WEDNESDAY HODGEPODGE #568

Thank you Joyce.

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1. When the Hodgepodge lands on September 11th I want to acknowledge that. Will you purposely pause to remember, pray, or attend any sort of ceremony on 9/11? Share any thoughts or memories you'd like to share about this day. 

I will definitely pause to remember and pray for the families who lost their loved ones. 

On that day I took Mark to the airport for a very early flight. When I got home I ended up turning on the TV and saw what was happening. One of the buildings had already been hit. I immediately texted Mark and they were on the runway and not about to leave. I had to pick him up later that day. 

Also, my dad was in town and he was at my Aunt and Uncle's house who are very late sleepers. I had to call and wake them up. They had to see this. 

Several years later we went to New York and it was beautiful and sad to see the Memorial for those who lost their lives. 

2. Growing up, did you spend a lot of time with your grandparents? What's something you learned from a grandparent? 3. What's your go-to breakfast? 

Yes, I spent a good deal of time with them on both sides of the family. My dad's parents didn't drive so it was when my dad could drive us to their house. My mother's parents lived not to far away but they eventually moved to Florida when I was in my teens. I loved both sets of grandparents. 

I would say that I learned some cooking from my mom's mom and she was a great baker too. After they had moved to Florida they would come and stay in our basement which was fixed up for them. I think they would spend about 3 months with us. So that was awesome. 

I like an egg sandwich on toast or a bagel, with cheese. Otherwise I saute spinach and mix in beaten eggs to make kind of an omelette. I don't do breakfast very often. 

4. Tell us the story behind one of your favorite photos. 

I have a lot of favorite photos but this one always brings back some wonderful memories. We moved to California around 1989. My dad came to visit, I'm not sure when this was, and we spent the day at Disneyland. 

I miss my father so much. He and I talked on the phone everyday. He sadly passed about just before the pandemic started at age 96. It was like 4 months before his 97th birthday. 

So in this photo I thought it would be cute to get the three of them with the Mickey Mouse ice cream bar. Right before I took the picture my dad took a bite out of one the ears on his. I remember saying something to him about it, like you couldn't wait?

5. This week Friday lands on the 13th. Are you superstitious in any way? Do you like scary movies, and if so what's your favorite?

I can't say that I am superstitious. I'm not crazy about scary movies but I have watched several of them years ago. Since Beetlejuice is listed under scary movies I will go with that one. Also, I am looking forward to seeing the new one. 

6. Insert your own random thought here.

You may have heard about the fires here in Southern California. We are safe but we can see them from our house. One we can see from the backyard and one we can see from the front yard. We also saw one of the others when we were driving home from Costco today. 

This was from the backyard on Monday night. 

This was from the front yard Monday night. 

This was the sun Monday night through the smoke. 

This was also the fire from the front of the house.

We drove to get some photos. 

This is when we walked out of Costco yesterday. 

That is from the fire we saw Monday in front of the house.

CORONA CALIFORNIA FIRE

If you watch the news you may have heard about the fire near Corona California. It was also listed at the Prado Dam Flood Control Basin Fire. 

Yes we could see it from our yard and as of this morning you can still smell it in the air. 

Our entire yard was filled with ash by Sunday morning. Mark and I were leaving early to go pick up Adam at so we told Amber if she had time we would appreciate her hosing down the furniture and patios. 

To our surprise, when we returned home early Sunday evening, the yard had been hosed! 

Okay, hosing may not be the best thing to do in a drought but we felt it was necessary. We have as a house owner turned our sprinklers down 20% to do our part. We have not been given restrictions yet. 

This was a solid soft charred leaf. Not crispy at all! 

 The hood of Mark's car when we left.

I will be posting our fun day with Adam later this week.

MARCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING

It's March....I can hardly believe it! Why do these years have to fly by so quickly? Did you know that it's only 298 days until Christmas. Shush....you didn't hear that from me!

I have a few things to share with you but it's really just some nothingness however if you heard about the fires in Riverside, CA that certainly wasn't nothing. We could see the fire from our yard. There was one point where a huge amount of birds were swirling around in the smoke and then they seemed to get past it and move on. Obviously I never want anyone to get hurt or lose their home in a fire like this but my heart does feel for the animals that would most likely not have survived this fire.

 

 

I have a few recipes to share from Pinterest. I had 3 fails recently which makes me kinda angry. If your posting a recipe it should work....I'm just sayin'

Slow Cooker Salsa Verde Pork by Chief in Training. Nikki is one of my favorites and I do follow her in my reader.  This came out so good. I didn't have a pork roast but I had the thick boneless pork chops from Costco which worked fine. I just so happened to have a cooking sauce that I got from Two Sisters Gourmet which is from PartyLight which looked just like a salsa so used it. I don't know if it was the simmering sauce I had or not but this was excellent. I have searched and I don't see the salsa available from Two Sisters Gourmet anymore. I will try this again with her suggested salsa.

 

 

Also you will see the No-Bake Biscoff Cookies and these are also from Chief in Training. She has a new post recipe idea everyday! She must never leave her kitchen. I made these especially for Amber because she eats Biscoff by the jar. I love the stuff but it's not low carb, but that doesn't mean I haven't had a spoonful of it at times! These are actually good but I'm not a huge fan of a non baked cookie but I would make them again for Amber, she loved them.

Tomorrow morning I will be on my quest very early trying to buy The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2. Also Target has Twilight, New Moon and Eclipse on sale for $7.00 each. I only own The Twilight Sage: Breaking Dawn Part 1 which I watch almost daily. I can't seem to get enough of it. I was recently going to go to the show to see Part 2 again last week but it had left the theatre it was at so imagine my surprise when I saw it was being released this Saturday.

Downton Abbey Season 3 disk one arrived yesterday and I can't wait to start watching it. If you see me on Facebook you would know that I was washing my floors yesterday. Sometimes I mop them, or sometimes I use a Hoover machine that I have but then there are those times when you have to get down on your hands and knees to give the grout a good cleaning. So I am doing it in sections because we have a massive amount of tile in our house. Today I will be doing the kitchen and then I will shower and start watching Season 3. I'm really excited.

Hope everyone has a nice weekend. We don't have an specific plans but we do need to make a run to Costco. I need to give Miss Skye B a bath but don't tell her....she will hide from me. If she would just stop laying in the dirt outside she wouldn't need one. She does this to herself!

 

RIGHT NOW AT 1:45 NEAR MY HOUSE

We are okay, we had to get in the car to get these pictures. We can only see smoke from the house. It's about a mile from my house but in our neighborhood.

Click on the picture to enlarge it. Can you believe I got into my daughters car in my robe! We can hear the airplanes flying over and can see some flames from the front of the house through the houses across the street. It is on our local news!