King and I

As I kid I grew up in Flint, Michigan.

I know.  Can you believe I totally survived that?

Michigan really wasn't all that bad of a place to grow up in the 80's because at the time the car factories were still pretty much in full swing.  Most people worked there, the rest worked in restaurants and shopping centers to supply the ever-growing demand and supply the pretty darn rich factory workers with whatever their hearts desired.  I remember quite a few of my friends had pretty nice houses if they had a dad who worked in one of the factories.

It was when those car factories started pulling out of Michigan and moving elsewhere that things went downhill quickly.  I've seen the rapid decline from a bustling, happy, growing area into a falling down businesses closing and moving out area.  In fact, only since I've been out of High School which was, gasp, 15 years ago.

But I'm going to talk about the happier times of Flint, because those are the times I remember the best.  Besides, it was just some stupid little salad I was making the other day that reminded me of a buffet near my house called the "King and I" - I'm not sure if there was a "the" in the title of the restaurant or not.  But it was on Miller Rd, pretty much at the edge between Flint Township and Swartz Creek in front of one of those many factories I was talking about just a minute ago.

When I was growing up, it was a pretty special occasion to go to the King and I.  We went only after church usually, and that meant dressing up.  I don't remember seeing anyone there wearing jeans (at least not until it moved over to it's second location later on in life).  Well, there are only three things I remember about the place, and that's probably because I was young then, pre-teen at the latest before the whole thing closed down.  But they had this really great fried chicken.  They also had the best freezer cheesecake and coconut creme pie.  And they also had grapes in whipped creme.

Ah the grapes.  Nothing like a giant purple or black grape, hidden in layers of fluffy whipped creme.  It was on the salad bar, so I always assumed they considered it a 'salad' rather than a dessert.  You'd scoop up this big spoonful of white fluff, and then take it back to your table and commence chasing fluffy grapes around the plate with a fork until you managed to actually stab one and bring it to your mouth.  And then the smooth whipped creme and the tart grape underneath it all...oooh heaven!

You don't see this on salad bars nowadays, although I'm rather surprised at that.  It's actually quite a brilliant fattening thing and so extremely simple to make.  Whipped creme + grapes = heaven.

I was thinking about this while making up a Waldorf salad the other day.  I'm not exactly a purist, so if you ever look up a recipe for Waldorf there'll be walnuts - I don't do that, I'm strictly grapes, apples, iceburg lettuce, miracle whip and a bit of sugar.  You'll probably find a recipe with walnuts, raisins maybe, perhaps mayonnaise or some other sweet dressing.

But the big ol' grapes I used for my salad reminded me of the King and I.

Later in it's life the King and I moved across town, I think closer to Grand Blanc (if not in Grand Blanc) near Dort and Hill Rds.  It stayed open for a handful of years before closing and the restaurant turning into a Damon's sports bar/rib joint place.  The original building turned into a place called O'Toole's which had some terrific homemade pies and my Mom's favorite club sandwich which was actually a Roast Beef Club.  Can't find a club sandwich anywhere else that has roast beef, lettuce, tomato, bacon and American cheese all in one sandwich.  But they had it.  They also had a big ol' 1/2lb. O'Toole burger that my brother and I would get from time to time.

That restaurant closed down a few years ago as well during the "Great Recession" of the 2000's.  Many small businesses took a pretty big hit from that recession. I saw a huge change in Flint after that period of time as well.  There had been some re-growth going on in the Miller Rd. area where even though quite a few chains were pulling out, smaller family run businesses moved into their vacancies.  But heck, when a restaurant like Sonic goes under after just a few years, it's a miracle anything survived there.

However...they were just a block away from the family-run Fuddruckers right up the street.  How could Sonic compare to them?  Fuddruckers is owned and operated by the Andrews family.  Mr. Andrews, his wife and at least one of his sons works there.  When nearly all of the Northern Fuddruckers closed down, his has remained open, still producing the fresh buns, fresh ground beef, the gooey cookies, lovely hand-make milk shakes...yum.  I'm drooling just thinking about it.

Every trip back home brings me back to the restaurants and tastes of my childhood and the simple recipes that kept our bellies filled in times of happiness and times of depression.  Maybe you've only heard rumors of places in Michigan, but if you happen up past I-75 through Flint, take a stop over at Miller Rd. and check out some of the small family restaurants, get a giant burger at Fuddruckers, or get a coney dog at one of the handful of Coney Islands around Flint.  (I'd recommend going to Palace Coney Island inside the Genessee Valley Center, they have the best)  And maybe you'll see a bit of the Flint that I knew growing up too.

The Guest Room

I like having guests over.  For short periods of time it's nice to have someone over from out of state, particularly my Mom or my In-Laws since we both moved away from our parents when we were married.  I had a friend who recommended it because it gave us an opportunity to learn what it would be like to depend on each other rather than our families, and for the last five years that we've lived away from our parents, I'd like to think we've become pretty independent.

However, I think as with all parents, they'd like us to be just a bit more dependent upon them.  I know my Mom would like me to call her every day, and my husband's parents would like to stay for longer periods of time at our house than we've allowed them in the past.  There's only one problem with that, of course, which was space.

It was pretty cramped when we had them over at our apartment when we only had two bedrooms and one of them was our bedroom, and the other a computer room.  When we moved into our current home, we picked up a spare room which was to be the spare room as well as a place where we could watch movies and read books.  Instead of becoming a spare guest room, however, it became a craft/hobby/library room where there wasn't a free wall to stick a bed up against.

Fast forward a year and my In-Laws finally broke down willing to pay for a bed for the room, so we suddenly had a quandary: where do we put the spare guest bed?

My husband started thinking it over, because even though my own mother would like a bed, she wasn't pushing for it (she understands how money can be and has a worse time of it than me) but his parents were the ones wanting to be here for a week at a time since they are retired now (unlike my mom, who happens to be older).

One Sunday evening after he visited me at work, my husband packed up his computer desk and moved out of the computer room.  I came home to a big ol' empty spot in the computer room and his desk and chair and computer down in the basement.  Mind you, we don't have a finished basement or we probably would have had it down there in the first place, but we did buy a carpet for down there so we could set up a projection screen and play DDR (that's a story for another time).

By the next week we'd ordered the bed and by that weekend I was scrambling to get my computer desk moved into the library (where I sit now as I type this) and the room cleaned up and trim painted, ready for the bed to be moved in.  We went out and bought new bedding since I had originally intended to use my old bedding that would fit it better...but decided that I didn't like the colors too well.  Found this set on clearance at B,B&Beyond and fell in love with it.  Almost would use it for my own bedroom if it hadn't been white (I will NOT put white on my bed...)  Then we took an afternoon off of work to go to IKEA and picked up curtains (which I still need to hem up, but I've been lazy) and  a small desk that I could put a TV on and possibly hook up a few gaming systems - mainly for my Wii Fit so I could still exercise.

There's my cats enjoying the new set up.  Olivia (the gray) tends to hide under the bed, she likes to sleep there and freak my husband out.  He calls for her time and time again and when she doesn't answer for a long period of time he starts to think she got out and has gotten herself hurt.  She's pretty stubborn about coming to her name.  Mina on the other hand, doesn't spend much time at all in that room by herself, rather she likes to be wherever her humans are.

