Yeah, we call our spare room the Mother-in-law room. The story is (if I haven’t already told you) when my parents were building their house, my grandparents helped with a lot of the work. My grandpa did all the wiring, my grandma stained wood (and we have a ton of it in their house), etc. Well, my grandpa was 11 years older than my grandma and my grandpa had been in and out of the hospital in the past years. My dad just always said that if anything ever happened to my grandpa that we’d move my grandma in with us and she could have the spare room. So he started calling it his mother-in-laws room.
So jump forward about 12-15 years, when PC and I started talking about getting married and finding a place to live, tbug said, Memaw better have a room too! Well, I’ve always thought of the spare room as my grandma’s room even though she passed away in 2007 so when we bought this house I just started calling the spare room the MIL (or mother-in-law) room. PC picked up on it and it’s been that ever since.
The best part is both our mothers have joined in and started calling it their room. So better yet, one-weekend Tbug was over and so were his mom, my mom, and my dad. Tbug said that it was my mom’s and his mom’s room and then she goes, but where will Nicky Bear [my dad] stay? We all looked at her and she said, I know he can share my room with me because he’s the King of Fun. We all got a good chuckle out of that.
So so I’ll quit rambling and proceed to show photos 🙂
Here was the room when we decided to buy the house. Remember, this is the previous owner’s stuff in here.
I heard that sound of the motorcycle go off. I dreaded that sound. I wasn’t sure why that sound was going off. I still had the ex’s number in my cell phone, I still had a certain ringtone set to it so I’d know if it was him trying to call me. It had basically been just shy of 2 months since we’d talked other than I got a text on my birthday saying Happy Birthday. Crap, I’ve been having such a good go at things, I didn’t want to be in a bad mood. It was already late, I didn’t want to get into a fight on the phone. I didn’t want to talk to him really… To answer, not to answer, what do I do??? I finally decided it was 11:30 and I had to get up early. I refused to answer the phone.
Eventually it quit ringing. Well Crap, now I’m going to lie awake wondering what he wanted, right? Wrong, I think I stayed up a couple more minutes to see if he left me a voicemail… if it was important he’d leave me a voicemail or send me a text message, otherwise, it didn’t matter. And I drifted off into dreamland.
I would be lying if I wasn’t kind of curious why he called me, especially so late… he used to know I liked to be in bed and asleep by this time, but for the first time in months it didn’t bother me. I didn’t feel guilty. Had there been a voicemail I would have listened to it but otherwise, I didn’t care. I didn’t feel like I owed him anything. I was told in college after breaking up with a guy after a year and 4 months that how ever long you dated them, it took you that long to get over them. I’m not going to say at this point I was over him but I’d had enough time to step back and examine the relationship we’d had over the years. Was it bad, No, was it great, no. It wasn’t great. And for the first time in a long time I could see that.
Apparently when you get into situations that you even say you wouldn’t allow to happen, if you gradually go in, you gradually become accustomed to them and you don’t know any different. Again, he didn’t treat me terrible so please don’t read that wrong, but things weren’t all that great either. It was easier to see that once you step back and look from a different perspective.
I hadn’t thought about the ex in a while. At first after everything happened, I took pictures of him down in different places but I still had some up. The more I grew closer to this guy from my past the easier it was to take pictures down. I feel those pictures that were up were a constant reminder of how things used to be, even though they weren’t ideal, we are creatures of habit. You get into rituals and habits and it is very difficult to change. The change is the unknown aspect of anything and you don’t always know how to react to it. It is scary, sometimes dangerous, sometimes wonderful, but it’s that unknown that scare people into sometimes not wanting to experience what is in store for them.
I am the first to admit, I hate change. It scares the living daylights out of me. But for the first time I turned that fear over to God (just know I’m not putting my beliefs off on you, this is how I feel), I knew he had a great plan and something wonderful in store.
