Tuesday Tip

Here's your (non)helpful Tip o' the Day from Ethan at age 4 or 5:

A Tuesday Tidbit

We here at "Writer's Block" strive not only to entertain (hopefully...maybe? occasionally?...sigh) and opine about various subjects but to instruct, as well.  Learning at home gives us lots of credibility and "authority" to do so (hopefully...maybe? occasionally?...sigh), right?

So today we bring you an educational nugget of truth, sponsored by alert reader and friend Pete Fessler on Facebook:

Now you can say you've learned something new. *wink-grin*

Tuesday Tips and Tricks

When Vacuuming ...

To really get carpet or rugs clean, vacuum slowly and make overlapping strokes, about 7 or so, to get out dirt or embedded particles.

Always check the bag before you begin because if it's full, you are just wasting time.


Left Clothes in the Dryer Too Long?

When you look to takeout and see that they are wrinkled, you can remove the wrinkles simply by putting a big damp towel into the dryer with the garments (don't overstuff). Dry again for about 15 minutes and take out immediately.


Cheap Air Freshener...

When your kitchen stinks because of cooking smells, you can get rid of those awful odors simply by mixing in a pan on the stove a cup or so of water with 2 tablespoons or more of vinegar and a sprinkle of cinnamon. Let boil and it should take care of the odors.

Tuesday Tips and Tricks

I'm sure I've posted these recipes before under "Hellish Kitchens." But if you're new to reading this blog, it might take you awhile to find them again...so I'll republish them now.

Enjoy!!

Breadmachine White Bread (2-pound loaf)
(Add the following to your loaf pan in the order given.)

1 1/2 cups of warm water
2 Tbsp. canola (or vegetable) oil
1 1/2 tsp. salt
4 cups flour (I like Gold Medal brand "Better for Bread" flour)
2 1/2 tsp. yeast


Cake Mix Cookies
Oven temp: 350 F

1 box any flavor cake mix
2 eggs
1/2 cup canola (or vegetable) oil

Mix ingredients together. Add raisins or chocolate chips, if desired. Using a tablespoon, drop spoonfuls about 2 inches apart onto cookie sheets. Bake for 9 minutes for soft; 11 minutes for crisp. Cool and enjoy. Freeze any leftovers.

Totally Tuesday Tidings

Happy Tuesday to you! The last one in June!

I'm writing my musings today instead of yesterday since we (my sister, my kids, and I) took a quick one-day trip to the beach...to play in the ocean, walk the "boards," swim in a pool, and visit my 87-year-old grandmother.

Since it's about a 3-hour drive, it meant an early start and a late finish, but we had a really good time, and it was wonderful to see my grandmother.

The weather wasn't very cooperative, and we ended up getting rained on a little (with a few rumblings of thunder), but the kids managed to dig in the sand and bury their aunt's feet...and generally enjoy themselves. (See the slide show below.) And I must say, the smell of the ocean was invigorating! We enjoyed some "boardwalk fries" and fudge...along with all the goodies we'd brought along for the trip.

In other news...

Hmm...

There's not much other news.

We are plodding through the summer, enjoying the slightly more relaxed schedule. It doesn't seem possible that school will begin again in a few months. But let's not think of that just yet...

The weather is cooler today due to a horrible thunderstorm we had last night, which arrived during the last half-hour of our drive home. I don't think the kids were ever quite so glad to see their beds.

We head to Hershey Park on Saturday for Stuart's company picnic. The kids are so excited since it means a day of going on rides followed by a yummy picnic dinner. It's the perfect way for our family to go to an amusement park -- actually the only way for us to go...because it's free.

