happy halloween!

Cassie has a couple of friends sleeping over. We had our traditional dinner -- Zombie meatloaf with bloody veins and bony fingers. They had brains and eyeballs for dessert.

She was a peacock at school and a queen for her sleepover. Lovely either way!

I was Raggedy Ann and most of my little friends at school have never heard of her. Oh, well.

welcome to blogger, lori!

love your profile picture...

where's the beef?

back in august we had a "not going away party" and i made a big pot of chili to serve with our three buckets of margaritas. rachael wanted a beef recipe, and this turned out really good (i've made it several times since the party). i searched for chili recipes online and then just used what sounded good from several different recipes.

in a really big, clean pot...
brown about 2 pounds of extra lean ground beef and drain off the fat
add one chopped onion
some minced garlic
a tall can of kidney beans (drained and rinsed)
a regular can of pinto beans (drained and rinsed)
a regular can of black beans (drained and rinsed)
a 6 oz can of diced green chilis
two cans of diced, stewed tomatoes
a can of beef broth (not the condensed kind)
a palm full of chili powder
less than a palm full of ground cumin
about 1/3 cup of brown sugar
lots of course-ground black pepper
a little salt

stir it all up and cook it for a long time (works great all day in the crock pot).

i've also made it with dark beer instead of beef broth. pretty good that way.
i've also made it with leftover shredded carnitas meat instead of the ground beef. also very good.

now you make the chili and come back with your "star" rating and list the variations you came up with...

those pesky estimates

Ah, the joys of being a homeowner! so that repair work on the siding i mentioned? today i heard the estimate from the electrician -- $2,600.00. Can you say OUCH!?

seems that since everything has to be replaced UP TO CODE, it's going to be a spendy adventure. that's okay, though. it will be done right. part of that expense is for the rental unit, so that's tax deductible. nice.

other than that -- it was W I N D Y all day. we did not play outside. it's still windy, but not too bad. and survivor is on tomorrow, so all will be well with the world. i'm making chili.

dinner at the Channel Club tonight with Kent and his mom and friends. visiting relatives = opportunities to dine out. please come visit! dinner at the channel club is lovely. i'd love to take you all there.

blown away

i do not want to go to work today! the wind just hasn't stopped. it's blowing 45 mph (gusts up to 60) and the high wind warning is in effect until 9pm tonight. the rain is coming down sideways!

there's some repair work being done on the south end of the house and the sound of the wind slapping around that house wrap all night made it difficult to sleep.

waah. okay. enough whining. off to work...

chillin'

well, it didn't rain during the parade! so weird. it was pretty windy and chilly, though. i was very happy that my new l.l. bean squall parka and fleece gloves arrived yesterday. yeah for new coats! (my first new coat since before arnold was born -- i think it was time.)

cassie played the crash symbols. she wasn't very happy about that but she does it well anyway.

arnold played the sousaphone. the high school band had brand new raincoats! no more of the traditional garbage bags for the parade!

Yunue and i carried the banner for the child care center -- a tough job with the winds today! here's a link to the SJC watch page -- has a picture of ME in the parade! http://www.sjcwatch.blogspot.com/

happy alaska day!

alaska day

there's a parade tomorrow. it will be raining, of course. that's the tradition. sitka is the only place in alaska that celebrates alaska day, and we celebrate it for a week. the kids will both be marching in their school bands. i'll be walking with the families from our child care center, which is celebrating it's 20th anniversary this year.

tuesday, cassie's school choir performed in the alaska day variety show. not much variety, really. the choir did a good job, and they helped mrs. turcott sing the alaska flag song before the beard and bonnet judging began. oh, so corny.

location, location, location

living a couple of thousand miles away from my extended family has many disadvantages. for example, this morning i learned that three of my nieces have blogs here. there is so much i don't know about them. it is easy to imagine them just as they were when i moved away 20 years ago -- not the grown women and mothers that they are today. and i'm really terrible about keeping in touch with them. maybe this will help.