I’m not sure about where you live, but in our part of the country, when you say Cashew Chicken it means fried pieces of chicken over rice with cashew nuts, sauce & scallions. I’ve been to other places and go to order Chinese food and have a hard time… usually it is grilled chicken of sorts, with rice and lots of vegetables and a sauce and some cashew nuts. There is a HUGE difference! I’ve only found our type in around here. PC said down in Kentucky they got close, but I’m not buying it :). So last night we decided that we wanted some good ole Cashew Chicken. We could have stopped at the restaurant and brought it home, but I felt like cooking so we ran to the store, picked up a few ingredients we didn’t have and went home and made dinner. This isn’t something we have a lot but it’s excellent! We took lots of pics to show you the recipe. I left my tripod at our house and we were at my parents so PC was in charge of the photos 🙂
(SWMO) Cashew Chicken
Ingredients:
for the Cashew Chicken: Chicken breasts cut into pieces, flour, milk & egg & Vegetable Oil for frying for the Rice: Minute Rice, water for the sauce: water, chicken bouillon cubes, butter, cornstarch, soy sauce optional toppings: Cashews, sliced scallions
Getting the assembly line ready for the chicken breading, although PC suggested I put the flour in a large plastic baggie and coat the chicken that way, MUCH easier! plus less messy!
Measuring the rice. For 4 servings of rice I used 2 cups to 1 3/4 cups water. Once the water comes to a boil, dump the rice in. Place a lid on the rice for 5 minutes, then remove from heat and wait until it absorbs all the water. The use a fork to fluff it.
Rice is easy, put a lid on and forgetaboutit! 🙂
When preparing the chicken, after it is cut into chunks you put it in an egg bath that is 1 egg to 1/4 cup milk. Wisk those together.
Cracking the egg 🙂
Wisking the egg & milk together.
Your mixture will look like this.
Cut the chicken in bite size pieces.
After the chicken is cut up into bite size pieces, dredge it in the milk/egg bath.
Then drop it into the flour. If you use the bag method, place a few pieces in there, shake it up, a few more pieces, shake, you get the idea. Other wise you’ll wind up with a horrible mess!
Pour the vegetable oil into a pan and heat it on the stove. It gets extremely hot so be careful not to burn yourself… IT HURTS 🙂 not speaking from personal experience or anything.
Use a test piece of chicken to see if your oil is hot. If it bubbles around it, it is, if the chicken just sits there, let the oil heat up more before dropping anymore in.
Be sure not to over-crowd your pan. It will reduce the heat of the oil and cause it to take longer for the chicken to fry up.
After the chicken turns a golden brown take it out of the oil and put it on a paper towel lined plate. That helps absorb some of the grease. Also right out of the oil, salt it (and I’m not a big user of salt but trust me, it makes all the difference in the world).
Now for the sauce:
1 3/4 cups of water. To that add 2 chicken bouillon cubes.
2 tbsp of corn starch. (this is your thickening agent)
Make sure you are wisking this. It’s good to have it over medium to medium high heat. Don’t get it to hot though.
Then add 1 tbsp soy sauce.
and 1 tbsp Butter
Then keep wisking until it thickens up. It should have the consistency of gravy for mashed potatoes and gravy as a comparison.
Now pile your rice on your plate. Then use additional soy sauce if preferred (it’s liquid salt basically). The top with your chicken. The dredge in your sauce. Now here is where you put the cashew nuts and scallions, we didn’t have any so we ate with out it.
Bon Appetit (yes that’s not Chinese but it’s all I know)
I think we are basically done with the kitchen. Eventually we’ll get the time/money to do a little more (such as counters, new cabinets, etc) but until then I absolutely love the kitchen.
May I present the Old kitchen (when the house wasn’t ours)
Not a bad kitchen. Remember all the “stuff” isn’t ours. This was all the previous owners appliances. She did leave the fridge, oven, microwave & dishwasher.
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And you remember some of these pictures right?
The first weekend assessing what I had to do
All the boxes from unloading kitchen stuff
Every time I’d get the cabinets clean they’d fill up again, it seemed never ending!
At the end of the first work weekend
Digging up Linoleum… sucky job!
After the first day of laying tile.
Finishing up laying tile
Grouting is so much fun!!!! haha… PC had to convince me I wasn’t icing a cake.
He got his fair share of grouting too.
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Drum Roll Please……..
I want to present to you, Our Kitchen…..
Are you ready?
Can you handle it?
Am I getting annoying….?
Yeah I think so too….
