The Chronicles of Nani - FOOD! Mediterranean + MS Diet

What you eat can make or break you. I found that to be incredibly true with MS! Thanking I was being nice, I made stupid mistakes in my diet when I could no longer walk and couldn't cook for myself. And MS and eating video at Cleveland Clinic made me think differently and move me in the direction of the way are used to eat. Sometimes you don't realize how bad you feel until you make changes that make you feel a whole heck of a lot better!

A friend looking for a Mediterranean salad ideas for me to try out brought me to a website full of fantastic very MS friendly ideas. Within a week of making that diet change I realized how bad I didn't feeling without even knowing it!

Join me on YouTube today at 8am to chat with me during the premier!

Or Watch anytime my cyber coffee shop is open 24/7!

The Mediterranean Dish YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVn4warYFHUopwaO4uR--jw

The Mediterranean Dish Blog

themediterraneandish.com

When "New and Improved" Actually Is Improved

I'll be amongst the first to say to be wary when a product is "improved." The worst are "Better Flavor" or "New Recipe, Same Great Taste" what if I liked the flavor the way it was? If the "great taste" is the same, why did the recipe need to change? I admit that, as much as I've always loved the restaurant and they make what I've loved as my favorite sandwich for a long time, I haven't been to Panera since everything on their menu has become "clean." After "cleaning" will my Bacon Turkey Bravo taste "soapy?"

But this is not about the Bacon Turkey Bravo. I do not come to bury Panera's Caesar salad. I don't even know if it's dead. I come to address a greater scare than cleaning my favorite sandwich as an adult. Campbell's messed with my ultimate comfort food since I was a child!

Classic look of Campbell's Chicken and Stars

I don't remember a sniffle or tear that wasn't "cured" with Chicken and Stars soup.as an adult it has always been and still is the soup I go to when I feel the need for something to make me feel warm inside. So imagine when just after I turned 50 the stars were different! Remember, I gave myself permission to be proud of my AARP years and complain about things that used to be better. This would be an easy thing to complain about being bad because it changed. But, we'll...

The new stars in Campbell's Chicken and Stars

Instead of the solid little stars of my first half century, the stars are bigger hollow stars. Well, they look more like stars and you can actually chew them. The old little stars just kinda slipped down my throat. It could have been a trainer for taking grown-up pills, to swallow something whole with liquid. The new stars make the soup a little heartier. It also reduces the choking hazard. But the best part is that so many of the old noodles stuck to the can, pan or bowl! The new hearty noodles ALL come out of the can and are much easier to spoon out of the soup cup; every last one!

Now I think I'm ready to get a Bacon Turkey Bravo, or at least pop open a can of Chicken and Stars for lunch.

American Hamburgers

Nani, Noni and Mom, circa 1983

So I'm not going to make excuses for not keeping up on things in the blog-world. The truth is I'm still having some problems hit and miss which includes the height of the new chair not being able to comfortably get in front of the computer, so I'm not on it unless I'm lounging back in the recliner. I still need to form a working normal for myself. I've been feeling like a bit of a hermit so for the most part when I get on the computer, I'm scrapbooking. That doesn't mean that I'm totally a hermit. I'll check my email and I visit Facebook, but I don't post a lot of anywhere right now. I am always getting on my own case for that and I'm trying to inspire myself to become involved with the world again. Politics has been very frustrating and almost painful. I post a little about that because I'm ripping my hair out with the idiocy that's going on in the presidential election this year. There seems to be a lot of people that are not fact-checking, they're just reacting to false statements. It frightens my "ugly-cripple-anchor baby" brain. It's just going to take some time before I'm ready to venture out into the world again.


I was looking at digital coupons to add to my Kroger card and one of the coupon choices was this:

White Castle condiments at Kroger?

It made me think about how long it's been since I've been to a White Castle. Ruthie, my aide, said that she hadn't been to a White Castle in 12 to 13 years, or half of her life. For me I don't think I've been to a White Castle since my grandmother passed in 1989 that got us both reminiscing about White Castle.

For me, White Castle was the American hamburger. What I mean is there was a White Castle on the road on the way to my grandmother’s house. In the Italian grandma tradition, Noni cooked... everything… constantly! Of course friends and family visiting, especially family, would encourage her every now and then to take a day off and just let us bring dinner in. She would have none of that, also in the good Italian grandma fashion, she loved cooking and cooking for people. But every now and then Noni would actually feel like taking a day off. When she wanted the day off she would say "I don't feel like cooking, let's get a bag of American hamburgers." You see, to Noni's palette White Castle hamburgers were the quintessential American food. (Keep in mind the actual Italian food is NOTHING like Sbarro or even Olive Garden.) So to me White Castle is a wonderful memory of "Noni's Day Off."

White Castle available in the frozen food? I had to check out the White Castle website. The last time I ate at the White Castle the onion chips were relatively new. Now you can get all kinds of things at White Castle! They have chicken and fish and a full breakfast menu. And then the sides; it's not just fries or onion chips anymore. Now you can get mozzarella sticks cheesy fries and fish nibblers. It's just amazing that White Castle is still competitive, keeping up with the fast food market and it still is that corner hamburger stand where you can get your sliders. Part of me would like to stop at White Castle for old times sake. But the closest one to here is about an hour away. Maybe it's a flavor that's better kept in my memory anyway.

Longer Days Again!

Happy Yule! It’s Winter Solstice which means the days will now be getting longer everyday! YAY!!

