Christmas is here! (almost)

I'm finished with most of my shopping.  I'm waiting for the packages to show up at Receiving my Dad's house.  Since I live in a condo I never have things delivered here.  The stairwell is open so anyone can walk by and see what's been delivered.  My neighborhood is nice but I'm not tempting the devil.

Speaking of holidays, I need to decide what design I want on my holiday fingernails.  I looked through the nail book when I was there but they did not have any holiday designs yet.  Snowman?  Christmas tree?  Red and green crackle paint?  So many choices.

Anyone out there in blogland have a suggestion?

Take that Sprint

Got a new phone today and I had to pay a $36 activation fee.  The sales person told me to call and try to get the fee waived.  The first customer service person said that they no longer waive the fee.  I asked for a supervisor who told me the same thing.  Then she asked if I had any other problems and told me I'd be receiving a follow up call to find out if my issue was fully resolved..uh, no...
Her:Ms Brown, you can speak to another supervisor and they will tell you the same thing.
Me:Sorry but I'm not going to say it was resolved because it wasn't.  I don't need to speak to another supervisor so they can tell me the same thing.  I understand what you're saying but I will not say yes because it was not resolved.
Her:  Please hold one moment.
New Sprint Guy: Hello , how can I help you?
Me: I've been a customer for over 10 years and never paid an activation fee and I'm not happy to have to pay it now.  I understand you don't waive the fee anymore but I'm still not happy about it.  I'm not sure why she transferred me because this will not be resolved by having another person tell me the policy.
Him: Let me see what I can do....(hold music) Ms Brown, we don't waive the fee but I am able to offer you an $80 credit on your account.  Will that resolve the problem?
Me: Yes.  Thank you.

$36 activation fee - $80 credit =  Issue resolved.

Don't mess with a poor teacher.

Bathroom

My bathroom is finally finished!  I'd take pictures but it does not look any different than it did before with the exception of the paint color and even that is pretty similar.  It took weeks to do because every time the contractor painted the walls they blistered.  He sanded and painted several times and we could not figure out why.  Finally it worked.  I have new bathroom walls and ceiling, a new kitchen light and a new patch of ceiling in the hallway.  I also have a ton of dust.

Next on the house agenda: dryer vent and back splash.  I'm waiting on the floor and toilet.  Exciting stuff.  No this is not my bathroom but isn't it nice?

Magic Machine

Today's blog is brought to you by the letter K.  K is for Keurig.  If you don't have one you need one.  Keurig is the easiest coffee maker ever.  K-cups are a little more expensive  but the ability to have individualized coffee in a few minutes is fantastic.  I can't even remember life before the magic machine.  I love coffee but I have cleaning the pot and measuring out the grounds.  I always forget and things get yucky.  Hazelnut, French Vanilla  and extra bold all at the same meal.  Coffee lovers unite.

Groupon

I can't say enough about the loveliness that is Groupon.  Hardly a weekend goes by where I don't have a Groupon related even to attend.  Celtic/Highland Games last weekend and sushi the week before.  Earlier this week I scored discounts for Nando's.  During the summer I got passes to my local Zumba/Yoga place.  Is there anything that you can't get?

Groupon brings people together.  See a deal that you like?  Send it to a friend and you have an instant outing.  Schedules are frantic.  Work is off the chain.  The kids need to go here, there and everywhere.  When you book that bead stringing Groupon, you know that you will be spending 2 hours of quality time stringing beads and gossiping with your dear friend.  Once you buy the deal, you have to redeem it because you already spent the money.  I am not in the donation business, ya know?

I'm looking forward to bead stringing and Lincoln's Cottage with friends.  Then I'll have the Groupon house cleaner come to get rid of the construction dirt so I can brush my teeth with the Groupon discounted toothbrush in a clean bathroom.  Then I'll move to my freshly vacuumed living room and  look for Groupon gifts for my friends near and far.

Try a Groupon and change your life.

Peace, Love & Groupons my friends.

Fudge or bark?

I was at the Celtic Games last weekend and I had some delicious fudge.  I forgot how much I liked it.  I'm thinking about making some for Christmas to go to along with the apple butter.    Fudge is really easy to make. While I was checking out recipes on foodnetwork.com I found several for bark.  MMMM!  White chocolate peppermint bark looked delish.  How about milk chocolate, cranberry cashew/pecan/pistachio.  White chocolate looks nice but I don't like the taste of it.  I love cashews, pecans and pistachios so they will definitly make it in the pool.  Trader Joes has great nuts and dried fruit.  Their cried cranberries and orange cranberries would be very good for bark.  I think I remember a sour cherry also.  No raisins, walnuts or peanuts, yuck!

On another food note, any ideas for my next canning project?  I have a box and a half of jars left and I need to do something with them.  I want to get the out of the house.  I have to do something acidic so I can process them by boiling them (as opposed to pressure canning).  Orange cranberry something perhaps?  Jelly, jam, preserves?

Ad lib?

