Comfortable Domesticity

Even though I've made numerous statements about how boring and lonely it is here, there is something comfortable and familiar about being surrounded by cornfields. You can even find fields in the middle of cities throughout the Midwest. We never lived on a farm growing up but our small town was surrounded by them. I wholeheartedly respect farmers. I took this picture a few miles outside of town. In this part of Illinois, it's usually either corn or soybean being planted. My gram's church has a small bit of land on which they grow corn, and it's some of the best corn I have tasted. Speaking of things tasting good...

I made zucchini pancakes again, this time with buttermilk pancake mix instead of biscuit mix, and diced jalapeno peppers. They were the best batch I've made so far. Gram didn't think of them as highly as I did though. 

Dinner tonight was fantastic. Gram made me in charge of cooking dinner, which doesn't happen very often. She can't tolerate how little salt and butter I cook with. I've been thinking of different ways to make quinoa and tonight I made quinoa barbecue. I cooked the quinoa in the rice cooker as normal, and then added Sweet Baby Ray's sweet & spicy sauce. OH MY GOODNESS! It was amazing! The quinoa is a healthy substitute for meat and any sauce made by SBR makes anything taste great. Next time I will try to make sloppy quinoa instead of sloppy joe's. Quinoa might be my favorite food now.

After a couple of months off, I've begun crocheting again. My mom gave me some wool yarn for my birthday and I've been staring at it for months trying to think of something to make with it. And then it came to me: a messenger bag for Fall. The colors are gorgeous and it's really fun working with wool yarn. I'm already done with the sides, bottom, and the front of the inside, with all of it sewed together as well. Unless something drastic happens, I hope to have it finished by next week.  If there is enough yarn left over, I might make a matching coin purse or wallet.

A friend of mine recently commented on my crocheting so I offered to crochet him something. One of my favorite things to crochet are beanie hats. I found a pattern for one about two years ago and have been making them for other people ever since. The first couple of hats turned out really bad and I ended up redoing one of them. Now I think I have perfected  the pattern. It's really easy to make (once you understand what the pattern is telling you to do) and it only takes a few hours to make if you fight through the hand cramps. The picture doesn't do the hat justice, like the rest of my pictures, but it's easy to see the pattern. Since one of my mom's dogs chewed up my winter hat before I moved down here, I might have to make me another one before it gets too cold. 

A scary thing happened last night. I was outside talking on the phone when Gram sent me a text saying she had fallen on the floor and needed help getting up. Normally I'm able to pick her up if she can turn over onto her knees. But her knees were swollen and bruised. I even put the gait belt around her but couldn't do it. I was completely useless. She called my uncle and he and my cousin came over. Gran was very sore but I can't stress enough how incredibly lucky we were that she didn't break anything. It's not the first time she's fallen without an obvious reason why. She went to the cardiologist today and he put a heart monitor on her. If her heart is causing the falls, then the monitor should pick it up.

I'm about fed u with our garden. The tomatoes and beans were pretty much a bust, though we did get some tomatoes here and there. Something dug up two of our cabbage plants and one zucchini plant. I saved the cabbages and replanted the zucchini plant, but it didn't survive. We had a couple of nights with a frost advisory but the green peppers and jalapeno peppers are still growing. I think I will be making salsa at some point. If I can get some pears, Gram and I will make be making and canning pear jam.

That's all for now. Until next time,

~Staci~

I Never Rode a Camel

It's nearly midnight and I have Morocco on the brain. It would be easy to sit here and give a minute-by-minute account of my experience overseas. But I won't do that. Going to Morocco was supposed to be an exciting, life-changing move for me, which only lasted for two weeks. And it was two weeks of hell. I had a limited amount of funds and therefore couldn't explore as much as I had wanted. Yet, there are three things that I still kick myself for not doing.

1. I never rode a camel.
2. I never saw Oudaya at sunset.
3. I never went back to the library to get a picture of the bird of paradise flower in the garden.