After a grouchy and the a whiny post, it’s time for a normal Nani, dontcha think? The Winter Solstice really is a holiday with good memories for me. Most of them are because I love sunlight. Seriously I didn't have to get too old before I realized I just like doing things during the day best. Even when I travel I prefer skipping going out and enjoying what there is to do at night so I can wake up and do morning things. So the marking of the days getting longer is worth celebrating to me. I also have a fun memory of the Solstice Celebration I enjoyed with the guy I was dating many years ago. He was a Buddhist who celebrated recognized the pagan holidays.


This also marks the beginning of a busy week for me. Tomorrow is our anniversary! It will be 7 years since that day that I started off a bachelorette falling on a 12 pack of cherry soda and ended waiting for my husband to get home from work. I still smile when I think about the fun that we had with our mischievous reveals the next couple weeks. There was nothing conventional about our wedding day or the events leading up to it or any of the things we did over the next few months to celebrate it. And I wouldn't change one bit of it for anything in the world. I am blessed that I have a wonderful man in my world. He has gone through so much with me and he is still my rock. I love you, David and as I get things in order I look forward to giving you the very best of me for many years to come.

It's my blog; I can have my mushy moments if I want them.

Then it’s Christmas Eve and Christmas day! We don't actually have Christmas eve plans this year, But David is off work that day. Maybe we'll exchange our gifts to each other if David's had a chance to shop by then. hehehehe… Christmas day will be family time.


I've been enjoying some flavors of the season this past week. I posted this photo on my Facebook page and received decent number of likes for someone who sporadically uses Facebook.

Panettone is a traditional Italian cake. Mom and I both loved panettone, but we did not like it with the candied orange peel. Noni always made a point of having one for Christmas that was solo uvetta/senza canditi; only raisins/without candied fruit. Those are not easy to find at all! I try to find one for Christmas but there have been years where I haven't had any panettone. This year I found an Amazon store that imports groceries from Italy. It fulfills the delivery through Amazon Prime. This panettone is a really good one too!

Panettone is a traditional Italian holiday cake. Taste-wise it’s similar to raisin bread only just a touch sweeter and a ton richer. A typical recipe for panettone includes a couple of eggs and double that number of just yolks. The texture is like the really soft inside of fresh Italian bread with a touch of cake to it with raisins and candied orange peel. Now the hard-to-find “senza canditi” is that just without the orange peel.

During the Christmas season panettone is a breakfast bread, a social coffee side or a light dessert. When you see what looks like a plate of hunks of bread on the table when you visit Italian friends during the holidays you think it’s just a plain thing to munch with your coffee. But when you taste a “little piece to be polite” you find out it has a truly addictive quality! An Italian holiday is a never-ending food coma anyway but the panettone with robust espresso after dinner was always a wonderful finish.

Be Vewy, Vewy Quiet…

…We're hunting pumpkin spice!

According to Nani’s Rules, September 1^st is the official opening day of Pumpkin Spice Season!

Yes, this is a huge fad and yes the middle-age-white-woman is the stereotypical demographic that the fad is known for. But I don’t follow the fad; the fad followed me and now it caters to me. I’m okay with that.

Starbucks takes credit for starting the fad, but I think the first time I had a pumpkin spice cappuccino was a gas station machine cheataccino a year before it was available at Starbucks. Starbucks made it "cool." Also the whole “pumpkins mean fall” thing for me was since childhood. I loved pumpkin pie and Pop roasted the pumpkin seeds from the Halloween jack-o-lanterns he carved before we were even allowed to handle sharp knives. I also used pumpkin pie spice mixed into Cool Whip for a low calorie pumpkin spice treat. I hadn’t thought of adding pumpkin spice and sweetener to coffee but when I tried the gas station cheataccino, I was hooked! It was a hot cocoa styled drink for fall; yum!

Starbucks is caving into the health food Nazis who started the Pumpkin Spice Latte conspiracy theory last year, freaking out about not having pumpkin in the drink and having some sort of poison instead. This year they have changed the recipe that’s been so successful while, according to them, not changing the flavor. Pumpkin Spice Latte will be available at Starbucks, to slide down your throat with slimy pureed pumpkin making your drink thicker but not affecting the taste, which you hopefully don’t really remember exactly from one year to the next, on September 8.

I probably won’t try the new recipe. If other places use a small amount of mashed pumpkin in their pumpkin spice drinks and I don’t notice it, fine. I had decided a couple years ago that for flavor, Eat ’n Park’s pumpkin spice latte was the best anyway. I have 2 big things that drive my thought that I have no interest in trying the new recipe at Starbucks. First, the purely psychological effect; I never expected anything but the spices in pumpkin spice latte and the thought of purred pumpkin in my coffee just sounds gross. Second, and I think the bigger reason, is I just can’t support anything that’s purely kissing the butts of conspiracy theorists. So, if I don’t know the pumpkin is there and it is, it proves that it doesn’t make any difference because I liked it fine without. It might even be defense of the change if it’s discovered that pumpkin in my coffee is what makes me think one is better than the other. BUT, you can’t even improve the taste and win me over when you’ve offended me, and giving in to the food Nazis is offensive. It won’t affect Starbucks at all. Many people won’t care, they’ll have a new customer or two who’ve read and were afraid because of the food Nazis and I’ll still drink plain lattes and their fabulous, albeit hard to get there in time for, pumpkin scones. But for pumpkin latte, I’ll stick to Eat n’ Park or Speedway.

I won’t miss Starbuck’ 'Pumpkin Spice Latte anyway because there are now so many fabulous pumpkin spice treats in the fall! Be on the lookout for these pumpkin inspired yummies!

The only things on the list I haven’t tried are the ones highlighted in yellow. #means I didn’t care for it. * means I have to have it at least once every fall!

