A Real Alaskan Housewife

Not sure what is going on. Thursday & Friday of last week I was having lightheadedness. I have no energy. Nor do I want to do anything but sleep. The only reason I am not curled up on the couch is because I need to change my pjs. Kinda interested in knitting but not enough to pick up my needles. I have an appointment tomorrow. Wonder if I am low on vitamin D.

Just dropped off my 6th grader. Sigh...where does the time go? Seems like yesterday she was rolling into kindergarten. Tomorrow, she will be graduating from high school & headed off to her adventures in the big wide world. This is why we must live in the present. The past is done. Nothing we can do will change what has happened. We can learn from our mistakes & blaze our own trail into the future. And live in the present. Unless you are hanging with Dr.Who. Then disregard everything I said. In just a bit my 4th grader is off to school. Then I can go back to my routine of sleeping till noon, watching soaps & eating bon bons. (In actuality, spending the morning cleaning & running errands in the afternoon.) The fun never ends.

Some weeks ago I stumbled upon  The Dreamstress  and she was talking about a year-long sew-a-long. For the first five minutes, I thought I would not be able to participate. Yes, I sew. No, I don't have the space to dedicate to sewing a historically accurate costume. (As much as I would *love* to...) However, The Dreamstress pointed out that knitting would be acceptable also. (Mental head slap) Of course knitted items would work as they knitted them! I was quite thrilled to see that. After signing up on the  Facebook  page, I spent about five hours screwing around  industriously researching possible knitted patterns. After several misleads, bunny trails and child/husband interruptions, I came across my first project. The Monmouth Cap. The history of the Monmouth Cap can be found  here.  In a nutshell, the cap was introduced in the earlyish 15th century. The everyday man wore the cap-made from serviceable material. Royalty wore the cap- made from finer...

Who does not LOVE Pintrest? Anyone? So, now that we have that settled... This blog posting is where I will post Pin Wins. The small ones that are wonderful but small enough that they don't really rate an entire posting. Where I can, I will try to link it to the original poster. However, I am not a detective, so if I attribute the idea to the wrong person, please let me know and I will correct. First up, Keeping track of that silly medicine. Or...Did I give him the dose? As you can see, we only missed two doses. The first one when I remembered about the Pin. The second was DH night. How many of you have children? Children that get sick? That need medicine? Do you also have a spouse that likes to help? This idea was one I saw and could not wait to try. No, I didn't want my kid sick, I just wanted to try this. And see if it worked. and the result is...Yes! Yes! Yes! I kept the entire kit in a ziplock bag and stowed in the fridge. Yeah, towards the end the Sharpie was...

Last week I was on a major sweets craving. I needed a fix. What I really wanted was chocolate chip cookies. Not feeling like going to the store for GF flour, I hit the WWW looking for a cookie that didn't use any flour. I was hoping there would be one as I have made flourless peanut butter cookies before. I was really hoping, and wishin' and prayin.... anyways... I found this.  Flourless Chocolate Walnut Oatmeal Cookies  I just have to say...Oh. My. Goodness. This is like eating candy. Let's just say I gained about a million pounds. On average, I ate five cookies a day. I convinced myself they were healthy- peanut butter, oatmeal, dried cranberries and dark chocolate. All healthy stuff. In moderation. AHHHHHHH.... Those two silly words!!!!! I followed the recipe somewhat closely. For the first batch (stick with me here) I used  Adam's No-Stir Creamy Peanut Butter , two cups Quaker Oatmeal, one cup dried cranberries, handful each of Ghirardelli white, dark and ...

As the title suggests, this post shall contain pics and information of my knitting projects. 'Mis-matched' socks for DD#2. These origionally started out as mismatched socks, however, because I didn'a pay attention to the starting color on the second sock I accidently made matching socks. The first sock was started and completed in November but got side tracked with Christmas monkeys. I started and completed her second sock in January, however, it was too big so it became my sock. I now need to make my second sock. Yarn: premier yarns , Deborah Norville Collection, Serenity Sock Yarn , Surf color Needles: Takumi Bamboo DPN #2 Size: Medium socks Pattern: Tall or Short, Socks to Go, Leisure Arts Little Books Other info: Cuff is Seed ribbing; One toe is a gathered closed toe; Other is Grafted. Comments: DD#3 likes cuffs to go over the ankle bone. Since I bind off tightly, top down always. First time turning the heel was confusing. Just follow the instructions. Watch v...

