Swimming, Sunrises, and Packers game

Friday night / Saturday morning food story

A picture is worth a thousand words!

Recepie for Raw Pear Cake (a suprisingly delicious mix of pear, spices and chocolate):

Ingredients: Half cup butter, 1 cup sugar, 2 T dry unsweetened cocoa powder, 2 beaten eggs, 1.5 cups flour, 1/4 t baking powder, 1 t baking soda, 1/2 t salt, 1 t cinnamon, 1/2 t cloves, 1/2 c water, 1 cup peeled, small chunked pears

Cream butter, sugar and cocoa. Add eggs. Mix dry ingredients in small bowl. Add mixture to butter mixture alternately with water, beating after each addition. Fold in pears. Grease and flour an 8x8 cake pan; pour in batter. Bake at 350 for about 45 minutes.

Millionaires at what cost?

According to conventional wisdom, Bryan and I are doing the “right” things to retire millionaires: we invest monthly in our Roth IRAs, we live by a budget, and we buy groceries on sale with coupons (just last week, for example, I bought a box of Hamburger Helper for 33 cents). But since we “moved” to the lake house, I wonder if we’re missing something in our financial plan.

Since we’re going into business with the homeowners, we know their financial stakes and they live a frugal lifestyle. Can we speed our way to millionaire status by adopting a frugal lifestyle?

1. Eat anything and everything. In recent years, Mr. and Mrs. P have moved their parents into assisted living facilities. In doing this, they cleaned out their parents’ pantries. Now…they have 60-ish boxes of jello, boxes quick pearled barley, and a box of Dream Whip cake additive with the price tag typed on the box. But hey, if it's still good, what not eat it??

2. Save what's not eaten. When we initially “moved,” I was asked if we drank milk. We love milk but I will not freeze the partially-empty container if we don't finish it. On our first day here, I nosily checked the freezers' contents. My wishes of frozen pizza and mozo sticks were replaced with containers holding a tablespoon of enchilada sauce, 8 frozen egg yolks, and multiple bags of partially eaten bread loaves waiting to be made into bread crumbs.

3. Collect…and save to sell. When I had my c-section, Bryan borrowed a firm desk chair for me to use. As it turned out, Mr. P had multiple carbon copies of this chair (they're really nice!!). If you walk into his basement, you will find 8 organs (the musical kind), a case of baby formula (remember, no kids=no grandkids), tools galore, a set of wicker chairs, piles of 2x4 wood, and etc, etc, etc! Upstairs is more storage and 5 or 6 computer monitors, broken printers, stereos from 1980, and 15 year-old sports gear.

My question of the moment: how frugal is too frugal?

I Love Grandparents!

They don't have to be my grandparents...just about everyone born before 1940 has a very special quality to them.

A couple days after we "moved" in, Randy's mom came by to pick pears. After I introduced her to Katie, we chatted about eating pears and all the delicious recipies they could be used in. Mrs. Prestash mentioned that you could replace pears in apple cake recipies. Lo and behold...the next day Mrs. Prestash brought us a homemade pear cake!

Today, the doorbell rang while I was playing with Katie. An elderly gentleman was standing there, and he asked if he could pick some pears. I showed him where the wasps were and warned him about them. As we talked, his wife got out of their lovely Lincoln. I expected her to ask to hold the baby...because who can resist this cutie!? Instead, she asked me if I babysat. I explained that I was babysitting the Prestash dogs, and Katie was my child. She said, "I know, but do you babysit others?" The lady explained that her neighbor was looking for an occassional sitter, and I suppose she thought I looked honest enough to give my name and number to her neighbor.

Mimi and Molly

The Prestash babies

(Above) Molly is the old girl--she's an estimated 18 years old, and she has cataracts in both eyes. Randy and Patti are thinking of surgery...but then again, she's 18. We give Molly 3 pills per day; she spends her days (and nights) sleeping in the hallway. She routinely mopes around the kitchen at 8am (breakfast time) and 6pm (dinner time). Unfortunately for us, Molly is in the 18 year habit of waking up at 5:30am to go outside. She barks and barks until one of us lets her outside. So far, Bryan has had this responsibility since I wake up at 3:30 or 4am to nurse Katie.

(Below) Mimi is the youngest of 4 years. It's hard to get her to be still for a photo op! She is full of energy, and her energy sometimes overwhelms Shadow. Just last night Mimi was sniffing Shadow and getting on her nerves. Shadow responded by snipping at her and showing her who the leader of the pack is!

(Below) Shadow and Mimi

"Our" house, from the middle of the street

The buick looks like it belongs here! On another note... there are 4 garage spaces, and only one car can fit in the garage.

Great room (flat screen is in front of the fire place)

Dining room (yes, dining room)

Kitchen--my fault that it's so messy! We had friends Beth and Mark Earnest over for a steak dinner last night.

Sun room/entertainment room

The deck where we grilled our steaks last night (it was rainy when we took this pics this morning--and our Ike rudiments aren't here yet!).

Introducing...Lac La Belle

Lac La Belle at sunrise

We're moving tomorrow! Nope, we're not moving back to Dyersburg, as my mom hoped when I told her the news yesterday. In fact, we're only moving temporarily. Bryan's boss is taking his wife to Europe for 2 weeks (nice birthday present, huh?), and they've invited us to stay at their place and watch their 2 dogs.

Their place...is a million dollar home on beautiful Lac La Belle.

I might enjoy this too much! I'm looking forward to...the sunsets, the king sized bed, the high efficiency washer and dryer, the cortland, red delicious, and pear trees (apple crisps!), the exercise room, a glass of wine on the deck with Bryan, the vegatable garden, the flat screen TV, the convector oven...and the list goes on!