Catching up

It's been almost a week since my last post. I actually had to go back and read the last post to help me remember most of what has happened since then. I have cut the grass (all of it) again this week. I have not pulled any more weeds from the beds. I have pulled more rhubarb though....gave some away, froze two more quarts and made a rhubarb crumble. I made two pies last week after my last post.

Two rhubarb pies and doggie treats out of the oven.

I still have some pastry left in the fridge to make at least one more pie this week. Yes, my pastry was a little pale. That's because I left the tin foil on it too long. It was still fully baked however and it didn't affect the flavour any, because both pies are GONE.

On Thursday I decided to pull everything out of the closet under the stairs. My plan is to put back only those items that I wish to store under there and get rid of the rest. The dining room is still full of "stuff" I need to go through. When my son and his GF come back from California in two weeks, we are going to have a huge yard sale, starting with the stuff I am purging from this closet......if I can let go of it.   

 During the renovation of the bedroom, we put building material and other large broken pieces into our trailer. On Friday, my Sweetie and I loaded up more junk from the yard. While I finished cutting the rest of the lawn, my husband attached a trailer hitch  and wiring harness to the back of his van, so that early Saturday morning we could take the trailer to the Transfer Station to dump our first load of the year.

 As soon as we finished that, we took off towards Toronto. I picked up a bouquet of flowers and the card I made for Mother's Day, and brought them to the Retirement home in Cobourg where my mother lives. They were just finishing up lunch in the Dining room when we arrived. We did not stay long, but we had a very nice visit. Then off we went to the kids' gymnastics club in Bradford where my young grandson and his twelve invited guests were celebrating his fifth birthday party. The staff showed them around the foam pit, the parachute, the trampoline, etc. My daughter provided the food, cake, colouring activities and loot bags during the final hour inside the party room. After the party, we moved everything back to my daughter's place, ordered pizza, and had a family birthday party when his other grandparents, aunt, uncle and cousins arrived. We didn't get home until after 10:30 that night.

Sunday was a lot quieter. It was pouring rain and so I tried reading more of my favourite blogs and we watched a few shows "On Demand" that we missed while out West. I also got some vacuuming done. Yesterday the lawn needed to be cut again after a weekend of rain. I also got a load of laundry washed and hung outside. We had a surprise visit from an old friend of ours who lives up north now, so we whiled away a couple of hours visiting. I have been making up a few shopping lists for when we go into town this week, but it isn't urgent that we go. I still have no need for groceries yet. 

 

Day Book - Tuesday, May 17/16

I am writing a day book today as a response to a challenge made by Natalie at Imperfectly Frugally.

Outside my window......It is a lovely sunny day with a slight breeze. (great clothesline drying day). I see my front lawn freshly mowed from yesterday and I see my front porch railing that needs painting. There are daffodils that are finished blooming for the season and the flower heads need to be removed.  I also see a dirty window that needs washing.

I am thinking.....that it is always easy for me to see the work that needs doing. Why don't I have the energy and motivation to do?

I am thankful for.......good friends, and of course my family.

From the learning rooms......my Sweetie checked You Tube for videos on how to change out the wheel cylinder and muffler on the year and model of his "new to him" van, so he can finish the work needed to get the safety done on his vehicle this week. He is a mechanic but each vehicle can have different ways of taking apart its components. I have bookmarked a video series on building a tiny home and I have become lost on pinterest looking at different homemade cards.

From the kitchen....I have unloaded the dishwasher and started loading back up again. I removed everything from the counters and scrubbed them down with my Miracle Wash. I also washed the fronts of the lower cabinet doors.

I am wearing.....jeans, bright pink T-shirt, pale pink short sleeved button down shirt and black socks. I have worn this two days in a row. It has been cool these past few days.

I am creating.....a mess in the dining room. I emptied the closet under the stairs and pulled everything out into the dining room. I don't want to put anything back unless it belongs there, and there are many bins that I need to go through first.

I am going.....nowhere today, I don't think. But I am making up lists of things I need to pick up IF we go into town. I also have sorted through some recycling and bagged it up to take to the recycling plant.

I am reading.....nothing at the moment. I am not a big reader of novels. I do read when I am on vacation however. The last book I finished was Missing Joseph by Elizabeth George.

I am hoping......I can get outside today to pull a few weeds.

I am hearing.....traffic passing our house. We live on the main street through town, which is also a major highway. I also hear my son using the whirlpool tub upstairs.

Around the house......I have two loads of laundry drying on the line outside. Both cats and the dog are sleeping. I have four kitchen cabinet doors in the dining room that needs the adjustable hinges removed. We don't need the doors, but we (or the tiny house) might need the hinges in a future project. I might use the door panels to make some outdoor signs for the garden, for myself or as a gift to someone.

