A Cake I Shall Bake.....

I had energy, lots of it, this weekend.. I decided Saturday would be the day to burn it all off.  I started with a good carpet shampooing, and ended up with myself covered in sugar, flour, and the scent of a vanilla pound cake baking in the oven... Baking a pound cake by hand, without a stand mixer, is hard work!!!!  It's such a wonderful experience to bake...with a pound cake, it's a very slow process, and exact.  Each ingredient must be room temperature, slowly beaten and blended perfectly, and each item added, one at a time... no hurries if you want success.  The end was this beauty and a house that smelled of vanilla and baked goods. How Super Comfy!!!!!

I've finally decided and made our reservations - for:

The Gettysburg Hotel 1797

I finally made the decision and bit the bullet.  I decided on a "real" hotel where check-in is after 4 p.m., we have double beds, coffee maker in room, fireplace and modern day furnishings, amenities, and hotel comforts in the heart of the Historic District, Downtown Gettysburg.  The idea of a quaint inn or B&B is great, but when you read the "Warnings, Policies, and Disclaimers" of the Inns and B&Bs, you find they seem a bit scary and rigid for my needs... I don't want to lose my money and reservation because I got caught up in traffic outside Washington D.C. - so the larger, more commercial Hotel industry won! Along with the fact it is on a historic square next to taverns, coffee shops, and such, so all conveniences....   We will have tavern food and some Black and Tans for our celebratory Gettysburg Birthday Celebration Evening....   Then I plan to go upstairs to my room, sit in front of the fireplace and chill out before the Sabrina's Express takes off to the Catskills and Berkshires in New England the next day.... 

I'm so excited!!!!!!!!!!!  So... we have the first three days planned... with a hotel booked... and then off to Gramma's House We GO!!!!!!  

Grate Day and Happy Planning!!!!!

The Bronchitis is gone... the ear/sinus infection gone... I just am in the weaning stages of getting off Prednisone - and if anyone has ever taken it before, ughhhh, you can relate to it is one nasty thing to take steroids!!!!

AND.... that's where my Joyful News begins.  I am PLANNING A REAL VACATION!!!!!!!  FINALLY!!!!!!!!!!!!  Not going overseas... but, I'll take what I can get.

The Kid is turning 24 this Thanksgiving... so we are going to toss in a trip to New England to visit my mother, but ... we are also going to make it an American History Themed Road Trip.  

ANTIETAM - AMERICAN CIVIL WAR BATTLEFIELD

Antietam Battlefield in Maryland - the site of America's bloodiest single-day battle, with more than 23,000 lives lost that day. Hundreds of visitors and locals have reported seeing soldiers in uniform, still on the field, seen wandering around as if lost, many hear the fire of cannons and guns, the sightings seem to be most prevalent at dawn and dusk.

Sunken Road - supposed to be extremely electrical feeling.... even today... like the aura has remained from this incredibly awful and bloody battle... and you can see why below:

Just dead soldiers left side by side in ditches, there were so many - and so many mass graves... all in the yards of farmers in the area - they say it is one of the most haunted battlefields, that people have claimed over the many years to see soldiers of both sides just walking through the fields - through the farm houses, and still as if in battle... so sad... 

GETTYSBURG - AMERICAN CIVIL WAR BATTLEFIELD

1. The Battle of Gettysburg, fought from July 1 to July 3, 1863, is considered the most important engagement of the American Civil War. After a great victory over Union forces at Chancellorsville, General Robert E. Lee marched his Army of Northern Virginia into Pennsylvania in late June 1863.
2. 
   
   

Here's a famous civil war photo of Confederate Soldiers taken prisoner - that has been colorized... I love the way they colorize things today - gives you so much more reality than the black and whites and tin types...

I am now working on hotels, places we will sleep/stay when in these two places.  I believe we will hit Antietam, spend the day, then drive to Gettysburg and stay there at one of the old hotels.  The Gettysburg Hotel is one on my list, and still looking into others... but I want to stay in something with a lot of character and history - since that is what this trip is all about....

Stay tuned for more, if interested!  I certainly am, and I am certainly thrilled to be giving my son this incredible opportunity to visit sites of interest and we will have private guides through the Battlefields via the National Park Visitor centers... Can't wait!!!!!!  

FYI:  I had ancestors fight both sides of the war...so, I am not prone to choose a side... I just feel a great swell of sadness that they had to choose a side and fight such an ugly war... brother against brother...

One Pot Meals... Giving them a try....

It may not be Autumn (here) as most people know it, but being that it is in the 60s-70s night and mornings, makes me believe I'm experiencing a real Autumn.... and so, hearty, rib sticking meals come to mind ... 

