Look at this, a deluxe wooden version of Monopoly. It was so heavy I could barely pick it up. Right next to it, they had a HUGE wooden Scrabble game. I admit, they look beautiful. These are old games I used to play as a child. I forgot to look at the price.
I enjoyed playing Monopoly until we got to the buying houses. Then all the bartering, etc. got be bored and I would quit. One of my siblings was ALWAYS happy to combine my winnings with theirs and off I would go. As I walked away I could hear them arguing, “That’s NOT FAIR, etc.”
Ah — Good old Monopoly!
Scrabble, we didn’t play this much. Not sure why, but I know some people who were die hard fans of this game. We played a lot of Canasta. Remember that card game and UNO.
So — if you need a LAST MINUTE GIFT… I just gave you a new idea!!
Life is amusing. I was at the Home Depot for a lightbulb. I enjoy seeing their Holiday decorations. I don’t have a Christmas tree this year. FEELING LAZY, but I do miss it. So, I decided to see what “small” trees they had. I like these quirky looking ones.
I looked at their TOP branch, to see which tree had the TALLEST and STRAIGHTEST branch. Some had crooked top branches. That was an immediate – NO GO! On further inspection, I noticed two tall branches next to each other. WHAT?? Were my eyes deceiving me? Was there an actual tree with two tall branches?
By golly there was!! I immediately thought of my TWIN brother. THIS was a PERFECT tree for TWINS. I looked to see if there were any shiny gold or silver stars around. No, but one tree had these red bulbs on it. So, for fun, I put the two red bulbs on MY TWIN TREE. To make my twin brother smile, I put his bulb a little higher than mine. AT FIRST, I admit, I had the bulbs side by side, which is how it SHOULD BE. Somehow though, from a design perspective, it looked goofy. So, I lowered one of the bulbs.
Laughing — NOW, if you look at the bulbs, they look like EYES. This is a TREE MONSTER coming after me. I sent the photo to my twin, he liked it!
As I kept looking around, I saw these fantastic colored cactus. Wow, I’m not a cactus person, but I do love the bright colors. They are amazing. I should have read how long they bloom.
How about a Cactus built into an ornament. Had not seen that before!
Oh, an older lady asked me what I was doing when I was taking photos. I showed her. She said she lives alone, no children, doesn’t care about Christmas anymore.
HOWEVER, a BIG HOWEVER, when I showed her the pictures I had taken, how I was moving trees/plants around to get my photos — THIS made her SMILE.
Suddenly, she was HAPPY! She said I opened her eyes, she had not SEEN the things I had seen as she walked by. She was going to take pictures to send to her nephews/nieces.
So — I feel like I was someone’s ANGEL!
It’s a good feeling! We CAN spread JOY this holiday!
I’m always on the hunt for a good smelling candle. They are especially helpful if you’ve cooked fish, cabbage or broccoli for dinner. Light up your candle, it’s even better than opening the windows. Somehow the candles work really well.
I recently read an article in ADWEEK, “Yankee Candle Began as a Christmas Gift of Melted Crayons,” by Robert Klara. Right there, the title sold me on Yankee Candles. Melted crayons turned into a candle to make a mother happy?! We all remember having crayons as a kid. What a clever idea!
Long story, so click on the link. I think you’ll enjoy the article. They have 600 fragrances. It’s Christmas, they say their most popular candle is Balsam and Cedar, I’ll have to give it a try.
This is a special story that pulls at the heart strings! GIFT OF THE MAGI – that was quite a story too!
Today is Thanksgiving, but I have to be honest, it doesn’t feel like Thanksgiving to me. COVID has changed things. Did you notice that people started putting up their Christmas trees at the beginning of November this year? They said they wanted to enjoy the spirit of Christmas for as long as possible.
I think we all feel this way in some way or another. This year, we had three family members pass within four months. This brings a cloud over the family. Funerals make us slow down, reflect on life, and think about the past, present and future.
As the year comes to an end, we want — Love, Peace, Joy, Hope — during these challenging times.
Yesterday, I thought. It’s time for me to change my mood, bring out MY CHRISTMAS SPIRIT!
A few years ago, my daughter gave me this cute little mouse. My other daughter named her Elloise. I know today is supposed to be Thanksgiving, but I’m in the mood for Christmas too. So, I went to the closet, threw things here and there and FOUND Elloise. I fluffed her up, straitened her scarf and skirt. Volia! I SMILED AGAIN. Time to bring some joy to my house.
I’ve been trying to embrace this health craze. Less fat, more protein — pancakes, waffles, cakes – NOTHING is the same anymore. Lately, the talk of the town is the Kodiak Cakes brand. Different people I spoke to were raving about their high protein pancakes. Delicious and kept them full until 1 pm. Of course, I asked, “What are you talking about?”
I like to eat pancakes / waffles occasionally, so was not up to speed on this Kodiak Cakes brand. Turns out, Kodiak Cakes, has been around since 1995. The company was started by Joel Clark based on his mother’s buttermilk flapjack mix. They are located in Utah. Due to funding the company was slow to take off, but now it has and it’s the latest craze.
It’s an interesting story, you should read about it. Joel Clark was even on Shark Tank in 2014; however, he did not accept a deal with any of the Shark Tankers. That show though introduced his product, people were interested and sales took off at Target. 14 grams of protein per serving does sound good, right!
I bought a box of Kodiak Cakes and made pancakes. I have to say, they had a great chocolate taste. This chocolate mix though, I felt was heavy and the texture was more like a cake than a fluffy pancake. I found a recipe for using the Kodiak mix to make little muffins. I decided to make mini cakes instead. They are cute looking, but the recipe I used was not good. The texture of the cakes were so dense. I went by the reviews and they were saying how “fantastic” their muffins were.
