todays medical news

Neither Grandma nor I went anywhere today, but the vehicles were busy. Polly had to take her dog to the vets early this morning to have the pin removed from her hip which has healed from her adventure with a car this summer. She left the dog off, came home and left again for a meeting in Fort Plain. Jess had to go turn in a final paper, collect her cap and gown and boyfriend, have a riding lesson, and whatever else in Cobleskill. Polly got home and left with Mike to take him to have his knee drained and get a cortizone shot in it. Jess came home by way of picking the dog up from the vet. Vet said Brittany, the dog, is healed well, Doctor said he now thinks maybe Mike's problem is more scar tissue from a high school basketball injury than he thought before. He was not able to drain much out of it. I know from experience that it takes a couple of days to think that those shots were worth getting, there is more pain at first than before getting shot.

Everyone is home and settling in for the night now. I think each went to the correct medical professional too.

My daughter Betty, er Jessie

Grandma and I have always called Jessie "Betty" and for good reason. Jess has many interests and traits that are so much like her Aunt Betty. She loves flowers and nature and crafty things. She is a very intelligent girl but took a while to figure out that it really is better to just do what the teachers want than to argue with them if you do not think that they are correct. She is in her own world, and has a tendency to not know what is happening in the other world that the rest of us live in, even if it is happening under her nose. Her picture is in the dictionary under the term "oblivious".

Why am I saying this? The telephone just rang and it was my darling daughter. She had just gone to pick up her robes for tomorrow's graduation and was quite surprised when they also handed her honors cords. She would not have known what the pretty gold rope was for if the woman had not congratulated her on obtaining honors as she handed her the cords. Now, let's see if she actually remembers to take the cords to wear tomorrow....

Those of you who know Betty better than Jessie does this all sound like someone you know?

Chocolate lovers utopia

I have been busy baking Christmas cookies, fudge, candy, etc. All that good dietary stuff. Polly has been helping and Jess is going to get making fudge as soon as she becomes a college graduate on Friday. Grandma is our chief test-taster. I just took a batch of cookies out of the oven that is soooo rich and good and chocolately. It may be partly due to the fact that our local WalMart did not have any cheap bakers chocolate, only had Ghirardelli. A double batch took 3 bars but is worth it. I will share the recipe if anyone is looking for a true chocolate nirvana.

Chocolate Mint Creams

1 1/4 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
6 tablespoons butter
2/3 cup packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon water
6 ounces semisweet chocolate (I used bittersweet, any diff?)
1 egg, slightly beaten
Pastel Mint Cream Kisses ( the mints that look like Hershey Kisses, picture showed green ones, I had white ones)

In a small bowl stir together flour and baking soda and set aside. In a medium saucepan combine butter, sugar and water. Stir over low heat until butter is melted, add chocolate and stir over low heat until chocolate is melted. Pour into large bowl, cool for 10 minutes.

With a wooden spoon, stir egg mixture into chocolate mixture, stir in flour mixture until combined. Cover and chill for an hour or so until dough is easy to handle.

Preheat oven to 350F. Shape dough into 1 inch balls and place 2" apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 8 minutes, immediately place a mint into center of cookie, pressing down slightly, bake 2 more minutes until edges are firm.

It says that you can then swirl mint with knife, that made a mess for me, but hot mint on knife was tasty. It says that it makes about 4 dozen cookies, but that is what I got from a double batch. I made one major error in baking these without realizing that there was only a swallow of milk in the frig. They are a huge Got Milk ad. Grandma, Jess and I were trying to share one swallow of milk after each having a cookie and we all felt rather gipped.

Bake yourselves some and pretend I sent them to you.

