More of the Same... Well Kind Of

I'm not going to talk about how busy and crazy things are around the homestead. Nope. Not gonna do it. If I did I'd just sound like a tired old record with a scratch that causes the needle to skip back and forth over the same three seconds of song. Over and over and over...

Wait. What was that? You don't remember records? Those vinyl discs that we call records? Yikes! Definitely showing my age here.

Well, um, oh-kay, moving right along. (But you're not fooling me. I know you guys remember them.)

What I am going to talk about is knitting... Glorious knitting. It is a sanity saver! At least for me. Don't you guys agree? When things get rough, it's good to have something to focus on. Something to do. And I can never just do one thing at a time. Nope not me. Especially when one of my projects is a very basic pattern. I need something a little more to work on as well. Keeps me from getting too bored.

Right now, I'm working on THIS project. It's for a friend of mine who is expecting. I at first thought her shower was going to be in March (she's due in April) but it's not. It's going to be at the end of February which means I have a lot of knitting to do on this. I'm only 25% of the way through the pattern.

My other project is the Traveling Woman Shawl. A group of knitters on Twitter started a Twitter Knit A Long (#TwitKAL) and so I jumped in. It sounded fun and like I said, I like doing multiple projects at one time. Keeps me motivated. Sounds strange I know, but hey, it works for me.

Oh, if you're a crocheter and not a knitter and want to join in the fun of a TwitKAL, the lovely JLYarnworks is hosting a #TwitKAL for those who crochet. Should be fun. I have enjoyed the Knit A Long. Just wishing I had more time to work on the pattern.

It's a lacy shawl. And I've never worked on a lace project before. Right now, I'm not that far along, might not be that far along even when we reach the end of the TwitKAL because of the baby blanket, but I do plan to finish. I think it's a lovely pattern and can't wait to see the finished product. Also, it will stretch my abilities. I like that.

OK, have to sign off now or I'll just keep talking about these two projects. But don't worry. I'll be back with pictures of them soon.

Crazy Days

Is it me, or have the days gone loco? My poorly neglected blog. I've thought of you often and have guilted over the fact that I have not blogged. But not enough to come out here and actually blog. Pitiful... Maybe. But I have been so busy. Things are just nonstop.

My sweet, little angel is growing like crazy. I swear she'll be walking soon. She certainly keeps me running and on my toes and with very little spare time. In fact, I wonder some days what spare time really means. I know for certain this elusive thing makes me stop and consider all the things to do, both the required and for fun things, during any time I may have that isn't booked solid. With that in mind many things just have not made the list.

However, now that we're (well) into the new year, I do plan to blog more.

But before we go there, I'm going to give a quick run down of my 2009 favorites. Ready? Here we go!

2009 Greatest Event: The birth of my daughter! Can't top that.

2009 Best Book: Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief

2009 Best Netflix: Harper's Island

2009 Best Knitting Project: Big Bad Baby Blanket

2009 Best Movie: Star Trek (Sorry Harry)

2009 Best Dish: Great Pumpkin Dessert (Sorry Pioneer Woman, I loved the recipes I've tried from your cookbook. They have been awesome. But the Great Pumpkin Dessert is so dangerously delicious it wins hands down.)

Well, there you go. Now on to 2010!

Not Really Neglectful

Wow, it's been awhile since I posted to the blog. Time really does fly these days. The past several weeks have been great. Full of a lot of firsts. First Halloween. First trip to see Santa. First Thanksgiving. First Christmas Tree. Lots and lots of firsts. And lots of just Mommy and Baby time with C$ out working. As well as lots of Mommy and Baby sicky time. Which is no fun by the way. Just in case you were wondering.

So you see, I haven't been neglecting the blog. I just haven't been able to get here and make a blog sound even the least bit coherent let alone interesting. Not that this post is either of the two in and of itself. But that is life. Sometimes you have to take the good with the bad.

I have a few blog posts in the wings just waiting to hatched. But in the mean time, I think I'll leave you with an iPhone App Review. The Amazon Kindle App for the iPhone.

So far, I'm rather enjoying this app. I've read a couple of books, in the process of reading another and have two books that I'm in the middle of that have just not engaged me enough to propel me to read further. Right now I'm reading a Harlequin Intrique. So far, so good on that one.

But all in all it's a great little device. And it's free to those who own the iPhone. Even better.

