Sweets For My Sweets

These make me smile:

 Red, White and Blue Cake

Individual Apple Pies

 This was a lot of fun to make.
My first attempt at a multiple colored concoction.

I made 4 of these yesterday.

Then [upon request :)] I made 4 more today.  :)

And that was about all the energy I had. 

I hope y'all are doing well. I think of you often and hope to be back in good form soon.

Take care Tadpoles. We'll see you on the flipside.

'Cause She's My "Baby"

Hi from the back porch of our Pond!

Ask my baby, Wallene, what she would like for dinner and she will say "Chicken Pot Pie".  Even if we had it the previous night, she will eat it every day if given the option.  But it has to be me making it from my recipe.  The store bought ones are just meh - kind of okay- but home make one and the kidlet is in heaven.

Yep. You guessed it. That is what I made for dinner tonight, except I made them extra, extra special.
Well, the family thought so.
See what you think:

Individual Pot Pies!
Aren't they cute?

So cool!  I always make a full pie and we eat slices.  I couldn't resist when I saw the ramekins at Sears today and I picked up a set of 6 for $12.  The family was so surprised when they came to dinner and saw them.  I knew they were excited to be having Potpie for dinner, but to get the extra special, individual pies was a real treat.  I like them because they don't really take any longer than a whole pie and there are no fights for leftovers :) .  They came out perfect [if I do say so myself :)] and the best part is they stayed hot all the way to the last bite.  I also made what I like to call "Confetti salad". This version has diced yellow pepper, orange pepper, cucumber, tomato and red onion.    It was a very nice, very easy dinner for a rainy, cold night. 

For the info factor - These are two crust pies. We don't do one crusters. heehee  They are cheap to make - my favorite thing!  If you prepare your own pie crust they are even more inexpensive.  A can - 2 cups - of white meat chicken [$2.70], a can of low sodium chicken broth [.67 cents] and 1/2 bag - 2 cups - of frozen, mixed veggies [.60 cents] with a little flour, milk and butter and you have a meal for 4 for under $5.00!  If you buy the pie crusts it will add $2.50. Please buy the store brand crusts tho'. They are just as good as Pillsbury, promise.  I used leftover chicken from a $3.50 roaster chicken we had for dinner last night, so it was even cheaper. :)  Woohoo! [This is also an excellent use of leftovers at Thanksgiving and Christmas.]

In other news - we went grocery shopping today.  Pooldad was on call this weekend and is being paid with a $150 grocery giftcard, but we won't pick it up until tomorrow.  We decided to pop over to a different grocery store to grab a few things to tide us through a few days.  It sounded like a good plan - milk, bread, some fruit. Maybe we would spend $50, right? Yeah. No. We found so many really great deals and since I like the produce department at this store much more than at the gift card store we spent $200.  We are good for the next two weeks. heehee  I did splurge tho' and bought $17 worth of grapes [again].  I wish I liked cheaper, healthy food - but ALL the fruit is expensive and besides, these grapes are soooo good.  They'll be gone by Wednesday. Guess I will have to use that giftcard and splurge stock up on more grapes. 

Thank you for your encouraging comments on my last post. I am trying, honest.  I think you know that, but please know I haven't given up yet, and I really am trying not to. Promise.  I realize I have to keep putting one foot in front of the other and take what comes when it comes. Your good thoughts and prayers really do help. I appreciate y'all more than you know.  I hope that I can find more regular, daily life stuff to post about before my blog turns into a whiny, medical history of me 'cause that ain't no fun! :)  Thank you again for continuing to hang out with me.  It truly brings a smile to my day, everyday. 

Have a great week Tadpoles. And if you are getting a weeks worth of rain try to make the best of it. We ARE tadpoles, after all, right?  Hugs to y'all. :D 

See ya' on the flipside!

What Not To Wear

Your headphones.

While on your computer.

After ingesting a healthy dose of medication.