More and more photos and articles are surfacing from the filming of the 24: Season 7 Prequel. And it looks mighty fine...mighty fine indeed. Only a little less than 5 months until that airs...and about 7 1/2 months until the new season begins. Fingers crossed that nothing will stop it this time. The Mirrors movie also comes out soon, and from the two trailers I've seen of it so far, it looks VERY scary. I told Stuart that if the baby is born during our viewing of this film and it's a boy, he's going to be named "Kiefer." He wasn't quite agreeable to that idea. *wink*

Speaking of the baby, we have our next appointment with our midwife tomorrow to see how our little "Leechie" is doing. I just hit 28 weeks last week and cannot believe how quickly this whole pregnancy is going.

I've been hustling to get stuff cleaned out and moved so that we can set up the baby's room. Last week, I discovered a box of all the news articles I penned while working for the Reading Eagle. It's been nearly 11 years since I left the newspaper to give birth to Emily...and I'd forgotten all the fantastic companies/people I enjoyed interviewing during my tenure with them. It's funny how life can twist and turn and change so much over the years, but a simple piece of paper can jog a memory and take you back to another moment in time.

On that note, I must bid you adieu and get some lunch ready for my hungry tribe.

Tuesday Tips

Here are three handy hints from Heloise:

Make Your Own Window Cleaner: Here’s my favorite mixture. Pour into a spray bottle and shake well: 1 cup non-sudsy ammonia, 1 cup rubbing alcohol, 1 cup water. Pour into a labeled spray bottle and shake well. Use to clean your windows.

Plastic Bowls or Dishes Stink? Make a paste of baking soda and a bit of water. Rub the mixture over the entire surface. Let set overnight. Then wash with hot, soapy water and rinse well.

Glasses Stuck Together? To unstick them, put ice cubes into the top glasses and then stand the rest in a sink filled with warm to hot water. Let sit for several minutes and then gently pull apart.

Tuesday Tidings

Happy Tuesday to you! The last Tuesday in the month of April!

Does it seem possible that the month is nearly over? That a third of 2008 is nearly finished? Wow!

Okay, okay. Enough with the rushing through life...moving right along.

I was chuckling at my Monday blog post yesterday. It was meant to be all tongue-in-cheek, but I guess I need to work on my humor skills...since my frustrations seemed to come out more than my mirth. *wink*

I'm in a slighter happier mood this morning, though I have to admit to a bit of sadness due to the fact that we went car "looking" last night -- with no intentions whatsoever to buy one -- and nearly got talked into driving one off the lot. When we came home and ran the numbers, it was way above our budget. A bit disappointing, but it was fun to drive around in one. Now to break the news to the salesman when he calls this morning...

Only 8 1/2 months until our show returns. We keep getting little snippets of info to tell us what's going to happen next season, and I'll tell you what...it sounds goooo-oood! The 2-hour prequel will air sometime in November. Something to whet our appetites maybe? Mmm-hmm!

Emily went to work with Stuart last Thursday for National Take Your Child to Work Day. She has a wonderful time and made lots of new friends in the various departments around Stuart's company. The customer service department even sent an e-mail to Stuart at the end of the day, informing him that they were keeping her. Edward was still too young to go this year (but next year!), so he and I had our own TYCWD...and celebrated his hard work at school by going to Barnes & Noble to use our giftcards.

Edward's soccer team won its third game this past Sunday afternoon. We saw a lot of good teamwork and determination, especially from Edward. It's fun to watch them improve each week.

Emily and I have been spending a good deal of time at a shop called Motherhood Maternity, having girl "dates." It's fun sharing this time together. She has a "passion for fashion" and loves to pick out outfits for me to try on. Her latest grouping included some very wide flare-legged maternity jeans paired with a nice stripey shirt. Very trendy. Of course, I couldn't see my feet under all the cloth. She was most excited by the jeans, which she said were "her kind of jeans." I chuckled and was reminded of how different our "eras" are. I grew up wanting to wear pegged-leg jeans. I even folded them so that they were peg closer at the bottom. My daughter likes the flared-leg jeans, mostly because she says they make her feet look smaller. Yes, that's true...if you can see them. *wink*

I saw some disappointing news from the Miley Cyrus crew recently. Apparently, she posed for a Vanity Fair photo spread and was "embarrassed" by the one topless photo of her showing her shoulders and back. If it was a painting from the 1800s, what could we say to it? The artist isn't around to chide. But it's a 15-year-old girl posing for an adult magazine in 2008. Pathetic.

