Choice Morsels

The Mama Kat challenge today is, "What's better? Being a kid or an adult? List 10 reasons for your choice." Photo from Pixabay When I was a kid, getting to be "grown-up" seemed optimal. Now that I'm a grown-up, I see many advantages of being a kid I didn't fully appreciate at the time: 1)  Less to worry about. The biggest worry I had as a kid was whether or not I was liked well enough for someone to want to trade papers with me. It seemed huge then, but, looking back, it was trivial. I just didn't have the judgement to know it. 2)  I didn't have to earn money. My whole profession was going to school and learning stuff for free. 3)  Related to earning no money is having no bills. 4)  Being a kid was a life with minimal demands. I did have a few household chores to be responsible for, such as changing my bed or helping hang laundry outside and taking turns washing dishes with my sisters, but really my time was my own the ma

Today's Good Eating recipe is for Oriental Ramen Noodle Salad.  Sometimes also called, "Asian Ramen Salad," it's quick & easy to put together using a combination of packaged slaw, sliced almonds, green onions, minced bell pepper, frozen peas, Mandarin oranges, Ramen noodles and a delicious sweet-sour vinaigrette! This recipe is one I devised by combining the best of 2 or 3 different Pinterest recipes for it, so what I'm sharing today is now my own recipe! The Air Force kids who came over on Sunday loved it! A few who normally dislike traditional mayonnaise-coated slaw, raved over this salad and had seconds! I served this salad with slow-cooker Hawaiian pulled pork sandwiches. (Photo my own salad) Oriental Ramen Noodle Salad Ingredients: 2 packages of slaw mix, any style 2 packages of Ramen noodles 5-6 green onions, minced (or more to taste ) 1/2 cup frozen peas, thawed 1/2 cup finely minced bell pepper, any color 1 4oz package sliced alm

The Mama Kat challenge I selected today was to share, "A memorable lesson I learned from my Dad that still sticks with me today." An amusing picture of Bette Davis from Pinterest During the nearly 5 years I was in the Air Force, I never owned a car.  Once I got out of service, returned home and was planning to go off to college in the fall, then I needed one. So I finally bought car. Before I was going to go driving off to live on my own, though, my Dad wanted to make sure I knew all the basics of car care: 1)  How to Change a Tire.  He made sure I knew where the jack and lug wrench were stored in the wheel well, how to properly place the jack plus block another wheel and how to use the lug wrench. (I had already purchased a 4-way lug wrench because I felt it would provide me better leverage for the task, should I ever be called upon to do change a flat.)  2)  How to Check Fluids.  He showed me where the oil dip stick was and how to check it. And the tra

Apparently, last Friday night, June 17, there was a major wind storm here. Just a straight-line wind.  We were in the house, watching a DVD. There wasn't any sound of rain or thunder. We didn't know anything was going on outside. We just abruptly saw the power flicker 3 times, then go off for a few seconds and come right back on, but we didn't think anything of it. That is a fairly common occurrence during the high A/C usages of summer.   On Saturday morning we walked out to the car to go someplace and were shocked to discover our Aspen tree in the front yard, fallen over sideways against the power line! We were astonished! This tree has weathered numerous tropical storms and hurricanes over the past 25 years and suddenly--this? Hubby promptly called the power company and because the tree was on line between the poles, they were responsible for removing it! (Whew! What a relief! Tree removable is expensive!) So here's a photo of our Aspen with the power compan

Have you been following this Between the Lines series about Women bloggers over the age of 50? This is week 9, the final week! To read interesting trivia about each of this weeks featured Bloggers, go here , to their interviews! Scroll to the bottom for the link list to all their individual blog posts on how and why they got into blogging! No favorites this week, though I always find it amazing how many clever names people come up with for blogs! I, too, participated in this series and if you missed my article on how and why I got into blogging,  read it here! *** Be sure to stop back for my regular Garden Pics featured every Wednesday! This week I've got a good shot of a tree a recent wind storm knocked over!

