Oh, Man, Is It Windy!

Last night whenever I got up to go to the bathroom (twice) I could hear the wind whipping around the house and all day the wind was just crazy strong. It was trash pickup day and I noticed that the neighbors' trash bins all blew over once they were emptied. I wasn't going to go outside because it was 27 degrees and made much colder by the strong wind but then I realized when I took my shower this morning that my shower curtain was stained and mildewed and I was tired of it so I went to Bed Bath and Beyond for a new one. They sure don't have much to choose from but I got the plainest, non-solid, white curtain that I could find. And it was on sale. Whoop!

I baked the WW Cheesecake with a Brownie Crust today. I couldn't believe that something like that could be so few points (1 for the crust and 1 for the cheesecake top) so I ran the recipes through the create function on the WW website and, yep, that's the right points total per serving. I was supposed to make it in a 9" pie plate or a springform pan but when I poured the brownie crust into that size pie plate (I don't have a springform pan) it looked like it was almost full so there would be no room for the cheesecake part so I poured it into a 9" square pan. Much better. Once it was baked and cooled I was supposed to let it sit in the fridge for 12 hours to let the flavors mature but I confess that I just went and cut it into sections and ate one. It was lovely and tasted like cheesecake without a speck of cheese in it. You use a small box of Jello Sugar Free Cheesecake flavor pudding, eggs, vanilla, sweetener, and Greek yogurt for the filling and it is awesome. I can't wait to serve it to my guests tomorrow night to see what they say.

Today was the last day of NaNoWriMo and I had the smallest word count of the month today but still went just over the minimum. All in all I hit 54,301 words. The novel's not done, I'm not even sure if what I have qualifies as a novel, but I'll keep working on it and see what turns up.

In Sketching the next page was these two wine glasses with ties on. They were easy to draw.

Next in How To Draw People was this ballerina. She has a smaller companion but I ran out of page so I'm drawing them one at a time.

The daily art page said to turn these paint splodges into birds. That was fun to take brush pens and add beaks, feet, and feathers to the little paint marks and turn them into birdies.

 

Oh, birds. I looked out to see this quartet of Starlings squabbling over the suet pellets. Then I looked at the grass and there had to be at least 50 Starlings all over the back yard. Naturally as soon as I got the camera into position to take their picture they all flew off but it was the most birds I think I've ever seen in the yard.

More Christmas prezzies came today. One of these days I should start wrapping so I don't have to do it all in one day closer to THE day.

Tomorrow I have to clean the house, at least vacuum and clean the bathroom, I'm having guests. Oh, and empty the dishwasher too. Then I have to go to Zambaldi to get beer for refreshments. I wonder how beer and cheesecake go together. We'll find out.

--Barbara

Can You Say Dreary?

It was so overcast today that I had the light on in the kitchen just so I could keep my spirits up. It threatened rain all day and kind of spit raindrops around in the afternoon but just about an hour ago there was a pretty good burst of rain. There's a pretty good wind too. Yuk. Although I'm glad that it wasn't snow.

Two of the Christmas cactus buds have bloomed simultaneously! And it looks like one of the others is fixing to bloom too. This is my year!

Writing went pretty well today. I think I might have finally had an idea now that there's only one more day of NaNoWriMo left but that doesn't mean that I'll stop working on the manuscript. It just means that I probably won't work on it every day.

I ate an apple while writing this afternoon and decided to try to draw my apple core. It kind of looks like my apple core. I should have done more shading to denote the planes and angles but it's not too bad. I have to practice drawing things not copying things.

Then I turned the page in Seuss-isms to find this guy upset because there's a spot on his towel. I think I'm getting the hang of Dr. Seuss hair on his little guys. Now that I say that the next time won't go so well.

Look what came in the mail today. My first Christmas card of the season. *sigh* I guess that means that Christmas really is coming. Besides I got three big boxes from Amazon with all kinds of presents in them and only one something for me. Christmas is definitely on the way since next Thursday is December 1 already.

 

I decided that I needed something new to knit. Something with pretty variegated yarn and I had just the yarn in mind and already wound into a cake. So I dug out a shawl pattern and cast on. This is really skinny yarn and small needles but it's pretty mindless knitting so far. That, of course, will change when I'm done with this first part but I've made this shawl before with thicker yarn and bigger needles so I know that I can do this. The colors are blending together more than I'd like but I still like the way it's looking.

