The Friday Five Good Things

 Five good things that happened this week.

1. I watched a Downton Abbey that I some how missed.

2. Quill and I hung out in the bedroom and watched The Great Waldo Pepper

3. The Eldest and I watched the live action Ruroni Kenshin. We agreed we liked the anime better.

4. Nothing helps a sore throat like Luigi's Italian Ice

5. My gift to me arrived.

How was your week?

T Stands for Coffee

 

The Eldest loves her coffee. Well, coffee that's flavored: raspberry chocolate, blueberry, vanilla. I found a cute tee shirt for her for her birthday next month. Of course, the cat could be holding a cup of tea, too.

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth's blog to find out what the rest of the T Stands For gang is up to. If you want to play, include in your Tuesday post a beverage or container for a beverage. Don't forget to link your blog to Bleubeard and Elizabeth's page.

The Friday Five Good Things

 Five good things that happened this week.

1. Everything was going well with the new phone except I couldn't get an Outlook email address to work. After finding out about MS Authenticator, I finally got it working. I was insufferably pleased with myself all day

2. The Eldest treated me to an Earl Grey latte and a scone

3. A trip to the Apple store to trade in my old phone. Apple gave me a much better price for it than Visible did.

4. While out and about I met an acquaintance I hadn't seen in a while.  We had a nice chat.

5. I had an eye doctor appointment. No changes to vision so no new prescription. Yay!

How was your week?

The Friday Five Good Things

 

Five good things that happened this week.

1.A dreary, rainy Sunday. Perfect for crafting

2. The Coopers hawk is back surveying his territory

3. The Young One and I had lots of laughs on our video call.

4. I made beef soup and bread. Perfect for a chilly day

5. The Eldest planted Sweet Williams along the front walk

How was your week?

T Stands for A Thoughtful Addition

 

to Easter dinner from the Eldest. Since she had to work at the hospital this past weekend, we'll be celebrating Easter next weekend.

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s blog to find out what the rest of the T gang is up to. If you want to play, include a beverage or beverage container in your post. Don’t forget to link your blog from Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s page.

The Friday Five Good Things

 Five good things that happened this week.

1. I found a great quote for the Heart book thanks to a friend in Tennessee

2. Errands and Five Guys

3. I only ate half of my Five Guys so I had an awesome lunch

4. More errands and  home in time to make chili in the crockpot

5. Another ice event and The Eldest had the day off. No overnight stay at the hospital

How was your week?

The Friday Five Good Things

 

1.  The Eldest was able to make arrangements to stay at the hospital where she works to ride out the storm on Sun. and Mon.

2. "A" showed up at 2 pm Monday to make a first pass of snow blowing the driveway

3. We didn't lose electricity through the storm.

4. A fun chat with the Young One. She told me about a game, Beast of Yore from Inkulinati where you battle with drolleries from the margins of medieval manuscripts.

5. Teague and I hoping the warm weather arrives so Two Old Ladies On the Road can plan another trip

How was your week?

The Friday Five Good Things

 Five good things that happened this week.

1. The Nephew-in-Law installed new shower light/fan.

2. I made brunch with a sausage and apple strata. The Eldest and I had mimosas, too

3. I finished the January junk journal!

4. The Eldest was cuddling Calli and asked her, "Who is my fluffy, little princess?" Calli meowed back Me

5. Teague picked me up after my doctor's appointment, and we went out to breakfast.

How was your week?

The Friday Five Good Things

 Five good things that happened this week.

1. We didn't lose electricity during the storm.

2. When the Eldest went to dig her car out, a maintenance man shoveling the hospital walkways went over and helped her out.. 

3. She had made a reservation at a motel close to the hospital, but her little car couldn't handle the road. She went back to the hospital and the night nursing supervisor found her a room on a med. surgical floor where she spent the night.

4. I've been having fun playing in the junk journal.

5.  During my weekly Teague visit, she took me to my annual mammogram appointment, and then we picked up sandwiches on the way back to her house. I had a gyros

How was your week?

The Friday Five Good Things

 Five good things that happened this week.

1. All alone and the television to myself, I cranked up the DVD player and watched, "How Green Was My Valley."

2. After her evening shift at the hospital, the Eldest made it home safely through the sleet, freezing rain, and ice.

3. I spent an afternoon watching craft videos.

4. Ended the year with Chinese food so no cooking. Began the new year with leftover Chinese food so no cooking.

5. Started the January Junk Journal Class with Lindsey Ostrom.

How was your week?

T Stands for Lah-Di-Dahs

 

The Eldest was going to order a Lah-Di-Dah (fancy beverage) from Starbucks She asked if I wanted something. My little, guilty pleasure from Starbucks is the Chai Tea Latte. 