La la la la

"White paper packages tied up with string,
These are a few of my favorite things,
When the pig bites,
When the sow squeals,
When the cold turns me bluuuuue,
I think of a few of my favorite things,
Annnnd Then I don't feel sooooo baddddd"

George, the trucker, arrived at 8:00 AM and Cindy and Oscar walked up the tailgate very nicely. They will return home in a few weeks after they get their haircuts and makeovers. I have been really getting anxious for them to make this trip as my mouth has been watering for a nice fresh pork roast for quite a while, to say nothing of a good bacon sandwich. They also were starting to really get mean and showing a desire to have a bite of human on a regular basis, luckily they never got more than rubber boot. I have my homemade applesauce down cellar just waiting. I am not sure just where they will fit in the freezers but I will make room somehow. If I actually went out and hung up some suet for the birds that would help out, we got alot from the last cow but the birds don't seem to eat it well in the freezer.

Adding them to the beef and poultry, and hopefully soon goat, in the freezers we should not need to have tasteless store bought meat for quite a while. There are still some chickens to be processed, along with Goose and ducks, but goose is being invited into the house for Christmas, we need to do ducks before Jess leaves, as she likes duck, and the chickens need to be squeezed in there too.

Why I will keep buying bread

Every so often I get a thought, usually when I am in the bread aisle of the store, that I could save a lot of money if I baked my own bread. All it takes is a meal like tonights to make me realize that it would not save money in this household, and we would all become much larger people. I do not know if I have baked bread or rolls yet that have ever manage to get cold around here. Tonight I made spagetti and meatballs with homemade garlic rolls. I have found a new roll recipe that is quite tasty and quick and easy for a yeast bread, which I brushed with garlic butter prior to baking. When the vultures flew away I had some nice clean bowls and pans to wash. Then I remember why we got rid of the bread machine, that is the most dangerous threat to a waist line that was ever invented. We got into a very bad spell of poring the ingrediants into that demon contraption and waking up to a fresh hot loaf of bread in the morning, which then caused the vultures to have an early morning feeding frenzy and squabble. At least making it by hand takes a bit more work and is not as tempting to be repeated several times in a day.

Silver Linings

It is too bad that it takes a funeral to see far spread members of the family, but it was great to see both Jason and Josh in one week. After two trips to Altmar in four days Grandma will be sleeping well for the next few days, but it does her good to see other people, she is much sharper during and afterwards. It was nice to go and visit snow. It makes it so nice to come home to our bare ground, green is such a pretty color.

I am glad that Jess will be home tomorrow so that Grandma can stay home while Polly and I go to meet with the other livestock superintendents for the county fair. (I am the beef cattle superintendent, last year we did not take a cow, go figure. We showed goats, pigs, and ducks and a goose.) If Grandma had to go to the meeting we would just get there and she would be saying it was time to leave, before we even had a chance to start doing the work we need to get done before Monday night. Then she would spend the trip home telling us how patient she is. We have not left our book changes to the last minute or anything. Then when we get home Polly will go to bed after having been up working all night and I will get to type up our changes before Monday's meeting. Hopefully Jess will be out of class so that both Polly and I can go to the meeting, as she is assistant superintendent for beef, sheep, swine, goats, and unofficially dairy. That translates to she is young and gets to do our running for us. She was lucky last year in that we had two very nice strong teenage boys who were always looking for us to need some help and jumping right in and doing the heavy work for us, we told those boys they have to show there forever.

Mike is hurting tonight after a goat knocked into his bad knee today and knocked him down. He is not real pleased with my babies, to put it mildly.

Shannons Gratitude Quiz

Shannon made this a while ago and now that I am having a low energy day today I thought I would fill it out. Melanie's filling it out actually gave me the final push to sit and do it.

Rules for this game. You will be given two choices of things you may or may not be grateful for. Choose the one which you are more grateful. You must choose one, no neither or both answers acceptable. If needed or desired, you may explain your choice. Enjoy.

Which are you more grateful for?

Ghiredelli or Guittard? I guess it is an answer in itself that I had to ask my daughter what these were :/

Morning or Evening? I never have been a morning person, so it is definately evening


Bagels or muffins? Fresh bagel from NYC bagel shop wins, but from the grocery muffins, homemade muffins, as I have not mastered bagels


Computers or Cell Phones? Computer, but I do like my hubby having cell phone when he is out on the road all week, and daughters having them as they are driving about


Cotton or Polyester? Definately cotton, I was a teenager in the 70's, I was enough polyester then to last the rest of my life. But hey, a man was really styling in a pastel polyester leisure suit with those few long hairs in the back of his head combed over to make people think he was not bald


Tennis or Bowling? Bowling, for sure.