I'll type up a Book Talk post about the books I've read on my iKindle soon. But for this post, I'll stick with the App review if that's all right with everyone.

The iKindle uses Amazon's Whispernet feature to delivery the books I purchase directly to my iPhone. No hook ups or downloads. I like that A LOT! When I log on to my phone and connect I automatically download the books.

When I connect, I can either go directly to my last page in the current book I'm reading or back to my main books page. This depends on me and how I closed down the app the last time I was there. But even if I go back to the main selection page it automatically remembers the last page I was on and when I select that book, it takes me right to where I left off. This is great for folks like me who read more than one book at a time.

I can change font and text color. I can refresh, bookmark, read vertical or horizontal.

I know this version of the Kindle doesn't have as many features as the original, big Mac Daddy does. But it has enough for me.

The only feature I can not figure out, is the Archive feature. It tells me it's there, but I just can't figure out how to archive. I think it may have something to do with when I sync up the device. Which, I have not played with that when syncing. Will do that soon.

Still, all in all, it gives me exactly what I need. This app gets an A in my book. And who knows, when I figure out how to archive I might even bump that to an A+.

Sweet Deal!

I know it's been a while since I posted. To say things have been hectic would be an understatement I think. But we're surviving and having a lot of fun with a lot of Baby's Firsts this time of year.

And even though I haven't posted in a few days (weeks) I don't really have the time to post now. But I wanted to jump in here really quick and post this incredibly sweet deal ( that is to say if you love to cook, if you love your crockpot and you love your Kindle it's a sweet deal) that Amazon has going right now.

Amazon has Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Recipes for Entertaining for Kindle priced at $0.00, that's ZERO dollars, as in free, right now. Go check it out!

I know I did. I'm always interested in new recipes and the ease of the slow cooker makes this book appealing. Not to mention that great price.

I don't know how long they'll offer it at this incredible price, so go check it out now.

The Round Down

This here post is all about rounding down. The pounds that is.

My weight did not used to be a struggle for me. I exercised regularly and watched what I ate, almost to the point of being obsessive about it. But when I hit the big 3-0 my weight began to climb, and it's been a tug of war ever since. I would gain weight then lose it.

Gain. Lose.
Gain. Lose.

With each fresh cycle I never seemed to lose as much as I'd gained. The result, too much weight! Add to that my pregnancy last year and the result, a much needed diet overhaul.

Granted, I lost most of my baby weight while nursing. But once I stopped, some of that weight crept right back on. Gosh darn it all! So I've decided to take some serious action. I signed up for Weight Watchers.

I've done Weight Watchers in the past with some success. But now I need to more focused, more dedicated. I want my daughter learning good eating habits and how to live a healthy lifestyle and that starts with me. And how can teach that if I'm not living it?

So the round down begins now.

Soups On!

Well, ok, not soup exactly. Actually, nothing like soup. But isn't that what 'they' always said in the old black and white movies when dinner was ready?

Maybe? Yes?

Oh well.

But can you at least tell by the lead in that I'm going to talk about food? If not then now you know. More specifically, I'm going to talk about the dinner I had last night. I prepared a meal from The Pioneer Woman's new cookbook.

When I first saw the recipe for her Chicken Spaghetti I knew I was going to make it. The ingredients just appealed to me. And making it even more tempting was the fact that *most* of the ingredients are items that I keep on hand anyway. I don't know about anyone else, but that makes recipes very appealing in my book.

The actual recipe calls for one fryer chicken. In my little, bitty humble kitchen I just simply do not have the room to debone a chicken, so I made a personal modification and boiled up chicken breasts and used can chicken broth instead. I'm all about quick and easy and that fits the bill for me.

Especially since my daughter was sick all weekend. So with that in mind, I did some prep work in advance for this dish. Still it took me longer to get everything assembled that I would have liked. I don't think that was the recipe's fault. In fact, I'm positive it was not. I have to say next time will be better. For one, I know what I'm doing with the recipe now and two, hopefully my daughter won't be so sick next time (or ever again, but I know that's just Mama wishful thinking. Sigh. )

So like I said, I had everything laid out that I was going to need, and I cooked the chicken and shredded it well in advance of meal time. Like I said earlier, one of the appeals of this recipe was the ease and on hand ingredients. That is on hand with one exception.

I don't know about you, but I don't keep diced pimentos (or pimiento) on hand. I don't really know what a pimento is. (Yes, the fact that sentence ends with is drives me crazy too!) So I looked up the word pimento and shame on me for not knowing that a pimento is a pepper. Well, now I know and you do too! Win for us all.