Ok here you go….
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Oh sorry got carried away… haha…
New Floor
New Wallpaper
I painted the hooks above the cabinets and the self along the wall
Our Kitchen is John Deere Themed (can you tell??)
We moved our appliances in
I’m not a big fan of clutter on the counters so I tried to keep it down. Some things just don’t go up though (ie mixer, toaster, etc).
We are extremely pleased with how it turned out. I found the tile on sale, 39 cents a square foot (so 39 cents a tile). Can’t beat that!!! We did crackle on the pegs. You paint it one color, put the crackle on and just as it dries you apply a contrasting color and it makes it look like old barn wood. Our original color was green with yellow over the crackle layer. So far all the appliances I had been gathering up since I was 16 years old. The only thing I bought was the blender that has a spic-it on it. I got it at the Wonderful World of Wal (aka Wal-Mart) on sale for $17. I figured it was meant to be… it’s green and everything.
Next up, I’ll have to show you the Mil Room or the Mother-in-law room as we call it. It’s also called a spare room.
He came to the house to pick me up on his way to take his daughter home. She ran in the house and spoke to my parents, then I grabbed my shoes and purse and we headed out to take her home. I thought I was going to be sick. I had a nauseous feeling in the pit of my stomach. What if I had to see her mother… what if I didn’t compare, or stand up to, or wasn’t as pretty as, all these wild thoughts went flying through my head. When he took her to the front door, the mother never showed her face, whew! I survived. After she was home we came back to my house and slept all afternoon. We had to recover. She runs 90 to nothing!The next 2 weeks he had vacation so he was home. He had lots of plans made, clean out the shop, rebuild the hot tub, ride horses, you name it, but every night once I got off work he came over to the house to spend time with me. When he first started he’d go out to do chores with my dad and me. Once he learned what we did and how we fed everything, he beat us home during the later part of those 2 weeks and had them done for us.
We were doing P90X so after chores were done he and I would head to Kalem & Evelyn’s house to do the workout. On the 20th was Jason’s birthday so after our workout we all headed to dinner at Cheddars.
The sad part is all through this Josh became more and more non-existent when he was around. I had a feeling all along that Josh liked me more than a friend and I sound so mean by saying, he seemed more like a big brother to me. I wasn’t oblivious to all of this but I hoped it would work itself out. So I went on about my business hoping that things would work out.
On the 22nd of August we had dinner club at a German restaurant out on 43 hwy. When they sent out the email this month, my parents also go an invite. So decided to come as well. He and I headed over in his truck and my parents drove separate. Up to this point after dinner club we’d go to the J’s and play rockband so I told him that if that was the case, we’d need a way home. When we got to Roswitha’s, I could feel some tension around Josh. I spoke to him and he wouldn’t speak back. Oh great, we’re going to have to have the talk, again. I hate the talk. The I like you but for a friend talk. Really it’s heartbreaking. I don’t like to be on either end of that conversation!
After dinner was over, everyone just split. So I looked at him and asked what he’d like to do? He didn’t care so I said, how about Mini Golf?? It was settled we were going to go play mini golf. He also indulged me and stopped at BigLots for me (yes, I love that store). Now here’s something I shouldn’t tell on myself but I always pay for one round and grab 2 balls and 2 score cards so that I can play both courses, easy & hard. I told him to do the same, in fact I think I grabbed 3 balls so that we could and I grabbed both score cards. He gave me the “Are you serious” look and I grinned. Then we went outside and proceeded to play mini golf. I would like to say for the record I won both rounds, but he was a good sport about it and not far behind me!
All through this I still went to see my friends, A LOT. It’s good to have friends to rely on when things get hairy! We went out to eat at a Thai place every Wednesday night, I went over on weekends that he wasn’t in town, I went other nights of the week even. Actually the month of August we took up doing P90x so I was over there every night of the week. It was very difficult the week of August 8-14th. My parents had gone on vacation to Hawaii so I was left to take care of all of our critters. My dad had 2 horses that had “colds”. It was the best option the vet could come up with anyway. I had to give them shots and take them out and let them relax every night and it was hot that week.
Kalem & Josh came over a couple times as did Evelyn to help me with the horses. They didn’t always want to cooperate with me… The little rascals.