Tomorrow I get to make WW cheesecake so the flavor can meld before I need to serve it on Thursday night when friends come over to knit. Man, I hope it turns out. Fingers crossed.

--Barbara

Just One of Those Days

Today was one of those days that got away from me. You know that I'm a slow starter of a morning so I don't really get moving on my day until after 10 o'clock so the morning is kinda shot. I sat down to write as soon as I got dressed because I had an appointment in the afternoon which is my usual writing time. I didn't make the daily quota today. I am 56 words short but I just ran out of steam. That's okay because even with not making the full quota I am 775 words over 50,000 as of today. Woohoo!

The daily art page had a fish outline that it said to color. Actually it said "colour" it in. The author is either British or Canadian, I guess. I can color or colour, I have enough colored (coloured) pencils for either one.

When I went out to top up the birdbath I could hear a lot of birds but when I looked around I didn't see them. Then I looked up at the neighbor's tree. There were all of the Starlings just waiting for me to go indoors so they could swoop down and raid the seeds and suet.

I got to spend some time with OJ this afternoon. We did some drawing and played with Legos and played a word game on the iPad that he likes playing. The only decent thing I drew with him was this arrow crab. Once again I proved that I can copy someone else's drawing but I suck at original drawings. I will not be showing you that one.

Then after supper I pulled out How to Draw People and started copying the figures on the later pages.  Today's opposites were Tall and Short. I love how disgruntled the short guy looks.

And that's it for my day. It got up into the mid-40s so it wasn't bitter cold when I was out running around but it wasn't warm either. I guess I'm stuck in my winter coat for the foreseeable future.

--Barbara

I Saw Some

 There were still lots of peanuts in the peanut wreath this morning and I was sitting at the table long enough to see this squirrel leap up to grab the wreath and wriggle out a nut. They are so fast that it's hard to catch them at it but sometimes I can manage.

Then a Downy Woodpecker came to peck on the suet cakes. There has been a huge flock of Starlings in the neighborhood this last week and they were in the yard. I took their picture but it just looks like dark blobs in with the leftover leaves and browning grass so I deleted it. They also like the suet pellets and flap their wings like crazy to hold on long enough to snatch a nibble. Again I wasn't fast enough to take a picture.

Writing went okay today. I put one of the guests in an embarrassing situation and let her try to deal with it. She didn't do a very good job of it but I got a lot of words out of her uneasiness. Then I sent both guests snorkeling which tacked on the last few hundred words I needed to hit my daily goal with a few extras for padding. I'm less than one thousand words from fifty thousand with three more days to go. I don't have a complete story and I don't know where it's going but I have a lot of words. Some of them I've used more than once. 😉

The bird today in Draw Like an Artist was a Bird of Paradise. I don't think that I did the tail correctly but it turned out all right.

Then I turned to the next page in 10-Steps: Everyday Things to find a skateboard and tennis shoes. I made the tennis shoes red because I like red shoes. I have a lot of red shoes but I won't be jumping onto a skateboard anytime soon.

I added a few rounds onto the latest Toe Cap while I watched the last two episodes of The Great British Baking Show. I got wrapped up in the show and stopped knitting.

That's all I have today. Oh, today's toss was an ancient ViewMaster I found down in the basement. No picture disks, just the viewer.

It was chilly and breezy today. I only went outside to top off the birdbath. I had a hard time getting warm and my hands are still cold but it's too hard to type if I'm sitting on my hands or wearing fingerless mitts.

--Barbara

I Filled the Feeders

but then I immediately came back here to write so if the squirrels found the nuts or the birds found the seeds I didn't see it. Today was a slow start day. I didn't get up until almost 9 o'clock and then it took me two hours to have breakfast, do yoga, bring in the mail and the first of the Christmas avalanche of packages, and get dressed. Hey, I'm retired, I don't have to get it together early.

Then I went to the grocery and was lucky enough to find the last ingredients I need so I can make WW Cheesecake with a brownie crust for Thursday night's knitting here. It wasn't too bad being at the grocery on a Saturday. It wasn't too crowded and they had everything I wanted to buy. Score!

It was also a slow start writing day. What came to mind I didn't really want to write so I tried to weasel my way around it and ended up paraphrasing it to get through to something I enjoyed writing. There still really isn't much conflict in the story and I don't know if there's a story there at all but I'll keep writing, at least for the next four days, and hope for the best.

