Posted by terrepruitt on December 29, 2017
Here is a picture of my lighted cat with a Christmassy bow. I have wanted to post about her before (I don’t think I have). She is very pretty. She is pretty when the light isn’t on, but even more so when it is. And now here she is in a fancy bow all decked out for Christmas.
December’s last Friday Photo.
Posted in Friday Photo | Tagged: Christmas cat, Christmas Fancy, Friday Photo, Lighted Cat, Night Light, Pretty Cat | Leave a Comment »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 27, 2017
I learn a lot of things from Facebook, how about you? In fact I learned about the service this post is about on Facebook, you might have, too. Have you heard of GiveBackBox? A woman named Monika Wiela founded it in 2012 after she saw a homeless man on the streets of Chicago asking for shoes. Her company, at the time, had a lot of empty boxes. And her researched showed that tons of unused goods ended up in the landfill. So she came up with an idea, a way to help people, reduce waste, AND give those boxes a second life. You can fill up a box with stuff you want to donate, then print a label and it will get shipped for free.
There are retailers that have partnered for free with GiveBackBox. They help promote the service. Customers fill their empty boxes with clothes and household goods around their houses that they want to get rid of. If you are particular about what charity you are donating to then you might not want to use this service because they ship to the closest participating one to you. But if you just want to have a box of donations picked up and shipped for free, this is an amazing way to do it. You can also drop off the box at a post office or UPS store.
Yeah, you just fill up a box with stuff you want to donate, then print a label and it will get shipped for free. Some partners, such as eBags, request that you donate “bags”. Things like purses, luggage, business cases, backpacks, and duffels. Then they will give you a $25.00 credit to buy one of their bags.
I think this type of service would help reduce the number of us that drive around with stuff to donate in our trunks for longer than we care to admit. Right? Have you done that? I had thought I was the only one until I started to see memes about it. Then I knew that it was just something many of us do . . . .for whatever reason. Well, this could solve that. Instead of filling up a box and letting it sit in your trunk for months. Fill up the box, print the label, then get it picked up! Sounds too simple to be true, huh? Well, perhaps it is. I don’t know, I have not used the service, but when I heard about it I thought it was a great solution to a lot of situations. I thought that maybe not everyone saw it on Facebook, so I could post about it to help get the word out about it. I think having the boxes I receive stuff in be used to get filled with items I want to pass on – and being able to print a label – and then have someone come pick it up – yeah, a lot of things taken care of right there.
What do you think? Is this a great idea? Will this help you get some of those items you want to donate out of your house and on their way?
Posted in Misc | Tagged: charity, donating clothes, donating goods, donations, free pick up, GiveBackBox, great way to donate, UPS pick up, USPS Pick up | Leave a Comment »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 25, 2017
Wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas.
Posted in Misc | Tagged: Christmas, Gift bag, Merry Christmas bag, Nessa, spakly bag | 2 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 22, 2017
Ahhhh. A few days before Christmas. I hope you all are able to enjoy at least a few moments. Here is my Friday Photo, just a close up shot of our some of the decorations on our Christmas tree.
Posted in Friday Photo | Tagged: Christmas, Christmas Tree, Christmas Tree decorations, close up photo, Friday Photo, things that sparkle | Leave a Comment »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 18, 2017
Years and years ago I went to a Princess House party . . . . do you know what that is? It is one of those home shopping parties where a consultant brings products to a hostess’ house. The hostess invites her friends over to shop. They place orders for the product and it arrives a couple of weeks later. There are a lot of products that are sold like this. Princess House crystal is one of them. They have other products . . . at one time they had cutlery, cookware, and decorative gifts. Now I am not really sure what their product lines include, but back then I was really into it. My favorite line was their Fantasia line. It seemed more sturdy, to me, than their regular line. Also one of the sales pitches was that you could paint the plates (or serving dish) on the bottom and that would give you a different look. I purchased a lot from the Fantasia line. I have never once painted a piece. I also had a party one time and I got a china cabinet full of product from that party. Well, back then, when I was buying the crystal and having the parties, one of the ways they would sell the crystal is to have the consultant make recipes IN the crystal while at the party. I have several recipes from those parties that I use or have used often over the years. Recently I had the opportunity to make one of those recipes. I hadn’t made it in a long time — and dang it is so good. But you will see from the ingredients, why it is not an everyday type of recipe. But artichoke dip sure is good.
The picture is of the actually recipe I got from one of the parties. But I also typed it up here for you with MY slight modifications.
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Artichoke Dip
1 large jar marinated artichoke hearts, drained
1 cup mayo
1 cup grated mozzarella cheese
1 cup Parmesan cheese
1 7-ounce can chopped mild Ortega chilies, drained
garlic salt to taste
After you drain the artichoke hearts, chopped them up. Make smaller than bite sized pieces.
