Fierce Omelet Craving

So the other day I was craving an omelet something fierce! Fierce would actually be an understatement. As soon as the craving hit I ran to the fridge to get right on it. I flung open the door with much enthusiasm only to discover I had absolutely nary an egg in the house. Who runs out of eggs and forgets? Apparently me and it was – might I add, a huge let down.

I immediately went from that letdown to my grocery shopping list and added my eggs at the tippy top! And they made their way to the kitchen yesterday afternoon. You have no idea how I planned my omelet all out and couldn’t wait ‘til this morning. I would have had it last night but we already had dinner plans thus the wait.

It was exciting, ever so exciting to go to the fridge and have all the necessary ingredients for my omelet this morning.

As I started prepping my pepper I noticed not one but two baby peppers growing inside. There’s numerous times I see babies inside the red and yellow peppers but this is the first time I’ve seen two. I put my finger behind the one as he blended in with the pepper.


Here they are side by side. I munched on these guys while I prepped my pepper and onion.


A slice of yummy life


Two eggs


Give ’em a good beatin’


A little concoction that’s seasoned really well with pepper and just a pinch of salt.


I love my little pan as it’s just the right size for my 2 egg omelet.

After they set I added lots of cheese and here’s a little sneak peak of how she looked after I transferred her to my plate.


Let’s just say I’m already planning my breakfast tomorrow and this is a tiny clue of what’s goin’ down.

A Beautiful Monday

Top of the morning! Okay, I realize it’s late morning but still morning no less and a Monday morning, a beautiful Monday morning with a bright week ahead.

I’m beginning to plan my meals and today I’ve kicked it off with one of my favorite yogurt flavors mixed with ½ cup Fiber One cereal toped with a sliced banana.


The sourdough pretzels I squeezed in will be my my mid morning snack in just a bit. Those provide the best bang for your buck when looking for something good to crunch on.

I’m getting ready to put those black beans on to cook and I’ll be adding some onion, carrots and a few other things as I like to add a little of this and that so who knows how it’s going to turn out. I’ll also heat up some jasmine rice cooked in chicken broth to go along with my beans.

Hubby took me to the movies this weekend and we saw Confessions of a Shopaholic. I don’t want to spoil it if you plan to see it…but it was painful for both of us. Sure there were some funny parts but in my opinion they didn’t make up the difference. I’m quite sure many loved this movie though, perhaps you enjoyed it. Hubby was such a great sport as this is a movie I wanted to see. We didn’t splurge on any treats at the movies but he did take me out for a wonderful “healthy” dinner afterwards.

As we look forward to the new week ahead, (speaking of that, it’s MARCH) we anticipate some warmer weather in the coming days. There’s so much to look forward to come spring/summer!

At The End Of The Day

Yesterday as I was relaxing at the end of the day (waiting for Hubby to come home from work) I was thinking about the little things I’m thankful for. So I snapped these pictures from where I was reclining. True, simple pictures of home.


It was late afternoon and the light was dancing on the walls and I was thankful for a clean apartment, the clothes were all clean, sheets were changed and I felt so ready for Hubby to get home as I was ready to begin this weekend with him. But at the end of the day, when I stop and think about it, it’s not home and everything in it that’s such a big deal, it’s whose in this house that makes it home. Family no matter how big or small is truly what makes a house a home. And no matter where our path may lead, home is wherever we are.

Apple Salad

  • 6 Apples
  • 16 oz Cool Whip – The large size tub
  • 20 oz Can Crushed Pineapple – I bought 2 cans but only used 1
  • 1 Pack Instant Butterscotch Pudding – I use 2
  • 1 Cup Nuts – More or less however you like – I used lots of chopped pecans

This is the little salad I made to take to the party this evening. It’s one of those very easy recipes to whip up on a Saturday morning and pop in the refrigerator and it’s ready to go when we head out this evening.

I thought it would be fun to snap some pictures as I went.

The Ingredients:

6 clean apples


All cut up and rarin’ to go

Cool Whip – Crushed Pineapple – Butterscotch Pudding (instant) – Nuts


I’ve already dumped the Cool Whip and now pouring the can of crushed pineapple, juice and all.


Pour in the Butterscotch Pudding mix – This is my favorite part in this salad – I use 2 packs for more Butterscotch goodness. To me it adds what seems to be a caramel flavor.


Add the nuts. I’m not stingy, I don’t measure, I just dump in a lot!


Give that mixture a good mix with a spoon.

Then pour the goodness over the apples and mix well to coat all the apples.


Note to self: Mix the Cool Whip blend before chopping the apples. My apples turned a little brown but hopefully no one will notice now that they are all hunkered in.

Unfortunately all my large pretty bowls are in storage so I’ll just have to use the same large mixing bowl. I wiped the sides down and here we have an apple salad.


