Book Review: Life's a Beach

I recently signed up on GoodReads, so I thought I would try posting my review here :)

Life's a Beach Complimentary Edition by Claire Cook

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Actually 4 stars might be pushing it slightly because it was a wee bit slow to start. Once things got going, it was pretty good. I'm no editor or a regular reviewer or anything, just so you know...



I got this from B&N when they were having a free eBook promotion, so I would say the value was excellent! The characters were quirky and fun, and although the author gives us a good view into their personalities, I felt the physical descriptions were somewhat lacking. It might just be me, but I like to have a mental image of the characters.When I read I see pictures, so without those descriptors I come up with something generic which produces a less than ideal connection with the story.



That aside, I did like how Ginger interacts with her family, and the quirky behavior made for a fun read. I particularly identified with her desire to find her artistic passion. Ginger is pretty sarcastic with a dry and sometimes goofy sense of humor, so I could identify with that as well.



All in all, it was not a bad book and completely appropriate for a light summer read. Not cerebral or profound, but entertaining.



View all my reviews

Summer Already?

I've mentioned this before, but I love fireflies! Lightning bugs, whatever...you just don't see them in Southern California, so I look forward to them every year. The weather has been really crazy here with fluctuating temperatures and the horrific outbreak of tornadoes, but it seems to be finally settling into something resembling normal. Today is 89 with a heat index of 97, 56% humidity with dew points at 73 - not officially summer yet, but it sure feels official. It's what we've come to expect for this time of year.

Good Ol' Days was hot- horribly hot!  We went downtown for a couple of hours, and I got so hot that I felt sick. It's really hard to enjoy the festivities when it's that hot. The boys got to buy a couple of things, plus they got invited to go swimming when we got home, so I didn't feel too bad about cutting the day short.They each got a cheap air gun that shoots little plastic pellets, so they spent the evening setting up action figures in the back yard and shooting them. Later, I was checking to make sure they were empty and pointed it at the floor when I shot it - practicing safety and all - and promptly shot my husband in the butt when the pellet ricocheted off of the floor. Nice shootin', Tex!

My dad has been in California visiting his sister and other family members, so the boys have had to spend the weekdays with their grandparents. Let me just say, we all can't wait until my dad gets back tonight, and I will leave it at that.

I am about to finish up with Fundamentals of Media Communication and I am so glad. The instructor is good, although hard to understand at times as I think English is not her native language, but otherwise no issues there. The class is really about the history of media and is soooo dry! I have a 10-15 page research paper due this Saturday on the topic of my choice (The Effect of E-Readers on Literacy) and hmm, well if I do the minimum pages of 10, then I only have 8 more to go. Now, I do have the research all done, but I have to organize the material and write it. Thankfully, they require double spaced lines! My last class was Fundamentals of Design and we got to play with Photoshop and Illustrator. I thought sure the Media class would be fun too - I was so wrong. Next I have Fundamentals of Digital Imaging, and then after a short summer break, Color Theory. Somebody told me Color Theory was boring, but I'm hoping for the best.

Dusting Things Off

Back in September (waaaay back) I made a decision. There have been a few times since then that I have questioned my sanity; asked myself what the heck I was thinking. What did I do? I enrolled in online college classes. I am pursuing an Associates Degree in Web Design and Interactive Media at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. After that, maybe a Bachelors in Graphic Design? Lol, we'll see.

School has kept me busy and I've been trying to find time to do everything, and the blog has suffered. I was told by more than one person that things around here were looking pretty dusty. So, I am dusting things off around here. I was also told that school will act like a sponge and suck all of my available time into it if I don't learn how to manage my time effectively. I have already seen some evidence of that, so I'm trying to be more organized. Not easy as it doesn't come naturally to me, except for those areas that I am OCD in,of course :)

So far I'm really enjoying my online school experience. Most of my instructors are helpful and encouraging and really care about the students' understanding of the material. Instead of just saying "Good job, now here's what's wrong..." they tell you why it's good, what needs to be fixed and why, and then give you suggestions on how to fix it. I've had several classes since October, and so far I have experienced good instructors, mediocre instructors, and a couple of excellent instructors - not necessarily in that order. Overall it's a positive experience. I'm just noticing how things don't change just because it's college. Some teachers are indifferent as to how well you do or if you pass or not. And then there are the teachers who want you to do well and excel and they are willing to get in there and fight with you. School was always easy for me; the only subject I had to really work at was math. My problem with school was that I was seriously bored. And, so, I didn't take it seriously.