The photo above is where my husband's computer used to be, and the one to the right up above is where mine used to be.  No, that's not my computer desk, that was a cheap $20 IKEA desk I bought just for the TV, but ended up nearly destroying because - NEVER BUY CHEAP IKEA - it'll just break on you.  The more expensive stuff is the good stuff.  I broke two beams on the thing and if it weren't for extra stabilizing beams on the chair I probably would have thrown that $20 down the drain with the desk itself.

Meanwhile outside...the gardens are doing okay but because of the drought my grass is dead.  My husband and I have gotten to the point where we're allowing our weeds to grow because that's the only thing growing out in the yard.  We have really pretty queen anne's lace and chickory and various asters.  I wonder what our neighbors think when they see all of our wildflowers?  Ah well, it's too ugly to take a picture of, so I'm not going to bother showing you...instead I'm concentrating on inside.  It's cooler in here anyway.

Feelin' a Little Derpy

 Some days I think everyone feels a little "Derpy" - a little weird, a little crazy, a little "I just don't know what went wrong."    I can't say that today necessarily was a day like that, but I had one of those days last week when I was trying to explain something to someone at work.

In reality, what I had said was wrong, but for some reason I couldn't spit it out and said, "No, I'm right and you're wrong, I mean, you're wrong and I'm right...you're wrong...I'm right...no, no, I mean...ARGGGG!  You're right...ah, FINALLY!"  Heh heh heh.  The co-worker I said this to I think got a kick out of it, but I felt rather bad because I just couldn't say what I meant!

So, as I said, everyone has a "Derpy" day.

This morning I got up and it's a beautiful day.  I haven't had a day off in a week, so it's especially nice to open up the house and just enjoy the beautiful weather, the breeze, the birds singing...well, you get the point.  I spent a little time this morning forming "the plan" for today.

Then I thew that out the window and went over to Walmart to pick up a blind bag pony in which to paint as Derpy Hooves.  It used to be quite simple to pick up every single one of the ponies in the set (see one of my previous blogs for more info).  However, today when I went the numbering system had mysteriously disappeared and I had to resort to feeling the packaging until I got a pegasus.  Luckily they are the only really easy ones to feel because they have the extra appendages and somehow I ended up with Fluttershy.

After picking up a Venti mocha with a shot of coconut from Starbucks, I headed on home, did something on my original plan which was remove the rest of the caulk from around the tub in my second bathroom (just a small piece of advice from me to you, if you don't have someone to clean your bathrooms with you or for you and you're looking for a house, get 1 1/2 baths, NOT 2 1/2 baths... two tubs is one too many).

Then after a good clean down of the tub (gotta get all that nasty mold/mildew out from behind the old caulk you know) I started on my Derpy Repaint.  It was hard at first to paint over Fluttershy since she's tied for first as Best Pony...but I already have two Fluttershy minis, so I got over it pretty quick.

As I worked on painting Derpy today, I was thinking about the fact that there are so many people who do custom jobs of ponies.  They make characters from the series (like Derpy) and they also make lots of OCs (original characters).  They make fanfiction characters and self-portrait ponies.  As I was painting Derpy I realized I really don't have a self-portrait pony myself because I think I'd probably be cutie-mark-less.  And, quite frankly, that's kind of boring.

But another reason there are so many custom ponies I think, and I've seen table-top gaming figures turned into ponies (like Warhammer 40K figures) is that many of the fans of the series are gamers, otaku and sci-fi geeks who are all into being creative.  What little I know about painting in miniature, I learned from painting 40K figures back in the day myself.  Of course, I also know that how I've been doing them isn't nearly as high-quality as I used to do with my 40K figures because the paint was much higher quality and I think if I were to start doing custom paint jobs for anyone but myself (and I would consider it) I'd probably go buy model paint instead of craft paint.

Derpy took a couple hours to do, including dry-time.  Basically I covered her in a couple of layers of gray, then colored her mane and tail in quite a few layers of light yellow, then painted her eyes white (which were surprisingly easier to paint than I'd thought they'd be) and did the yellow, black and white outlines, then finished off with her bubble cutie mark.  Put on a clear varnish which, unfortunately, made her look more lumpy than I would have liked...guess I should have just put a spray varnish on her, but I was afraid she'd drip if I'd do that.  Overall though, seeing as though she's only around 2 inches tall, I think I did a pretty good job on this repaint.  I didn't even paint Celestia's eyes when I did her, so this is a step up.

And now...I guess I should go back and work on my list of things to do...which means getting back to caulking.  ^_^;  It's such a nice day though that I might just wait on that for awhile longer...

Small Gardens you Can Grow at Home

I've often thought of my yard as a handful of individual mini-gardens.  Each little ecosystem is living in it's own balance and a carefully planned garden can be beautiful all on its own.  You can make these mini-gardens wherever you are, whether you have a lawn to plant or maybe a patio at an apartment, or perhaps you're into inside gardening.  Wherever you'd like to plant your gardens, there's a size and configuration to suit any need and green thumb talent.

Today I'm going to discuss three different gardens that I have in my lawn (I have more, but these are my features for today).

To the right above is my "Peony Garden".  The peonies, strangely enough, were pre-existing when I moved to this house.  They were the only flowers, besides one sad little dianthus and some flowering bushes.  Whoever owned the house before us either didn't like gardens at all, or took everything they could move with them (or had a lot of perennial stuff that died).

As you can see, my peony garden was pretty darn ugly when I first moved in. I was actually surprised when the first sprouts of the peonies came up because I wasn't sure anything was in the garden.  But spring turned into summer and with the first signs of the peonies I started planting other plants.  The right side is lined with chrysanthemums which are also a purple/pink hue and will probably start blooming in another couple of months.

Small stems around the front are irises I planted this year, not sure what they'll look like, I haven't seen them bloom yet.  Behind them are petunias, behind the peonies are snapdragons and a lilac bush.  You can't see the lilac, it's tiny...but eventually I think I might have a taller bush to tower over the peonies.

This garden actually mostly takes care of itself.  Peonies up and bloom and then I'll cut the dead blooms off and they'll be pretty bushes through most of the summer.  The petunias will fill out and the mums will bloom from summer through fall provided you trim the blooms off as they die.  I could avoid any yearly planting if I put in some other kind of annual, but I like the look and smell of the petunias.

The second garden is my geranium potted garden on my porch.  These geraniums (which seen here and merely getting really poofy green with leaves and will start blooming in another week or two, some blossoms are already forming) are mostly 2-5 years old.  (The one on the far right is a trimming from older plants).  I take geraniums inside in the winter and they go into something of a really ugly stasis for the few months of cold, but really perk up with warm weather and sunshine, a bit of Miracle Grow and water.  I actually had more luck when I had a Southern facing window when I lived in an apartment and I could get them to bloom during Christmas indoors.

I'd recommend geraniums to anyone who is a bit leery of gardens in general.  Buy a red geranium.  I say this because the fancy ones tend to die quicker or if you aren't using the same fertilizer that the greenhouse used they tend to change color toward a red anyway (I had a bi-color that's now solid pink and deep magenta also turned red).  Buy a slightly bigger pot than it originally came in, and have fun with colors, especially if you're going to bring it in you'll want something pretty to look at when the plant goes into its winter 'ugly' stage.  Buy a small box of Miracle Grow - it's not that expensive if you buy a "sample" box and with geraniums you'll only need to use the small scoop side once a month while you're watering it.