I've been trying new Pinterest recipes fairly often to build-up a good inventory for posts, so I tried this one a couple weeks ago: S low-Cooker Cheesy Bacon Ranch Potatoes! It's a tasty side dish. The potatoes were very tender & cheesy. The recipe only calls for 1 Tablespoon of Ranch Seasoning. It said "or to taste," but without having ever made it, who would know? So, I tell you 1 Tablespoon IS NOT enough. 2 or 3 Tablespoons PLUS at least 1 glove of minced garlic would greatly improve this dish, so for this recipe, I'll be adding that to the ingredient list! I'm also suggesting Hormel Real Bacon Bits for a quick way to have bacon without the mess of cooking it! This recipe originally comes from this blog . Slow Cooker Cheesy Bacon Ranch Potatoes Ingredients : 1/4 cup Hormel Real Bacon Bits ( or 6 slices, cooked, cooled & crumbled.) 3 lbs red potatoes, chopped into 1 inch size chunks 1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese (I used Kraft 2% milk

Today's "find" is another beautiful Florida State Park in my special series:  Payne's Prairie Preserve State Park ! Located just south of Gainesville, Payne's Prairie is 21,000 acres of marsh prairie. In 1774 it was visited by famous artist & naturalist William Bartram who dubbed it the "Alachua Savannah," when he wrote about it in his book, "Bartram's Travels." It became Florida's first preserve in 1971. To visit Payne's Prairie is to see Florida as it was prior to the arrival of European settlers & much work has been done to the park to restore it's waterways to it's original pristine state. The Preserve is home to a wide array of native wild animals & reptiles, plus 270 species of birds AND small wild herds of Bison, Cracker Cattle & Cracker Horses.   Cracker Cattle & Horses are descendants  of original Spanish horses & cattle brought to new world. They are historically native to F

The Mama Kat challenge this week is to share, "10 things on this summers' to-do list." This list, arranged in no particular order, reflects things I'd like accomplish, which I may or may not get done: #1)  Collect & save seed from various garden flowers for next year's use. #2) Make blackberry jam with this year's blackberries I've collected. #3) Order new feather bed pillows and Suncast brand quick edging. (accomplished) Suncast Quick Edging #4)  Finish current garden edging projects once the edging arrives, a project that may run into fall. My ultimate goal is to edge all my flower beds with this stuff for easier long-term maintenance. #5)  Make a dessert with the blueberries I saved this year sometime in the near future. #6)  Harvest tomatoes, squash & hopefully melon from veggie garden and decide what to do with it all. (Especially all the yellow tomatoes!) #7)  Clear out summer garden by end of August to

For today's Garden Pics: First, a fair shot of a Red-Headed Woodpecker on my squirrel proof feeder.  They're coloring makes them easy to identify. He may not be able to get inside the feeder, but his long beak allows him to reach through and get a tasty sunflower seed! The Red-Bellied Woodpeckers do the same! Next: My Dark Blue Hydrangea! It is actually a bit deeper blue then captured by my camera. This has been my best year yet for a good show of  multiple bloom heads on nearly all my hydrangeas!  The secret is not to hedge or cut them after July! (Since my friend mentioned it: I read on Pinterest it helps Hydrangea be more blue if you bury a few copper pennies near the roots, so I did bury a couple by each blue.) **** Be sure to stop back tomorrow to see what's up for Mama Kat!

The Between the Lines series is still on going! So, if you want to read the various profiles of June's +50 Women Bloggers, here's the link to the profile interview page!  If you scroll down to the bottom there's a clickable list to their individual posts on how and why they got in blogging at an older age!  Week 7 +50 Bloggers Equine Guided Growth was my favorite!  A horse farm retreat in France? Who wouldn't love that? Many featured Bloggers are international! And since I missed posting Week 6 because I had other things going on here's the Week 6 +50 Bloggers , too! To catch up with all the Between the Lines featured Bloggers, go to Katherine's Corner for full the list of links! **** I'll be posting links for the series here on Tuesdays till the end of June! See you for Garden Pic Wednesday!

