It is officially a beautiful day.  No clouds in the sky.  Just sitting here working and waiting...

Fashion Blind

I used to be sassy, yet professional, I used to have my own style.  Really, it was my own style!  I would buy clothes and remake them to fit me.  They were nice simple clothes, with clean lines and sometimes, I would mix it up some great bold patterns, or colors.  NOT WILD, BOLD.  I had a great roomate in college, who minored in fashion.  Her style inspired me to have some as well. 

Somewhere between my last office job 10 years ago and today, I lost my ability to determine what is fashionable.  Today, my wardrobe consists of t-shirts - both long and short sleeved, jeans, sweaters and a couple pairs of black shoes...I have a few semi-work outfits that I wear when I go to meetings with clients who require business attire in their offices.  I have resorted to wearing a uniform.  I acknowledge this today. 

I have tried to go shopping a couple times this fall at retailers near our home only to feel like a fish out of water.  All of the clothes seem like clown clothes they seem odd, and clumsy....I know, as a child of the 70's I have lived thru and witnessed (participated) in some of the worst fashion trends in history - parachute pants, inside out sweatshirts, neon, pegged jeans, short shorts, yolk front jeans, stirrup pants, and my favorite, knickers.  I probably should not complain about this chapter in the ongoing fashion evolution.  

My biggest issue over the last years, truthfully has been the fact that I work out of my home in a rural community. My style barometer is the chickens in our back yard and our neighbor's cows. 

I don't want to be like the Moms on Saturday Night Live with the "mom jeans".  I need help.  What resources are out there to help me?  I occasionally have the style network on... I watch the makeover shows, but I often find myself asking "do people really dress like that?" 


How do I get back in the game? 

Time flies...

My husband's cousin took this picture of her youngest and our daughter yesterday at their first day of school. 

seems like just yesterday that I took this photo of the girls:

I didn't realize until I just went thru some of the photos of them that 90% of the time her daughter is on the left and mine is on the right... Funny....

Progress (image heavy post)

The pit digging extended thru all of last week.  On Saturday morning, it was completed and the pool assembly began.

We had a bit of progress on our DIY Pool this weekend.  We also spent a considerable amount of quality time with each other.   It was quite a nice change to our normal running around.  these types of weekends are the BEST! 
 

It has been great these last two months having my parents living with us.  My mom even got in on the "self portrait action" this weekend (Boogie's words, not mine)

building the pool started

in progress.

she can't resist climbing...then again, what kid can??

hard at work preparing the straps

oh yeah, i got a new griddle for our stove - i will post on that later...

adding straps aka rounding the pool

leveling the bottom of the pool

Merely a small flesh wound.  (actually it was)  this injury was a result of a collision with the wrong end of a pick axe. 

dinner on the patio with my folks and the family.

this guy really needs a new home. any takers?

Two Great Little Tips...

#1: The container that our dish soap came in was not so attractive or functional for that matter. They cluttered up our counter and always looked funky dirty.  My dad made the great recommendation that we use a condiment bottle/dispenser to hold our dish soap on our counter. It works great, is easy to clean and takes up almost no room on our counter.

#2:  We live in the country.  The fields around our house are planted with corn this year.  During "Corn Years" we have tons of black and fruit flies in our house, even if we keep the doors and windows closed. They just come with the territory.  I have no patience for bugs in my house, period.  One of my son's friends told me that his mom uses apple cider vinegar to take care of the fruit flies.  I immediately got out a little canning jar and filled it with the apple cider vinegar, placed a piece of plastic wrap over the top, secured it with the jar lid, and placed a small 1/2" diameter hole in the plastic wrap.  It works incredibly well to trap the fruit flies and has made a considerable dent in the number visible in my kitchen. 

Low-Fat Rice Pudding

 

With the cooler temperatures this past week, I have had a strong desire to make rice pudding.  I scoured Pinterest, Epicurious and Yummly for ideas.  They all seemed way more complicated, fussy and high calorie than necessary.  I decided that I would figure it out on my own based on some of the recommendations in the recipes from those sites.

  

So, here goes: 

Ingredients: 

3/4 c jasmine rice

2 1/2 c skim milk (separated)

1 c water

1/4 c sugar

1 small egg

1 tsp real vanilla (more if using imitation) 

cinnamon or nutmeg for garnish (optional)

raisins, fresh or dried fruit to taste (optional)

Directions: 

In a small sauce pan, combine 1 1/2 cup milk and rice bring to a simmer over low heat.  cook 20 minutes.  stir frequently to keep from burning to the bottom.  add 1/2 c cool milk, water and sugar cook on low for another 20 minutes until thickened. In a glass measuring cup, whisk together remaining milk and egg.  slowly stir into the mixture in the saucepan.  cook on low heat for 5 minutes.  take off heat.  stir in vanilla.  let cool 5 minutes.  serve with dried fruit or cinnamon garnish.

  

Updated Exterior Photos

This is our home...  all freshly painted! 

The chicken coops...

Chicks in the garden...

Pool & Painting Progress

We decided to put the back hoe back to work.  It had sat next to the garage for way too long without a project. Logical conclusion, put in  a pool.  We looked at lots of options from free form pools,  to standard rectangular and everything in between.  We even briefly toyed with the idea of using modified livestock tanks for the pool.  In the end, we found DIY pools  to be incredibly affordable and just up our alley (the DIY alley, that is).  "Way" back in 2001 when we made the mistake of  paying to have our house painted, we swore off contractors at all costs.  So, we are embarking on this adventure of  a DIY Pool.   So far, so good! 

My husband made great progress digging the hole for the pool and then the rain came.  We had been almost 4 weeks with no rain and 24 hours after starting the pool, down pour! After the storm there was more than a foot of water in the bottom of the hole.  This may be a sign... but we are going to go ahead. 

It took the the better part of three days to drain and dry out the hole. 

Boogie and Billy Ray.  In the background, the porch columns have been covered and are ready for final paint.

Once the hole dried out, the boys got in on the action...

Yesterday, the house was painted and the hole was nearly completed.  The hole needs some fine smoothing and leveling - it looks great!  the house need some small touch-up in a couple areas.  Otherwise, things are making great progress here.

Billy Ray

One of the pullets we got this spring is not actually a pullet. She is a he...a Rooster....  He thinks he is as beautiful as they come.  He does have beautiful color and feathers.  Billy Ray has the most wonderful mullet and loves to sing to all of his girls in the morning and at night just like his doppelganger.












Introducing Billy Ray:

Billy Ray Rooster

...and his doppelganger, Billy Ray:

Billy Ray Cyrus

The last 8 months in photos around the house.

Last winter, I knit this rug out of 6 sets of old white sheets for our Living Room

This spring we got 5 pullets. Or so we thought.  One ended up being a Roo.  Can you guess which one?

We had some miscellaneous yard projects, including finishing the patios from last year to do.

We built a coop for the chickens.

the chickens grew quickly.

We had beautiful weather.

We went to 180 baseball games...

and track meets.

The grass grew up between the pavers in the patio.

We fixed the drainage for the patio.

Boogie started her summer vacation....

the house needed some attention but...

we decided to get more chickens...We were given  an old dog house and converted it to a coop.

It only took a day, some scrap wood we had hanging around, $5 in hardware and $50 in chicken wire and fencing to make it look this beautiful!

The new residents of the dog house - Edwina & Babs.

the patio and drain tiles done.  Columns are almost done.  They just need paint and bases applied. 

And now the pool project begins....

... and the house painting.  

 Stay tuned for more posts with more words and less photos.