Ahhhh...what does GF and DF mean?  Well, GF is short for Gluten Free and DF is Dairy Free. Well, Alaska Girl, what does that mean? "A  gluten-free diet  is a diet  that excludes foods containing gluten . Gluten is a protein complex found in wheat  (including kamut  and spelt ),barley, rye and triticale. Corn  and rice  also contain gluten, but are considered gluten-free, as the gluten in these species do not cause celiac disease .  A gluten-free diet is the only medically accepted treatment for celiac   disease,   the related condition dermatitis herpetiformis  and wheat allergy , but not gluten allergy ." (wikipedia) Wikipedia-the end all be all for info! Not really. So, here is info from celiac.com  " wheat, rye and barley, it is obvious that you will need to avoid these grains. Less obvious however, are the myriad of products that contain gluten as a hidden ingredient." So. Gluten-free basically means cutting spec...

A friend sent us a box of organic California lemon cellos. Opening the box was heaven... the scent wafting from the lemons was like sunshine. The yellow color was a bright spot on a gray cold day. When we got home, I washed the lemons because they had a looooong cold flight. (You like taking a shower/bath after traveling, yes?) For the first couple days I simply enjoyed the sight and scent of sunshine in my kitchen.  We did photo shoots. Fresh from their bath.  Sunshine streaming thru the kitchen window.  Beautiful, lovely gorgeous lemons. (I didn'a realize my Trifle bowl was, well, dirty) I realized that I should do something with the wonderful lemons instead of letting them go bad. I shared several with friends, sliced some up for water and ate them like oranges. Oh yeah. Good stuff. One recipe I have never tried from scratch is lemon bars. I have enjoyed them at potlaches, BBQs and restaurants and have *loved* them...

Tons of stuff has happened. No longer a nanny. We have our own place. DD#1 is getting married. Its f'ing cold. DH will be unemployed. Good Lord. Talk about stressful events. For the last couple months we have been in a holding pattern when it came to DH's job. Mantech lost the contract for the base. We knew the new company would be downsizing. Managment had no idea (at least they said so) who was staying or leaving. All we knew was the warehouse would have eight positions and there were 14 people looking to stay. So, several need to go. Due to his low position on the longevity totem pole, DH was among the first to receive notice. Yes, knowing he has no job is, well, stressful. I am busy looking for a job. I am becoming disenchanted with the search. I have a good work ethic. Yes, I have not been employed the last couple years but I have been volunteering. I have not just stayed home being a slacky housefrau-eating bon bons & watching soaps. (I *love* watching Law & O...

World Thinking Day  is coming up and my troop picked Greece as their country. Snack today was our turn, sooooo.... to tackle two birds in the hand, DD#2 and I decided to make pita bread. Of course, we made it last night in preparation of our troop meeting today. On one of my Pinterest boards, I had pinned a  pita bread  from the Brown Eyed Baker. What a perfect opportunity to test the recipe. Aaaaand (drumroll please) here is the result: This made 16 small pitas. Yes, three are missing. We needed to taste test. Close up of the inside. My thoughts- Taste is fab. Texture, chewy & firm. Sadly, no pocket.  Smitten Kitchen  recommends spritzing the dough discs prior to baking. Gonna have to try that next time. The girls enjoyed the bread with hummus and decided we needed to use them for Thinking Day. Hmmmm...I'll have to freeze some to see how they taste. Pita Bread Pin (I didn'a take any pictures of the process. I must admit, I was not pla...

Cuzins playing in the front yard. (Was viewing my posts and discovered I never posted this one.  Summer of 2010 we had family visit. Here is one of the adventures we had.) After a tasty hotdog dinner, we went fishing at Fingerlake. Having learned from the Father's Day experience, I did not expect a whole lot from kids when it came to fishing. Sure enough, after we got the hooks baited and lines cast, DS and the boys were done. There was mud all around that needed to be dug up and played in. Getting no hits on the hook, Bob decided to cast DD#2's line a bit more to the left. We did not know the shore was part quicksand (quickmud?) Here is a picture of the result. Pictures of the kiddos and wildlife. We did not stay long. My allergies were kicking in and I was ready to go home, shower and change. Not sure if you can see in the pictures, but cottonwood seed was flying all about. So far the visit has been wonderful.

I visited my dad today at Fort Richardson National Cemetery. I know since he  has passed, I can talk to him anywhere. His memory stays with me. Sometimes though, I need the physical motion of visiting his grave site. The weather was cold, 16°F. The sun is out but has no warmth. Snow is on the ground. Yet I can hear birds singing-letting me know spring is not far away & there is a future no matter how I may feel at the moment.  With a fresh snowfall, I can see footprints to various headstones. As always, I took pictures of my Dad's view. The mountains are beautiful with the snow crowns. The green of the spruce trees are a stark contrast to the white mountains. I truely miss him. Sometimes the pain is not there. Other times, especially when going thru difficult times, all I can think about is wanting him here. I need his advice. I regret not listening more. I want him to watch his grandchildren grow. I miss him...