Blog Swap ???

I must be totally stupid, because I happened upone someone's blog a bit ago who was participating in a Blog Swap.  Ok  soounds good to me, I'm in, but I can't figure out how to get my partners.  Anywho, maybe someone will help a Sister out over here.  I am cutting and pasting what I got from someone else's blog with the instructions. 

http://www.swap-bot.com/swap/show/66825#comment-317115


I participated in a swap on Swap-bot called Be my blog follower on Blogger. To sum it up it was a blog swap only for those of us with blogs on Blogger. It was a chance for us to get more blog followers. There was a total of 29 people to sign-up :) We each got 10 partners that we had to checkout their blogs and follow. Yay, that means 10 more followers for me and 10 more awesome blogs I get to read!! I loved all of the partners I was paired up with.
 
Stay tuned folks.  I hope I get 10 Partners from somewhere, and Sorry to those that get ME.  LOL

Thrifty Pillows and other Fabulous Finds

My Sister, doesn't really believe that Thrift Stores sanitize stuff.  Well I am of the school of thought that, what I don't know, won't hurt me.  I mean I sleep in hotel rooms and God knows what happens in them, and lay my head on those pillows.  So which is safter, do you think? I am voting for the Thrift Store pillows.   So here is what I have gotten lately:

The Blue one is  aRalph Lauren.  I am totally in love with it.

Don't you just LOVE it when you find something you really need.  How about a food scale that I was going to buy from Weight Watchers and there it was in the Hot Line Store in Kitty Hawk NC.  Along with this vase of Peony's for 2.98. 

Got this beauty for 99 Cents!  I can't wait to redo it for my kitchen.  I like the trellis on the side.  so I am thinking vintage fruit prints.  Got this one at CHKD in Williamsburg.  They had GOOD stuff in the Williamsburg Thrift Stores.  I got 2 original watercolors of some of the shops in Colonial Williamsburg that were professionally framed for 4.98 a piece.  I can't leave real art work in the stores even though I had no where to put them.  But My Brother in Law Jack, wanted them bad, so I sent them home as a surprise for him by way of Leslie. He loved them.

My Bff Susan is really into redoing bowling bowls lately. I had seen 2 in a local store and she said she wanted them, so I went back in there today, just to pick those up and look what I found!  It's a real pottery dish.  It's pretty big but you can't tell it from there.  I think its beautiful. It was 8.25 which is more than I like to pay at the GW, but I couldn't let it get away.  I also picked up an altered book of fairies someone had started.  I have been wanting to try one out, so now I have no excuse. I will just pretend it's like a Round Robin and I am next.  Amazing what some people don't want. 

I am off to OBX for the next 2 weeks.  Can't wait to see what the Thrift stores down there have for me =)

Adventures in Canning and some Psycho Babble

Being unemployed definately has its perks.  Aside from the lack of $$, I get to do things I have always wanted to do, and never had the time.   For instance last week, I snapped a couple of pounds of snap beans and cooked them with potato's in some nice fat bacon side meat, I borrowed,  (it's not really borrowing if you have no intention of returning it, is it?) and while I was snapping, I kept thinking,  this is me.  This is who I am.  This is the authentic me.  This is what I love doing.  Simple things that soothe the soul.  I guess I got caught up in the rat race, and you just push aside all those things, that make you happy and you just......exist.  Ok so enough of the psycho babble. 
I got to spend the day with Nana, canning her famous sweet pickles.  I can't hardly cook without them.  Ham Salad, Deviled Eggs, Tuna Salad, I wouldn't even bother making them if I didn't have her pickles.  It turns out Nana is a very good teacher.  She told me step by step what she was doing and why, and some things she said, I do this because this is the way my Mama did it.  I was totally afraid,   then she said, here you do this one, so I did. Then I said, here, you do the rest, then the phone rang and I just proceeded.  It's a fairly simple process, but it is time consuming and as Nana says "It's Hot work"  and that it is.  Standing by a boiling pot at the stove is definately hot work.  So I felt adventurous and got some stuff do can on my own.  I made Pepper Jelly and Strawberry Jam.  Definately more Hot work.  I had a little snafu with both of them.  The Strawberry Jam didn't set as well as it could.  This is totally my fault as I used a pan that was not quite big enough so when it came to a full rolling boil if I didn't keep stirring it was going to bubble over, so I squeezed the Certo out with my left hand and thought it was all in, but later I realized I had not gotten it all out, at all........ hence super sloppy jam that tastes awesome.  The Pepper Jelly, I didn't chop up the peppers fine enough.  So then I decided I should strain it out, then hubby comes along and says it's supposed to have some in, so I put a little in each jar and it's too big, and it all floated to the top.  What's up with that.  All my jars pinged after their hot water baths so now I am hooked.  I am searching for recipes and want to can everything I see. 
I had lunch with Donna, who had canned peaches last year, and she said she didn't use the hot water bath but turned all the jars upside down.  I had never heard of this, but I found it online and they said it's not a sanitary method for canning.  But I ate a jar of her jam and it was fine some 6 months later.  I am afraid to poison folks which is why I was afraid to can to start with. So I took the safe route.  And as it happened I had a canner with a rack in it, in  my attic.  I am pretty sure it was my Great Aunt Frances' who has been gone many many years.  She used to make amazing food.  Chow Chow and Cherry Preserves.  And Fruit Cake with a whiskey soaked piece of cheese cloth wrapped around it.  And I remember her back screened porch with boxes full of apples from her apple tree out back.  Little green apples with little black spots on them.  And her pantry in the kitchen.  See this really is who I am.  It's in my blood.  =)

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Ta Da!!!!!