Monday, November 29, 2010

I'm Still Thankful!

Well, I made it through Pie Day, Thanksgiving Day, Black Friday, and a glorious weekend all filled with food.  Oh yes!  I'm feeling very fat indeed!  It could have been so much worse!  Bad enough though!  Let's just get the stats out of the way.  Today glucose 104 - not too bad, and fatometer has inched back up to 155.7.  Bummer!  My pants are feeling pretty snug!  I won't look great (even for my age) in my swim suit in January if I continue on this course so hang on!  I'm gonna slam on the brakes and spin the car around!  But first here's a recap of my Thanksgiving holiday.   First - it was really quiet this year.  Most of our kids were unable to come over.  Michele was brave enough to drive across the pass in the middle of a snow storm and made it here on Tuesday.  Wednesday before Thanksgiving is of course Pie Day and here she is mixing up and rolling out pie dough.  Pie day is very special for me.  I used to help my mom bake the pies so I always think of her on Pie Day.

  

And someone could not wait for Thanksgiving day to arrive...


Oh well!  Since there were only a few of us there were certainly enough pies to go around.

I worked all day Wednesday cooking as much of the Thanksgiving meal as I could so that Thursday would be less frantic.  We had of course been thawing out the turkey all week.  I was getting a little concerned though about what I was going to cook the bird in because, well...  here comes a little mini story...  The week before Thanksgiving I was in Woodinville and one evening my sister in law Andrea told me about a great roasting pan her mom had just purchased from Sur La Table.  Now that got me all kinds of excited because I had been salivating over a beautiful roasting pan and rack in their catalog for days prior to my trip over.  I knew it was on sale but I still was having trouble justifying spending quite so many dollars on one pan - even though I do believe that you usually get what you pay for.  I decided that I was going to splurge and just go for it.  No more foil roasting pans for me!  I had two options... I could go to the store and pick it up or order it online.  Since I had driven the truck I was having trouble imagining myself parking that beast in downtown Kirkland.  I can't even line it up straight in an empty parking lot.  I decided to order online.  Rather than pay $30.00 for shipping I opted for the ground method which was free, but according to the shipping department would not arrive until shortly after Thanksgiving.  I then remembered my sweet little mother who pesters God with all kinds of tiny things so I figured I would do just that... I asked God to deliver my roasting pan so I could use it for my turkey on Thursday.  I did however let him know that if he had way more important matters to attend to I would be ok with that - but I was totally willing to receive my roasting pan early if he could squeeze that little miracle in.  :)  I woke up each day wondering if my pan would arrive.  Each day it did not.  On Wednesday I listened all day for the dogs to bark announcing the approaching UPS truck but no barking.  About 5pm I decided I better  send Michele to the store to buy one of those stupid foil roasting pans.  What?  Dogs barking?  Could it really be...  
Oh yes!  My beautiful new roasting pan!  Well you can just imagine how excited I was about that!  I think I stared at it for the rest of the evening and couldn't wait for the morning to come so I could plop that birdy in there.

Thursday morning I rolled out of bed bright and early and started off with a long soak in the tub to set the tone for the day.  Of course there were moments of mild panic but dinner came togeather in the end.  The bird I must say was a huge surprise.  It was the prettiest, crispiest bird I've ever roasted - well here he is...
He was so pretty I couldn't even pick at the skin.  My brother Gene and I used to steal all the skin before my mom could get the turkey on the table.  If he had been here I would have chased him away with a meat fork!  :)  Which is what my mom should have done once or twice.  It may have cured the evil behavior.  :)  Anyway...Dave did the honors of carving him up.   Slice after slice fell to the platter glistening with moisture and I decided it was ok to go ahead and admit that he had been hanging out in the freezer since last year.  :)  Could a pan make that much difference?  What else could it be?  Crispy AND moist?  A tiny miracle for sure!