*Pumpkin Spice Latte (Eat ‘n Park is the best!)

*Cheataccino (gas station cappuccino)

*Coffee (I’ll be ordering a Couple boxes of PS K-cups next week!)

Tea

Cookies

*Donuts (At a cider mill or orchard is the best, but Dunkin Donuts does good ones too!)

Loaf (I make a loaded Christmas loaf with pumpkin and spice that I rather like)

Cake

Muffins

*Scones (Starbucks)

*Ice cream

Shakes (McDonalds are great)

Egg nog (I called it Pumpkin Nog)

Cream cheese (Philadelphia, but I couldn’t find it to try it last year)

Yogurt (Couldn’t find it to try it.)

Pudding (Jello instant, YUM!)
Oatmeal (Made my own with pumpkin spice creamer)
Peanut butter (Jif WILL try this year)

***Soup (Zoup, OMG)

#Beer, Ale, Shandy (The pumpkin beer I tried was okay, but not really a Nani choice)

Pumpkin butter (I’ve bought a jar at a fruit market and made a batch of my own; an excellent fall addition for biscuits, toast or anything you’d use a fruit butter with!)

Snack pie (McDonald’s has a hot pumpkin McPie which I love. I think Hostess does one too)

Pop Tarts (I WILL find these this year!)

Oreos

Pepperidge Farms Pumpkin Spice Milano cookies

***Pumpkin Spice M&Ms

Pumpkin Spice Latte M&Ms (New this year and I want to try them. It might Pumpkin Spice repackaged or there may be 2 types of pumpkin M&Ms this year)

Hershey Kisses (These are good, but they are pumpkin spice white chocolate confection, not chocolate)

*Candy Corn (Seriously, pumpkin spice candy corn – OH MY!)

**Pancakes (IHOP has done these for many years and they are fantastic!)

Fudge

Salt Water Taffy
Marshmallows
Chewing gum
Toffee (Trader Joes)
Salted caramels 

*Almonds (Blue Diamond – fabulous!)

Candied Pumpkin Seeds (Trader Joes and Nature Box, both excellent with baked sweet potatoes!)

Pumpkin Spice Chocolate Truffles (tried these in Vermont last year – YUM!)

Are you a pumpkin spice fan? What are some of your favorites?

The Good Life

Oh here is a blog post I love writing. Maybe you’ve heard about Coca-Cola Life and maybe that’s what you need me for!

I’ve mentioned before that I’m a BzzAgent, which means I get to try new things and talk about them, Bzz! When I was offered the opportunity to try Coca-Cola Life I signed up right away. I got a carefully bubble wrapped 8oz glass bottle in the mail and popped it in the fridge. I just chopped the ends off a couple organic carrots for an afternoon snack and figured now was the time to try the naturally sweetened Coke. Oh my!

Coca-Cola Life is sweetened with cane sugar and stevia leaf. It’s only 60 calories and here’s the kicker for me; it doesn’t taste like a diet soda, it tastes like a Coke! Coca-Cola has always been my cola of choice and while I liked the Diet Coke with Splenda, it was still a diet soda. Coca-Cola Life tastes like the cola I’ve loved since I was a kid!

You can find Coca-Cola Life at most of l the major retailers that sell soda and if the place you buy soda doesn’t have Coca-Cola Life, ASK FOR IT! It’ll be with the other sodas or you’ll find it with the natural food area because it’s just as natural as my organic carrots.

If you try Coca-Cola Life, stop back and leave a comment to let me know what you think.

It's The Coffee, Stupid!

This is influenced by Bob Evans. Bob’s is an Ohio-based company that’s been seeing its regulars and repeat business shrink in its restaurants lately. David sent me an article from the Columbus Dispatch about it. They are changing the menu and getting back to fresh and wholesome basics in their food. It’s their thought that improving everything will improve the bottom line.

 

Bob Evans AWESOME Sausage Gravy!

I’ve had Bob Evans’ breakfast food And let me tell ya, they don’t need to improve the food! They make a variety of wonderful sweet breakfasts and the best, BEST, sausage gravy this side of the Mason-Dixon line. They cite losing breakfast market share to IHOP and Cracker Barrel. Those are two restaurants with great breakfast food, comparable but not better than Bob Evans. What Bob Evans lacks is that IHOP's coffee isn’t fabulous, but acceptable and it’s pretty good at Cracker Barrel. Bob Evans’ coffee is the WORST! I’ve written complaints to Bob Evans about their awful coffee before. Of the three restaurants, the local Bob Evans is closest to us, but we eat breakfast at Cracker Barrel or IHOP more because I don’t like to have breakfast without my morning coffee and I won’t drink the coffee at Bob Evans.

Think about it. You go out for breakfast and you’re seated. The first question the host or wait staff asks is if you’d like coffee. You’re drinking the coffee before your breakfast comes to the table and you’ll finish your last cup before taking the check up to pay it. It’s the only part of the meal that is there and on your taste buds for the entire visit. Bad coffee will drive people away much faster than food that’s a cut under gourmet. But they’re changing all the food. I hope the change the coffee and make it a ton better too because if they don’t change the coffee I won’t be coming in for the new breakfast items…unless I can bring a cup of to-go Cracker Barrel coffee with me when I visit.


What are your thoughts on sit-down breakfast out? What restaurant has the best coffee? What’s your favorite breakfast dish?

I started it with Bob Evans Sausage Gravy and Cracker Barrel coffee.

Don't Make My Donut Healthy!

I haven’t updated in a while but I’m not going to write a “bring the blog up to speed” post either. I haven’t written because it’s been a rough month and If I can’t say anything nice… Suffice to say things are getting better.

