An Icy Derby

Yet more wintry weather. Nothing much to speak of, though. Here's what I woke up to this morning...

Some areas got some snow--we had snow last night that turned to freezing rain. Left some ice. Lovely. Thankfully the roads are clear. I have places to go today.


Early this morning Kiki the kitty was going crazy at the window. There were lots of birds out and about, especially the cardinals! They wouldn't stay still too long for pictures, but I managed to snag a couple...

Around lunchtime I headed to my former Cub Scout Pack's annual Pinewood Derby races, held at my church this year. As a Unit Commissioner, I try to visit each of my 5 units every month, and I thought the Derby would be a great opportunity for a visit. It was.


Here are some of the cars from the kids:

Love the Snickers car! It actually did very well in the races, too.

The adults have their own race, also...called the Mad Max. The Cubbie rules don't apply to the adults, so there are lots of overweighted cars, and cars with a little extra oomph!

The one with the doll face scares me a little.

The Cubmaster put a lot of work into his car. His is the box the block of wood came in.

There are always fabulous prizes for the boys whose cars do well. Look at all these trophies!

And they're off!

The Derby is always a highly-attended meeting, and everyone has a great time. Who wouldn't, with car races, food, and fun opportunities to have your picture made?

Of all the days to not wear make-up. :) 


Great job by all!

What Is This?

I was in a classroom all day with no windows. I came outside at lunchtime and found a few snow flurries. No indication of this on the weather reports, but it IS January, and cloudy, so a few flurries are OK.

This is near the public library just down the street from the middle school.

 After school when Nicky and I left, it was still snowing. Hard. Here's the view from the car as I was driving home...Nicky took the picture on my cell phone.

By the time all was said and done, here's what we had:

And still coming down at night.

When it finished, we were only left with about 3/4 of an inch of snow. Nothing much at all. But every bit of it unexpected. The weather guys were very surprised.


They weren't the only ones. Gotta love these DC/Maryland winters!

First Snow of the Season!

Heh, heh, heh....

OK, so this is barely a trace. But it's still snow.


I kept seeing on Facebook that the kids were refreshing the school page to see if school had been called because of a snow day.


I mean, really, kids??  For this?


It's still early. Don't fret. I'm sure the good stuff's coming. 

A Good Night for Chili

Winter has finally arrived here in Maryland. A cold front moved through early this morning, bringing winds and much colder temperatures. It seemed like a good night for chili.


I made tonight's chili recipe a while back...recipe and story here. After that fiasco, I put the recipe in the back on the recipe file and forgot about it. I dusted it off last month for the Christmas party at the pantry I volunteer at, and it was the hit of the night. I decided to make it again.


The chipotle chili referenced in the recipe has changed in the stores a number of times, but is now Hormel Chipotle Chicken Chili. That's it on the left in the picture.

 The recipe turned out so much better than the first time I made it! It's a wonder what you can do when you follow the recipe.


Here's Eric's bowl before eating...he fixed a slice of buttered French bread and a glass of red wine to finish off the meal. 

This one is definitely staying in the front of the recipe file from now on!

Happy 2012! A To-do List for the Coming Year

It's been nearly a year since I've posted to this blog. One day shy, to be exact. Last year was a crazy one. I got a full-time job at the middle school where I sub, teaching the modern day equivalent of Home Ec. I was responsible for all lessons, grading, subject to evaluations at the drop of a hat, meetings out the wazoo with school officials, parents, you name it. In January, I began, at the School board's request, classes to obtain my official teaching certificate. After 26 years out of school, it was very difficult to go back to school! By March, that position was eliminated due to budget constraints in our county. My schedule eased a bit, as I no longer took classes, and when school was out in June, I heaved a huge sigh of relief.


I resumed subbing this school year, and I'm much happier. I just finished a long-term job, teaching 6th graders Reading for 2 months. No stress, because there was an end in sight.


In August 2010, our nest became a little emptier as we dropped JJ off at college at the University of Iowa, 15 hours from home. He did very well in his first year away, but I fretted the whole time he was gone.


And I ate. A lot.


