Tag: Wine

Tales on Christmas EVE EVE

On By BackporchwriterIn Uncategorized11 Comments

Top of the Morning to ya! We opened a wine I liked that we sipped on over the last couple of days. It had a good taste. I took a pic to remember it.

It’s “Christmas Eve Eve”. George and I have always loved Christmas Eve Eve. Once it was his father’s birthday (also named George) and we always went out to celebrate. Sometimes Olive Garden, with the whole family. Bless Him. He made life fun and interesting. If you had a problem, it was his problem and he would try to solve anything. A very giving and kind heart and a humorous side to him. Just don’t ask him if he wants to buy a chicken. LOL

Why do you ask? He, “Granda” would tell a certain joke only in a loud restaurant, or crowd. He casually asks you “Hey what do you say to a deaf man when you want to sell him a chicken?” And then he yells at the top of his voice “DO YOU WANT TO BUY A CHICKEN?” I mean AT. THE. TOP. OF. HIS. VOICE. It’s a showstopper folks. I’ve been there. The entire restaurant stops talking and looks over.

The fun of course, is later when you go out to eat again and he says “Hey what do you say to a deaf man when you want to sell him a chicken?” And the whole table would go “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO” in unison, also causing everyone to look. lol. He was a mess. And we are thinking of him this morning.

And no, it would not be politically correct for me to blog such a joke in public fashion, but I was telling a story of someone who told that joke to a group of friends/family. So in case anyone is confused, I’ve straightened that out for you. (There’s always a few judgers out there looking to pull the spec out of your eye while the big wooden beam rolls around in their own, rolls eyes. That came from the Bible. Not the eye rolling part. That part came from me. lol)

Here’s George’s Dad holding Katy – she was born on Christmas Day!

And here’s my Dad holding Katy. Only he became Pappaw.

Katy had me get out the pics of her as a baby so she could compare pics to River when he is born. She already has a 3D pic which is very realistic.

Here’s the moment of birth. Look at Mom’s face. It wasn’t planned for her to be in the delivery room. George was in there with me and when the time came they asked if she was planning to stay and I said, “sure” so Mom was thrilled to get to stay in there. I was also relieved to have Mom and George in the room.

I remember this feeling. The overwhelming feeling of “joy and protection” over this baby. I remember thinking immediately that I would do all I could to protect this wonderful being for the rest of her life as long as I am living. That is what was going through my head at the time, that I would eternally protect her and love her. I next remembered seeing her hands and how pretty and long they were. And how cute her feet were. I had no idea how to be a mother. I just new how much I loved her.

I saved this blanket and gave it back to Katy at one of her showers for River.

She was a cute baby. She didn’t look like this for very long. She thickened up. Her Daddy loved to give her an extra bottle just before bed. I would feed her what the doc suggested and he would throw that extra bottle in there.

She was already contemplating her future as a teacher, I think.

I look at this pic and think “why didn’t I comb my hair after delivery”? I had other things on my mind and that was a good thing though.

Our “package” came with a dinner for two in the room with grape juice for the wine. I had that turquoise house coat forever. I remember how that was a sweet dinner. But I also remember how tired I was. And I remember George was anxious to go home and us be released and it took forever. He was getting a bit agitated. All I wanted was rest. I think I was tired for a long while.

Katy was born on Christmas Day. I remember on Jan 3rd, Granny Jan, George’s Mom came to our house and fixed a birthday dinner of Spaghetti for me at our house. I was so tired still. I just wanted to sleep and rest. But of course I wouldn’t miss my own spaghetti dinner. I just remember it was all I could do to sit up and eat. I know young mothers are tired, but I seem unusually tired the first few weeks. I also didn’t want to sleep because I wanted to stay up and make sure she was breathing. I realized I had to sleep while she slept though but could always sleep best knowing someone was on watch or holding her.

Going back a bit. Here I was with Mom and my grandmother’s while pregnant.

So Christmas Eve Eve and Christmas has always been very special. It was also my “Nanny’s” birthday on the left. And of course Mam’ma’s (center) birthday was Dec 14th.

