3rd week of January

Good morning everyone 

No to do list on paper this week, just the list in my head as this week is a different week but I’ll have more in that later. 

               
Before                                                                                   After 

One of the jobs on last week’s list was to straighten this bookshelf.  I thought it was going to take a long time but it only took 5 minutes.  

It’s a tall shelf, taller than the door. My husband built it several years ago to fit a funny space in a hall.  

My mother lives in a retirement community and her meals are provided but she isn’t crazy about all their meal choices 

So yesterday,  I cooked foods that Mom cooked often when I was young- and took them for her lunch.   

Goulash which is ground beef, onion, elbow pasta, canned tomatoes and tomato sauce- very simple but delicious 

Creamed potatoes- I know it is a double starch but that’s how we always ate it.  My Dad loved potatoes and they were a budget food.

Apple salad- no exact recipe but it’s diced apple, cheddar, celery and pecans with a light dressing of mayo, sugar and vinegar.  

Banana muffins

I like to pack foods that need reheating in these Tupperware containers.  They are hard and won’t break, have handles for easy holding and don’t get hot in the microwave. 

After lunch,  I drove my van through a car wash.  My husband bought us monthly subscriptions and I could get my van washed everyday if I wanted to.  

It’s really weird as you have to put your vehicle in neutral, it’s dark and noisy in the tunnel  and the car wash tracks move the vehicles along.

But it does a great job and I do like having a clean vehicle. 

Other meals this week are from Every Plate.  I ordered ours with a deal our daughter shared with us.

I will caution you that I’m a very experienced internet shopper but Every Plate has a website where I ordered before I even knew I had ordered.  

But is OK and I will be very cautious if I ever use their website again 

Below is the food they sent and it all was fresh and high quality 

The 3 meals recipe cards

And the spicy shrimp I cooked compared to their photo- I added tomatoes and onions to the salad and I didn’t eat a full serving of the shrimp.  

It was good but was far from spicy 

There have been some comments I need to respond to and I will do that soon.

Hope you all have a good week 

❤️ Rhonda 

Buy Nothing Group, and few meals

Hello everyone 

I’m happy that most of the stuff on my to do list is done

I had a pretty big pile of discards and I gave most of it away on a local Facebook Buy Nothing group. 

As people claimed things,  I put them in grocery bags with their names outside our home.  

It’s all on the honor system but so far, things are getting picked up and it’s been fairly easy.  

Buy Nothing groups are local, by city and town.  If you have a Facebook account,  I think they can be a great way to give things away free  or to get things for free.  

We gave away an assortment-some was our stuff, some belonged to our daughter’s family. 

We still have our original doors and windows but have ordered new ones.

The front door will look like wood but I think it’s some kind of fiberglass.  

I wanted internal blinds on the windows but we have 7 curved windows and internal blinds aren’t available for them.  

But it is OK.  New doors and windows are expensive and having internal blinds almost doubles the cost.  
We found out today that we should have our new windows and doors installed in February.  That’s much earlier than we were expecting.  

We had homemade pizza one night with a 1/2 recipe of the dough in the link below 

http://ifyoudostuff.blogspot.com/2012/03/homemade-calzones-wonderful.html

And stuffed bell peppers another meal- they were still steaming when I took the photo. 

I used the recipe below as the base but it used 6 peppers and I only used 2.  

They were delicious and I should make them more often.  

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/235323/dis-stuffed-green-peppers/

Hope you all have  had a good week 

❤️ Rhonda 

Working on my to do list

Hello everyone 

I can’t say I’m going real fast but I have checked off a few things on that to do list.

My biggest job was deep cleaning the fridge.  

When there were 7 of us living here,  it was like a game of Jenga fitting all the groceries, leftovers, lunch things, etc in to this fridge.  

It seemed like it was always full to capacity. 

So yesterday, I took everything out shelf by shelf.  I also took out all the shelves and drawers and door cubbies. 

