Sunday, April 29, 2012

Make Something Monday - One Man's Trash...

One day last summer, my parents were over and Deputy D was out in the backyard charring....um I mean grilling.... the burgers.  At some point when I turned my back, he decided to take one of my cookie sheets outside and put it on top of the burner attached to the grill to keep the patties warm once they were charred... I mean cooked.

At any rate, most of you know this was not a great idea.  To this day, I have not been able to remove the black marks from the cookie sheet and can't bake on it anymore.  I only use it for dishes that I know will overflow in the oven or will be in some way messy.

I am glad I did not ever throw it out, because I learned a great use for old cookie sheets.  I wish I could take credit for this idea, but I learned about it at church's ladies event that I attended.  I apologize for the lack of step-by-step pictures, but I did not want to be the freak taking pictures of everything that I did (especially since it was my first time attending).



Here are the steps they took us through:

Measure out sheets of scrapbook paper (or other decorative paper) that will fit the inside of the cookie sheet.  You can use as many as you like.  We did two, a smaller one for the top where the letters went and a larger one for the bottom.  Round corner the the top two corners of the top sheet and the bottom two corners of the bottom sheet.  Glue down both sheets (we used regular glue sticks, but when I do this again, I will probably pull out the handy dandy hot glue gun).  Measure a length of ribbon that will go all the way across.  Someone cut my ribbon for me and it is a bit short and bugging me, so I am thinking of trying to find something to glue to both ends of the ribbon to cover this up.  Glue down the ribbon.

I cut out an extra travel tag just to put in the middle of my board just because I thought it looked really nice.

Cut out letters that spell out whatever kind of board you are making.  We made prayer boards, so we have "P", "R", "A", and "Y" letters.  You could spell out MEMO, GROCERY, REMINDERS, NOTES, MENU or just about anything that would be useful to you.

To make the magnets, we used various buttons glued to circular magnets.  I think the leader called it "Liquid Glass," but I suspect super glue or hot glue would work fine.  Let the magnets dry completely before putting them onto the cookie sheet.

For the hanger, we used a binder clip.  Thrifty and nifty in my humble opinion.  A great project that uses up things most crafty people have laying around the house!



Never Put Off Until Tomorrow What You Can Do Today

...Or tomorrow's list of chores will end up being twice as long!!

I have been really tired the past few days and have not kept up around the house like I should have.  And guess what that means.  When I get around to doing it, I will have even more work to do because I am so far behind.

Little Man and I got up a little earlier this morning, and tried Sunday School at the new church.  It was an ok class and pretty good service but me, but Little Man had an amazing time.  He was flying high when I went to get him from children's church.  Which is a really good thing for him!  His Sunday School teacher even made a point of stopping me after church and telling me how much they enjoyed having him and how she hopes to see him again soon.

Deputy D worked last night, so it was just me and Little Man this morning.  It's hard going to church without him, I really miss him and we still do not really know anyone.  I wish that churches had a really good way for newcomers to meet new people and get involved.  I have been trying, but putting myself out there in new situations is not one of my strengths.  But that is a rant for another day.

Before we left for church, I had started lunch in the Crock-Pot.  I found a recipe in a cookbook not to long ago for pulled pork that was really simple.  Put pork tenderloin in the Crock-Pot, pour in root beer, cook for 5-6 hours, drain and replace root beer with BBQ sauce, cook 30 more minutes, shred, and serve on buns.  I am not a fan of root beer, so I subbed cola.  It was tender and juicy, but WAY too sweet for my tastes.  I am more of a tangy gal when it comes to BBQ.  I just don't like sweet BBQ sauces.  So this time, I just cooked it in Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce the whole six hours, and it turned out great.  Please excuse the picture of the half-eaten sandwich below.  I was in such a hurry to taste it, I forgot to stop and take a picture until I was halfway through.

