Freezing on the outside & laughing on the inside!

I guess it's only fair that because my a/c is now working that something else needs to break in order to take it's place. This week's journey deals with my gas hot water heater. After taking it completely apart, we have now realized that Kirk and I have no idea how to fix a hot water heater. We have now suffered for 2 days w/out hot water. Sound like I'm whining a little? You should have heard me in the shower!!! Not only did I scream every time the water touched me, but when I went to turn the shower off.................the handle just spun! There was no turning it off!!!! This should have pushed me over the edge, but for some reason only made me laugh. And the more I laughed, the more I realized how lucky I am that we at least have water. Whether it's hot or cold.........we're pretty lucky. That being said, I'm hoping this will be our last night w/out hot water. Hopefully we'll be able to get someone to look at it tomorrow. I'll have to say that I'm feeling pretty energized after my freezing cold shower. At least I'm not alone in this! Every few minutes I hear Kirk yell, "WOOOO!" from inside the bathroom. This is wrong..............very wrong, but every time he yells it makes me even happier!

Vegetable Beef Stew

1 lb. hamburger, stew meat or leftover roast

1 vidalia onion diced

4 carrots peeled and diced

8 red potatoes cut into bite size chunks

1 ear of corn cut off the cob

1/2 lb. fresh green beans snapped into bite size pieces

3 basil leaves finely chopped

sprig of rosemary finely chopped

2 cloves of garlic minced

1 T. bacon grease

10 very ripe roma tomatoes diced very small

2 cups homemade chicken broth(this is just what I had in the freezer)

This is a very easy, very versatile stew recipe. I usually use whatever beef I have in the freezer & whatever vegetables I happen to have in the refrigerator. The vegetables can be altered to your liking. I've always thought that celery would be good in this. But, I married a man who not only hates celery, but passed that trait onto my 3 children. So, celery is a no go for me. If you don't have any fresh tomatoes, you could always use canned. I only used chicken broth because that's usually all I ever have here at my house. Beef broth in the can would be fine too. If you don't have any broth, water will always work. The broth just gives it that little extra something. If you like your soup thick, I would stick with my measurements, but if you like it more soupy then I would add a little more broth.

Brown the hamburger(for this recipe it is important to use regular hamburger, not lean. I know, I know..........but we need the grease that cooks out of the hamburger for later) in a large skillet. Season meat with salt, cracked pepper & garlic powder. Once hamburger is cooked, using a slotted spoon ladle hamburger out of skillet draining the grease back into the skillet. I used a large wooden spoon to push the hamburger down to get all the grease out. Put the drained hamburger into crock pot. To the hamburger grease add 1 tablespoon of bacon grease(I always have bacon grease in the frig for this sort of thing. It must be a southern thing. If you don't have any bacon grease add a tablespoon of olive oil to the hamburger grease.). To the greased skillet add onions, potatoes and carrots. Season with salt, cracked pepper and garlic powder. This will take about 20 minutes or so. Stir every few minutes so nothing starts to stick. The purpose of this step is to not only lightly brown the potatoes, but marry the flavors of the meat with the vegetables. The potatoes are not going to be completely cooked in this step. You just want to give them a light brown color. Once this has been achieved add chopped garlic, basil, rosemary and green beans to the vegetable mixture. Only sauté for a few minutes or the garlic may burn and taste bitter. Now, add the entire pan of vegetables to the crock pot. Next, cut the corn kernels off of the cob right into the crock pot. Add chopped tomatoes and broth. Cook all day stirring whenever you happen to think about it. Make sure you taste this before serving. It may need more spices. If you like it spicy you could add hot sauce to this or even cayenne. I always serve mine with crackers or corn bread. Tonight will most definitely be crackers!

Go BIG or go home......Updated



It has been 27 days since I planted my super small, elevated fall garden planted entirely in composted material. I couldn't be happier with the results so far. 

