August already?!?

I love my job and one reason is because of SUMMER.  And August is farm market time.  This basil plant is outside my own front door though and this year I tried making blender basil pesto.

My deluxe 33 year old blender did a fine job.  I know it is this old because it was a wedding gift we received 33 years ago!  Gold was obviously an 'in' color back in '78.

I poured it into this jar and then froze it.  Isn't it a beautiful green?  When it thaws I can add the parmesan and romano cheese and use it over pasta.  The basil plant has already grown almost as big in 2 weeks, so I'm going to make another batch tomorrow.

This is the biggest and greenest caterpillar I've ever seen.  It was crawling close to my basil plant.  No idea what it will be.

Last Thursday I walked the farm market and found what I thought were the best beans and the best price to make dilly beans.  This is my first batch of 7 jars.  I may have time to make another batch, but I also want to make regular pickles, pickled hot peppers and pepper jelly and August is already flying by.

Oh, here's a cute couple I saw when I was in Cambridge in July.  Don't they look happy and expectant?

In the pink

Well this title has nothing to do with the sex of a certain baby, who now I hear will be made known in a week or so.  Actually it is the realization that as far as flowers go, it is my preferred hue.  I used to labor over what flowers to buy for my yard and several years ago I figured out that pinks were what I liked.  So it has made flower buying much easier now.  Here's a shot of my whiskey barrel impatiens and my mother in law's old laundry tub that I plant in now.

I am officially on summer break now and today is Nels' 30th birthday.  I woke up that Sunday morning and told Bob that we would not be going to church as usual.  We sat on the living room floor, played cards, timed contractions and went in around 5:00 in the afternoon.  He was born at 10:56.  It was a wonderful day and I was able to stay then in the hospital until Wednesday.  I ordered my meals from the cafeteria, nursed the baby, took sitz baths and relaxed before the real world hit!!  And here it is, 30 years later...

New Baby

 Here is a picture of my ESL colleague and her new family.  Meg is the same age as Nels and we've worked together for 5 years.  She was my EA for 2 years and then went back and got her MAESL and has now been an ESL teacher for 3 years.  I love this girl like my daughter.  So I guess I'm kind of like a grandma! Ha!  Mason is sooooo...cute and he has wonderful parents.

The bad news?  Our school district is dumb!  They have cut 120 teachers, Meg being one of them.  They especially hit the ESL department, even reaching up to tenured teachers.  These are the kids who need the extra help and that's where we're cutting?  I think they're counting on the parents not speaking up.  Well we're organizing, writing letters, attending meetings, getting parents involved and if this new Mom is not in my building next year, I will be one sad girl!

Earth Day

I'm not handing out a flower because of Earth Day.  This was a couple years ago in April when our school handed out coffee, doughnuts and a flower to any of our volunteers as they drove by the front of school on their way to work.  It's a tradition now and this is what I'll be doing Tuesday morning.  This year Earth Day is on the same day as Good Friday, so two things to ponder and commemorate in some way today.  If the weather was only cooperative, I'd hang out my laundry.  Hope you have a nice Easter weekend.

Theater Week

    

Last Friday I went to the History Theater in St. Paul for my SEED class to see "As American as Curry Pie".  A one woman show performed by the writer herself.  Really good, but I was really tired.  Betsy and I went to "The Wizard of Oz" at the Burnsville High School last night.  Really good, but too long.  I guess when you know the ending, the last scenes can drag.  But excellent play, probably just tired again.  (Is there a theme here?)  Sunday we are going to Augsburg to see Marit in "Anything Goes". 



Over Spring Break I walked into TJMaxx and saw this big green dragonfly and had to have it for the house.  It's a good spring/summer decoration after all the wreaths and miscellaneous winter decor.  Now if we could only get the weather to act springy.  (Snowing as I write this :( not happy)

What I Did On My Spring Vacation

I may actually make some of my students write this very essay on Monday.  Here's some of what I did.  Monday I had my chiropractor appointment.  Afterward I went to Half Price Books and bought 2 books and 5 CD's.  I found the sound tracks to West Side Story, Showboat, Fiddler on the Roof, and South Pacific.  On Tuesday I took my niece Jessica out for lunch and we chatted for couple hours.  I also did some shopping!  I went to Kohl's with 15% off and bought a rug, a shirt, earrings, sandals and something else.  I spent just over $50 so I got a $10 cash coupon, which I used on Friday to buy some new sunglasses!  Then I went to DSW and used a $20 off $50 coupon.  I found the Eastland shoes I love in BLACK!!  They were on sale for $60 marked another 30% off and I also bought some Teva sandals on sale and scored another bargain!!  Wednesday I drove down to Northfield to get a cut and color.  Thursday I went to the mall with Bob's gift certificate from work and bought him shirts and pants for work.  On the way out of Macy's I stopped at the Origins counter.  The dermatologist told me to get GOOD sunscreen for my face.  I ended up buying one of their moisturizers with sunscreen and a serum with natural bleaching agents.  Laser treatments on my sun damaged spots are expensive, so I thought I'd try something that cost less.  Still on those 2 items I spent just under $100.  She did give me a free sample of the moisturizer for my purse and another sample of their cleansing scrub.  She could tell I don't exfoliate!  Friday I spent at home cooking a turkey, taking it off the bone, and boiling the carcass for soup.  I also made Ole some homemade dogfood, which I took a picture of.  I also took a picture of me and my sun damaged spots.  We'll see if that serum makes a difference in a month or 2 :)  Check out my scarf.  Grandma O. gave me some square silk scarves, about 20" by 20" years ago.  I've been wearing them the last year a lot.  I'm not a fashionable sort, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't like to be!!  So I didn't accomplish too much, but I had a chance to relax, read a little bit and walk the dog. Ready for work tomorrow...........

Genius!!

Here is a picture of the Mexican shrimp.  It was frozen raw, instead of precooked like the smaller bags usually are.  I marinated it in oil, soy sauce, lemon juice, garlic and Old Bay Seasoning.  Definitely the best kind of shrimp we've ever had.  I prefer this over the prawns.  (Bigger shrimp)  Very tasty and lots of leftovers!








So I took a picture of my plate.  I totally forgot to take pictures on Saturday night when we had the swordfish kabobs.  Bob invited the neighbors over and Hans was here, so I wasn't thinking about the camera!    

So....my stroke of genius was finding a recipe for
granola muffins.  I baked them this morning and they
were good.  I was thinking about spreading the granola in the back yard for the birds because of the off taste of the walnuts, but baking took care of that.  I still have a couple cups of granola left over, so I'll
probably still give the birds a treat!  Happy last day of March!!