Why, oh, why do we have to rob these girls of their innocence so young? She claimed she didn't know what it would look like. Hmm... Well, the other photos were taken digitally -- and I'd assume this one was, too -- and had to be approved. She certainly knows what dollar-signs look like, having grossed $18 million last year. She's no dummy, but I worry about the fame going to her pretty little head. And this is a "role model" for little girls under 10, who should really be enjoying little girls around their same age?

Hmm...on that note, I'll bid you adieu until next week...

Tuesday Tips

Some handy hints from Heloise:

When Making Dry Powdered Milk:
Mix it up and put into a covered jar or pitcher and leave in the refrigerator overnight before you drink it — because it will taste better. Add a pinch of sugar too!

How to Keep a Pot from Boiling Over:
Rub just a bit of vegetable oil or butter around the inside of the pan before you put in the water. Another classic hint is to put a wooden spoon across the top of the pot.

Recycle Leftover Cookie Crumbs:
Take crumbs from the bottom of your cookie jar and add them to puddings that you are making to create a crunchy taste or on top of ice cream.

Monday's Musings as Tuesday Tidings

Happy Tuesday!

I'm a day late for my Monday Musings.

Life was a bit crazy yesterday after a "slightly" overly-busy weekend.

On Saturday, we went to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, to watch my nephew, Erik, play basketball and then to have lunch with both my sisters and their families for Edward's and Erik's birthdays. Then on Sunday it was church and Sunday School followed by a luncheon to help a missionary get back to her post. On Monday, Emily had her PSSA writing test for school, and Edward had been up the entire night-before...very sick after eating way too much at a missionary luncheon. All this after Stuart spent Thursday, Friday, and Saturday fighting the effects of food poisoning gotten from a "free" lunch at work. Ugh!

I'm happy to report that life is mostly back to normal today. Both school and work have resumed. And I think I'm mostly caught up on laundry. So there's a light at the end of the tunnel.

Well, the writers' strike is officially over, but our beloved show, 24, isn't coming back until...next January! Argh! All that hoping and waiting.... *sigh* Oh, well. We'll have to make do with other shows and movies until then. And I'm just about to start Book #15 in my own Jack saga. We decided that Jack is really Odysseus from Homer's The Odyssey. *wink* Maybe so.

* * *

A little post-President's Day puzzler for you from Stuart's Cranium page-a-day calendar:

How many of the six U.S. presidents named James can you name?

* * *

5 THINGS TO BE HAPPY ABOUT

• cups and saucers clinking

• a mantle with knickknacks

• sewing a quilt

• pizza from a wood oven

• the smell of library books

* * *

I love the smell of books.

Go into any bookstore, and you get that paper/bookcover/cardboard smell. Or even a college campus bookstore, with all those textbooks. Book-smell overload.

When I worked for Highlights for Children, they had a storeroom filled with the books from the Boyds Mills side of the company. I always enjoyed going in there to look for something. Paper/cardboard/ink/glue...whatever it was...the books always smelled good.

Then there's the library, especially an older library with lots and lots of books.

It's not a musty smell. Just a pleasant, warm smell of something familiar. The smell of a new adventure.

I cringed when I first read about electronic books. Would that book-smell be lost forever on future generations? How would they understand it if they didn't have a book to hold and page through? It made me sad to think about it.

But that's still the future.

I think enough people are like me and still enjoy the feel and smell of books enough to keep the real thing around for awhile yet.

Totally Tardy Tuesday Tidings...

Photos by Ben Solomon, GWHatchet.com
(If I publish this at 11:59 p.m., is it still considered Tuesday Tidings?)

Happy day and new week to you!!

It's been a "rough" week already! Wow! And it's only Tuesday.