But hey, I've never cooked with the veggie before so that's my excuse and I'm sticking with it. Yep. That's right.

Anyway, I moved right on to preparing the meal and getting everything sliced and diced and then mixed together and boy does that make a lot of food. Not a bad thing. But when you're just looking at the ingredients, you don't really think this is a lot of food. At least I didn't.

But then finally, all the ingredients were mixed and ready to go. The smell was outstandingly yummy. It baked up nice and quick and finally, finally we were eating. The dish was amazing. Very flavorful and pretty colorful to boot. This is a new favorite in the family I think. And to make things even more yummy, there's leftovers for dinner tonight!

Books Books and More Books

Today’s post is about books. Are you surprised I want to talk about books? I kind of am. You see, there for awhile, I lost my love of reading and writing. But I’m working on finding it again. I think what really happened was I lost the ability to lose myself in the story. Mainly because I was too busy trying to pick the story apart. So I’ve ended up spending some time away from fiction books. I’ve been reading a lot of “here’s what to expect with your baby at this age” books and before that “here’s what to expect at this stage of your pregnancy”, and many craft books. But over the last several months I’ve been reading again, or at least trying to.

I’ve actually picked up some fiction novels and read them. I started with some romantic suspense novels (my first love) and most recently finished a YA novel. I also have the Kindle for iPhone and have a few e-books stored there as well.

My original thought for this post was to tell you a little bit about some of these stories and my grade for each. However, due to timing, I’m going to have to break these posts out into multi posts. Perhaps a weekly book post. Yes, I think I like that idea. Every Friday will be book day - books I’m reading, books I want to read and other book related topics. That should make for some Friday fun discussions. It also ensures that I post somewhat regularly.

So for this Friday our first book featured post is Wicked Game by Lisa Jackson and Nancy Bush. I read this book while I was out on maternity leave. You can read an excerpt of the book here.

But here’s the blurb:

ONE BY ONE, THEY’LL DIE.

Twenty years ago, wild child Jessie Brentwood vanished from St. Elizabeth’s high school. Most in Jessie’s tight circle of friends believed she simply ran away. Few suspected that Jessie was hiding a shocking secret-one that brought her into the crosshairs of a vicious killer.

UNTIL THERE’S NO ONE LEFT.

Two decades pass before a body is unearthed on school grounds and Jessie’s old friends reunite to talk. Most are sure that the body is Jessie’s, that the mystery of what happened to her has finally been solved. But soon, Jessie’s friends each begin to die in horrible, freak accidents that defy explanation.

BUT HER.

Becca Sutcliff has been haunted for years by unsettling visions of Jessie, certain her friend met with a grisly end. Now the latest deaths have her rattled. Becca can sense that an evil force is shadowing her too, waiting for just the right moment to strike. She feels like she’s going crazy. Is it all a coincidence-or has Jessie’s killer finally returned to finish what was started all those years ago?

So let me start by saying that the blurb hooked me. I was looking for something different, and I thought this was it. The story started out all right and kept up an ok pace until about one-hundred or so pages in. Then it started slowing way down. I think because the plot got caught up in itself. There were a lot of characters, and they didn’t seem to act rationally. There were a lot of ‘clues’ that never really gave a clue as to what was happening and many of the character’s motivations just were not there. I could specifically site the Hero, Hudson, and the Heroine, Becca, who repeatedly claimed they wanted answers, but when it came right down to getting the answers were more interested in jumping each others bones than seeking the answers. Even after Hudson’s sister was killed. I could, maybe, forgive this if I felt an emotional tug but that too fell short of the mark.

The only thing that kept me reading was the dangling carrot. The Colony. This plot point did fascinate me, and I’d hoped for more on this. Ms. Jackson and Ms. Bush definitely knew how to work the line so as to keep it just out of reach. Almost too well, because it started to become a little frustrating. Especially at the end when there seemed to be a huge information dump where the authors told me a whole bunch of backstory instead of letting it unfold.

Overall, I ended up with mixed feelings about the book. On the one hand I was disappointed. However, on the other hand, I bought the next book, Unseen, in The Colony series by Nancy Bush. Which I would not have bought had I not still been very curious about the The Colony.

Still, even with that in mind, I have to rate the book a solid C. There were too many other issues for me to rate it higher.