I'm Sick Of Winter!

I don't know about you, but I'm totally SICK OF WINTER--and it's only January 10th.  Officially, we've had winter for almost three weeks.  Those weeks of cold, snowy weather that happened before the Solstice were apparently faux winter.

The forecast has been bleak:  snow, snow, and more snow.  But there are benefits to winter, and believe me, I had to look high and low to find them.

First off, I'm staying home more and saving lots of money on gasoline for the car.  Of course, the furnace seems to be on 24/7, so we're making up for it by using a tremendous amount of natural gas to keep this place almost warm, so we'll probably be in the red for that.

I have a new giant freezer.  It's called my porch.  We ran out of space to put the Christmas goodies about mid-December.  Not a problem.  We just put them on the porch.  The temp hasn't risen above 30 out there in at least three weeks, so the cookies are still frozen, as is the big bag of ice.  All the craft beers hubby received for Christmas are nice and frosty, and I froze a big vat of turkey soup, which I first cooled outside, and then put in individual containers to freeze, so I wouldn't have to take up a third of my fridge/freezer to store it.

Oh dear.  That's only two good things.  I'm not into winter sports, like skiing, sledding, tobogganing, skating, or snowmobiling, and even if I'm not cold, seeing all that snow outside makes me feel like I should be either hibernating, or eating or drinking something fattening to make sure I survive this long, cold, lonely winter.

There must be other good things about winter.  Can you think of any?

My Favorite Meal of the Day

I love lunch.  Not just going out to eat lunch, but lunch in general.  I think I spend more time each day planning my meals than actually enjoying them.

Lunch is so full of possibilities.  Sandwiches and soup?  And which sandwiches; ham and cheese on rye with loads of lettuce?  Tuna with celery and onion with tons of lettuce on multi-grain bread?  Chicken salad with onion, celery and lots of lettuce on white?  BTL with lots of mayo and loads of lettuce on toast?  (Did I mention how much I like lettuce on a sandwich?)  And subs.  We have a great little sub shop down the road that gives you an small assorted sub with tons of meat, cheese, peppers, onions, and lettuce for $3.00.  Toss a (very small) bag of chips, and you've got yourself one mighty fine lunch--for two, even!

I love leftovers.  Give me leftover curried chicken any day.  (Leftover curried ANYTHING is on my top ten list.)  Leftover potato salad with any above-mentioned sandwich (and baby dill pickle) is also marvelous.
When I go out to lunch, I like to have something I wouldn't have at home.  Like...Indian food I can't (or am too lazy) to make myself.  (Goat anyone?)  I also love Greens and Beans, which I have made for myself, but it's labor intensive.  And fish fries.  Yeah--at the Globe Hotel in East Aurora.  (Who wants the smell of fried fish hanging around the kitchen for a couple of days....) I love a linen napking.  Salad forks.  I love being waited on, too.

Unless Mr. Ivy is feeling creative in the kitchen, we tend to eat a lot of the same stuff for supper.  That amounts to:  lamb shoulder steaks; chicken, oven baked barbeque pork (with my mother's wonderful home-made barbeque sauce).  I have a lot of cookbooks.  It's time to haul them out and try something new.

But supper can wait.  Today's lunch is curried beans and rice.  Ahhhh...that's nice.

What are you having?

Fibber Magee's Closet

Now I'm much to young to know from actual experience about Fibber McGee, but I've heard about him.  He was a character on an old radio show and every week he'd open the closet door and tons of stuff would fall out and make a BIG NOISE.
Well, I've inherited his closet. 

One of my favorite shows was on BBC America a while back: "How Clean Is Your Home."  Two neat-nick ladies, Kim and Aggie, go in and inspect the absolute FILTH in British homes, chide the homeowners (who are rarely embarrassed--their 15 (or in this case 30) minutes of fame, I suppose) and clean up the mess.  They usually do it in 24-48 hours.  (I'm on day three of my quest.)
I loved this show because no matter how cluttered my house is, I know I'm not living in that kind of squalor.   But alas, my house (and especially my home office) is cluttered.