Everything got washed in the sink with Dawn Powerwash and and a scrub brush.  

I’m a big fan of the Dawn.  It really cleans off stuff with no effort. 

Before

After 

Besides cleaning,  I also refilled the tea dispenser, peeled a bag of tiny oranges, 

and brought more eggs and a bag of big oranges from the shop fridge into this fridge. 

I found multiple types of cheese that need to be used soon so we will be having pizza, tacos and salad with grated cheese on top this week.  

There are also 2 containers of sour cream so I should use some of it in something baked soon.  

I only cleaned the fridge side.  The freezer side still needs cleaned but I don’t think it will be a very big job. 

❤️ Rhonda 

2nd to do list of 2023

Good morning homemakers 

One thing on last weeks list that did not get done was a bath for our dog, Ducky. 

So, that was done first thing and now he is pouting and looking out the window.

Here is my to do list, what I hope to accomplish this week anyway, but as always, we will see. 

Hope you all have a wonderful week

❤️ Rhonda 

First week of January doings

Hello everyone. I hope y’all have had a good week. I have had a very busy week with that long to do list. I wasn’t expecting to get as much done as I did but I feel better now that it’s mostly done.  

Above is what the first spare bedroom looks like, it’s what we call the kids room. Ducky likes it now that I have the curtains open where he can look outside whenever he wants.

When two of our grandsons were living in this room, it mostly looked like this below picture🥴

Besides house work, I made two kinds of stock. I cooked the hambone left from New Year’s Day. I’ve never made ham broth but my son said he did and they liked it. The big crockpot has beef soup bones that we got from our daughter’s family when they bought a butchered cow.

I let the broth chill overnight in the fridge. 

When I checked on it this morning, I was pleased to see that the broth from the beef was like gelatin almost. Anyway I ended up with 3 quarts of beef stock and about a quart and a half of ham stock. It’s all in the freezer waiting to be cooked into something delicious.

This is last weeks to do list. I didn’t get much done in the master bedroom or bath this week but that can happen this coming week

In our dining room, is an accumulating pile of stuff that needs to leave the house, some of it is from our daughters family and some is from our home. So I will go through that this week, and list some of it on the Stillwater buy nothing Facebook list and some of it may go to Goodwill and some of it may go to the trash, we will see.

There is a lot to do at daughter‘s new home. Lots of boxes to unpack so it’s not ready for pictures just yet. But the kitchen is the first room they set up and it is a big beautiful kitchen. That island is huge! And you can’t tell it from the picture but it has three or four stacks of drawers on both sides so there is so much storage. And behind the stove is a walk-in pantry. The floors look wood but those are ceramic tile that look like wood.

That opening was originally supposed to be bricked but there is a brick shortage so the builder suggested wood as an alternate and I think it looks so nice! 

They were able to get just enough brick for the exterior after a wait, but to get enough brick for the interior was going to take much much longer.  

It’s a beautiful new kitchen, isn’t it? ❤️🏡❤️ 

I’ll be back tomorrow with a new to do list. 

❤️Rhonda 

First to do list for 2023

Good morning 

This is a pretty long list and it won’t all get done this week but it does all need done so at least I have a plan 

I’ve got plenty to keep me busy

Talk to you all soon

❤️Rhonda 

First day of 2023

Hello everyone 

I hope you all have had a nice first day of the year.  

We had our traditional black eyed peas, cabbage, rice, cornbread and a smoked spiral ham.  We don’t eat it because we are superstitious but because it is just a fun tradition.  And it tastes good! 

Our son in law really enjoyed it and asked why we only eat it once a year.  We eat all the components during the year but I guess we only eat the whole traditional menu on New Year’s Day,  

Thank you all for the complements and suggestions about our front door.  I’ll let you know as we order, etc.  The windows will all be custom made so I don’t think it will be a very fast project. 

This prayer is in my 2023 planner and I really like it.