Last night I decided to collect a few One Pot meals.  Just throw everything into one pot, no draining, no changing pots, nothing - all in one... and my first meal was an absolute success:

ONE POT CHILI MAC

(My Low Fat/High Fiber Version)

In my Knock-Off Le Creuset Dutch Oven, I browned up a whole chopped Sweet Yellow Onion, 2 cloves of garlic, and 1.25 lbs of ground turkey in 1 T olive oil (I used 3 T – because I used more garlic and cooked with the turkey meat that has low fat content)

Then I added a box of Pomi Diced Tomatoes with juice, two cans of Bush’s Chili Beans (Medium) – drained, 2 t chili powder, 1.5 t cumin, salt * pepper to taste, 4 cups of low sodium chicken broth, and brought it all to a boil…

Then I added a box of Whole Wheat Elbow Noodles, turned the heat to simmer, gave it all a good stir, put the lid on and checked it every 5 minutes for a stir for a total of 10 minutes …turned the heat off and then let it sit and set....with lid on....

You can add some cheddar cheese, or a dollop of sour cream, etc. if that is what you prefer on your chili....

Voila – a hearty, high fiber, low fat meal!!!!!!!!  Kid ate HALF the pot!!!!!!!! 

Ingredients:
1.25 lbs. of ground turkey (or whatever you choose)

1 Yellow Onion – peeled/chopped

2 garlic cloves – diced up

1 T. Olive Oil (use as much as you feel you need)

1 can 15 oz. of petite diced tomatoes (I used the whole box of Pomi Diced Tomatoes) with juice

2 cans of drained Chili Beans (I like some spice, so I chose Medium)

2 t. chili powder

1.5 t. cumin

Salt and Pepper to taste

4 cups of Low Sodium Chicken Broth (you can make this vegetarian** see below)

1 box of Barilla whole grain elbow noodles

** Vegetarian – skip the meat/turkey and use vegetable broth….maybe add bell pepper with the onion and garlic to give more substance J

It's So Good To Breathe!!!!!! Oxygen!!!!!!

I can BREATHE - how exciting is that!!!!!!!!!  I love my doctor - he was right - he said after two-three days of taking the medicines, doing breathing treatments 4 times a day, and with the new inhaler - I would feel better... he was right!  By next week I will be finished with all the medicines, and I imagine I'll feel like a million dollars!  Phewwwwwww....

My beautiful MONEY PIT!!!!!!  

Nebulizing....and Ancestry.....

While I sit here and use the nebulizer so I can breathe....

I was looking through photos of ancestors.... I love old photos/antiques... so even ones of just an anonymous person interests me...

I think this is a beautiful child, a fantastic photo of a great great uncle from my paternal

side of the family... his father was my 3rd grandfather... I don't know if my mind is playing tricks on me, but this child has my son's look - did I pass such strong genes to my son.... 

and another great great uncle.... showing off his beautiful horse

This is a photo of my 6th great grandmother on my maternal side of the family, a true Pioneer .... poor thing, not a tooth in her head, but she was a very devout Christian and proud of her family/her husband/her children and the home and work they put in to build up the community they started when her family moved to the MidWest in wagons....

Barking up a Storm....

That's all I am up to these days - a good ole barking.... the doctor put me on so many new drugs, inhalers, and steroids, ughhh, on top of I have a nebulizer and have to have 4 breathing treatments a day.  So far, I have had 3 treatments today, started my new medicines, and I have been sitting here for an hour catching up on some tv shows I love, and I haven't barked once...  The doctor promised me that in 48 hours I will feel 90-100% better.  I'd say I'm at 40% right at this moment, and I'm afraid to move or do anything in the event I go back to 0%....

Right now we're having a really fantastic thunder and lightening storm....

Last night I made the mistake of watching the UK's version of "Who Do You Think You Are" with Brendan O'Carroll (Mrs. Brown) and he researched the murder/assassination of his grandfather... it broke my heart - his grandfather was assassinated because he would not force his two sons to surrender - so the murderous Auxillary thugs came to his house and shot him dead - an old man who ran a hardware store in Dublin and was not a member of the IRA and who could not in his heart turn his children in knowing they'd be executed... his life for theirs....  Then I watched Julie Walters who traced her family back to Ireland as well and found out that her family had stood up to the tyrannical landlord, an aristocrat from England known for his arrogance, his attrocious behavior and actions as a landlord, etc., who stole from and starved out his tenants... they risked imprisonment and punishment, including her grandmother - I read about these women who were always made out to be meek and tolerant - just cleaning house and popping out babies- and the truth is they were tough as nails and forces to be reckonned with!