Another thing that hasn't changed are the classroom dynamics. Just because it's online, does not mean that you don't deal with personalities. All of those people that you rolled your eyes at in high school are still there, they just have different names. Remember "teacher's pet", and "wannabe-teacher's pet"? How about the "class clown" and "class narcissist" - ("everything is all about me")? Yeah, names and faces have changed but that's about it. I find myself renaming them all with names I am more familiar with. Makes it more fun :)

Okay, so I'm taking college classes towards a degree - check! I'm getting the blog operational again-check! I'm on a roll, so what's next?  Oh yeah...there's still that 20 lbs I'd like to lose...*sigh*

Fabulous... and Disturbing

Our weather has been pretty fabulous here the last week or so - mid-60's overnight, and 80's during the day, and except for the storm we had a few days ago that brought water up to, but not inside, our garage, it's play-outside weather. The only drawback is that mosquitoes enjoy this weather too  :(

The locusts were thick this year! I took the dogs outside one night when we were still having 90 degree evenings and forgot to turn off the porch light, so when I went to get them back in, I had a bunch of locusts and other night bugs buzzing around the light. The locusts were like B-52's with a drunk pilot at the stick - flying all over the place and hitting the walls and each other. Naturally, the dogs get distracted by the bugs and won't go inside. So, while I got Ruby Sue inside and was trying to get Stella, a locust got inside the house... Wonderful... got the dogs inside, the door shut, but the stupid locust was flopping around all over the place. The dogs were going crazy trying to catch it, and finally the silly thing was quiet. I assumed Ruby Sue probably had squashed it, but then it started its buzzing and rattling noises again, and Ruby Sue jumped like she'd been shot, frantically trying to locate the thing. At one point she looked up at me with the most amazingly human look of frustration on her face as if she was saying "Well? Just gonna stand there are ya?" In fact, I answered her look with, "Well, if you weren't such a chunky monkey, I might be able to get back there to get it!"  But then Stella came to her (our) rescue and caught the locust...and promptly ate it with a loud crunching sound... eww!  And the whole time this is going on, Toby is in the family room barking. Can't imagine how the men in my house all managed to sleep completely through all that racket...

I posted last summer that what we call 'locusts' here are really cicada's, but for convenience sake I continue to use the term locust. It should also be noted that I get corrected by certain family members, who don't live in my house, and that certain others (you know who you are) get downright offended by using the proper name. So, we have locusts...not cicadas.

In my last post I briefly mentioned a rumor about the real reason behind our recent elementary school upheaval. Primarily, to save a certain administrator's job. Well, apparently it was not a rumor, but rather a disturbing fact.  We received a letter from the state, as did all parents of students enrolled in our district, that told us that the requirements for participation in the federally funded Title I program were not being met and the district has been identified for improvement in reading. "This means that the state will work closely with the district in analyzing why the district is not making adequate progress and will help in developing plans to address the problems." (directly quoting from letter) "Title I provides extra help primarily in reading and mathematics to students in schools with high free and reduced lunch counts, and requires each state to determine if Title I districts and schools are making adequate progress each year toward the goal of having all students meet standard by 2014." If they don't make adequate progress two years in a row, they are identified for improvement, and they will stay on improvement for at least two years as the districts/schools must show adequate progress for two years to go off of improvement. They determine the progress by testing, which is done on students from 3rd grade on, so now only one of the elementary school's is being tested, and that means that the person who was in charge of the previously failing school is now in charge of K through 2nd grades. It won't be tested, meaning that person will most likely have a job for a another year or two, if the parents don't grab their torches and pitchforks first. That particular person is not well-liked,  but what really bothers me is that she is governing my impressionable 1st grader. Indirectly, yes, but in charge all the same. Disturbing, yes.