Imagine a cake with these ingredients (too much protein): 1 cup Kodiak mix, 4 eggs, 1 cup unsweetened applesauce or 4 smashed medium bananas. Mix, cook at 350 until done.
Baking is about experimenting. We win some, we lose some, but we don’t give up.
I’m on a quest to make these little cakes healthy and delicious. I just need to fine-tune the recipe.
If you haven’t heard of Kodiak Cakes give them a try. They have all kinds of flavored mixes. You can’t go wrong! High protein, just add some fruit, light syrup – you’ll be in breakfast heaven!
Moose memories. For over 30 years, every September my father went moose hunting in Canada. He’d be gone three weeks in the wilderness with either my brothers or friends. That was a highlight of his year. Two months before he left, he’d go shopping for groceries to bring on the trip. He’s start pulling out his hunting gear, etc. It was a big ordeal, all of us helping to pack up the truck.
We then would eat moose meat ALL year. The moose burgers were good, but if we heard my Dad yell to my mother, “Pull out a moose roast for tonight,” we ran to visit our friends. Moose roasts were so dry and gamey tasting, just AWFUL! My Dad wised up to this tactic of ours and would say, “EVERYONE will be home for dinner tonight!”
My Dad liked to play pranks on his buddies. Since we had a lot of moose meat, he would give some to his friends. One year he had the hoof of the moose, wrapped it in the white paper that the butcher shop uses and wrote “TENDERLOIN” on it! Gave it to his friend and waited. It took a few months, but you can imagine when his friend called. He sure was mad, his poor wife was unwrapping the “tenderloin” package and found the hoof. She was NOT amused and did not want anymore moose meat from my Dad.
When we were kids we’d have our friends over for dinner. They were excited about having hamburger and french fries. We would stare at them as they ate their burger and keep asking, “So, what do you think? Do you like the burger?”
They would say, “YES, it’s really good!”
When they were finished eating we would tell them they had just eaten a moose burger. At first they looked at us and said, “WE WHAT???” You just had a moose burger. Wasn’t it good! They had to agree, moose burgers were good.
Now my Dad is in his 80s, going moose hunting is too strenuous for him. So, of course, there is sadness to this. I know my Dad misses going. A surprise happened at the store. LOOK, what I found — A MOOSE PLATE!!
I smiled. My Dad would look great at the head of the table for Thanksgiving with his very own MOOSE PLATE!
So, he will have a BIG SURPRISE this year. I hope he likes it as much as I do.
Winter is coming. Actually, it’s almost here. I think we will get our FIRST snow in Chicago today. The first snow is always exciting and beautiful. Then the shoveling and slipping on ice starts (laughing). While I was “thinking” about this, a friend sent me this BEAUTIFUL picture of a peony.
The message was… Thought I would brighten your day. We are having summer, but your winter is starting.
So true, beautiful flowers still bloom when we have winter. I remember falling in love with the Bird of Paradise in Hawaii. What a special flower, it does look like a colorful bird.
How about the orchid. I fell in love with this too. Growing up in the Midwest, we didn’t have exotic flowers. When I moved to California that’s when I started seeing amazing flowers. They say you can see Angels inside the orchid. What do you think?
So, we end the week with a smile and gratitude.
A BIG thank you to my friend for brightening my day with the PINK PEONY.
Sometimes we realize we have signs from Heaven! When I was in Rhode Island, I kept finding Lucky Pennies, then two quarters. I have not found lucky pennies in a long time. I found it strange to keep finding money like this in the oddest of places.
THEN I realized, signs from my cousin in Heaven. She died this summer of illness / COVID. What’s important here, is that she went to Rhode Island School of Design. Here I was in Rhode Island walking where she walked for four years. Once I realized this, my HEART grew so big. When I would find another coin, I would think, “OK, YES, I’m looking at your beautiful city.”
I always have this blue pouch in my purse with my Angel, so I kept adding the coins I found to the blue pouch.
Another strange thing happened. The day I was leaving, I found two lucky pennies in the airport. One was RIGH UNDER the seat where I was sitting. My cousin saying, “Good Bye.”
Stranger… the next day, I found out her father passed away while I was at the airport.
Life is interesting — signs, coincidences?
I don’t know, but I do feel a sense of comfort at this moment. Might be silly to some, but to me, it’s a loving sign!
Be open to signs that might come to you for whatever reason or purpose! They do come!
A spooky typewriter. I LOVE this! I’m sad it’s not real!!
When I saw it, I immediately thought how perfect it was. In fact, as it has a page in it already, I thought of this old dusty piano my grandfather had that played music by itself. This would be similar.
Imagine you get up in the morning, depending on the keys you hit, the typewriter starts typing! You sit with your coffee, feet kicked up on the desk, reading the newspaper. What a glorious morning. Typewriter makes a cackling sound when story is done. You rip off the pages. THEN – Off to the editor!
My girlfriend’s birthday is on Halloween. She’s been doing research on her Irish family. They have some haunted cemeteries there. She could use this typewriter to RECORD family history. What do you think?
I HAVE SOMETHING BETTER. Although, if she survived the heart attack on opening the birthday box, I’m not sure we would still be friends. Imagine my fright, when I was “innocently” looking at Halloween stuff, turned TOO QUICKLY and saw this boa constrictor.
Oh my gosh — I DID JUMP BACK!! Realized it was a FAKE, then said a few… well, BAD WORDS!!
So, I decided neither of these were quite right.
The search continues… I did see a HUGE purple spider in someone’s yard. It had googly eyes. FUNNY!
I enjoy seeing the decorations. Some people go ALL OUT with their Halloween decorations & costumes.
Brilliant Viewpoint 