Cutlery

Maybe you have the same problem, Brilly.

I inherited my great-Aunt Helen's set of stainless steel flatware when she died back in the 1980s. I used it beginning when I had my first apartment, and I've used it ever since then. I think it had approximately service for 12. I have big forks (dinner forks?) small forks (dessert or salad forks?), big spoons (soup spoons), and butter knives. Probably not all the pieces were there; I never counted and it didn't matter.

It's been fine for Mr. K and me. It was fine when we had N. It was still usually sufficient when we had J. Now that we have K, most of the time, I'm out of at least one size of spoon or fork, and the knives.

Most of my flatware is either dirty in the dishwasher (waiting for me to fill the machine so I can start a load), dirty in the sink (waiting to be put in the dishwasher) or clean in the dishwasher, (waiting to be put away in the silverware drawer). It seems like I am always behind on my dishes. It was particularly noticeable on Thanksgiving, when we were trying to set the table, and I didn't have enough butter knives for everyone, and we had to mix for sizes. Then for dessert, we had to re-use the forks we used for dinner.

I think what I need to avoid this is either service for 24 (I doubt I could still match the pattern my great-Aunt had) or a policy of constantly washing silverware by hand each time it is used (no thanks). Rarely I find some of my flatware outside in the yard, taken out by the children. It's certainly possible they've lost some outdoors.

I do have another set. It's the flatware Mr. K used before I married him. His is thinner and not as nice as mine, so I put it away in a drawer, and when the kids beg to use silverware out in the dirt, I give them some of that, realizing might never come back.

I have another partial set. It's silver-plated from my grandmother. I never use it because it needs polishing and I don't think silver-plate is supposed to be run through the dishwasher. I guess I should keep an eye out at thrift stores for some that resembles mine or that I simply like the feel of and just mix it into what I have so that I quit running out of stuff. This literally happens every day.

Chick-Fil-A Night, stupid digital TV

We dined at Chick-Fil-A tonight for the school's PTA fundraiser. The PTA gets a cut of the proceeds during a certain time period. In turn, they pack the place with students' families. It was noisy and miserable, but it wasn't as busy as last time we went, about two months ago. I don't know if it's the economy or just that we came right as the time began and left after 35 minutes. We might have come later last time.

TV stinks. I wanted to watch Terminator, The Sarah Connor Chronicles. My digital TV signal kept breaking apart because of the rain. I tried it in my bedroom on the analog TV with the converter box. The picture fell apart. I unplugged the #$%$# converter box, and put the rabbit ears directly back into the TV. I got a pretty good picture and watched it on analog TV. I don't know what we'll do early next year (February, I think) when the networks quit broadcasting in analog and it rains or the weather is otherwise odd. Sometimes windy weather breaks up the picture.

I hate the whole stupid digital TV thing, and I am so sorry the government has decided to do away with analog TV to use and sell the bandwith of the electromagnetic spectrum it will have once used. NO, I don't want to pay a regular fee to watch TV with less trouble. If I did, I'd already have cable or satellite. Fortunatly I listen to the radio a lot more than I watch TV.

Bonfire Evening

Keith built a fire in our pit this afternoon. He had a good bed of coals ready by dinner time. We invited a family over for dinner that is a friend of ours. They have kids N and J's name, but they just transferred to a private school last year, though, so they no longer attend with N and J.

We cooked hot dogs. Mr. K has a grill that stood in the coals. We cooked the adult's and K's hot dogs on that. The older kids put hot dogs on sticks and cooked them over the coals themselves. We also made s'mores for dessert.

The evening got really cold. I think we are down near freezing as I write. Near the fire, it was quite nice. The girls and I went in the house early. I think the girls got sick of being picked on by the boys. K was cold. Everyone's gone home now, and my kids have showered. J had marshmallow in her hair until she showered. K smelled like a campfire.

Anyway, it was sort of like the fun part of camping without the yucky part of no toilets, no heat, and sleeping on the ground.

Space Shuttle

I think I just saw the space shuttle Endeavor fly overhead. It's dark out, and it was a very bright light moving rather rapidly across the sky.