Today I want to talk about diet. Stay with me here, it’s probably not what you think; let’s talk about balance. Let’s talk about donuts.

Weight Watchers is all about accountability but the focus is on balance and portions, not sacrifice. I know when we have spaghetti it’s going to be 12 points for dinner plus a salad, which is 2 additional points for a serving of balsamic vinaigrette and croutons. I don’t make “light” spaghetti or tell myself I can’t have it, I just plan to have 14 points for dinner. I think my greatest weakness in sweets and pastries is donuts and the easiest guarantee an eating plan won’t work for me is to tell me I can’t ever have a donut again.

My first job was when I was 16. I worked at a deli/Italian store until I was 18. Senior coworker, Jill, and I opened the store on Sundays. Part of the early Sunday was that a large tray of donuts came in that was sold form the glass case on the front counter. That tray always included two white-frosted crème-filled long johns. The customers had no idea that we ever had white-frosted crème-filled long johns to sell because the truth is we didn’t. Those 2 donuts NEVER made it to the case where the donuts were displayed on Sundays. If I brought the tray in when it arrived I took them off. If Jill brought the tray in, she took them off. Once we had everything set up for the first morning rush after church, there was about a half hour before that rush started and Jill and I got a donut break. It was always the white-frosted crème-filled donuts. They were NOT custard. They were crème-filled; just sugar and fat, the way donuts are meant to be.

32 years later those are still one of my absolute favorite donuts. They were the donuts Grandma always made sure were in the Thanksgiving donut box because she knew that was my guilty pleasure and that is the donut I get from Kroger as my treat after grocery shopping. They are 9 Weight Watchers points and worth every one of them to me. It’s a beloved donut that I like and it makes me think if the special treats Grandma made sure I had Thanksgiving morning and it makes me remember Jill and that special treat we shared on Sunday mornings.

Every 2 weeks when I go to the grocery store I plan my trip to get the most of the allowed bags to bring back on the bus, the most of the money spent for my groceries and the most of the energy to do my shopping. I also plan the most of my breakfast points with a coffee and a donut reward for my careful planning when I get home. I’ve found that even at Kroger, where they have trays of those wonderful donuts that take me back, if I don’t go early, the white-frosted crème-filled long johns will be empty trays.

My other top donut is the even more chocolate donut that evolved from the chocolate honey dip that I saved allowance to buy all by myself the first time I went to the store alone; the double chocolate frosted. I love the Dunkin Donuts version best, but I have had others that were good too. I’ve also had some sad double chocolate frosted.

Now, truth be told, I usually consider Tim Horton’s donuts to be the best. I love their walnut crunch donuts and give me a box of Tim Bits in the wide variety of glazed cake donut holes and crullers and it needs to be a small box because there is a danger that no matter how big I’ll finish the whole thing. I did say I had a donut weakness. But the one Tim Horton’s donut I find disappointing is their double chocolate frosted. There is no glaze on the chocolate donut, just frosting. I’ve seen or had the double chocolate donuts that have no glaze on the donut, even one from a Dunkin Donuts franchise! WHAT is that all about? Is it supposed to represent a healthier donut because it cuts down on the sugar? Really? We’re talking about a donut, not a granola bar. What part of FRIED DOUGH are we trying to make healthy?

Not healthy; just a dried out donut under the frosting

I don’t know one person, not one, who has ever eaten a donut and called it part of a healthy food plan. A donut is a treat. It’s one of the important every now and then things that keeps other food decisions in a healthy balance. But a donut is sugar and fat with maybe another thing added with very pungent flavor, like a serious fudge frosting, a total nut coating or a strong cinnamon to complement the sweet but flavor-consuming base. Donuts are supposed to be sweet and fattening if overeaten and just yummy with no concessions made to the health nuts du jour. If you want a totally healthy sweet snack, have fruit but if you’re selling a double chocolate frosted donut, rest assured no one is looking for any calorie-cutting and glaze the thing before you frost it!

National Donut Day is Friday, June 5, 2015. What is your favorite donut?? Will you make a point of indulging that day?

My New Personal Trainer?

 Yummy lunch salad only one weekly point on "Simply Filling"

Thursday is the first day of the week for my Weight Watchers tracker. That means that Thursday is, ideally , weigh-in day and the day my 49 points a week for treats or to add to days I have the munchies reset. I’ve been having troubles with fluctuating losses and gains battling with steroids, depression and lately just sheer frustration and the wintertime blues. When I said “diet program,” when I was in counseling the doctor asked me which “diet plan?” She smiled when I said Weight Watchers and told me it was the only answer that would have been acceptable. Weight Watchers is paying attention to and balancing the real food you eat anyway, adding or subtracting to obtaining that balance. Diets with prepackaged food or regimens that leave out your favorites are recipes for defeats that risk mental health as well.

Weight Watchers points system is customizable. There is no food that is considered an “off limits” food and exercise routine is required. One of the program styles that’s a little more strict is called “Simply Filling. With Simply Filling you eat until you are full, but from a list of “power foods;” fat free dairy, fresh vegetables and fruits and lean meats without added fat. You still get 49 bonus points a week, but those points are used for low fat instead of fat-free cheese, the required healthy oils for balance or shake and bake coating on a pork chop. (planned dinner for David and me this weekend) So, it’s a little more strict on food choices, but some have found it very successful and it is very similar to the way I eat anyway, minus the chocolate. So I’ve decided to kick-restart myself using the Simply Filling plan for 2 weeks. After that initial 2 weeks, I’m going to alternate between a week on the Simply Filling plan and a week on the regular points plan. That means I’ll get my double scoop waffle cone every other week instead of every week. By alternating weeks on the different plans I should be mixing it up enough to confuse my metabolism into working harder. We’ll see how it works.