A medication that is guaranteed to cause nausea.

Because when the urgency to projectile vomit presents itself you will not be able to remove those puppies fast enough to avoid a small disaster.

Ask me how I know this.
Go ahead.  Ask. giggle

And you guys wonder where I have been?

In answer to all your kind queries and emails we are here, going through the motions, getting through our days as best we can.  I thank you all so much for keeping in touch. It is so nice to know I have you, my Tadpole friends.

I am sorry that I haven't felt up to responding or posting.   It has just become harder and harder to muster up enthusiasm for much of anything these days. It seems as tho' we are on the hamster wheel of health care in this country.  I am not complaining - I am thrilled I have doctors that want to treat me. Isn't insurance a wonderful thing? :sarcasm drip: - but we are growing weary of the specialists, the extra special specialists and the super dooper specialists. Oh, and let us not forget the "God's gift" of specialists.  Seems when you see one doctor you are referred to two more doctors who, in turn, refer you to even more doctors.  During all of this appointment making [or should I say "attempting to make"?], the researching, the running around and the waiting [my god, the waiting!] we find that the important questions are not being answered. Or we are given vague responses and then passed along to the next doctor.  It is frustrating to feel myself sliding backwards instead of feeling like I am moving forward.  It is scaring me. And if it isn't enough that we are challenged by the sheer number of oncologists, not to mention the upcoming transplant contingency, we have to ask, couldn't they all be located in relatively the same area?  I am not even asking for them to be in the same hospital or even the same city [they aren't] but is it really too much to have them in the same state?  Seriously.  I honestly think Maryland will be joining the queue soon.

Jeesh. I'm tired just writing all of that out. And I know it begins all again come Monday.

So that, my friends, is it in a nutshell. There are many bright sides, I assure you and I do say thank you many, many times throughout the day because I do have so much.  I know this. Still, it doesn't mitigate the fact that life IS a struggle right now and I wonder if I have enough strength for this fight.

I truly hope you all have a wonderful week.  Enjoy yourselves and keep up the shenanigans. I had a fun time catching up and can't wait to read more.

See you on the flipside Tadpoles. :)

Hiya!

See?? I'm still here!
And still smiling. :)

This is my last busy, busy weekend at home before the next round of specialists, tests and treatments begin on Monday.

If you can't tell from the pics, I am a wee bit worn out and tired, but in attempt to show my Momma [who is is in perpetual worry mode] that I am "making the effort" I tried to take a pic' of my hair and my dress. I thought I did a pretty good job [with my hair, not the pic' - argh. I suck at picture taking] but once I pulled the pics up to email her I thought "Meh. Not so much."  Try, try, try as I might I am stuck at 97 lbs. Soooo, I have decided to be happy about it, rock this stick-girl body and as long as I don't scare small children and dogs everything will be just  fine and dandy. heehee  More new clothes for me!

I am especially glad for this weekend because tonight we will pay the bills, stock the house with food and goodies and finish with a relaxing meal of homemade pizza.  I think we are going to rent "War Horse" too.   Tomorrow we pick up Squirrel at school  - YAY! - and she is home for the summer. That is the best part of the weekend [of course. :)] Tomorrow night we will celebrate "Cinco de Mayo" with delicious Mexican food and the neighbor's [illegal] fireworks display. Love it! Sunday we are going to visit the girls' Great Grandma.  She requested I bring her favorite lunch of Chicken and Dumplings and chocolate/chocolate cupcakes. I have to admit that may be my favorite meal too.

I hope y'all had a wonderful week and will have a fantastic weekend filled with family, friends, food and fun.

We'll see ya' on the flipside Tadpoles. Take care.

