Tuesday Trivia and Wednesday Homemaking Tip

• Ever since the Bergeson kids grew up we haven’t had a trick or treater.  Not one.  Monday night about 8:30 lights pulled into the driveway and I thought, “Hey!  It’s a trick or treater!  Good thing I picked something up today just in case.”   Nope.  No trick or treater.  It was our home teacher bringing us rootbeer and vanilla ice cream.  It was the best because Calvin and I had just finished family night and didn’t have any treats to end it with, and Calvin is hardly fooled that Kool-aid can count as a treat.  It was such a fun surprise. 

• A few weeks ago I got the same fortune in a fortune cookie that I got 29 ½ years ago (just a few weeks before we got married).  The fortune reads, “Your love life will be happy and harmonious.”  And that must be fortune enough because there were no lottery numbers to go with it.  Now I'm not superstitious, knock on wood, but I do put some stock in a fortune cookie that says what I want it to say.  And while Calvin and I aren't always harmonious (I still can't read his mind and he's been teaching me for 29 years), our life with each other is happy and full of love . . . and two fortune cookies say it's so.

•  I made pepper jelly and grape jelly today.  The pepper jelly didn't set up, so after I processed it I had to dump it back in the pan and add another box of pectin.  I added 1/2 cup of applesauce to it for an extra dose of pectin and re-bottled it.  It's set now.    

• Really good grocery sales make me excited.  I still remember when chicken legs were 29 cents a pound a few years ago.  We ate them every Wednesday night for a year.  Today I went to Wal-Mart to get pectin, wax paper, and sugar.  Sugar has gone up again.  So has cottage cheese.  So has pectin.  So has everything else but bananas.  And our Wal-Mart doesn’t carry wax paper anymore.  It was a very discouraging trip . . . until I went down the 75% off all Halloween items.  Oh, oh, oh!  Bags of miniature Reese’s peanut butter cups were only 62 cents as were the bags of candy corn M&M’s.  I figured 15 bags would take care of the future.  Cupcake sprinkles were only 43 cents and cellophane bags were 36 cents.  I suddenly felt fine about the price of cottage cheese.  The M&M’s are the right color for Thanksgiving so are the orange cellophane bags.  The black bags will work perfect for Christmas with some red and white striped paper.

eighteen25 has their new
free fall printable posted 

• My favorite holiday is coming.

• We voted last night.  I always find the initiatives interesting and wonder who thinks them up.  Two of the initiatives included this time were whether or not the state should close the state liquor stores and turn it over to the private business sector, and whether or not the state should let their savings account grow or should spend it.  Today there were a few people at Wal-Mart trying to get enough signatures to put legalizing marijuana on a future ballot.  They weren’t having much success.

• I discovered that I’m allergic to almonds.  I am sad.  First walnuts, then pecans, and now almonds.  Why oh why couldn’t I have been allergic to Brazil nuts instead.

•  Today’s homemaking tip is to make extra burritos the next time you cook them for supper.  Roll them up, wrap them in foil, and put them in the freezer.  Another tip is to roll them up, wrap them in foil, and put them in the crockpot turned on warm for a tailgate or potluck party.  They’re both handy tips.  Here's the recipe I use for the filling.

• Calvin cured some bacon.  It’s not his first time, but it is his best.  The next batch is going to be perfect.  He and Ray also made sausage from the deer they shot a couple of weeks ago.  They added pork fat then either maple flavoring or hot spices.  I made biscuits and gravy using the maple flavored sausage and it was really, really good.  (Venison wore its welcome out the year we ate it and ate it and ate it and ate it some more, so I was excited to have this taste so good.)   

• While searching for information about Gideon from the Old Testament I read an article by Lynn Hartsell that said that corn always has an even number of rows, there is one strand of corn silk for each kernel of corn, and a normal-size ear of corn has 800 to 1,000 kernels (and silk strands).  I thought that was plain interesting.

• We’re going to see Abe and Grace this weekend.  We’re going to the Air Force – Army game while we’re there.  We’re excited to go.  Abe says we have to wear Army colors.  I may wear gold and black, but I will still cheer for the blue and white as well.  I always win at these games because I can cheer for both sides.  Always.  Of course I guess that means I always lose, too.  I started collecting a pile of things to take to Abe and Grace.  I wish the airlines didn’t have the liquid restriction because Abe likes grape jelly.   

•  Ty and Michelle find out in another week whether baby Payne is a boy or girl.  

6:30 a.m. is a bit early for a coo and a smile on demand

• I really love being a grandma.  Better even than M&M's for 62 cents.

What's your trivia this week?  I'd love to read it.