Week 26, June 19, 2016

Thoughts and Quotes: A father is someone who keeps photos where his money used to be.

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY TO ALL DADS

Tips:  Friend Joey's cousin Billie and her husband Richard make all kinds of wonderful jams, jellies, and butters.  Each jar top has a label identifying the contents, followed by a really fun quote.  They buy Avery labels which are round, and as I understand it, they come with instructions on how to print on them.  Look how cute.

Tidbit:  A Techie Tidbit.  Nephew Ron bought a 3-D printer.  He needed a container for holding the fuses he uses at work so that they didn't get all mixed together.  This is what he "printed" to hold them.  Remember - it's 3-D.  He said that it took 32 hours.

I asked him what they're made of, and being the true techie in every sense, he didn't say that it's sort of like cardboard.  He told me that they're made of polylactic acid and it comes in different colors and sent me this from Wikipedia: "Polylactic acid is derived from renewable resources, such as corn starch, tapioca roots, chips or starch, or sugarcane".  So my guess is that it's sort of like cardboard.  But how exciting.  Wouldn't you love to be able to make a custom holder for your makeup, or your desktop items, or your scrapbooking goodies? 

Tidbit:  A Tea Tidbit.  Angela, of the Tea With Friends Blog, had a post this week showing the cutest teabag in the entire world.  Take a look.

Teaching and Learning:  This time it was learning.  Friend Joey and I went to the library for a class on apps.  She already has a smart phone, but I'm still at Consumer Cellular for $17.66 per month.  She wanted to learn new apps and I wanted to see if I could justify a reason to get a smart phone.  I took my Kindle Fire, hoping I could find some useful apps for it.   Well, it turns out that we only learned about library apps.  But - did you know that you can check out music?  and read magazines?  and take classes on a multitude of subjects, in addition to learning 72 languages?  watch TV shows or movies? all on your phone.  You can, of course, check out e-books as well.  Check with your local library.  You might be missing out on all sorts of fun things.

Tidying:  My kitchen and breakfast area ceilings have a new coat of paint.  No, I didn't do it, but I went after the paint and supplies and a nice young man (Jase) did the work.

Tidying Again:  I took all the dishes down from the tops of the cabinets and bookshelves for the painting of the ceiling, and the next day I washed every single one of them.  Applause, please.

Things That Grow:  Again, no, I didn't do it.  This is from Friend Joey's bush.  Isn't it lovely? Now I want one, but don't know where I'd put it.  I read in Southern Living Magazine that your blue hydrangea can turn pink.  If you want it pink, dissolve one tablespoon of hydrated lime in a gallon of water and drench the root zone in April or May.  If you want it blue, dissolve one tablespoon of aluminum sulfate in a gallon of water and drench the root zone in April or May.  They didn't say where to buy the chemicals, but I'm assuming wherever they sell plants.  If you want white, you have to buy a variety which won't turn regardless of what you do to it.

Tidbit:  Thank you to the makers of mixes.  How did my grandmother accomplish so much? How she would have loved being able to open a box of brownie mix and a can of frosting and have dessert in no time.  And then I can put everything in the dishwasher.

Tasting:  We didn't get around to making the Swiss steak my son wanted while he was here. I had the meat in the freezer and everything else I needed, so I decided to go ahead and make it.  I don't have a recipe.  I simply put some oil in the skillet, cook some chopped onion at a low heat until translucent.  Pound some sirloin or round steak pieces with my metal meat tenderizing hammer (on my bread board shaped like a pig that he made in high school).  Then I dredge the pieces in flour, salt and pepper and remove the onions to a bowl, and brown the meat in the oil.  Next I return the onions, put in petite diced or crushed canned tomatoes, a brown gravy mix dissolved in one cup of water, and a bit of sugar to counteract the acid in the tomatoes.  Cover and simmer until tender.

I also made mashed potatoes, buttered carrots, and a vegetable salad.  I took dinner (and the brownies) to a recuperating friend (and husband) and they're always so generous with their gratitude, you'd think I took a gourmet meal.  They won't know the brownies came from a box until they read this.  They'll taste better that way.