Cover and refrigerate


Now I too can chill now that my dish is ready.

A Candle In Honor Of Colin

Today my friend Tanya

from Sunday Baker is remembering her son Colin. Today would’ve been his 14th birthday. To read her heartfelt post click on her name (above) to read her birthday wish. To help commemorate Colin and honor his memory, my candle is lit and will remain lit throughout the day and evening.

The warm soft glow is a gentle reminder of Colin

and a mother’s (Tanya’s) loving words.


And this candle that stands so tall is a reminder of Colin’s Journey


There Are Signs Everywhere

I’ve taken so much time away from blogging! It’s a sign that I’ve been very busy and that I need to get back here to let everyone know I’m still here. After being away for so long, it’s hard to get back into the motion of things but I’m ready to poke my head out.

Our little corner of the world has been a beautiful mass of snow since Christmas and I’ve so enjoyed this winter more than ever. But I’m ready for a break in the weather. For one, the builder has not touched our home since the end of December. It was too cold to pour the footer and everything came to a screeching halt. The builder says they will resume the project the first of March. And number two, I’m ready to move into our home like yesterday…Is it done yet? So as much as I’ve enjoyed the winter and the pretty snow, it’s okay if it goes away for now. It’s a sign that construction will recommence!

Here’s my little desk aka the end table right next to my recliner. I enjoy keeping inspiration in front of me, this is the source of what I’m currently drawing as my background for now. It’s a sign that I like to constantly study my subject even when I’m not drawing.


I just love the way advertising has a way of reeling me in. The thing is – this page is just where I stop. I know exactly what I would do if I had a box of those in the house. Let me be very clear that I could not just eat one! That’s my sign to leave the box on the shelf.


New growth amazes me. The little poinsettia my neighbor gave me after the holidays is still flourishing. I love that word flourishing – flourishing with new little leaves, isn’t she so cute? I think it’s a sign that she likes me.


I wrapped up my little pansy project a few weeks ago and this little thing is currently on her little voyage to India. It’s a sign that I keep my word but a very poor way of executing this on time. I still remember Hubby telling me that I was biting off more than I could chew at the time.


Our days have gotten just a bit busier as we’ve been meeting with our builder more often. We had a meeting with her last week and we have another little meeting this evening. We’re delighted with the progress and we are right on schedule with deadlines and where we need to be at the moment. It’s a sign that we’re moving in the right direction.


Valentines day is a fun day but no different than any other day of the year. I’m blessed with a man that truly treats me like his valentine daily. When asked by a friend if I got anything for valentines, I replied, yes, I have him and hubby replied we celebrate valentines every day in our house. We did enjoy a nice dinner and I had my chocolate for the first time this year! I selected a huge chocolate chip cookie with warm fudge in the center with a dollop of ice cream drizzled with fudge and Hubby had the key lime pie. It’s a sign to eat like that occasionally as I was up a ½ pound the next day. However, I’m celebrating nearly a 40 pound weight loss and I wouldn’t trade those little up’s on the scale for all the tea in China.

I’ll try to remember the signs out there as some of them can be very deceiving and others pointing the way ever so clearly. Sometimes it’s necessary to stop and adjust for the moment but most importantly see the good and enjoy the path with a thankful heart.

Distorted View

Our days are getting busier (with decisions to make) as our home is starting to go up. Well, we’re hoping it goes up as the crew has not been able to do much if anything on our home the last few weeks due to our very cold weather. This is going to be another busy week and we have plans to meet again with the builder Saturday.

In my free time my artistic adrenalin has turned to distorting photography. I do have plans in the very near future (hopefully this week) to begin some more drawing. Here’s a few samples of what I’ve been up to.

To see the detail of the last two pictures will be a lot better to click on them.

This is a sunrise in our backyard that’s been taken to extremes. I love the cast of the blue, yellow and orange shadows on the snow.


Here we sharpened the outlines, gave it a soft focus and punched the background with a bit of film grain. This picture was taken from one of our road trips last year.


This bridge was taken from a road trip early last fall. I played so much with this and loved the painterly outcome.


That’s all for now.

Remember When

The days seem not that long ago when we were children heading out for that first day of school. Yesterday I was reminded of those days while out shopping for some shoes and other goodies. There were children and parents out doing that last minute shopping and the little lads and lassies were out flaunting their new duds and backpacks. The crazy thing was, I ran right smack dab into Jennifer and Little Chic on the sidewalk and was so shocked to see them.

The picture below is my very first recollection of Jennifer and me. Jennifer is in the orange and I’m in the red. Back in the day, Jennifer was a wee second grader and I was a wee third grader. Just in case you don’t know the math, that was 31 years ago! We were in a school program… and who knew all those years ago that we would be bumping into each other way up here in NY. I think this is pretty cool!