TV or Radio? TV, I listen to very little radio anymore, have gotten to like quiet in the car


Military or Police Force? Military


Electricity or Plumbing? I would have to say electricity, as the water pumps and heaters do not work without it. Gravity gets our spring water to the big cistern in the basement but electricity gets it above ice cold and up to the rest of the house


Spiders or Snakes? I cold happily live without either one but will take 8 legs over none. I prefer 4 legs with 4 stomachs



Elementary teachers or high school teachers? elementary teachers, when I think back to my favorites, they were elementary


Books or Magazines? Books, for the girls and I a perfect mother/daughters bonding day out is a trip into Utica to AC Moore, Barnes and Noble, Tractor Supply Company, Michaels Crafts and lunch at Panera's Bread. We look at the book section in all of the stores.


Money or Time? Time


Pumpkin or Pecan pie? not fond of either, I like pumpkin in bread, cookies, etc. but not pie, I will eat some Pecan pies, but given a choice I'll take apple custard or cherry cheese, or a bit of each


Summer or Winter? summer, I hate cold more each year, snow is no longer fun but a lot of work, heat is so expensive, grandma is harder to get out and gets stir crazy, ice hurts when you fall on it, is it summer again yet?


Sewing machine or Washing mashine? I much prefer using a sewing machine, but am more grateful for the washing machine, especially now with grandma not having much bladder control and having several changes of clothing/bedding a day. I do a minimum of 3 large loads of clothes a day, usually more. I like my clothesline in the summer, but cannot stand to have the washer out of commision for anytime. On the other hand I am in the process of making a sewing room upstairs for Polly who has gotten into collecting old sewing machines and has about 12 of them.


Board games or card games? Enjoy both, anybody up for Risk with Aunt Mary Lynn rules?, but a good game of pinochle is probably top of the list


Mountain or Beach? mountain, but right now a nice nap in warm sand does sound good, without the sunburn though


Spring or Fall? I love a pretty fall, unlike this year when the leaves got rained off of the trees before they really turned, but have gotten to like fall less as it means winter is coming, whereas I look so forward to spring and getting outside. A warm gentle spring is wonderful, but a rainy cold one is frustrating


Christmas or Thanksgiving? Christmas, but am dreading this coming one as my baby will be moving to Virginia shortly afterwards


Blogging or Facebook? blogging, have just discovered that, have not gotten into facebook


Chili's or Applebees? I have not been to a Chili's there are not any near here, our local Applebees is terrible, but I hear that others are better.


Carpet or Hardwood? I love the look of hardwood but with the big tank of ice cold water under our floors in this house I am very fond of the carpet to help keep from freezing the feetsies


Dishwasher or Microwave? Microwave, I do like it for heating leftovers, our hard water ate our dishwasher years ago and replacing it is not very high on my wish list


Boston or Las Vegas? Have not been to either but would like to go to Boston and have no desire for Vegas.


Ballet or Baseball? Baseball, I live with Grandma, Go Yankees!, but right now it is Syracuse Basketball season, Let's Go Orange, clap, clap clap-clap-clap.


Mashed potatoes or Candied yams? Mashed potatoes, never could like yams or sweet potatos, no matter how they are cooked


Milk or Juice? definately more grateful for milk, it has supported me for a lot of my life, if it was still possible to make a living on 30 cows I would be milking Jerseys now


Lincoln or Washington? Washington, I guess


Homemade or Store bought? Homemade, definately, my kids are calling me a frustrated homesteader, or else they say that all of our amish neighbors are rubbing off on me. (I don't know how, they do not even use our road anymore, haven't since the day I accidently kinda mooned them, hmmmm.....)

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone. I went shopping today for dinner so I guess the menu is decided, as long as I get it all cooked in the next couple of days.