Trying To Stay Busy

I don't know if it is nervous energy, or  if I am trying to stay occupied with everyday life so I don't have to think about my next appointment, pill, treatment or the pain, the bigger picture.  I do know that I sure have been cramming a lot of the mundane in the past few weeks.
 ~
I haven't been posting lately because I have recently begun to lose my train of thought.  I like to call it "side effect #419".  I just can't seem to get the essence of what I want to say across. It can be very frustrating to me.  It even happens when I am talking to my family and friends here in our pond.
 ~
I know [hope?] y'all understand.  You have been a great source of support to us with your comments and mail, so I thought maybe I would leave you ::breathless:: with a list of my activities these past few days.
 ~
I hope you enjoy. I know we sure did! [Warning:  There are amazingly l-o-n-g run on sentences to follow. Oops!]
 ~
Friday was pizza and movie night, at home, but before we could begin Wallene had to take an on line algebra quiz. It had to be submitted beforemidnight Friday night.  No problem, but she was without a graphing calculator. Although she was doing the work without one, they are allowed to use them. It makes checking her work a lot easier.  Her Dad and I researched the price [$100] and availability [plenty] at Staples and with my $5 off coupon we headed on over.  Surprise! They were sold out and the only other one in stock was $120. No thank you.
 ~
We then went to Wal Mart. ::shudder:: It was amazingly empty for a Friday evening. We were able to zip in only to discover that they too were sold out of the calculator we wanted.  Their price was better [$94] but they didn't have any other models to choose from. We decided to give it one more try and drive over to Best Buy since there seemed to be a run on TI-83 graphing calculators in Sterling, VA that evening.
 ~
We had success at Best Buy. I literally ::skippyhappydanced: in the aisle.  We purchased the last one for $105 and Wallene was able to complete her quiz on time. At 10:00 pm we settled in for delicious $5.99 pizza and watched "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close".  We had purchased the pizza on sale and it was one of the best frozen pizzas we have tasted.  It was a "Freschetta Deluxe Topping Rising Crust Pizza".  If you can find it, even at the full price, $7.99, buy it! I only had one piece and I would've had more but. . .  Regardless, there were no leftovers. :D
 ~
After a quick night's sleep we woke to a gloomy, doomy, very chilly day.  Wallene was dropped off at school at 8:30 am.  She was participating in her Marching Band's fundraiser until 1 pm, so Pooldad and I settled in for a cozy day indoors.
 ~
Here's where the weekend fun [for me at least] really began.
 ~
While Dad drank his coffee I prepared breakfast.  I have to admit I was inspired by Spadoman's trip to Chicago and all the great meals they ate.  Since we're watching the pennies and my sodium [yawn!] I made breakfast with food on hand and tried to make it as healthy as I could.
 ~
It was so delicious!  I made skillet potatoes, crisped in olive oil with green, red and yellow peppers, onion and a splash of oregano and paprika to spice it up.  Served with 1 egg over easy, 1/2 piece of toast, a bowl of grapes and two bites of a sausage patty made me a very happy camper.  Pooldad had the same, but X10.  "Growing boy" and all that y'know.
 ~
After breakfast we bundled up and walked the dog.  It really was a drizzly, bone chilling day for the end of April, but it made coming home to a cup of rich Ghiradelli hot chocolate much more appreciated. Finally, we warmed through so we tackled the weekly chores of dusting, vacuuming, cleaning the kitchen and laundry before we picked up Wallene.
~