And DON'T over-water a geranium.  It'll start getting ugly after not being watered for a month, but normally they won't die, they just kind of go into stasis. (Above is an example of the ugly phase, but this is a five year old geranium I haven't trimmed up yet).  Make sure the dirt is dry before you water it again.  If it's wet, it's still happy.  If you can remember to water it once a week, you're doing good.  The blooms will come out and the leaves will fill out with enough regular sun, water, and fertilizer ready for the next summer.  As leaves die off and flowers wilt, pull off dead and trim off extra long branches and root them in a glass of water (like a potato) and you can make a new plant too.

Lastly is my Cat Garden.  This garden is actually about 3 by 2 foot (smaller than a poster).  If you've got just a tiny footprint by an apartment, or maybe a tiny box, you can plant a garden like this one.  It's just a mix of a few different perennials and annuals.  Putting a focal point in like a garden sculpture is often a fun way to add something special to your garden.

I'm usually pretty careful about putting too much 'junk' in a garden.  I have some neighbors who have every spinning thing they can think of, or another that uses white pots that completely cover their lawn!  (I need to get a photo of it this year, it's pretty crazy).  Others use a ton of garden gnomes, or other decorations they leave out all year.  Don't!  If you've going to decorate your gardens with accessories, don't go overboard.  I tend to think you should make sure your item isn't too big, usually a neutral color of some sort, and make sure you take it inside during the winter or it'll look like you're just being lazy (unless you live in a warm climate and can have a garden all year long, then do whatever you want!)

My cat garden consists of the evergreen bush (it stands maybe 2 1/2 foot tall) which apparently needs a trim now that I'm looking at it.  Also three corabells, hens and chicks and a couple petunias (yes, again with the petunias).  I lucked out actually, none of the petunias were blooming when I planted them and the pinks match the corabells nicely.  Make sure you make a nice balance - taller objects in the back (the corabells will get bigger with age and they spike up nicely) and the hens and chicks will stay small and grow across the ground.  The petunias are the only annual and I've considered replacing them with a primrose which would also provide bright colors at least in the spring.



I hope you'll give small gardens a try!  I hope these little pictures inspired you to do some gardening of your own!  Enjoy!

Planting Trees (Things to Keep in Mind)

The world is a better places with trees in it.  Or, rather, on it.  We've all heard the speeches, celebrated Arbor Day and Earth Day by planting a new tree, and it's not a surprise to us because we know plants keep the soil in check, make the oxygen we breathe, supply the pulp to make the paper we use every day, provide shade for our yards, homes for animals...well, you get the idea!

This blog is NOT about that.  This blog, rather, is about how flippin' ugly my yard looked before I planted trees.  Mind you, there were two trees planted between the sidewalk and street since this is one of those 'HOA' neighborhoods, but they really don't produce much shade and I have yet to see a bird nesting in either the white maple or the ginkgo along the side.

Sure, as you can see from the picture, there were a few bushes out front, (and if you look really closely you'll see the tiny little red Japanese maple I planted in front of the porch, but that was only a week or so difference from when I planted the pine.) but overall the yard was one big sparse lot of ugly patchy grass (as you can also see from the photo).

Almost the very first week after we moved in my mother bought us a little Redbud tree.  It's out in the backyard, looked pretty darn sketchy for the first whole summer, lost nearly all of it's leaves and we were worried it would die over the winter.  It looked like this when it bloomed, and now has a bunch of pretty little heart shaped leaves.  I think it spent most of last summer laying in roots.  It even produced seed pods, which my mother's tree I planted over 10 years ago didn't want to do until at least it was 5 years in the ground.

The second tree to go in was the Colorado Spruce that you see in the photo above.  My mother bought this one for us also, picked it out at Lowe's and immediately planted it.  A few weeks later I went to a nearby garden center (Strader's) where I bought the Japanese Maple.  It's been off and on sketchy last year (the leaves went from red to green) and this year it's sort of droopy, we're thinking because of the early spring and various frosts which I'll probably need to watch it in the next years to make sure I cover it during frosts later on.  You can see a picture of it in my post about landscaping.

And finally, the newest arrivals to my household are two beautiful little Blue Spruces.  You can see them to the right of the Colorado.

Now I get to the real reason for this blog.  You need to know your pine trees.  I haven't had one problem around the Colorado since I bought it, that includes trimming the grass around it and mulching around it.  I really didn't think I'd have a problem with two little blue trees either.

In fact, when I went to the store to buy them, I picked them up, put them in my shopping cart, and got so many complements as I finished doing the rest of my shopping that I was starting to worry someone might stalk me out to my car and take them (a lady at the register threatened!)

That afternoon I bought planting soil, mulch, and went out in the chilly air that day and dug my holes and planted the trees, looking at how much better the yard will be when we have nice tall trees.  Well, I actually had another reason for planting them where I did...we had neighborhood kids playing football up and down our side lawn and they were killing our grass.  Not only that but the side of our house is pretty butt-ugly.  You'd think they'd put at least one extra window on the side, but NO!

Later that evening a rash started to break out along my hands and up my arms.  Come to find out, certain people are actually allergic to pine tree sap, and maybe also to their needles.  I found this out the hard way of course, and had to suffer with nasty little water-blister bumps along my arms for a few days until they finally settled down after enough medicine was applied.

So.... the reason for this blog is to really keep in mind what trees you're planting, and are you allergic to them?  If so...don't plant them!  Plant what you know - did you have maples in your yard growing up?  Then go with that.  Go with what you know.  I was never around pine trees more than for a little while here and there at my aunt's house, (none of my other relatives had pines) so I never got to find out the hard way.

But DO plant trees.  These new subdivision things that are popping up everywhere take out every single mature and beautiful tree, plow them down, plant boring trees out by the curb and leave everything else so barren that I'm afraid one day the neighborhood will be taken out by a tornado just because there's nothing to block the wind!  And don't get me started on noise...nothing is blocked without a nice wall of trees!

So there's my tree-hugger speech for the day.  Enjoy!

After Anime Central 2012

I'm glad that my husband and I got to go to Anime Central.  I say this because at this convention there are so many people there that we aren't the oldest in the bunch.  In fact, there's some who are quite a bit older and have been attending quite a bit longer than we'll ever hope to dream about.  However, on the flip side, it made me remember old times when I used to have quite a few more friends and acquaintances to meet up with.

It's weird, if you think about the scenario, because back in 2003, which I think was the first year I went to Anime Central, I had quite a few friends to meet up with.  I didn't have many internet friends, I didn't have MySpace or Facebook at the time, so there was no asking a friend on their wall and asking 'you going to the convention'?  You either saw them there, or you didn't, or maybe you dropped them an email if you had one, or you talked to them either in person or on the phone.

I used to hang out with friends at conventions, I used to have three-day weekend crushes on guys there, I used to flirt with other cosplayers, I used to get glomped, stopped, hugged, photographed and over-all just had a good time and met new people.

This year, with Facebook, I thought, 'oh, there shouldn't be a problem with me finding some of my old buddies.'  So I messaged them.  Nothing.  Completely ignored.  I can see my posting on their wall and see absolutely NO responses from them.  Thanks for all the fish....NOT.

