Fried green beans, you say! What's that got to do with anything! Well, have you had them? I had not until this past week. How long have I lived in the South you are asking yourself. Right? I know, I jsut never have been a big cooked vegetable fan, although I've made sure to cook and shove them religiously under the rest of my family's nose to eat for THEIR nutrition. I've always managed to scathe by relatively unnoticed that I don't consume much real cooked-to-death veggies myself. Mind you, I do eat them lightly steamed or totally raw as with most of my veggies. I just happen to be sort of like a rabbit and would prefer my veggies right from the garden before ever hitting the stovetop or oven at all. Grilling veggies is fine with me, light grilling. Okay, we all have our thing. But to get on with the rest of this light-hearted story, my brother had given us a gift certificate to TGI-Fridays for Christmas, so DH and I decided to break up our monotony and have lunch there one day this week mid afternoon. We have lots of them here at the beach, and we are in the one closest to our home. Right, real adventurous, aren't we. It's funny when you stay home so much you become like a frightened rabbit and then don't want to venture out of your cage. This is not a good thing, I call it "institutionalized". It's going to be rough to get over once we find jobs again! Anywho, after scanning the menu for the best deals we ordered, me going first: Southwestern salad, chicken entre', peanutbutter pie for dessert. By that time, I had engaged our waitress in a big conversation because she too had moved here from the western part of Virginia, very close to where we used to live in WV. She was busy telling me her big story of what had prompted her family to make the big move south. I never even heard what my DH ordered, so when FRIED GREEN BEANS came to the table, I'm like, "What in the world is that?" We shared the fresh green beans which had been heavily battered in a very spicy (surely a TGIF trademark secret) batter and then deep-fried till a little past golden brown. OMG!! They were soooo gooood!! We're hooked and will venture to learn how to cook those at home now. I couldn't believe I had eaten so many when they were finally gone off the plate! I used to be a deep-fry wizard when I was young up north raising my family. Home-made French fries in my own deep frier seasoned with all kinds of different spices was a staple in our house. I had a great open-top deep frier with a basket with a sturdy handle, so I would just set in on the rangetop right under the exhaust fan which would suck up all that nasty grease smell for the most part. But, as you age, and the doctors stress to you about watching that ole cholesterol, well, heck, I just packed that deep-frier up when we moved and really never got it back out afterwards. We got into the "less fried foods" thing and stayed there. But . . . the fried green beans may have just prompted me to unpack that old faithful grease-pit again!! If you haven't tried them, DO! The spicy batter is delicious, so that's a must if you try to whip some up yourself at home.
Thanks everybody for the wonderful comments you've been leaving for me. It's so encouraging to read your thoughts on things and to receive your encouragement. It means so much that you take time to jot down your thoughts so I have your feedback. REALLY! I've always read on other scrapping blogs how that simple word of thanks inspires designers to make more, and I can see how that is so true now.
I'm a very late night poster, so if you see words occasionally misspelled (as I just saw scanning through my previous post - ugh!), please just be aware that I do know better, I just must go blind eventually at night or the brain runs faster than than the eyes can catch up. I love the King's English and try to use it correctly and spell it correctly also.
Mason's dad decided to hold Mason's official 4th birthday party Sunday at McDonalds at 1:30 p.m. with some other little neighborhood children invited. He called us at 1 p.m. to invite us. Now I'm positive he doesn't understand much about females, because it takes most females longer than a 30-minute start flag to put ourselves together in full dress and make-up, much less get gifts and cards together and be down in the city on location inside of that 30 minutes. I had to hussle like greased lightning not to miss this party! We made it as the second-hand struck 1:30 pm, but I was out of breath. I took lots of pictures and a short video of it on my camera, so I'll have some scrapping to do and show soon. He had a big time and was full of constant jabber as is normal for him. He talks as if he is a grown-up, but he does play like a child his age. One of the other children (4 and under, mind you) began to cry over something not going their way, and Mason just stopped what he was into and looked right at her and said, "Please don't cry at my birthday party because I'm having a good time and that will make me all sad too." Just sounds so grown up for four years old, like he thinks as an adult and conveys as an adult. Scary sometimes. You want them to stay child-like as long as possible, ya know? I did pretty well with my emotions during this event and only broke down once during the taking of the video I was trying to get. The tears of missing his mom just wouldn't hold back any longer as I watched him have such fun. She was always so into the making sure that he would have that type of great fun on his special days during the year, and not just for him; she did so for her neice and nephew to the point that the 7-year old nephew cried in the middle of having Christmas because he misses her so much. She was good at making each of us really feel that we were special to her. She put time and a lot of thought and energy into things she did for others. DH and I still plan to grab Mason for a few hours later today since today (Monday) is his real birthday and take him downtown to play in the "Man's Store" which is what he and my DH call The Bass Pro Shop! Mason totally loves that store. They don't have to buy a thing, the just go there and hang out and touch everything and play in the tents, sit in the canoes, just hand out and look at and talk about guy stuff. I took Mason there to get a photo of all of my grandkids sitting on Santa's lap as it was a free promotion preChristmas. As we went in the large front door, he was a few steps ahead of me and he turned and said, "Mimi, I LOVE this place!" It was such an unexpected statement from one so young but it was so cute and so pure that I don't think I'll ever forget how much expression he had in that statement to me. However, my fair lady granddaughter balked that night and would not sit upon Santa's lap for love nor money! So I have this photo of my two grandsons together on Santa's lap without her, and that's not exactly what I had envisioned. But Miss K is your typical moody female already at 4 yrs. of age. In a group you always have at least one that is pulling in the opposite direction. It's a fact, so I don't let it bother me; you just learn to roll with that stuff.
Our weather here tonight is extremely strong wind going through. It's trying to rain, but there is so much wind that it's howling and gusty. I can hear stuff beating and banging around outside like prehurricane type weather. Weirdness for this time of year!
I took some "create digi" time and came up with some neat stuff I'll be sharing with you. I even managed to scrap a page of the many faces of Miss K using a template that I think is so adorable which you can find free at Digi Scrap Depot and the designer is Kirsten. Visit her blog, she keeps some nice digis coming at you. Take a look at this, the template is very clever, and I'll use it again for some of my own posey pictures and probably again for some gardening photos of my mom. I was pleased how this turned out!
DOWNLOAD HERE
And to finish up and to help celebrate Mason's 4th birthday, here is the first of my "MASON JAR" projects for your consideration. It's a crocheted dish cloth/bath rag or even useful as a potholder if you like. Dimensions between 10-11 inches square, 100% cotton, machine wash/dry. It's nice and big and well done, if I do say so myself. I've been doing needlework since I was a pup! I'm doing these in a multitude of different color combos and used them this year as Christmas gifts myself.
Red-Peppermint Rag_Item: CR_#01
Price: $8.00 + (S/H, $2.50)
1 comment:
Thank you so much for this Freebie. I want to let you know that I posted a link to your blog in CBH Digital Scrapbooking Freebies, under the Page 9 post on Jan. 26, 2010. Thanks again.
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