Five Favorites For This Friday

Hello and Happy Friday, and happy last day of May! I'm kind of sad to see May end, as it is one of my favorite months, usually because the weather is pleasant - not too hot for any length of time, with cool nights which means good sleeping. This May was rainier than usual, but I think around here at least, April was a LOT rainier, so I'll take it.

If you are a long-time reader here, you may recall that I used to do something fairly regularly called "Five Favorites For This Friday," which was a post that was a random collection of things that made me happy in the past week. I felt like doing one today, and I looked to see when the last one was.

Gulp. 2016.

Well, I'm bringing it back today, so here we go.

1. I apologize to anyone who already saw this on Instagram or Facebook - feel free to move to the second item on this list!

I took this photo on our way to West Virginia last week, because looking at the mountains covered with trees reminded me of something. When I was in fourth grade, my classroom had a view very similar to this one.

I used to look out and think how the trees resembled a tufted carpet. Then I imagined that God and our guardian angels walked along it unseen, making sure that we were OK. It was always a comforting thought. (I spent a lot of fourth grade looking out the window. We had moved in the middle of the school year, and I was way ahead in lessons, etc.)

2. I took this picture to post on  my friend Carol's Facebook page. Some of her family background is Polish, and I knew she in particular would appreciate this. On Saturday night, this was our dining venue. I didn't just like the sign, I liked the bonus statue of the Infant of Prague in the window. A perfect storm, you know.

For the record, the pierogies were wonderful. I wish I had more right now!

3. Guilty. All 34 counts. 

4. There's a little girl who lives down the street from us, who I used to see at least twice a week, taking a walk with her babysitter. She is a cutie, but has always been pretty shy if you said hello - you know, she would kind of give you a smile and then hide behind the babysitter. 

I saw them yesterday afternoon, and was surprised because she was so much bigger. And she has definitely gotten over being shy! I said hello and commented that it had been a while since I'd seen her, and she said, "I'm five now, and I had a birthday party last week!" I wished her a happy belated birthday, and she launched into a long, complicated story about something that happened at her birthday party which was probably not as complex to understand as it seemed. But the best part was at the end of the story, when she said, "So all in all, it was a fabulous and magnificent event!" 

We should all be so lucky, right? 😊

5. Yesterday I showed you the very beginning of my Emotional Support Chicken. I spent yesterday afternoon putting the two back wing sections together, and working on the next part. 

I'm having such a good time with this! I even tried crocheting the two back wing sections together (the red vertical line) and though it's not perfect, I'm happy with the result. I just thought that the crocheted seams that I had seen on other projects looked much more decorative, and wanted to try it.

So there you go. It was a decent week for the most part. 

Now it's on to June and the weekend. The only specific plans I have are to take some herb plants and put them into different pots, and getting The Tim to help me with potting some lavender plants in a large pot similar to ones that are holding some other plants that seem to be very happy. Other than that, I just have my usual little projects around the house, and seeing what I feel like doing. It will be nice to have a quiet weekend after traveling last weekend, and having a kind of iffy start to this week.

I hope you'll have a good one as well, and find some time to just do whatever will make you happy. Take care. 

Did You Eat "Poverty Meals" When You Were Growing Up?

Thanks for all of your kind words and wishes for The Tim's birthday.  He seemed to really enjoy his dinner and his cake, and was thrilled with his Crazytown Hat!  I'll see if I can get a photo of him wearing it.

When I told him I had made his birthday cake like they did in Roman times, he looked puzzled and then said, "Did you put columns on it?" which amused me.  He appreciated my "artistic" efforts.

It was a good weekend and a good day all around.

A friend of mine sent me this link, with the message - "Wait! Did you know these were 'Poverty Meals'" and my first reaction was to laugh, but then it got me to thinking.  I know I have mentioned before that we were very poor growing up, but to some extent, we didn't know it unless others pointed it out.  We were lucky to have something to eat every day, and clothes to wear (even if they weren't necessarily nice clothes) and occasionally we were farmed out to live with relatives for a while, but that was always presented as an adventure rather than something that was a problem.  

But I remember being shocked years ago, when a discussion about foods we ate as kids but would never eat today was going on.  I mentioned that one of my favorite things as a kid was fried bologna sandwiches, but I would never eat one today, because a) I am a vegetarian, and b) I knew there was no way I could successfully duplicate the ones my father used to make that tasted SO yummy.  At which point, a co-worker said, "Fried bologna sandwiches????  That's what poor people eat!"  

