Confessions of a Grandma

Yesterday I read Arkansas Patti's post about eating to empty the refrigerator ( http://thenewsixty.blogspot.com/2009/12/eat-refrigerator-empty.htm ). We are also in the the process of emptying the refrigerator, freezer, and any open pantry items. We will be leaving for Florida on December 28th. This chore is complicated by the fact that we are hosting my family Christmas party this Sunday. That means lots of food and I can't very well serve a big bowl of cornmeal mush just because I have an opened container with about a cup and a half of cornmeal in it that I need to use up. Last night we had cornmeal mush (let's call it polenta) with a scampi made from the remains of a bag of frozen shrimp, a bit of garlic, the last couple of splashes of juice from a week old lemon, and the last of a jar of capers. Hey, it was pretty good. We're sure to have much stranger meals before we leave. I have a dread fear of leaving flours and grains in the cupboards even though I transfer eve...

It was warm today...60 degrees! When we are in Florida for the winter I will complain mightily about the frigid weather when the temperature is in the 60's there. All is relative. I took an extra long walk today to compensate for the recent bad weather and my own recent slothfulness. I walked to Jericho Center and around the green, stopping to drop off a book at our library and then to mail our property tax payment at the box outside the general store, then taking my usual loop: Brown's Trace to Barber Farm road to Fitzsimonds Road back to Brown's Trace. There are several new highway signs put up in the past few days--"Yield to pedestrians in crosswalk" (seven cars drove by in rapid succession while I stood at the crosswalk) and yellow signs alerting drivers to side roads (most with fairly inventive spellings and/or questionable grammar). By the way, it really annoys me when people automatically add "Road" to my address on Brown's Trace. "Trace...

I recently was reading an article, "Handy Hints for Around the House: Time-saving shortcuts you'll thank us for!" To keep bed linen sets together and organized in your linen closet, fold the top and bottom sheets and one pillow case, then store them all inside the remaining pillowcase. Seriously, is it just me or is this really kind of stupid? Here I have folded top and bottom sheets and both pillowcases. Stacked neatly like this they can be placed quite easily on similarly folded and stacked sheets in the closet. Are they going to jump around and disorganize themselves when I close the door? Maybe my sheets are better trained than some, but they tend to stay put until I move them. Stuffing sheets into pillowcases seems like unnecessary work for very little benefit.

I have very little idea what Facebook is all about. I am trying to sign up though. Threadneedle, the fabric shop I so loved, is out of business now, but the former owner has started a group on Facebook and I want to join. It seems quite complicated and I am completely stymied by trying to upload my picture, but I'll keep at it. Can't be defeated by a machine, darn it!

I have always enjoyed magazines although now I have let all my subscriptions lapse. I have always found that after a while the issues seem to be repetetive and now it's a hassle to change addresses when we are away. I can borrow magazines at the library in Jericho (although not the most current issue, but so what), read them at the dentist or doctor's office, buy them for a quarter at the Venice library, even read some stuff on line. Still, I end up buying a magazine every now and then after standing in the checkout line at the supermarket. There's alwyas some intriguing hook splashed across the front covers and I give in. Recently, I bought a Woman's Day. The hooks--"1 MONTH TO A HEALTHIER YOU...lose 10 pounds" and "STOP SPENDING ON STUPID STUFF." So, do you want to know the secret of losing 10 pounds in a month? Eat less and exercise more. No magic and in reality that is exactly what I expected. I did have high hopes for the "STOP SPE...

I made the mistake of letting Kristen dig through my fabric scraps box during her visit last week. She found some red velveteen and some pink satin. I'm not even sure where it came from--probably included in some yard sale purchase. This is what she wanted to have made into jackets--two of them because she has two 18" dolls and they apparently want to dress alike to go to the "hip hop club." It took all day but I did manage to finish two jackets suitable for an evening at a hip hop club if you happen to be an 18" doll. What a miserable job sewing velveteen is! It shifts as you try to complete a seam. Lint flies all over but particularly gums up the bobbin case. Thank goodness I did not attempt this construction while the grand children were here because there would have been no way to keep the swearing under control. Little ears just don't need to hear that kind of stuff. At least Kristen really does appreciate the doll clothes. So it gives me a kind of gran...