I haven't fully researched Title I, but it looks like for schools/districts that don't make adequate improvement in the allotted time get their funding restricted, and then the state takes a more direct hand in the situation by replacing administrators, etc.  It also appears that if a state has too many under-achieving schools, that state's Title I funding gets restricted. That most likely results in inquiries into how and where that money was spent. Hmmm...interesting.  By the way, "high free and reduced lunch counts" is code for "a lot of poor kids". I've got news for anyone who cares to pay attention: soon, all public schools in all states will have "high free and reduced lunch counts". We're probably already there. My humble opinion based on my observations. Now, who wants to know where we're going and why we're in this handbasket??

Surviving

I have been trying to post all last week, and the week before, but just kept getting jimmy-jacked at every turn. Interruptions, internet outage, slooow computers, puppy...you name it!

One Friday night my ten year old (as of Aug 3rd) had a friend stay the night. He brought his turtle which he had caught when he was out fishing somewhere...yeah, he really did. My boys had a great time, but Bobby and I were a bit disturbed by a couple of things. I put the lights out and TV off at 11:30. At 2:30 I saw lights on and heard giggling. When I went in to check on them, they were watching a really stupid cartoon that was recorded on the DVR, and Legos were scattered all over the floor. When I hit 'live TV', Adult Swim was on - not good.

The boys were up at the crack of dawn, and after cleaning up the breakfast dishes, I saw our guest on the computer loading some Alien vs Predator game and drinking a cup of coffee...what the heck?? Bobby told me he was going to take the motorcycle down to get some gas in it...said he would see me in a couple of hours...he was joking, but I know there was a spark of wishful thinking there, hee hee.

Our guest went home at noon, and we all did some cleaning, mowing, and gave the dogs baths, and then the guys went to the city pool. I had a blissful two whole hours to myself - yahoo!! That almost never happens! In fact it's so rare, that I waste precious time trying to figure out what I want to do, HA!

Sunday we shopped for school supplies, and $45 later, we still didn't have it all. We are asked to supply tissues, hand sanitizer, disinfecting wipes, and baby wipes (not sure what those are for), in addition to all the other stuff. We still need to get the backpacks, too, although I think Sully's is still good, but Tucker definitely needs a new one. Thankfully, there was no expandable on the list this year- those things are expensive and they don't last. Last year we spent about $50 on all the supplies, including backpacks and expandable, which was almost $10 by itself. So this year, I've spent $45 and that's without the expandable, and I haven't finished yet...what the heck??  Oh, and they raised our sales tax from 7.3% to 8.3% - isn't that lovely??

Sunday the 8th was the last day of swimming at the city pool, so I took the boys Saturday afternoon. Wow! Quite the collection of hairy backs, tattoos and just all-around poor taste were on display. The boys had a great time, and when we got home we grilled some hamburgers, and I ate the last dill pickle my friend Angie made. So sad...but, we're gonna get together and make some...yippee!! Later, we put on a movie and one by one, we all fell asleep. Woke up just in time to see the end credits, ha!

We have had a horrible heat wave with heat index temps of 113, 115, etc and no rain. Lot's of humidity, but no rain, and we need some rain. Our backyard has cracks in it, it's so dry. Early Sunday morning we finally got some rain. It woke us up pretty spectacularly with, what I call a flash-bang; a directly overhead lightning strike with an intense  flash and immediate boom of thunder. There were actually two of them about 30 seconds apart. It lasted for a bit and then finally settled down to just a rain event. About 5:30 I got up to go to the bathroom and noticed that the house felt hot. I checked the digital thermostat in the hallway and discovered it was blank. Great...I woke Bobby up and told him and he went to WalMart to get another one. We got that hooked up and ...nothing. Fabulous...Bobby went outside to make some sun tea and found out from the next door neighbors that their tree got hit and the blast took out their A/C, 2 computers, 2 TV's, their phone, our A/C, and the neighbor's across the street A/C. The A/C guy was fixing theirs and he came outside right them and asked if we wanted him to come in & look at ours also...let me think- YES!!  Turns out it fried our thermostat, and the transformer in the furnace, and after replacing those two things we were back in business! WOOT! We went over to take a look at the tree and discovered that the lightning had traveled down the tree and exploded out of the roots creating a hole and debris that looked like a small grenade had gone off. I don't know if they make small grenades, so maybe I should say m80 - quarter stick of dynamite??  Anyway, it also blew the water meter cover off-you know those things in your yard that look like mini manhole covers and weigh almost as much. We also discovered that the blast had knocked one of our front transom windows out, and knocked the charger to Bobby's portable radio right out of the receptacle, and, our dishwasher will no longer run through the cycles on its own. Honestly though, we were blessed because every other electronic thing in the house from the Wii to the computers is perfectly fine.  Cool!