So the Friday before my parents left, my mom looked at me and asked if she was supposed to bring him and his daughter something home from Hawaii. I looked at her with a strange face and told her, she didn’t have to do anything. I never expect anything from her. Later that night she changed her tone and said she’d like to bring them back something, what size did they wear and what should she bring them home. Would he like a Harley Davidson shirt or another shirt or what? I told her I wasn’t sure. I was still really just learning about him myself but if she would like to bring him back something anything she’d bring back would be just fine. She wanted to know sizes so I shot him texts to find out his size and his daughters size. When he replied I told her and she asked me to text it so she’d be sure to have it while she was there.
While they were in Hawaii my mom was calling or texting me with different things they had done or different questions. She told me she found the perfect shirt for him, told me about it and asked if he’d like it. I told her I’m sure he would. She also found something for his daughter. I told her thank you and I’m sure they would be pleased.
He and I continued to talk through our normal portals. He didn’t come home the first weekend my parents were gone. I’ll admit if it weren’t for my friends, I would have been bored out of my mind. It was to hot to go outside except maybe to jump in the swimming pool but the swimming pool hadn’t been opened this year yet so that was out.
I woke up on Saturday morning (the 8th) and wandered into my mom’s sewing room for some reason. Not sure what possessed me to do this but anyway I did. I had made myself a John Deere blanket with the normal green and yellow colors, then I found all the colors for a Pink John Deere blanket. I was standing at my mom’s sewing table and saw all my pink material I had bought and it hit me almost like a freight train, I wanted to make him a John Deere Blanket. I had a few pieces of green and yellow JD material left over from different projects but not nearly enough.
I called my grandma to see what she was up to. She said she was just sitting at the house.
-What are your plans today?
-Well I didn’t have any, why?
-If I ran to town and bought some material, would you be interested in helping me make a blanket?
You know the Brad Paisley Song, Letter to Me is a great song and truthfully makes you stop and think. Then I happened to be reading my blogs catching up for the day and I ran across DAR’s post for the day, Dear Me. Love, Me. And I couldn’t help but be inspired to do the same thing.
Wouldn’t it be cool to be able to tell your younger self to relax, things do work out for the best? Don’t pressure yourself, just go with the flow, make some excellent memories and don’t forget those who helped get you where you are. I know I’ve been reflecting a lot on my past especially with the wedding coming up, but sometimes the past is who makes you who you are for the present so you’ll be well suited for the future.
Dear 20-Year-old Nicole,
You are entering into the last few semesters of college. Things have changed drastically. Your best friends and you have parted ways because of differences of opinions but sometimes that’s not a bad thing. Stick to your guns, those friends show back up in your future needing your strength and support. I know the guy you broke up with left you feeling hurt, but don’t worry, something better is coming down the road waiting for you. You’ll need him as he needs you and you’ll become best friends. Don’t get so worked up, God has a plan for everything, just be patient and wait. Tough times will come but you’ll make it through them. Heck, you even graduate from college at 22 years of age. It’s coming.
Spend as much time with your grandparents as you can, you lose them just a few years down the road. Always take the time to remember how they sound because after they are gone you’ll miss the sound of their voice. Your grandma wanted nothing but the best for you as did your mother and they’ll both drive you nuts about the guy you wind up dating, He’s not the guy for you but because of a chain of unfortunate events you’ll find the guy of your dreams. Maybe you should find some pictures of this guy you’ll wind up marrying and show him to your grandparents. They’d love to meet him in some way shape or form! You even choose their wedding date in honor of them!
As with any “outing” at my house, when family (or friends but mostly family) comes over, it’s a huge ordeal. Everything has to be in the perfect place and usually it gets put off until the last minute and a lot of times left for me to do. This Sunday was like every other, except this time my mom came up “sick” and couldn’t help. My dad he was busy outside so it was all left up to me. I was frustrated beyond belief. My mom woke me up at 7:30 am to clean the house and get it ready. Wait, I thought this was supposed to be for my birthday… and I’m the one who has to do everything. (yup, I should be used to this by now.) So I spent all morning cleaning, doing dishes and cooking food.
