My sister loves these drinks and personally, I don’t blame her. I happen to think they’re pretty darn good, too. If they’re made right. Here’s the recipe we use.
3/4 oz tequila
3/4 oz rum
3/4 oz gin
3/4 oz vodka
3/4 oz triple sec
3/4 oz sour mix
splash of cola
Shake all liquers together with sour mix. Pour into a tall glass. A hurricane glass would be perfect. Add a splash of cola and garnish with a lemon slice or two.
Enjoy!
Right now, I’m reading Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen as part of the Classics Bookclub hosted by 5 Minutes for Books. This is the second time I’ve read it. Although, I have to admit, the first time around was for a school assignment and I plowed through it so quickly that I didn’t get a chance to enjoy it. This time around, I’m taking it slow and enjoying it.
Last week, I finished up Scream for Me by Karen Rose. I’d never read anything by her before, so I was skeptical at first. It seemed to start out slow, but after I got into it, it was a pretty good read. Good plot, well-written characters, and a few surprise turns kept me interested. I didn’t know it at the time, but it’s apparently a sequel to Die for Me by the same author. I’ve researched it a little and a third book, Kill for Me, is due out in February 2009. Now, ‘;m going to have to go back and read the first one. I wish I’d known it was a series!
After being on the wait list for several weeks, I finally got to read Fearless Fourteen by Janet Evanovich. The Stephanie Plum series is one of my favorites. I read the first one last October and was hooked from the very first chapter. Since then, I’ve read every book in the series. Love it and recommend it to anyone who likes a good, humorous suspense story with a little bit of romance thrown in for good measure. These books are light and easy to read, yet hard to put down.
I’m reading Sign of the Beaver by Elizabeth George Speare to my son. It’s a good classic. I’m sure most of you have read it before. I’m enjoying it as much as he is.
I checked out The Future Homemakers of America by Laurie Graham, but haven’t cracked it open yet. It’s about a group Air Force wives who are thrown together out of circumstance and form lifelong friendships as they see each other through life’s ups and downs. Fom the reviews I’ve read about it, it’s a very entertaining story although some of it can be predictable. So we’ll see.
I’m looking for book recommendations for my 10 year old twins. They’ve tried Nancy Drew, The Bobbsey Twins, Sweet Valley, Babysitter’s Club, The Boxcar Children, and Hank the Cowdog but they’re into more modern books. I’d rather not have them reading Hannah Montana and High School Musical books all the time so any suggestions will be greatly appreciated!
I also want to recommend any Andrew Clements book for your middle school-aged kids. My girls have read all of his books and loved every single one. They’re fun and deal with real-life issues that kids this age are dealing with. A couple to check out are Frindle and No Talking.
Head on over 5 Minutes for Books and tell us, What’s on your Nightstand?
In today’s economy, everyone is trying to save a buck. With outrageous gas prices and soaring grocery bills, everyone’s cutting corners and trying to get the most for their money. Back to school shopping can be expensive, especially when you’ve got more than one kid in school. Trust me, I have four school-aged kids this year and it seems as if the school supply lists were longer than ever. Then, of course, came the clothes shopping.
I did manage to improve my shopping habits this year and ended up spending way less than what I normally do on back to school expenses.
The first thing I did was go through all of the kids’ clothes. I took inventory of what they had, what they needed, and what they could live without.
I gathered up all the clothes that were still in good condition but were no longer being worn and took them to a consignment shop where I was given store credit for the value of the clothes. Using that store credit, I was able to get several good, name-brand shirts in excellent condition for each of the kids. I think altogether I got about 15 shirts for right around $35. That comes out to less than $3 a piece.
I probably could have sold the clothes on eBay and made more money on them, but I didn’t want to go through the hassle of photographing, listing, shipping, etc. This way was easier for me and it only took one day, where eBay would have taken at least a week.
Next, I made a list of what each kid absolutely needed. Socks, underwear, shorts, etc. Then I headed to the local thrift stores. My favorites are Goodwill and Salvation Army. They have great sales and the clothes are almost always in excellent condition. There, I was able to find shorts, shirts, pants, and a couple of sweaters/light jackets for cool mornings. I spent about $60 and each kid got about 4 outfits. Keep in mind, that these are pretty much all name-brand clothes that I’m buying and they’re all in excellent condition. It takes a little extra time to dig through the racks to find the good stuff sometimes, but it is worth it when you can get a shirt for a dollar that normally retails for $15.