Mix all the ingredients together – either in the dish you are going to bake it in or in a bowl then put it in the dish. You might want to skip the salt all together (if I am saying that, you REALLY might want to skip the salt) because all the other ingredients seem to make this dip salty enough.
Bake in the oven at 350° F for about 15 or 20 minutes. Or as the original recipe says you can microwave it on high for 6-8 minutes (until cheese is melted).
Serve with tortilla chips or crackers.
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I always cut up the artichoke hearts because when you are trying to scoop them up with a chip or a cracker a big chunk of artichoke heart is just too difficult to deal with.
This last time I doubled the recipe (except for the chilies) and used one of my Princess House Fantasia baking dishes! I mixed it, baked it, and served it in the same dish.
Artichoke dip is a really popular dish. It is easy to make and tastes really good. So I am sure you have heard of it. I bet you even have your own recipe. What do you do to make your artichoke dip?
Posted in "Recipes", Food | Tagged: artichoke dip, artichoke hearts, cheesy dip, easy dip, make ahead appetizer, party dip, Princess House | Leave a Comment »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 15, 2017
I took a photo of these reindeer to post for my Friday Photo!
I love my Christmas decorations!
Posted in Friday Photo | Tagged: Christmas decorations, Friday Photo, reindeer | 2 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 13, 2017
While I was decorating for Christmas and making some Christmas gifts I was listening to Christmas music. I was listening to Pandora. I have a few Christmas CDs, but I thought I would listen to something else to see if there was any new stuff out there. To me it seems as if anyone sings they’ve done a Christmas album. Most often it is the same Christmas songs over and over. I have to admit that sometimes I like a new version of a traditional Christmas song. I can still like the old version, but it is nice to hear a new take on it. Well, this year on Pandora I was introduced to a Christmas album a couple of years old that had new-to-me songs on it. PLUS there are two versions of two songs that I didn’t even think I liked until I heard this group’s version. A couple of the songs I liked so much, I talked my hubby into an early Christmas gift of the album. The album I am talking about is Train’s Christmas in Tahoe.
First of all, last year was the first time – that I know of – that I had heard Joni Mitchell’s River (1971). And the version I heard I did not like. I think it turns out that I just don’t like any Christmas songs that particular artist sings on her album (2014). She has WAY TOO MANY dramatic pauses and they are WAAAAAAAY too long. Geez. It is to the point of annoying. So I thought I didn’t like the song. But I like Train’s version. Just now, before I typed this, I listened to their version then listened to the other artist’s version. I realized – as I FORCED myself to listen to the whole song -I had never listened to the whole song by that artist because I just don’t like it or so I thought. Turns out it is her version I don’t like. I need to listen to Joni Mitchell’s version to see how it is for me.
Then another song I have always really not liked until Train’s version is Happy Xmas (War is Over). I cannot tolerate John Lennon’s version of that song at all. That high pitched voice(s) on that track just really grates on my nerves. I am sure there are many out there that love that song . . . but I was so very relieved to hear not everyone likes it. I thought I was the only one. But I like Train’s version.
There is not one song on this album that I skip. And I was really happy to see that the album/CD has bonus tracks on it. It was purchased from Amazon so we had advanced access to it on Amazon music, but when the CD arrived it had more songs on it. Yay. Amazon music has 15 tracks, but the CD has 20! And one of them I don’t ever remember ever having heard. Have you heard of The Cherry Tree Carol?
What Christmas music are you listening to? What is your favorite Christmas song?
Posted in Misc | Tagged: Amazon Music, Christmas CDs, Christmas decorating, Christmas gifts, Christmas in Tahoe CD, Christmas music, Christmas Songs, Happy Xmas, John Lennon, Joni Mitchell's River, new Christmas songs, Pandora, The Cherry Tree Carol, Traditional Christmas songs, Train | 6 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 11, 2017
I love Christmas decorations. I have a lot of ornaments and it takes me quite a while to decorate the tree. I also have a lot of decorations that I set all around the house. That can take some time, too. It seems like every year there are some that I just don’t know where I put them the year before and so it is a challenge trying to get all the things out and around. But there are some decorations that are super easy to put out. They come right out of the box and in their spot and BAM! Decorated! They are high return decorations . . . in my opinion. They look great and they are soooooo easy to deal with. It is great to have easy decorations that have a bang. I am going to share with you the ones I think of as easy but have a really big bang.