Our neighbors, Carol and her adorable mom that everyone calls Granny came over and had dinner with us.  Carol made some wickedly good almond tea cookies.  They were the kind that you might as well just eat in one sitting cause... well, that's what's going to happen anyway.  And we did.  :)  One of my favorite things at dinner was the home made huckleberry sparkling wine that Granny brought.  One of their friends made it out of local huckleberries,.  It was not meant to be sparkling but somehow it turned out that way.  It was mildly sweet and tasted really good by itself and mixed with a punch I had made - as a spritzer.  The bottle it was in reminded me of an old moonshine jug.  I have it soaking now to remove the sediment.  I am hoping that Carol will forget about it.  I'm sure I can find a use for it :)

One of the very best things about Thanksgiving is the leftovers.  There is of course always turkey soup.  My version of turkey soup is a variation of something Dave's grandpa used to make when he was a little boy.  Nifla.  It's a peasant soup.  Meant to use up what ever left overs are around the house and includes dumplings.  Not the fluffy biscuity kind.  It was very tasty!  The old turkey bones made that great big pot of soup and 8 more quarts of turkey stock that are now in the freezer.  Alright... I've been too lazy to actually put them in the freezer.  They are sitting out on the grill outside but they are frozen!  I also made Thanksgiving Shepherds Pie made with turkey, stuffing, turkey gravey, green beans and mashed potatoes.  It was divine :)

The thing that really sets this Thanksgiving apart is that it has snowed and snowed!  We have about a foot of snow in the yard and pastures right now and another 6 inches is expected over the next couple of days.  It is not melting off since the temperature has remained well below freezing.  It seems pretty early to be snowed in but - it sure is pretty!

Well it's time to say goodbye to Thanksgiving for another year.  I have my Christmas tree up and Christmas carols playing.  It feels like a hot mug of cocoa is in order.  Perhaps I can find a nice non-gross sugar free mix. :)  Riiiiight!  If only I can get through the Christmas holiday with no more weight gain I'll be happy!  Perhaps I'll get out my sewing box and find some pretty red and green embroidery floss and stitch my lips together.  :)

Ciao!

Monday, November 22, 2010

Eating in a Winter Wonderland

The cheer of the holidays arrived for me this morning when I woke up and found the ground covered with snow.  Yay!  I can see deer running across the fields and through the woods.  It's so much easier to spot them.  What an awesome weekend.  Well... except for poor Lucy (one of our yellow labs).  She appeared with the nastiest gash on her side and we never could figure out what happened...  had to take her to the vet yesterday.  Other than that it was lazy and wonderful!  My glucose level is 103 this morning and the fatometer reads 152.4 which is down a couple of pounds after the binge of the year.

This week is Thanksgiving!  My pantry is full of wonderful things I should not eat :)  Potatoes, fixings for pies is what comes to mind right away.  I am prepared to cook a feast for 15 or 20 people as usual but only Michele is coming over this year.  It will be a very quiet Thanksgiving.  How strange!  The boys can't get time off work to make the trip over and Amberlyn has traded us in in favor of Thanksgiving diner with her new boyfriends family.  We can't believe we are being abandoned like that!  :)  Katie will be fixing Thanksgiving for her own little family in California.  We will have left overs for a month!  Carol!  You better come over and bring Granny for dinner!  I am going to make a special treat for me.  Grandma Olsen used to make it because she always had left over pie filling.  Crustless pumpkin pie.  I'll experiment with sugar free sweeteners on this one and leave the normal pies fully loaded.  I'll also make a baked sweet potato for myself rather than eating piles of mashed potatoes.  I hope :)  My daughter Michele is coming tomorrow and we will mix up the pie crust and stash it in the fridge.  Wednesday is pie day :)  I used to help my mom make pies for Thanksgiving so I always think of her on pie day.  I always think of my brother Gene as I pull the turkey out of the oven.  We used to pick the crispy skin off of the turkey as it was resting (much to my mothers dismay) and munch it down.  In my family we have a tradition of holding hands and singing a silly little song... "here we are together".  It's quite a process.  It involves calling out the name of each one present and that could be on some years up to 25 people.  It always gets a little confusing but that's ok - it's pretty fun :)  I spoke with my mother a couple of days ago who told me that she got a letter from my nephew Andy who won't be home for Thanksgiving because he is in Marine boot camp.  He thanked her for hosting the most wonderful Thanksgiving dinners and wanted her to know how special they were even though he knew it was SO much work for her.  Even with all the help from other family members it is quite a feat to pull off.  He said that he would be thinking of all the family on Thanksgiving day and asked if she would call out his name when they sang the song so at least he could be there in spirit.  Well drat him!  Now he's made me cry twice!  I told her to call out mine too :)  Everyone remember our military families in prayer this Thanksgiving.  They are the protectors of this great country that we are so thankful to call home.