I served on sourdough bread (I forgot to get buns at the store) that I sliced up and toasted a bit in the oven.  It's actually a bread machine recipe, but I got tired of the short, squat little loaves the bread machine was churning out, so I used the dough setting and the pulled it out, formed a round loaf and let it rise a bit more before cooking it in the oven.  This was really late last night, so again, I forgot to snap a picture of the loaf before I cut into it.  I think I will need to cook at a higher temperature next time, because the crust did not brown as much as I would have liked.  But since I was totally making it up as I went along and ignoring the recipe, I think it turned out alright.  (The last two pictures are how the loaves come out from the bread machine.  The first one is the sliced up version from last night.)



For a side, I served my Momma's potato salad.  I wish I could share the recipe, but there is not really an exact science to it.  At least, she has never written it down for me.  You cut up potatoes, boil them until fork tender in salted water, drain, add a plop of mayo, squirt some yellow mustard, salt and pepper to taste, and then throw in some chopped onions, dill pickles, and boiled eggs.  Mix all together and let sit for a while before serving.  It's better to let it refrigerate overnight.  The flavors really come out more that way.  And everything is really just to taste... We are constantly taste-testing as we go along.


For dessert, blackberry cobbler.  Of course, served warm with Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla ice cream.


I better stop procrastinating and go finish clipping my coupons and get started on the house or my list will be three times as long tomorrow.  Until next time!

Saturday, April 28, 2012

Rise and Conquer

Sometimes, I am too stubborn for my own good.  As much trouble as I have been having making bread, I love baking and bread so much that I have just not been able to make myself give up.  Little Man is home this weekend and has been wanting to help me make something, so we tried a kolache recipe that I found on Pinterest.

I ended up making two batches of dough.  The first batch did not rise at all, and the second batch rose a little but definitely did not double in size.  I used Jimmy Dean sausage links instead of a kielbasa sausage, and I wasn't thrilled with the results.  Maybe that's simply because I didn't get the links browned enough when I cooked them, but the meat to bread ratio would definitely be better with the larger-sized sausage.

Once I saw that neither of the batches of dough rose like they should have, I almost tossed them and just used a canned biscuit dough, but I figured that I spent the time making the dough so I might as well use it and see what happens.  So I cut the dough in to equal portions, patted out a oval shape, put down some shredded cheese, added the links, and then wrapped the dough over the top and pinched the seams shut.  I did a pretty good job with that part,  I only had a bit of cheese leak out on one of the finished kolaches.

I left them to rise again for 30 minutes, and I think they did a little better this time than the first rise.

I had four rolls of dough left over, and for kicks decided to pat them out, make indentations in the middle, and add some blackberry jam that I have been trying to use up because Deputy D does not like it.  I was completely winging it at this point, but that's just how I roll.

I popped everything in the oven and baked until golden brown.  The taste wasn't bad, but I may keep looking for a different dough recipe.  We will see once Deputy D gets up and tastes them.  He is a much tougher critic than Little Man, who says that he likes almost everything that I make.  Little Man's assessment of the kolaches?  Two thumbs up.  I could definitely taste the olive oil, and I am not sure whether I liked it or not.  Little Man and I both liked the blackberry jam ones more than the sausage and cheese ones.

I will conquer bread-making one way or another.  I am bound and determined to figure out how to make the dough rise correctly, so you will probably be seeing a lot of bread recipes on here.  If you want to be a taste-tester, just give me a holler!!




















Friday, April 27, 2012

The Pen is Mightier Than the Sword

"There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside of you." ~Maya Angelou

Deputy D didn't really care for Wordless Wednesday.  He liked the picture I posted, but wanted to know why there were no words.  I referred him back to the title of the post.

This is really ironic considering that Deputy D has some sort of built-in filter in his brain to where he can only process a certain percentage of words during our conversations.  According to him, he listens for key words like "money", "emergency", and "hospital."  The in-between words are apparently unimportant.  I strongly disagree.  It's not just that I am arrogant enough to think that every word I say is important in some way or another, it's just that if I am taking the time to tell him something, than it is probably worth him listening to.

