{ A day spent fighting allergies and looking through cookbooks }

 

Could we all just take a moment to welcome in Fall?  With big wide open arms.

Although, apparently Fall in Texas is slightly confused with summer.  Just ask the 100 degree temperature we're feeling.  Sometimes I want to go outside, and just yell out "ENOUGH!".  

 

But I doubt that would do anything, other than bring in some unwarranted attention from neighbors

 

 

The allergies have been at their worst.  Of course!  I'm sure it is because the other day I said to Curt, that I was doing so well and hadn't had allergy attacks in a while.  Sometimes I wonder why I open my mouth, I should already know that whatever I say, is going to come back to bite me in the behind.

I'm not the only one though, everyone in our area is suffering with them.  

But for me, they get so bad, that nothing seems to help, aside from taking a pink little Benadryl pill.  It knocks me out within 20 minutes, and therefore gives me some reprieve.  Problem is, it also makes me quite groggy for a couple of hours, and I don't like that feeling at all.

So today, was pretty much a useless day.  I got nothing done, other than nod off constantly, wake up feeling groggy, walk around and get some daily household chores done, and just look through some of my cookbooks.

 

So that's what I leave you with, just some quick shots of the cookbooks I was looking through.  Hope you enjoy.

As for me, I'm headed back to my bed.  I can't wait for this groggy feeling to subside. 

{ Homemaking halted by allergies.....ugh! }

My day started bright and early, or rather, dark and early, because when we get up at 6am, it is still pitch black outside.  

We have our morning routine down to a tee, matter of fact, I think our bodies pretty much just move themselves through the early morning hour between 6 and 7.  Alarm goes off, we get up, Curt heads straight to the bathroom to get ready for work, then takes Kaia out to potty.

While he does that, I head to the kitchen, give Elliott some morning hugs and kisses, give him a treat, and feed him his breakfast.  I then put Kaia's breakfast in her bowl, get the water boiling, prepare our cups of coffee, get Curt's lunch ready.  At this time Kaia is usually back inside and looking for her morning treat, which I give her, along with lots of cuddle and kisses.

Then we move back to the bedroom.  I hand Curt his lunch and his coffee, he works at his computer for a few minutes while drinking his coffee and leaving for work.

I sit on my bed with both Kaia and Elliott, drink my coffee, and look through my phone, say goodbye to Curt and then finish my coffee, watch some youtube videos and around 7:30am, get up, and get my day started.

Just like that, every morning.  There's something comforting about that well known routine.

This morning, I sat and watched the doves in my yard.  Yesterday, I had gone out for an errand and when I returned home, my entire property, roof of the house, and yards were covered in doves.  I have never seen so many in my life, it was amazing and I felt such peace as well.  I strongly believe that doves are very much connected to the Holy Spirit.

 

I turned back around to see these two, staring at me from inside.  They are so cute, just look at those faces.

I got dressed, made the bed, cleaned the bathroom, then went to fill my new rice tub.  I ordered it from Amazon and it arrived yesterday afternoon.  I wasn't sure if it would work or how good it was, but it actually is just what I was looking for, and I love that it has wheels, which make it easier to move around.

 

I got 3 of these scoops as well, one for the rice, and one each for Kaia and Elliot.  Once I got the rice all moved to the tub, and into the pantry, I got more water boiling for my second cup of coffee, emptied the dishwasher and refilled it, gave the counters a good wipe down and took out my chicken for dinner.

 

Oh coffee!!!

The practice of making a pour over cup of coffee, is one I've loved since I was little.  Maybe it's a Portuguese thing, or a European thing, but these machine coffees are just not my cup of tea.  I do have a Keurig and I'll tell you, I hardly ever use it, same as for my coffee machines.

I just find that a cup of poured coffee is a million times better.  But that's just my own opinion.

This morning I had a Kahlua French Vanilla coffee, and a bagel with cream cheese and some of my homemade apple butter.  Perfect breakfast!

I grew up in Portugal, and breakfast for us was always a cup of coffee and some kind of bread, either toast, or a bread roll with ham and cheese, or quince paste and cheese, or jam.  That was basically our to go breakfast, not until I moved to the USA did I even think of a heartier breakfast.  

The whole sausage and bacon, and eggs, biscuits and gravy etc, is something I wasn't used to, I do love, but I definitely can't eat it everyday.  It's far too much for me. 

