Hot hot hot!

Good ol' summer in southwestern Ohio...harumph! The temp today is about 98 degrees with 70 percent humidity. It's so hot that when you go outside, it's like walking into a furnace. At the back of my mind I am constantly thinking of people who are living in this area without air conditioning. I just can't imagine how they survive. If we still had our New Hampshire room airconditioners, I'd be donating them for sure. Brayden's babysitter overslept this morning, so Brayden came to my house today instead of tomorrow. Poor little guy has a nasty, phlemmy cough, but that didn't do one thing to change that sweet little disposition. We had a very good day. We went outside this morning and I hooked up the hose and let him water the flowers -- Gramma and the grass got far more water than the flowers did, but oh well -- we had fun. This afternoon when it was too hot to go out in the sun, we went out on the back deck (which has a canopy) and I brought out a tupperware container full of water, a spoon and a measuring cup. I stripped Brayden, diaper and all, and just let him have at the water. I ended up refilling the container about 6 times, but he had so much fun splashing around in that little bit of water! We stayed outside for more than an hour, which is amazing, considering the heat. Jeff is home sick again, same cold as Brayden. He seems a bit better today, but still feels real punky and tired. Because Brayden was here, my To Do list was small today. Here's what I've gotten done: -- 1 load of laundry -- Put clean dishes away (with Brayden's help) -- Reload dishwasher (with Brayden's help) -- Vac kitchen (with Brayden's help) -- Make bed -- Quilt - got in about an hour while he was taking his nap -- Put toys away after Brayden left Dinner tonight is hot dogs, rolls and salad. Too tired to do much else, and it's too hot to turn the oven on!

Car Shopping and Today's To Do List

It's finally time to buy a NEW CAR! YAY! I have no idea what I want, but I do know I want something that gets 30+ mpg. Our mechanic (the world's BEST mechanic) wants me to buy American, and I will look at what's available. I did see an ad for a 2008 Taurus Crossover that I liked, but not sure if it's in my budget. I won't be able to go out looking for a few days -- waiting for the $$$ to come in to pay for the car. Instead of a car loan, we take a loan from our stock savings plan, and then the interest is paid back to us, rather than the credit union. The car payment is actually the same and comes right out of Jeff's paycheck - but the interest actually goes into our stock savings account. Since GE stock isn't doing well at the moment (or for the past several years - harumph!), this makes total sense financially. So meanwhile I'll be on the web looking at different cars. Nearby we have an "AutoMall" which has a dealership for literally every car maker, and is "one stop shopping". Quite convenient to shop for a new car this way! I was planning on going car shopping today, but now have to wait for the $$$ to come in, so it's time for a new To Do List. Here's what I plan on getting done today: MONDAY'S TO DO LIST -- Clean upstairs bathrooms -- Empty all upstairs trash -- Spend afternoon quilting -- Dishes out of dishwasher -- Sweep Kitchen floor I really need to vac and dust upstairs, but Jeff is home sick today with a nasty cold and cough, and I don't want to stir up dust and make him cough more. So my day just got a whole lot easier! The downstairs is still clean so nothing major to do there other than keep the kitchen cleaned up. DINNER ideas - Hmm...with Jeff sick it needs to be something simple, but it's WAY too hot to make soup. I have some leftover roasted chicken, so maybe I will make a stir fry with chicken, green peppers (from the garden!), green beans (also from the garden!), onions, garlic (good for his cold) and noodles, all with a light sauce made just from some chicken stock and ?? not sure what yet. That will be light enough for this nasty hot weather and without milk or cream so it won't aggravate his cough.

Another round of colds?!? No no no!

