A Lovely Weekend

It has been a gorgeous couple of days, weather-wise. Unfortunately, I chose to work indoors during most of that time.  Yesterday I was pretty much tied to the kitchen. I put the last 3 chicken thighs from the last grocery haul two weeks ago, into my crock pot to make another chicken stock. I washed and cut up the 3 bunches of broccoli (7 heads) into florets. Then I peeled the woody stems and cut them up into coins to throw into homemade soups. I also washed and removed the membranes and seeds from 10 rainbow (sweet) peppers, sliced and froze them as well.

 While I was moving items around in my freezer, I found two unidentified containers that I had neglected to attach labels to, so I removed them to defrost.  I knew they were leftovers, but wasn't exactly sure what they were.  I washed my stamps that I took off the dining room table. These were the ones I used to make my Thanksgiving and Halloween cards. I was able to talk with "Dee", my daughter and my eldest son on Facebook Messenger throughout the afternoon, while simultaneously putting together some die cuts for future cards. I made a batch of homemade vanilla extract, using 4 beans to 200 ml of vodka, and placed in a glass jar in my baking cupboard. I will give this a good shake every few days and it should be ready by Christmas.

I did go outside for about an hour so that I could mow both the front and back lawns, before it was time to make dinner.  One of the mystery containers from the freezer turned out to be fried ground chicken and the other container contained mashed turnip. For supper last night I heated up the turnip, some whole green beans and two of the chicken thighs from the crock pot. I placed the broth and the third chicken thigh in the fridge to make a soup later on.  Tonight I have made up another dish of creamy white sauce with the cream cheese and mixed together cut green beans with the fried ground chicken, placed a layer of mashed cauliflower on top and made my version of Shepherd's Pie. It is in the oven now warming up.

Today was a wacky kind of day. Although I was up, showered and dressed by 7:30 this morning, I didn't get my breakfast until noon. All the family members I didn't get to talk to yesterday, called me this morning. One of those callers was my sister. My mother was taken by ambulance to the hospital over the weekend for further evaluation. It isn't working out at the Assisted Living Facility and she may have to be placed in a long-term care facility. That kind of news is just very upsetting. Then this afternoon, my husband's brother called and talked for about 2 hours. He arrived in Kingston a  few days ago but both he and his wife have been very sick. I had no idea. He will try to get out to see me tomorrow; but if they're able,  they are driving back home to Florida on Wednesday. So in essence, I haven't accomplished  a thing today. Some days are like that. It is just impossible to get started.