Open House was Monday. We got to go to two schools this year, and we thought it would likely take much longer as we don't know where anything is in Tucker's school. But, as it turned out, Tucker knew exactly where he was going because the incoming 5th graders went on a tour at the end of the school year. He even knew where Sully's new class was. I'm really not happy about the changes, and no one else is either. I heard a rumor that this was all to save one person's job. Apparently, when a school is consistently below standards, the state comes in and forces changes. The first person to go is the principal. So, that would mean that they did this to scramble everybody up and confuse the state??  Nice...

School started yesterday (Wednesday) and all in all it went well, even with all the confusion. And believe me it was mass confusion. The first day of school is always hectic, but this was a nightmare!  Bobby took Tucker and dropped him off no problems. I took Sully, and because he was in first grade and not quite as seasoned at this yet as Tucker, I planned on going in with him all the way to his room. There was nowhere to park because fully half of the parking they have available was blocked off for buses (they changed where the buses go) and people who had found a space, were not leaving. You parked anywhere you could which was up and down all the side streets, driveways, and alley entrances. I didn't see anybody get a ticket, but I know there were complaints about blocked driveways! The end of the day was not much better; Sully wasn't put on the bus to come home because his teacher, although she knew he was a bus rider, asked him how he was getting home, and being 6 years old, he told her his Papa picks him up. Well, he does, at the bus stop, and then takes them to his house until I get off work. I had mentioned that to her also, but it was Open House, new people, lot's going on, so she obviously didn't remember that part. And Sully didn't volunteer the rest. I also heard that there were supposed to be shuttle buses between the schools for the after school program, so that kids in two different schools could be transported to be with their siblings, but there were in fact no actual shuttle buses. Apparently whoever was in charge of that part, either didn't know he was in charge, or forgot about it, but nothing was arranged for transportation.

So, I have survived a sleepover, the heat, lightning, Open House, and the first day of school. Wow! I'm tired :)

What It Is

It's been a hectic and frustrating 3 weeks since I last posted. A lot has happened that has just had me completely distracted: I found out my pelvis is rotated - ouch! - gotta have special wedges to lie on to fix that; I had a root canal; I burnt my leg on the tail pipe of the bike - NEVER done that before; I caught a summer cold, the heat and humidity is totally out of control, I got my computer back from Geek Squad (minus a couple of parts), I am on the outs with my mother-in-law again (what a surprise!), and I now have a store on Etsy. Now I will attempt to tie all that mess into a coherent blog post, hee hee!

My mother-in-law; I'm not going to go into a lot of detail as I like to keep things positive. Yeah, we all know that life isn't always positive and uplifting, but I don't see the need to wallow in the negative, so I won't  :)  When I said that I'm on the outs with my mother-in-law, I really meant that she is on the outs with me. She is frequently just flat mean to my boys, she bad-mouths me to them, and she pumps them for info; how much time I spend on the computer, do I cook for them or make them get their own food, clean the house, do laundry...stuff like that...very much like a sitcom...hmmm, lol.
She has accused me of 'wearing the pants' in our house, which I find hilarious because if she really knew her son, she would be laughing too. But, what her accusation does for her is shift the blame of any given occurrence of non-compliance by Bobby from him to me. She also makes stuff up when it suits her, which is what has caused this most recent unpleasantness. The bottom line here is that with my mother gone, I and my boys should be able to count on her, and we can't. So I'm done trying to patch up this non-existent relationship, done with accepting insincere apologies, done with eating her burnt, dry dressing at holiday dinners! It is what it is.

And moving on to a much happier topic; I'm so happy to have my computer back :)  It was the graphics card - the built-in fan on the card went out and the whole card was a pile of melted slag on the floor of the computer tower. It was an add-on, so they removed it and I'm making do with the factory one until I get a new one. I had left a DVI adapter connected to it because when I disconnected the monitor, I couldn't get it off, and I left the power cable attached. Guess what my computer came back without? Yep, no power cable and no adapter. I did get them back, though.