Brayden came down with another cold over the weekend, poor little guy. And as of this afternoon, Jeff has announced that he is also feeling punky and believes he's on his way to getting sick as well. It's only been in the past week or so that I feel as if I'm finally over that horrendous bout of bronchitis/borderline pneumonia from a few months ago -- and here it comes again! UGH! Just the thought of being that sick again is making me crazy! I have washed my hands a zillion times today with anti-bacteria soap. I am driving Jeff crazy because every time he touches something -- coffee pot, door knobs, telephone, remote -- I'm right behind him with a Clorox-wipe! And - drum roll - I have announced that I am sleeping in the guest room tonight. He's starting to cough and hack and I do NOT want those germs landing on me all night! I'm not sure Jeff understands how serious I am about this. I was SO sick that last time -- sicker than I ever remember being in my life -- and I just don't want to go through that again! So, for the first time in 30 years, we're intentionally going to be sleeping in separate beds. Aside from Jeff's cold, today was a nice quiet day. I spent several hours in my quilt room, got all caught up on laundry, made a nice roast chicken dinner, and watched the NASCAR race. Jeff and I are both in a fantasy NASCAR game on ESPN -- and I am real pleased to announce that I am STILL in first place :) I do a lot of reading during the week, pay attention to qualifying and practices, pay attention to who's trying to get into the Top 12 for the Chase, and make good solid decisions. Of course, "things happen" but I've been in the #1 slot for the past 4 out of 5 weeks, so I'm doing something right. Jeff is now in 3rd place, but has been as low as 8th! Our weather here in southwestern Ohio is nothing but NASTY. They've just changed the upcoming week's forecast to very high 90's to low 100's for the entire week! UGH! Of course this area has very high humidity as well, so when you go outside it feels like there is absolutely no air to breath. On the days I have Brayden it will be difficult to keep him in the house, but going outside is just plain unhealthy. Last big news -- I'm going CAR SHOPPING this week! Finally! I followed Jeff over to the mechanic's to pick up his car on Friday, and my car spewed out big puffs of gray smoke the entire way. When we got back to the house, I got out of the car and said, "That's it. I'm not driving this anymore." It is absolutely on it's last legs and I am not going to break down along the road in 100 degree weather. So I am going to drive Jeff to work on Tuesday morning so I can have his car, and hi ho hi ho, car shopping I go. I just need to test drive a few and pick out what I want, get everything drawn up, and Jeff will stop after work and sign the paperwork. Done deal. I can't wait! I have been without a reliable car for WAY too long. There's just no reason why we haven't bought one long before this!!! But - no more complaining. I'm getting one this week, and I'm really happy about it. I had test driven the Ford Fusion and really really liked it, but now I'm thinking about getting something smaller and better on gas. I would like to drive up to New England and visit Tricia and Paul, so gas prices are a consideration. We'll see!!!

Saturday To Do List - NOTHING!

I am officially taking today OFF! Wow - the past two days have been hectic, babysitting for Brayden and preparing food and house for the poker party last night. The food was a great success -- meatball subs followed by the Ice Cream Sandwich Cake. Man food! Our electricity went out around 11pm, but because we have a candle-chandalier in the dining room, the guys continued to play by candlelight! The game broke up around 12:30am. Me, I fell asleep at 7:30, woke up around 10pm! I was just plain worn out from babysitting for Brayden (who was just a titch fussy -- I think he's coming down with another cold or perhaps it's allergies?) and cleaning house and cooking. Didn't spend the evening quilting as I anticipated, but now I'm all rested up and ready to rock n' roll in the quilt room today! The house is exceptionally clean, I've got a refrigerator (and freezer) full of meatballs, it's way too hot outside to do any yard or garden work (high 90's with very high humidity) so..... I plan on doing a whole lot of nothing today and resting up afterwards! Yippy!!! I love days like this! OK, one exception - I do want to change sheets on the masterbedroom and guest room beds. But that's no big deal and won't take me 30 minutes total. I'm going to go get that done as soon as I post this, and then it's an official NO HOUSEWORK OR COOKING kind of day. YAY! A note about the Ice Cream cake (recipe below). I thought it was a bit over-the-top sweet for my taste. The men loved it. I also think it definitely needed chopped nuts in the chocolate filling. It was VERY easy to make -- took a total of about 15 minutes, and froze nicely. Before wrapping the aluminum foil up and over the top, I put six toothpicks on the top to help tent the foil so it wouldn't pull off the frosting before it froze. That worked well. I also took it out of the freezer once it was frozen, and patched and missing frosting spots, moved it off the alum foil and onto a platter, then put alum foil over the top (still with toothpicks). This cake easily serves 12 as you do not want to cut big thick pieces -- just too rich for that! But otherwise, it's a good recipe. Scale of 1 to 10 I think I'll rate it a 7, but I think the guys would rate it a 9.

Gramma bought me a Sit n' Spin!

Oy Vay! What a long day!