Well, I was still hopeful, so I went in search of all of those friends, took time out of my schedule to search panels, vendors, alleys and wherever else I thought I might find some of my old hook ups.  Some I found, and I did find the majority of them, were polite and talked to me briefly, but I knew they were thinking about something else, not talking to an old friend they hadn't seen in awhile.  Others gave me the complete brush off.  Talk about disappointing!

This time around I didn't make any new contacts.  I was just too bummed by the ones who had gone on with their lives.  I understand that life happens, but this was the weekend of seeing old friends, making new ones and in general talking to people who have similar interests as yourself.

And basically, I'm too afraid any more to make new friends.  Which of course, leaves me in the awkward position of complaining about not having friends, but also unwilling to make new friends who will in turn lead me down this grump about feeling abandoned and betrayed.

All of this begs the question, why do I like My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic so much if I am having such a hard time finding friends?  I like Twilight Sparkle.  I'm basically her, growing up over the years, having one friend (not my BBBF - big brother best friend, but my LBBF - little brother best friend) with a few others here and there, but suddenly I've found myself with only a small handful of friends and too busy, and quite frankly, more than a little scared, to make new ones.  And I don't have a Pinkie Pie, or Apple Jack, or any of those others who pop over and say, "hey, want to be my friend?"

I did have that from time to time... a few friends helped me out along the way, and as I think back, I'm not sure I've ever made a friend all by myself....  Which, is really kind of pathetic.

Ah well, enough, I'm just writing this for myself anyway.  I just wanted to get it down while I was in the mood and felt like writing something.

On a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT NOTE...

We ate some really, truly, righteous food this weekend.  Sweet Baby Rays BBQ on Thursday night.  On Friday some really strange vegetarian sandwich I'm actually thinking of eating more veggie stuff from now on (but then also had an AWESOME BLT that day too).  Then on Saturday we had Giodorno's (sp) stuffed pizza which is like a Chicago deep dish only with TWO crusts.  Then on Sunday we had the best Ramen I've ever had at this Japanese market...the best bread there too...oh my gosh do they make anpan there like pros, it's like being in Japan without ever setting foot there.  And then Triple XXX Family Diner: rootbeer and burgers in the very first drive-in in Indiana near Purdue University (my first DDD Guy Fieri restaurant).

Ah...food.  Never lets you down, always fills you up!

Landscaping Practice

So, here is my house.  It's one of those cookie-cutter houses that you see just about everywhere nowadays because the companies that build them have a handful of designs to choose from, and even though there are subtle differences between them, overall they just look the same.  I was attracted to our house...why?  I can't even quite remember why because when we were first looking at the place it was pretty pathetic, as you can see from the photo.  Besides a few online photos, this is what I saw the very first day we were looking at houses.  Bare bones, pretty ugly.

But even when I lived in an apartment, thankfully we had a ground-floor patio and there was just a tiny patch of land to plant stuff.  I was pretty happy with it really, because I could put a few veggies out there, a couple flowers, and it was my garden.

So, you can be rest-assured that when we moved into our new house I was pretty stoked about having a huge yard to do stuff in.  The first plants that went in were a few bulbs from the apartment that I had pulled up, as well as a six-pack of mums that I had bought just that previous fall.  All of the geraniums that I keep indoors during the winter, they all were packed up and came with me as well.  Then, I did all of the inside stuff for a good month until I was pleased and we had moved in and it warmed up enough to actually start the process of getting the outside looking at good as the inside.

First step, getting some stones in order to raise up the garden around the porch. There was one plant left in that poor little garden, which I later found out was a dianthus when it finally started blooming after a lot of water and Miracle Grow.  The only other plants left in the yard were a large lilac bush (of the miniature variety), three spirea, two peonies (which magically popped up in a bare patch to the side of the house) and one huge viburnum which has become something of a bane to me because it never stops growing and I have to constantly trim it during the summer.  But during the spring it has the prettiest smelling flowers.  (Oh, and some golden evergreen-shrubs that you can't see very well, they're just a hint of color).

Later that summer I added the stones to the garden, a second level closer to the fall, the mums love that front garden.  Planted a few other bushes, pansies and later petunias.  Put in a red Japanese maple, and the house started to look a wee bit better than it's winter counterpart (but of course they always do).  However, we're still having grass problems as you can see in the picture above, and in subsequent pictures too.

 Fast forward to this spring.  As I mentioned about the grass...we've got a lot of bad patches still (enough that a Scott's guy knocked one day after walking by and gave us some info...heh heh...urg).  Anyway, in the fall I trimmed out the lilac up front for a more square shape, added that second row of stones up front as I mentioned, and planted tulip and daffodil bulbs.  The tulips can be seen in the right garden.  They turned out to be a really pretty mix of fancy bulbs, some multiple rowed, some variegated, some frilly, and all either purple, white or maroon.

I digress.  So, at the time when I planted the Japanese maple I'd been thinking about continuing the garden out around the front of the sidewalk leading up to the front porch.  After a couple of co-workers first brought me a bunch of plants, and then another loaning me a tiller to work on my garden out back, I thought it was time to finally start work on a little more landscaping.

The result after about 5 hours of tilling, weeding, digging, planting, stone-laying, etc... is what you see here.  I came home after an eight-hour shift at work and started going at it before dinner, took a dinner break, ran to Home Depot to buy some edging stones (at the awesome price of like 36 cents a piece) and finished up at dusk.

The idea was to have a pretty cohesive garden that wraps around the front of the house.  The new plants that went in this year were two yellow/red spirea (which are supposed to bloom red, so I'm looking forward to seeing bloom alongside the larger pink spirea).  A couple of corabells that my friend gave me, and a dozen snapdragons of various colors because I've been in the mood for snapdragons this year for some reason.

 Here's a bit of a closeup of the garden itself.  I still have to mulch it, which probably won't happen for a few more days since it's threatening to rain now (although I took these photos first thing this morning it's gotten pretty windy and dark out as I write this blog).  I think the reds from the tree, the tips of the spirea and the corabells give a nice accent to the otherwise green flowerbeds.

Eventually I'll probably straighten out the line of the flowerbed so it doesn't do the funny little curve out around the tree, but since I have a bunch of curves around the yard like this already it softens up the very squared off appearance of the house itself.

As you follow the curve around the spirea and lilac, you can see the golden evergreen bushes, the tulips, and the viburnum.  (You can't see it but to the left there's a purple azalea hiding by the porch) and a recent addition is also the purple creeping phlox that I was given by a friend (and added to a bit with the help of a gift card from Home Depot).

It all needs to still be mulched, mowed, trimmed, etc.  But I think the overall appearance is appealing.  And what I think is the coolest thing is it cost less than a $100 for the majority of it all.  Can't ask a landscaper to do it that inexpensively!

Ah...I guess I need to wrap this up and close up everything...the storm is rolling in faster than anticipated.  Please look forward to seeing more photos of the garden as it progresses and fills out this summer!

On Baking Challah Bread

This is what came of my first attempt at challah bread.

A few months back I heard about the Jewish bread while watching Unwrapped and thought, "that stuff looks pretty tasty" and I came to find it pre-made at one of the local bakeries in my favorite grocery store.  It was soooo yummy!  I think you could easily compare the taste to Hawaiin sweet bread since it had that really light, fluffy consistency, you could just pull chunks off of it and eat it without any butter or anything (although cinnamon butter tasted pretty good too).