One of my favourite things........right now, is my Contigo water bottle. It was a gift to me from my DIL in Vancouver while I was out there. It is spill proof and holds a liter of water at a time.

A few plans for the rest of the week........I have some personal phone calls to make in the next couple of days. My son and his GF are leaving Friday for two weeks in California. While away, the GF will be celebrating her birthday, so I will fix a birthday supper for her tomorrow. Fortunately, I made all those cards before I left for Vancouver. We've had six birthdays and Mother's Day since we've come back. Whew!
There is always OUTDOORS work to be done.

Here is a picture I am sharing....

Cookies my daughter made for her son's fifth birthday (theme was LEGO police)

Rhubarb harvest

Rhubarb has been one of my most WASTED resources. I have a lovely big patch, but only manage to make a couple of pies or fruit crumbles during the season, and I let the rest of it bolt and eventually die off.. Well this year I will resolve to do better. I have decided that since I have another freezer this year, I will take advantage and freeze as much rhubarb as I can when I am not using it up in my baking. 

I was feeling my age and a lot of sore muscles this morning when I got up, so I decided I would take a break from all the yard work that needs doing. We went into Kingston to pick up my new license plate sticker. The one I bought in Elliot Lake was just a 10 day trip permit so that I could get it back home and have the car safety-ed. My appointment was yesterday. While the car was on the hoist and one wheel was off, they discovered that the wheel cylinder was leaking. Coincidentally, there was already a brand new wheel cylinder in the back of my van because my Sweetie also needed one for his vehicle. They installed that one and only charged one hours labour. So my vehicle is fit and licensed. Yay! My Sweetie will have to pick up another one for his vehicle when he gets his van in for his safety. 

From there I went to the Bulk Barn to buy oatmeal, cornmeal, chocolate chips, split peas, ground black pepper and smoked paprika. I also bought a couple more vanilla beans and some essential oil, which brought my total up to $42. But I got a senior's discount of 10%. bringing it back down to $38.92  This afternoon I cut, washed, and chopped four quarts of rhubarb ready to make pies. I prepared my pie crust for rolling out tonight after seven o'clock. Our Hydro summer schedule started May 1st, so our high peak time is now 11 AM to 5 PM. (the opposite of our winter schedule) I also made doggie biscuits to go into the oven after the pies. After 20 minutes, I will shut off the oven and leave the biscuits in there overnight to harden.

Four quarts of chopped rhubarb for the freezer, or pies.

My rhubarb patch...In a couple of days, I will be able to harvest even more.

I was able to get another load of laundry washed in cold water with my homemade laundry detergent and vinegar for softener, and hung outside on the clothesline. I folded and put away the laundry I hung yesterday. 

Supper tonight is meatloaf, boiled potatoes and carrot coins prepared this afternoon so it would be ready to cook at 5 PM (mid-rate for Hydro)

I sorted the recycling bins for pickup tomorrow and brought down all the garbage to put out at the curb tonight before bed.

I am still hoping that I will be able to do more yard work tomorrow.

In the garden

I spent another three hours outdoors today. I planned to clean up our gravel driveway, but I didn't have the proper tools for the job. So I started to pull weeds around the backyard pond instead. I haven't finished yet. It is a huge job and I also need to pick up more vinegar to make my weed-killer. I also helped my Sweetie with putting together a metal frame for a gazebo we got from "Dee" last year from one of the Elliot Lake yard sales. We didn't get that finished either. Hopefully, tomorrow will remain clear and sunny.

I hung out a load of wash I did last night. I washed another dishwasher load of dishes since last night, and I cleaned the filters of the fish aquarium this morning. Three hours pulling weeds in the bright sun has tuckered me out. I will show you the garden spaces that I worked on yesterday in the front yard.

Pasque flower in the foreground and blue windflowers to the back.

This area still needs me to clean out the dead twigs of last year's growth of beebalm and common primrose, but the area is green with narcissus and allium. 

These daffodils are surrounded on one side by blooming aubrieta deltoids and later blooming lavender. 

I have both white and pink bleeding hearts . To the left you can see some globe thistle coming up. I want to thin these plants soon, and move some to the back. These are self-seeding and will soon take over this flower bed if I don't get rid of them. 

I have blue forget-me-nots growing in the lawn and in my driveway that I need to transplant back into my garden

Golden alyssum and blue deltoids

Grape hyacinths among the large spiky leaves of the yucca plants. 

Mother's Day and Elliot Lake yard sale

I got two of these hanging planters for my veranda on Mother's Day. 