Now the personal trainer I was talking about? Well, remember that it’s not a WW requirement to have an activity routine, but it is encouraged through extra point that can be earned, “activity points,” to add extra food points to your food budget. Well, how much exercise am I able to get in a power chair? Marco to the rescue!

We often joke about Marco being part lots of other animals, including part dog in that he eats everything he finds on the floor and he also plays fetch! He has purple and green jingly balls like that one in the picture. When he wants to play he brings David the ball and David tosses it for him. He keeps bringing it back, just like a dog playing fetch! As long as Daddy throws it, he keeps bringing it back. Well just this morning, he brought the ball to me. It didn’t take him too long to figure out just where he needs to put the ball so I can bend over, reach for it and pick it up to throw it for him. I don’t know if it’s worth any activity points, but after a few times I can feel the end, reach, throw, repeat. Even a little movement from a wheelchair is a good thing, right?

Happy These and Thats

I need to write a nice blog post, really I do. I’ve actually written a few…papers, we’ll call them papers, they might end up being blog posts at a date in the not far future, but right now they are just papers. I’m dealing with some things right now. I’m not dipping back into depression, I keep a close eye on that, but I’m troubled by a few things and that shows up in my writing. I write to relieve stress until what's at the root of my problem comes out and it seems to have not come out yet, so when I "just write" it hasn't been as "up" as I usually am. I have to be really careful about my journaling for scrapbook pages too!

Today will be one of my snippets and potpourri posts. There have been good and bad things that have inspired a paragraph or a thought that’s worth sharing. Today I’m going to refrain from things that bug me. Let’s see what I have…


In the scrapbooking Nani-world, last night I finished the last folder in November of 2008 and all that’s left is the December folder. That will be my focus for next month because finishing that only folder left with complete 2008! My main area of concentration for the rest of this month will be in 2011, which also starts with November right now. It has only 4 folders, so I may start December with 2 years of the 6 I’m working on with just a few layouts to complete. I might actually be only working on layouts for 2015 by this time next year! David and I were talking about getting some proofreading time set up soon. The greatest challenge for me there is he has to do the proofreading on my computer because I have a ton of fonts he doesn’t have so he can’t open the files on his computer to make changes…and I know there will be corrections to make!


I read an article yesterday called When copy-and-paste ruled America at Smithsonian.com. It’s a 2-page article about the history of scrapbooking. Very cool read. It talks about how print media and the start of scrapbooking was a natural combination, how men and women scrapbooked and why. Mark Twain made the verb scrapbooking popular and marketed his self-adhesive scrapbooks. It was fascinating and it really does show that the very roots of scrapbooks were so much the Smash book idea of today and that digital scrapbooking in the digital age is as natural as those smash-style books were at the dawn of print media for the same reasons. It’s a fun read and it really makes my daily diary-scrapbooks pretty timeless too.

Speaking of those diary scrapbook pages, here is week 44:

I didn’t record the credits as I go on this one, but if there is a paper or element you see that you’d like to know more about, leave a comment or drop me an email and I’ll look it up! I have them all done through last week, week 45, but last week had some not-bloggy stuff.


I've discovered that I'm becoming enamored of the deco owls I've seen so much lately. An Instagram friend keeps showing dishes she's prepared with deco owl salt and pepper shakers in the photos. I've also found so many owl coffee mugs! It started as simple owls like that in scrapbook kits and it just grew on me LOL

I grumble about Christmas marketing completely overshadowing Thanksgiving, but I found this photo that I love!

It was called a vegan turkey when it was shared on Facebook, but if I was having a big enough party I’d definitely make this fruit tray regardless of the meat-eating status of my guests. It is, however, a great way to have the tradition of a Thanksgiving turkey for non-meat eating guests!


David found a bottle of Pumpkin Spice Coffeemate for me yesterday. I know, it’s late in the pumpkin spice season to be getting my first bottle, but every time I’ve been in the grocery store they’ve been out of it! I actually would’ve preferred the smaller bottle but all David saw was the bigger one. I don’t use it in coffee, I use it in oatmeal! That’s what breakfast was this morning. A quarter cup of flavored creamer is just rich enough and just sweet enough to make incredible oatmeal! It’s 8 weight watcher points for the whole bowl of oatmeal but matched with a single point powdered coffee creamer and a free fruit, it’s within my preferred 10 points for breakfast and on a day I awoke to a couple inches of snow outside it was WELL worth it!

I said I was going to try to be positive today so as far as the weather goes let me just say “Pumpkin Spice Oatmeal!!!!”

Hail To The Queen!

Well, happy birthday to the queen anyway, Kaline is 9 years old today! That photo was taken this morning. I admit, I photoshopped the eye dirt away, in the instant social media shot she’s slightly less perfect.

This is the (Not Photoshop or actual scrapbooking quality for me) collage I did with my favorite of her baby pictures. She really has grown from an adorable kitten to a beautiful and noble cat and the shy at first then adventurous kitten has well-defined cattitude now!

This is what an actual gold golden delicious apple and a real emerald brushed green pear look like! Really, I bought them at the ball game last Friday in Cincinnati and the small pieces of fruit were 2 dollars each! All of the food at Great American Ball Park is quite expensive. Add the fruit to a grilled chicken breast on a wheat roll and bottled water I had for dinner and it cost near $20! But it’s comparable to the unhealthy choices and I didn’t blow my Weight Watchers points that day! I did that Sunday with Cincinnati Chili! But I only blew the daily points. The WW weekly plus points kept me in my allowance!

