Lost and Found

This may be the only thing we haven't lost! We are having a run of bad luck recently with lost checkbooks and earrings... misplaced I should say because those were found. Now it's something REALLY important. Something that can't be easily replaced. Hubby is upset, I'm very upset. We used this item almost daily and now it's gone, GONE. Disappeared from the Earth, poof! The last time we saw it was Sunday afternoon before the kids came over for dinner. After they left Hubby settled down in his favorite chair, turned on the History Channel and realized it was gone. We took cushions out, we looked under furniture. Had it just grew legs and walked off or maybe, just maybe we had put it away? THAT is unlikely!

We have a special place in the entertainment center, an "Aches and Pains" drawer. You don't have an Aches and Pains drawer? Inside this drawer resides the buckwheat heating pad, the corn heating pad...poker chips, checkers and cards. The games don't get much action, but the heat pads...well, let's just say they see daylight a lot these days! Missing from the drawer is a rice bag. It was handmade by me, the idea from my SISTER-in-law way back in the 1970's. I think we may have used it once during that decade. Maybe twice or 3X during the 1980's. We were 40's during the 1990's so that's when it came to live in the family room.

I don't know where it got off to, but I know what I'm going to make this week. You need to save the directions below, you may not need it now, but you will someday...

Click on the picture for a link to Skip to my Lou! Cindy has a great tutorial on making this wonderful little bag that would make great Christmas gifts. It can be used for aches and pains or my favorite use...warmed and laying at my feet while I'm blogging!

Virtual Vacations and a $100 Prize!

Mornings I check my email, make sure my blog posted, then see what's going on at Chickens in the Road, Tales from the CoopKeeper and Purple Chocolat Home. Sometimes, there's a fight brewing. Sometimes there's a Menopausal Meltdown. And sometimes when I'm lucky, I get to go to Hogsmeade Village, visit Hogswart School and partake in chocolate cauldrons from Honeyduke's.  

Yesterday I was making my "rounds," curled up on the couch in my pink robe, coffee in hand when I read on Jacqueline's blog Purple Chocolat Home that I was the winner of the $100 gift certificate from Macy's! I nearly dropped my coffee and I could barely type as I scrolled down to comment!

Macy's is an iconic destination for Christmas. If you are lucky enough to live close to one, you know first hand the fabulous holiday displays are the stuff that dreams are made of. We shopped at the Macy's in Sacramento, California when we lived there early 1970's. We would mostly "window shop," but the sales were good enough that we were able to buy a beautiful china hutch that we enjoyed many years. It now lives with our youngest daughter Amy in Texas. Every Christmas when we decorate the trees, I love to unwrap the special ornaments that mean so much to me. One of those ornaments was bought at Macy's nearly 40 years ago.

We haven't put our trees up yet, but when we do...I'll share that little Angel with you!

Thanks again Jacqueline for a wonderful giveaway,  I can't wait to do some online shopping!

Mom's Apple Pie

GRANDson Gavin was riding with us last weekend to Mom and Dad Tilton's house. It's a small trip, about 25 miles over to Fayetteville. We were trying to get him to do a little math in his head so we asked, "How many pies do you think Great~Grandma has made in her lifetime? She's 86 now and hardly a week goes by that she doesn't make a pie (or 2) a cake, or cookies. Great~Grandpa is nearly 90 but his appetite is mid~30's! They have been married 63 years and if she has made two pies a week like I'm guessing, that's 6,552 pies! Some weeks she didn't make any though, but she made up for those weeks when the church had a potluck and she took 3! Anyway you figure, she has had a LOT of practice!

They have an Arkansas Black apple tree in their backyard and it really did well this year with a bumper crop. Arkansas Blacks are an antique apple, an heirloom variety that has stood the test of time for keeping well and staying firm as long as they are stored in a cool garage or basement. She's been putting sliced apples down in the freezer for weeks now for pies.

I've watched as she put on her apron with the big pockets, pulled out the green Tupperware bowl and started peeling apples, one by one. She never measures anything so it's a handful of sugar and sprinkling of spice. A few turns of the apples and she places them into an old Pyrex pie pan that she's used hundreds of times. It didn't take her more than 10 minutes to stir up the crust and roll it out, into the oven it goes and it's not long until the house smells of cinnamon and goodness.

Life zips by us, this year especially. Don't let another day go by without a slice of pie. Make one or just buy it and bake for the ones you love. It's one of the memories that you'll hold close to your heart!