My back is finally feeling some better, so I got the computer all hooked up last night, and the next couple of days will be spent getting it updated, etc. And I need it because I am selling Etsy shop graphics on Etsy. Gary's wife Barbie makes fabulous beaded jewelry that she sells there, and she thought I should make and sell banners, etc. So I am, and we'll see what happens :)

Last Friday Mike & Angie and family came over to our house for a cookout, and they brought some yellow squash and zucchini from their garden and it was wonderful! I was out of olive oil, so we sprayed it with olive oil Pam and put salt, pepper and garlic on it and threw it on the grill. Very tasty! Angie also brought over some home-canned bread and butter pickles that were really good. I don't usually care for that variety, but I really liked them. She said she did some dills also, and she would bring me some. Yum! We have both been trying to find a good and simple recipe for peppered dill pickles - there was a lady here in town that used to make them, but she is gone, so we're trying to figure out how to do it. She cut her cucumbers thick and she used fresh dill sprigs, and little red chili peppers, and an assortment of seasonings, and omgosh! they were awesome!! Of course the first time I had them, I was pregnant with Sully, but I had them again after that and they were still awesome, hee hee. So, if anyone has a good, personally tried and true peppered pickle recipe they would like to share, either send me an email or leave it in the comments. 

Ok, I'm going to leave off with a little pearl of wisdom from my 6 year old: "Did you know that girls don't have pee-pees? Nope, they have ra-gi-nas."

Reunions, Puppies and Brownies, Oh My!

Every five years something happens here that hardly happens anywhere else, and it's a big deal. It's called the All Class Reunion and I'm told that our town is one of the few that does it. All motel rooms in 3 other towns were full as well as those here.  I didn't go to school here, but I usually go along with my husband. Oddly enough, I've never been to one of my own. I was in Georgia for my 10 year reunion, and before the next one, I had moved to Kansas. They might have done a 5 year, but I don't recall it, or what I was doing...hmmm...

Last weekend was the big reunion, and everyone got to see everyone. There were slideshows displayed on building walls, several homegrown bands playing at various locations, quiet (and some not-so-quiet) get-togethers in homes, pubs, parks, two beer gardens - just about everywhere all over town. And it was HOT! We were in the middle of a heat advisory which had been going strong all week. That's a lot of hot sweaty people. 

After coming home from his class get-together at the pub, my husband said the sweetest thing to me. He told me he was SO grateful for me and for things that didn't work out. His big crush in high school had been there - roaring drunk -  and it was not a pretty sight. Wonder if anyone got any video??

I mentioned a ginormous new puppy recently, so I thought it would be good to post a picture of him.

and for perspective, here he is with my full-grown Bassett Hound, Ruby Sue

These were taken last week or so, and he's bigger now. He's now 9 weeks old.

The boys decided on Toby for a name. We kind of wanted Schultzie (from Hogans Heroes) since he's German, but the boys didn't like it. They didn't care that he was German,and they didn't know what Hogan's Heroes was. Oh well.

He's a lot of fun, and super sweet. He doesn't like being out of sight of the family, though. He has to have all of us in any given room or he whines and goes looking for the absentees. He camps out on top of the air vents, and wants back inside when it's hot outside. But, he is a giant furball, so you can hardly blame him, there. 

So far he hasn't messed with the lizard enclosure, but Skittles keeps his eye on him just in case. I don't know what he thinks he would do, but he sure does eyeball him and puff out his beard when he comes into the room.

I know this post is a bit scattered, but I just have to share something; Have you ever had Rocky Road Brownies?  I never had before, and I don't care for most Rocky Road ice creams, which is probably why I never paid any attention. I do like marshmallow creme though, so a hot fudge sundae with marshmallow creme does sound good. 

Anyhoo, lately my boys have been on a smores kick. We make them in a 350 degree oven with chocolate chips, and a marshmallow on top of one half of the graham cracker. After 5 minutes, we take them out of the oven and put the other half of the graham cracker on top & voila! Smores!  

Well, I still had chocolate chips and marshmallows, but was out of graham crackers. But I did have a brownie mix up in my cupboard, so I made the brownies and when they were 5 minutes from being done, I put some chocolate chips on top and I cut up some of the marshmallows and put them on top of that and put them back into the oven for the remaining 5 minutes. Oh my goodness! They were yummie!  Kinda messy, but still yummie  :) 

In fact, I'm thinking I need to do that again real soon, only get some mini marshmallows. Yeah, that would work better...