I have started a double trousseau for the Bitty Baby dolls in California. This is a knitted ensemble modelled by a Madame Alexander doll. Are you old enough to recognize the White House era Caroline Kennedy? And I couldn't make pajamas for the little man and not make a night shirt for the young lady. I also tried my hand at making a pattern based on a nightgown that I bought for myself and really liked. It turned out to be way too small, so Kristen will have two night gowns now. We call this a "learning experience," but I really did figure out the mistake in my calculations--one of those "AHA" moments while brushing my teeth. For the life of me, I cannot understand how people without good oral hygiene habits ever figure any thing out. It just seems that life sorts itself out while I'm brushing my teeth. Maybe that just me. In the garden--break in the weather for a brief time yesterday and I got to do some much needed weeding--I notice small tomatoes and ...

Threadneedle Fabrics started 50% off all inventory today. The place was mobbed. I do love a bargain, but really not at the expense of a lovely shop with quality merchandise right there at the nearest shopping center. This makes me very sad--even as I scored a lovely silk and more pajama flannel. Mike said he had read that a number of Joann's Fabric were shutting down as well--don't know if this would include the South Burlington store, and their fabric does not compare to Threadneedle, but what's left? Walmart? No, thanks. You hear a lot about the out-of-control credit card debt as contributing to today's sour economy. I think cheap-goods-greed as perfected by Walmart is equally to blame.

Maybe we are all just weary of the rain and clouds and more rain. Blame it on the infamous upper level low stalled over New England. My petunias, poor darlings, are actually rotting. Anyway, nothing turned out to be easy today. I started to clean the bath tub tiles in preparation for re-grouting a few spots. Well, the few spots grew to several spots and then a whole bunch of tiles caved in to reveal a soggy, crumbly sheet rock wall behind. Now it is a job beyond my capabilities so we will have to call in professional help. That was the big thing, but even sewing today felt more like time spent sweeping up snippets of thread and dropped pins and dust balls from the bobbin case. Then I baked cookies and felt like it was such a daunting task to wash up bowls and measuring utensils and cookie pans. So I guess I am in a bit of a grumpy mood. The cookies are good, though, and I am looking forward to a big glass of wine with pork chops and potatoes for supper--and a big cookie ...

Elizabeth graduated from high school June 5th and is now looking forward to going off to college in a few months. Is it just me, or do grand children grow up on a faster time schedule than other kids? In the blink of an eye, I tell ya. We did not "gift" her anything, but don't think we are Grinchy old grand parents. We did send a card with a check and a silver keeper jewelry box.

When did we all stop giving and start gifting instead? "My friend gave me a book for my birthday" has been translated to "My friend gifted me a book..." I'm sorry. That just plain sounds wrong. It is better to gift that to receive. Admit it--just sounds wrong. That's what I think.

My grand daughter is into play dates. This is a new concept for me. I seem to remember just meeting friends outside and going off to play--sometimes at some one's house but mostly just outside. Our back yard was a common place for a baseball game. There was a skating pond and a sliding hill in winter. We knew where to go to pick berries or ride bikes to the swimming hole in the summer. It being pretty much the same when my own kids were young, but I do believe as a parent I did have a better idea at any given time where they actually might be than my own parents did when we were growing up. There was a book written by Robert Paul Smith in 1957-- Where did you go? Out. What did you do? Nothing.-- that pretty much sums up the "don't tell" attitude of my generation. Anyway, playing now has to be scheduled into a kid's day. You can order "parent cards" handy for handing out to other parents so that play date arrangements go smoothly. I'm sure ...

There are plenty of advertisements on TV related to finding your true love, soul mate, perfect match. Wow, it's mind blowing. There are tests you can take to show with whom you would find life time love and commitment. I wonder--if Mike and I were to fill out the questionnaires, what are the infinitesimal chances that we would be matched to each other?

Health magazine for June has an article about 50 secrets to fabulous and fun tastic summer hair. By far my favorite for a laugh: Wrap sections of your damp hair in cotton tube socks and tie the ends of each sock together. Go to bed for the night. Socks are more comfortable than rollers, you see. (Does anyone really do that? Sleep in rollers, I mean?) Then in the morning take out the socks, fluff your hands through your hair and enjoy the waves. My hair is already wavy so I don't think that I'll try this. Because my hair is wavy, I naturally yearn to wake up with perfectly straight hair. Also no one in the house has tube socks. It would not be worth the trip to K-Mart or where ever it is one goes to purchase tube socks. This little beauty secret would pretty much hatchet any chance of getting lucky that night and I still think it would be hard to sleep with knotted socks all over your head so you might want to be occupying your time somehow. And really, if I ever did try t...