The busyness never seems to stop....and here's me hoping life would slow down a bit once we put the clocks back an hour...

Anyways...

There was quite a bit of excitement this weekend on our coast since several of the cast/crew of 24 -- including Kiefer -- were filming in Washington, D.C. I was really hoping to go (we're three hours away), but we had some house chores -- like finally putting in our kitchen floor -- that had to take precedent over roadtrips... Drat.

I also heard that Rocco is playing in Atlanta again...tomorrow. No chance of us going there this time. All the mundane duties of life call...like homeschool learning group, dance class, a doctor's appointment, Spring soccer sign-ups...

Speaking of our homeschool learning group, tomorrow is picture day. I'm always excited for that since it means new photos showing the growth of our kids. When they were really small, we, like most new parents, took them regularly (read: bi-monthly) for photos. In fact, if you stapled the photos together, you'd have an animated flip-book of them growing during those early years. Still in all... I'm excited since we only get professional photos annually now.

I spent two hours this morning participating in a focus group for homeschool curriculum. It included a Myers-Briggs type indicator profile to show what my teaching style might be. The session was quite interesting, especially because you got a good mixture of people.

One of the added bonuses? I got paid $75...not a bad hourly rate. The other? My great, wonderful, marvelous friend Angel watched my two cherubs for me...and I returned to her house to watch her three munchkins so that she could join in the afternoon session. Worked out perfectly!! $75 each! Woo-hoo! Let's go shopping! *grin*

I saw two former colleagues from the newspaper whilst I was waiting in line to vote tonight. Pretty interesting, especially when this usually-introverted-former-reporter told the one totally-extroverted-former-colleague-turned-business-editor that she was available if she -- the editor -- ever needed a stringer or a sub. (I have to admit, I miss it a lot. I love being home with my two sweeties...but I miss some of the excitement of the news world. I noticed it especially while I watched the reporters in New York City during the 24 Season 7 trailer. There's a certain non-drug-related-rush gotten from having deadlines and doing interviews.) Ah, well. Not the right season yet. *sigh* Until then, I have to be content in training future journalists...and continuing to write my bestseller. *wink*

* * *

5 THINGS TO BE HAPPY ABOUT

• meditating on the morning commute

• student-organized film festivals

• rotary telephones

• chicken pot pie in a flaky crust

• earrings that dangle and jingle

* * *

The first time Emily used a corded phone she nearly ripped it out of the wall. We had one in the house just in case we lost power and the cordless ones didn't work.

She was about 2 years old and had no concept of a phone that was tethered to the wall. As far as her toddler mind understood, phones were portable. She couldn't grasp the idea that a phone might have a cord attached to another part.

Usher in the rotary telephone.

My grandmother gave us an old one that she was throwing away. She thought the kids might get a kick out of playing with it.

It was such an oddity to them. They couldn't understand the center dial with the little fingerholes over each number. It didn't resemble any phone they'd ever seen.

Technology is like that though. What we grew up with suddenly becomes antiquated seemingly overnight.

Our kids "surf" the internet on Pentium III (or better) computers with a DSL connection that allows downloads in seconds. I grew up with a Commodore 64 -- a chunky computer with 5 1/4-inch disk and a game/program loading time that allowed you to use the bathroom and get a drink and snack before it was finished. My parents didn't have computers at all.

I remember the first time the kids saw 45 rpm records on the walls of a 50s-style ice cream shop. They pointed to them and giggled, laughing at the funny, black "CDs." Hmm...

Can you still hear the purr of the telephone dial as it rotates? I can. And what a bummer if you missed the proper hole and had to start over again...

* * *

Well, I missed my deadline, and it's technically Wednesday. But since I can tweak the time aspect in the "post options," you don't technically know that.

I'll bid everyone adieu and return anon with more musings.

Tuesday Tidings

Happy Tuesday to you...just past the ides of October!