And a good blogging development for me is, after a year or so of not being able to,  I can finally comment as my self on my own blog and on other blogs.  

That reply option has been missing and it’s been hard to talk back to you all and just took the fun out of blogging

I don’t know exactly what fixed it but I did adjust some setting on my iPad- even though I’d done similar things multiple times before.  

Who knows?  I’m just grateful it is fixed.  

I don’t know what 2023 holds.  I do plan to get my home put back to pretty much how it was before except even more decluttered.  

And I plan to blog often

❤️Rhonda 

I want some advice

Good morning everyone 

The last 10 months with our 5 house guests has been fun and busy.  They finalized the purchase of their brand-new just-built home yesterday and started moving in. The new home is beautiful and I will share some photos later. Right now it’s very much in transition as they move stuff from this home and from several storage buildings.

I’m guessing most all of you were in that recent cold spell over Christmas. That was a hard one, wasn’t it? Anyway we’ve known for a while that our doors and windows were kind of leaky, they are 22 years old. But during that cold spell with the hard winds, the curtains in our dining room were fluttering back and forth from the breeze coming in the closed and locked window.

So, we have started shopping for replacement windows and a replacement front and back door, there is a good company in our town and we feel very safe using them.

My biggest decision is what kind of front door to get. We can get a metal door which we can paint or they will paint whatever color we would like. Or we could get a wood door and my husband is thinking he would like a wood door.

Our home is brick, with a lot of terra-cotta in the brick and gray mortar. We have fairly new siding and it is white.

Our roof is brown and our fence is white. Shutters are white but could be painted.  

We do plan to paint the hanging light fixture glossy black to match the ones we painted by the garage door.  

What kind of door and what color do you think would look good with our home?  I don’t want a big glass window again.  I’m leaning toward maybe a row of windows just at the top or a solid door with no openings but I really don’t know. 

Do you think a color like terra cotta, gray or blue would be good?  Or what about a wood door and what stain wood?  

About 2023,  I plan to be back to blogging regularly 

Thank you all 

❤️ Rhonda 

November news 🦃🍁🥧

Hello everyone 

Today was getting things started for our Thanksgiving meal on Thursday.  

I think 10 of us will be here

I’ve started a pile on the  counter for the Thanksgiving ingredients, 

I saw Manuela at  https://acultivatednest.com/ had links to several free printable Thanksgiving planner sheets.  I’ve always just made my list on plain paper but this year, I printed off a few sheets that worked for me.  I plan to keep them and reference them year to year.  

Our 3 little house guests wanted to help peel the potatoes so I said sure! 

I diced onions and celery for dressing,  chopped pecans for several dishes and diced some onions just for anytime we need diced onion.  

We also grated some really sharp cheese to make pimento cheese to eat in celery.  

Earlier this month,  my husband and I spent 9 days in Branson, Missouri.  The trip had been planned for months with reservations and show tickets all paid for.  My husband has several back issues and one of them flared up shortly before we left.  But he still wanted to go so we did.  He was physically hurting most all of them time though 

There are many things to do in Branson and we like the musical shows best. 

We saw The Haywood’s, Clay Cooper, Hot Rods and High Heels, Christmas Wonderland, Jersey Boys, Hughes Family Christmas,  The Gatlin Brothers, The Bellamy Brothers and The Oak Ridge Boys- and maybe a few others but I can’t recall them as I type this.  

We stayed in a condo and ate most of meals there.  We didn’t shop except to get groceries at a huge, fairly new Aldi in Branson and of course Walmart.  

It was cold in Branson!  

We had a good time and got our fill of vacationing.  

And this homebody is happy to be home 🏠 

The Gatlin Brothers 

Jersey Boys - we learned the young man on the left side of the photo graduated from the university in our town. 

 He is an amazing singer and we also saw him in Christmas Wonderland 

Hot Rods and High Heels- a 50s theme show 

Clay Cooper 

Our sweet Cora- she is growing fast!  She likes plain raw carrots and doesn’t want them cut up.  