Fruit Cup
Turkey
"Turkey" Gravy
Stuffing
Roast Beef
Beef Gravy
Mashed Potatos
Green Beans
Corn Pudding
Cauliflower
Broccoli
Spinach
Brussel Sprouts
Creamed Onions
Banana Pumpkin Bread
Rolls
Cherry Cheese Pie
Apple Pie
Apple Pear Pie
Lemon Merangue Pie
Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie
Chocolate Cake with cream cheese filling
Gianduia Cheesecake Brownies

The girl who checked me out in the grocery store asked if I left anything for anyone else in the dairy section. I told her that vegans would have a hard time eating anything at our dinner. If the veggies don't have sour cream or heavy cream they at least have lots of butter.

I had Polly bring Tom in from the freezer tonight to start thawing, that is the biggest of the turkeys we raised this summer, he is much bigger than the biggest that I saw in the grocery store today which was a 35 pounder. I am glad that I cooked one of them for my birthday, as I learned then that these birds ate too well and are too fat to make gravy from. I actually be having chicken gravy from the broth that I made yesterday from the necks and chests (not breast, the bony part below) of the chickens that we did up last week.

Tomorrow will be baking day, Wednesday will be spent finishing the baking and doing up whatever else can be done the day before.

It should be calmer for me after dinner this year than last. I have moved the dining room into the living room. That way I do not have to get the table back down to get Grandma's bed back in place so that she can lie down when she is tired. Now, I can just get the food put away and actually deal with the dishes the next day if that is what I feel like, or at least do them at my own pace, which by the end of dinner is slow. The table had been pushed into the corner since Grandma's hospital bed moved in, which was rather of a pain as it collected stuff which got pushed back out of reach and piled up until I felt like crawling up on it to deal with the mess. The china cabinet has been in there since last winter when Polly got Grandma a flat screen HD TV. It had gotten so that Grandma could not see the regular one anymore. That now hangs on the wall where the china cabinet was. It sure is great for watching Orange basketball on!

Once again, Happy Thanksgiving everyone, wish you were all here with us.

7 years and counting

Yesterday marked 7 years since that memorable Thanksgiving Day, November 22, 2001 when Mike and I had about 70 of our closest friends and relatives here in the garage for bar-b-que and a wedding. Thankfully, the weather was warmer on then than now.

Much has changed in the past 7 years but I am still so happy with the man I married.

We spent a romantic evening last night. Mike snored on the bed, I worked on the Grandmother Remember's books and watched "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" which I had not seen before. Jess and Jeremiah came in to watch the end of the movie with us and then started watching another movie long enough for us to get interested in it, and then they left. Sometime before the end of the 2nd movie we were both snoring. (This is why I do not go to the movie theater anymore, it costs too much to put up with the people in back of me poking me and telling me to stop snoring. But, put me in the dark theater, make me sit still for a few hours, and what do you expect will happen?) Ah, passion, who says it dims with time. I had even left my long johns off and was only wearing my fleece pjs with the cupcakes on them, I know how to dress sexy for my man.

We can only wait and see what passion we are saving for the next 7 years.

Mike's MRI

Mike went and had his MRI this morning and the good news is he does not have an anuerism or a cyst. The bad news is they do not know what the matter is, the MRI did not show anything. Next, he has to talk to the doctor tomorrow and see what she has to say.

He is now home and cutting up the chickens that he and Polly killed yesterday. I will have boneless skinless chicken meat, separated into white and dark meat, in the freezer by tonight. Yeah. I am getting tired of beef, beef, beef, especially when there has been chicken on the foot and pork and chevron on the hoof in the barn. Now, if we can just get the pigs an appointment for their "haircuts", but the local butchers, er barbers, are all booked up for months. They still have 14 chickens, 5 ducks and 1 goose to process, hopefully more will be done this weekend.

A fairly uneventful week

I have not posted this week as there has not been much to say. I have not been feeling great so have not been getting much accomplished beyond the daily necessities of living. My family has been fed, and had clean clothes and dishes. I have been working on the Grandmother Remembers books, progress is being made there.