But I guess it's different with written words.  I don't know if it's because he has the time to stop and process what I am saying or just that he can read (or not read) at his leisure.  Maybe, it's just that he really likes my writing style more than he does my verbal style.  Who knows.  Eventually, though, even I will run out of words and I think that Wordless Wednesday definitely has its place in the world.

I love to read and write.  I have ever since I was a little girl sitting on my grandmother's knee listening to her patiently read me story after story after story.  Thanks to her, I was reading way before I started kindergarten, in a time when we did not push our kids to have their college major picked out before elementary school was finished, and reading in kindergarten was not that common.  I spent most of my kindergarten year playing with play dough, putting construction paper strips into Elmer's glue bottles to make it colored, and coloring pictures of the beach.  Oh how times have changed.  Little Man was journaling in kindergarten.  One has to wonder how much a kindergartner really has to journal about.  But I digress.

I loved to read so much, that I often got grounded from reading when I was in trouble growing up.  To this day,  walking into a bookstore and inhaling the intoxicating smell of new, unopened, unexplored books with fresh, crisp pages is one of my happy places on Earth.  I can be having a horrible day, and I can walk into a bookstore and forget everything else going on and be swept away with all the possibilities and mysteries hidden in the rows and rows of books.

It took me a while to realize how much of themselves authors really have to put into books.  Art of any kind is fascinating to me.  But I have a special place in my heart for books.  Writers, even of fiction stories, have put time and thought and little pieces of themselves into every sentence, every word, every character... I believe in the power and value of the written word.

All of this to say (I have warned you that I can ramble incessantly), that not writing all these years since I graduated college was probably one of the reasons it was so easy for me to get all dark and twisty last year. It was easier for me to deal with things growing up when I wrote about them.  It was mostly fiction, as it was easier for me to make up a world and write my struggles into it than it was to write about the actual truth.  Writing short fiction stories about the hapless girl who struggled to fit in anywhere in the world probably got me through the torture that they call high school.

So now, lesson learned,  write I will.  I can't promise that it will always be relevant to anyone but me.  I can't promise that it will always be entertaining.  But I can promise it will be real and honest.  I may not have very many readers, but I know that I have some and that is good enough for me.  As long as someone reads what I write, it is worth it, even if that's just Deputy D.

On a side note, I want to thank everyone for the kind words and support that you showed me after my post on Tuesday.  So many people are going through similar things, and I just had no idea.  I guess it is one of those things that you don't talk about very often.  But now, knowing there are people I can talk to and share with, makes things a little bit easier to deal with.  All of the messages and comments really did mean a lot to me and I want you to know that I value each and every person that takes the time to read my fledgling little blog.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Wordless Wednesday - The Dark Side Is Strong With This One

Truthful Tuesday - The Origins of Emo Marie

So I have decided that some Tuesdays will be Truthful Tuesdays.  Not that I am being deceptive the rest of the time, just that Truthful Tuesdays will be used as a confessional of sorts.  After all, confession is good for the soul.  Right?  And since they say the first cut is the deepest (and now I will have that song stuck in my head the rest of the day), I will start with the hardest, most painful truth that I could share.

TMI Warning: The following may contain some very emotional and deeply personal information. If you don't really want to know, stop reading. Now. Seriously.

This one is a long time coming.  I promised a while back that if I reached my weight loss goal of 100 pounds by my birthday last year, that I would "expose" myself and give everyone the lowdown on how the weight loss came about and how I did it.  Well, I lost the 100 pounds, but my birthday came and went quietly with no big revelation.  No one really asked me about it, and I am sort of glad that they didn't.  Because the truth is that last year was not a good year for me.  I went through quite a bit of struggle and almost didn't make it out of all the muck.  I just recently got to the place where I could talk about it, and Deputy D just got to the place where he is comfortable with me sharing our story with everyone.