After that, I went to Walmart and bought all new socks and underwear for each kid, which cost me about $50. My twins are really into Hannah Montana, and Walmart has an extensive line of her clothing, so I got them each a HM shirt there which cost me about $18.
I also went to JCPenney, Stage, and Payless Shoe Source. Each store was running some kind of special and the kids ended up with 3 more outfits each and 2 pair of shoes each. Altogether, I spent about $160 at these stores.
Which brought my total amount spent on school clothes to about $275 or close to $70 a kid. And they all got enough clothes to last them at least couple of months. I’ll have to get them a few more pair of pants when the weather turns but for now, they’re good.
Last year, I bought everything new and spent about 3 times what I did this year and got less.
With the supplies, I pretty much went straight by the list. Even getting all the brands asked for. I bought them all at Walmart because they had a decent sale and spent a total of $97 on supplies, including backpacks. I even bought all 8 reams of copy paper that was requested. Guess I was feeling generous after saving all that money on the clothes.
Lesson learned: Less really is more, if you play your (debit) cards right.
Ok, I’m joining in all these bloggy carnivals and hope I can keep up with them. There are so many to choose from, I just can’t make those kinds of decisions, so I decided I’m just gonna have to suck it up and deal with my procrastination lack of attention-span and do my best to keep up with all of them.
The newest one I’m joining is Homemaker Monday’s hosted by 11th Heaven’s Homemaking Haven. Whew, that was a mouthful!
Anyway, the title is pretty self-explanatory. You write up a homemaking-related post and link it to her Mr. Linky on Monday morning and she will choose one post to feature each week. She explains it so much better so head over and check it out.
With all four of my kids being in school and having reading homework requirements every night, we go through a lot of children’s books.
The twins are in fifth grade and have to read 30 minutes a night. My son is a third grader and he reads for 20 minutes each night. Even my four year old in pre-k is required to read (or listen to) one book each night.
Some we’ve read recently are No Talking by Andrew Clements and We’re Going On a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen.
One of the twins is reading No Talking and she’s been raving on it since the first chapter. It’s about a class of fifth-graders who have contest to see who talks more; girls or boys. They have to go a whole day without talking at school. They can’t talk in the classroom, hallways, bathrooms, playground, anywhere. Sounds interesting, doesn’t it? I bet their teachers loved it!
We’re Going on a Bear Hunt is my four year olds favorite book right now. We’ve read it so many times, she has it memorized word-for-word and “reads” it to me almost every day. When I was a teacher’s aide a few years back, I loved reading this book to my class of 2 & 3 year olds. I made up a whole routine for the story complete with voice-changes and hand motions. They loved it too! I highly recommend this book for kids of all ages. I’ve found that my older kids still enjoy listening to me read this book.
If you receive an e-mail entitled ‘Bedtimes,’ delete it IMMEDIATELY. Do not open it. Apparently this one is pretty nasty.
It will not only erase everything on your hard drive, but it will also delete anything on disks within 20 feet of your computer. It demagnetizes the strips on ALL of your credit cards. It reprograms your ATM access code, screws up the tracking on your VCR, and uses subspace field harmonics to scratch any CD’s you attempt to play. It will program your phone auto dial to call only 900 numbers. This virus will mix antifreeze into your fish tank.
IT WILL CAUSE YOUR TOILET TO FLUSH WHILE YOU ARE SHOWERING.
It will drink ALL your beer.
FOR GOD’S SAKE, ARE YOU LISTENING? ?
It will leave dirty underwear on the coffee table when you are expecting company.
It will replace your shampoo with Nair and your Nair with Rogaine If the ‘Bedtimes’ message is opened in a Windows XP environment, it will leave the toilet seat up and leave your hair dryer plugged in dangerously close to a full bathtub of water. It will not only remove the forbidden tags from your mattresses and pillows, it will also refill your skim milk with whole milk.
***
WARN AS MANY PEOPLE AS YOU CAN.
***
And if you don’t send this to 5000 people in 20 seconds, you’ll fart so hard that your right leg will spasm and shoot straight out in front of you, sending sparks that will ignite the person nearest you.
Send this warning to everyone!!!
THERE’S A LOT OF SADNESS IN THE WORLD! Right now, as you read this, 17 Million people are having SEX!!!
And look at you — you’re on the computer!!!!
Brownies! An all-time favorite dessert.