First, is my lighted berry garland. I have two strands. These are the best things every. I have looked for them over and over and I cannot find them. I have some really pretty berry garland, but it is glass/plastic covered styrofoam so it is kind of delicate. It sheds no matter how careful I am. And so little bits of coating (I don’t even know if it is glass or plastic, but I don’t want my cats to eat it!) come off. So while, I love the look of it, it is not that easy to display and take care of, but the berry garland I am showing you here is awesome. It is plastic and it is very hearty. I actually just lift it off of the shelves and put it in a box. It somewhat stays in that formation in the box so I can just lift it out of the box and put it over the shelf and BAM! Just like that the shelf is decorated and looking very festive. This is one of my favorite decorations. It is usually one of the first things to go up. So easy and so decorative.
Another easy but beautiful (in my opinion) decoration is my wreath made of ornaments. This one is a cheap plastic version, but hanging on the door, ya can’t tell. It looks like nice ornaments. I think this is another easy thing to decorate with. Just pull it out of the box and hang it and you have all kinds of colors going on. It is shiny and colorful. Speaking of wreaths another great one for easy decorating is my bell wreath. This one I received as a gift from a friend and I love it. It is made of metal so it is a better quality than my other wreath. These two things along with my berry garland are the first to go up.
Then there are big red bows. I don’t know that it gets any easier than that. Just huge red bows placed about the space. Big red bows give it a nice cheery feeling. So festive!
And if you have some, why not use the Christmas plates. I actually have a plate holder on my wall that has plates in it all year round so when Christmastime comes I just replace our regular decorative plates with the Christmas plates. Easy-peasy. They have so many types of Christmas plates you can probably find just the right ones to match the rest of your Christmas decor. Or get some really fancy ones to be the highlight of your decorations. However you do it, plates are an easy way to decorate.
Whenever I pull out my berry garland and put it over the shelves I think, “Dang that was easy!” This year is occurred to me to share and to pick a few things that I think have a decorative POW but that are really easy to put up/put out/display.
What do you think? Do you have any decorations that take absolutely no time to put out, but really POP?
Posted in Misc | Tagged: bell wreath, berry garland, big red bows, Christmas decorations, Christmas plates, easy Christmas decorations, lighted berry garland, wreath made of ornaments | Leave a Comment »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 8, 2017
Oh, I love Christmas decorations. And I love mine. It is so fun to open them up every year. This is one of my favorites. I don’t remember where I got it, but I love it.
A sleigh for today’s Friday Photo.
Do you have a favorite Christmas decoration?
Posted in Friday Photo | Tagged: Christmas decoration, Friday Photo, metal sleigh, pine cones | 4 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 6, 2017
Ah, the Holidays are upon us . . . we have even made it through one. I should have actually done this post BEFORE Thanksgiving, but I hadn’t actually thought of it as a blog post until last week when one my students thanked me, saying it really helped her during her travels recently. One time when she had traveled she said sitting in one position for so long really affected her hip adversely. So I made a suggestion to her. This is a suggestion to help with the long hours of sitting for travel whether it be in a car or on a plane (or even a bus or a train). The best thing to do, of course is to get up and walk a bit . . . stretching your entire body, but that is not always possible. Sometimes it is HOURS before you can get up. So one way to help fight off that soreness that overcomes the body is to shift your sitting position.
Sitting with your legs curled up under you or outstretched in front of you would be a way to shift the way you are sitting, but again, I am talking about sitting in a car or an airplane where the room might not allow for curling your legs under you or stretching them out in front of you. So an alternative is to just take something and stick it under one buttock. It could be a rolled towel, a jacket, a scarf, a pair of socks . . . something soft and comfortable, but that will give you a bit of lift. Granted having one hip hiked up higher than the other is not really optimum posture, but it sometimes is enough of a shift to prevent that sitting-in-the-same-spot-for-hours-soreness that comes on. After a little while, move the bundle. You can move it lower down your thigh, or under your leg at the edge of the seat, or to the other buttock . . . just move it. Then after a little while – you are deciding on the length of time you move it – move it to another place. You can move it randomly and just put it wherever you want or you can be methodical and move it from one cheek, down to the thigh, down to the lowest part of your thigh, then up to the next cheek . . . going in a pattern. Whatever works for you. Whatever allows your body to get a bit of a shift.
This can work if you are driving too, as long as you can safely still work the gas and brake pedals.
Again, this is not the best thing . . . .getting up and moving would be the best think, but sometimes that just isn’t possible . . . so this is the next best thing. It can help a lot. It relieves the muscles giving them a break from being in the same spot. Being it the same spot tires them out. Let the rolled up towel (or whatever) help let your muscles relax and prevent them from getting tired and sore.
What are your tips for preventing soreness associated with sitting for a long period of time?
Posted in Misc | Tagged: Holiday travel, Holidays, preventing soreness from sitting, relieving soreness, sitting for a long time | 4 Comments »
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