My garden

I have flowers! My tomatoes have several buds on them and I saw a pretty white blossom one my sole serviving pea plant! Yay!!!!!

A Box!

I participated in a "Summer in Winter" swap that one of the groups I read in Ravelry put together. The rules were to send a skein of yarn, a jar of home canned "goodness", and a surprise. I recieved my box today from Dina "nrggrl". She sent me some bubbles for that first day of summer, a coffee mug with a pic of what her summers look like, dark chocolate (in the freezer at the moment as it was 80's here today), and napkins with strawberries on them. Some cherry marmalade that looks super yummy! Oops, almost forgot the yarn! Two skeins of Knitpicks Shawdow in "Vineyard" a dark, yummy burgandy. The pic online is more purple than real life.

Why???????

Why can't I do what I know I need to do? Why can't I stand up on my own and speak my mind? I am a good nurse, I take the best care I can of my patients. I can stand up for them, so why not myself? Why am I so afraid of hurting others to the point I don't talk? Or I beat around the bush and don't even adress the issue I really want to/need to talk about? Why?

Do I really need a new hobby?

I have been interested in making dollhouses since I was a little girl. When I was a girl, my grandparents had a renter that made the most fascinating dollhouses that even had electricity! I remember that he entered one into the county fair and seeing there with a ribbon on it. So, R bought me my first dollhouse to build while he was here. A beginner model but still very pretty. It even has gingerbread on it! So, I opened the box and read the instructions. Seems very through. This one is the one I have. Wish me luck!

Stuff and "Purely Decadant"

Well, about 30 minutes ago R left to go back up north. He has a really long day ahead of him, about 20 hours of driving. Overall, it was a really good visit. We went to San Diego to visit with some of my family. He got quite a few "honey do's" done for me that I didn't ask for and wasn't expecting to happen, so that was nice. I would get up for work and he would tell me "I did this and that for you while you were asleep" Was really nice. I do miss being with him, but I know that he made a decision to help out his mom. I will like having the house back in some kind of order as it is like a small tornado went through the house whenever he is here.

He did bring down some "yogurt" for me to try. There were two kinds of yogurt, a soy based one and a cocout based one. I actually prefer the coconut based one more. The consistancy and flavor is more of what I remember what yogurt having. Really very good. He also brought me some "ice cream" made by Turtle Mountain. This was their Purely Decadent made with Coconut milk ice cream. Also very good. He brought me Chocolate, Vanilla, and Cookie dough.
The chocolate and the vanilla taste just like ice cream without any obvious coconut taste. The Cookie dough did taste like coconut ice cream with cookie dough pieces in it. Not really appealing. At least I now know that there are products that will satisfy my cravings for dairy without actually eating it. Now I just need to find out it I can get my local grocery store to either carry it or at least order it for me!

Nutrition and Life

About a year ago I learned through trial and error that I am either allergic to dairy or have an intolerance to it. I am not lactose intolerant. Here is a list of symptoms of lactose intolerance. I don't get any of those. Also, I cannot eat yogurt. Appartently some people who are lactose intolerant can, as the good bugs in the yogurt eat lactose. What I get is hayfever-like symptoms. And a headache. I start to have breathing issues in about a hour after consuming dairy. Not fun! So, I have been trying to delete dairy from my diet. That has been a real challenge. Not only do I crave it about once a week, it is also in just about everything premade! So, I take Zyterc daily and Benadryl when I need it. I also have been doing a lot more cooking at home lately.

I have also been very interested in Once A Month Cooking. It is basically what it says. You cook once a month, stock the freezer up, and eat off that for the month. You then only need to buy fresh produce as you need. I have done something similar before but only two week intervals. I found that I didn't cook enough variety, so I was eating out. This week I have been making staples, i.e. shredded chicken, meatballs, cooked bacon, cooked ground beef, that kind of thing. Freezing those staples, that way I can make several different things. Two things that I did make up as complete foods is chili and burritos. Those things I know that I like and will eat as is. The chili I could eat as chili, or put it over rice or noodles. The burritos are more for work, just take out of the freezer into the frig at work, then microwave when I get hungry.

So I will see how this new way (for me) of cooking will work. At least it got me to clean out the feezers!