So I log on to the blog and see "customize." I click on that thinking it would be good to jazz up the page. Trouble is that I simply do not understand the language. To me, a computer is a glorified type writer. Remember those? Any way, site maps, gadgets, crawling, html--all mean next to nothing. I don't know what to do with any of it. I'm lucky I learned to type. We had an old manual type writer (Remember those?) when I was a kid. By the time I was in high school my father had brought home a used IBM Selectric and weren't we just in the space age then. I didn't take typing in high school, but my mother insisted that I learn to type. Her plan had always been to go to college and that was certainly her plan for her children. Unfortunately, her dad lost his business in the depression, which hit just as my mom was graduating from high school. He could no longer afford to send her to college and she ended up going to a secretarial school so she could...

Last Sunday we were driving to the Waterbury Flea Market, and as we were going along the Winooski River, Mike commented that the water was too high for a canoe trip. "You're safe," he said, "or I'm safe." Funny little reference to my proclivity for tipping over the canoe based on my complete and utter lack of any intuitive knowledge of physics and its application to canoe paddling. Last year we took a trip down the river in May. The water was kind of high and moving fast--made for an easy paddle. We stopped at an island to have a picnic lunch. Mike wanted to go to paddle around to the back side of the island. On the way we veered too close to the shore and tipped over so fast we didn't know what hit us. The day was warm and sunny but the water was still cold. We ended up laying our clothes on trees and having a naked picnic lunch. Then when things dried out a bit, we headed on. Just passed the interstate bridge, we came to fork in the river. We ...

Between working in the yard/garden and doing some spring cleaning jobs inside, my hands have taken a wicked beating. Time for a manicure. I have to do my own manicures. When I was working and had more discretionary money, I would gladly pay for the indulgence of a pedicure, but even then I did my own manicure. Let's face it, the average manicurist takes one look at my nails and thinks, "Why bother?" In truth, lots of people who seem to care about nails much more than I give me confused, dismayed, slightly dyspepsic looks upon noticing my nails. My nails are short, okay? To me a good manicure is scrubbed clean nails, pushed back cuticles, clipped back, filed smooth nails that do not ever extend past the finger tips, and a good slather of rich hand cream. For special occasions, maybe a good buffing. Polish, French manicures, air brushing--not for me. Several years age, Mike and I went on a raft trip in the Grand Canyon. This involved six days of rafting down the C...

Let me just say, in regard to Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracles --should I ever, ever be in vircumstances where I have to depend on eating only the food I am able to grow myself, I am SO moving to California's western valley section.

I have noticed a couple of spots along the roads around the house that have a pattern of accumulated litter. Specifically, there are two different spots where a serious number of coffee cups cover the ground for a twenty foot stretch or so. Both happen to be within just about the driving distance it would take to drink a cup of coffee purchased at nearby convenience store. My assumption is that a regular traveller stops at the convenience store, purchases his or her morning cuppa, drinks it on the way to work each morning, and tosses the empty cup out the window in or near the same spot each day. Has to be some one very neat, obviously, because who wants garbage piling up in the car. Or, more likely, some one who is very RUDE. Really, I am a knee-jerk liberal by nature, but I do contemplate setting aside my otherwise firm opposition to the death penalty when it comes to dealing with litterers. Okay, extreme perhaps, but how about a tax on food purchased at fast food and convenien...

I was on a guided nature walk on the beach when a woman commented that she often wondered how pelicans were able to dive into the water as they do without breaking their necks. Would have been an awfully SHORT evolutionary history for pelicans if they weren't designed to dive into the water after fish. I don't care if you're of the Darwinian persuasion or the Divine Design persuasion--that was a stupid comment. Bicycle riders are largely a menace here on the isle. Clearly marked bike lanes and still riders are going against traffic or riding on the sidewalks and snarking at pedestrians who don't jump off the sidewalk fast enough. Share the road, I think, means: "Make way for me and superior method of transportation--greener than a car, more efficient than walking." I have worked long and hard, and successfully by and large, at overcoming my irrational childhood terror of dogs. Then the other day a dog bit me as I was walking to town. Apparently it was my fault...