catch up sunday

Posted on November 3, 2024 by is there any more pie?

I have not forgotten about blogging, I swear.  There have been…issues.  My computer is very, very slow.  As in “barely operating”.  I bought some software to clean it up, but nothing has worked so far.  Banjo Man has offered to drive me to Staples today to buy a new computer, so I will be back in business later this afternoon (she said hopefully).

Why is he driving me instead of me doing it myself?  Well, first of all he wants to stop my dithering about repairing it/buying new/stalling by walking me into the store and making sure I leave with a new computer.

Second, I’ve been dealing with this ongoing low-iron = no energy problem.  People, it has not been fun.  BUT I finally bit the bullet and had an iron infusion last Thursday.   Fingers crossed for increased energy and the ability to go up and down the stairs without stopping to rest (and whine).  I haven’t been able to stand for any length of time, meaning we actually sent out for pizza Monday night.

It was so good I had to take a picture.

It took me three days to assemble a chicken spaghetti casserole, but I got it done.  I will share the recipe in the next blog post.  If you’re a ten-year old boy (or Banjo Man) you’re going to think it’s fantastic.

Third, I have a toothache.  The dentist warned me last April that she thought a particular molar would be a problem eventually and it would be a “nightmare” (her word) to remove.  I will not bore you with the grisly details, but as  you can imagine this information did not fill me with joy.   I hope to get an appointment asap and start the process.  In the meantime I’ve dug out my five-year old supply of Percocet.

Has it been a long week?  Oh, yes, it has!

Here’s the bright spot in all of the medical drama:

My nephew and his sweet wife are expecting their first child in January. So of course I had to make a quilt.  This has kept me busy for a couple of weeks now and has been a happy distraction.

Another happy distraction?  A friend’s garden:

I do hate to see the end of fall decorations, but they’re lovely while they are here.

Posted in family, food, personal female whining, quilting, rhode island | 5 Comments

going batty

Posted on October 26, 2024 by is there any more pie?

This is a bin of leftover quilt batting.  Strips and chunks of batting from years of quilt-making have been saved.  Why, you ask?  Because it is easy to zigzag them together to create bigger pieces, “new” batting to use in new quilts.

Last May at the lake was very cold and cloudy, the kind of weather that makes me want to hole up inside and sew. Which I did. The summer food was prepared and frozen, stacked in the freezer for the upcoming days of family dinners. So I bought “travel the world” and “explore the wilderness” themed fabrics for son Will’s future second grade class.

That project finished, I had the bright idea to create little quilts for story time using the leftover fabrics. Little quilts are great fun to make, so I made seven of them before the weather changed, the sun came out and my Texans arrived.

Now that I’m home it is time to quilt them. I dragged out several bins of batting and began to measure the strips.

Clearly this was not going to be the easy project I’d envisioned.

Here is the fabric I bought for the 2nd grade projects:

The pennants outside of Will’s classroom.

These pictures are out of order. I’m sure there is a way to fix that, but I haven’t figured it out yet. I’ve been working on the blog post for three days and had to stop to install and run new software to speed up and clean up my computer–and it didn’t work.

So…zigzagging batting strips turned out to be a bit of a challenge. Maybe even a nightmare. I gave up and ordered a king-size batting on Amazon, which I will cut up into four pieces for the four remaining quilts. I have shoved 2/3 of my old batting scraps into a garbage bag and have kept a bin of the larger ones for a time when I might possibly be able to use them.

The floor of my office is now empty and I am much happier.

As for my computer, I am going to take it to the experts this week. It’s barely usable and I waste a lot of time sitting here waiting for it to move between websites and programs and photos.

I bet you all know what I mean.

Tomorrow I will return to piecing chunks of fabric together to make quilt backings.

Being frugal is a lot of work.

Posted in quilting, rhode island | 2 Comments

where’s the bear?

Posted on October 18, 2024 by is there any more pie?

Game cameras, ring cameras and maybe even in-real-time have shown proof that there is a bear wandering around our little wooded neighborhood.