I jumped right into my homemaking after breakfast.  Got the house clean, watered all the plants outside, and then got busy cleaning and organizing a shelf under my wall oven.  It's something I've needed to do for a while now, but kept forgetting about it.

I went through, cleaned, and moved everything that was under there into some pretty woven baskets.  It looks so much better.

Because it hadn't been done in a few months, it had a lot of dust and I should have known it would affect me, since one of the allergies I have, is to dust.  I wasn't even thinking, but right after I finished, my nose started feeling congested, I started sneezing and I then I couldn't breathe.  

I managed to quickly make us some lunch, pigs in a blanket.  Ate a few pieces and then made a beeline for the bedroom to my allergy pills.  And that was where my day practically ended.

The thing with my allergies, is that when they get this bad, I have to take my pill, and it completely knocks me out, within 20 minutes.

I figured since I was going to be forced into a nap, I might as well do my devotionals and Bible reading while Kaia and Elliott settled in for their naps, and I waited for mine to kick in.

By the time I woke up, I had to get dinner started.  I've had a pounding headache since then, the congestion is still hounding me and my asthma is having a field day.....all because of dust.  It is fascinating to me, how our bodies work.  I can't stand my allergies and how my body reacts to certain particles and things, but at the same time, I think it's amazing how our bodies are made.  Don't you?

Anyway, I dragged myself into the kitchen and began the process of making dinner, which just as it always happens, it was something that would need work and attention and more effort than I really wanted to put in, considering the way I'm feeling, but I just set to work.

 

So what was dinner tonight?  Well, it was chicken fried chicken, gravy, a potato bake and some green beans.  By the way if you want to see my dinners every night, be sure to follow me on Instagram.  I usually show myself preparing our meals, and then show the dinner plate too.  

It seems to be one of the things my followers over there most like seeing.  I'll be honest, I love food, so I too love seeing what others are eating or making in their homes.

Dinner took quite a while to prepare, and after we ate, came the long process of doing dishes, cleaning the stove, packing lunches for tomorrow, and putting my kitchen to sleep.  

I always love taking one last look at my kitchen before turning the light off, for the night.

I made my way to my room, and marked off more things off the daily to do list.  Ok, so let's quickly talk about the to do list.  I've never been one to follow lists, I love making them, but I never followed them.  But the past month or so, I have gotten into the habit of actually making a daily list, and adding everything that I want to get done that day, then crossing off with a highlighter as I do them.

Sometimes I miss a thing or two, just like today, I ended up not making French Bread for dinner, and I didn't get to vacuum the carpets either.  Those will move to tomorrow's list.  But basically everything I can think of that I want to do, I write down.

I've noticed as I've gotten older, I tend to forget more Hahahaha

And not only that, but as moms we are so busy during the day, and trying to do so many things at once, I tend to think of something that needs my attention, but then walk into a different room and see something else, and start on that, sometimes completely forgetting why I even went in that room to begin with.

Anyone else like this?

Making these daily lists has helped me stay on track and put my thoughts down on paper, all I have to do is look back at the list during the day, and cross off chores as I finish them. 

For now, it is working for me.  If in the future it stops working, then I'll figure something else out, but I'm quite happy with this system for the moment.

And with that, my Wednesday comes to an end.  My allergies are still raging, my headache is still pounding, and if you have allergies or sinus issues you know what these headaches feel like, every time you sniff or try to breathe in, it feels like a vice grip around the head.  Ouch!!!

I've just taken another allergy pill, and no doubt it will be knocking me out in the next 30 minutes, so I better close this out before I fall asleep and slam my head on the keyboard.  

Have a great night ladies, I'll be back in the morning with a recipe to share for our Cooking Thursday!

{ Quick trip to Oklahoma }

For those that don't know, we live very close to the state of Oklahoma, and though we have family who live in the State, we don't go up very often, unless needed to do so.

My husband's childhood home is in Lawton.

It is a house that I love, a house that brings back a plethora of wonderful memories, many involving my father in law who passed away two months, almost to the day, before Nicholas was born.

I remember many road trips from Idaho to Oklahoma, some when Jasmine was a toddler, some when I was but a few weeks away from having Nicholas.  Family get togethers, funerals, good times and extremely sad ones too, but it's that home that when you walk in you immediately feel peace and want to be nowhere else but there.