So... Happy Thanksgiving!  Ciao!


This is just to get you in the mood.  :)

Monday, November 15, 2010

I Am Determined to be Grateful :)

It's Monday!  That's what I'm determined to be grateful about.  I prefer Fridays and Saturdays so much more!  But I am super grateful that I woke up this morning.  :)  The struggle continues!  This morning 153.5 and glucose 123.  Not great.  Must have been that half a baked potato and the glass of egg nog!  Carol... you are responsible for the egg nog idea!  :)  On the other hand... last week one of Dave's buddies from the railroad came to stay with us along with two of his children.  Scotty was on phase two of his combo work/vacation.  Not only does he work for BNSF like Dave but he owns and operates a catering business.  He had been hired by BNSF to provide a feast at one of the North ID yards as they met a safety goal.  The feast - they call them "feeds" :) was a great success and having completed that task he planned to spend the next few days hunting with his kids.  We were astounded to be the happy recipients of more food than we can possibly eat in a month!  Just as I am packing to go to Woodinville for the week.  Let's see... I believe there are now 8 whole crabs in my freezer along with a bunch of boned, skinless and marinated chicken.  We pulled some out and I cooked it for lunch yesterday.  It was decidedly Asian.  Just a touch of pepper with onion, garlic and fresh ginger.  I'm not sure what else was in there - but so tasty.  There are about four more bags of that in the freezer.  Clam chowder!  Gallons!  Shrimp, razor clams... a big roll of elk pastrami.  What am I forgetting?  Oh and he had just been to Cash and Carry and purchased a huge prime rib.  He hacked us off 4 enormous steaks.  I say hacked because when I gave him my 30 year old Wustof chefs knife that has not been properly sharpened - ever, he decided he could do a better job with his hunting knife.  :)  Note to self.... next time a chef comes to visit have sharp knives!  Anyway!  We were blown away by his generosity!  Most of these awesome gifts are in the freezer - which is a bit of a problem since next month poor Panda gets to have her "sad day".  :(  That was a really long story working up to what I wanted to say about Scotty.  He is also a type two diabetic and is taking two medications along with insulin injections.  He's pretty proud of having a glucose level of 108 in the morning after all that.  He knows exactly what he needs to eat and also cheats like crazy and then takes an extra insulin shot to make up for it.  That my friends is exactly what I want to avoid!  I'd really like to keep my feet thanks!  I think I'll tape a picture of Scotty to my fridge.  I recall that my grandmother, Mama Quinn used to lock her trailer door and make a pan of cornbread and eat the whole pan while Aunt Rita banged on the outside of the door begging to be let in so she could remove the cornbread!  Come to think of it... I made cornbread to go with my chili last week.  I did not eat the whole pan but I did over the course of two days have probably 4 pieces.  Scotty said it was the best cornbread he's had in a long time.  :)  Is there any hope at all?   

Well, like I said, I'm packing up to spend a good portion of the week in Woodinville.  I need to behave diet wise since I have not done that so much lately.  I sure wish I had not baked those potatoes yesterday since I have rib steaks to grill tonight!!!  There really is noting like a crispy olive oil salt and pepper skinned baked potato to go alongside a mammoth rib steak!  What to do?  Now that's a problem I'm very grateful to have :)

Ciao!

Thursday, November 11, 2010

A One Liner...

153.6 glucose 117.  Improvement!  Still a ways to go to be back to two weeks ago.  Oh - ha ha!  Just looking out the window and saw one of our little calfies chasing a chicken.  Pretty comical.  :)  Ok I lied... not really a one liner.

Ciao!

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Woe is Me!