Ingredients:
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour an 8 inch square pan.
2. In a large saucepan, melt 1/2 cup butter. Remove from heat, and stir in sugar, eggs, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Beat in 1/3 cup cocoa, 1/2 cup flour, salt, and baking powder. Spread batter into prepared pan.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes. Do not overcook.
Frosting Ingredients
To Make Frosting: Combine all ingredients. Stir until smooth. Frost brownies while they are still warm
Serve immediately. Great with with vanilla ice cream!
I’ve never made this pie myself, but my sister’s fiance made it for Thanksgiving dinner last year and it was delicious.
SWEET POTATO PUMPKIN PIE
Preheat oven to 350°F.
In the bowl of a food processor, combine pumpkin pie filling, candied yams (undrained), sugar, spice, salt, coconut milk, butter and eggs and process until smooth.
Pour into a 10″ pie crust and bake for 1 1/2 hours
Remove from oven and set aside for at least 20 minutes before serving. Tastes great chilled.
The kids finished up their first full week of school today. The twins are doing great and are looking forward to starting the orchestra next week. My son loves his teacher and his class. I think the fact that they have a hamster and a fish tank helped a lot with that. He’s normally not a big fan of school, unless you count lunch and recess.
Kaylee did really well in Pre-K this week. She had an accident on Monday and cried until I got her out of the car, then she was fine all week. No tears or potty incidents. She finally confessed that she was scared of the bathroom at school, hence the accidents the first few days. We talked about it and now all is well with her potty world.
Kaylee has made quite a few new friends. The ones she mentions the most are Thomas and Benjamin. Yes, my daughter’s best friends are boys. She is already saying that she will miss her Benjamin Jones when we move. Her Benjamin Jones. How cute.
I’m waiting to see if we are going to qualify for another relocation package or if this move is gonna be out-of-pocket. They’ve already shelled out over 10 grand on moving expenses, hotel accommodations, and meals on us this year. I doubt they’ll do it again. But I can hope, right?
I washed, dried, and folded 6 loads of laundry today and they are all still sitting in the baskets, waiting to be put away. Laundry fairy, where are you when I need you most?
I’ve got tons of packing to do. Which is pretty much my own fault since I’ve known this move was coming for at least a month now. I just wasn’t sure of the date. I’m still not sure of the date. I just know my hubs was told “very soon” and “as soon as possible” so I’m thinking 3-4 weeks at the latest. I’m just glad all four kids will be in school when I finally do get around to packing. They don’t need to hear the obscenities I’m sure to mutter while I fill box after box with this junk we’ve spent the last 11 years accumulating. I threw away a lot the last time we moved, but I think we’ve collected twice as much as I threw away in the last seven months.
Now that all four kids are in school, I’m bored during the day. If I had any kind of talent, I’d start designing blogs or something creative like that, but I wouldn’t know where to start. I do good to make my own presentable. I’ve been playing around in Photoshop lately and will post some pictures I’ve taken sometime. I’ve made earrings and drawn pictures (mostly of eyes and horses - weird, I know). I’ve cleaned house and done laundry. I’ve watched movies and gone to the library. I’ve played computer games and alphabetically organized all of our movies and now, I’m bored. I’ve run out of things to do. Which I guess is a good thing because I have more time to spend online here at my blog and twittering and reading blogs and maybe I’ll even start posting more and get more involved in the blogging community. Who knows? I just need to find something to do…And I don’t mean washing dishes, putting laundry away, or scrubbing toilets. I’m looking for a hobby, not a chore.
Well, I’m gonna sneak into the kitchen and make some these delicious little things. I make ‘em at least once a week. Have I mentioned I love the Pioneer Woman’s website? If you’ve never read her, You definitely should. Mouth-watering recipes, excellent photography, and humorous, well-written posts galore…You won’t be disappointed.
August is National Peach Month. Or is it July?
I don’t know for sure, but just for today, I’m gonna go with August. That way we can celebrate by making peach margaritas. Yum.
Ingredients:
Instructions:
This recipe for potato wedges works great as a side dish for grilled steaks or as a party appetizer. Sometimes, I eat them all by themselves, just for the heck of it.
Couch Potato Wedges
4 whole potatoes, washed and quartered
1/4 cup sliced green onions
1 (8-ounce) package (2 cups) cheddar cheese, shredded
8 slices crisply cooked bacon, crumbled
Bake potato wedges at 350F for 40 minutes, remove from oven
Immediately sprinkle with green onions, cheese and bacon. Continue
baking until cheese is melted (1 to 2 minutes).