And this meager offering from my weed patch.

Things That Grow:  I have to be the world's worst gardener.  Every year it's new mistakes.  I never have any luck with carrots, but thought I'd plant a few "test" carrots this year.  Just look.

What causes this?  I think they're so embarrassed by my garden that they try to sprout another leg so they can run away.

Tidying:  I had a box of bits and pieces of silver in the garage, badly in need of polishing.  I picked these things up at thrift stores, so nothing cost very much.  No big loss (money-wise) if I messed something up, so I decided to experiment with some methods I'd saved in my "Home" notebook.  I started with this creamer and sugar bowl (actually, I did pay $10 on eBay for these) and this flatware.

The method was to mix 1 quart of hot water, 1 Tbs water softener, 1 Tbs salt in a pan with a a sheet of aluminum foil in the bottom of the pan.  No good.  To be honest, my water softener had a moisturizer added, so maybe that messed it up.

Then I tried this: Line a pan with aluminum foil, fill with water and bring to a boil.  Then add baking soda and stir.  When it returns to a boil, put in the silverware and turn off the heat.  In a few minutes, you should have clean silverware.  That didn't work either, but it did loosen the glue which held the shell spoon together.  I didn't even know it had been broken.

Then I resorted to my labor-intensive method.

The results were satisfactory, and yes, the spoon in the middle is Mr. Peanut.

Alas, the creamer and sugar bowl are too far gone to use for food, so I intend to use them to hold flowers on a tea table. The creamer has a spot on the handle where the silverplate is missing, so I bought some metallic silver paint, and we'll see how that works.  I didn't know such paint existed.

If it works, I'll try it on these:

Then when I was talking with Friend Joey, she told me about this, which I found at Bed, Bath, and Beyond.

There's a basket inside.  You drop in the flatware, wait ten seconds, pull it out and rinse. It made short work of all this:

I have no idea what this is.  I must ask Chosen Brother Peter.  He probably knows.

And I found that Weiman now comes in a liquid form, which should be easier to use, and will be better for larger items.  It smells just like the Hagerty brand.  Also from Bed, Bath and Beyond.

And LInda at www.life-atapestry.blogspot.co.uk, if you're reading this, these are the forks I told you about which say "Sheffield, England". They also say "stainless", so I'm assuming that they're not very old.

These forks are a mystery.  Why are the handles as long as iced tea spoon handles? Peter? Anyone?

Tasting:  Finally, I used my larger-size muffin tins from Friend Joey.  I made muffins from Joann Fluke's recipe in her book Blueberry Muffin Murder, and they're called Blue Blueberry Muffins, because you mix blueberry pie filling into the batter.  You can get the recipe here. I didn't put the crumb topping on.  

Before baking, the batter was the color of the gray modeling clay I used in grade school.

After baking, they looked fairly normal.

But cut open, they rather remind me of dingy laundry.

They're very good.  I believe the pie filling does add to the blueberry taste.  I followed her directions and divided the remaining pie filling into 1/2 cup portions and froze it for the next three batches.

Tidbit:  A new customer dropped by my Kitty-Cat Cafe on Monday.  She must have liked my menu, because she's been back every evening for dinner since then. Glad to see her back, because she looks really skinny.  I believe that my regular customer, Pepper, proposed to her.  I certainly hope that she turned him down.  I don't need any mini-customers running around.

Togs: 

Day 22, June 13, 2016

  

Day 23, June 14, 2016

Day 24, June 15, 2016, Different pants, remove tee

Day 25, June 16, 2016

Day 26, June 17, 2016

Day 27, June 18, 2016

Day 28, June 19, 2016

Gee, do you think I might be yearning for a trip to Hawaii?

SAY HELLO TO SUMMER ON JUNE 20 AND THEN MAKE A WISH ON THE STRAWBERRY FULL MOON THAT NIGHT

NO TIDYING NEXT WEEK - ALL FUN

(Maybe a little tidying, but I won't talk about it)

Thank you for sharing my life