Superbowl between two
and Masterpiece Theater with Jane
Which shall we watch?
I say Superbowl, you say Jane Austen
Which to be????
You stay here, I'll go up there
And watch my Jane Austen in peace
While listening to you and your father cheer
As the Giants beat the Pats
And Jane flirts with men
Hmmm, wonder if Tom Brady ever read any Austen???

As you can tell, we had a slight problem in our house last night. Matt wanted to watch the game and I wanted to watch the next installment of Masterpiece Theater. They're showing all of their Jane Austen works: next week, Pride and Prejudice with Colin Firth. Yay!
Anyhow, we worked it out and inbetween witty barbs in sitting rooms holding cups of tea, I heard "Go, go, go! Yes!!!!" and thought that the Giants must be doing something right!!!

In response to Boy's (my brother, just in case you were curious) question regarding gardening, I try to share some tips:

~Plant only what grows in your zone. If you're not certain of your zone, look at a seed catalog. Here we are zone 4/5 depending on the catalog and where the line is drawn.
~I love heirloom plants, particularly tomatoes, but our growing season is about 2-3 weeks shorter than central Indiana and unfortunately, that is just enough that the tomatoes don't have enough time to fully ripen. Pay attention to your first and last frost. I know that they can be at odd times when you live in the Midwest but they still dictate your growing season
~Compost, compost, compost. Mother Nature gave us all the things we need to grown plants and veggies. Stay away from chemicals if possible. Granted, there are times that you need them, but for the most part, you don't. Find out what your plants like and use it. My tomatoes love my coffee grounds and egg shells. And since I drink coffee every day and use eggs probably at least once a week, we have them on hand. AND they don't smell like other compost. They both just dry out. Crumble them up and mix them into your soil during planting. If you start to see spots on the bottoms of your tomatoes (blossom end rot) add more eggs. Your tomatoes need more calcium.

Any other thoughts on gardening??

Well, now, I'm ready for spring. Which is good since it's going to rain/snow here all day today and tomorrow.......