Makes 16 wedges.
PS. I apologize for the crummy presentation of this here recipe. If you’re looking for recipes accompanied by fantastic photography and humorous dialogue, you should visit my bloggy-idol Ree’s site.
Today is Kaylee’s first day of school. She should probably be going to kindergarten, but her birthday misses the cut-off date by about 6 weeks, so it’s off to Pre-k she went.
She was excited and anxious and cried just a bit as she realized I would not be staying there with her. Her teacher, Mrs. A, was really nice and comforting and I knew she’d be fine as soon as I was out of sight.
Do most 4 year olds not recognize their own written names? I’ve never really thought about it before but Kaylee has known how to read, spell, and type her name for at least a year and a half. And she’s been writing it for several months now, which was also a shock to her teacher. I was surprised at how many kids in K's class couldn't recognize their own names. Maybe it's the former teacher's aide/literacy tutor in me, but I've always worked with my kids on things like this. I think I started teaching Kaylee her name when she was about 2 years old. She could actually type it before she could write it or spell it.
Before I left I kissed Kaylee’s hand and reminded her of the story we’d read the night before. She was in tears and begging Mama to stay with her, but I somehow kept my cool and assured her she would be fine and I would pick her up this afternoon. Then I left with tears in my own eyes.
My baby is in school. What am I going to do with myself for 7 hours everyday? So far today, I’ve read a book, taken a morning nap, and checked the clock a zillion times to see if it was time to pick her up yet. And it’s not even lunchtime. I’ve still got nearly 3 hours to go. I hope she’s holding up better than I am.
This is my favorite sugar cookie recipe ever. It’s super easy and delicious.
Ingredients:
Instructions:
*Makes about 2 dozen, depending on the size you make them.
Today, I found out my mom has congestive heart failure and is borderline diabetic.
The diabetic thing I could have guessed. She has all the symptoms.
She has poor health to begin with. She’s had several surgeries over the years. The one I remember most vividly is the hysterectomy she had on my 10th birthday. Yes, that’s right on my birthday. I remember sitting in class, looking at the balloons and flowers she had sent me wondering if how she was doing. If they were done yet. When would she be able to come home? Did she remember to get the right kind of ice cream for my birthday party? Chocolate cake, right? What did you expect me to think? I was 10 and in the 4th grade. Birthday parties were very important back then.
She had surgery a few years a go to remove her gallbladder and since then she’s had several intestinal/digestion problems. She can’t eat a lot of greasy or spicy foods and she used to live on them.
She has liver problems and a lump in one of her breasts the size of a golf ball. It’s nothing serious though. A Cyst caused by caffeine. No cancer there. Thankfully.
She’s had surgery on her shoulder and her wrists from complications of her job. She works in a factory and does a lot of repetitious work.
In 9 days she is going in to have a net put in to hold her uterus up. It’s wreaking havoc on her bladder and threatening to make a very unwanted appearance.
On my birthday, September 4th, She will be going in to have an ECHO test done. This will help determine the reason the fluid built up so much around her heart and causing her legs to swell up so that she can barely walk. Also it will let us know if the medication she’s on is helping at all
I am hoping to make it back to Missouri to be with her either during the surgery or before or after. I’m not sure. I just want to be there for something. She needs me. She may not say it, but I know it. She’s a strong woman and has been through a lot in her lifetime. She’s an awesome mom and an even better Grandma. I hate seeing her in this condition.
I guess this is where the guilt comes in. I feel like it’s somehow my fault. Like if I was there I could help her more and maybe she wouldn’t be so sick, so stressed out, so worried. I know it probably wouldn’t make a big difference. But I still want to be there.
It’s a mom/daughter thing.
Here’s the Meal plan for this week…
Sunday - Meatloaf, Mashed Potatoes, Corn - Yes, we eat a lot of mashed potatoes and corn - They are the few rare veggies all 4 kids will eat.
Monday - Sloppy Joes and tater tots
Tuesday - BBQ Chicken, Baked Beans, Potato Salad
Wednesday - Tacos! A Family Favorite
Thursday - Take-out (it’s shopping and errand-running day)
Friday - Chef Salad
Saturday - Spaghetti (dh’s day to cook - he makes the best spaghetti!)
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