A month or so later I found a magazine that had the recipe for it.  It's the Fine Living Breads issue, and after a bunch of hoopla to get my hands on it (a coworker offered to buy it for me as she bought hers with a coupon and it took an extra week to get payment and my magazine in my hands) and another week or so before I tried a recipe out of it.  The delay was caused mostly by the chocolate issue that followed after it and I tried two recipes out of that one as well as Alton Brown's homemade gourmet ice cream (which, by the way, the chocolate is every bit as good as anything you've ever tasted...unless you've had Jeni's and then maybe it's a bit weak on the chocolate side, but her ice cream is crazy rich).

Anyway, after dithering over the bread making thing my mother-in-law took me into the kitchen the last time I visited and taught me how to make cinnamon rolls using the Kitchen Aid mixer.  Thank goodness because even though I had made a recipe of bread with it since I got it for Christmas, I hadn't tried anything that turned out to taste really good.  Those cinnamon rolls however, were pretty darn tasty.  Good enough in fact, that a week or so later I made a large batch of dinner rolls which we're still eating on out of the freezer.

So, with cinnamon rolls, bread rolls, and a kind-of-okay loaf bread out of the way I thought "It's time to try something a bit more difficult".  And with Easter Sunday off, it was the perfect time to try this Jewish treat.

But... the house was too cold, and I forgot to rise the dough in a warmed oven, so it rose too slowly.  Then I warmed up the oven too much and ended up killing some of the yeast (I'm pretty sure).  But the dough stretched good and it braided just fine, as you can see from the picture.  It browned a bit fast, but the recipe warned me so I did as told and covered it with foil and then waited to see how pretty it was.

It looked beautiful and the house smelled terrific.  It had to be good, something that looked this good, right?

Wrong.

I over-baked it.  The recipe warned about under-baking so I never once thought that maybe the timer would be too long.  It was also dense, dry, not nearly as sweet as the store-bought loaf and didn't pull apart...nope.  Had to use a knife.

Thought to myself, "Maybe it'll be better the next day."

Nope.

Still dry, maybe more so, even after being placed in a Ziplock bag overnight.

Solution?

Bread pudding.  First attempt.

This is the first time I've ever tried to make homemade bread pudding, and usually it tastes better when you make it with cinnamon rolls (the best I've ever had was made from a cinnamon sticky bun that was bought from a restaurant called Gracie's Country Inn up in Michigan - they would have it on their buffet from time to time).  But this turned out to be a close second, but for the fact I must not have beat the eggs and milk completely because there were a few chewy portions of egg.

The problem I found, soon afterwards, was that I didn't have a good vanilla sauce recipe.  I wanted something that tasted like those sauces I had as a kid at Gracie's and heck, even like my mom made, but most of the sauces that looked right online had ingredients I didn't have at home.  I ran out of eggs doing this and don't keep whipping cream or whole milk on hand.

The solution?  A mix of different recipes I found online, which basically came down to a cup of 1% milk (which I do have), 2 tablespoons of margarine (again, no real butter) a tablespoon (plus some) of cornstarch, 4 tablespoons of white sugar, another 2-3 of brown sugar, and then stirred and stirred and stirred on low, then let boil and it thickened up and I added a teaspoon of vanilla extract.  Voila!  So yummy!  Oh, and for the record, I was dumping by this point so most of the ingredients are estimates at best....heh, kind of lucky it worked out really.

So..... what have I learned about bread making?

Challah bread should have plenty of time to rise and become really fluffy - and sweeter, I think there should be more honey in it than my recipe called for.  And in the future I'll probably just buy it...  And as for bread pudding...ah heck, it tastes GREAT with enough sauce on it so who can complain?  Oh, some people I'm sure, I don't put in raisins as you may have noticed, but that's a personal choice since I'm not a big fan.

I hope you like my little bread story.

Flower Photography

Ever since I received my very first camera, I have found myself drawn to taking photos of flowers.  Of course, back in the day with my little Polaroid in hand, I didn't really have clear photos of them, nor did they look very photogenic when the picture developed after minutes of redundant shaking of said Polaroids.

I was in my early teens when I started a garden of my own in the old sandbox that neither my brother nor I used any more.  My mom allowed me to start my own pansies in a starter set and I watched those little seedlings take sprout and watched all summer as eventually they blossomed and I was able to see all of those beautiful little faces 'look' up at me.  I was hooked on pansies after that and also forget-me-nots because I grew those too...although they didn't bloom nearly as prolific, and they were too small to take good photos of at the time.

At my mom's house there still exists a scrapbook of the first photos of that garden and even a few pressed flowers from that first crop of pansies.  Ever since I've either grown pansies or planted them (they're a lot easier to buy pre-grown of course, though more expensive) and I've had a penchant for taking pictures throughout the season.  Pansies are an unusual flower as they tend to only thrive during the early spring and late fall.  I kept my fall planting through January and probably would have managed to keep more than the handful I still have alive had the aphids not killed them after I brought the pots indoors.  (Apparently bugs are dormant in the winter and they woke right up and started munching once they got inside.  I blame myself, those pansies were doing good in the very mild winter we were having except for a few frosts that provoked me to bring them inside again.)

Later in life I found myself drawn to all sorts of flowers, including the beautiful Redbud tree which my mom agreed to buy after she cut down the apple tree that was in her backyard when she refused to rake apples anymore and decided that my brother and I wouldn't either.  She resorted to cutting it down the moment someone knocked at her door asking if she had any trees she wanted taken care of, even though it had been the center of my childhood summers, climbing, adventuring, swinging beneath on the swing set... well, you get the idea.

The photo above is actually my second Redbud, this one I planted the first week we moved into our new house (you can see our rickety back porch in the photo).  At the time this photo was taken, it was just about to bloom early again (last year it had bloomed early when I bought it, nearly three weeks before other planted ones) but this year because of the ridiculously warm winter.

The pansy you see to the right here is actually one of the winter survivors.  I'm very proud of my pansies, you see.  I strive to keep them alive as long as possible throughout the year and many summers I can keep them alive until they start a second growth in the fall.  This fellow might actually have been part of the previous spring planting, but I can't be sure because it was buried by the chrysanthemum I brought from my apartment when I moved.  (Those are the leaves you see around the pansy.)  I may have planted them both nearly around the same time and because of the protection of the leaves the pansy may have survived both summer and winter, but I know for certain it survived winter and decided to bloom again this spring.  The flower was quite small, only the size of a quarter.

I've been fascinated by pansies and violas since a kid as I've mentioned.  Back then you didn't really smell pansies at all, they had a very light (if any) fragrance.  Since then they've created breeds with much bigger flowers and a much stronger smell to them.  I remember the first time I ever smelled a pansy and thought that was the prettiest smelling flower I'd ever smelled (outside of lilacs and hyacinths.)  My interest in these flowers also came from a childhood friend of mine who managed to keep a viola alive for a good year or so and it was blooming in the winter after she thought it had died.  It's amazing how strong these little flowers are.  I think I read somewhere that they stand for 'remembrance' but I can't be entirely sure.

 Most recently I've been growing azaleas.  When I lived in Michigan they weren't nearly as prevalent at garden centers as they are today or as they are in Ohio.  I think the weather is a bit milder and they're a bit happier.  This particular fellow is super pretty with a very beautiful purple flower - the color is pretty accurate in this photo - with dark green leaves.  The bush has gotten a bit bigger than when I planted it, so I'm pretty happy with the result.