Luggage Goodies And Whatnot

I never got around to elaborating on our travels but we ended up bringing well over 300 pounds of luggage I would venture to say upwards of 350 pounds! I thought of everything from hangars, to our digital bathroom scale, to the important papers we needed and everything in between. We ended up with a total of 5 check bags and 4 carry-on’s.

Every single piece of check baggage was carefully weighed on our handy dandy digital scale so that we wouldn’t be over the weight limit of 50 pounds per check bag. There was one bag that weighed exactly 50 pounds and I mean EXACTLY 50 pounds at home. When the gal at the airport was ready to take that bag, Bob informed her saying “this bag is exactly 50 pounds.” She rather gave him a funny look, took the bag and the bag was exactly 50 pounds on the scale at the airport. It was not 50.2 pounds, I’m talkin’ no points, just 50 point zero pounds EXACTLY! (insert a HUGE PRAISE and a sigh!) I was just a wee bit concerned about that bag as that was the heaviest one. All the other bags were a mere 49 point something pounds each. It was an enormous relief that all the bags passed the scale test and I was amazed that both my scale and the scale at the airport were exactly the same.

The gentleman right in front of us in line had gone over the weight limit by 15 pounds and was charged $50.00! He argued with the gal checking his bag and she firmly said “Sir, you can either take out 15 pounds or pay the $50.00” he said in a gruff tone “just charge it”. You can imagine how jittery I was after that ordeal.

When we arrived into Binghamton, a gentleman right next to us, after seeing our luggage said “Are you guys going to be gone a month or something?” We said yes, we just moved up here.

We shocked ourselves with the amount of luggage we brought because we’ve learned to travel light. I normally pack just one carry on for the two of us if we’re going to be gone a week (that’s if it’s summertime). That’s it, we don’t fuss around with check bags and what have you. So for us to have such an entourage of luggage ended up being a puzzle loading all that stuff into the rental car. We made it home with our luggage and I had it all unpacked and put away by the very next day. The bags are now stowed away upstairs in the other bedroom and we are all settled in.

For the upsetting part, I lost my camera while whirling around all that stuff in Texas. I totally misplaced it and came to grips that I accidentally packed it somewhere. It wasn’t until I started unpacking up here in Binghamton that I found it safely tucked away in my carryon! (Sigh)

Our cars arrived yesterday! And to think just two days ago they told us we would not receive the truck until this Friday. I’ll tell ya, I felt like ‘Queen Bee’ back at the wheel of my old familiar truck. It was truly like a piece of home delivered to our hotel doorstep! And my face lit up so bright to see my set of wheels outside!

Bobby has not driven since he got home from work Friday evening. He’s made me drive everywhere this weekend so that I would get acclimated to the area. I’m so glad he thought of that and directions are starting to sink in. I’ll be ready to hit the road no problem and I have plans for the mall today.

We received our computers Friday afternoon and Bobby so diligently set up my computer that evening. I brought my tape dispenser, scissors, pens, little stapler and a few other desk items.

My Little Office

Bobby was so nice to give me our bedroom desk area downstairs and he’s taken over the bedroom desk upstairs for his computer/office area. I think he knows I got the better end of the deal but he wouldn’t have it any other way.

Bobby’s Office

We’re settled into our little nest and beginning to call this home. After all, we’ll be here for quite a while, so why not make ourselves ta home in our hotel.

Magic Loves The Great Outdoors

Magic has always had a love for the great outdoors so this is something we’ve been treating him to each day. This morning as I was coming back for my camera, Bobby at that same time was on the way with the camera. It’s something that we were both thinking this at the same time. Here are a few pictures of Magic in the great outdoors.

Magic’s Time Has Almost Come

Magic our kitty is not doing well since his last visit to the vet. When we took him in to get his shots (for the flight), we learned that he lost another pound in the last 4 months bringing him down to 4.5 lbs. And Magic seems to be going down hill so fast from the time he had his shots and the trip didn’t help either. Bobby weighed him again just a few days ago and he had lost another half pound from the time we arrived. I weighed him again this evening and he’s down more than one pound in the last three days. He weighed in this evening at 2.4 pounds. He’s sleeping almost 100% of the day now and doesn’t appear to be eating anything at all. Bobby has been trying to get him to eat some chicken, tuna, broth, kitty treats and Bob’s been trying anything and everything that he can possibly try to get his poor kitty to eat something, anything.

The vet told us that Magic would eventually get to this point but it is so hard to accept. Today Bobby purchased Magic’s little box and our hearts just about broke. Bobby’s found a little pet cemetery where they will cremate. And we’ve already made plans to have him cremated and we’ll keep him with us until the day we retire. We have plans to eventually burry him in our backyard one day and we’ll plant a tree in honor of him. He’s been Bobby’s friend going on 18 years and it’s so hard to say goodbye.