So here is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.  Deputy D and I have fertility issues.  The kind of fertility issues that mean that we are only going to get pregnant if a miracle occurs.  Yes, this is what started the whole long, happy/sad journey.  We, like most couples that have been married for what they feel is an appropriate length of time and not having anywhere near the financial resources necessary, decided to add a bundle of joy to our family.  Hopeful, optimistic, excited, we waited month after month after month expectantly, with no plus sign ever showing up on the test.


I began to suspect there was a problem, wondering what on earth it could be, because I clearly come from a long line of extremely fertile women that could repopulate the earth all by themselves if needed.  We talked about bit about it... Let me just inject here that I LOVE Deputy D with all my heart.  But once you go questioning someone's...ummm... manliness... they tend to get pricklier than a very grumpy porcupine.

So after much "conversation", we started testing.  Among other things that we found out, I was diagnosed with PCOS and as being pre-diabetic and having hypothyroidism.  My weight was causing my conditions, and my conditions were making it extremely hard for me to lose weight.  Well... what was I supposed to do with that?

First things first.  Lose weight.  In my mind, listening to the doctor, that would fix it all.  Lose weight and get pregnant.  They put me on several different medications to treat my conditions, and these medicines did help me to lose weight.  But I lost my first 20lbs just by dropping regular sodas.  I do still drink diet and I know they are not so healthy either, but it's much better than what I was doing.  Then I cut down my portion size.

I was a big girl... Deputy D used to say I was built like a linebacker.  Yes, I know, it's mean.  But he just doesn't seem to understand why.  I just try to look past it.  Anyway, I started out this journey at 246 pounds.  And I LOVE food.  And carbs.  Ah, carbs.  I could make a whole meal of just bread and I would be perfectly content.  Bread and butter or bread and dipping oil.  YUMM-O!  Who needs meat and veggies anyway?

So there is also the issue that I can EAT.  At that time, I could put away as much food as every other guy at the table combined and then some.  It was not a pretty sight when I was hungry.  Deputy D once had Little Man convinced that if I was hungry enough, I would eat him.  And Little Man believed him.  That's how bad it was.  And let's not even get started on chocolate.  Or the fact that I am a severe stress-eater.

My first action was to limit how much I was eating during the day.  My body thought I had decided to starve myself, but in reality, I am just eating better, more normal portion sizes.  Except when I am stressed.  I still struggle with that to this day.  Then I started trying to throw a little more healthy food in when I could.  I also started drinking more water.

And the weight started coming off.  It came off fast at first, and then slower and slower until I thought I would never reach 100 pounds.  But I did, and I am happy with myself and what I accomplished.  I feel better and I am more confident in myself.  I am not embarrassed to go to school functions with Little Man or get my picture taken anymore.  Little Man got made fun of several times at school because of how fat I was, and it broke my heart to see how bravely he defended me and how much he loves me.  He has enough issues of his own.  He does not need his mom adding to them.

So I lost the weight and we still did not get pregnant and I sank into a depression that I almost did not come out of.  I lost interest in all my hobbies, I quit helping around the house because I was always so exhausted, I lost touch with most of my friends, I pushed Deputy D away because I was so stinkin' frustrated about the situation and did not know what else to do, and I basically shut down and crawled into a dark corner and sat there.  Deputy D was a champ and took up the slack and tried to make everything better, even though to this day I still don't think he understands what it's like for a woman to long to be a mother and have to live with the reality that it is probably never going to happen.

I stopped caring about almost everything, and life got pretty bleak.  And now y'all are catching on to why Deputy D nicknamed me Emo Marie, huh?  He would get so frustrated with me, that he would just throw up his hands and yell, "QUIT BEING SO EMO!!!"  It is important to note here that Deputy D does not deal well with female emotions in general at all.  One of the quickest things I can do to make him mad is start crying.  It's really strange, but I guess it's who he is.

I started blogging (Emo Marie and the Quest for a Baby), but I was in such a dark place that even that was not helping me.  Possibly, it was even making it worse.