Silly, tautological name. Because Chai means tea. So it's a Tea Tea Latte and somehow they know to throw in spices like black pepper, cardamom, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, vanilla and lots of sugar with foamy milk. You can order it hot or iced. I don't like it iced. Those warm spices just don't taste tight to me.

Anyway, she got me a Grande (medium size) Chai Tea Latte on her dime!

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth's blog to find out what the rest of the T Stands For gang is up to. If you want to play, include in your Tuesday post a beverage or container for a beverage. Don't forget to link your blog to Bleubeard and Elizabeth's page.

T Stands for Sausage and Chick Pea Soup

 

My bad. I had promised to post the recipe for Sausage and Chickpea Soup last week.

The Young One shared with me a recipe she got from her meal kit so I can't print the exact recipe. As I've mentioned before, I'm a lazy, half-assed cook so here is the version I did. The soup got rave reviews from my Himself. The soup is customizable so use what you like best.

This can be adapted for the stove or done in a crockpot. I opted for the crockpot. How do you spell lazy? C.J. This will probably feed a family of 6 - 8 or a family of 3 Italians.

You will need:

l lb. of Italian sausage, chicken sausage, or sausage of your choice. I used Italian sausage with fennel.

Since the Eldest does not like Italian sausage, I also used 1 lb. ground beef.

2, 32 oz. of soup stock/broth. I had vegetable stock in the pantry. You could use beef or if you're using chicken sausage, use chicken stock.

Onion (to me this is optional as onion as well as garlic is an IBS trigger for me so I tend to use very little or to leave it out entirely, sauté it)

1 can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed.

1 can, Tomato paste (the recipe called for a couple of tablespoons, but I loathe recipes that don't use the entire amount. I had leftover jarred sauce in the fridge so I used that instead)

1 tablespoon of Italian seasoning (or to taste)

Salt and pepper to taste

8 - 10 oz. bag of spinach leaves. Himself won't eat cooked spinach so I left this out. I substituted a couple of cups of frozen, mixed vegetables.

Optional: 1/2 box of small pasta (Orzo, Tubettini, Ditalini, little Shells, Elbows) The soup as is wasn't substantial enough for me so I added the pasta. 

1.  Cook the sausage. I bake it in the oven until the internal temp. is 145 oF for pork sausage, about 40 or so min. at 350 oF. When cool, cut into rounds. Alternatively, you could squeeze the meat from the casing and brown that. But since I needed a way for the Eldest to pick around the sausage, I cut it into rounds.

2. If using ground beef, brown the ground beef until no pink remains. Drain.

3. To your crockpot add the sausage (ground beef),  the soup stock, (optional onion), chickpeas, frozen mixed vegetables, Italian seasoning, salt, pepper, 

4. Cover and cook on low for 6 hours or high for 4 hours.

5. At the last half hour left of cooking add the pasta.

6. If using the spinach, just before serving toss in the spinach until wilted

Serve along with a salad and bread if desired.

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth's blog to find out what the rest of the T Stands For gang is up to. If you want to play, include in your Tuesday post a beverage or container for a beverage. Don't forget to link your blog to Bleubeard and Elizabeth's page.

The Friday Five Good Things

 Five good things that happened this week.

1. We watched my favorite movie, The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951)

2. Himself put out some fun Halloween decorations

3. The Eldest treated me to a Starbuck's Chai Tea Latte with a mini scone.

4. One of my students was at a fair, saw a scented candle and thought of me. The candle was called Quill in Ink

5. Lunch with Teague at Dairy Queen. Even though it was chilly outside, I ordered a vanilla frappe (shake). So unlike me to have ice cream when the weather is cold, but it tasted so good. Maybe it was a last hurrah for Summer.

How was your week?

The Friday Five Good Things

 

Five good things that happened this week.

1.  I ordered some items from Michael's. The shipping box was the perfect size box to send the Young One her Death Doctor's costume in case she has a Halloween event to attend.

2. The Eldest ran an errand and brought me back a bar of fancy soap I used to get.

3. While watching the video of the Rennie Revisited class., the instructor used my name as a practice example

4. I spent the day watching the Rennie class videos and drawing the Glasgow rose

5. On the way home, I saw both sides of a rainbow

How was your week?

T Stands For Crane Beach

The Eldest had a vacation week around the time of her birthday the second week of July. She asked if I wanted to go with her to the beach. It used to be if you wanted to go to the beach, you packed a bag, towel, and chair and drove to the beach. Now you have to make reservations. It seems local residents complained about the Summer people getting all the parking spaces. Reservations come in the form of day passes which get scooped up quickly or 2 hour passes. Nice if you live close to the beach but not practical if you have to take an hour and a half ride to get to the beach.