I have two other azaleas in the yard, one is more of a pink color, the other was supposed to be white, but the rabbits got hungry this winter and ate all the leaves.  It's still hanging in there, if barely, and I've considered potting it again until it gets big enough to survive scary bunnies.

Well, that's all the time I have for now.  I hope you enjoy my little flower photo gallery.  I'm thinking of posting more of them on my DeviantART account if you'd like to see them.  Haven't yet but might.  I do enjoy taking pictures so if you like them too, leave me a comment!

Derpy Hooves

I'm actually glad that there are plenty of copies out there of the 'original' Derpy voice and name on the episode of MLP:FIM.  In fact, I'm glad I still have a copy of the episode on my TiVo so I can watch it again myself.  It's kind of sad really that they changed the voice and completely dropped her name from the episode.  Actually, the voice matches more what I had in my mind anyway, so I'm not entirely sad about that.  In fact, if the voice actor hadn't been so rushed to fix it (IMO) she probably could have gotten more character into it yet than the quick rush job that it felt like.  But the fact that Rainbow Dash no longer said her name was Derpy more sad to me.

I haven't said anything really about this whole thing because, well, I know that no one reading this blog really cares since I'm not a huge Brony blogger or anything.  I have been blogging about ponies, but that's only because I enjoy the show and enjoy ponies that have more in common with anime characters than whatever it was they had become over the past few years.  I enjoyed the very first ponies but when they tried to go too overboard... ah well, I'm enjoying this new series for what it is because I enjoy the kind of humor and mostly the cartoon style of it over anything else.  It's very pretty, especially on HUB HD.  ^_^

Anyway, I too am one of the bronies created by watching the Derpy episode.  That's all it took, one episode waiting for Derpy to arrive for the first time and then ever after catching up on all of the episodes until they finally gave her a name and a voice.  And then there was something of a split.  True Bronies loved it.  People who liked ponies, but I wouldn't consider a Brony, hated it and parents were up in arms and they actually took the cartoon episode down to re-do it!  I don't think I've heard of anything quite like that but maybe when they stopped playing that Pokemon episode that caused seizures.  (Actually, it's not uncommon to take down episodes of anime because of content and parents not liking this kid showing a bit too much skin or some word they weren't happy with being muted)   I'm just surprised they did it with a character that was so loved, and I really doubt even one kid out there said to their mom, "Hey Mom, is that pony mentally disabled?"  Doubt it.

Apparently in the minds of the cartoonists, Derpy will always be Derpy and do 'derpy' things and maybe she won't have a name and her eyes won't roll around as much (which, actually, is kind of fine by me too) but in the back of our heads, all Bronies will probably mourn the loss of the original we all saw go way over the top and how much we cheered and smiled the first time we saw her in all her derpy glory.  It's fun to 'derp'.  In fact, probably half the photos my husband has of me on his cell phone are derped up photos.  ^_^

 I guess that's all I'll say about this subject for now.  It's just a shame they had to do such a drastic change because of a few people not knowing how to 'love and tolerate' as the show teaches us.

Favorite Somepony

Surprisingly, after I wrote what I did about Valentine's Day, I got a fire lit under me and sent out some valentines cards to various people in hopes they'd get them before the holiday.  As for my husband...he'll have to wait and see!

I ended up discovering that indeed, I DO have to work on the holiday so most likely we'll be doing our celebrating the day or so before, hopefully I'll get my Olive Garden gift cards in the mail so we can go there since I'm pretty much a crazy pasta lover at heart.  I know there are better Italian places around town than the OG, but you know what?  I've had their food since I was 12...maybe before, I don't know for sure when the first one opened in my town, but I do recall very clearly ordering off of the kid's menu when it did.  Part of that fat blog I did I believe mentioned how often I went out to eat as a kid.  We went to the OG at least once a week and quite a few of the waitstaff knew who we were, how we liked our salad, and that sort of thing.  Ah...I still like it even though I tend to get the runs after I eat there...

Anywho, today was catch up on life day.  What I mean by that is that during the winter I'm incredibly sluggish.  I'll spend the majority of my time watching TV and zoning out (when I'm not at work) and many days I'll look back on what I did and not even really recall what I was thinking about during that day.  I suppose most of the time I'm just looking forward to some other day.  So when I get out of this slump (I think perhaps it's a type of depression, although I've never been diagnosed since I'm usually so lazy I can't get myself to a doctor) I usually do a bunch of stuff I've been holding off on doing for months.

Today was go to the dentist day, which turns out to be almost exactly a year since the last time I went since I couldn't get myself to make an appointment until last week.  Then I also went to get an oil change for my car, which kind of needed it even though I hadn't gone 3,000 miles yet but it has been over 4 months...I don't drive much but my car's on it's 10th birthday this year.

Also thought I'd do that Valentine card thing as well as a bit of shopping where I scored all of the school pals for the new MLP:FIM set that just came out with Cheerilee - although I already had her, she's got her leg raised unlike my previous toy.  I'm quite excited to get them and here two days before Hearts & Hooves Day which will be airing on Saturday...I'll be working, I'm glad I have TiVo...

Anyway, I guess I'd better go make dinner for my 'special somepony' since he's on his way home from work. Oh, hey, I also made homemade brownies that rivaled Ghiradelli...buahaha...and tonight is also homemade ice cream night!


So much for my diet...  >_<;

Notes on Valentine's Day

Most years in the past my husband and I have made plans for Valentine's Day, and it's usually a few weeks out by the time we'd secured reservations.  It's usually for PFChang's or some other kind of restaurant where we'll do the whole three course meal thing with appetizers, main course and dessert, but this year I haven't even looked to see what my schedule is going to be.  Knowing my luck when I finally go to write it down I'll probably be doing the closing shift or some other shift that wouldn't be very conducive to getting a night out with my hubby.

What's odd about this is that even though I've decorated some of the house with the mandatory hearts and such, I really haven't been in much of a mood to do the Valentine thing.  Heck, I bought My Little Pony valentines just because I had a friend who used to mail out cute little kid valentines to all of her friends and I always thought that was a unique way to celebrate the holiday even when you're over 20.  But here they sit next to me and I have only opened the box.  It's exactly a week a way and I haven't even looked at cards for my hubby or anything.

I'm actually kind of glad that the American version of Valentine's day isn't like the Japanese version (although I've heard that it's been changing in more recent years), because I would be horrible at sharing chocolates with guys on this day.  It's odd that in Japan it's supposed to be that girls give guys chocolates they make, and then guys turn around on "White Day" which is March 14 and give girls gifts in return for those chocolates.  Interesting way of looking at things, but I'd definitely have failed in more recent years to do something of the sort. Now, back in my teenage years...I betcha I would have done the chocolate thing and probably would have never gotten anything in return...mainly because I was friends with a whole bunch of guys I had crushes on - but if the idea was really anything like in the anime, those guys probably would have been loaded down with chocolates and I would have just been one among many.

Rather glad that I'm married and don't have to worry about the ups and downs of Valentine's day.  Maybe it's a selfish way to think about it, but I'm rather happy that I'm no longer alone.  Or maybe, rather, I just don't worry about it anymore.  Just like any holiday recently I don't have the time to spend fretting over everything.