My neighbor (who lives in the shed) stopped by at 6:10 p.m. and said something about looking for the space shuttle between 6:12 and 6:17 p.m. in the southwest part of the sky. Mr. K, N and J went right out. I wasn't going to bother, but K wanted to go out, so towards the end of that time frame, I got her in a jacket and shoes and took her out. Mr. K had spotted the shuttle at that point, and it was moving across the sky. He pointed it out to me, and there it was!

As I start this, I haven't thought of one

The kids will be home from school in half an hour, and I haven't figured out for sure what I'll be making for dinner. I think I'll cut up smoked sausage and throw it into some red beans and rice from a mix. I like it. I'm hesitant to, though, because the kids hate it so much.

N has a Cub Scout den meeting tonight. Probably Mr. K will take him. Tomorrow he has a Cub Scout pack meeting. The whole family will go to that meeting.

K and I were at Walmart today. Their food prices are coming back down. Now I worry about a depression instead of rampant inflation, although I'm afraid that will come, too, since the government turned on the printing presses. I just can't find happiness thinking about the economy.

I got a new Nancy Drew game for my computer. I'm trying to save it for Christmas vacation with the kids. I don't know if I can hold out that long. Maybe we'll open it up during their time off at Thanksgiving next week.

New Rabbits

We got new rabbits this morning--one buck and two does. We already have a Peter and Jane, and Mr. K wanted to go with the P for males and J for females theme, so we named the buck Padre (Spanish for father), and we named the does Jennifer and Jill after two friends of mine. My friend Jennifer has five kids and Jill has six. We hope the names will make the rabbits more prolific.

I ruined dinner

This morning I was starting dinner. I decided to make barbecued beef on a bun. I had browned my beef, mixed my barbecue sauce, combined them in my little crock pot, and turned it on.

Then I pushed it way to the right to make room for my bread machine on the counter next to it. I needed to make whole wheat rolls to use as buns for the beef. When I got the liquid measuring cup out of the cupboard over the crock pot, I accidentally dropped a mug. I looked the mug over carefully, and it was fine.

About half an hour later, I looked at the crock pot and saw it had a large chip in its rim that extended into the top of the pot. I concluded I couldn't guarantee there weren't any ceramic shards in the beef mixture, so I dumped the whole thing, crock pot and all, into the trash once it had cooled.

We still have dinner rolls for dinner, but it's a little hard to come up with a main course. I have a bag of some kind of Bertolli frozen shrimp dinner thing, and I think I'll use it. Sadly, we had shrimp fettuccine for dinner last night, and the kids hated it because they don't like shrimp (which is how I can afford to feed shrimp to five people--the kids only have to eat a shrimp apiece).

I made black bottom cupcakes to go with the dinner. They're sort of ugly, but they taste pretty good when they are cooled off. I warned Mr. K they have dairy in them--a cream cheese/cheesecake like filling.

J Growing Up

I took J out shopping this evening to look for Christmas presents for her brother and sister. One place we went had a youngish-girl (teen or tween) makeup set. J immediately said she wanted that.

I immediately said, "Absolutely not."

J said, "Why not?"

I said, with disbelief, "Because you're six."

She said, "And..."

I repeated, "Because you're six."

She repeated, "And..."

I finally just had to say, "Jessica, you are not getting a makeup set for Christmas nor your birthday," and then I just ignored her protests and we moved on.

Probably it gets me no awards in the realm of parenting. I failed to convince her I was right; I only convinced her there would be no makeup for her.

First paragraph is revolting

Not much is happening here. My house is a mess, and I can't get K to go to sleep so I can clean. Earlier I was on the phone with my mom, and she took off her diaper and pooped on the floor next to her potty. Good thing it was on the Pergo (laminate). I just scraped it clean and then wiped the floor down well with a Chlorox wipe. It was really icky there for a while, though, before I got the mess up, and it formed sort of a thick pancake instead of logs.

My mom's birthday was yesterday. I remembered to call her at 9 p.m. Pretty much that's as late as I can call her because she goes to bed so early. I came very close to forgetting her birthday. I had sent her a present a couple weeks ago and a card last week, so it wouldn't be like totally forgetting, but still, I'm sure she'd have felt awful if I forgot to call. I know I would have. I confess I just pretended I was waiting until the kids went to bed (which I might have done anyway had I remembered), but really I just about missed her birthday.