Here's a picture of my garden when it was planted on September 22, 2011. It contains cabbage, broccoli, collards & buttercrisp lettuce. And because it was planted in composted material.........I've had a few tomatoes germinate. I'm not sure how they'll do, but as soon as I saw their leaves it made me question any weed that sprouted up......

And here is my garden today.....

I can't believe that in less than a month I am able to go out to the garden on a daily basis and harvest fresh lettuce. What a nice treat!

She who dies with the most fabric........WINS!!

It is time for me to make a confession...............................I horde material. There, I've said it. It's out in the open and I can finally breathe. I don't care how old it is, how small the piece...........if it's fabric...........it's mine! I have hand me down material, new material, old material and very, very old material. It is my weakness. Luckily, with my latest project I am going to use up a good amount of my stock pile. I have decided that after years and years..............it is time to make another quilt. This quilt is different from any of the other quilts I've made in years past. This quilt is called a rag quilt. Each square is quilted individually before piecing the entire quilt together. And the seams are wrong side out on purpose leaving strips of soft, frayed fabric. I am basing my quilt on this particular picture of a rag quilt that I found online.

Rag quilts are exactly what they imply..............made of scraps of fabric that don't seem to belong anymore or are too small. The prettiest ones I've seen contain a variety of fabrics with no particular order or design. In many ways, my life is like a quilt. Like everyone else, I've had my share of "ugly" moments in my life. But, the beautiful ones always outweigh the bad. But I could never wish away these painful parts of my life because what if that changed what I have now? The quilt that I'm making now is alot like that. There are pieces of my quilt that are beyond ugly. But, for some reason, I can still see the beauty in them. And as much as it pains me to include them, I just can't make myself omit them. 

This material was given to me by my grandmother, Mo. I love this particular material for a number of reasons. First of all the material is actually dated and stamped 1968 right on the fabric and second of all...........I'm pretty sure it's never been unfolded since Mo put it away years and years ago. It reminds me of when I was little and lived in the East Palatka house. I'm not sure why, but it does. And for some unknown reason..............I love it! And because misery loves company I also had to include the other ugly one too. They seem to fit together somehow.

pieces from Kirk's BDU's will also be included.................

here's material from the curtains I made for Ryley's room when he was a baby............

here's a piece from Bailey's very first halloween costume. I dressed her up as a witch and made her a dress.

I made throw pillows for the kids out of this material..................

My step-mom made a beautiful Easter dress out of this material for Bailey when she was only a few months old. I bought her hot pink jelly sandals to go with the outfit.............

this is all of the material that I am using to make the quilt. There are 312 7inch pieces and 50 13inch pieces total. As you can probably tell from some of the previous pictures I have already started quilting the individual pieces. I'm only about a quarter of the way finished with this step. Luckily I have chosen a simple X pattern for quilting and because of that can do it with the machine instead of by hand.

This is the quilt that I made for Kirk while he was away at Basic Training in 1997. I used old jeans, red bandana and various patriotic materials for this quilt that depict where our life was at the time. Bandanas always remind me of him.....................when I met Kirk he was a farmer. And he'd wear a bandana around his head when he worked out in the fields. Doesn't sound like anything special, but I remember the first time I saw him working on the farm and thinking I'd never seen anyone look as sexy as him in a worn out pair of jeans and a bandana tied around his head. So, that is why I included that. Kirk will forever be a blue jean man and because of that................I included jeans. My quilts are full of memories. So many things are tied into my quilts. I choose the material so carefully. Each piece needs to mean something to me...........or to my family. Kirk always says that he wants to be buried with the quilt I made for him. I love teasing him that I'm going to have to throw it away one of these days. It's been repaired and washed thousands of times and is still the prized possession of whoever gets to it first on movie night. It's age only adds to it's appeal. How many times have one of us ran our hands over the embroidered parts of the quilt???? I want this new quilt to hold the same kind of memories for us that the old one does. So, I included material that to the unknowing eye might not seem to fit. But, to us...................couldn't be more perfect.