A short entry to say Happy Birthday to my baby girl. Tonight is MS group meeting, so I have to get things gathered up for the bus pick-up. The group leader role sometimes makes my type-A personality and my type-MS body fight over me. The type-MS wins battles when I fall asleep in the middle of paperwork, but in the end type-A still wins the battle for my public face!

Grocery Trip - Nani's Liberat-yum!

Black Bean Soup

Good morning on a bright and gorgeous Saturday! Yes, wake-up temperature was 36° but it’s SUNNY!!! Besides, tomorrow, Easter Sunday, it’s going to be 70-ish degrees and still sunny; perfect for a pastel dress and a new hat at church or coffee on the patio while munching the ears off a chocolate bunny.

Yeah, okay, sunshine just makes me happy. Moving right along…

At the end of last week I went grocery shopping! That may not sound like a big deal but I went grocery shopping by myself. I had my list, my coupons and three reusable shopping bags. The reusable shopping bags hold more than the little plastic grocery bags and there is a two-bag limit on the bus. I can put one bag around the head rest on the back of my chair in order to have three bags of groceries but only use floor space for two bags. I chose a time day when it would be a little less crowded at the store and was happy to find people were so helpful. A store employee swapped out full handbaskets for empty ones so I could get my shopping done – I can’t push a shopping cart from a wheelchair. I had no trouble finding employees that would grab things on the top shelves for me and in one instance a fellow shopper seemed almost honored when I asked if she would get a can of beans off a shelf that was out of my reach when there wasn’t an employee in that aisle. It was a good day. I got my three bags of groceries home and got them all put away before a well-earned cup of coffee and a donut.

At the beginning of this week I made a crock pot of black bean soup with the fruits from my shopping trip. I haven’t made black bean soup in a long time and golly it was SO GOOD! A 1 pound bag of black beans makes six servings. I have three left; one of the fringe and two in the freezer. I’m going to try not to thaw the container in the freezer for a couple of weeks but I haven’t made it in years and years and years and it’s really hard not to have it every day right now.

I use a slight variation of a recipe from “Fabulous Beans” by Barb Bloomfield, one of my favorite cookbooks, printed in 1994. It’s a great cookbook and in looking up the Amazon link I found “More Fabulous Beans” which is now on my Amazon Wish List!

Black Bean Soup

Ingredients:
1 lb dry black beans
8 cups water
1 chopped green pepper

1 TBS oregano
2 TBS cumin
1 TBS salt
6 TBS lemon juice

Soak the beans overnight with 2 TBS baking soda. (The soda will make the beans kinder to your stomach, sort of like adding preemptive Beano to the soup!)

Drain and rinse the beans and put in a crock pot with 8 cups of water and the chopped green pepper. Cook on high for a few hours until the beans are soft. Turning the crock pot on in the morning will make the beans ready for the finish when you get home from work.

To finish the soup, add the oregano, salt, cumin and lemon juice to the beans and cook in the crock pot for another 30 minutes. Purée a couple cups in a blender and return it to the beans to give the soup a creamy texture. Serve with a tablespoon of sour cream.

The recipe with the sour cream is only 6 WW points. :)

The “bookmark” made me smile. This recipe has been a favorite of mine for a long time. We used to do one “vegetarian night” a week when I worked at Omnicom cable just after trade school. I remember when I wrote the note to Mom because I was working until 6:30 and she got home around 5:30. She was adding the finishing ingredients so the soup would be ready when Pop got home. Back in the mid-90s my printing was legible too! I loved this soup and was excited to share it with my parents. I was pleased that they both liked it. When we did vegetarian night, Mom and I used to go vegetarian all day. Pop made sure he had lots of meat with lunch.

Bottom 20; Just Stop

On top of the ramp rail. Those slats are 4" high

and that's what stuck in spite of the wind!

Wake up temperature was 10 degrees! It’s been steadily falling since 7:05 this morning and the current temperature is -10 at 4:00PM. It’s sunny, which is unusual for the Midwest the day after it snows as much as it did, and windy which makes for bitter, bitter cold getting worse as the day goes on. It’s beautiful, but it’s beauty I only want to see out my window with a cup of hot tea. We were under a level 3 snow emergency until 2 o’clock today. Level 3 means you can get arrested if you’re on the roads unless you are essential personnel like emergency, medical, infrastructure (like snow removal people) and news media. Yes that means business as usual for my hubby. Our fantastic snow removal people, after some debate as to whether or not they could actually make it in time for David to get the work, got here early and did a great job clearing off our drive, walks and ramp in the blowing snow. I still consider it level “too high to count” for me personally. So I’m staying in.

I’m swiping an idea from Empty Nester today because it is just a great one for letting off some steam and clearing the air for productive thought as we get 2014 going. She did her “Top 20 Things I Do Not Want to Hear in 2014.” I’m doing…

20 Things I’m Done With Going Into 2014

Warning: some people may disagree, some vehemently, with my thoughts. Please let’s respectfully disagree and not argue about it. You’re welcome to blog your bottom 20 on your own blog. :-)

1. Cold. I’m just ready for spring now.

2. Keep calm and… Just stop that; I don’t want to see one more meme, advertisement, scrapbook journal card or card that says “keep calm and” anything. Write something original.

3. “Miley Freaking Cyrus” I completely agree with Empty Nester on this one!

4. “My Bible says the government…” Read the First Amendment. Read the passage that starts “render unto Caesar.” Close the book and step away from the keyboard.

