Yesterday and Today

Yesterday was a wonderful day at Church!  The speakers and teachers were all so inspiring and motivating.  They really made me want to be better.  I spent the evening knitting with a friend who made me a delicious supper--lavash bread sandwich and the best wheat/coconut/chocolate cookies in the world.  Really.  She is working on some beautiful socks that she is knitting toe up.  We thought she was at the point where the heel started but it looked like she needed three more rows.  Maybe we can start the heel next time we get together.  I did go over the pattern and write in the numbers at various places since she has a finer gauge than the pattern so changes in numbers were needed.


After the pepping up yesterday my plan was to visit two sisters with my companion but, when we looked out first thing this morning, sleet and freezing rain were hitting the road surfaces at an alarming rate and we just did not dare to go out (me) and children were home from school (my companion) so we will try again next week.

Since my planned church work was at a standstill I decided to spend the day profitably doing something else of real value and chose: family history consultant training.  One nice thing about this training is that records are kept and you can see what modules you have already completed.  That is also a bad thing about this training system:  you discover that either you had not finished all the modules after all, OR there were new modules to do.  So I went to work. I worked through several of them, taking time off to work on our own family history as part of the training.  There again I found that some of the people I thought I had already entered in the system were not there, so now they are.

Now that it has already been a productive day I feel the need to pick up the charity knitting project and get rolling on getting the last of the sisters' squares sewn together.  There is one more strip to go.  On Saturday I had a brain flash that I was not going to get the blanket finished in time for the meeting on the 8th of March--well, that was not the brain flash...that was just common sense:there is too much knitting still to do to get it completed with hand-knitting.  The brain flash came when it occurred to me to see if anyone on FREECYCLE had a knitting machine they would let me borrow, so I sent a message on Saturday evening.  Yesterday there was a message and offer!  Of course, I must drive to Springfield to get it and the roads were just too awful today; tomorrow I am going to the temple; so on Wednesday I am going to get up early and drive down there to pick it up before the potential knitting group meeting. I should be able to knit six strips pretty fast with that machine then pick up stitches to get a border around the whole thing.  We shall see.  Below is a picture of most of the squares.

Satisfying

Today has been a somewhat satisfying day...to this point, and hopefully it will continue on in like fashion.

Up somewhat late-ish and made a quick breakfast of hard-boiled eggs, warmed in the microwave, for Bob.  I ate a leftover sandwich from yesterday.  With the energy derived from this food, I was at the computer by 8 AM and worked until after noon on the Visiting Teaching lists/emails/letters.  The wonderful ladies have started responding already!  Yay for them!

It was sunny and beautiful outside and almost got me out there but I was cold and headache-y so I took a nap instead.  When I woke up the opportunity for a walk on a gorgeous day was gone. I hope Jonathan was able to get all his taps placed today while it was yet lovely out there.  Of course, slogging through the extra foot of snow that came yesterday may have made it less than a pleasurable activity...

Next on the agenda was to make some Black Bean Chili.  This is the recipe I used:

Black Bean Chili
www.grasslandmeats.com

Ingredients
1 1/2 pounds boneless pork, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
2 15 1/2-oz. cans black beans, drained
1 cup chopped onion
1 cup chopped yellow bell pepper
1 cup thick and chunky salsa
1 15 1/2-oz. can diced tomatoes, do not drain
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper

Directions
Combine all ingredients in a slow cooker.
Cover and cook on low heat setting 7 to 8 hours.

This is what I did differently:  instead of 1 cup of chunky salsa, I put in the whole jar.  Since I have just ordered my Pampered Chef garlic press I passed on the garlic and instead used about a tablespoon of some granulated garlic/chili powder/granulated onion/ground cumin mix that I use to put on buttered popcorn.  I added another teaspoon of straight chili powder and left out the crushed red pepper, though I am thinking of squirting in some chipotle sauce before serving this.  It tasted good when I first put it into the pot.  Oh...and I used a full 4 cups of cooked black beans and nearly two cups of chopped onions.

The proof in the pudding/chili will be if Bob likes it.

 It is snowing outside!  Great night to eat this chili...or at least some hot soup.

Busy

Whew!  Has life ever been busy lately.  Too many things to do; nearly all of them enjoyable but demanding.  Many knitting projects completed; new ones started.  Right now in a pinch to get a charity project finished by March 8th.  We shall see.

This photo is Egeblad, knit in ecru sport-weight cotton yarn from Mary Maxim.

The Morning After

Yesterday was a busy day: taxes to pay in Royalton and Tunbridge, errands to run in WRJ and West Leb, and finally:Book Group! 