A funny joke about inflation 

Although there is really nothing funny about inflation.  

I know many people are truly struggling right now

❤️ Rhonda 

Back to regular homekeeping

Hello everyone 

It’s Monday and I’m hoping to have a productive week.

I made a to do list 

I checked off a few things but my husband had a morning Dr appt with his back specialist and then we got a grocery pickup.

No photo of our purchases though as I was in a hurry to put things away and it was just normal kitchen items.  

Sadly they were out of 8 things on my list- lactose free milk, hens, strawberries, clementines, and I don’t remember the other things 

And then we had a visitor.

So…….. I didn’t get as many things done today as I hoped but tomorrow is a new day. 

I put out a few fall decorations 

This wreath  is not new, according to my blog it’s been on our front door since at least 2014 and I think it’s several years older than that.

We got some much needed rain today so I’ll sweep the leaves later.  It would of been pointless today,

The pumpkins were bought at a church fundraiser by our son in law’s mother.  She takes her grandchildren there every year and since those children currently live here,  the pumpkins are on our front porch.  

The baseball shoes belong to them too 🙂

I saw this instagram recipe and tried it today as we had all the ingredients on hand 

Below is a screenshot from IG 

They were very fast to mix up and they are quite tasty.  I’m sure the grands will like them.  


Hope you all have a productive week

❤️Rhonda 

Shopping at a military commissary and some replies

Hello everyone 

My husband needed to go the VA hospital to get his eyeglasses adjusted. 

So while we were near a military base,  we shopped at a commissary.  Commissaries are grocery stores for military.  

Commissaries used to have very low prices compared to civilian stores.   Compared to stores in my town now though,  the commissary is about the same on most prices.  

We go there because their meats are higher quality and a good bit cheaper than I can buy locally.  They also have some brands we can’t get locally and they do have some good sales and coupon matchups.  

I got the  biggest  surprise and laugh when I saw a supply chain problem there. 

The meat was not wrapped on a plastic or styrofoam meat tray but was wrapped on an assortment of disposable plates.  😂

I’m guessing was did not make the butchers and meat wrappers too happy as the plates are much floppier than meat trays.  

We like to buy these big boxes of meat for $43

The commissary labels them Economy Boxes and I think they are a good economy. 

Our box had 3 packs pork chops, 1 pack of 2 pork tenderloins, 

1 beef roast, 2 trays of beef cube steaks and 4 rolls of 85% ground beef. 

I added up all the price stickers on the wrapped meat and it came to just a few cents away from $43 

I don’t know how much the ground beef rolls sell for but it’s like they were free because all the wrapped meats are things we might of bought individually anyway and they cost the total of the box. 

Our very best bargain today was eggs.  Are eggs really high where you shop?  I think the last carton of 18 eggs from Walmart was $5.89.

  

I’ve never seen eggs in 24 count cartons and these were $3.39 a carton. 

We bought 3 as we eat lots of eggs with 7 of us living here 

https://news.va.gov/101540/eligible-veterans-can-shop-at-defense-commissaries/

Commissary shopping privileges are now available to veterans rated with any military disability and their dependents  and for reserves, in addition to retirees and active duty. 

I’m not sure how vets without ID cards get that established to shop there but I do think it is worth it, especially if your nearest commissary has a great meat department like Tinker Air Force commissary.  

A few replies 

The White Lily flour made especially nice pizza crust.  It was soft on top and crisp on the bottom. 

The chocolate chip cookies were really good too and had a nice crispness to them too. 

If I am in the Deep South and can purchase this flour, I may get a few more bags but I won’t pay crazy shipping prices to get it any other way.  

About the stuffed peaches,  I used canned peach halves.  

Drain them and turn them all cut side up.