#1 is pretty self-explanatory. I'm sure it would have been hard to track down a camel in the middle of Rabat,  the capital, which is on the Atlantic coast. But I didn't do much research to find one. # 2 would have been easier to do. Oudaya is a small, walled-off village overlooking the Atlantic, Rabat, and the city to the north, Sale. It's beauty is really indescribable. One of my friends took me there during the day and offered to bring me back on my last night in the city. But I was in a hurry to get to my hotel near the airport outside of Casablanca. And I was already suffering from what would become bronchitis. Not to mention the allergy medicine I had taken made me high. It was a once-in-a-lifetime chance to explore Casablanca and I don't remember it. #3 would have been the easiest of all. I had gone to the library but had to hand over my passport and my purse in order to be allowed inside. That was extremely uncomfortable. Who would expect to find a garden in the middle of library? Not me. And I certainly didn't expect to see my favorite flower, the bird of paradise, blooming right in the middle of it. My camera was in my purse. I told myself I would come back to get a picture of it but I never did.

Bird of Paradise

These three things still cause pain when I think about them. If I had to pick a fourth item, it would probably be the whole Casablanca incident. I can't allow myself to rehash everything that happened, nor can I drag others through my awful experience. The last couple of Septembers are so full of bad memories, that now I'm too afraid to tell anybody about good things that are happening to me out of fear that I'll jinx myself some how This should be my last post about Morocco or anything else related to the "horrible" month of September.

Until next time,

~Staci~ 

A Whole Lot Of Nothing

Considering the last two Septembers, I am having quite a tame one so far. NOTHING has gone wrong. It would be highly superstitious of me to knock on wood after having written that and I will resist the urge. Work is going fairly well; they are consistently giving me at least two shifts per week. However, it seems that most people who eat out don't understand that waitstaff depends upon their tips to supplement each paycheck. If I make 10 dollars or less in tips, I can report that to my boss and get minimum wage for that shift. But that hasn't happened yet. I can understand not leaving a tip if your waiter is completely rude or totally screws up your order. But if not, PLEASE leave a tip.

I spent all of Monday in the kitchen experimenting with new recipes. Gram started a gluten-free diet this month, so I tried to incorporate ingredients that she can eat. For lunch I made Parmesan-crusted chicken over rice noodles. Surprisingly, Gram liked it and I thought it was pretty good too. I had leftover rice noodles with which I made a 3-cheese pasta bake for dinner. THAT was good! Long ago, I found a dairy-free coleslaw recipe which I made for dinner too. I was surprised that Gram liked it. She doesn't usually like when I turn regular meals into meatless and dairy-free dishes. Between lunch and dinner, I decided I should make dessert too, so it was the perfect time to try making pie crust for the first time. I combed the internet for a crust recipe that didn't require shortening (since we didn't have any) and I used Gram's gluten-free flour.  For the filling, I combined cream cheese and chocolate pudding. After accidentally using too much milk, I decided to freeze it. Gram said my crust was perfect but I find that hard to believe. It was certainly hard to make but it might have been because of the flour. Gram talked to a lady who makes gluten-free products and she said that g-f flour doesn't work like regular flour. For example, bread made with g-f flour won't rise when it bakes.

If I make through the rest of this month without something going horribly wrong, then I will definitely have an announcement to make. I'm afraid to say anything and then have to backtrack later when everything falls apart. But I will say that certain things in my life are looking better; there is hope for good things to come. However, as I type that I remember saying the same thing last year and two years ago and I also remember how badly things turned out in the end. Then I would have to apologize for failing once again.

My online lit class is going well and there are only two weeks left. I dropped out of my stats class because I couldn't get the software to work. Several classmates tried to help me out but nothing was working. Without that software, I couldn't do the homework or the exams so there wasn't any reason to stay in the course. It was supposed to be an introduction to the subject but it certainly wasn't for beginners. Sad biscuits. My chemistry class still hasn't begun yet and a starting date hasn't been announced. I might try to find another course to take after my lit class ends since the stats course was a bust.

Until next time,

~Staci~