Actually I guess I should have titled this one... Fat is Me.  I'm on a run away freight train... I'm pretty sure it's hauling lard!  :)  This is not funny!  Anyway I might as well just get this over with... fatometer:  155.6.  Gulp!  That's up about 7 pounds from "the good ole days" or about two weeks ago!  And glucose was 117 which is much lower than I expected!   I actually intended to eat well yesterday and I started out that way but unfortunately the noodles that were left over from the night before called my name and so I ate them with butter and parmesan cheese.  All of them!  Also, our neighbor called and  told us to come and get the apples from his tree since he was not going to use them.  Dave came back with a tractor bucket of them.  I selected six very nice apples and made a pie out of them.  How stupid was that!?!  And Michele who has paused here on her way back to Everett has made two very tasty batches of salsa.  What else do you do with salsa other than put it on chips???  Really!  Somebody help me out with some salsa ideas!  And what am I supposed to do with a tractor bucket of apples that will not cause blood sugar spikes?  All I can think of is... pie!  Nice warm apple pie.  Of course this fatness did not happen over night.  I've been on a big fat binge.  Just call me Bingy :)  It sure comes back faster than it goes away though.  If there's anyone out there who can relate to my despair I could really use some encouragment!  Post a comment.  Give me your best low sugar apple recipe :)

Oh... I really should mention how much I enjoyed our little mini trip to Seattle last weekend (which was part of the problem)  I took lots of cool pics from the roof of our hotel and down at the pike place market... and then my SD card went haywire and I lost all the pics.  Bummer!  But check this out... Here's my favorite thing I bought...

Matching aprons.  One big one for Mumsey and one little one for Aubrey and Charlotte when they come to visit.  Were gonna make diet food :)

Ciao!

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

One More Week and I Would Have Had to Start From Scratch!

This will give you some idea of what happened last week... fatometer reads 152.1 and glucose 135.  And I'm thankful it's that good!  I have to say... during the stretch when I was doing so well I began to wonder if I really didn't have diabetic issues.  I can quit wondering.  The answer is most decidedly yes.  Yes Kathy, buying a large bag of peanut M&M's is really a stupid move.  Ok... I spent most of last week in Woodinville.  Just to be absolutely clear... any poor dietary choices on my part are not Andrea's fault!  She is always cooking yummy stuff that will be good for me.  It is my own fault if I sneak out into the kitchen and snitch a cookie - or three.  What I really need to avoid is that glass of wine!  If I have that I might as well just insert the end of a hose from a pump truck filled with any food into my mouth and turn it on full blast.  I know that!  And I did it anyway.  What a dork!  So... can anyone guess which behaviors I need to modify?  There were some real highlights though.  Everything at Jeff & Andrea's was awesome!  Always is.  Tacos at Dee's.  At least I got some exercise playing with Cyara.  We made alphabet letters with our bodies :)  Dinner at the Wild Vine was very good too.  I got a salad of some kind... forgot what though but I do remember Bobby's salmon being very tasty.  Oh... and the dessert I split with Amberlyn.  :(  We went there to watch my brother Jeff play guitar with Brad (his guitar teacher)  Twas fun!
Jeff is the one in black.  They did a great job!

On Friday I went to spend the weekend with my Aunt Jane and Uncle Jay in Paradise, CA.  I accompanied my Aunts Joyce and Marge.  We had a great time visiting.  Unc picked us up from the airport in Sacramento and I enjoyed driving past all the orchards.  Paradise is located pretty high up and the view is beautiful.  We were on our way to Chico to meet my cousin Robin, Maggie and baby Martha at the Farmers Market in Chico (which is open all year!!) and we stopped to take in the view.  Beautiful view.  Hard to tell from my phone pics but...  first pic me and Aunt Marge, second pic is Aunt Jane and third is just the view from the overlook























My Uncle Jay is a mighty fine cook.  He made us this delightful breakfast Sunday morning


And here he is enjoying it.  And Aunt Joyce

I realize now that I didn't get a picture of Robin and his family :(  but I did get one of little Martha.  :)  This was at the Japanese restaurant in Chico.  So tasty.  One of my not so great choices.  I had seafood udon.  Noodle soup.  Right.... noodles.  But it was SO good!  Anyway... little Martha ate and ate and ate...
oh yeah...  I'm sure she's going to love this pic when she grows up.  She was adorable though.  I'm still amazed at everything she ate!

Well anyway... I'm home again now so I can flog myself and then get back on track :)  I came home to a bunch of tomatoes that had ripened on the table while I was gone so today they are in the big ole pot becoming more marinara sauce.  I think I have one more batch after this one.  Last batch will be salsa though... if only Dee will give me her salsa recipe!  Yes... I think you already did... but I lost it.  I promise... I won't lose it again!

and here are a couple of pics that just make me glad to be home again...




And now it's off to work I go.  Ciao!