Anyway, long story short, my mother in law needed some things done at the house and as you know she's been fighting breast cancer for many years and recently, her husband Ken had heart surgery.  With everything going on at the moment, we don't want them driving around and leaving their house, and it's much closer for Curt and I to pop up there, than it would be for them to make an almost 5 hour drive.

We don't mind, we love being able to help and as I said above, it's a house that we love going back to.

One thing we enjoy, is the drive up to the house.  Love driving through the greenest of fields, cattle, ponds, old barns and a vast prairie as far as the eye can see.

Some of the most beautiful land to drive through.

Friday morning we took a quick drive up to the house, to take care of some business for my mother in law.  We weren't sure how long it would take so we went prepared.  I took my laptop where I could work on editing some photos or blog posts, my review book to read, and even my grocery list and menu plan since I needed to get groceries as well.

What probably would have taken a whole day was actually done in about an hour, so we packed up and returned back home. Though I did drag Curt to the grocery story with me, we went to the commissary on base.

I will tell you that it felt so good to be back in a grocery store shopping  A lot o the items were back in stock and aside from a few things like rice, beans and pasta whose shelves continue being quite bare, everything else was back on the shelves, including toilet paper.

One thing I have no been able to buy at all since March, is rubbing alcohol, which is slightly frustrating because as you know, I make all my household cleaners and fabric deodorizers.  I use vinegar and rubbing alcohol for that, so have had to go back to buying cleaning supplies.  Yuck!

But this too shall pass.

Today has been a day of basic household chores, got all my laundry done, dishes, worked in the veggie garden a bit and then we all got in the pool for about an hour in the afternoon.  It honestly feels amazing to have a pool that you can just jump into at any time, have a quick swim and enjoy the fresh air.

We were only in for about an hour, it is extremely windy outside and my allergies don't do well with that at all, I actually need to go take my Allegra now.  I took a Singulair this morning but it's done nothing really, I've been constantly sneezing and scratching at my nose and eyes.  *sigh*

Once we got out of the pool, hubby got us all McDonald's as a treat, and now everyone is either laying down for a nap, watching movies or playing computer games.

It's been the type of day I enjoy, quiet, no rushing, just us 4 with some junk food thrown in.  Ha!

Tomorrow will be about the same, but with church in the morning, I watch the Elevation Church live sermons every Sunday morning and they have been such a blessing through this Coronavirus quarantine.  I encourage you to check them out if you haven't.

Aside from that, I do need to catch up on my review books, I'm falling a little behind in my reading.  I also want to bake some sort of dessert, and get my house and family ready for the week ahead.

For the rest of this evening, I will be reading, watching TV and relaxing, oh and trying not to scratch my eyes and nose off. 

{ Day 11 of Quarantine/Day 6 of Shelter in Place - Horrid Allergies }

"And Moses said to the people, 'Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today'."

- Exodus 14:13 -

It is getting harder and harder to stay indoors and not let that feeling of being confined, get to you.  It has become a matter of telling myself daily, that this will be over with soon, that this won't go on for too long.

I know what I'm saying is understood by you all, since we are in the same storm, going through pretty much the same situation.  In a way it makes me feel better to know that the whole world is in this together, it would be harder to accept if it was just our country going it alone.

Does it make this easier?  In a way yes, and in a way no, because as humans we tend to withdraw inside ourselves and not see anything but our immediate situation.  It does not make you a bad person or a self centered individual, it makes you of human flesh and blood.

So it's something I'm trying very hard not to allow.  Of course my family is my number one priority, but I also think about and pray for all my friends, blog readers, community, country and world.

Today, I didn't do much at all either. 

The reason?  Allergies.  They have been so bad the past few weeks, and they've made me feel pretty yucky.  Stuffy nose and headaches are the main culprit, but my right year is ringing again pretty loud and feeling quite stuffy too.  I don't know what it is with my allergies but since two years ago, they have decided to attack my ears. 

I've been taking my Allegra and Singulair and just getting by.

I did a bit more crochet today, I'm enjoying the simplicity and easiness of granny squares, and since Ive got so much time on my hands now, I'm working through my yarn stash.  A blanket is what I have in mind, but will I actually finish it or will it go on my long Works in Progress pile?