Hope you aren't fretting over it either.  ^_^

Ponies and Ohayocon

 So, according to polls, I'm the minority when it comes to Bronies since I'm female, over 30, and also married.  Only 3% of Bronies aren't single, according to a poll I read online today.  Go fig.  Maybe it's because the majority of people who are my age, female, and married are probably too busy worrying about what their kids want to watch rather than what they do...

And yet, here I am, a grown woman, going out during one of my days off in order to search for these elusive blind bag sets of ponies.  My first round was actually pretty successful even though I didn't know there's a numbering system to the bags.  If you want to collect these ponies too, just know that on the back flap near the top there's going to be a little number which you can match up to the picture on the back to see which pony you are getting.  (I have them here in this picture in order, 1-24)

The first two trips, I didn't know that there was a numbering system, or at least, I hadn't figured it out yet, but I managed somehow not to get any duplicates.  Then I started my quest to find more this weekend once I'd discovered the secret and managed to get every single one, no duplicates, at the local Walmarts (and I can say Walmart-s because I went to four.)

I'm especially happy I was able to get the 'secret' ponies, which are numbered 22, 23, 24.  They are clear and glittery which brings out the 10 year old in me.  Hee hee.

Anyway, as this blog is also about Ohayocon, I'll put a note about that in here as well since there were dozens upon dozens of pony cosplayers, which I may have joined with provided the bad experience I had would have been avoided.  I'll explain that more later, plus I saw a dealer selling these blind-bag ponies for $4-$5 a pop when you can get them for less than $2 at Walmart.

Ohayocon started out really well, we had a table in the dealer room for Tsubasacon so we were able to do some advertising, but our guy with the flyers and the sign poles didn't get there until late so I spent most of my day trading off to wander through the dealers and buy stuff I probably shouldn't, have, and then later we did a bit of advertising before heading home for the evening.  I took pictures of pony cosplayers and found out that they were going to be at the various brony get-togethers through the weekend.

Saturday was a mixed bag.  It started out snowing outside, but I wore my Mitsuki outfit anyway, froze my butt off for awhile, but it was all good, because I had a lot more interest in our booth because of it.  Then a Staffer came by - biggest a$$ of all time because the bugger told me that we couldn't have some of the things we were selling out on our table!  For over 10 hours on Friday we had those same items out and I'd already sold some of them, no one had said a thing.  Then suddenly he's threatening to kick us out??!~  I took down my 'questionable' items - aka my foamie wings and earrings - all wing designs and all "official" Tsubasacon merchandise even though they didn't have the Tsubasacon logo on them (ahem, another table also had t-shirts on their table that didn't have their logo!!)  but I left my sign out talking about them and managed to sell one of the pairs of wings (helped I was actually wearing a pair myself - ha!) - thumbing my nose at the law, that's what I'll do!

But there were a whole heck of a lot of grouches at Ohayocon this year.  Mind you, not everyone, there were some really nice staffers I met and were really helpful, but then I even had an artist alley guy yell at me for being too close to the glass in the alley...I was THREE feet away, couldn't even touch the glass, and had my hands clasped in front of me and the guy yelled at me!  I'll tell you what, jerks like that don't deserve to sell artwork, little lone make any money for being an idiot.  Well, I'll show him, I bought a bunch of prints from another gal who actually designed the cover for a journal I'm writing in at the moment and I was so excited that I was able to meet her after looking at her artwork for over a year now.

Okay, so as I said, pretty mixed bag.  The first guy who yelled at us made me go into total breakdown mode and I decided not to go back on Sunday.  But Saturday when we had closed down for the night and had our dinner, I thought I'd see if the brony meetups were still going on, but the areas they were at were surprisingly empty...so I just started walking and somehow mysteriously stumbled onto a MLP showing.  My husband couldn't believe it, because he'd just asked me where we were going and I was like, "I dunno, I just want to go this way..."

We later found another friend we hadn't seen in awhile doing the same thing after I watched the newest episode of MLP...but that's another story.

At least all the money I made at the table before the idiot closed me down paid for my blind bag splurge!!  ^_^

Pinkie Pie

If you haven't watched MLP:FIM, then you probably won't get the pink pony drawing.  BUT, if you HAVE watched the show, you'll know who Pinkie Pie is.  She's not my favorite pony in the series, but for some reason I felt like doing a quick sketch that was kind of free-flowing and very different than the actual style of the series.  I have my own kind of drawing style normally, but I some of my style from the early anime styles I used to read like CLAMP and Trigun, and throw in perhaps a random shojo manga here and there too.  It's kind of fun putting a character into a different style all together.

So I was cruising the "Brony" meme site on the icanhascheezburger site (if you've been there, you'll know what I'm talking about) and saw a link to IMDB and the television series.  So I put my rating in for the show and there was a bunch of information.  So, it really is true that the majority of the (at least those who can access the internet) fans are males in their 20's or so.  Females in their 30's (like me of course) are actually a very low number.  Now, I kind of wonder whether that's because many women my age who might be fans are fans because of their children, and they don't have time to be going around online voting for cartoons.  It's a theory I have, but at least my name is in there somewhere so they know I'm a fan too.

The strange thing, and I know I've said this before, is that most women my age grew up with My Little Pony in its original incarnation.  I'm proud of that fact, but not in a creepy 'hoarder/white trash' kind of way.  If you've ever met someone like that, you know.


I just can't grow up.  Okay...WON'T might be a bit more accurate.  Sure, I work my 40 hours, I do my manager stuff, I try to be all professional from time to time.  I pay my bills, I take my cats to the vet, I clean the house...but my house is filled with posters of cats and anime and cartoons.  I have a shelf in my master bedroom of stuffed animals that both my husband and I have collected over the years.

But I don't like pink.

I'm not sure why Pinkie Pie was the first of the ponies I drew in this style, but I'm thinking of trying a few more soon, so keep your eyes peeled.

More weirdness to come.

New Year's Repairs

Instead of writing a list of New Year's Resolutions, I thought I'd make a list of repairs that I'm going to be working on this year.  I believe I started this blog after buying our house, well after we got settled in, in fact, so that most of the initial problems were solved long before I started writing about life.  And for quite awhile, we didn't have many problems crop up, just the usual cleaning and daily care.  But the house was in pretty bad shape when we first bought it since it was a bank owned property where the owners were obviously not happy to have left their home.

I think I might first tell you about the state of the house, at least briefly, because from what I've heard it was originally owned by a couple, and you can kind of tell that things were going well.  They'd painted the downstairs, installed various shelving units in the garage and basement, put up wallpaper borders in the kitchen (bleck - first thing to go!) and at least for awhile, I think they had a pretty good home.  Somewhere in there, according to a neighbor, they moved to another town, allowing one of their children's families move in with their two young children.  You can tell that one room had been 'loved' to death by the sheer amount of dirt and crayon drawings on the walls.  Then another room must have had a special painting day with the kids helping because it was painted fuchsia pink and there were tracks and fingerprints of it everywhere throughout the house.  I'm still finding spots on the stairways, outside on the back doors, you get the picture.  They must have thought that the bright paint was a good idea because part of it was also in the second bath, but they ran out of paint and used a bright orange to finish it up.  I figured this room was for a pre-teen because every square inch of the pink space was pin-holed with, what I assumed were posters of some sort.