The second Christmas cactus flower opened up completely today. They are so pretty and delicate looking.

These are the creatures that were on the opposite page from the little guy with the baseball bat that I drew out of Seuss-isms yesterday. These are not friendly looking creatures. It's no wonder he's after them with the bat.

On the next page of Sketching was a big sign for Happy Friday but I made my letters too big so all I managed to fit on the sign was Happy Day. That's okay, there's room for artistic license.

After supper I sat down and finished the last 48 rows of the Rainbow Sophie Scarf and the 7 finishing rows. It's a little scrap of a scarf but it feels nice on my neck because the yarn is half silk. Ahhh.

 

I finished the small amount of smoked turkey breast that I brought home on Thursday for supper tonight. I treated myself to a slice of toasted onion bread as a turkey breast holder. So good. I wish I'd been greedier and taken more but I had to leave some for the family, they have 10 mouths to feed.

--Barbara

No Birds or Squirrels

 I was busy all day and didn't take the time to watch out the patio door so I don't know what the birds and squirrels were up to today. It got up to 48 today so the last vestiges of snow in the shade disappeared. I had my Women's Spirit Zoom this afternoon and SND found a timer that had a squirrel in the snow so I wrote about how Durwood had a vendetta against them because they ate the birdseed and peanuts instead of leaving them for the birds. Now when I see the squirrels out there leaping up to the peanut wreath or clinging to the suet pellets feeder I think of my beloved Durwood and smile. Thanks, squirrels!

The second Christmas cactus bloom opened a bit more today and I am hopeful that at least one more of the remaining four buds will open too. Maybe they'll open one at a time. I don't care as long as they open.

I had a heck of a time getting the words started today but I finally had a thought and wrote it out. Whew. Lala reminded me that I'm the boss of my characters so I have five more days to make them do something more than sit around with their feet up on the beach.

The first page I drew was out of How to Draw People. It's a page of faces. I especially like the guy on the right with all the hair.

In Seuss-isms the next picture is of this little guy wielding a baseball bat. On the opposite page are some creatures that look pretty mean that he's threatening. I'll draw them tomorrow.

At Friday Night Knitting Zoom tonight I got a lot of rows added to the Rainbow Sophie Scarf. Only 48 more little rows until I get to the last seven rows that finishes it off.

Like I said, I was kind of pressed for time today, what with doing yoga and taking a shower and getting dressed in clean clothes and writing a thank you note, so I didn't find anything to toss.

--Barbara

I Gave In

This morning I got the electric slicer from the basement and sliced the onion breads. And that was just too much so I dug out the toaster, slid a slice in, and made me a piece of onion bread toast with butter. It was delicious and worth the wait. I only had one slice and then I saved the rest for Thanksgiving dinner with the family in Shawano.

Here's the groaning board of tasty Thanksgiving delights. DS cooked two turkeys--one smoked and one deep fried. I have to say that the smoked one is my favorite. There was bread stuffing, white and sweet potatoes, corn pudding, mac & cheese, Brussels sprouts with bacon, green Jello fluff stuff, cranberry sauce, cranberry relish, and onion bread. Then there were four kinds of pie--one regular pumpkin pie, one pumpkin chiffon with rum, apple with streusel topping, and pecan pie with bourbon--with your choice of whipped cream or vanilla ice cream on top. Needless to say, even taking a small bit of everything (but only a slice of pecan pie a la mode) I am stuffed to the gunwales and feel like I won't need to eat again for at least a day.

It was a bird drawing day. First in Draw Like an Artist the bird was a Kakapo. Which I looked up and read that it is a flightless variety of parrot endemic to New Zealand. Never heard of it. But here it is. Ta-da!

Then in 10-Steps: Nature the next figure was a Puffin. I drew a puffin not too long ago but I think this one turned out better. I like the coloring better too and I'm happier with its feet.

It got up to 48 today so almost all of last week's snow melted, even the stuff in the shade. I was glad to see it because it made driving the 40 or so miles to Shawano and back easier.

And the Christmas cactus is opening up another bloom. It still has three or four more buds hanging on.

Writing went okay today. Nothing exciting happened in it but I managed to write enough drivel to meet my daily quota. I'm just happy when enough words come.

Today's toss was a few ancient silverplate soup spoons with the silver almost worn off. They don't feel especially good in the mouth so out they go.