For lunch [still inspired] I played short order cook. Everyone was served a steaming mug of homemade bean and smoked turkey [in lieu of ham] soup with their choice of sandwich.  Wallene had a BLT, Pooldad had a fried hotdog with mustard and diced onions and I had 1/2 roast beef, swiss cheese, lettuce and banana pepper sandwich.  This is my favorite sandwich, by far, that I make at home.  Pooldad enjoyed the other half.  Thank goodness I have him to eat my extras. :D
 ~
With nothing much to do we all took naps.  There is something about sleeping on an overcast day that is so comforting, y'know?
 ~
For dinner [yes, still cooking and cleaning the kitchen] I made ghoulash with individual dishes of sliced raw veggies for dipping in spicy Catalina dressing. YUM  Although I do think I chopped, diced and cut up my weight's worth in vegetables and fruit this weekend.
 ~
We slept in this morning and awoke to one of the prettiest days in a long time.  The change in the weather was amazing.  It was if Mother Nature flipped her "I'll be nice today" switch and gave us a sunny, 70 degree day.  It was perfect for the long[ish] car ride out to see our Grandma.  It is such a gift to be able to spend a few hours with her, forgetting that she is 100 years old!  She is such a spit fire.  She, of course, put in her request for next week's lunch and dessert [Chicken and dumplings with lemon cake] so we will be back again soon to deliver the goods.  It was so, so nice to feel good enough to go and see her.  Sometimes I become so physically drained from the car trips to and from my appointments I don't want to get in the car if I don't have to.  Today it wasn't the case.  I had so much energy I couldn't wait to get out and enjoy it, especially if it meant visiting Non.
 ~
On our way home we filled the van, saving .20 cents a gallon by using our grocery store rewards card - a bargain at $3.75/gal, picked up a fresh fruit and veggies to fill out our menu this week and came home to plant our container garden on our back porch.  This is very exciting for us because it is an experiment.  We aren't green thumbs [more of a black thumb, if you will] and this is our first time attempting vegetables. We planted two different tomatoes, one yellow squash, one mild pepper and for fun a watermelon plant. :)  We'll see how it goes. I am most excited by the watermelon and hoping it does well because when we were at the store today we paid $5 for a small watermelon [on sale!] and spent $18 on 6 lbs of grapes which will last us until Tuesday.  Throw in a few bananas and we had $25 in fruit that won't last us a week.  Thank goodness the tomatoes were on sale, but better yet - the Farmer's Market opens next Sunday!! And I will happily pay more than that for home grown, locally sourced, organic produce. Bring.IT.on!! :D
 ~
The icing on the cake to the near perfect weekend was dinner tonight.  I made chicken fajitas [again with the chopping of the veggies!**] refried beans and Spanish rice.  Since this was my only sodium intake of the day I indulged and had some of everything. Wowser it was good - even if I do say so myself. ::wink::
 ~
Have you ever had a meal, that when you were finished, you just knew you needed just *one* more thing?  LIke, say, maybe a cake to make it complete?  [Does that make sense?]  We have a lot of ice cream, sherberts and homemade cookies in the house, but they just weren't going to do.  They weren't fitting the bill. It had to be cake.  So, at 9:30 pm I made a carrot bundt cake [speedy cooling it on the back porch since the temperature had dropped 20 degrees since sunset] with cream cheese frosting rosettes dotting just the top of each piece.
 ~
It was the perfect end to a near perfect weekend.  And I really do appreciate you reading while I rambled along. heehee
 ~
It will soon be Monday morning here and so I will begin another round of "facing the big picture".
~
At least I know I can do it with a smile on my lips and a lighter heart.  It really does make it easier Tadpoles. Trust me.
 ~
Thanks for everything.  I am sure we will chat soon - be looking for me in your comments. :)
 ~
And I'll see ya' all on the flipside.