There was also candle wax everywhere.  This was a rather new addition to the house before we got it because over time the spots I was unable to get out of the carpet have turned black with dirt buildup and then I have to spend time repairing these spots on the floors.  There were also nailpolish spots and smoke damage in the master bedroom where I suspected mom or dad smoked under the bathroom fan, staining the counter with nicotine as they put out their butts, burning the floor's linoleum multiple times.

Almost every light switch cover was damaged or removed, all of the light fixtures and fans were gone, nearly all of the appliances were gone and so too all the blinds and even one of the doors was removed from its hinges.

Mind you, this wasn't the worst house that we'd looked at during our house-hunt a year ago (goodness, it's almost been a year since we started looking!) but it took me a good week to get all of those repairs completed, and the bank had to fix a gas leak too.  We had other problems over time, like bad lightbulbs and beeping smoke detectors, a garage door that we had to get openers for, and a back porch that I had to pound into submission so it wouldn't fall apart on us the first year.

During the summer months we'd pretty much solved most of our problems, except perhaps for the leaking sub-pump, which was thankfully a very easy fix.  Leaky sinks that my father-in-law repaired.  But overall, this house has treated us pretty well.

And then...

There's a leak in the basement.  We've been working on fixing it for half a week now, but it's leaking from a t-joint under the washing machine, and no matter what we've tried, nothing has stopped the leak.  Tape, epoxy, rubber sealant...  So that's number one.

The calk that I thought I'd repaired in the bathrooms is now cracking, so obviously I did that wrong in the first place.

The soap dispenser in the kitchen stopped working so we need to get a stopper for the hole and just stop using that all together.

The pretty wood floors in the kitchen I thought had been there awhile?  I think they were actually put in to sell the house because they're starting to fade already.

Not to mention all of the nasty holes in the linoleum floor in the master bath which needs a new coating.

The subpump pipe next to the house needs a better repair than the duck tape we used at the beginning of the year...

Well, you get the picture I think.



And yet, you're probably wondering, why am I sitting here blogging instead of getting on some of these problems now?  Well, it's because I spent a few hours putting up all of the Christmas decorations, and that is enough work for me!

Christmas Card Time

It's always been one of those debated subjects in my family when it comes to Christmas cards.  I remember as a little girl watching my Mom pull out the big box of cards, the roll-a-dex, pens, stamps and address labels.  She'd then proceed to use up an entire book or two of stamps (which back then were lick and stick so I got to help) as she wrote out each and every envelope, signed our names inside of the cards and then sent them off to various friends, neighbors, family members and everyone Mom could think of.

At first we'd get so many cards back that we'd have an entire door plastered with them, some hanging onto the wall next to it.  That was, of course, before the internet really caught on with the masses.

Then, people started to die and people just didn't do Christmas cards any more.  So when we received a card from someone, Mom put a little symbol next to their names in the address book (she got rid of the roll-a-dex), changing the symbol from year to year so the next year she'd know who to send Christmas cards.

After awhile, those numbers dwindled and I think Mom got by with just using cards from previous years and sending out a handful here and there as she received them.  And actually, shortly before I moved out, I was helping her with the few cards because I put in my friends and associates as well.

When I moved out of state, I was fired up!  Time to send out a bunch of Christmas cards so everyone knew where I lived and I'd print out pictures of me and my (at the time boyfriend) husband who I was living with.

I received about 10 cards that year.

The next year, only about 5.

This year, so far, only 1.

I'm debating on whether to send everyone Christmas cards this year since we just moved and yes, I have a new address that maybe not everyone knows about... but it's this personal debate of whether it's worth the time and effort.  Even in a technological age, much of my family doesn't keep in touch with me through the internet or even Facebook.  So you'd think that even once a year they'd want to hear from me through a card.  Say "hey, how you doin'?  We're still alive" or something to that extent.  But when we're only 15 days out from Christmas, just two short weeks away...you think I'd have more to show for it.

It's not that I'm expecting presents, visits, fruitcakes, or even a phone call.  But a card?  Is it REALLY so hard to send cards now in this age of texts and emails?  Why is it so hard to WRITE more than two-three words?  People don't want to call when they can text, and they don't want to write because they can text...and yet if I don't get even a text, are you even alive out there?

Maybe that's why the Christmas spirit is so hard to come by anymore.  It's hard to receive it when no one is giving.

'Nuff said from Scrooge.  ^_^;

It's Christmas Time Again

The holidays for me have changed a lot since I was a little kid.  Maybe I have to clarify that to the year 1999, just as the New Year had rolled in, because I remember very distinctly playing one of the Legend of Zelda games and fishing, showing my Dad how cool it was, very shortly before he died.

When you lose a parent at the age of 19, things can get pretty weird very fast.  Luckily I was still in college and even though I had an on-campus job, it wasn't a real job by any means so there wasn't a big disturbance from being gone for awhile.  My mom told me I needed to stay in college and that summer I picked up my first job where I'd put up a Christmas tree on Halloween, find myself in a mall on the day after Thanksgiving and find only one parking spot at the far edge of the property, and I had a Mom who didn't want to decorate for the holidays anymore.

My brother and I took it upon ourselves to pick up the holidays.  That was the first year that I made an effort (in the freezing cold and rain) to string lights up outside my house, to decorate the Christmas tree, and to get my Mom going when it came to making Thanksgiving dinner.  In fact, not too many years later, I'd started doing Thanksgiving all by myself (with a few helpful tips now and then) and eventually Mom even started decorating and getting into the spirit again.

But ever since that first Christmas in retail, I've been there, putting up trees around Halloween and not being able to enjoy a Christmas carol or tune because it's been played 50 Million times before December even hits.  Being one of the retail people can really suck any fun that Christmas once held for a person.  I try not to get into the spirit some years because I worry that I'll just wear out too quickly, and I usually do.  I wait until the last week or so before Christmas to shop, wrap presents, mail cards, etc. just so I don't get burned out.  It's hard being the numb one when everyone is having parties and exchanging gifts.  But I guess that's just the person I've turned out to be since my Dad died.

Maybe it would be different if we had a big family.  In fact, our family is so small now, at least the amount that can travel, we can sit around our little kitchen table.  I made Thanksgiving dinner in such a blur this year that I'm not sure how it all came together at exactly the same time, or how it was over so quickly.  I even got to watch the parade this year, albeit, mostly on the TiVo, fast-forwarding through commercials  Basically just my Mom, my husband's parent and grandmother, and besides a few aunts and uncles who all live out of state, it's a pretty small family, so holidays are rather brief I guess.

This year I decorated as I always do.  I think I get more enjoyment out of the process of decorating than I actually do enjoying the decorations.  Mind you, I do like looking at decorations I only see once a year, and maybe that's the reason I deck the walls like I do.  But we have very few people over to enjoy them, and when I mention 'oh, I should take a picture to show you', even my Mom shrugs and says, 'that's okay'.

But, even without people enjoying my decorations, at least I know that the cats are enjoying them.  They enjoy playing with the strings of lights in the windows...they enjoy chewing on the Christmas tree, they enjoy the copious amounts of treats that I've been giving them randomly...you know, the Christmas spirit and all.  They even have a stocking of their own we're working on putting stuff in.  It's the little things that count you know.

Boy....this really makes me sound pathetic.

I guess I should go work on Christmas cards.