Cat's Favorite Places, Health and Knitting Update

Tiger loves to hang out on my writing chair, but since I've been using it more often, he's found another location - in front of the corn/pellet burner.

I keep a clothing rack in front of my corn/pellet burner, to dry clothes, when I cannot hang them outside, or when they don't dry completely (after being outside).  Tiger loves to stay warm there.

 I'm down to the last 10 rows or so, and adding the fringe, on my knitted shawl.  

 Although I found "In Defense of Food" interesting, I am enjoying this book more.  This book explains the content and benefits of specific foods that folks should be including in their diet more.  Growing up, I can't remember being served brussel sprouts, Kale, or Swiss Chard.  We have started growing these in our garden, but there are so many other foods we should be eating too.  Watch out kids, Mom's adding more vegetables!

Tonights frugal dinner - Ham Bone Soup and homemade corn bread.  I have a few ham bones in my freezer, which come in handy for an inexpensive, but healthy dinner.  I am thankful I have one bag of soup beans left.  

My ham bone soup:  Wrap a ham bone in 2-3 layers of cheese cloth and tie with cotton string.  Place in a crock pot and fill with good water about 1/2 full.  Add a mix of soup beans that have soaked over night (I just buy the dry bean mix at the store and discard the flavoring packet).  I toss in what ever I have - frozen garden tomatoes, dehydrated green peppers, chopped onions, chopped celery and sliced carrots.  Today I added some potatoes.  I salt and pepper as needed, but the flavor is so good with the bone, I don't salt it sometimes.

I remove the bone about 3-pm, and continue cooking for another hour or so.  I typically cook on high 1 hour, then lower the heat to "low" for the rest of the time (if the beans are pre-soaked and rinsed).  I think I cook mine about 7 hours or so.  I serve it with corn bread. 

Pinching Pennies

It's that time again, where we have to "pinch" pennies to keep the bills paid.  It happens when the income is reduced.  This means meals without going to the store. 

For a different lunch, I took leftover turkey, added home canned zucchini relish (a bit of spice to it), and some lite safflower mayo.  I grilled it between 2 slices of bread, in olive oil. Yum!  The relish adds just enough flavor too.

14 Hand Crocheted Scarves

Most are made from leftover yarn from other projects.  These are being shipped to New Jersey, for folks in need.

I had a moment the other day.  I was complaining about cleaning my bathroom, and here there are folks on the East coast that don't even have a house at all.  Shame on me.

These scarves will help a few more folks this winter.

From the Homesteading Journal . . .

. . .unloaded one truck full of split wood and stacked it on the porch, split another load and stacked it in the wood barn.  Hubby and son drove to split and load another load, and we helped upload and stack.

 . . . got our first snow on Friday, and a light dusting on Saturday.  The weather went from 60's on Thursdays to the 30's on Friday.

. . . sprouting another jar of mung beans to feed to the chickens.  They love them, and we are getting an ample amount of eggs.

Farmer's Market Basket.....

I borrowed my Farmer's Market basket to hold a current knitting project, but one of the cat's had another idea.

See her (Mattie) all curled up on top of the knitted blocks inside the basket?  I guess that means the blanket will be nice and cozy when it's finished. Ha ha ha!

Black Friday Husband Funny ~ More so My Own Funny

If you follow my blog, you probably already know I detest Black Friday.  I detest the overload of wasted paper stuffed into my Thursday newspaper.  I detest the stores attempt to lure in the craziest people, and today, you are liable to get shot while shopping on "black Friday."

"Look honey!" he laughs throwing the entire ton of store flyers at me, "look at all those black Friday deals!!"

Literally, the flyers weighed down a sink hole in my bed.  I was trying to crochet and rest before retiring, and he has to do that to me?

(He laughed, and laughed)

The rest of the night, while sipping our loose leaf organic sleep tea, and attempting to relax with a good TV show, we were bombarded with blurps of black Friday songs, commercials and more commercials - blech!  What a way to ruin the night, I thought.

During every commerical, I'd look at hubby.  He'd be smirking and holding back a chuckle.

I could not sleep after that, and for other reasons.  Finally, I fell asleep about midnight.  Then my son woke me up by taking our lab out at 2am.  I fell back asleep.

Then it happened.

"BEEP, BEEP!"

My cell phone woke me up. It was 4:30am.  I looked at the phone.  A text message.  I better check it, you just never know if it's an emergency.

"Seriously!!" (after checking the message)

I wanted to throw that phone at the wall and smash it, or stab it with my knitting needles.

When hubby woke up, and made us eggs for breakfast, I told him about my night.  When I got around to sharing the part about my text message, he burst out laughing.

"That is SOOOOO funny!" he laughed, and laughed, and laughed.

You see, the text message was an alert from some store, telling me about the first black friday deal they were having.

Hmpf!

Oh, he's still laughing about it.  

         

   

Thanksgiving Sunrise ~ Bringing in the Christmas Season

Up early, to start the cooking, I glanced outside to see the most beautiful sunrise.  

While taking a few photos, I noticed a jet flying right through the clouds.  Imagine what those passengers saw in their window.  Gorgeous.

 I put together a cute clothespin ornament over at S.C.R.A.P.  I hope to have a few more before the special day arrives.

 Yesterday, while crocheting in my reading chair, I glanced out to see two cardinals in the evergreen tree.  By the time I got out there, I only got this one photo.  They were singing and flying around together.

However, while I was out there, I noticed the lack of highway traffic, and the absolute peace and quiet.  Although I won't be able to drive south on the highway (due to the next little town hooking up to city water and sewer and roads closed) without a detour, I will enjoy this quiet time.  Every day, cars, trucks, and semi's pass on a constant basis.  Now, we have long breaks from even seeing a vehicle pass.  Oh, I am so going to enjoy this time.  Detour or not.  

Happy Thanksgiving!