Then my day got better, about 12noon I got a phone call, it was him. He was just around the corner of my house and needed to know exact directions. I was also nervous because he was meeting my parents today also. That’s when it happened, my mom stormed off into the bedroom mad at me and slammed the door shut. I was (and still am) confused about what I did to cause that reaction. My dad walked in the house and asked where my mom went. I told him what little of the story I knew that had happened and he said, okay and went on about his business.
Then he pulled in my driveway. So I was torn, do I make him walk up to the house? Do I stand on the back deck and talk to him? Do I greet him at his car? I went for choice b, stand on the deck and talk to him. He walked up and I took him in the house. My dad was getting ready to walk out so I did a quick introduction and then we went into the kitchen. I had some things in the oven cooking and the timer was getting close to going off.
He asked where my mom was and I told him she was sick and went into her bedroom. I wasn’t sure if she’d be out or not.
Once the timer went off on the oven I pulled whatever was in there out. He asked what the plans were after that. I said I didn’t have any so we decided to get in his car and go for a short drive. I was actually starving, I skipped breakfast and lunch so we went to Sonic and he bought me a Cherry Limeade and cheddar peppers. mmmm! Then we went driving around for a bit until I looked at the clock and realized that I really should get back to the house.
We pulled into the driveway and parked and went upstairs. As I opened the back door to go in the house I heard my mom’s bedroom door slam shut again. Okay so she went back in her room. Awesome.
I wasn’t sure when he planned on going home. I knew he had to get back home and when I say home I meant the 7 1/2 hour trek back to Kentucky. He never left and he never left. So finally I said, “I’m not sure when you are planning on going home, but if you’d like to stay for dinner, you are more than welcome to.” -I hadn’t decided when I was going back. -Well I just wanted you to know you are welcome. You might even get to meet my mother. But you’ll also meet my grandparents and my uncle and whoever else decides to show up. At this point I’m not even sure.
30 minutes to an hour later my grandparents and my uncle showed up. I did all the introductions of him with my family. About that time my dad came in from doing chores and ran to his room to take a quick shower and change clothes. He came out and threw the brats on the grill. Once all the food was ready to go he asked me if I’d spoken to my mother. I told him last I knew she was asleep in on their bed so he told me to go in and ask if she was planning on eating with us or not.
I had to wake her up which made her grouchy and she told me no. So I went back out and told dad. He said okay, I guess lets eat so I moved all the food onto the table and had everyone come in to the table and we ate.
They went home somewhere around 7:30 to 8 and he was still there. My dad had to run the tractor back to my grandparents and get his truck. My dog loves to run with the tractor so he told me to keep Morelli at the house. I brought Morelli into the back door just so he wouldn’t be tempted to follow the tractor. About that time my mom walked out of the bedroom, gave me an evil mom look and walked back into her room and slammed the door again. A few minutes later I got a text asking my my “filthy” dog was in the house. I sent her one back telling her and I got another one that said to Get him out of the house. haha I was getting yelled at through text and was a little embarrassed.
Finally he said he should get going so I walked out to his car with him to say good bye. I asked him how it went and he said it was great. My family was great, my dad and uncle were hilarious, he just wished that he could have met my mom. I shrugged and said I was sorry, maybe another time. We stood outside talking for probably an hour to an hour and a half. I felt so bad because I knew he had to make that trip. He told me he’d go back in the morning, wake up early and drive. That way he wasn’t tired on the way home. Said he’d just go back to his mom’s and crash for the night. Made me feel a little better but I still felt bad that he had to do that.
I gave him a hug that night as he got ready to leave and I didn’t want to turn him loose. Something was different. It was a scary but good different. Silly me even became a girl and cried, not sobbing cry but just a few tears because I didn’t want this boy to leave. I’d had to much fun with him that weekend. More fun than I’d had in a LONG time.
He finally left and I walked into the house. I asked my dad what he thought of him and my dad said he was a very nice young man. I grinned and headed up to my room to wait for him to call and say he’d made it to his mom’s house. Then I jumped in the shower and went to bed with a smile on my face.