My musings come to you today instead of Monday, due to the fact that my daughter and I had our birthday yesterday, and we headed up to the Big Apple to see some friends and do a bit of shopping. *grin*

And, wow, are we ever tired now!

Still in all, it was a great day, and it was wonderful to see Lana and her adorable girls! (We missed you, Jesse!)

We may have been a bit ambitious to go shopping at Macy's afterwards...

But one cute outfit, several yummy snacks/drinks, a "quick" trip to the 9th floor to see the Christmas display, and two adorable teddy bears later, we left that store and headed up Sixth Ave. to see the......Sketcher's store.

There aren't many earthly things that Emily desires more than sparkly pink shoes...well, actually, sparkly pink anything will do (a trend we first noticed in the jewelry district of Los Angeles when she was just 8 months old...but that's another story).

She'd been wanting a pair of Cali Gear shoes since she first saw a TV commercial for them this past summer. We don't usually go for stuff we see advertised on television, but in a search this summer for some kind of enclosed-toe sandals, we found some for Edward in a local shoe store. But, alas, as usual they didn't come in Emily's size, a hazard of growing bigger faster than most girls her age. She was a really "good egg" about it all and didn't complain, saying that she had nice pink Lands' End sandals that still fit just fine. Pretty impressive for a 9-year-old, huh? But I knew in her heart she'd been hoping...just a little bit.

And there they were! (Insert angelic choir singing here.)

Pink Cali Gear shoes in her size and the next size up and the next...

Complete with Cali bits!

Well, that birthday money nearly leaped from her new birthday purse.

By the time we got to the PATH train, her birthday shoes had been replaced by her new hot pink Cali gear shoes. Hmmm...I might need to get me a pair. They're kinda cute...

The kids bought me Season 2 of The Closer, so you know what Stuart and I will be doing for several upcoming evenings. (And, no, not that, dear. *blush*)

Anyways...

We had an incredibly busy week followed by an incredibly busy weekend, and I'm still feeling dizzy. (You know it's bad when you look at your calendar and every day has at least two jottings on it...)

My annual "wellness" visit to my family doctor on Thursday sent me to the eye doctor on Saturday -- a first visit for me. Made it nearly 37 years without a formal, personal visit...two days before my birthday. Not bad, except that I need glasses...and have needed glasses for a long while now. Ugh. So nearly $300 later, in 7 to 10 business days I'll be sporting some trendy oval frames that make me look and feel school-marmish -- despite the reassurances of everyone around me. I just gotta get used to the prescription and then I can have contacts...

So let's see...in the last two weeks I've been to the dentist, the doctor, the eye doctor... All that's left is the gyn. *smile* He's next. I've never been to a male gyn doctor before -- I usually see a midwife. But my hormones have been wacky again and affecting my waistline -- not in the familial way either -- so I'm off to see him soon, too. I think that will cover me for the year.

Edward had another soccer game this Sunday. They won again! YAY!! Edward nearly got a goal. He was so psyched afterwards, especially because it was our family's turn to bring a post-game snack, and I had bought his requested choices of Cheetos and lemonade...not the healthy choices I would have picked, but he felt "cool" because of it...so I guess 5 minutes of coolness is worth it and won't affect the other kids' health too much.

*breathe*

I think life can finally slow down a bit. We can only hope....

I won't do my usual calendar page musings today. I'll save that until next week, or another day when my writing brain is slow.

But I'll leave you with my favorite Bud-boy quote from yesterday:

As we were making our way out of a store in New York, Edward said quite loudly and emphatically, "We came, we saw, and we didn't see a thing we liked!" A bit embarrassed by his comment, I chuckled and cautioned him to keep his voice down, to which he replied, "Of course I didn't see anything I liked...it was all girl stuff!"

* * *

Completely unrelated except by marriage... If you haven't recently checked out my fantastically wonderful hubby's blog, take a gander over to Squid on the Grill. He's added a few new entries.

Have I said how much I love my hubby?

*grin*