The new year makes you want a clean start, so yesterday I decided it was time to clean the closet.  Talk about a trip back in time.  I have stacks of paper going back 10-20 years. By the time I sorted out the wheat from the chaff, I had 8 bags of shredded papers and a stack of stuff for the recycle bin that was at least 12 inches high.  (To quote Dave Barry:  "I am NOT making this up!")

I was able to reclaim quite a bit of closet real estate, which was immediately swallowed up by stuff that had been sitting under my china cabinet (where I keep my collection of 1950s figurines) for ... several years ... and STILL this room is cluttered.  I simply have too much STUFF, but a lot of it is stuff I just can't seem to part with.  Like books.  And books on tape.  And figurines.  (*Sigh*)

Today's quest is to reclaim my computer desk.  As I've got the file cabinet in order I might be able to clear it off...and hope to keep it clear for at least a few days....

Cross your fingers for me!

What's cluttering up your house?

The Keys To The Kingdom

I lose things on a regular basis.  I especially lose vital things like my glasses, gloves, the white-handled knife we use to use to cut pizza and, even more important, my keys.

A few years back I bought a new car.  At the time, I had a really bad cold.  I picked up the car on a Monday, drove it home, took the keys out of it and went into the house and put them down.  Because I was so sick, I didn't drive the car again for another three days.  So, there it was 6 a.m. and I needed to go to work and...no keys.

No matter, I'll just use my second set of keys.  And off to work I went.

I have not found my main set of keys yet.  I still maintain they're in the house somewhere, but Mr. Ivy says they're buried deep in the middle of the local landfill.

Big deal, it's just a set of keys, right?  WRONG!  Not only was the leather tag something my late Dad made for me, but on that ring was the spare key to Mr. Ivy's car.  So what, we'll just get a replacement, right?  The replacement for my new car key was $1.79.

Well, Mr. Ivy's got a SMART car.  That means there's a little chip on the key that will allow the car to start.  To replace this key costs about $60.  To program the key costs another $40.  (Boy am I glad I have a stupid car!)

It's been a real pain in the butt not having a key to that car.  If I have to use it, I have to take HIS keys, which means he shifts into total paranoia mode.  WHAT IF YOU LOSE MY KEYS???!!!

It's a possibility.  I've been known to stamp through the house, swearing a blue streak as I search for my keys or glasses only to find them IN MY HAND!!!

Now you might think this is the first sign of dementia, but I've been doing this for the past 25+ years, so I think we can rule that out.  What's the answer?  My Dad always said my head was full of Tommyrot.  (Stories, songs, the weather, the cost of pork won tons, etc.)

I think he was right.

I lost my keys again this past week (they were in my seldom-used coat's pocket) and decided enough was enough.  It was time to get a second set.  We went to Home Depot and had copies made to all the keys to the kingdom (except for Frank's car).  I'm good to go again.

Until I lose this set of keys.

What do you lose on a regular basis?

And I wanted to have a picnic . . .

Yup, if you live in a snowy part of the country and have gutters on your house, you're probably well aware of ice dams.  Everyone says you have to have them, or the snow melt will wash away the dirt around your foundation, but to me gutters are pretty useless -- at least in the winter.  All they do is get choked with ice and ruin your roof.  Raking the roof of snow seems to help, but the back of my house it too tall for that, so I can only reach the roof around the front of the house.

This is what our barbecue looks like this winter.  (Note the Stalactite icicle.)


We won't be cooking hot dogs for quite a while.

How about you?

Of Pens and Rescued Horses

The older I get, the more I want the same things I wanted when I was a kid.  Take colored pens, for instance.  I absolutely love any pen that isn't black or blue.  So I was in 7th heaven when my friend Gwen gave me colored pens for Christmas.  Holy cow!  Red, green, turquoise, pink, purple AND yellow!  (The pink and purple are my favorites.)