All the hard work on Weight Watchers, out the window. At this point, I've regained all but about 10 pounds. I'm heartbroken, and angry at myself. I did pinpoint that I'm a stress eater. Go figure.


So this new year brings a fresh start. New beginnings. I don't like to think of these as New Year's Resolutions, but as a to-do list of things to accomplish in the next 366 days. (It's Leap Year, don't forget!)


So without further ado, my to-do list for 2012:


1. Make better food choices.
2. Write my choices down. I do better when I'm accountable, if only to myself.
3. Make time for exercise! At least 3 days a week.
4. Keep up with the housework. When I work a lot I tend to let the house slide, and then we live in a mess until I get around to cleaning. A little every day gets the job done. 
5. Make time for crafting. I really enjoy crocheting and cross-stitching, but never make time for it, because I think I should be cleaning, or something. This relaxes me, and makes me happy. If Mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy!


Here's my first project of the new year:

I decided on this series that I printed from the free patterns at The Vermillion Stitchery. The cute snowman is Father Time. I had all the supplies on hand, except the fabric. I made a run to Michael's earlier and finished my supplies list.


I hope your to-do list is as fulfilling as mine. Happy New Year!

From Fabric to Rags

Last week I began my first quilt...a rag quilt. I got the pattern from a fellow teacher at school. It seemed easy enough for a first project, so I bought all the fabric on Black Friday and began the quilt after Christmas.

You need 1 yard each of 8 differnt flannel fabrics. I went with a winter theme, because that's the most of what I could find in the store.

 For the filling, a crib-sized package of batting. I actually ran short, but luckily I had some purchased for a project I haven't begun yet.

 And of course, a rotary cutter, mat, and ruler.

 The squares of flannel are cut into 8-inch squares, the batting 6-inch squares.

 That didn't take long.

Then match squares of the same fabric with a piece of batting in between and sew across on the diagonal, chaining the fabric squares as you go. Then clip apart and sew across on the other diagonal. Makes a lovely "X" on the square.

 The chaining wasn't as hard as I thought it would be.

 All done! 64 squares.

 Next lay out the squares in a pattern pleasing to you. I liked the diagonal pattern here, but the lone red square in the corner was kind of sad.

 Sew each square to the next with a 1/2 inch seam allowance. Then assemble each row to the other until you get your quilt--8 squares by 8 squares.

Now for the tough part...each seam must be clipped 1/4 inch. All of them. It took 2 days and my fingers are still numb.

Then wash and dry. Check the dryer vent every 10-15 minutes because this thing will SHED. A LOT.

Voila!

My first rag quilt. I'll probably make this again. After I get the feeling back in my fingers.

Just what I need--a new craft. I enjoyed this, though. And Nicky has already put it to good use! That's nice...I'm glad he likes it. So do I.

A Happy New Year Tree

Well, it was meant to be a Christmas tree. But time and other priorities got in the way of finishing this project.

I was visiting some of my favorite blogs a few months ago, and I found this very cool project at Polka Dot Pineapple. Lettie is a tremendously creative person and has the best ideas, most of them with fabric or paper. This was a ruffled fabric Christmas tree that I just fell in love with.

First, I had to create the templates. This was the worst part of the whole thing. Very tedious, but now I have them and can make many more trees!

 Fourteen different templates cut out of poster board!

 I bought this fabric several years ago with no idea what to do with it. Now I know. It has very cute, tiny trees all over it.

 Fourteen circles cut out of fabric to make the tree.

 Here's a closer view.

 The trunk of the tree was an empty thread spool covered in a scrap of fabric and glued into place. Then a regular drinking straw was inserted into the hole of the spool.

After cutting out all the fabric circles, I trimmed the outside edges with pinking shears and took a running stitch around the inside edge, pulling tightly as I went. Each of these forms one of the ruffles of the tree.

After stacking them in order (largest to smallest), I trimmed the straw to fit and topped with a jingle bell. With the tree fabric, a star would have been better, but I didn't have any. No matter...it still looked great!

 The view from above is very cute as well.

Check out Lettie's blog and you will find a great assortment of crafts to create! The link above goes to the tutorial for the tree, but clicking on the banner will take you to the most recent posts.

Enjoy! And Happy New Year!