Cabol

A friend of mine is a huge crafter type, mostly scrapbook stuff and card stuff and stamping stuff. She invited me to join her and another coworker at a scrap book retreat (coming up this weekend). I decided to go because I'd like to make Anya's 1 year scrap book before she's 10, and I'm running out of time. I signed up for this retreat a couple of months ago, and suddenly it's now only two days away and I'm scrambling to get ready. What is so retreatful about this, I wonder? I've been spending all this time preparing...finding photos, making sure I know what month they are from, compiling entries from this blog to write on the pages. I still need to send a bunch of photos to walmart to get printed. This is work!

I'm a little nervous about the retreat. There will be about two dozen folks there, and I can pretty much guarantee that all of them will be craftier than I am. I'm okay with that, but I'm still a little concerned about the looks I'm going to get when I show up with my plastic grocery bag full of scrap book tools from 1993 (the last time I did any scrap book stuff). Have you seen all the STUFF you can buy to make scrap books? Holy canoli. I'm trying to keep it simple (and cheap) by sticking with a few basic stamps, one pack of colored paper, and (yes) my stuff from 15 years ago.

What is a scrap book retreat, you may ask? Most of these folks will show up at the retreat place Thursday and stay until Sunday and sleep there and eat there and bathe (I hope!) there. They will spend hours and days and eons sitting in metal folding chairs, pouring over (probably) meticulously organized photos and doodads and thingamabobs to make a billionity million scrap book pages. It sounds kinda cool, like a giant sleep over, but I won't be diving in all the way. My friends and I will only be there Friday and Saturday, and I'll be at the mercy of Andy's driving services.

Oh, I have to make a snack to share. Does bringing the popcorn popper and kernels count ya think?

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I cleaned out the car this weekend. I should have known better. I think all those cheerios and hay bits were forming a protective layer because when they were all gone the car began to stink. Like garbage stink. Like someone left a potato-to-rot-under-the-seat stink. We've checked pretty much everything. Under the seats (no potato), under the hood (no cat), in the glove compartment and the spare tire area (no mice). Nothing.

This morning when we went to get into the car, the smell was even worse than yesterday. We rolled down the windows and went on our way because what else was there to do, really. After a few miles we got used to the smell, and it wasn't so bad anymore.

Then Andy drove over a very freshly-dead skunk.

Anyone know a car wash place that uses tomato juice instead of soap?

To make things even worse, the skunk smell snuck into the car and saturated us with its rottenness all the way into work. Luckily we have some air freshener in the office, and after running through a few bursts of it, I am somewhat linen fresh.

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I don't think I've ever posted a link to another blog that wasn't a place we've bought sheep, but this is one of my favorites, Margaret and Helen. It's a political blog written by two ladies who totally rock.

"Mr. President, I ask you this: If they don’t even believe you are an American citizen, why the hell do you care if they think you are going to kill their grandmother?"

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For those of you who know us (and I can't imagine anyone who doesn't reading this), you will be shocked to know what we (Andy and I) did tonight.

We hung some curtains in the living room.

Then we sat on the couch and stared at the curtains.

I know, I know. Pretty crazy. I think the last time we had curtains was in the bathroom of the AA house several years ago (red curtains with pea pods my Mom made me for my dorm window in college). We just aren't curtain people. Curtains are expensive and get dirty and cats like to hang from them and who needs curtains when you live in the boonies anyhow. So what changed?

We found a really cool curtain rod on clearance at BB&B. Regularly $50 and we go it for $8.

You get a curtain rod, you gotta get curtains. Problem is, we only found the one rod and there are two windows in the living room. I guess we'll keep our eyes open for another rod. See what we started? Now we're gonna have to curtainize every window. Where will this stop??

So now that you know what Andy and I do for fun, here's a look at Anya's idea of a good time.

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Wheat flour is very, very good in blueberry pancakes with maple syrup on top.

Wheat flour is a bit dry in peach pie crust.
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I went and picked blueberries this weekend with some friends at the farm of a co-worker. The peaches are from our CSA fruit share from Good Food, Good People.

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After several months of incredibly scientific research, I have come to the conclusion that all raisins are twiggy. I've tried cheap raisins and expensive raisins, and they all have twigs. Some batches are worse than others; it's all about the luck of the draw. I'm rather disappointed that with all our technological whizbangery, noone is able to create a way to improve the twiglessness of raisins.

Speaking of twigs, do not use shredded rhododendron as mulch around your new viburnum.

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Most mornings I have a bowl of oatmeal with raisins for breakfast. Since I'm cheap, I buy generic raisins (and oatmeal, but this is about raisins). Lately I've noticed that the generic raisins have a LOT of twigs in them. I try to pick the twigs out before the raisins go in my bowl, but they are sneaky things those twigs and Anya likes to sneak non-de-twigged raisins in when I'm not looking. I am seriously considering switching to name brand raisins. I ask myself every morning, "Is saving $1 every couple of weeks worth eating twigs?"

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2008 Resolutions

So, how did we do? Well, Kenny is not living in a temple, Andy isn't ready for a marathon, and Anya skipped over crawling for her beloved scoot. However, I neither ate donuts every day nor gave anyone to the gypsies. Yay me!

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Evidently, the people who designed Anya's toothbrush were not gardeners.





Too bad I didn't notice the similarity when I bought the toothbrush because now every time I see it, I squirm a little bit. I could never use this toothbrush myself, but lucky for Anya she hasn't had much experience (yet) with the disgusting tomato horn worm.

The tomato horn worm is the most repulsive garden pest. It is yicky and it hides and you don't see it and you are all "la la la" merrily picking yummy tomatoes and then you grab one and it bites you with its dragon-sized fangs of doom and you shriek and run and flail your arms in the air and fall to the ground in a puddle of hysterical bawling.

My mom has this huge industrial-sized pair of tweezers that she reserves for the hideous task of plucking these nasty creatures off a plant. I don't have any of my own and have tried kitchen tongs...but they really don't have a good enough grip to pry those nasty beasts away from their homes. And of course you can't pull them off with your bare hands because you'll get leprosy or flesh-eating sores or zits.

One time, when Andy was away at school, I found a tomato worm in the garden. I did the required shrieking and flailing, and then I called on my very brave roommate to save me. She got the bug off the plant and put it on the driveway and BAM SPLAT dropped a brick on it. The only thing more disgusting than a live tomato horn worm is an exploding tomato horn worm. Hrm. Or perhaps a tomato horn worm being ripped apart by a flock of hungry ducks.

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After we voted this morning, we stopped at the Hardees in town. It only took us half an hour to get through the line at the polls, and we had some time before daycare "opened." Probably 85% of the people in Hardees were wearing "I Voted" stickers, and I was thinking to myself how cool it was that so many folks had already voted. Then I thought..."I'm surrounded by a bunch of adults all wearing the same sticker on their shirt/coat/sweater." I giggled. 'Cause it's funny.

So, go get your sticker and be one of the cool kids! Go vote! (This message not intended for Canadians or other weird foreigners.)

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