Have you seen Zootopia? Even if you haven't, the ad for the film featuring slow Sloths working at the Department of Motor Vehicles scene was heavily promoted.  It was a direct, rather pointed poke-of-fun at the real DMV, which sometimes has a reputation for being slow. The other night, at a going-away dinner for one of the Air Force guys in our Bible Study, we asked the 19 year-old young lady across from us, who still lives at home with her family, how getting her driver's license was going. (It's her first driver's license, by the way.) She explained that the DMV here has a 30-day waiting list for driver's license applications and she was still waiting for her name to come up. I said," So, we REALLY do have Sloths working at our DMV !" I got a good round of laughs for that one! *** Today's Good Eating Recipe is Pineapple Fluff! Like Green Fluff, also known as Watergate Salad, Pineapple Fluff also known as Pineapple Salad, is basically the s

Have you ever walked in your sleep? Photo from Pixabay Actually, I have. More then once. In this particular experience I'm going to share today, I do remember the details of my actions, but I remember them like an observer. It was like my conscious mind was just a passenger, watching what I was doing in a vehicle being driven by my unconscious. Perhaps it's because I'm a lucid dreamer by nature. Lucid dreamers are aware they are dreaming. When we were kids, my two younger sisters and I shared a bedroom. It was a large, spacious room. I slept in a full-size double bed and my sisters had the bunk-bed. Now this bunk bed was not your average store-bought type. This bunk bed was a huge, heavy wood one constructed by our Dad. The mattresses for it seemed a bit wider then your average single-size mattress, so they were plenty roomy. I had a penchant for wanting to sleepwalk myself into the lower bunk bed. In this particular instance, it was younger sister sleeping

Blackberries are on!  We're picking handfuls daily and have collected a pint already! So today's Garden Pic is a collage showing both blossom & berry: These are upright, thornless blackberries that range in height between 4 and 5 feet tall. (They have to be tied up) I fertilized them well last year, so the berries are big and fat this year. For best results, I dig in some granular garden fertilizer around the roots after fruiting is finished to nourish the new growth, then again in middle fall before it's cold. Today's Garden project was cleaning up the large back rain garden. It needed a bit of raking & weeding, a little thinning out of the Flag Iris and Liriope and the addition of some fresh river pebbles. *** Stop back tomorrow for Mama Kat to hear a good sleepwalking story!

It's Monday! It's sunny now, but was raining from the western fringe of a tropical storm moving over eastern Florida.  It was getting a little dry, so the steady drizzle has been good! Today's Good Eating recipe is a Pinterest recipe for meatless  Tortellini meat that I converted into a "Loaded" Tortellini meal by adding leftover grilled steak & more veggies!   It's a great recipe for home grown garden tomatoes, any color, and fresh Basil!  Hubby does NOT like meatless meals and I had leftovers to use up in the frig! This tortellini recipes really lends itself to any sort of upgrade you want to make to it and is terrific for using with anything you have on hand or want to use for meat: chicken, beef, pork, shrimp,wieners, kielbasa--whatever! The original meatless recipe is available here @  McCormick . Photo is of the original meatless version from McCormick Loaded Basil & Garlic Tortellini 1 8oz package Tortellini, boiled & dr

T he Mama Kat writing challenge today is a "College Memory." After 4 years in the Air Force, I decided I was ready for college, so I was older then most of my fellow students, who were right out of high school. My first semester of college was in the fall 1980. The year John Lennon died. That alone sent a memorable wave of grief over the school population. I was enrolled in a 2-year Commercial Art program. It was a small country college. The class wasn't big. Maybe 20 students in my graphic art classes. I remember this one guy was obsessed with the band "KISS" and, anytime he could, he made them the center of his art. He was apparently great at drawing KISS; less great at anything else. My instructors were both commercial artists who'd worked in the field before becoming college teachers. Brad Rock was one of them. He was new that year. A blond, forty-ish guy taking on a room full of greenhorn artist wannabe's. One day that first semester,

Today I worked on the flower bed that's just above the veggie garden, weeding out weedy pesky tuffs of grass, laying down newspaper among the rows of flower stems, then mowing and scattering the mulch over the paper.  Here in Florida, where it's so hot and can run dry, a mulching helps retain moisture in the soil. I also noticed nematode damage on the Roma tomato and cut away that stem portion, saving what green tomatoes it had. (Tomatoes are one fruit that will ripen in the house! Today's Garden Pics: Lots of summer flowers means nice vases of garden bloom for my table: This vase has blue hydrangea, gladiolas & black-eyed susans! Other Summer Blooms: Here we have pretty Fushia colored 4 O'Clocks blooming next to a  thistle-like Sea Holly!  They make an interesting texture together! I keep meaning to snip some of the Sea Holly for my vase!  And My Favorite 4 O'Clock: Limelight! It has citron green leaves and dark Fushia flo