There has not been great news on the health front around here this week. Mike had a doctor's appointment on Friday and was put out of work for at least a week. It depends on what the MRI shows when he goes for that on Thursday. He has been having a lot of pain in his knee and the doctor thinks that it is an annurism (sp?), in which case he will need an operation. We are hoping that it is just a cyst, which will not put him out of work for as long. So, while he is home this coming week, he and Polly will be killing chickens for the freezer. I am seeing a nice plump roast chicken for dinner one night this week too. It is amazing how much more I have mashed potatos for dinner with him home to peel them, lol.

Aunt Jan called this afternoon to tell us that she had a mammogram which showed a couple of lumps which are cancerous. They are running more tests next week to see if it has spread and will be operating on her on December 2nd. We are all praying that it has not spread any.

Jessie keeps getting offers on the job search. Today she had a very promising talk with a woman in Virginia. I like the idea of that one much better than Georgia, there is more of a chance of seeing her once in a while.

Deer hunting season opened here yesterday. I feel like we are living on a major highway instead of our little back road. The weather has been cold and rainy so the hunters seem to be all driving up and down the road hoping that Bambi will come up and knock on their window and jump into the back of the truck, so they do not have to go out and slog through the wet woods.

As you can see it has been a very slow week here, but they are rather nice to have once in a while. Next week I will try to get more accomplished, then the week after that will be devoted to Thanksgiving baking, cooking, cleaning, etc. Grandma does not have any doctor's appointments until Thanksgiving week so I am hoping that my iron levels will be up and letting me do more in the next few days.

Reflections

It has been a weekend for reflecting back for me. Yesterday my baby turned 22. How did this happen, where has all the time gone? I was just 22 a few days ago. She will be graduating in another month and then who knows.

I also have started, again, on Grandma's old project of the Grandma Remembers books. For the 11 of you who do not have yours they are getting closer to completion. 5 are all written and just need pictures and the other 6 are in various stages of writing. I am hoping to finish the writing this week and then start on the pictures. It just takes good days on Grandma's part for where there are questions that she needs to answer. Yesterday we got a lot of blanks filled in, today we did not do so well.

I had to laugh last night. I am using the siblings book that is written for a template where possible for some pages. I was feeling really good about my system and was merrily writing along a nice story from another book about how the parents of the one getting the book had met on the Staten Island ferry and was just a few words from the end when I realized, crap, this is Mary's book, this will not work. Thank goodness for the invention of White-out. Sorry Mary.

I have been inspired to start this to help those of you that would like to keep track of how Grandma is doing be able to do so more accurately than I can say over the phone when she is listening closely to see what I am telling people. I will also be including the daily goings on around here for those who are interested in such. This is my first post and I will be ending it soon to see if I have figured this out correctly, as I am internet challenged as my daughters regularly tell me. It is a good time to start this now as Grandma is tired so I need to keep things quiet and most everything I think to do is noisy in some form. Grandma just spent a couple of days visiting with Betty and Johnnie and seeing Johnnie's new farm and getting a perm and is now glad to be home to the home routine and to catch up on her rest. It was good for her to see something different for a couple of days though.

While she was gone we rearranged some furniture downstairs to make it easier for her to get around with her power chair and to have more space that she can get to. We are working on moving the dining room into the living room and her bed is in front of the wide screen hd tv that Polly got for her in that is on the wall where the china cabinet used to be. I have also been working on the rooms upstairs, getting them fixed up, I have finished what I count as 3 this year. My old bedroom is now Jessie's room. It had suffered bad damage when the roof needed replacing so I taught myself how to repair/replace missing plaster in the walls and ceilings. Then I attacked the closed under the attic stairs which had never been very usable due to the fact that there was more lathe showing than plaster. It now has plastered and painted walls, is much tighter and more dust free and I am using it for my home repair stuff storage upstairs. So even thought it is just a closet I count it as a room due to the fact that it was quite a project. I learned how to make plaster corners in there. Then I started on my old living room upstairs which had serious ceiling and floor problems. It is now done and Mike and I have moved our bedroom in there as of last weekend. I am now starting to strip the several layers of old wallpaper from the very back bedroom, then will need to repair plaster etc. and it will be a much nicer guest room next.

Now to see if I can post this and then I will have Jessie help me with the setup.