For a 28 ounce of peach halves,  I mix about 4 ounces of softened cream cheese, a little vanilla, maybe 1/4 c finely chopped pecans and 2 or 3 T powdered sugar.  

Then fill each peach half and keep chilled until serving. 

http://ifyoudostuff.blogspot.com/2020/12/blogidays-december-7-cream-cheese.html

That link is when I blogged about them a few years ago and also contains a link to YouTube video of  a homemaker preparing a very similar recipe.  

Sorry about my infrequent posts.

I am doing a good bit of cooking and cleaning with 7 in our home, but frankly, I just don’t get as much done as I used to.

I keep all the necessary things done but I don’t have the energy right now to do lots of creative or extra stuff.  

Hope you are well and happy 

❤️ Rhonda 

Another morning in the kitchen

Hello everyone 

First to answer a few questions- 

Cheese has always kept just in the freezer for us.  Sometimes I freeze cheese that I shredded and sometimes I freeze the pre-shredded cheese.  I can’t tell any difference in fresh cheese and thawed out cheese.  

Daughter and family are still living here.  Work is happening almost everyday at their new home but construction just takes awhile.  

About nonstick cookware, many of them say “lifetime warranty”. But in my experience, they all start sticking after a year or so.  

It’s hard for me with the cast iron, as it is heavy and my mind thinks you need soap to clean stuff.  But I use a scrub brush, hot water and sometimes a little salt.  Then I dry the skillet and use a paper towel to rub it with just a few drops of coconut oil.  So far, my big skillet is staying clean and I like using it.  I have 2 smaller skillets that I cleaned and re-seasoned. But I haven’t got in the routine of using them.  

With 7 in this home, the really big skillet makes the most sense anyway.  

About the 2 girls that came for the supper the night we had apple crisp,  it was no drama, just 2 sweet girls from out of town that had the same classes as our son and all worked at the same restaurant.

Now there was another night with some drama around that same timeframe. A different son had a girlfriend name Stephanie but they “broke up”. Then he quickly started dating Luanne. We had a family gathering around that same time and the son came with Luanne and somehow Stephanie knew about the party and she also came.  Nothing crazy happened but we were certainly on pins and needles wondering what might happen.  

On to today,  I wanted to try White Lily flour after seeing it on Southern cooking shows. Daughter and husband made a quick trip to South Carolina for his work and brought me back two bags of White Lily  flour. (Stores in my Oklahoma town don’t carry this brand) 

 So I’ve been looking on the White Lily website and found a few recipes and started them today.

Today is Friday and we almost always have pizza so I made a double batch of pizza dough. The website says pizza will be thinner and crisper made with white lily. Tomorrow is Saturday and we usually have a big cup to breakfast so I mixed up some ingredients to make biscuits. I use the recipe on the back of the bag and it calls for shortening. I don’t use shortening very often but I had a small can in the pantry. It was still in date but it smelled rancid so I just used butter instead. I also mixed up a batch of refrigerator chocolate chip cookie dough that you shake it to rolls and then can just slice off before you bake them. And granddaughter Elizabeth has been asking for peach halves that are filled with cream cheese mixed with chopped pecans, powdered sugar and vanilla.  So I made a batch of those too.  

Everything waiting in the fridge for supper and breakfast. 

On the right is a big pack of thick sliced that we bought from a fundraiser from grandson Gavin’s FFA group.

I think the breakfast eaters will be especially happy tomorrow.

White Lily flour recipes used 

Pizza recipe

https://www.whitelily.com/recipes/easy-homemade-deluxe-pizzas-3878/

Chocolate chip cookie refrigerator cookies recipe 

https://www.whitelily.com/recipes/chocolate-chip-refrigerator-cookies-3528/

Biscuit recipe on the back of the bag 

This is not a sponsored post. I think you might have to say that whenever you are talking about a product these days.
And I haven’t actually cooked any of this yet. I’ll let y’all know in my next post how it all turns out.

❤️Rhonda