When I was a kid, I also wanted a horse.  Back in high school I rode very badly, but loved to go out even in cold weather to take a ride on Zippy or Babe (usually Babe, who always seemed to be pregnant, but didn't seem to mind a chubby teenager on her back).  Frank was shocked the first time I introduced him to the softest thing on the face of the planet, a horse's nose.  Whoa!  I think he thought the horse would bite him, but this particular horse (in Colonial Williamsburg) seemed used to being petted by city slickers.

Well, I can have lots of pens but I can't have lots of horses.  Or even one.  (Our backyard is the size of a postage stamp.)  So instead, I support Cracker Box Palace.

( BTW, Cracker Box Palace is what George Harrison called his estate, Friar Park, in Henley On Thames.  In the early 1900s, my great grandmother was a cook there (and made the world’s best rice pudding.  I do not know this from personal experience; my Dad told me so).  Ole’ George even wrote a song about his home.)

There’s a Cracker Box Palace down the road from us in Alton, NY.   It’s a farm animal rescue organization that takes in abused (and homeless) horses, cows, goats, and assorted other farm animals.  (They really aren’t equipped to take in discarded pets.)

They have a wonderful newsletter and that's sure to make you cry.  I'll never understand how people can be cruel to animals--big or small.  But there are also stories of rescue and adoption.  Here's a picture of Blaze, who's currently looking for a new home.  (Sniff...why did we buy a house with such a small back yard???)

My point?  If you didn't overspend at Christmastime, maybe you could forgo a a couple of lattes and send a couple of bucks to your favorite no-kill shelter.  For big or little animals.  You'll feel good and the animals will feel even better.

Happy New Year

Candle In The Wind . . .

From the time I could understand words, my mother instilled the fear of fire into me.  She grew up in England before the days of central heating, where a coal fire was the only way to keep the shivers at bay (and not very well, either.  You toasted on one side while the other froze).

So when candles became the rage, I never succumbed to the temptation to buy and light them.  All my friends did, but the idea of touching match to wick was just more than I could bring myself to do.

Okay, I exaggerate.  Before I learned to say NO SMOKING IN MY HOUSE, I'd burn a votive candle when my friend Judy came over.  When I visited my brother, I used to take a candle with me because it seemed to dissipate the smoke somehow.  (Either that or it was wishful thinking.)

My friend Gail waxed poetically (pun intended) about certain candles.  She particularly liked the lemon icebox cookies aroma.  (They're soybean wax/no lead Kitchen Pantry Lights from Swan Creek Candle Company.)  Gail told me she sits her candles in a potpourri warmer and the aroma keeps her from eating cookies all day. (She should know.  She's a Weight Watchers graduate and has kept the weight off for several years.)

I thought about it for a long time before I broke down and bought myself a candle warmer and yes, a jar candle of lemon icebox cookies.  At first, I timidly warmed the candle in the kitchen, fearing the cats would knock it over.  But after a couple of weeks and they didn't go near it, I worked up the courage to bring it into my office, where it's sitting even as I type this.

Oh, the heavenly aroma of lemon icebox cookies is enough to make me get out a spoon and gouge out a piece of wax...it just smells sooooo good.  I've also got a butterscotch toffee candle that someone gave me as a gift that smells just like butterscotch pudding.  Yum.

Supposedly burning (or melting) aromatic candles should heighten the senses and cause your creativity to flow.  I don't yet have enough experience to know if that's true.  But if it is...I've got a world of dessert-flavored candles in my future.

Cabin Fever?

Once upon a time, when I had a day job, I used to experience cabin fever any day I HAD to stay home.  It was like permanent itching powder on the back of my neck.  Get out, do something, Go ANYWHERE.

I don't feel that way any more.  Nowadays, any day I DON'T have to go out and be somewhere doing something is just fine.  In fact, it's paradise!