Saturday

Mr. K is taking the kids down to the creek to play on the sandbank. I was there by myself earlier to fish, but all I caught were small fish. I'm staying home because Mr. K has the oven on to bake some rocks he's going to flint knap. I guess the heat sort of glassifies them, or in some other way makes them easier to use. He starts at 200 °F, and increases the temperature by 50 ° each hour until he reaches 500 °F. Then he holds it there for a couple hours. Finally, he shuts the oven off and lets the rocks cool over night. I can't wait to see my electric bill.

We've had some warm weather lately. I think it will be cooling off after today. Tomorrow we think we'll go geocaching at a park about three miles from here. We were there a few weeks ago, but didn't find all the caches. Probably the fall leaves were at their color peak there last weekend, but they should still look pretty nice tomorrow.

It's Mr. K's birthday today. He didn't want a cake. He wanted a cherry pie made with some of the cherries we froze from our tree this spring. That's what he got. For dinner he wants to go to Hardee's. The kids are excited.

I think my neighbor who lives in the shed is next door at the other neighbor's house (the one who doesn't actually live there because she's taking years literally to renovate the house). She was there mowing the lawn. She can't stand the guy who lives in the shed. She told me he tried to kiss her once. ICK!!!!! She's also worried in his drunken state he'll trip over some of her stuff at her house and sue him.

If it weren't for the rocks in my oven, I'd go over there and try to get rid of him for her. Sometimes I send Mr. K over to do that, but he's at the creek right now unless he decided to join my kids and husband and go to the creek, too.

Happy Comrade

I called an old friend of mine this evening. I haven't spoken to him in at about a year, but we've known each other since I was 16 and he was 19. We worked together at a summer camp, and then we were at the same college for a while.

He has been a communist since I met him. I've tried to convert him to capitalism since I met him, and he's tried to make me into a communist. Naturally, we've both failed miserably.

Anyway, figured he'd be delighted with with our election results. He is. He says he's ready to spread the wealth around. Obama has more communist tendencies than any other candidate the Democrats have ever run. In the past, my friend has had to vote for the actual candidate of the communist party, who never stands a chance. Often, if the race is close, he'll vote for the Democrat just to save himself from the Republican.

Anyway, he's very happy this year. He told me he had a group of his communist friends over for an election party last night, and the booze flowed freely as the night wore on. They had a great time, and this was the best election result they'd ever seen.

So anyway, my buddy is very happy with the election results. He's been doing a lot of campaigning for Obama, and now he's enjoying the fruits of his work. I'm delighted he's happy, but I'm unhappy with the election results.

Meanwhile, I'm sitting here hoping we won't need a Supreme Court justice replaced during Obama's reign, and wondering if a conservative worth backing will surface in time for the 2012 presidential election.

Election Day

I'm having my morning coffee. Today's has caffeine. I'll have to take all three kids to the polls by myself unless my husband comes home between appointments and can watch them or come with us.

The kids and I are planning a McCain victory party for ourselves this evening. I got a 2-liter of pop, and I'll make some cookies and some kind of appetizer. They're excited.

School is closed today because of the election. The schools are used as voting places. School was closed yesterday for parent/teacher conferences. Usually they are done on election day so the kids only miss one day of school. This year they moved conferences to Monday because they didn't want anyone complaining they couldn't get a parking place to vote because the lot was full of people going to conferences. This year they are expecting record turn-outs for voting.

My dad even voted this year after not casting a ballot for a couple decades.

K is ready to Trick or Treat

Kate as a Clown
Originally uploaded by greycharleigh

K went trick-or-treating as a clown this year in the clown costume both N and J used when they were small. Probably the costume won't fit in another year. I'll have to evaluate it and see if it's in good enough shape to give away or just throw it out.

This year, a friend of mine who lives in a neighborhood invited us over to trick-or-treat with her kids. Normally we just go to the mall since my street is too busy to trick-or-treat along.

I think the kids had a good time. They got better quality candy (more chocolate). I stayed and talked to my friend while she gave out Halloween candy. K wore out early so I took Mr. K and her home. N, J, and I got to stay for a neighborhood Halloween party after the trick-or-treating.