Misspent ....

Vacation? Perhaps, but alas, I got more done than I thought I would.

Who would have guessed that one little water leak would lead to a mess and lots of cleanup? That's done, thankfully. And the carpet looks smashing.

As is usual whenever I'm off, there was a whole lot of cooking going on around here. Pans of lasagna, not one, but two kinds of fresh apple pie, a variation of beef stroganoff and a few other things. If only I took pictures...I could have posted them with the recipes!

When you're in a hurry, be careful what you throw in boxes or bags to store. I finally got around to taking care of those assorted boxes and bags in storage. The local charity resale stores got the benefit...lots of clothes, toys, coats and even some furniture. It's amazing how much room you have when you get rid of the stuff cluttering up your storage area! Some of them even pick up which is even better!

And as a reformed technology person, I spent a good chunk of my vacation online. I never check my Facebook account unless I get an e-mail, so I went mulling around there and found a few new cool groups, including one for the Carondelet Historical Society. Besides that, I found a really cool article about saving wet electronic equipment like MP3 players here at cnet.

Sure, I had to do some homework for my online classes, but I got them done in time to start the Christmas shopping (and now I have plenty of room to hide the stuff!) and found all sorts of interesting stuff, including this cool candy selection on www.amazon.com called the 1980s Retro Candy Gift set. Gotta love those wax lips and fangs! I won't reveal any of the other things because some people are too nosy! Just gotta wait for Santa!

Nevertheless, I go back to work soon, but I have aspirations of goodies while I wait. This article about short story writers called Brevity is a Virtue makes me want to write something. We'll just let that idea float around and see what happens.

More to come...check back later.

Food and fun

It's sweltering here at our house, so no pies baking like last week (Dad got a summertime favorite--blueberry).

Here are a couple of food and fun oriented articles from my trips around the internet.

Frugal Pleasures of Paris in Summer (from http://www.nytimes.com/)
I've been to Paris in June, but one day, I may check it out in July and August, too.

I saw this story on Living St. Louis today (on KETC--it's an oldie but goodie) about Sweetie Pie's soul food restaurant. If you've never been there, you've gotta go!

The happiness log

My husband had one of these on the submarine, so here's the beginning of mine with some photos included.

Today's installment...stuff to do on your day off.

1. Visit with old friends. I had lunch in Chesterfield and visited my old coworkers at the City Hall.

2. Visit your family and do some work. Here's Eileen's newly painted nails in her favorite color--purple.

3. Finally get those photos off your phone. Here's Liam and a friend at an indoor picnic at our parish recently.

4. Bake. The peach pie is going in the oven...yum. Recipe to follow.