I have to be honest, that never occurred to me.  Just like most of the things mentioned in the linked article never seemed like things we ate because we were poor.  Of those things mentioned on the list, we regularly had all of them except chicken livers and fruit in condensed milk (I feel pretty certain that my parents must not have liked them).  They were just part of the regular rotation of meals.  There are some I still happily eat today, that until I read this article, had no idea were originally around because of their low costs.  And for better or worse, I think of some of them as treats (cinnamon and sugar toast, for instance).  

A black woman I worked with once told me that "no one who was self-respecting" in her community would eat boxed macaroni and cheese.  I was an adult before I realized that people made it completely from scratch - I thought "homemade" mac and cheese meant that they used the boxed stuff and jazzed it up, or that they used the "fancy" boxed stuff!

(regular - we never had it with these 'fancy' veggies!)

(fancy - fortunately for my parents, we didn't like this version as well, 'cause I know it cost more ...)

I did find a recipe for truly homemade mac and cheese years ago that I make pretty regularly now - using whatever cheeses we happen to have - and we enjoy that.  But I've also been known to fix the boxed stuff on occasion ...

So - what about you?  Did you eat "Poverty Meals" and if so, did you know that's what they were?  

Now I'm thinking of some other things that likely fall into that category - in any case, this has all been quite illuminating to me.  :-)

Puerto Rico Vacation: Part 1, Fajardo

We arrived home this past Saturday, late afternoon, from our week in Puerto Rico.  The whole thing was perfect - no problems on either of our flights, no problems with reservations where we were staying, and the weather was great.  One day it was slightly humid, but it was mostly in the high 70s/low 80s, and though it would rain a few times, it was 15-20 minutes and then the sun came back.

We had lucked out because we got some nice deals on places to stay that we otherwise would not have been able to afford.  These are the kind of places that some people might always visit, but for the four of us, it was a real treat!

Our first place was in Fajardo, which is a really lovely waterfront town about 1 hour from San Juan.

After we checked in, we walked on to the hotel balcony to take a look around, and find a spot for some late lunch/early diner.  The view is shown above.

Our room had what was called "the garden view."  In the background of the picture, you might see some teeny tiny white things - that's the skyline of San Juan!

The resort was just beautiful - there was even a resident kitty, named Dottie!  She especially liked us. since we had cat treats.

We had made reservations to take the ferry to Palomino Island on the second day, and go horseback riding.  Unfortunately, the trails were too wet (they go up along mountain trails on the island), so they didn't want to risk the horses getting injured.  All of the horses are rescues, and they rehabilitate them and socialize them.  At this time there are sixteen horses (and I realize that my niece Amanda is the one with all of the horse pictures on her camera!)  But it was still a wonderful place to spend the day, and besides the horses, we saw a lot of other critters!

The ferry at the dock.  The ride both ways was kinda crazy, since the water was really choppy!

Here are some of our first views of and from the island:

We saw lots of chickens (including a hen with chicks!), some roosters, and some iguanas.

The roosters were, of course, ridiculously noisy!  Talk about strutting your stuff ...

The iguanas were busy basking in the sun.

This pictures makes me laugh - I call it "An iguana and a rooster walk into a bar ..."

It was a beautiful day, even with a couple of quick rain showers, and we walked all around the island.  We were there from bright and early in the morning until about 1:00, when we headed back on the ferry and took a little break before going to the pool to hang out for a while.

We had a truly amazing dinner (I had vegetarian mofongo and a mojito), at a place called La Estacion, that used to be a gas station.  It was recommended to us by the man who was in charge of the horses, and it did not disappoint.  The Tim also had the mofongo, Pat had grilled red snapper, and Amanda had grilled lobster.  With various drinks of course.  All the food was declared yummy and amazing, and we all ate too much.  But it was worth it - we were on vacation, after all!

We also had an "adventure" involving a trip to a local K Mart because both The Tim and Pat needed belts (a ridiculous story no matter how you look at it), so by the time we got back to our rooms, it was kind of late, and we'd had a busy day.  So we had a nightcap in Pat and Amanda's room, and then we all turned in since the next day we had a bit of a drive to our next destination.

My cold was in full force, but since everything was so leisurely, it was OK.  I'm sure there were others around us though who wondered why someone who seemed to be hacking up her guts and blowing her nose a bazillion times was out of the hospital ... :-)

Suffice it to say that last Monday was a WHOLE LOT better than this Monday was!