While I was typing this, George came in and said “Merry Christmas Eve Eve”! We have always said that to each other through the years.

George and I are looking for a bit more rest tonight. The last two nights have been rough with Roger. He is just unsettled. I’m grateful that George has been dealing with it. When I wake up I’m awake for the night if it’s after 1:30 unless I go right back to sleep immediately. Night before last I couldn’t go back to sleep until almost time for the alarm to go off. Last night Roger started early wanting off the bed. He gets thirsty we’ve figured out. So at 10:30 after an episode of wanting down, George took him for water and both Roger and George began snoring and I’m lying wide awake. Finally prayed for sleep and got it but Roger wanted down over and over again. I just remembered George getting up. And last night after that first encounter, I was able to sleep again after the others. I got more sleep than he did I think.

Now the little bugger will sleep ALL day! ::sigh:: I’m tempted to wake him up when he’s sleeping so he’ll sleep at night. But I just can’t do it.

So all is on track on the work front. Today is my last day to work for before the holidays. We went to the store last night. We stocked up on a “few things” and ended up with a $200 buggy full. lol.

Tonight I’ll make sausage balls. And Christmas Fire Crackers. I kept calling them Christmas Crack but that was wrong. I got that term from someone else and they were wrong. You have to watch what you repeat. It might be wrong. Christmas Crack is chocolate and peppermint I think. But this is Cheese it Crackers, canola oil, pepper flakes, and dry ranch dressing and you bake them. I’ve had it with oyster crackers too but the Cheese It’s are excellent.

Then tomorrow morning I’ll make casserole and clean up a bit and we’ll have a snack spread for Mom and Aunt Martha and Uncle Ken. And then we will have a prime rib dinner and Christmas morning we will munch on sausage balls until brunch.

We are well stocked. No one will go hungry. And we have 3 desserts we bought last night: Red Velvet cake, cheese cake, ice cream, and a chocolate silk pie. Wait – that’s 4 desserts. George wanted to have enough choices. And I think he wanted some leftovers. 😉 I picked the ice cream – it’s strawberry. That sounds so good right now.

So I better get ready and get to work for this final day. A lot to do today. But the mood is happy. A bit tired but content.

Beef Shawarma, Wine Bottling, and Working on Next Video

On By BackporchwriterIn Uncategorized3 Comments

George fixed a beef shawarma dish Saturday night and it was almost just like eating at a Greek restaurant. YUM!

As the temps cooled a bit I was able to sit in the sun room some this weekend and sip coffee. However, I did not take much time off other than getting ready for the work week and working on this next video.

The video is finished. It has been uploading since about 6 p.m. yesterday. Our internet does this thing – well it’s probably a Mac thing – every so often the internet will just quit and it tries to search for a network. Before I always thought I had to reboot but now I just stop the internet and restart it from the settings – then it finds our assigned network again. It’s really strange. So I guess overnight it quit and I thought it’d be through this morning but I had to restart the internet.

I’ve learned that you always set your video on YouTube to Private first until you make sure it IS what you want. I always play it through first. If I don’t like something, or something was corrupted – I can ditch it and I still have the movie in my timeline on iMovie. I can change something if needed.

So I worked on this for several hours yesterday. It is getting easier but I still think it takes about an hour for every minute of footage with all that goes into it. I’m ok with that though as I like being creative with it. Kinda have to be to make sitting at home interesting at all.

I was worried about the footage if you have been reading. We haven’t done much but cook and eat and I got my new camera. We went to see Mom. So while it’ll be similar to the other videos – it’s still a bit different. I also had not been in the mood to video. I can see that during the week with work, lack of proper sleep, I’m just surviving. But on the weekends when I can get more sleep I’m in the mood to video or take pics of everything. So being worried about what footage I had, I videoed a bunch this weekend but didn’t even need it. I have a whole ‘nother video to do before we do the one in Texas. Of course it’ll have to all wait til we get back. In this video though I promised the next one would be at the ranch for the Gender reveal, so I’ll have a video that takes up to that point on the ranch. How funny is that that I ended up with extra footage.

