March

She’s Saddled – Coronavirus Day 18 (also)

This is Granny. Everyone, meet Granny, Granny, this is everyone.

She is a 2-year-old mare that we have. The youngest horse we have on our place. And it is time that we start doing something with her. She needs to earn her keep. haha. A few years ago I broke Bucky to ride. He was such an awesome horse. We sold him last year and to say I’m a little bitter about this… I am. I hear he’s an awesome horse though and the people who bought him are in love with him. That’s good.

A few years before that I broke Barbie to ride. Now… Once I got her broke, then I got pregnant and was “grounded” from riding horses for 9+ months… so my dad finished her for me. Because of potential complications, the doctors wouldn’t allow me to ride.

But now… we have Granny. That’s her barn name. A barn name is what you call them in the barn, etc… but they also have a registered name. Anyway… (more…)

Planted the Garden Today… Coronavirus Day 17

So here’s the thing… The thing is… The thing… Okay okay, the thing is… I might have planted my garden too soon. I might have gotten so dang excited I couldn’t stand myself and jumped the gun.

I live in Zone 6B. That is temperatures -5-0˚F on the cold side. A couple of years ago we got colder than that… but typically this is pretty accurate for SW Missouri.

My Grandma and my dad told me that my Great Grandpa said we needed to have our potatoes planted in the ground by St. Patrick’s Day (March 17). That didn’t happen since I didn’t start my garden digging until March 21st. Because of the country lockdown, I haven’t been many places. Lowes and a local farm store. The farm store was the only place that had potato starts. I didn’t get mine in time. I guess because everyone is home with nothing to do… everyone is starting a garden. Sigh!

But I did a little research to see if there is anything I should have planted. Turns out as long as you have daytime temps of 56˚F or more you can plant corn, celery, peppers, tomatoes, watermelons, squash, and beans. That’s what the internet tells us. These plants tend to like cooler weather… except maybe the watermelon and the corn… I’m not sure I agree with the internet on those.

I looked at the back of the package. We’re at March 30th so I figured that’s close enough to April. A lot of the packages said April so I went for it. (more…)

Book Review: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

It was interesting going back and reading this book. While it was a lot like the movie, there were a lot of differences too. I’m pretty sure years ago when I started reading the series, this was the last book I read through its entirety. But I have to say, it’s been years so I forgot quite a bit too.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling

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And just like that… Coronavirus day 6

It has been an interesting last few days… to say the least. Life is never boring on a farm, that’s for sure. While we’re supposed to be self quarantining, you can’t quite do that exactly when you live on a farm. Anyway, you can’t stay indoors because there are animals that rely on you. 

My parents live the next place over and then my grandma is the place after that. So I have a couple hundred acres to keep me occupied in this self-containment time.

It seems like these days there is a bad rap on people who are farmers. They are horrid people who don’t take care of squat. Well, I have pictures and stories to prove that’s just not so. Today is a prime example.

My uncle lives with my grandma. Moved in after he and his ex-wife went through their divorce. (more…)

WTH is Happening? – St. Patrick’s Day – Coronavirus Day 4

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! In a matter of a few days, life has dramatically changed… It’s weird. What are we in for? I’m a little scared, but being scared doesn’t help things. 

Earlier today the little and I decided to make cookies before we headed off to my parent’s house to ride horses. We’re being advised to steer clear of all people over the age of 65 who are at high risk. Well, my mom and dad kind of fall into the age category. I’m not steering clear of them though. I mean, I don’t want to be the cause of something, but going without seeing them would suck too.

I made the choice to let my little grow up with her grandparents and taking that away from her or them… that’s not an option. We’re around them almost every day anyway. So anyway… Maybe I’m a jerk… (more…)

Book Review: Bringing Up Bébé

I started this book in August 2018. Yes, that long ago. And finally finished it. I would read it and then quit. Read then quit. I’m not sure why I couldn’t just push through and finish it, but… I actually read it as a suggestion from a blogger, The Life of Bon. It sat on my Good Reads shelf looking like I wouldn’t read it. And truthfully, I wasn’t. But I finally did. 