Our Relaxing Day

We started off the day by sleeping in. There was no alarm or wake up call to jolt us out of bed. And the blinds in our bedroom were pulled tight the night before. They’re the kind that make our room blacker than black long after the sun rise! Let’s just say I may consider this type of blind for our next bedroom.

We made it down to breakfast around 9:45 AM. Rochelle, you will appreciate this… I’ve already purchased a large bottle Crème Brulèe coffee cream to carry down to breakfast each day. And to top if off, Bobby gave me a nice coffee thermos that he received from work. They keep fresh coffee down there all day so I’ve been known to make a few coffee runs throughout the day.

We were finally ready to leave the hotel in search of a home/lot around noon. Can you tell we were not rushing around at all this morning? We Drove to PA and looked at some property. (The property in PA we were looking at would only be a half hour drive to work for Bobby.) To make a long story short, we didn’t find what we wanted there.

We’ve got this ‘lofty’ idea that we want a view. This land is so breathtaking and it would be so nice to have a home planted right on the top of a hill. The beautiful thing about this area is that it’s not all built up with lots of developments. The silly thing is that most of my readers already know this and Jennifer has lived here for what, 17 + years now? But this is the first time for us to experience this and I’m truly in love here.

After our trip to PA we stopped by downtown Owego for a very late afternoon lunch/dinner. We ate at a nice little Italian restaurant and the stuffed shells were out of this world! Then we leisurely strolled down the streets window shopping and found some charming quaint little shops. What a nice mellow day and we let it unfold without a rush.

We got home late afternoon and we were able to once again pull those blinds to make the bedroom dark and took a nice little siesta. Ah, we continue the relaxing pace into the evening hours.

The Man Of My Dreams

It was 10 years ago today that Bobby and I had our very first date. What a great guy he was and still is. On the next date we had a nice motorcycle ride down by the intercostal. He still wow’s me and I’m so thankful for him each day.

We always had great times together and he always made me feel special. Those times never faded as he makes me feel like I’m the most important person in the world.

Since our move, he’s been calling each day just to see how I’m doing. His whole desire is to make sure I’m alright and he’s doing whatever he can to make this transition is as easy as possible.

The three day holiday weekend is coming and I’m so blessed to be spending it with the man of my dreams.

Day By Day

The house hunting is going pretty good. There are a few places I want Bobby to see so we’re scheduling time to look this Saturday. Bobby has put me in charge of the house hunting while he’s at work and wants me to narrow it down and then he gets involved after all the homework is done. We both like it that way and we work really well as a team. I’ll continue looking and hopefully we’ll find something we like. If not, we’re entertaining the idea of building.

I keep wondering when we’ll feel at home and I don’t think it’s going to feel like home until we get settled into a place. Patience is key, one day at a time and we will be all settled into our home sweet home one of these days.

On the bright side, we’re learning the area more and more each night and discovering our new favorite places to eat. Our realtor has given us a list of restaurants she recommends and we are certainly making our rounds. Our cars should be here by next weekend and I look forward to spreading my wings a little more.

Our computers should be here tomorrow and it will be so much better with all my programs.

We keep chipping away day by day enjoying our stay until we can call it home sweet home.

Off To A Great Start

I wake in paradise each day and I’m so in love with it here. I’m still unable to fathom that we are in the middle of this beautiful place. I’m in awe of the land surrounded by gorgeous rolling hills. Bobby is such a sport as I’m constantly saying “It’s so beautiful here”.

I’ve been keeping myself busy house hunting and finding plenty to do to keep busy. I’ve also settled into an afternoon nap each day this week. It’s not like me to nap daily so perhaps my body is just trying to catch up.

Each evening when Bobby comes home (that sounds funny, home) we figure out where we want to go for dinner. Then we take our own sweet time chatting over the dinner table, catching up with each others day.

The other night after dinner we made a visit to Wal-Mart and I was totally blown away by the size of the one here. I’ll just say it’s the biggest one I’ve ever been in ‘seriously’ and I’m so in love with it! My only problem is that I want to feel home, I want to feel like it’s ‘my’ Wal-Mart, I want to know it like the back of my hand. Believe me, this Wal-Mart and I are going to become pals and I’ll be so acquainted with this place before you know it.

Side note: While Bob and I were in line to check out, a group of college boys were behind us chatting. I got so tickled when one of the guys asked the other… “What do you think is gayer, a robe or pj’s.” The other guy responded quickly, “A robe” Hmmm said the guy who asked the question “Why a robe”. Well said the other kid, I have both a robe and pj’s but if you must know… “When I think of a robe, I think of someone who is cold and snuggling to keep warm, they have a cup of coffee in their hands and they have slippers on their feet”. This kid made me laugh right out loud. I used to think of college students as adults but really they are just grown up cute kids. Ya just gotta love them. Living near college town is another perk, it will keep us young at heart.

We are off to a great start and looking forward to calling this our home.