The stove installation man did not come so we had another sandwich supper:  Bob had some baked tofu on toast and I had some corned beef on straight bread(i.e not toasted).  The lack of stove guy was a real disappointment since I had just spoken with the Whole Foods Market Commissary on Monday and learned how they make their lovely CHEWY tofu and was gungho to make some. (The Golden Sesame Tofu logs at Whole Foods in Beford, MA are delicious!) Oh, well.  Maybe today is the magic day for the stove.

Around 6:30 I left for carpooling to the Book Group (discussing "The Tipping Point") from J and A's house.  Saw the grandkids for a minute and loved C's new 'peanut" theraball.  He gets pretty wound up on it and then pitches over on his nose...not the best thing to do.  L was a bit distressed that Mom was leaving her. E was totally absorbed in Bear Grylls and his fire-making exploits.  (I may have the name wrong...the show is Wild something.) 

We had a lively and interesting discussion and had a great time looking at K's loom and work.  She does STUNNING weaving!  I am so very impressed.  She loaned me a book on double weave, which I turned on the light to start reading when I got home (AT ELEVEN O'CLOCK!!!! and that isn't even the latest Book Group has run....!) but I was so tired that I got little out of it except admiration for such beautiful work.

This morning I  awoke with a headache and feeling droopy and logey.  I guess that is a sort of Book Group hangover.

Rainy Sunday

Today we came home from Church in a cold rain.  Because we moved out the old stove yesterday and the new one has not been installed yet we used the microwave to heat up some old soup.  Bob ate cream of butternut squash soup and I had sweet potato, corn, and kale soup.  They were both good.  He went home teaching and I took a nap until the phone rang.

Before HTing and napping we watched the birds on the porch for a while.  It was a fabulous bird day despite, or maybe because of, the weather.  We had blue jays, chickadees, sparrows, some little gray crested bird that we don't know yet, a couple of nuthatches, Mr. Cardinal and later Mrs Cardinal, and ***NEWSFLASH***a pileated woodpecker!  It was huge!  We had already had a small Downy woodpecker...at least that is what I think it was...smaller than the bigger Hairy woodpecker.  It pecked on a post on the porch then snuck in to grab a bite to eat from the birdfeeder!  Pretty funny.  A little later he was pecking on the window frame in the dining room.  Grandpa surprised him by knocking back...

The 'new' chair on the porch has been a great place to spend afternoons when the birds, and squirrels, are feeding.  So many birds come to visit.  It will be interesting to see who comes this winter.

Concord Family History Day 2010 is complete!

What a good day it was today in Concord, NH!  For me the day started early...including taking some medicine to keep the coughing at bay, and it worked.  Something called Musinex DM I think.   I took it last night and slept for the first time in almost a week.  The coughing did not start up again until I was driving home.

When I set up for the blogging class all seemed well at first.  The Methots had set the room up perfectly with a screen, a table with a projector ready to go, a power strip underneath the table readily available, and an extension cord.  It could not have been a better setup.  We did change projectors to the one that I brought but that was all.

The only glitch in the system came when I tried signing on to Blogger.  That, and all social networking sites, had been filtered out.  I got on the phone to SLC right away but did not succeed in getting the filter lifted in time for the first class.  The five people in that class were kind enough to say that the presentation was fine and would get them started.  Thank you to all of you and your generosity of spirit to make me feel better.

Shortly after the end of the first class the phone rang and it was SLC calling back to say I had to call a different group for help, which I did.  After Paul checked the firewall box for me I was able to give the needed info to the new group and eventually we were able to lift the filter for the duration of the rest of the conference.  You can imagine my relief when Blogger.com came up on the screen.

On to the second class where we were able to set up another blog...the Windsor County, Vermont Genealogy blog.  I plan to post documents and data I find in town clerk offices in various towns in Windsor County in case they might be as useful to others as they are to me.

Sitting in on the Brick Walls panel was enjoyable and interesting to see the knowledge of the other panelists as they strove to answer brick walls questions that had been submitted on the website prior to the conference.  Harry and Ellaine had done a LOT of preparation and had beautifully documented answers to hand to some of the class members.

Home safe and sound now, and resolved to get really rolling on family history work again!

Update on the gadget

Well, I keep checking but the odiogo gadget does not always work.  It does work for several of the blog posts, but not for all of them.  I only feel a little better about it because I went to a Legacy blog and found theirs did not always work, either.  I can only hope that whatever made it not work will be fixed.