We’ll take four!
Dresses, that is. Mama, Country and I went shopping. Man, did we go shopping. Clothes for Country and Diva, and 4 just-alike-except-for-the-size dresses for the four of us to wear on Mother’s Day. Seriously, this is the universally flattering dress. It fits all of us and looks great on each of us! Can’t beat that! This is our first year without Grandmother, and so, for the first time, I may be in my own church on Mother’s Day. Or I may end up going to Granny’s church, with the rest of that side of the family. Regardless, we’ll be wearing those new frocks, that much is settled. Also, we did not get new slips, the “control” ones that mashed our boobs flat and let our bellies hang about in a most bouncy and unflattering way. Also, I think I hurt my shoulder joint getting the thing on and off. Just sayin’
So, what are you doing for Mother’s Day? Do you still live close enough to visit? I tell you, when I lived out of state, it was hard on me not to be around my family on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, almost as hard as the bigger holidays of Christmas and Thanksgiving. Of course, that was before everyone was online, when you still had to use the yellow pages to send a long distance mothers day gift. 1-800-FLOWERS makes it so easy to select just the right arrangement, unlike when you had to call, and kinda just hope what they were describing to you sounded like what you thought it sounded like. Did that make sense? I hope so. If you ordered flowers back in the day, you know exactly what I meant, anyway. Nothing more unnerving than having to say ‘Red, she likes red, can you send some red flowers that look like ruffles?” “No, I don’t know the name of them.” “No, not roses, the other ones”. Yeah, slick, right?
Be smarter, and let the florist work harder instead of you, LOL!
Cass in the Kitchen: Shrimp Scampi and Dori Sanders’ Country Cooking
So sorry this is late, and I actually even thought about skipping it, but I did that last week when I got slammed, and I’d hate to let that become a habit. I enjoy this segment, and I have a bunch of recipes waiting in draft mode, and yet more pictures of recipes on the camera card, so I really do want to keep up with it. In addition to the cooking, I am still reading mags and cookbooks, so I certainly am not out of kitchenly things to say, and probably won’t be for some time to come!! So, let’s get on with our little cooking show!
Shrimp Scampi
2 sticks of butter
1/4 to 1/3 cup minced garlic
lemon pepper
basil
thyme
oregano
cilantro
2 pounds of shrimp, peeled and deveined
2-3 pounds frozen mixed veggies (I used Normandy Blend)
12 ounces angel hair pasta
Melt the butter in a large skillet, add the garlic and spices and saute until it smells so good you begin to drool. It’s very aromatic an a totally pleasant way. In the meantime, partially thaw those veggies in the microwave about 7 minutes, and set the water to boil for the pasta. Add the shrimp to the butter/garlic/spice mixture, and stir them in. Just as they begin to turn orange, add the veggies, and stir them in real well, too. I know scampi is usually served with veggies on the side, but, man, I had to take advantage of that butter-y, garlic-ky prefection!
Start the pasta when you add the veggies. It will only take 3-4 minutes to cook, and your veggies should be done in about that time. You want them to still be a little crispy. Drain the pasta. I put mine in a big bowl, and then poured the shrimp/veggie/sauce over it, and mixed it up.
Here’s what it looks like on the plate. Divine, right?
Alas, Drama is allergic to dairy, so she got this instead:
Dori Sander’s Country Cooking
I also had a fun and profitable trip to the library, as I think I mentioned. I checked out a couple of cooking books, and one of them was the delightful Country Cooking by Dori Sanders. This was a delightful read, and I do mean “read”. The book is full of stories about her life past and present. I found out she lives just a few hours fro here, so how neat is that.
There were several recipes I want to try in here, and I found the first one on the the fly leaf, a reference to fried green tomato parmigiana, which I have never had or heard of, but which sounds like food perfection. I’ll be having to test that one out when green tomatoes are cheap.
I also thought the recipe for boiled noodles looked pretty interesting. You make the dough and then push it through a colander or sieve into a pot of boiling water. The book has lots of simple techniques that like, so don’t think you’ll need a lot of fancy equipment to make the food.
I thought the baked eggs and grits looked good, too. I have several breakfast casserole recipes, but this is the first one I’ve seen that includes grits. I love me some grits, ya’ll!
Finally, I want to make this cobbler that practically makes itself, you just pour the ingredients one over the other, and the crust bubbles up through the fruit as it cooks. It doesn’t get much easier than that!
I’ll be checking this book out again when I am ready to some more experimenting, and I may get a copy if we like what we taste. Which basically boils down to: might as well order it right now.
Ready? Set? Prepare to Blog!
BLOG!
Wow, ok. I’ve been incredibly distracted for the past couple of days, chasing rabbit trails. I looked at this site, and that led to this site, and then they linked to another site, and then the day was over and oops! No post. Sorry. I don’t mean to forget about yu and suck as a blogger, it just happens. And then? Well then, I realize my error and flood your feed reader. Muhahahhahahhhahah! Oh wait. Bet that’s only funny to me.
I lack time and chutzpah to show you most of what I’ve been reading on, but here’s something I know you will like: Custom Photo Cards. I know I mentioned awhile back that I was thinking of ordering some, but then I didn’t. Because I am a slacker. But then I had occasion to send out a couple of cards this week, and you know what? I had to go buy cards. Ones without MY picture on them. And they were cool cards, and they served the purpose, but really… when I want to send a note of encouragement to a friend, I’d like a personalized card. See, just because it says Merry Christmas or whatever in the example doesn’t mean I have to have that. I could have it blank inside. I could put my face on the outside. Or my blog header, complete with name, right across the front. Or maybe just yarn, ROFL!