This is when I wish I had a mac laptop for the road so I could work on it- but NO I’m not going there, lol. That laptop is for retirement days and travel one day, Lord Willing.

There’s nothing wrong with waiting til I get back to work on the videos. And I should have enough at that point that I can keep on going and get ahead or behind – however you want to look at it. I’ll have movies to work on – several in a row and won’t have to wait for interesting things to happen, I hope. lol

So this video will be up tomorrow, Lord willing. It has 22 min left to upload but I need to make the thumbnail and such.

At Kroger yesterday I couldn’t resist buying a Student Planner. I’m such a goober. I get so excited for the next calendar year and the next planner that sometimes I end up buying a planner in the fall with the students and then another when the new ones come out in January. But it seems that is driven by whatever my needs are. Sometimes I don’t like the planner – that’s usually what it is. I bought a hardback one that was hard to write in once. I bought a big one for the room and it was big and bulky. The black one above has been great as it’s flexible. But our world has shrunk and mine with it and I kept thinking how nice it would be to have one that fits in my purse with enough room to put to do’s on each day. So BAM! This one was it. I never saw a price but figured it would be cheaper than the one I’d be buying for Jan over the internet. So I spent some time converting dates in this. Now I have it on the go in my purse.

So I cut George’s hair yesterday. It looks good if I say so myself. I’m really nervous about getting behind his ears though. I forgot to get a photo but I did video it.

And he bottled some wine yesterday. This time it’s Pinot Noir. One of my favorite sipping wines.

He buys generic labels for them.

One thing about doing a Blog and Vlog is trying to remember to both video and take pics of everything. LOL

I did get some video done for the first time on the new cam as I didn’t do much of that at Mom’s when I played with it for the first real photo session. But I quickly learned as I wanted to video a scene of his wine bottling. We will see how it goes. It’ll be on the next video after this one coming up. I was proud of myself for remembering to keep a battery charged up.

Well, I need to get moving. I’m getting up at 4 all week on the first crack if I can, so I can get to work early, maybe help George with the dishes some since the dishwasher is broken, and then tonight I have to do my pedicure and some laundry and redo my vitamins for the week. Oh the dishwasher guy comes on Tuesday! Yay!

Oh and I did a thing yesterday! I bit the bullet and did the subscription for Canva. As much as love graphics, photos, illustrations, gifs, and background removal – it will be my new graphic program of sorts. That is exactly what it is. So I need to think of it as that instead of just an app. I have salivated over the Pro Version of this for over a year. So I gave in. It will help me tremendously! It makes things so much easier. So Epidemic Sound and Canva are my main two tools. I also have a pro version of Word Press and my own domain as well. But for a hobby I don’t think my expense is much at all. I mean it could be golf, lol. I get to enjoy my hobby every weekend – heck really every day. No matter what the weather. It’s been the one consistent thing I’ve done in my life I think.

I pop in now and then on this bar in Spain. So many nights they have been filled with party goers and no masks. I see the stools now are taped down and every other table is too. This is Bar Oviso in Barcelona.

And it’s a coffee/cafe during the morning and daytime hours. I notice she is wearing a mask too. I have been trying to see in webcams what other countries are doing and it appears that all across the globe mask wearing is being done.

So I have a system update to do on my Mac, but I’ve been advised by various YouTubers/MacOwners to wait a month before downloading updates and never allow the automatic update. That way they can get all the bugs out and your apps/developers have time to react. So I think I’m about a week or two in – in waiting on it. But I noticed that my email has jumped up again. I haven’t had much time the last two weekends to go through it. I guess I’ll do that on the way to Texas when I’m not driving.

Every now and then I have to go in and cancel a few things. I can’t keep up with some of the things I like to keep up with. I enjoy the WebMD articles and even like the AARP articles, although I don’t get into anything political with that group I just want the benefits – but I forget about them, lol.

Anyway, best get off and get rollin’. I’ll be trying to pop in every day even if it’s for a minute. Since I’m working extra it will give me something to make me feel like I’m getting to do something for ME! But soon it’ll be time to GO to TX.