I am not sure exactly what snapped me out of it.  Maybe I finally realized that Little Man is going though a really tough time, and desperately needs me.  Maybe it's seeing so many of my friends and family deal with life-threatening illnesses.  Maybe it's just the fact that I finally realized that I am truly blessed.  We have jobs, a roof over our heads, food on the table.  I have a beautiful son, and loving, if cantankerous, hubby.  Not having a baby is not the end of the world.  It's hard, but not the end of the world.  Sometimes it takes me a good, long while to get to the right answer, but I almost always get there eventually.  I am just sorry for what I put my family through to get there.

Don't get me wrong.  There are times that I still want another baby so desperately that it's hard to breathe.  When I see a family with a baby, or walk through the baby section at Walmart... I stop and think about what it would be like to hold a baby in my arms again.  I want to share that experience with Deputy D so badly.  I cry a little, but then I take a deep breath and pull myself together, give it over to God,  and go back to whatever I was doing.  And sometimes when people innocently ask me when Deputy D and I are finally going to give Little Man a brother or sister, I have to stop and think about what to say.  Because I really don't know what an appropriate answer is.

I put myself in the dark place, and with the support of Deputy D and Little Man (who both love me unconditionally) and the support of my family and friends, I pulled myself out of it and I don't want to go back.

This is the day that the Lord has made.  I will rejoice and be glad in it.

I will be thankful for everything that God has given me, and Deputy D and I will hold hands and deal with whatever the future brings us.  Baby or no baby.  And in the meantime?  I will continue to heal, and I will pursue my Quest for Domestic Perfection.  And probably drive Deputy D bonkers somewhere along the way.  After all, how could I ask for more?


"So if there's anything I've learned from this journey I am on
Simple truths will keep you going, simple love will keep you strong
'Cause there are questions without answers and flames that never die
And heartaches we go through are often blessings in disguise
So thank you, Lord, oh thank you, Lord
How could I ask for more?"
~Cindy Morgan



Monday, April 23, 2012

Make Something Monday - All That Glitters

Left me preface by saying that every wall in my house would be purple and glittery if I thought that Deputy D would let me get away with it.  Eventually, now that I know I can do this, I expect many more glittery things to be appearing in our house.  I was walking around the house with the plate of leftover glitter mixture last night, trying to find something to apply it to because I did not want the precious, glittery mixture to go to waste. Our bathroom door almost got a glittery design painted on it.  But I knew that would probably not make Deputy D very happy, so I sadly threw the beautiful, glittery concoction into the garbage.

Before I did, though, Little Man saw it on the kitchen table.  He looked at it very strangely and then asked me what it was.  I explained to him what I was trying to do, and that I was a little frustrated because it wasn't working quite like I had hoped.

He nodded his head wisely and then said, "I see what you mean, Momma.  They are WAY too sparkly!"

Bless you Little Man.  Sometimes you know just the right thing to say.  I was being Little Miss Impatient, and should have known to wait until it was completely dry before I pronounced the project an epic failure.  And I also should have known that I would be the only one to see the flaws and globs in the finished product.  Everyone else would be blinded by their sparkly beauty.

I have been wanting to try and make my own glittery shoes from a DIY tutorial that I found on Pinterest.  Yes, I know.  I spend WAY to much time on Pinterest.  But I have actually tried several crafty things and quite a few recipes that I found on there.  So I consider it time well spent.

Deciding to take an old, raggedy pair of black flats that I never wear and was considering throwing out, my first stop was to Michael's to pick up glitter and Mod Podge (and I had my handy-dandy Michael's app that gave me a 20% off my entire order coupon).  I chose Recollections Extra Fine Glitter in Fairy Dust and Mod Podge in Gloss.

I started by scuffing the shoes with a nail file (sandpaper would work, too) to give the glitter mixture something to stick to.  Then I mixed the glitter and Mod Podge.  There was no exact science or formula, but next time I will go with a higher glitter to Mod Podge ratio from the beginning.  Then I started painting it on.