So I decided to sign up to have ads on my blog.  I'm not sure that I get enough traffic to make it worth it but who knows.  MCPS had not given us a raise in a while so I need to find some way to earn a buck.  LOL
Unless I write more and get more views I think that's exactly how much I'll make, a buck.  If the job is not going to give me a raise then I have to find other ways to increase my income that do not involve taking an additional job.  I don't have anything that I can make and sell.  I don't have any hidden talents.  My family is not rich.  What's a girl to do?

I'll try to write more often to get some traffic.  Wish me well.

Project Apple Butter: How to...

It's been a while.  I was too tired to blog.  I hate leaving things unfinished so I'm typing up my how to blog tonight while watching MI-5 aka Spooks (BBC).  I didn't take as many pictures of apple butter as I did on PPR (Project Pot Roast) but there are still quite a few.  Here we go

Ingredients  

Cook the apples in apple cider and a little lemon juice.

Lots of apples in lots of pots.

I put the cooked apples through the food mill.

The food mill will remove the skins and mush up the apples to a smooth consistency.

All the apple pulp is in the crock pot with the spices.

I used the spoon to prop the lid open so the excess liquid could evaporate.  The pot was full to the rim  so you can see it worked.  On to the canning.

I ladled the hot apple butter into pre-heated jars and boiled them for about 10 minutes to seal them.  It worked most of the time but I had to re-process a few of them.

Finished apple butter army all properly canned.  No refrigeration needed until after they are opened.

The mess in the kitchen...

spills over into 2 pictures.

Thanks for reading Project Apple Butter.  I encourage you to blog your own Food Project.  If you don't have a blog I'll publish it for you.  Any suggestions for my next project?

Project Apple Butter: Who's who

Just like Project Pot Roast, I'm going to go step by step through the process of making and canning apple butter.  First up, the players aka ingredients.  

Apples

Apple cider

lemon juice

cinnamon

dark brown sugar

allspice

mace

vanilla extract

molasses

whiskey

last minute addition 

Equipment

crock pot

apple corer

strainer

food mill

canning set

I turned the pic so you could read it.  No the Lemon Juice is not flying.

Next up, How To......

Project Apple Butter: In the beginning

In the beginning there were apples.

And they were good.  Larriland Farms is a fun place.  I highly recommend it.  They have great activities for the fall.

Project Pot Roast: The final chapter

This is the final installment of Project Pot Roast  Project Beef Stew.  It is delicious but not at all what I expected when I started out.  The onions and the green peppers totally disintegrated to thicken the broth.  The extra spices that I added worked out very well but next time I'm going to go lighter on the salt.  When the water evaporates, the salt is stronger.  I over salted a little but nothing catastrophic.  Here are my final pictures:

in the bowl

not the best picture.  lol but you get the idea

Thank you for participating in Project Beef Stew.  Next up, Apple Butter.

Project Pot Roast: Should it look like this?

This is the second to last post in the Project Pot Roast series.  It seems that my roast turned into stew.

Resting stew/pot roast.

The haze is steam.

More steam.  This time you can see the stew like consistency.

The chuck roast cooked into a stew.  Maybe I added too much liquid.  I think it needs to have plenty of broth to properly cook in the slow cooker.   When I tested it this morning I added more salt, garlic powder, adobo, red pepper flakes, Dijon mustard and the Jamaican curry powder.  Everything cooked on high all night but I turned it to low about 8am.  Now it's about 3 and I turned it off.  Final tasting in a few hours.

Project Pot Roast: The Process aka Chop Chop Chop

This is what you've all been waiting for...ha ha ha.  Holy pictures Batman!  I hope you enjoy them.  Picture are in order of preparation.  You can chop stuff in any order.  This is mine.  I did a rough chop on the veg since they are going to smush up during the cooking anyway.

You might recognize this motley crew  from the last blog.  Everything gathered together for the before picture.

Onions are first on the block

Celery is next

Tomatoes get peeled and chopped.  I skinned them because I don't like finding the skins in my cooked food.    If they don't bother you, skip the skinning.

Green Pans at the ready.   This things are awesome! 

Beef bouillon cubes ready for the pool.

Beef searing and water boiling for the bouillon cubes.

Mmm the bouillon is boiling.

Look at the beautiful brown sear.  I added a little olive oil to the pan and put it over high heat to get that nice color

Tomato, celery, onion, baby bella mushroom and garlic ready for the  crock pot.

I flipped meat and seasoned it with adobo.  If you look closely, you'll see that I stuffed garlic cloves into the meat.  This was not easy.  I went with vertical stabs after the sear but I would recommend horizontal cuts before you sear.  It also means the garlic won't slip out when you flip the meat.

The beef in the crock pot on top of a layer of celery.

Onions in the frying pan for a little color while the beef broth hangs out on the back burner.

More celery and tomatoes join the party.

Onions browning on the stove.

In ye go fellas.

Mushrooms are frying up before they take the plunge. 

I fried the garlic quickly before deglazing the pan with a little onion soup broth.

 

All liquid and mushrooms in the crock pot.


 

I almost forgot the green peppers.  No escape for you! 

Now we wait.   8+ hours from now dinner will be served.

And now, my sweets, we wait.  I'll post again when everything is cooked.