Ya’ll have a good week. What you up to this week?

French Weekend with Friends

On By BackporchwriterIn Uncategorized8 Comments

With doggies in tow, we took to the road and made our way into Franklin, TN to visit with friends for the overnight. And for our “French Cuisine” focused weekend.

It didn’t take long for us all to settle in, although I think Don and Lisa thought we might be moving in for a month or two! It looked like we were set for an expedition with our cooler, boxes of food, pans to cook fondue with, our overnight bags, the dog’s needs.

The wine began to flow. And this one above was my favorite.

Roger stuck close by in the kitchen – not sure if it was to be near his Daddy or to be close to the smelling good French cuisine, or because the mat was just comfy there.

We snarfed down some cheese fondue.

Ate French pastry filled with escargot and oysters. This was my first time to have escargot. They are on the same order of mushrooms and oysters – the texture and taste are not going to be my go to foods, for sure. lol

Maisy had the right idea and found her comfy spot on the sofa while everyone was in the kitchen.

With about 6 of us sipping wine, it didn’t take long for the 2nd bottle to be cracked.

When the humans fondue and feast, the doggies get the good seats. 😉

And then came the French Onion soup – oh so heavenly. George did a great job of it and the fondue.

Hours later, as it turned into evening, Don fixed us a French martini and then we did our Christmas!

And you know that was all just the beginning! Don and Lisa fixed an awesome dinner! A lamb roast, lima beans, and then I had made the potatoes – a French type of scalloped potatoes with Gruyere cheese.

Lisa had made a gluten free bread shown above, and I loved loved loved the taste of it. I want to make some.

Then we set into coffee, French roast of course! Caffeine could not keep me awake. It was not long after before I headed to bed and the doggies joined. Everyone else stayed up later. I’m always the first to go to bed with my early to rise and early to be routines.

We had a comfy bedroom suite with our own private bath and a back door to take the doggies out. While I did have to take the dogs out around 4 a.m., the did allow us to sleep in until about 8 I think. RARE! They were patient. Once we did get up Maisy began barking until she was fed. I was scrambling to get it done, trying to find their bowls, their food etc.

We sat around this morning talking about how full we were and drank two pots of coffee. One regular French roast and the other chicory flavor. And then guess what!

We ate again!

These above were quail eggs. We had regular eggs too. And some good bacon. mmmmm. And Lisa whisking up the eggs!

French loaf of bread – yes!

And I’m just a fan of some good looking decor! Fruit and chocolate and roses! Need to throw that in there! So pretty.

Lisa had slaved away the day before making some crepe’s. The strawberries and creme and chocolate was great drizzled on it.

The husbands were serious about their portion of the morning feast. (They would make someone a good wife, we teased.) lol

We were supposed to have the chocolate fondue after dinner the night before but we were too stuffed so we had it after breakfast.

Let’s just say the chocolate fondue was really good. A shot glass of chocolate had both Lisa and I heading for bucket fulls of water a few minutes later. The sugar and the caffeine – might have sent us a bit overboard.

The girls then did the hot tub after cleaning the kitchen and had a long talk out there with Lisa and Amber and me. We came in and I took a shower and made the bed. Maisy wouldn’t let me finish.

While the guys (Don, George, and Dillon) did their hot tubbing us girls went for a neighborhood walk as it was sunny and 66!

Yes, I was facing the sun, but it captured what I was seeing!

Not long after, we packed up and headed home. The doggies have been tapped out and resting.

Our time with Don and Lisa and Amber and Dillon goes by so fast. We had a lot of fun, shared a lot of laughs and said “oui oui” way too often. We are still pondering our next theme, but we are considering a 4th of July weekend extravaganza! 😉 The date pretty much set and while it was our turn to host the next one, Lisa said let them do it so we can swim in the pool since it’ll be summer, and then we’ll host the fall one.

It doesn’t really matter where we are, we’ll have a good time. As always!

I was pretty tired when we got home. George said “are you really tired from relaxing all weekend?” Yep, I am. lol.