5. “It is what it is.” I’ve been done with that copout for a long time. It is what you let it be; quit making excuses.

6. Updates to Windows 8. If they can’t fix it don’t change it.

7. Arguments about why the minimum wage shouldn’t be raised and tax loopholes for corporations shouldn’t go down. It’s just wrong. That is what’s destroying our economy and anyone who argues for it just looks like a fool.

8. Wardrobe malfunction. I think most “wardrobe malfunction” incidents are either intentional or pointed out by people looking to be offended.

9. Pop up ads that cover what you’re reading even if you have pop-up blocker. It’s like my newspaper is spamming me even when I pay for the paper and actually look at the ads in the print version.

10. Reality TV

11. Facebook games; I get invitations to play them all the time and I have absolutely no interest. It’s like “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” when the game players find someone who doesn’t play they call them out so everyone knows and tries to assimilate them.

12. Rising prices on everything. There’s an app for that we just haven’t installed it. (See #7)

13. Retailers stuff your email inbox with spam when you buy one thing.

14. Profit Manasseh Jordan calls; this fake called me incessantly. I actually spent 15 minutes listening to the prerecorded message so I could talk to a real person, accused them of “doing the devil’s work because they get their call lists from public lists of people with financial or health trouble to exploit them and take money” and demanded to be taken off their list. I’m now getting more calls. (Yes I’m keeping track and I’m joining a class action suit.)

15. Off season trades. I kinda long for the old days when a player often retired with the team he was a rookie with. I don't care if I sound old.

16. The photograph with a gun and a Bible that says we should teach them both in schools. If you truly believe the Bible and a gun go together maybe the schools should have a restraining order to keep you out of them.

17. salmon and tilapia; why can’t the fad fishes be flounder and mahi-mahi?

18. “Like us on Facebook to print our free coupon!” I have to accept more advertising to print my own coupon, really?

19. When you mention to someone “I have details about it on my blog,” and they tell you “oh I don’t read blogs.” Even though the same person has no problem delivering the line “I posted on Facebook, didn’t you read it?”

20. Did I mention cold yet? It’s really worth mentioning twice. At 5PM it's -12 here and the wind chill is 40 below. I want to go to Brazil. Right now it’s 88 degrees and the coffee is fresh!

Wish I Was A Bear

I’m walking around… Scratch that… I’m rolling around in a strange world. It’s not my world; it can’t be. The temperature would never, I mean NEVER, be much below freezing let alone below zero. But this morning, in this strange world where we had 9 inches of snow on the ground by the end of the day yesterday, it was 9° BELOW zero. I’m just not able to process these bits of information as fact, not in MY world.

I called our snow guy to arrange to have our snow plowed and shoveled before David left for work yesterday. I happened to be sitting in the dining room when he was shoveling the ramp. Of course it kept snowing until midafternoon and there was already another inch when David left but it was still a lot easier to drive through. When he came home you could almost not tell it was done all. There’s more snow in the forecast on Sunday so were just dealing with the snow in the drive and I’ll call to have it all cleared again after it stops snowing on Monday.

So I’ve been inside the house today and after looking at the weather I promptly got on the phone and started fixing the next few days. The temperatures next week will not go much above 10° until Thursday. The HIGHS are expected to be: 1 on Monday, -3 on Tuesday and then a “sweltering” 12 on Wednesday. When it’s that cold the MS and Raynaud’s work together to torture me! My legs and back muscles go into nonstop spasm. I canceled plans to meet Tori and Rina for lunch on their way home tomorrow so they be home and off the road that much quicker. I also canceled lunch plans with my friend Lissa on Sunday in consideration of two days of expected snow with further accumulation. I also postponed doctors appointments on Monday and Wednesday. YEESH!

So there’s my gripe for today. Yeah I know I’m griping about the same thing everybody’s griping about. Did you know currently in its 32° in Atlanta?! Incredible! I know they’re calling it Global Climate Change now but I want to go back and get my Global Warming. (Pout)

All this time indoors is giving me the opportunity to do some important things. But I haven’t been doing a lot of important things. (Smile) I am slowly working on cleaning up stuff around my computer, slowly. At least I have been keeping up dishes. (Bigger smile) Today I did a lot of reading. Well you know, two books a month is on my Projects and Goals list. You can look over on the sidebar; I’m currently reading Delusional Traits by David George Clarke. It’s book two in the Rare Traits trilogy. Remember how much I loved Rare Traits? Yeah. Delusional Traits is kinda like that. (Awesome Mr. Clark!)

Tonight I’ll do some scrapbooking since a page a day was in the Products and Goals list as well and so far in 2014 I’ve done exactly… my signature on Ginger Scraps which doesn’t count in my list of completed pages. I really need to work on that.

I did get all of my needed phone calls done today before I buried my nose in the Nook. That cleared up my schedule to pretty much hibernate for a few days. When David gets home from work I’ll ask him to bring a few containers of veggie soup up from the freezer downstairs (because hey, I just set them on the porch and they’ll keep frozen) and let that be my vegetables for a few days. I’ll go to the produce market or maybe just the grocery store on Friday after my doctors appointment when I’ll be out anyway. Expected high then is 26, maybe I should wear my spring jacket.

Well off to do that scrapping now. No matter where you are make yourself a cup of coffee, tea, warm cocoa or heck, it’s Friday night, whatever it takes to keep you warm! (I like to fill up the rest of my cup of hot cocoa with peppermint schnapps.) ;-)

I Found The Good Stuff!