Garden Transplants

"Have you ever had one of them days, boy, have you ever had one of them days? When nothin' is right from morning 'til night, have you ever had one of them days?..." Those are lyrics from an old Elvis song in the movie GI Blues, if you didn't already know that. My mom was a true-blue Elvis fan, and I listened to a lot of him growing up. 

Every time I have one of those days, I think about that song, and I hear it in my head. My roots are no doubt one of the biggest reasons I really liked Jason Lee's new show Memphis Beat on TNT. His character is a big Elvis fan. I really did enjoy the show and am looking forward to the next episode. The nice thing about shows not on ABC, NBC, or CBS is that they get a fair chance at succeeding. So, I'm hoping for a long run for this one.

I'm having one of those days actually, which is why I have the song running around in my mind. I somehow got my lower back out of whack almost 3weeks ago now, and my chiropractor has been busy putting it back. For about a week, I thought it was just about better, but then I woke up this past Sunday morning and it was as if all that progress never happened. I think it was lugging around the new and HUGE German Shepherd puppy we have that knocked it back out...hmmmm...

Anyway, I'm walking like Fred Sanford (Redd Foxx) and the only comfortable position for any length of time is lying down. You can't get much done that way, and it's starting to wear out my patience and my nerves. I now have a greater appreciation for people with chronic back trouble, for certain. I'm feeling a wee bit cranky, and having some trouble finding my joy, and I don't like it! 

So, when one of those random small-townish things happens, (like old guys driving their lawn mowers down the road for whatever myriad of reasons there are for that, and actually causing a traffic jam of 8 cars) it makes me want to scream. Rolling the windows down first, of course, so everyone can hear me lose my mind. Or, because my back hurts when I bend over or down to pick something up, I am constantly dropping things...or cleaning up something on the floor...ugh! And these cursed brick streets!! Charming to look at, yes, but secretly a devious method of torture, I'm thinking.

I did have one bright spot in an otherwise poopie day, however, that made up for the rest of it. A sales rep for an office supply company stopped in as she does from time to time, and we got to talking. We discovered a bit of common ground in that we are both transplants from larger gardens. I, of course came here from California, and she came from Houston, Texas, out of a desire to live in a more rural area, and smaller community. It was really fun exchanging our culture-shock stories and comparing notes on everything we had to learn here.

Some of those lessons are as follows:

1- People here are wavers, and they expect you to wave back. If you don't, you're anti-social. So wave, even if you don't know who they are. 

2- Toilets are called stools here. 

3- Dinner is lunch,and supper is dinner - breakfast is still breakfast. 

4- Your driving reflects directly upon how you are viewed as a person; they know your car, and they will talk. 

5- Your business is not your own; everybody knows your business better than you do, and if you keep to yourself, stay out of trouble, they will make stuff up. 

6- Stop lights and stop signs are suggestions, just like turn signals. 

7- Your designated trash day is also a suggestion - it could be any day after that day or maybe the following week, and complaining most likely won't help you out any. 

8- Don't ever, under any circumstances park your new shiny car way out in the Wal Mart parking lot by itself unless you want it to be hit by a shopping cart or have someone deliberately park their pile of junk so close you have to crawl in on the passenger side. 

9- The contents of your shopping cart will be scrutinized and commented on. 

10- Your neighbors will not pretend they didn't see you in your jammies and your hair in a towel trying to wrangle your dogs in the house at 6 am - they will instead wave and make sure you know they saw you.

Just a few examples of the quirky-ness here, but in all honesty, people are friendly, and genuinely concerned and interested. So when they ask you how your parents are doing, it's sincere. And when there is a need, these people respond! It does remind me of Mayberry from the old Andy Griffith show sometimes :)

Blueberry Dump Cake Recipe

My friend Angie asked me to post my recipe for Blueberry Dump Cake here, so I am obliging :)  It's so simple, it's ridiculous! Most people know how to do a dump cake,I guess-traditionally it's cherry & pineapple, but I don't really like that combination, so I decided that blueberries would be better. Also, when we went camping two summers ago with Angie's family and our friend Angela's family on her parents property, her mother made some absolutely fabulous blueberry desert in a dutch oven. It's haunted me ever since hee hee, so this somewhat satisfies that particular craving.