The week the Eldest chose also happened to be prime vacation time. I told her about the reservations, but she had no difficulties securing a day pass to Crane Beach in Ipswich, Massachusetts. We left early on a Monday morning, and had a little hassle with commuter traffic.  When we got to the beach, we were one of the first visitors and hardly anyone was there.

A seagull

claimed his spot on the beach

We took a selfie to remember the day

The Life Guard crew were holding contests to see who could paddle out to the buoy 

and back to shore first.

It was a perfect beach day. Though the weather was hot and humid at home, it was quite breezy at the beach. We set up our chairs and I made a little cabana to try to keep us out of the sun.

It had been decades since I had been at this beach with Teague. One thing I forgot about was this beach was notorious for Green Heads, a type of Horse Fly. They have emerald green heads and giant teeth! Apparently, the Green Heads decided to return a few weeks earlier than normal to correspond to our visit. 

By the time we left, I was covered with so many bites I looked like I had chicken pox.

I found a beautiful snail shell

There's a snack shack along with a clean beach house so we decided we didn't need to drag along a cooler for lunch. We did bring water. 

The Eldest was going to treat me to lobster sandwiches for lunch, but they were out of lobster. I opted for a veggie and hummus wrap with a peach ice tea. The wrap was delicious, but I'm not a fan of peach flavored things though I do like peaches. All that could be said about the tea was it was wet and cold. We had a nice lunch underneath the pergola.

While the Eldest was swimming, I met a young woman a few years older than the Eldest. Her name as Tanya and she had also brought her mother for an outing. We had a nice chat.

How many seas must a white gull sail

before she sleeps in the sand? (apologies to Bob Dylan)

Despite the Greenheads and the sunburns, we had a nice day at the beach.

See ya later! 

Only if the Greenheads are gone!

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s blog to find out what the rest of the T gang is up to. If you want to play, include a beverage or beverage container in your post. Don’t forget to link your blog from Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s page.

T Stands for Eldest's Birthday

 

We've always celebrated birthdays by going out to dinner. The birthday person gets to pick the restaurant. The Eldest decided she wanted to go to The UxLocale for her dinner. Good choice as the restaurant is our go-to place for special occasions.

On the way in, I got to say hello to Elaine, the owner and chef. Elaine used to work at the Worcester Art Museum where I teach. We had a nice time catching up and then a fabulous dinner.

I ordered a change of pace dish for me. Usually, macaroni (pasta) has to be in gravy (tomato sauce). I ordered a fettuccini and zucchini dish in a butter sauce. Delicious and look at the pretty dish my dinner was served on. I also had a glass of Prosecco. So festive.

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s blog to find out what the rest of the T gang is up to. If you want to play, include a beverage or beverage container in your post. Don’t forget to link your blog from Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s page.

The Friday Five Good Things

 

Five good things that happened this week.

1. I heard from my high school friend who is moving from California to Arizona. The renovations to the house haven't been finished yet so they won't be moving until the end of the month. I'm glad I didn't send the new home card yet.

2. The Eldest Door Dashed donuts for breakfast.

3. The first ripe tomato and cucumber when to making a cucumber and tomato sandwich on brioche for lunch. Okay, it was Wonder Bread and still delicious

4. During bookbinding class learned about a jig to make perfect mitered corners. Found a different tool that does that plus has  4 other features for less money!

5. A lady at the hairdresser let me go ahead of her so I could have the hairdresser I like to cut my hair

How was your week?

Doodling for Stress Release

 

On Mondays via Zoom, I participate in a class where we spend  a half an hour doodling our stress away. I missed two weeks of class because, I skipped class because I was invited to go to the beach with the Eldest. The second time, I was busy doing stuff and lost track of time, but this week I paid attention to the clock.

The assignment was to draw concentric circles and doodle in the spaces.

The Friday Five Good Things

 Five good things that happened this week.

1. I finished Season 2, Part 1 of The Sandman

2. The Eldest invited me to go to Crane Beach. 

3. I had a lobster roll at the 99 Restaurant before going to Qi Gong and Reiki Meditation

4. The Eldest was working and Himself went to a karate seminar. I made a sandwich for supper and binge watched The Gilded Age.

5. Another hot and humid day, Teague and I had ice cream at the Dairy Queen.

How was your week?

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Blueberries! Well, they're green now, but we'll have blueberries if the critters don't get to them first.

Strong winds on Friday took down this large branch

A pretty Calendula in Ink's garden.

The Eldest gave Himself a red peach tree and

a regular peach variety for Father's Day

A curious Rose Breasted Grosbeak

How does your garden grow?