Bringing Up Bébé by Pamela Druckerman

The secret behind France’s astonishingly well-behaved children. When American journalist Pamela Druckerman has a baby in Paris, she doesn’t aspire to become a “French parent.” French parenting isn’t a known thing, like French fashion or French cheese. Even French parents themselves insist they aren’t doing anything special.

Yet, the French children Druckerman knows sleep through the night at two or three months old while those of her American friends take a year or more. French kids eat well-rounded meals that are more likely to include braised leeks than chicken nuggets. And while her American friends spend their visits resolving spats between their kids, her French friends sip coffee while the kids play. (more…)

Wear the Damn Helmet… Coronavirus Day 1

The other day, in a matter of 5 minutes I saw no less than 4 posts where WHO was calling the Coronavirus (COVID-19) a Pandemic. Okay, so what does that mean?

Epidemic – noun – a widespread occurrence of an infectious disease in a community at a particular time.

Pandemic – adjective – prevalent over a whole country or the world.

Okay, what does that mean though? We know this is prevalent in multiple countries. We know countries like Italy are on lockdown and the U.S. has put a ban on travel in and out of regions around the world. But 4 different places telling us it is a pandemic, do we need to panic now or something? That really didn’t tell us anything other than something we already knew, they just declared what we already knew. I’m still scratching my head. (more…)

What Camera Lens Should I Use?

Once upon a time back in September 2009, I bought my first dSLR. I didn’t have a friggin clue what a dSLR was. A couple of friends of mine and I decided we were going to take a photography class at a local technical school. Honestly, I hate to say it, but it was a pretty worthless class. The teacher threw a lot of information at us in a very short amount of time. And instead of encouraging us to learn to take better photos, we just took random photos and moved on with life. The only thing I learned from the class was there was something called a dSLR. Said dSLR was different than a point and shoot camera. Bam, now you learned what I learned and it was a lot cheaper.

That first class I came home and had to do some research on what a dSLR camera even was. Now, here we are a little over 10 years later and I’ve owned a Canon Rebel XS, (2) Nikon D5000, a Nikon D90, a Nikon D7100, a Nikon D610, and recently upgraded to a Nikon D850. To say I like Nikon cameras might be obvious. However I keep up-to-date on Canon’s as well so if someone is looking for suggestions on what to buy, I know both models. I’m not so good at Olympus or Sony although I did own a semi dSLR Olympus for underwater photography. I didn’t own it long enough to do anything with it though.

A Kit lens vs body alone

There is a lot of controversies when buying a new camera. Do you buy just the body and then buy a lens or do you buy a kit lens with the body? There are a few things to consider before you totally make up your mind. First, if you look at the lens itself, it has a lot of information that looks like jumbled letters and numbers. What do they all mean? (more…)

Book Review: Bridget Jones’s Diary

 

I know this is a movie that came out, oh gosh, way back when. But here’s the thing with this book… prior to starting Grad School, I bought this book, at a book sale at work for a quarter. It sat there waiting for me to read it for years. I’m talking years! Jump forward to grad school. I took a British Comedy class. I really had no choice. And this was actually on the book list that we had to read. Shhhh… I still never read it. I glossed over it enough to be able to talk in class about it, but I didn’t read it. I had this class the same semester that I had comps and this was the furthest thing from my mind. Oh, and watching the movie DOESN’T help unless you’re comparing how the book and the movie are DIFFERENT!

Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding

a 30-something Singleton who is certain she would have all the answers if she could:
a. lose 7 pounds
b. stop smoking
c. develop Inner Poise (more…)

Just Retired Tiered Cake (Vanilla)

Just Retired Tiered Vanilla Cake

I sure hope you didn’t try to come to my blog last week. I woke up on Wednesday and would have sworn it was April Fool’s Day (by the way, I hate that day). When I came to the blog, it redirected me to some weird website.

It was trying to get me to click on a button to back up my Window’s machine. Well joke’s on them because I don’t have a window’s machine. But whatever. Anyway…

Over the weekend, I was able to knock 2 things off my Baking/Cooking Bucket List. I made a tiered cake which I haven’t done since I took cake decorating classes. And 2, I made a mirror glaze cake.

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