Yesterday was cold and snowy.  The flakes were so big they were clumps.  I sat in my little comfy chair and read a book for about four hours by the glow of the Christmas tree.  Sometimes my cat  would come and sit with me for a while.  Just to make sure I knew he loved me, he'd settle on the back of the chair and purr.

Can life get much better than that?

It got worse. 

Just as the sky was transitioning from afternoon to evening mode, I had to put on my hat, big coat, and gloves and venture out into the 10 degree almost night.  By the time I finished my errands, it was even colder, although at least the snowflakes were a more reasonable size.  I am NOT going out today, and if I'm lucky, I won't have to go anywhere until at least a couple of days.  Can you say "settle back in a comfy chair and read, Read, READ?"  (Or maybe watch a DVD or two?)

Ahhhhh...heaven again.

Mmm-mmm Good!

Don't you just love Christmas?  Not only do you get and give lovely presents to/from family and friends, you get to revel in the feast--for days on end.  Mind you, I am not a great cook--but I'm getting better!

Yesterday I was just going to make a turkey salad sandwich and a turkey pot pie out of the leftovers.  But after I got the bird out of the roasting pan, I figured--why not just get it all over with in one day instead of drawing the whole leftover prep out over the weekend.

Up first--lunch!  Turkey salad.  (Mmmmm....  It was delish.)  I denuded the skeleton (isn't it funny to think of a turkey skeleton?), got out the soup pot and toss in all the bones.  I boiled them for three hours.  Meanwhile, I got my veggies ready for the soup and the turkey pie.  Of course, lunch intervened, and by the time I'd strained the broth from the bones, I'd forgotten which bowl of veggies was what and dumped my turkey pie veggies in the soup.  Oh, what the heck--I figured and dumped the rest of the veggies in the soup, too.  Then I dumped in the meat that came off the bones.  Whoa--this is one pretty thick soup.

I used a bunch of leftovers for my turkey pie, too.  Leftover gravy, leftover pearl onions in white sauce, tossed in a can of chicken broth, more veggies and lots of meat.  Whoa!  Using the onion sauce and gravy really gave my pie a great taste.

I made everything without a recipe.  I like the feeling I get when tossing stuff together and it coming out tasting very fine indeed.  (Secret ingredient in both the soup and pie:  a pinch of herbs de Provence--but just a pinch--that spice packs a lot of whollop!)

What great tasting food do you make without a recipe?

Counting Down to Christmas Part II

The house is clean, the decorating is done, the wrapping is almost finished (one more), and I'm stuffed from all the holiday goodies I've eaten in the last month.  I should be working on the WIP but I don't feel like it.

I've already watched most of my holiday favorites (Elf, Rudolph, White Christmas, The Santa Claus) and I'm thinking about watching the Polar Express this afternoon.

And as a treat, I've decided to do a little counted cross stitch, something I haven't had time for in YEARS.  I picked up a couple of little you-make Christmas ornaments and it will be a pleasant way to pass the time until tonight when we host some of our family for another round of junk food before the big prime rib feast tomorrow.

I've got dip to make and cookies to thaw and other goodies that need to be prepared.

In the meantime, look out for Santa!  (NORAD's tracking him, you know!  Last I checked, he was in China.)

Counting Down To Christmas

Two shopping days left.  I have only two more gifts to buy (, and then I'm done.  Tomorrow I'm wrapping.  That'll take a few hours.  Tomorrow I intend to VEG.  And Saturday (the big day), we're hosting Christmas dinner.  (Prime rib.)

In the meantime, there seems to be an abundance of food EVERYWHERE I LOOK!  We got a "bread" basket as a gift, filled with wonderful breakfast foods.  I ate the scones with the Devon cream.  (Oh, god, it was enough to make me swoon.)  Last night I visited friends and two of them brought delicious cookies.  (One of them also made her world-famous Chex Mix and gave me an ENTIRE bag of the stuff!!!)