Next time I do this... and trust me, there will be a next time... I will make my layers thinner and will watch for globs and drips more carefully.  Once they are dry, I found that there was not a lot I could do about them.  I will also use either a soft-bristle brush or a sponge.  The paintbrush I was using just left way too  many streaks. 90% of them did disappear when the Mod Podge dried, some of the streaks turned into globs.

If you do this, watch the edges and toe very carefully for globs and to make sure that you are covering the entire area.  I almost missed a couple of spots around the sole of the shoe.

It took me four layers to get the coverage that I wanted.  Keep in mind that I was trying to cover up some mistakes with some of these layers.  Also, next time I will start with a light-colored shoe instead of a dark-colored shoe if possible.  The dark color underneath changed the color of the glitter more than I would have liked.

Just apply the number of coats that you desire and then let dry.  Once dry, find an outfit to wear that goes with your new, improved, sparkly shoes!!











Sunday, April 22, 2012

Read the Directions Carefully

So, I am always giving Deputy D (and most guys in general) grief about not reading the directions when starting something.  They look at the directions, read the first couple of lines, think "I got this", throw the directions down, and then proceed to start the project and then get frustrated when it doesn't work like it should.  I have been extremely frustrated with my attempts to make bread from scratch, knowing that there was some key element missing, but not sure what that would be.

Well, today I emptied out a jar of yeast and was taking the label off so that I could re-use the jar for something.  And what do I see?  Top line of directions in all capital letters... Measure yeast and bring  to room temperature before using.  WELL NO ONE TOLD ME THAT!!!!  Lesson learned, and next time I catch Deputy D not reading the directions, I will have to keep my mouth shut because apparently I am guilty of the same thing.

Yesterday, in the midst of my frustration over not being able to find a tortilla press anywhere in town, Deputy D shared a funny story to try and cheer me up.  So for those of you that might have known about Emo Marie and the Quest for a Baby, you might know that the doctors had me tracking...well...let's just say "things" closely.  So me, being a big advocate of "there's an app for that", downloaded a couple of different apps to help me do that.  I changed the settings on Little Man's iPod the other day to update everything, and I guess I forgot to change them back.  Because when I updated my stuff, it added some things to his iPod that were not for him.

On the way to drop Little Man off on Friday, Deputy D noticed that he was huffing and puffing and sighing (which, if you know him, means that he would like you to ask him what's wrong) and angrily tapping his finger on the iPod.  Here is how the conversation went:

Deputy D - "What's wrong?"
Little Man - "I have been trying and trying to figure out this game and I just can't make it work!!"
Deputy D - "Well, what game is it?"
Little Man - "I dunno... The name says IP Free."  (I will let you go look up what that stands for.)
Deputy D (Laughing) - "Little Man, your mom and I have been trying to figure out that game for a couple of years and have not had any luck.  I am sure she did not mean to put that on there for you when she updated the iPod.  I'm sure it was an accident and is just a Momma game."
Little Man (More Huffing and Puffing) - "Well she needs to quit putting her games on my iPod."
Deputy D - "I will let her know."

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.  But, it did get my mind off the tortilla press, and we headed home where I proceed to make non-circular but extremely yummy homemade tortillas for the enchiladas.  There was not a circular one in the bunch, but Deputy D didn't complain as he was chowing down on dinner.


Church was really good today.  When I got home, I started a batch of sourdough bread in the bread machine.  We will see if it turns out better than last time.  For lunch, we had Italian Crescent Casserole and Sea Salt and Vinegar Potatoes.  Both were really delicious and extremely easy to prepare.  For the potatoes though, I will change up the recipe a little when I make them next time.  The malt vinegar did not really "stick" to the round potatoes.  I will probably smash them up a bit before adding the vinegar, or I will cut them in half before roasting in the oven.