Yes, I live in the country.  In the woods.  We are used to deer, foxes, and turkeys strolling past our house.  We have even spotted an elusive fisher once in a great while.  And last spring Banjo Man exchanged stares with a bobcat perched on a stump next to our house.

But a bear?  I am looking out the windows frequently in hopes of spotting said bear.  Maybe we need a RI game camera (ours are up at the cabin 3000 miles away) after all.

We have been home five days.  I did not get dressed yesterday.  I sipped tea and took naps.  I’m obviously not recovering from our 15-day road-and-plane trip, not yet.   As I told Dancing Mandolin Player on our phone call yesterday, I may not get dressed again until March, when Banjo Man tells me it’s time for us to drive to the airport and fly west.

Maybe our local bear and I are feeling the same urge:  hibernation until spring.

Posted in personal female whining, rhode island | Leave a comment

soup and friends

Posted on October 17, 2024 by is there any more pie?

My dear friend Nancy B. died of ovarian cancer fourteen years ago this month.  She was a brilliant writer and a faithful, generous, loving friend.

Those of us lucky enough to be part of her life miss her terribly.

In honor of her, I made her Tomato Soup yesterday.  Would you like to try it?

Nancy’s Tomato Soup Recipe

Ingredients:

1 chopped onion, sauteed in butter
28 oz can of diced tomatoes
2 cans of cream of tomato soup
1 1/2 cups of milk
2 TBS sugar
1 tsp each of basil, garlic powder and paprika
1 8-oz cream cheese, cut up into chunks in order to  melt faster

Mix all together in a crock pot or pot.  Heat and cook, stirring so that cream cheese melts (there might still be little bits but that’s okay).

Nancy served it with banana muffins!

I’ve been searching through pictures on my computer, but the darn thing is acting up and I can’t access what I want.  Here’s a picture of Nancy from her Silhouette page.   She wrote as “Dee Holmes”.

Dee Holmes's picture

Posted in food, friends, rhode island, writing | 3 Comments

a little reminder

Posted on October 16, 2024 by is there any more pie?

I have been attempting to age “with grace” until I saw this on the Bonnie Hunter quilting blog this morning.  I like this philosophy better, don’t you?

 

Posted in a more pie opinion, rhode island | 3 Comments

too lazy for words

Posted on October 13, 2024 by is there any more pie?

Okay, it’s almost noon and I am still in my nightgown.

Such a luxury.

Banjo Man is outside weed-whacking the edges of our very long driveway.  He is so happy to be cleaning up the place.  Daughter Nancy couldn’t get the darn thing started more than once, but it is working now and so far so good.

Not such great news for the lawnmower, though.  Despite having it fixed (again) before we left in April, it only worked once and then died.  Banjo Man hates it with a passion, so I have been researching lawn mowers and I think there is a trip to Tractor Supply in Banjo Man’s future.

Since it is close to the very disappointing Chinese restaurant, we might have a new mower later this afternoon.

Instead of accomplishing anything truly important, I am here in my office perusing things on my computer.  I have ordered a special soap dish for my Humby shampoo and conditioner bars.

Snuggle Tray

I have been mightily tempted to order one of these, but I am resisting.  I have one at the lake and it has been great fun so let’s see if I can make do with a round one.   The vintage ones are about twice as much on Etsy.  Who knew?

Square Tube Cake Pan

As I said, I’ve been researching lawn mowers.  The prime candidate is a Troy-Bilt 21″ gas push mower, but the reviews are of the “love it or hate it” variety.  Maybe Banjo Man will get lucky this time?

I think he should buy an inexpensive one, because the costly mowers don’t seem to last long, even after expensive repairs.  So why bother?

Just a non-mowing woman’s opinion.

Time to get dressed, I think.  If you own a lawn mower  you love or hate, please let me know.  I don’t want to read any more about them.

Enjoy your Sunday.

 

 

 

Posted in family, rhode island, shopping | Leave a comment

and the number is…3008

Posted on October 12, 2024 by is there any more pie?

That’s how many miles we covered on our trip home.

And yes, we are home.  At 5:15 PM.  It was a day that started calmly at 8:00 AM and would move along quite nicely until we entered New York State at Port Jervis.