I'm posting what I did, but you can change it up however you want.

So here we go:

4 cups blueberries - can be frozen or fresh, canned too probably if you don't have anything else available

1 Lemon cake mix DRY- 2 if your 9 x 13 pan seems larger like mine does

1/2 cup sugar

1 Tsp Cinnamon

1 stick butter - 2 if you are making a larger pan

Oven at 350

*Note, this is not a regular cake, so be sure to use a shallow pan (ie, no bundt cake pans), and don't follow the directions on the cake mix  :)

Combine your blueberries with sugar & cinnamon in the bottom of your pan. Sprinkle your cake mix over the top getting good coverage. Slice up your stick butter and place it on top of the dry cake mix. I sliced mine thin so I could get good coverage with just one stick, lol Then bake for 50 minutes if your blueberries are frozen, 30-40 if using fresh. If you're using canned, you might start checking after 20. The top should not be gooey, so just keep checking it until the top is light golden and not sticky to the touch, and kind of feels like a sugar cookie. That's it! Easy-peasy!

I made this last Sunday night to take to church. Sunday evenings are relaxed get-togethers, plus we had a missionary from Colombia visiting. I divided it into two pans-my large 9 x 13, and a smaller one , size unknown , that I inherited from my mom.  (Both of my 9x13's say what size they are on the bottom, but one of the two is deeper than the other, and just enough larger that I can nestle the other one inside it - go figure!) I used a whole bag of frozen blueberries and divided them between the two pans. I used two sticks of butter, and then just kind of guessed at the amounts of sugar & cinnamon. You can make this using a yellow cake mix or white, but the lemon just kind of sets off the blueberries, in my opinion, so if you aren't into the flavor of lemon, use something else. You just might want to adjust the amount of sugar you use as it might be too sweet - definitely adjust it down if your pan is small.

If you try it, I'd love to hear how it turned out, so feel free to leave comments or email me. Oddly enough, hardly anyone leaves comments, but I get lot's of emails lol.

Parade Photos

I thought it might be fun to post some of the pictures I took of our Good Ol' Days Parade. It was the 29th year for our annual festival. I don't know where it stands as far as being one of the oldest celebrations of it's kind in the area or whatever, but it's not alone. There are several, with Joplin's Boomtown Days being the biggest, at least for the 4 State Area, which is what we are called. I'm pretty sure it's because the name '4 corners' is already taken, that and our corners don't line up very well...

My hubby & kids are in there, but you can't really see them very good. 

It's ok-I know they're there  :)

Part of the color guard - and a good shot of our brickstreets.

Dolly the Trolley...except that now we have two of them so I'm not sure if the other one has a name...

They do run tours, and around Halloween they run a haunted one that sounds like a lot of fun.

A 1955 Chevy Limo that used to be a funeral car and belonged to my boss, Mike. 

A couple of firetrucks, and my Gary & Barbie's son Alex...say Hi Alex!

A guy on a vintage bike, which is the Good Ol' Days icon...looks uncomfortable, huh?

Ok, the stars are to preserve peeps' anonymity, etc. ...This just struck me as funny, so I had to post it. If you are the owner of this backside and would prefer I remove this from my blog, just contact me ;)

A truck towing a boat...

 

Some more firetrucks...

Big guy, little car....

a looong line of tractors

antiques

my friend Jenni and Kaylie, my friend Angie's daughter

and the horses bring up the rear of the parade, for obvious reasons, which until a few years ago, it apparently wasn't obvious to the organizers, because the horses were scattered throughout the entire parade.

awww...mini's are so cute, but baby mini's are adorable!

and there's the end of it - our grand parade  :)

There were a few more tractors, and other random entries such as all the trucks and cars with state and local candidates for various offices -I didn't take any pictures of them. They can campaign on their own blogs!

So there you have it, a small-town-Kansas-style parade.

As cheesey as it might seem, this little parade is a big deal to the kids who get to ride in it, and that makes it totally worth it. If at no other time in their lives, for that little while they got to be celebrities, with all eyes on them. 

How cool is that??