When I started working on my own geneology, I had been told by a few relatives I'd have lots of Irish and Scottish relatives. But, no, that's not the case.... my family came over on both my paternal and maternal side during the Mayflower days, Pre-Revolutionary times. (There is an Irish wife here and there) There were the English that came over and settled in New York and were very political and influential, educated families with bloodlines to the Lancasters, and there were the scholarly and educated Germans that came over and settled in the South because at the time in Germany they were persecuted for their political and religious beliefs, as well as, they were promised lands so fertile for farming that their families would never be without - and so, my Lutheran German ancestors made the move over, fighting in battles, such as The Battle of Kings Mountain, and settling into North Carolina where there are monuments and statues of my ancestors throughout the counties they lived in and prospered.  There were those that we thought were German, that turned out to be Dutch... the spelling of the name being changed over the years through transfers of deeds and agreements as they moved from the East coast on a wagon train to Indiana.  The names are spelled differently which would differentiate whether German or Dutch, but they are pronounced exactly the same... so it ended up our Dutch ancestors were always thought to be German due to mispellings... My great grandfather was supposed to have been from a Scottish family, nobody knew, or could answer about the heritage - they are Welsh! It amazes me that my ancestors came over on diseased ridden ships, low on food, no potable water, people dying from horrible diseases from the living conditions in close quarters on those ships, and yet my family made those trips and didn't die, didn't get sick, and even made the trip back and forth to bring over wives and children they left behind... 

The only sad part of it all is that I cannot share any of this with my great grandmother - I know that she would have taken such an interest, she'd have been in disbelief to know about the family she was born into... I really wish I could have found all this out during her lifetime.  Sometimes I think the drive I had to do all the genealogical work and solving mysteries was for her, and her alone.  

Recipe for My Little Family Up North... the Vegetarians!

• TABOULEH SALAD
• 
  
• INGREDIENTS:
  1 cup hot water
  1 cup dry bulghur wheat (you could go with couscous)
  4 green onions, chopped
  1 cup fresh chopped parsley
  ½ Cucumber, peeled/cored-de-seeded, chopped
  1 large tomato, chopped
  ¼ cup fresh chopped de-stemmed, mint leaves
  1 clove of garlic minced, or substitute with 1/8 t. garlic powder
  1 cup of diced up/chopped in thirds pitted Kalamata Olives
  4 oz. crumbled feta cheese
  ½ bag of steamed/sautéed baby spinach leaves (I’d sauté really quick with the garlic)
  
  
  DRESSING
  2 tablespoons vegetable or olive oil
  1 or 2 Squeezed/seeded fresh lemon
  1⁄4 teaspoon salt and ground pepper
  
  
  Directions:  Cook up the bulghur wheat (which is just soaking it in hot water and then fluffing), mix in a big bowl all the ingredients – then whisk up your dressing and toss it all together very well…. And eat with some toasted/heated up pita bread… YUMMMMM... IF TOO dry - then just toss in some more olive oil... 

I Don't Bark, I "Cough" "Wheeze" and "Rage"....

Editing my Rant and Rage.... got it out of my system, now time to smile and move on :)

Yesterday, I stood up for a little old lady who had called me crying from the hospital because her 5 grown children were already fighting over her estate, and she was not dead!  Well, today I made a trip with co-worker, to the ICU at the hospital, met up with doctor and nurses, and read the little woman who was so sick all the documents she wished for me to prepare, and she signed; they were what she wanted (not her ungrateful children's wishes) and she signed, the nurses witnessed, and the doctor provided a document that the lady was of sound mind and had her full wits about her to understand what she was saying, signing and understanding... Now ... I hope she gets better and gets to go home and not have to deal with such awfulness again!!!!!!!   

Today, I stood up for myself, in regards to the poor treatment and quality of service from the pharmacy - My active aggression was that I wrote a letter to his boss, to corporate, and faxed it, and mailed hard copies, and done... lets just say, I made it known that I was taking my business elsewhere... maybe enough other people complain and they'll find better employees or retrain the ones that they have on customer service skills.

Let's just say that it is QUIET in the office, people are smiling and pleasant and going out of their way to be professional and friendly... WHAT a difference it makes after I finally snap - and am backed up when a client repeats verbatim everything I've complained about.... Honestly, it's not about whether they keep their jobs or not, it's whether or not they do their job and in a professional manner that does not adversely affect their co-workers and clients.  That's all....  and my professionalism pays off once again, I received a beautiful thank you card from a client along with a gift certificate for the assistance I provide that is more than expected... I like to make people happy ... I go out of my way to do so when it comes to work, and normally it pays off!!!!!!

Why have I been such a grouch and miserable:  I was diagnosed after a trip to the doctor's office on Monday morning, after spending half of Saturday and all of Sunday in bed, coughing, wheezing, blowing, feverish, and miserable... with Bronchitis, Sinus Infection, my right ear was infected, Strep Throat (been so long now since tonsils were out, strange to have strep!!!)... I was out of work for two days, and yesterday went back and the doctor cleared me to go back to work... I almost made it through an entire day!!!  Then ended up with very low grade fever again, in bed for the night coughing and hacking, with hot tea to sip and two snuggle bug cats....