That was my breakfast this morning I finally found my Panettone solo uvetta, senza canditi; only raisins or no candied fruit. That’s not the common and traditional way to make panettone but I don’t like the candied fruit and and never have. Mom didn’t like it either but loved the panettone senza canditi and every year Noni found a panettone senza canditi for her daughter-in-law and her granddaughter for Christmas. Now I make a point of finding only raisin panettone for Christmas in remembrance of my grandmother and my mother and because it just tastes so great.

It usually takes searching before I find my panettone. Shopping online helps! So when I ordered my traditional Italian Torrone candy, I added a couple of the mini panettone like the one I had for breakfast in case I still couldn’t find full size. The candy shop didn’t have panettone solo uvetta in larger packages. But I did find 2.2 pound panettone senza canditi at a different store online and bought two. Now I’ll make sure keep my hands off one of them so I have it for Christmas breakfast.

That was breakfast this is now

Skipped a few hours there because the bus called and I went shopping! Yanno, it is SO cool to use the paratransit bus for something all by myself that’s NOT a doctor’s appointment! I did some Christmas shopping including finishing all of my Secret Santee shopping. Now I’m not going to say what stores I shopped at because my Santee might just read The Chronicles of Nani. Besides I bought a few other things that might also be for someone who reads my blog. You never know.

No one has ever asked me how long it takes me to shop. I never have been a huge shopper. In my teens and early 20s I could spend a day at the mall with my mom or with friends but I don’t think that really counts. I like to shop for Christmas things alone and I really do enjoy that. If I want an opinion I like the unbiased input from clerks and other shoppers. So today I had a mission, one place that I wanted to go and to make my trip reservation with the bus I had to be able to sell them how long I’d be. Hmmm… One store, one list with a few different names and a few different things and some choices I knew I’d have to make for those things. So I guessed two hours. It took me one at the store I planned to visit. Since I had an hour before the bus was scheduled to pick me up and the rain had let up I motored to some of the other stores in the center and did a little more Christmas shopping!

One of the stores was Family Dollar. David doesn’t do dollar stores or discount stores; what Grandma used to call “junk stores.” Don’t get me wrong there, Grandma loved going to “junk stores.” What wonderful places they are for craft notions and the little things we use every day that aren't meant to last. Frankly I’d rather pay two dollars for something that lasts a month than pay five dollars for something that last two months. Sometimes the natural female shopping gene just makes more sense than the male “I hate stores” gene. I don’t get to go to those stores so much anymore because when I get together with girlfriends it’s for catching up over lunch, dinner or coffee. I was very happy when I passed the windows and realized the next door was to Family Dollar. I only had a half hour left so I was careful and well behaved and next time I’m grabbing a bigger basket! But this is where I found a special little something for me:

Isn’t it just SO Nani? I collect coffee mugs and I just adore the word art with a single word or subject in many fonts and it’s the word coffee! My little giftie for me was only a dollar and a large size from my Keurig brewer with a tablespoon of Coffeemate is a perfect fit! I love my new mug! They have a mug that says cappuccino in orange and cocoa in purple too. I may have to plan another trip to Family Dollar after the holidays. The really good news to me was when David came home for lunch I showed him my new mug and I told him it was only a dollar. He smiled. He understands that a good deal on a mug I really like is the same thing as a good sale on model train cars that fit his layout for him. .Ah, marital bliss!

Pirates Went Off-Script!

Last night’s “playoff game” was not what I would have written, but unfortunately what I was prepared to watch. The Reds have the stuff, but this year they just didn’t click, not in a going to the post season kind of way. Too many key players spent time on the DL. (Because losing Joey Votto to knee surgery last year wasn’t enough.) So we start again in the spring and guys, try to stay in one piece next year! I really hope they negotiate with Shin Soo Choo and keep him as a Red. He’s been magic this year. Also David and I have matching shirts so we say “Choo-Choo” when we wear them together and we want them to be correct when we wear them!

On the other side of things, Pittsburg has been building steam for a few years, just until this year that steam was gone by the All Star Game and the second half hasn’t been kind to them. I’m not ready to give them the whole ball of wax this year, not while the Tigers and Red Sox are still in it. Actually Cleveland has been pretty amazing this year too. I hope to see them carry us Ohio fans tonight. Of course next they’ll face the Red Sox so they’ll lose our house after tonight, but tonight, GO TRIBE!


As a segue to cooking I have to confess that I might have had something to do with our loss last night. I’ve been craving my mother’s baked macaroni and cheese. I picked last night as the night that would be my first try at making it. Mom was a huge Pirates fan. Could be that the power I summoned was too much for my Reds. But look at my first try!

I noted last night that it turned out okay. My first attempt at going to act baked macaroni and cheese pieces much like Mom’s as Olive Garden’s crostada tasted like Noni’s; just enough to make me want to perfect it. I’ll definitely make it again.

We’re starting to get just a touch of harmony in the house. I think a lot of the time Carla and Marco fighting is really Carla and Marco playing. They just playe rough. Kaline is still pretty sincere with her growls but we found out the spraying wasn’t so much her acting out as it was not feeling well. She has a mild urinary tract infection. Now our greatest challenge is giving her medicine. She has to take it twice a day for two weeks and she does not like it! We tried mixing it with “Kitty Milk” the first night and she slept in Marco’s room. She drank the milk and got the medicine and then we wrestled with her to get her morning meds. That was not fun. Last night she was on to us and didn’t touch the milk. And this morning I meds were an even bigger struggle. We’re going to try one night with a medicine mix–in. Wish us luck.

One of the popular items Carla and Marco argue about is Marco have decided he likes Carla’s hammock. Kaline used it too but nowhere near as much as Carla. Marco finds it very comfy. We’ll see what happens in this new feud.