And don't laugh because I'm sure you all have a long WIPs stack as well.  Who doesn't?  Hahahah

I realize that my daily posts have been pretty short and not filled with anything exciting, but I think nowadays I will settle for boring and uneventful over the alternative.

I'm finishing my grocery list which my husband will take with him to work tomorrow, so that he can go grocery shopping at the base commissary after work.  I could go and I'm not in any way, not allowed to, but we've made the joint decision that there is no need for us all to be outdoors, and since he is already on base, it makes sense for him to pick up the groceries instead of putting me at risk.

So I'll finish that list tonight and then try to read a little.

Tomorrow, I was hoping to finally get my seedlings in the ground but we are expecting rain storms tonight and tomorrow, which means that plan is out the window. 

I'll probably work on baking some bread and cookies, and even though I wanted to carpet clean my living rooms, that is not going to work if it's a rainy and damp day.  Guess I'll have to find something else to occupy my time with.

Earlier this morning, I did another quick inventory of the freezer and pantry and reworked my monthly meal plan accordingly.  It's something I'll keep doing every other week, until all of this gets back to normal, whether that's the end of April or May or who knows. 

I want to close this post by wishing you all a blessed end of Thursday, and reminding you that God is already past this pandemic and waiting for us on the other side.  We know the outcome of this, we know that God wins, we know that this is His battle and not ours. 

But let's not forget to do our part, and I'm not just talking about the washing of the hands, or staying indoors and so on, I'm talking about praying, reading the Bible, comforting those who are having a really hard time with the situation and sharing our testimonies.

It is what we can do for ourselves and for others.

Bad allergy day

I don't know what happened, or where this allergy attack came from, but halfway through the afternoon, my eyes and nose started itching, I started sneezing and it was just downhill from there.

Even after I took my Allegra and Singular, plus the nasal allergy spray, the attack continued.

I haven't had such a bad allergy flare up, in many many months, so something must be aggravating me, just wish I could figure out what and remove it.

For now, I'm just sitting, trying to contain my sneezes, stopping myself from scratching my nose and eyes to oblivion, and listening to a crime documentary on YouTube.

I started my day with driving Jasmine to work, and then came straight home to get started on my housework.  More clothes were washed and set out to dry, I'm taking full advantage of this warm breeze heat we've been having.

The clothes go on the line and within 10 minutes tops, they are fully dry.  Isn't that something?

My soapberry tree is producing hundreds upon hundreds of these beautiful little green balls. Soon they will start changing color and that is when I'll collect a ton and use them to make all sorts of homemade soap.

I'll have to do a post on that when the time comes.  I'm all about using things at your disposal and this tree in the back yard, sure provides a HUGE amount of beautiful soap berries which will be turned into dish soap, shampoo, multi purpose cleaner and many other things.  Did you know you can even wash your laundry using these???  Crazy!!!

But, I'm very excited to dive right into the world of soap nuts and their amazing cleaning and medicinal properties.

I was able to catch up on my reading for about an hour this afternoon.  This is the next book on the review list and I'm enjoying it a LOT, can't wait to tell you all about it.

In the meantime while I wait for my soap berries to turn color, I'm resorting to simple tried old fashioned ways of cleaning the most stubborn of stains, especially in my white kitchen towels.

All I do is get a big plastic tub, fill it with boiling water, add in vinegar, baking soda and some powder detergent, pop the towels in and give it a quick swish then set it out in the warm sun for a couple of hours.

How to whiten kitchen towels in the sun:

One big tub
Boiling water, 1 gallon
Baking soda, about 4 heaping tablespoons
Vinegar about 500ml  (2 and a half cups)
Powder detergent, 1 cup
Plastic bag to cover


Mix the baking soda, vinegar and detergent well, then pour in the boiling water.  Carefully add in your kitchen towels, be careful not to burn yourself.  I use a big wooden spoon to stir the towels into the water.

Place a plastic bag over the tub to cover. You're basically going to give it a nice steam bath, or a sauna if you will.  You don't have to cover with the bag, if the sun is hot enough, you can leave it as is, and that is what I did today.

Let it sit in the sun for a couple of hours.  It's best if you place them out in the morning and leave them until later in the day, or even overnight.

Ring them out really well, then throw in your washer.  That's it, simple and again, we are letting nature help us out.

I am going to do another bunch of towels tomorrow and I'll show you the whole process and maybe even do a separate post to help you.   I'll also show you how much cleaner and whiter the towels turn out.