Things are not settled down yet

I got home Wednesday afternoon and caught up on some phone calls to friends and family to let them know I was back and asked about the events in their lives. A very dear friend had surgery scheduled for while I was away and I was a little surprised to learn that she was still in hospital. Thursday morning I went to visit her. I came home and crashed. I guess I was recuperating from the long days of travelling across the country.

Yesterday morning my Sweetie and I left without coffee or breakfast for the hospital in Napanee. My husband had a terrible night. He had pain in his foot that started in his ankle and spread halfway up his calf and all the way into his toes. His foot was swollen twice its size and was red and hot. While in the waiting room, he had chills so bad that the warmed blanket they gave him was not enough to warm him. I retrieved a wool blanket from the van to wrap him in. It turned out to be gout, but they couldn't take a chance that it might also be an infection; so, we had to wait for the results of the blood work from the lab. They prescribed a higher dosage of prednisone and percocet for the pain. We were gone from home from 7:30 'til after 4 p.m. It was not the way either one of us had planned to spend our day.

 Today I did my first shop at a grocery store. I had to drive into Kingston anyway to pick up a part we ordered for our dishwasher, and car parts needed to get one of our vans certified before we can buy Ontario plates. I knew I needed a couple of things without taking a shopping list, or deciding what the menu plan will look like this week, so I went to the nearest grocery store (Freshco) and picked up those items and their weekly loss leaders. This is what it looked like.

Bread cost $8.11

Three loaves of brown bread were $1.94 each and hot dog buns were $2.29  I will never get the deals that Nathalie does in Central Florida. 

Proteins cost $16.99

This was not a great deal. This is the result of not having a shopping list and just buying what looked good to me.

Produce cost $23.57

Red seedless grapes at $1.99/lb. were $5.84,  3 frozen juice concentrates cost $3.53, frozen stir-fry veggies were $7.99, frozen peas and carrots cost $2.49 and two peppers cost $1.73 I also bought a 3 pound bag of fresh carrots for  $1.99 (not pictured) 

Dairy was $5.76
The margarine was 97 cents and the cheese was marked down to only $4.79

Pantry items cost $7.72

The multi-grain Cheerios are a favourite. The large 560 gm box was on sale for $3.99 with a coupon for a free 2 litres of choco milk next time I shop. Sugar is $1.97 and the tins of diced tomatoes were only 88 cents a tin. 

Sundries cost $3.96

These also were not great deals, but these are the items (vinegar and tin foil) I needed this week. 

Total expenditure on groceries was $66.11

My Sweetie was feeling so much better today. He didn't get out of the van, but he came with me on my errands. Once home, he installed the small part needed to fix the dishwasher. I have done two loads of dishes so far today. He tuned up the lawnmower for me so I cut some of the lawn but not all of it. The grass was so thick, the mower kept stalling on me. I have the worst of it done. And I have made up more of my homemade laundry detergent and  washed two loads of laundry which I have hanging outside on the clothesline. Tonight's supper will be an easy pasta bake. 

I'm home again.

But just barely home. I arrived early this afternoon;so Nathalie, don't expect any comments on your blog because I won't be doing that until tomorrow. I haven't even unpacked the car yet. We made the trip across Canada to Northern Ontario in only four days. We spent the weekend at my Dad's house and rested. But I have to tell you about some "gifts" I received while I was there. On Friday night, we attended a trade show where I received a $10 gift certificate to Shoppers Drug Mart that was good only on Saturday. I used it to buy some food items. Free stuff.

Ten dollars bought this and a bag of potato chips which we ate the first night. 

I entered a few draws and was lucky enough to win a $25 gift certificate to another store in town. On Monday I went in to spend it all on merchandise. More free stuff. 

While I was away, I received my Sample Source package in the mail, filled with more freebies.

One Melitta coffee pod. large 90 gm Brookside dark chocolate, raspberry lemonade drink you mix with water for a full days multi vitamin, sample of dog food, two new VH sauces to make butter chicken and teriyaki, Qia protein bar, samples of breathe right strips, coupon for free box of Catelli super green pasta, and a few high value coupons . I love getting free stuff in the mail. 

And need I remind you all that my husband received my son's Dodge Caravan to drive us home. Today, he got a list of what needs to be changed out before it can be certified and the emissions test before licencing. And I received my Dad's Dodge Caravan for myself. The appointment for my emissions test and safety is next Tuesday. Two free vehicles came at the best time, as our Jeep finally gave up the ghost just before I left for my trip to Egypt. It is only costing us the price of registering ownerships, the emissions tests,  the cost of parts and labour to certify the vehicles, and new plates. They should last us for several more years.

While in Elliot Lake, I went to a few yard sales as well. I will share my treasures with you later in the week, after I have unpacked.