I knew today was going to be busy but it's 8:30pm and I've still got things to do. Jeff was out of Jury Duty by 11:30pm, so he came home and started shampoo'ing carpets while I went grocery shopping. I unloaded the car, put groceries away, wrapped up a frozen pork loin I bought and had cut into boneless chops and roasts, then did a bit of cleaning, but was generally "land locked" downstairs because all the carpets were wet! So I did head to my quilt room for about an hour, working on a "big boy bib" for Brayden, since he makes such a terrible mess now that he's feeding himself and needs a large bib that covers ALL of him (is it possible to make one that also covers the high chair?? LOL). Then we had to drive to the mechanic's to pick up Jeff's car. Normally this is a 10 minute ride, but the road between here and there was closed (!) and we had to take about a 10 mile detour, only to get stuck at a train crossing for a VERY long and VERY slow train! Once we'd picked up his car, we decided to come back another way, and got caught up in traffic jams at every turn. What should have taken us 20 minutes took well over an hour. Tonight I made 5 lbs of ground beef into meatballs. Some will go to make meatball subs for the poker party tomorrow night, but since I was already making them, I decided to triple the amount and make some for the freezer too. So four batches of meatballs later, that's done. While the last batch was in the oven, (yes, I bake mine) I put together the ice cream sandwich cake. I will say I'd wish I'd omitted the oreo cookies -- possibly put in chopped walnuts or pecans instead. They were just too bulky in the frosting, for my taste. But oh well, I followed the recipe and it looks good. It did take more than the 8 oz of Cool Whip called for -- probably about 12 ounces when all is said and done. Luckily, I had an extra container of Cool Whip in the freezer, so no second run to the grocery store necessary. Tonight we need to get the furniture back in place once the carpets are dry, and I've got to straighten and dust the shelves in my office. The rest of my office is done and looks good -- just forgot these few shelves. It's been a long day and my back feels it. Time for some Motrin and Ice and sit down for a bit. Brayden is here tomorrow, so we'll have to run around again at 5pm after he leaves and clean up toys, sweep or even wash the kitchen floor, etc.

Busy day

As I mentioned before, Jeff has a poker party here Friday (tomorrow) evening. So today and tomorrow are preparation for that. Unfortunately, my back "went out" completely yesterday morning. For the entire day I had great difficulty sitting down, bending, picking anything up, and standing in one spot for any period of time. I was home alone with Brayden, and bless his heart, he was absolutely wonderful and I didn't need to call Jeff to come home or DD to come get the baby. We walked around the yard a bit (walking is what seems to be the only comfortable thing I can do!), Brayden carrying a 2 foot dowel that he was pretending was a weed-wacker. LOL We went out to the vegetable garden and found green beans ready to pick. I picked a few and he and I munched on the fresh raw green beans, and he LOVED them! Thattaboy! He had concord grapes last week fresh off the vine, but they were a bit sour and he didn't care for them at all (as in - he popped one in his mouth and promptly looked at me with the "What on earth are you feeding me??!" look of his!) So I was a little surprised he was willing to test something else straight from the garden. But try them he did - and begged for more! I couldn't pick Brayden up at all, so when it was time for his nap, I handed him his bottle and told him it was rest time -- so he took his bottle and hiked up the stairs and headed to the bed! Sometimes I can't believe this little guy is for real! LOL! Temps in the afternoon were mid and high 90's, so it was too hot to go outside for very long. A few times Brayden wanted to do something I couldn't do because of the back pain, so I just explained that Gramma had an "ouchie" on my back and I needed to sit for a bit. He'd bring me one of his books and sit in my lap to read, or he sat and played with his toys on the family room floor. I'd purchased a Sit n'Spin at a yard sale last week, and introduced it to Brayden while he was here. He took to that like a duck to water! LOL! I didn't even have to show him what to do! I think it's genetic -- DD Mary and DS JJ spent MANY a happy hour on their Sit n' Spins! I had to help Brayden sit down on it, but once I did, he was good to go :) The other thing I simply cannot do when my back is out is vaccuum. Something about the position when moving the vac back and forth really hurts my back. But Brayden was upset that the kitchen floor had crumbs on it, so I got out the vac anyway. And he vaccuumed FOR me! Did a darn good job too. I have a video of it on my other blog but guess I should move it over here, since it's unrelated to quilting. So here it is: My back is feeling 50% better today, and I have a long two days ahead of me. Jeff took the next two days off to help, and what happens?? He gets called in for Jury Duty!! THURSDAY TO DO LIST

• Dust/polish dining room - done
• Clean desk in office, dust office - done
• Clean downstairs bathroom - Jeff volunteered to do this
• Grocery shopping - done
• Make meatballs (for subs) and ice cream cake - done!
• Windex windows at front door - done
• Sweep front porch and walkway - done
• Set timer on fountain - done
• Good general pickup - done

Lastly, (before I go get to work!) I want to mention the FISCHER PRICE TOY RECALL. I just bought Brayden an Elmo car, which he absolutely loves and played with a lot. This morning I heard about the recall on the news and checked the recall website and sure enough, the Elmo car is on the list. There are a LOT of toys on the list, so if you've bought any toys in the past several months, please check the list!!!