That is it for today.  I worked on the budget.  I actually sat down and wrote out any debt that we have, the amounts still owing and then went month by month until it was paid off, rolling over money from one paid off debt to the other and so forth.  I'm going to snowball the bejeebers out of our debt and we will be completely debt free in 2 years.

Definitely looking forward to that.

I'm about to enjoy a latte and watch some Star Trek with the hubster before bed.  I hope you've had a fantastic week so far.  Mine has been pretty quiet and I've enjoyed that, sometimes no action is the best thing you could wish for, right?

I'll be back tomorrow with the kitchen towel post for you all, have a good one :)

{ What a week it's been }

I really don't want to come in and whine and moan and complain.  It's just been one of those weeks, bad weather, a lot of driving around and dealing with horrible allergies that have decided to attack my right ear.  Last year I got fluid in both years from the allergies, right around this time as well.

3 week ago, I started struggling with the allergies again, getting bad bouts that would leave me coughing and losing my voice.  A week after that started, my right ear became muffled and felt like I couldn't get it to pop.  A week after that, I had put some olive oil and tea tree oil in, as advised by some people, and two days after that I started getting the ringing in my ear.

It's now been 4 days of the non stop low buzzing in my right ear, the ear is still muffled, and I'm about to rip my head off with this nonsense.

I am giving this until this weekend, and if it's not getting better, I'm making an appointment for the doctor next week.  I just can not handle this clogged ear and ringing feeling.  I don't have pain, I do have itching inside the ear, so I'm starting to think that it's developing from fluid into an infection and it's time to nip this in the butt.

{ Allergy results and my Atlanticus }

Finally!!!

It's been almost 2 weeks and I hadn't heard back from the doctor on my allergy panel.  The rest of the results came back fine, I didn't realize until today that my doctor had ordered pretty much a full panel, so everything was checked including Thyroid and so on.  Everything is good there.

Let me just start by saying that, if you're in the military you know how frustrating it can be to try and reach your PCM (primary care manager) by phone.  Usually you can reach the Tricare appointment line but it's automated and you get the run around and so on.

I had been trying for a few days to reach my doctor or at least her nurse, and couldn't get through.  Today I called the Tricare appointment line and they actually transferred me to the Family Care Clinic so I could reach my doctor, which by the way, I didn't.  But the airman that spoke to the me on the phone was extremely helpful and after following some of his suggestions, I finally landed on the right spot which is the Tricare Online Patient Portal.

If you haven't yet done so, you might want to check into that, you can access all the doctor appointments, the lab results, you can order prescriptions and make appointments and even message your doctor through a secure server.  It's amazing!!!!

Ok I'm getting off track......so yeah I got my results from the allergy panel and I'm allergic to quite a lot of things around my house which completely explains why I've been suffering so bad with allergies.

One thing I suspected but wasn't completely sure of, was the dog dander, and yep, it came back that I'm allergic to Cat and Dog Dander.  Oh joy!!!!  I can't get near cats, they make me so sick, but I think my body is used to dogs because we've always had dogs, the only time I really suffer is when they are shedding.

Anyway, I'm allergic to mold, fungus, grass bermuda, grass timothy, grass johnson, white ash tree, birch, oak, juniper trees, russian thistle, mugwort, house dust mites, ragweed and a few other kinds of grass and spores and whatever that I don't even know.  Honestly from that list, I think only one or two things are not around me, everything else is in my house (dogs) or in my front and back yard.  LOL

So I'm waiting to talk to the doctor so that we can figure out the course of action, because I'm absolutely miserable and need some relief.

Alright, after that medical talk, let me show you some prettiness.  I worked on my Atlanticus while waiting for my allergy pills to kick in, and while doing that I started rewatching my Everybody Loves Raymond DVD's from Season 1.  I absolutely LOVE this series.

Did you know that the Atlanticus blanket is a boy?  It's actually a him.  How neat is that?

I'm loving how it's turning out, I wanted it to be inspired by Cath Kidston colors and I think I've achieved that, only color really missing is the yellow, but I am just so happy with the progress so far, and for once I'm caught up on a CAL.

All ready for Part 7 on Monday :)

Well friends, my allergy meds are kicking in and here shortly I'll conk out so I'm going to cut this short and head to bed.