So, as far as everything on the personal front – I’ve been trying to work on some projects as I get time. I have been working on getting my photos from the phone drug over into my iMac files which I’m doing by year.

And then I realized I still had most of my videos from our November vacation last year. And I temporarily (or permanently) got side tracked and began doing an iMovie video. Clearly I need more skill. And for the life of me I cannot remember to turn my phone sideways to video. So I need to finish dragging all the photos and videos over to my files and will need to watch some iMovie videos on YouTube to learn some more. I have done the iPhone version but the desktop one is quite different. I kinda have a goal to do some periodic “Vlogging” – and do our vacations and other than that do some videos seasonally as we have enough built up. I want to integrate that into the Blog and create a channel to go along with it, just for fun. I’m quite taken with the video creations I see and I love what I’m learning and I’m just evolving in that direction. I’ll also be able to put those on the blog itself as well.

So, it should be pretty fun and will likely end up being a new hobby. It takes HOURS to put these videos together. But I have enjoyed the ones I’ve done in the past and I’m looking forward to trying to learn how to do them where they look professional in quality.

So I’ll have to quit doing the iMovie work until I get these photos over to the iMac so I can delete a lot from my phone for my next trip – Why? So I can put more photos on the phone! The problem with doing the iMovies is that they will be put together as I have time and will be published much later – not as quick as the blog photos. But that is ok. I’ll be learning and doing them as I have time and I think it will be something I’ll enjoy but I have a LOT TO learn. And they won’t be perfect. I also have to find out where to get music from. Hopefully free at first. I don’t mind paying a little bit for a site to use loyalty free music (or rights to use it or whatever the term is) if it’s something I’m going to be doing ongoing.

I finally got my THAT SHAKE/SUPPLEMENT COMPANY I USE’s 1099 downloaded for George. But I still have a lot of things I have had on the list that I’ve not done yet. George needs to get me my documents (they are locked up) for my updated drivers license. I need to send Mom Fancy’s ribbon for her hair since her hair dresser can’t find pink ribbon (I guess she doesn’t use Amazon). I need to make sure I still have my graphics files (tubes) and we need to start planning things for the Amelia Island trip. However, soon I will be meeting Katy in Tulsa – not this week but next week. And I have a lot of other projects around the house to do, and when I get back from Tulsa (Susan and I )- we need to plan the shower for June and I need to start getting the house in order also. So not really making a lot of progress on much. Slow and steady with these photos slowing me down. At least I’m almost to 2020!

I was so excited to have all my photos synced automatically. It’s great for when I blog! No downloading or uploading of photos. But, if you delete off your phone, it deletes off your photos on the iMac (on the cloud). So I’m having to drag over the ones I want to keep off the cloud so they permanently stay. I had a lot of things on my phone too. So there is quite the many photos to transfer. Then I get off on tangents as I said earlier of doing iMovies and such and – well, it was fun. I also have been known to get off task by playing video games as they are fun to me. I found one that mimics Sim City – the very old version I love it! So yeah, I get OFF task sometimes. Anyway, I love being able to do these kinds of things. I love being geeky. I love planning new things and working toward them. So the to do list still looks the same as it did last week, pretty much!

I’m thrilled that it is March! Spring will be popping soon! And I’m so glad to have my life back! No travels, no open enrollment time, I get to enjoy some time with my daughter soon and all this makes me happy. With warmer weather coming, I suppose that the Corona virus will rid of itself. I sure hope so. It’s a bit scary doing air travel in the next few days. That puts you in a higher risk zone for sure. But I’m not cancelling my life over it. I’ll take the risk to see my girl.

My food tracker journal arrived and I’ll be starting that up this week. I’ll take a pic and show you what it is like as the week progresses. But what a wonderful weekend we had. Now I need to do laundry and all that I normally do on the weekends during the week as best as I can. But tomorrow night I’m getting a pedi so I can wear sandals in the next week or so. And I’m so ready for a spring shopping spree. Might need some more sandals! 😉 Hope you all enjoy your first week of March and I’ll pop in for some short little blog posts this week!