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Now no one really cares for Monday mornings, me particularly. I’m really not a morning person anyway. I love to sleep and my co-workers joke that I don’t wake up until around 10am. I woke up before my alarm went off this morning though, with a huge grin on my face. At about 7 I got a phone call from him.
-Good Morning Beautiful, how did you sleep? -Good morning, really well. How about you? -Not bad. I had a great time this weekend. -Yeah me too! So where are you? -On 60 just outside of Springfield. -I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you out so late. -Why I’m not, I could have left anytime I wanted, but I got the chance to meet your family, I wasn’t about to give that chance up! -They were on their best game last night too. -Your grandpa told me I must be a good man. -Yeah he told me that too, said he could tell a lot about a man by their handshake. You passed the test. -I guess so. -Well I better get off of here, I need to get my hair fixed so I can be to work on time. -Ok have a wonderful morning and day. I’m sure I’ll talk to you later on. -Um… hello, you better, I better get something letting me know you made it home. -Don’t worry, you will. bye -bye.
I then went on to fix my hair and get dressed for work all while smiling on a Monday morning. My mom hollered at me and said she was riding to work with me (my parents and I all work for the same company). Sometimes that makes me grumble because 1. I like my alone time and 2. I hate feeling like a little kid who has to drive with their parents because they have a learner’s permit. I know I have issues… LOL. I didn’t even grumble that morning though. I was in too good of a mood.
Yeah I shouldn’t have spoken to soon. On the drive to work my mom got me upset. She hit me up about the fact that he had a daughter and that the ex-wife would always think she came first. If he started doing good, she’d take him back for more money. If he got a new car, she’d take him back for more money because she needed a new car. On and on and on. It dawned on me right then, my mom wasn’t “sick”, she just didn’t want to meet him and that was a good excuse.
This was all coming from the person who wanted me to move on, date other people, 5 1/2 years was too long to spend on someone who wasn’t going to make more of a commitment. She and I have had our little squables all through life about stuff like this. I know she only wants whats best for me but this guy was different. Besides, maybe we’d be doing better because of ME and MY job and the ex can’t come after MY money.
Just when I think things are getting better, they always go another direction. But he and I weren’t even dating, we had been on a few dates, we’d hung out together but that didn’t mean we were getting married tomorrow. sheesh!
So I got to thinking about what all still needs to be done for the wedding and what has been done for the wedding. That caused me to make a list this morning. I think I’ll share it with you all. For those of you getting married, maybe you can help jog my memory of what I’m forgetting, for those of you already married, you should be pros and know what I’m forgetting, I hope :). Boy that was a run-on sentence!
I have my dress
I have orders in for the guy’s tuxes, they are going at the end of the month to get fitted/measured.
My Flower girls dress is done, shoes are bought, she’s decked out!
We’re still torn on the ring bearer… I can’t see spending so much money to rent him a tux :(, that bothers me.
We have the reception hall booked but still need to do a finalized tour.
I woke up Saturday night of the party tired. I was awake until late the night before and of course, so anxious for the party that night that I was wide awake at 7 am. Go figure… Saturday = sleep in but not when you are excited!
That morning I ran to town with my mom (as you can see, a Saturday morning ritual) and then we headed home around noon. My dad was bailing hay so I went down to the hayfield to see if he needed any help and to take him lunch. I rode around in the tractor with him for a while until he realized he needed something at the house. He tried to tell me where it was but I told him he’d be better off leaving me to bale hay and him run back to the house to get it. So I started making the rounds in the field when my cell phone went off. I idled the tractor down and jumped off running yelling, “Hold On I can’t hear you.” (Yeah I have caller ID so I knew who was calling.)
He was just calling to make sure I was coming and telling me I could come over whenever. In fact, if I wanted to come over earlier I could. I told him I was bailing hay waiting on my dad to come back to the field but once dad was back and didn’t need my help anymore I’d probably get cleaned up and head his way.
Dad came back and I helped him [do something to the tractor I don’t remember now what] and then I rode about 2 more rounds around the field with him, just talking. He asked about the guy and what my plans were for the evening. Once we got back to where my car was sitting he told me to go ahead and bail off and head to the house and get cleaned up. He had this all under control now. I felt bad for ditching him but he insisted so I got off the tractor and headed to the house. (more…)