I went grocery shopping yesterday.  Didn't I buy the stuff to make our family's pink dip?  (Nobody else on the planet makes pink dip (which gets its color from ketchup).)  That means potato chips have to happen on Christmas Eve.  We've eaten two pizzas in the last week; had Chinese food for supper last night.  We're going out to lunch for our annual Christmas date today, and tomorrow we're going out to dinner at my Aunt's. 

I've got cookies in the freezer.  I've got a vat of mixed nuts (no peanuts).  Red & Green peanut M&Ms.  Holiday Hershey kisses.  The only healthy thing we've got in the house is the remains of a wonderful fruit basket we received as a gift.  (Grapes are gone.  I keep telling myself that eating them canceled out all the bad stuff.)

Can you see a diet on my horizon?  How about you?

I'm Dreaming of a Green Christmas . . .

"I'm dreaming of a white Christmas...just like the ones I used to know...."

It seems like these words have been ingrained into most of America and people wax poetically about those beautiful ice crystals mounting up and decorating their homes and yards.

Well, to that I say:  BULL!  See that picture above?  That's snow.  Oh, yeah, it can be pretty, but to people traveling to be with family and friends for the holidays, it can be lethal.  It not only snarls street traffic, it plays havoc with the entire airline industry!  I don't know about you, but I've already had enough of the stuff for the year, and it winter only officially started yesterday.

Our next-door neighbors drive to Indiana every holiday season to be with their "real" family.  Hubby has drive 78 miles to pick up his mother who'll visit for Christmas.  Several years ago it took him two hours to drive five miles when lake-effect snow off Lake Erie turned his 90 minute drive into a seven hour ordeal.  (That was before we had a cell phone.  Insert image of Ivy frantic with worry.)

One Christmas, many years ago (the one where I gave my brothers a new basketball--my Aunt wrapped it for me and I picked it up on Christmas Eve), it was 64 degrees and sunny.  My only real memory of that Christmas is of me sitting in the kitchen watching Jonny Quest, with just the screen door closed, while my brothers dribbled (doink, doink, doink) out on the driveway.

The first Christmas Hubby and I were in our current house, it was another sunny, dry, GREEN Christmas and we took a leisurely walk down the street.  That felt nice.  I wouldn't walk down our sidewalk in snow.  For one thing, despite paying tons of money for our town to clear our sidewalks, they really only make them more treacherous because the sidewalk plows do a lousy job and toss snow into your driveway (where it usually freezes and you have to wait weeks for a thaw, meanwhile bruising the underside of your car every time you drive over it).

Green Christmases are safer.  And wouldn't you really rather have people alive to enjoy the holiday than a picturesque landscape?

I would.

What's for dessert?

Here in the Land of Ivy Bend -- we've always had pie for Christmas dinner dessert.  One or two people have a tiny slice and then nobody wants the leftovers.  Mr. L usually spends the next couple of weeks eating said pies for breakfast. (Naturally, I freeze them in individual slices.)  However, much as he loves pies, Mr. I gets sick of them after a while.  So this year I've decided to do something different for Thanksgiving dessert:  carrot cake.

Hey, it's got veggies in it--it's good for you, right?  There's just one problem:  I can't stand that cream cheese frosting.  Ick--it's too sweet and cloying and kinda slimy, too.  I thought I'd make a lovely carrot cake in a bundt pan and lightly dust it with confectioner's sugar.

Whoa, Nelly!  Brother and Hubby don't WANT it lightly dusted with confectioner's sugar.  They want the whole thing slathered in slimy icing.

Okay, I'm game to have cream cheese frosting on hand, then anyone who wants it can dig in, but since it's likely I'm the one who'll be eating carrot cake for the next two weeks for breakfast, I don't want my breakfast covered in goop.

So, what do you think I should do?  Frosting or sugar?