--Barbara

Temptation...

...thy name is onion bread. I made the dough this morning, let it rise, punched it down, formed it into turbans, and let it rise again. Then I baked it. While it was baking a miracle occurred, the aroma of baking onion bread permeated the house and made it nearly impossible for me to ignore it. I was sorely tempted to get out the bread knife and slice off a piece when it was just barely cool enough but I resisted. I'll get the electric slicer up tomorrow morning and slice both loaves and just maybe there will be a crumb or two for me to nibble on.

There were still a few peanuts left in the wreath this morning and this squirrel had a different approach than yesterday's squirrel. This one leaped right onto the peanut wreath from the birdbath and hung on upside down until it wriggled out a peanut. Then it dropped to the ground, adjusted the nut in its mouth, and scampered off.

In Sketching he had printed post-its on the pages and had drawn things that were around his desk. I drew some of the things that I could see on the table and I copied his palm tree drawing because I'm a big fan of palm trees.

For my next drawing I carried up a stuffed snorkeling lobster than used to be my brother TW's and drew that. I should have colored it red like the stuffie but I use a lot of red colored pencil and mine is getting a little short so you'll just have to imagine that it's red. I suppose I could have used a crayon...

Writing went a little easier today. It didn't take me as long to get the words down and it wasn't as much of a struggle as it was yesterday. I turned off the hurricane today so now I have to think of another conflict for Rose and Iggy to endure. I wonder what it will be.

Tonight while I watched TV I decided to cast on a toe cap for no-thinking-needed knitting. It's just a simple knit 2, purl 2 pattern around and around and around for 4 inches before the toe decreases. Easy peasy.

 

Today's toss was what was left of last Thanksgiving's onion bread. It got shoved back on the top shelf of the freezer and only emerged the other day. It was very stale and freezer burned so not worth keeping.

The weather report for tomorrow has changed and it's supposed to be in the mid-40s with no rain so I'll be able to drive to Shawano for Thanksgiving dinner with confidence. I didn't want to miss it but also didn't want to drive in bad weather. It was sunny and got up to 50 today, a dramatic and welcome change from last Saturday's single-digit wind chills.

--Barbara

Nuts

I filled the feeders today and the squirrels were quick to find the peanuts that I threw on the grass and I saw one Bluejay too but it was gone too quickly for a picture. I love watching the squirrels figure out how to nab a peanut out of the wreath. They're so acrobatic.

Writing was a challenge today. I spent most of the day trying to wring out my daily word count and made it just before 3 o'clock this afternoon. This story is eluding me so far. I have a lot of words in the binder but again this year I'm not sure that I have a plot, but I'll keep at it and something is bound to turn up. Eventually.

I went right to Seuss-isms when it was time to draw this afternoon and found this boy with two books on his head and a bird that laid an egg on the book. I sure enjoy copying the pictures in this book.

Then I turned a few pages in How to Draw People and found a page of faces to draw. I'm enjoying the simple lines that turn into people.

I got out the Betty Crocker's Bread cookbook to make sure that I had all of the ingredients that I need to make onion bread tomorrow. I didn't. What I thought was all-purpose flour turned out to be bread flour which I don't know if I could substitute and still achieve the same texture and I only had one envelope of yeast and need two, so it was off to the grocery this evening. In the dark. I don't go to the grocery at night but off I went. Now I have everything I need and won't have to get dressed before I mix up the dough.

I looked out to see the sunset and it wasn't much but I took its picture anyway.

This morning the tech from Van's Heating came to service the on-furnace humidifier I had installed last March. He fiddled around with it and decided that the main board needed replacing so he went to get the part and installed it. Didn't solve the problem. So then he thought that maybe it needs a new damper but the parts place didn't have it in stock, they have to order it, so when it's in he'll have to come back. I'm lucky that it is still under warranty so I only have to pay for the service call. Good thing I kept my old stand-alone humidifier too because I couldn't figure out what to do with it. I filled up the bottles and have had it running since Saturday.

Once he was gone I drove over to Paul's Pantry with the donations that DS and DIL1 collected last Saturday at their 1st annual Chili Cook-off at the brewery. They asked for food or small cash donations from people who showed up without chili to enter and I volunteered to deliver it so they didn't have to figure out a time to do it. They're so busy I can't imagine when they would find the time.

--Barbara