 ~
[**I actually love to chop vegetables and fruit. It sounds weird [you know me!], but it is so relaxing and rewarding to stand and chop, chop, chop away.  I do own a nice food processor, but I like my knife and cutting board. tyvm :D]

If I Stay Up Any Longer

I am going to have a midnight snack [okay, okay 4 am snack] of cabbage rolls*.

That wouldn't be a good thing, would it?

Although. . . the whole "gaining weight" thing is working in my favor here.

Sigh. G'night!



*I made these for dinner last night.  I need to make these more often. Like everyday. Sooo good.

Light Heart, Big Smile

As much as I hated to write the previous post I thought it only honest to share what is happening and what is going to happen with you all.  I wasn't intentionally vague because I don't want you to know all the details. I left out a lot of the details because I am scared.  Scared that if I type everything out in black and white, line by line, it will be even more real. I hope you understand that simply the knowledge I hold in my head is more than real enough right now. For me, for my husband, for everyone. Trust me on this. :)

I wanted to thank you all, truly everyone, for your supportive emails and comments. I don't know if you realize just how much you buoyed my spirits with your heartfelt words.  Mostly tho', I am so happy that you all know me well enough to know I want to laugh. I want to smile and Tadpoles?  You guys are really, really good at that!  I am not surprised, of course, but it so reassuring to laugh, laugh hard and laugh long with my friends. I have gone back to read them many times, as I am sure I will in the future, because they make me smile. And I want to smile, regardless. I so appreciate it.  Thank you again.

Someone said that I must be feeling better because I was leaving such chatty comments and long emails.  It isn't that I feel better as much as it is the easiest way for me to connect and keep in contact with you all. This is especially important to me now since I don't know when I won't be able to do it in the future.  I think it also has to do with all the nervous energy I have.  I am able to expend some of it by "chatting" with you all without physically exhausting myself. Notice I didn't say mentally?  I think my writing speaks for itself in that area. heehee

With a very happy heart and a good day's sleep I decided it was time to buy some new, dressier clothing that fit.  I do love my new jeans, but they aren't what I like to wear to wear to church or to a few of the appointments I have to go to. That's just me, but I have more confidence when I feel I am dressed appropriately for the occasion.  Besides, I don't need my skirt slipping to the floor during Communion. Wal Mart was more than enough for me. ;)

I knew I didn't have too much time in the mall to shop so I took Wallene to expedite.  I love the clothing [from the misses department!! woohoo!] she picked out today.  I don't think she wants her Momma bedazzled anymore than her Momma wants to be bedazzled :D. We were having such a blast with only one small hiccup. It took a long time to locate my size.  Either the style didn't come in a 2 [the woman's version of a junior's 1] or the few pairs of pants, dresses or skirts they did order in were already sold. :(  I saw oodles of my normal size but it took forever to find anything worth trying on now.  She prevailed tho' and I now have a  beautiful pair of flared white dress pants matched with a black and white polka dot shell. She also found a cute, white lace cotton dress, lined, with a taupe jacket. The jacket might go back because I think the white dress deserves a bit more pop of color, don't you?  My eye has really been drawn to this season's orange explosion.  It is not a color I ever thought to buy myself but, next to yellow, it has to be the happiest color you can wear.  Yes, I think an orange jacket, brown belt/shoes and orange/brown accent jewelry will work nicely. [Bored yet? Sorry!]

You would have been proud of Wallene because when she noticed me perusing the $5 clearance rack of sweaters in Macy's she took immediate action. She forcibly removed me from the area saying "No. NO Mom. You have enough Mom. Move away Momma."  I argued [okay I whined, but who's counting?] that they had my size, but she would not be deterred.   She stated that sweaters fit everyone and I had enough at home that I could layer when it became chilly again. But, but...but!  C'mon! $5? In Macy's?  It was painful to do but I promise I did not buy a single one [or four].

I know this isn't earth shattering or life changing, but it was fun for us.  We took our time, window shopped, sprayed perfume [the car smelled fabulous on the way home] and managed to expand my wardrobe just a wee bit more.  I might turn into a shopper yet!  I certainly would've added to my old wardrobe had I known it could be this much fun.

We came home to a delicious pot of homemade chicken noodle soup, watched a movie and played the wildly addictive game of "Pass the Pigs".  It has to be the silliest game anywhere, the only thing you have to do is roll little rubber pigs like dice to score, but you can't stop playing. Then we ate dessert. For me, I ate dessert a few times. ::big grin::

It was my kind of day Tadpoles.
 
Thank you for lifting my spirits. :)  ::skippyhappydance::