A personal note...

Life has a way of taking you by suprise. Somedays it can be full of wonder and joy and other days it is full of sadness and pain. Unfortunately today is the latter for me. Today my Mom had surgery to remove 1/3 of her colon due to cancer. Me and my Mom have had our up's and downs throughout my life. We are both strong stubborn women and sometimes butt heads. But what do you do or say when the thought of losing your Mom hits you so hard the wind is literally knocked out of you? I thought I was doing a good job of keeping it together until this morning when I showed up to the hospital 30 minutes late. I was being the brave girl everyone expects me to be until I saw my mother in that hospital bed crying and looking weak as water. And then it hit me. What in the earth was I thinking? Why hadn't I run around this morning with a fire under my ass to get to her? What would I do if something happens to my Mom? All I could do was let it out and cry. In spite of all our little ups and downs I love my Mom dearly and am scared to death of losing her. I thank God I made it to the hospital just as they were taking her back to surgery. I thank God for my Mom.....

Pepto-Pink Room Redo

Have you ever started a project and about half way through had absolutely enough? I had the bright idea of giving Gracie's Pepto-Pink room a makeover. And of course I'm half way there and READY to be done! She loves pink so there was no convincing her to change the color. So we ripped up the brown carpet to expose the hardwood floors. Which are so beautiful! The trim was stained a light oak so I primed and painted all of it linen white. It makes the room look so much brighter. Her bed and dresser are oak so it was just to much wood tones in that pink room. And the best, best, best redo is her new bookcase. It used to be painted bright red and was just sitting in our basement. I used some leftover paint from my son's room and painted it this pretty green color. I've gotta finish painting the doors and it will be complete. Now she has room for all of her books and knick-knacks and it didn't cost me a dime. I want to add some finishing touches to girly it up a bit more and I am DONE! I'll be sure to post pictures next week of the completed room.

Fresh Start

It has been way to long since I have posted anything on here! Life has a funny way of smothering the good out of me sometimes. But, it's time to dust off the cobwebs and make a fresh start at this. So many things have happened this year that it's hard to keep up with everything. I lost my job, my husband is out of town most of the time and I think I'm losing my mind really fast. I can lay something down and forget where I put it a minute later. I have forgot my daughter on the bus and left my son at the YMCA all in a matter of weeks. I used to be so organized and with it. I could remember my schedule and tell you everyone else's too. But not anymore! Oh well, just call me crazy, everyone else does!

Recipe of the Week

This week I will be posting 2 recipes since I forgot about last week's. Oops!

It's football season and I love it!!! My son plays middle school football, our high school team is 3-0 and I go to every game I can. The TN Titans and UT Vols are our teams around here! So I thought I would share a few good football food recipes.

Swiss & Rye Bites

2.8 oz. can French fried onions, crushed

3/4 c. bacon, cpisply cooked and crumbled

1/2 c. mayonnaise

3 c. shredded Swiss cheese

14 oz. jar pizza sauce

1 loaf sliced party rye

Combine onions, bacon, mayonnaise and cheese in a large bowl. Spread one teaspoon pizza sauce on each slice of bread; top with one tablespoon cheese mixture. Arrange on an ungreaded baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 12-14 minutes, until heated through and cheese is melted. Serves 6. (Okay I could eat 6 by myself, so double or triple the recipe for a big crowd!)

Cheesy Artichoke Dip

8 oz. pkg. cream cheese softened

1 c. mayonnaise

2-6 oz. jars marinated artichoke hearts, drained and chopped

3 c. shredded mozzarella cheese

1 c. shredded Parmesan cheese

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 onion, chopped

Blend the first 2 ingredients together; fold in remaining ingredients. Spread in an ungreased 13"x9" baking pan at 350 degrees for 35 minutes. Serves 12.

GO TENNESSEE!

My crazy guineas...

We've had guineas for a couple of years but this is the first time we've had babies. I cringed at the price we paid for our male at a local auction. But he has earned his keep by giving us little babies! There were about 15 in the first hatch and now we're down to 3. They are easy prey when they're that little. The remaining 3 are now "teenagers" as my kids call them and growing very nicely. The second hatch had about 30 and sadly we have 1 chick left. It must either be very lucky or very smart because it hangs in there with the others and is growing every day! The last picture is of our male and he loves to come to the front door and peek in. I think he must see his reflection in the glass because he pecks at the door. I love it! They are the hardest working farm animals, working from sun up to sun down pecking at bugs. I couldn't imagine having a farm without them.

State Fair

On August 20th we went to Louisville for the KY state fair. My son had to give his country ham speech for 4-H and lucky for us we got to see alot of neat things while there. They were having the dairy animal shows, rabbit show and every kind of bird you can imagine show! The first picture is two sweet dairy cows patiently waiting for their turn in the ring. The pumpkin was the fair winner which weighed like 800 pounds I think. It was a whopper! This bunny was so cute I could have taken it home if it had been for sale. If only my angora rabbits looked that good! And the final picture is of my sweet Gracie lovin' on one of the cows. Look at those sweet eyes. I've decided I need a Guernsey cow just to love on it! We had a really good time although we were exhausted from it all. Next year we plan on going more than one day because there is just too much to try and fit into one!

"Cannin Maters"

I am so excited about my first quart of mater's! Okay so one quart isn't much to brag about but hey I'm easily impressed! My jar didn't turn out so cute though. I think because it was an older jar it had residue I couldn't get removed and sooo it ended up cloudy looking. And the stupid maters floated up even though I packed them as tight as I could. Oh well, maybe they'll be picture perfect next time! The mater in the picture is crazy looking! I don't know if they are supposed to be knobby like that or if it's just deformed. We don't spray our veggies so I just cut off the bad places and use them. No sense wastin' a good vegetable! I'm sharing the recipe I used which was sooo super simple! Happy "mater cannin"!

Canned Tomatoes

35 to 40 large tomatoes

1 tsp sugar per quart (optional)

1 tsp salt per quart (optional)

2 tbl bottled lemon juice

Peel tomatoes by dropping then into boiling water for 15 seconds. Immerse in cold water and peel skins off. Core each tomato and leave whole. Put salt, sugar and lemon juice into the jars. You should have plenty of juice to cover the tomatoes by pressing them down. Remove air bubbles and clean the rim of the jars. Seal and process in a water bath canner for 45 minutes. Makes 7 quarts.

I didn't have enough tomatoes to make 7 whole quarts so I just used what tomatoes I had. There were a few tomatoes that I had skinned that wouldn't fit into the jar so I just put them in a frezeer bag and froze them.