Category: MISC

T13 #4 (132) Sleep Distractions

hosted by Thursday Thirteen

1) the bright red LED light on the bedside clock
2) the 7 pound (but feels like 200) cat that has to wedge between me and hubby
3) the blue LED light on the DVR
4) the spotlight on the side of the church that seems to be aimed directly for our bedroom window
5) the stack of books on the bedside table that I’m trying to finish reading
6) the stack of mending that never seems quite empty
7) the lists of projects that never seems to diminish, but only grow on this old house
8) the aches and chronic pain that never seem to diminish
9) the night light in the hall bathroom that changes color every few seconds
10) the restless dog
11) the endless list of “TO DO”
12) blog entries to be written
13) blog entries to be read

~*~BBQ BEEF or PORK- the easiest and tastiest EVER~*~

Hubby and I are supposed to go out for Valentines, but we’re also supposed to have yet another blizzard on Valentines Day, so I may be making this recipe instead:

BBQ BEEF

3-4 pound chuck roast or boneless beef ribs*
1 large onion, chopped small
1 12 oz. coca-cola
2 cups Sweet Baby Ray’s barbecue sauce
1 cup ketchup OR 1 cup mustard**
1 cup packed brown sugar

  • Put the meat and coca-cola in 6 quart crock pot on low for one hour.
  • Do NOT use high, you can’t cook this recipe fast, it just doesn’t work.
  • After an hour, add the remaining ingredient.
  • Stir well and put the lid on.
  • Cook on low for 5 hours.
  • When done, meat will be in shreds and fat will have all but dissolved into the sauce.
  • Serve over mashed potatoes or on buns.

*You can use stew eat, but it isn’t as good. You need the striation and marbling of fat. The combination of the marbling and the coca-cola tenderizes the meat and makes it yummy.

**Ketchup makes it a little sweeter while mustard makes it more tart.

~*~*~*~*YEAH – my First AWARD*~*~*~*~

So I’m surfing through the 892 emails tonight, no lie, 892, trying to see which ones pertain to OWOH whose entries end at midnight, which ones are blogger friends I need to read up on and the normal spam, etc… when lo’ and behold I receive this one:

“Tamy – I am enjoying reading your blog- It’s always so entertaining! Come by and see me – I’ve left you a little surprise- Vickie”

Vickie is over at Sand Flat Farm and is one of the blogs I read faithfully and she is one of the greatest artists I’ve ever seen. She does the most beautiful and vibrant pieces I’ve seen in a long time.

This is the award she left me:

Now Vickie had no way of knowing that this was one of the longest, yuckiest days I’ve had in a LONGGGGGGGG time. Not knowing that when she awarded me this made it even more special!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks so much Vickie!

Head on to Vickie’s blog and read about the other wonderful bloggers she gave the award to.

Sweet Goodness Hanging Heart Swap

I just opened this great swap from my swap partner Heidi for the Sweet Goodness Hanging Heart Valentines Swap hosted by the Sweet Goodness Girls over at Sweet Goodness Swaps. I especially love the felted ornament Heidi, thank you so much. This swap showed me how small the world can be when Heidi and I realized we co-existed in my home town while she worked for the newspaper I grew up on for several years. We probably passed each other on the street or in the mall and never even realized until the blog world brought us closer together. Ironically we both live 250 miles fro there now and only 5 hours apart.

Give me 5 Monday


Five hints, tips, tricks, advice or any other stories related to resumes or succeeding in the great job hunt!
  • 1) Be yourself!
  • 2) Listen to what the interviewer is asking and interpret what they are asking into how you can be their answer to problem solving.
  • 3) Be confident and use the appropriate words and descriptions when filling out your resume’.
  • 4) Dress business like and conservatively.
  • 5) Look them in the eye and speak clearly.

~*~MENU PLAN MONDAY & 5 Night Dinner Challenge~*~

Last week’s menu went really well and we stuck to it except for a couple of baked goods that got snuck in for comfort with all the cold weather.

MONDAY ~ Oven Brisket, glazed carrots and garlic roasted red potatoes
TUESDAY ~ Tostadas made from the leftover brisket using a recipe from A Pioneer Woman Cooks
 WEDNESDAY ~ Spicy Roasted Chicken & Salad
 THURSDAY ~ RESERVATIONS at MAXSELLS on FISHER LAKE with a View
FRIDAY ~ Pot Roast Sandwiches and Cole Slaw
SATURDAY ~ Maple Glazed BBQ Chicken & Salad
SUNDAY ~ Pork & Noodles with Cucumber Tomato vinegar salad

Done in conjunction with Favorite Ingredient Friday hosted by Overwhelmed with Joy and 5 night dinner challenge hosted by Sommer designs.

Iceberg – snow not lettuce

Hubby cleared off the entire driveway (obviously we don’t need to open that door) except for this one ‘berg’ after the last blizzard. Mother nature got him back though. We had another blizzard yesterday and you can’t tell where the berg used to be, cuz the whole driveway is that height again.

~*~Formal Dining Room/Parlor/Office Update~*~

So moving the office/studio upstairs didn’t quite work for me or us. Plus hubby was going to put a pool table in the former formal dining room, but it turned out to be 1 foot not wide enough. So, here we go again…………….

At least we’re getting it all painted as we go. So, the cocoa color is out and in this new office the bottom will be the Oklahoma Wheat like the living room, but the top which is old embossed wall paper will be Innocence White. The wall paper is in excellent condition, but a little tired after many years. The paint is helping to seal it and brighten the color at the same time. You can really see the difference in the 3rd picture. These rooms were fortunately all mold free.

So the old spare bedroom is going back to being the new spare bedroom, but the sewing and crafts will stay there. The old office/studio will now be the pool room and the futon will actually make it a 3rd spare bedroom when necessary. The old formal dining room will become the new office. This will force me to keep it a lot cleaner since the formal dining room, oops, the office is the center of the house.

~*~KITCHEN UPDATE~*~

I finally finished painting the kitchen and it looked so nice, clean and organized that I had to take pictures. For those of you that are tuning in late, this remodel came about do to unscrupulous sellers who neglected to tell us the first floor bathroom and kitchen were mold infested and not sealed to the outside (water had been seeping under the sun porch and kitchen wall). They neglected to tell us a lot of things ~ so much for disclosure statements and older people being basically honest. We were forced to tear out the bathroom, kitchen and sun porch within a month of moving in. Considering all of that, we can live with the plywood counters and floors a bit longer. We combined the kitchen and sun porch into one room so now we don’t have four corners, but 6 just to make it confusing.
We still have a few cabinets (the sink base unit, the 24″ set of drawers to the right of it and the 36″ to its left, the 36″ base to the right of the stove and the 24″ base to the left of it) to purchase, stain and mount, but we’re getting there. We also still need counter tops, but can’t do those until we have the rest of the base units in place. We still need to do the bottom & corner moldings, but first we have to get a floor which we can’t do until the base units are done. We still need to do the ceiling panels, but can’t do those until the rest of the top cabinets are hung. We still need to do all the top molding, but that hinges on the ceilings and the floors which hinge on the base units. I can’t get rid of that rolling rack until we hang the cabinets. Darn we keep coming back to those pesky cabinets. And I didn’t even get to needing 10 windows in there. They are single pane originals t the house as are the storm windows on the outside, so they’re basically uninsulated and worthless! When I took the pictures, I was so happy with all the progress we’d made, but after writing this I’m exhausted with what is yet to be done.