While going through my xs freebie newsletter, I found Valentine’s Stitchery. I was so excited to find this design:

This is a xs rendering of Cape May, NJ one of my favorite spots on earth. So I looked around the different places suggested by the designer to buy it and I couldn’t find it. I then wrote to the designer, Nicole who lives in West Chester, PA., a few towns from here. She pointed me in the right direction (my fave LNS had it too, but I decided to order it online). She says she drew the design while sitting on the beach. To get this view, you’d have to be in the ocean, I had to chuckle to myself. My grandparents honeymooned in Cape May back in about 1921. I love nostalgia.

Superfresh food store had two split chicken breasts for $1.00 a pound! I bought two packages and should go get more as that is a steal. Yesterday I boiled the one package with celery, onion and carrots and made a nice broth. We had turkey chili last night though ( from scratch). Tonight we had chicken noodle soup and pecan apple chicken salad. I learned from my cookbook Chicken Soup by Marcie Ver Ploeg that you don’t cook chicken soup all day long like our great grandmoms did. They were dealing with tough birds. Our chickens are not bred to be tough. I also learned if you don’t cook a variety of pieces together, like the wings, etc. your broth will be weak. Since I was just cooking breasts, I added three packages of boullion and that did the trick. I forgot I had the above cookbook the last time I made chicken soup. It has 75 recipes and is illustrated with little cartoon style chickens. The cover shows two chickens in a Viking style ship with spoons for oars. I guess you would have liked to see the finished product, but they were goobled up too quickly by the guys.
By the way, don’t store cooked chicken in plastic bags in the frig. I stored them this way a few times and they tasted odd. I used a storage container last night and the chicken tasted much better.

…you may not want to read this joke. It’s hysterical!

These are between $3k and $6k. I know, I’m a dreamer.

I think it’s nice when people are thoughtful, especially the people who live under your own roof. It sure was nice for Brian to run back and forth to McDonalds, the Chinese take-out, etc while my mom was here (don’t have people over when you need to grocery shop), but hey, he had to eat too. I did make a big breakfast for us yesterday though. : ) Brian tends to use my van on the weekends for all these short trips. I was a bit peeved when I got in it to take mom home and the gas tank was pointing toward 1/4 tank. Okay, you would think maybe one of those times he had it out, he would drive it to the gas station and get me some gas. He didn’t. And guess who wound up in the gusting wind getting gas-yep, me. I told him about it.
Though he did point out he had put his clothes away from the clean laundry basket, he left mine all over the bed. I really didn’t feel like putting clothes away when I got home from the cold and grocery shopping and then fixing a fast dinner. What’s with guys?
Both of these guys think the weekend is leisure time for them. I don’t feel bad at all now about taking a half hour to stitch here and there because of their lack of interest in being thoughtful and getting things done around here.
I’ve been surrounded by men my entire life. It ain’t been easy kids.

Wow-almost 100 hits in a few days time! I decided to get a counter to check out the stats feature. Pretty cool.

My mom is still here. Everyone is tired and the ladies took naps all day. The weather is blah. It was fairly warm for January. We had driving rain at 4 am (I was awake) and now it’s windy and cold. Brian was restless and snored all night and usually he is vanished to the guest room, but mom is in there. I guess it will be a Sominex night today. Wish us sweet slumbers.

Thanks to Kate, over on the sidebar for pointing out this. It was fun to make, though I made a boo-boo I had to fix. It must be the Friday the 13th mess up effect. Notice I didn’t mention the internet! LOL

You think about it, but it seems so far off. Then someone gets sick and ends up in the hospital. Their wife is older than they are by seven years and senile. He takes care of her, but who takes care of him? She is giving her daughters a hard time. She’s never been the nicest mother, but when senility set in, she is worse. What to do? Who is going to make the decisions?
I am talking about my uncle and his wife. I don’t think they will be living in their house together again. His one stepdaughter says he looks awful. Her mother is yelling at them. I don’t think she is even asking for my uncle. Rough stuff. I hope things work out for the best.
~~~This is bothering me too. I had terrible cramps tonight, just like a teenager. I got out the trusty heating pad and took Tylenol. Watching some sitcoms helped too. I feel 95% better as I type this.
~~~I added a stitching rotation to my sidebar (is that a list?). I want to work on more of a variety of things. I know when crunch time comes on the charity or RR, I will probably be working on them non-stop. I have to get the RR finished before the other stitchers in the group because mine is going to be making the rounds across the sea. I am a bit nervous about sending these precious RRs as a Christmas gift to my dear friend Charlotte got lost (she’s in Ireland). I think everything is going registered mail from now on.
~~~I got the best surprise in the mail today from my ‘coz’ Nancy in Illinois. The latest Nicholas Sparks hardback At First Sight. I’ve read almost all his books, so I thank her for for sending one of my favorite author’s newest editions.

~Update-I had Sean bring my mom out for overnight for a change of scenery (1/13). Uncle Don is home! And his wife is there too. Mom and I are shocked. I still think it won’t be long before something drastic happens.

It seems that I get more into stitching when there are new episodes of my ‘must see shows’ on the tube. So both Lost and Invasion were new…and pretty good! I can’t wait to read what the ‘Lost’ tribe has to say about the new episode. Talk about being analytic!
I made nice progress on the little boy project last night and did okay with the bear tonight. I am getting a little tired of it. Too many light colors.
I have another special quilt square due in the summer. It’s Americana/travel related. I am doing Independence Hall and actually found the book I was looking for in a few minutes! It was published in 1976 and of course has the twin towers in the NYC design. I may just have to do that one.
The chart’s print is so small it needs to be blow up abit or I will get cross-eyed or get a terrible headache trying to stitch it. Glad I found it though.