Long Division Sucks
Yesterday, school was derailed by long division. Stuntman knew how to do it, and I knew he knew how to do it, but he didn’t know he knew how to do it. And I could see that the 3 problems the math book assigned him each day were not reinforcing his skill set, but were just … making him feel like he was dealing with a new concept each day. Yesterday, I assigned 4 extra problems, and though the first 3 had taken almost an hour, and the fourth one had taken about that long due to his protests, I held firm, and the last three took about 10 minutes. The boy now knows how to do long division, and more importantly, he knows he knows.
It’s a good thing I like math.
20 rows to go
Sometimes, things just drag on and on and on. I have 20 rows to go on the front of Skimmer, and that purling back takes forever. Of course, it’s also increasing by 2 stitches every fourth row. I expect the back will go much faster, since it will be decreasing at that rate. Muhahahahhahah.
In other news, I have a headache. It is a new kind of headache, like a band around, but up and down, not across, my head, and with shooting pains down into my jaw, mostly affected my left side. Not fun.
Good Morning! GiveAway! Menu Plan Monday! Ghandi!
Yes, I said morning! I’m posting in the morning again, because I think I am wittier and more entertaining then. I’m still going to be short and sweet, because, HI! it’s Monday, and Monday is just so dang Monday-ish. Of course, at a fluffy five foot nothin’, I am short and sweet all the time 
Ok, today was the day I had planned to give away A Fine Fleece. I think I really messed that up by pulling an old entry and updating it and adjusting the time stamp. I know a lot of you read on the feed, and I think the feed readers disregarded that since in “cyber speak” it was not a new post. There were only 4 entries, and I feel like it’s a discredit to the publisher to complete the give away today when I usually get over 50. I know knitters still love books, so I know I must have messed up something somehow. Please look over in the sidebar, and you’ll see “Enter Here” over a picture of the book. That link takes you to the contest entry post. I will close the contest next Monday, abundant entries or not, and I am updating that post to reflect same. Or, if you don’t need to see a picture of the book, you can just click here.
Now for Menu Plan Monday. You will recognize these items. I just got to the grocery store Friday night. (No wonder I feel hard pressed if it takes a major maneuver just to get out to buy food, LOL). I now have the ingredients for the food I planned for last week, and so that’s what we will be having.
Corny bites (I’ll talk more about these after we try them) with refried beans and some sort of Mexican rice.
Chili with Cornbread
Beef Stroganoff
Tacos
And that’s all I am planning for now. You can participate in Menu Plan Monday by clicking on this banner, but don’t go yet, there’s more from me underneath it!
Ghandi: I put this movie in my BlockBuster Q awhile back, and it has been sitting here on my desk for a couple of weeks. I spent the weekend pretty much unplugged, as I indicated in my that post on Friday. That means that I did not get the lesson plans made. I realized that late yesterday evening, and then I realized that this made today a perfect day for watching Ghandi. I went to see it when I was in school, and I wanted to share it with my kids. FWIW, I also saw the Hobbit as a school field trip. Yes, I had one extremely cool teacher. I’ll work on the lesson plans while we watch. Then I’ll probably finish Skimmer AND read a book. Ok, maybe not all that, but it is over three hours. We’ll start right after lunch, and I’ll try to remember to let you know how it went when I post tomorrow.
Can we please unplug?
I realized I kinda left a lot of stuff out of that last post, and I thought I might try to round it out just a bit. When I re-read it, I was left hanging, and not only did I write the post, but I;m the one living the life, so if I am scratching my head, something needs to be clarified for sure!
Ya’ll. I am tired. No. I am not tired. I am just two hairs short of weary, and there is a world of difference. Tired means resting will fix it. Weary means I need to get away from the press of life. There is nowhere to go, though, and I …. it’s just been a constant assault these past few months, and just when I think things are coming a bit more under control, I get blind-sided again. Like, for instance, I had planned to basically take this weekend off and pamper myself just a little bit. Read, play with the kids, talk to dh about something besides what’s for dinner, and then this afternoon, I realized I have to write lesson plans. Not just the plug-in-the-new-math-book plans, that I was expecting, but entire multi-subject plans. Not quite the “light shopping and general relaxation” I had envisioned.
Ya know… if I were a rich woman, I would book myself on a Flight to Australia, and I would hire a guide (paying him extra to be quiet), and I would go on walkabout. With a new camera. And lots and lots of sunscreen. I would go for the weekend and only sleep on the planes there and back.
Instead, I will go to the grocery store, write the plans, and maybe, just maybe squeeze in an extra five minutes in the shower. But I tell you this, if my mama says “Let’s go to town”, I am dropping what I am doing and going to town.
GiveAway Reminder. Also, apologies.
This has been a real lackluster week at Cass Knits. See, I even left off the ! because it has been so. stinking. dry. I have been so busy with the house and the schooling, and all the other stuff and would you believe? Another wake yesterday! Therefore, there was no Cass in the Kitchen yesterday, there will be no Online Craft Club today, and I think I am going to take the weekend to basically unplug.
Oh. Except for the lesson plans I have to write. See what I mean? It’s just not letting up!
Anyway, please remember to enter the giveaway. I’m not quite sure what happened this time, but I think the fact that I used a previous post to announce it may have affected it. I’ll see you Monday.