Oh, there was traffic!  Lots and lots of traffic.  Bumper to bumper, stop-and-go, very stressful traffic.  It would last well into Connecticut.  I drove for over two hours and certainly didn’t go very far.

Banjo Man took over somewhere in Connecticut, but after about twenty minutes of smooth sailing, we were back in the middle of traffic.  Happy to reach 15 mph once in a while, we crept across the state until we could break free at Middletown and head south on Rt. 9, right down to I-95.

We stopped in Westerly, RI to pick up Chinese take-out from our favorite restaurant for dumplings, etc.  Later on we realized the food was inedible, the worst we’d ever tried to eat.  We are taking it back to them tomorrow, having called and told them how bad it was.

That’s a first.

Also it was the only bad meal of the trip.  Right here in our own backyard.  A bit depressing.  (I wish we had a Culver’s in RI.  I liked that place, but it was in Indiana.)

Daughter Nancy was waiting for us when we drove up to the house.  Such a happy welcome!

The house looked so good.

Banjo Man is on the couch watching college football.  I wonder how long he will stay awake.  I plan to go to bed soon and not get out of it for eighteen hours or so.  Or maybe not until Monday.

Or Tuesday.  Maybe by then I will have the energy to unpack bins of velvet pumpkins and start decorating.

After all, it’s October and pumpkins await.

 

 

 

Posted in rhode island, road trip, travel | 4 Comments

last night on the road, tomorrow home

Posted on October 11, 2024 by is there any more pie?

This is the prettiest bathroom floor of all the hotel bathroom floors I have seen on the road.

We’re in a Fairfield Inn in Lock Haven, Pennsylvania. This pretty town is about ten miles north of I-80 and as we drove past farms, homes, barns and churches into a thriving town, I was second-guessing myself. Was there really a great hotel out here? Mystery solved when we finally found it…next to a cancer hospital. I imagine a lot of exhausted and worried people have stayed here. My heart goes out to them.

We ate on Main Street in a local restaurant with many Greek specialties. Very nice and a special dinner for our last night on the road. Have you ever heard of Greek lasagna?

We were in the car at 7:30 this morning. Drove 460 miles. Mostly on roads narrowed by “road work” signs and cones, but we never saw anyone actually working on the road.

It remains a mystery.

We have 381 miles to go.

I can hardly believe we are almost home!

Posted in road trip, travel | Leave a comment

how did we get to howe?

Posted on October 11, 2024 by is there any more pie?

Indiana, that is.

We were up before six yesterday, on the road before seven-thirty. By early afternoon we were feeling so good about the day, I booked a hotel (free with points!!) to make a 500-mile day.

We weren’t going to have such long days, but it was a good day to drive.

Until it wasn’t.

Forward progress was halted for an hour and twenty minutes outside of Chicago. It was a very long time to the Indiana border. Traffic? Oh, yes! The stop and go kind for mile upon mile.

We arrived at Howe at sunset, discovered a chain called Culver’s for salads and chicken tenders, then crashed into our free hotel beds.

I don’t know what our philosophy is today. We are 815 miles from our New England home.

Tomorrow night I will be in my own bed. But we have no idea where we will be tonight.

Stay tuned and wish us luck.

Posted in road trip, travel | 1 Comment

iowa, yes, we made it

Posted on October 9, 2024 by is there any more pie?

This morning at 9 we “Ubered” to the airport. Our driver was a musician from Nashville who plays jazz bass.

Ah, Austin…

I saw these at the Austin airport. Tempting.

We flew to Dallas, then to Omaha. A very easy trip, as flights go.

A sign at the Omaha airport:

Sounds good to me!

The airport is under construction.

These are views from the sky walk.

Our GPS never works in Omaha, so it was a challenge finding the interstate to Des Moines.

We didn’t make it to Des Moines, but we came close. We’re in a small town off I-80 in a not-so-great hotel, but we were tired and not fussy.

It’s 7:30 but it feels a lot later. We hope to be up and out early. The three-day Columbus Day weekend is coming up and I have no idea what kind of traffic we’ll encounter between now and home.

Tomorrow: Illinois and Indiana!

Posted in road trip, travel | 1 Comment