ketchup

it's that time. i'm playing ketchup. sure, it's CATch up to you yankees, but here in the deep south, ketchup works just fine. here's what we've been up to...

today i'm in third grade. i'm actually in my old third grade teacher's classroom. that's what keeps this ole job interesting. i never know when i'll be asked to fill in for my own old teacher, and then the students spend most of the day asking if the chairs are the same as when i was here, which desk was mine, if the wallpaper is new, etc. today they are actually all about me. they love me, naturally, i mean, who wouldn't? they've taken to calling me mrs. awesome. ill keep it.
most classes have a fun book that the teacher reads to them during breaks or something, and this class is no different. they are reading the nickel-plated beauty, and they checked it out of the sms library. when i see a library book, i immediately open the front cover and find something i love. check-out cards. we used to write our names in the lines each time we checked out a book, then the librarian stamped the date for when the book was due back in the library. well i found a good card in this book. here it is, for you readers out there...

If you can read through the blur, you'll see my class!! Casey in 4-D on the top line is Casey McGhee, or so I think it is, and she was in my grade at one point. Martha was in my class, 4-M, and her book was due back on Jan 10, 1996. Wow. we were 9. love it. i think i tried to pick out books that my sister had checked out before me. i thought it would make it cooler. i guess she never read this book, because my name isn't on this card.


as far as cooking travels have gone, they haven't gone far. i did recently make a super delicious sandwich that john swears was the best sandwich i've ever made (thank you pioneer woman!) it was marvelous, and i might have to make it again this week just 'cause. i also have recently had my very first try at cooking deer meat. john killed 3 deer last season, and we haven't eaten hardly any of it! it's been frozen down at his shop, so i made him bring some home. i just browned the meat and made a deer spaghetti type dish. it was pretty good, if i do say so myself! here it is...

i made PW's garlic cheesy bread too (to die for!) looks good huh? 

scrumptious. 

i love our table. 

we had a really really really bad storm on saturday. john and i were helping out at our YL yard sale, and we were driving home afterwards when the skies blew up again. i asked him to pull over. i begged. i pleaded. he kept driving. he had to run into the post office, and i sat in the car, because i'm just so sweet that the rain would have melted me. i sat, i listened to the radio, and i watched. i just knew i was going to see a twister fly out of the sky and suck the white pickup into the air, and i'd be catapulted out the window. i knew it. i waited. it never happened. the lightning scared me half to death, but then eventually the husband did emerge and we were alive together again. we drove home at about 5 miles an hour, partially because the rain was so strong that we couldn't go faster, but mainly because i was gripping the door handle and john's leg, begging him to slow down. we did make it home alive, but only barely.


yesterday we had our final YL club of the year. it was a little sad really. this year's senior class was CRAZY, but i loved them. i'll really miss the girls that i grew close to, but i'm excited for them to go to college! i'll post pictures from last night later.

chicken litter

that's right. litter from chickens. you can imagine for yourself how one might obtain chicken litter before it's put into that nice clean MiracleGro bag and sold at WalMart. i however, will choose to overlook that, and will just use it from my bright shiny bag. and that's just what we did. when the husband and i decided to grow our garden (i'm sorry i keep raving on and on about it, but it's a big deal for us! it's like practicing raising children!), we asked his mother's neighbor for some advice. he's grown gardens for a few years now, and seems like a pro. he told us that pro-mix and chicken litter is the way to go. sound a little bit like trying to read obama's healthcare plan? yeah, i agree. it doesn't make much sense to me either, but the husband and i are diligent listeners, and we found out that pro-mix is the perfect mixture of dirt, sand, and something else that i forgot (apparently listening doesn't stick). so you pour that into your garden, or in our case Lowe's buckets, and you fill 'er on up. well you stop in the middle actually. then you sprinkle about a tablespoon of chicken litter on top, then fill up with pro-mix. then you dig a little hole for your plant, sprinkle a tiny bit more chicken litter, and put your plant in there!
the chicken litter is really supposed to help plants grow super strong. once the litter gets in there, it helps nourish the roots. then the roots go down, and they hit that second layer of chicken litter and they go wild! we'll see how it goes...

i took some more pictures because they're just so cute! enjoy!

i love that color! then we ate it. YUMMMMM!! 

i have an OUTSTANDING guacamole recipe that i can't wait to use this in!! 

we went to dinner with the scoggins family on friday, and then stayed to hang out, as usual. their adorable daughter addie, who i want to just take for my own, got ice cream with her dinner, and i was playing with the camera, so naturally, i took pictures of her. bask in the sheer cuteness of this child. 

she saw me taking pictures and thought she should smile. i told her to keep eating. 

so she ate and looked.

then i stole of a picture of the husband, but he, like addie, thought he should pose. go figure. 

i just love her!

how does your garden grow?

so i may have mentioned that we are growing a garden. our backyard is pretty ugly, so prepare yourself before you look at the pictures. you've been warned.
we are growing a container garden, too. not just a normal one. we're trying to move...anywhere...and if we do get that chance, our garden is portable!! we went and bought some beautiful buckets from lowe's...you'll soon realize that's sarcasm. and my dear darling studly man of a husband built us a raised garden that we can take apart and move too! it's just dreamy.

so here it is...

isn't it cute!? we have 4 tomato plants (2 are in the raised bed), zucchini, squash, jalapeno peppers, bell peppers, and something else but i forgot what it is. on our cute little pot bench in front are rosemary from john's mom, basil, and cilantro.

i'm growing some flowers. i think they're going to be dahlias, which are my absolute favorite, but i can't remember for sure if that's what i planted.

our little raised garden!! we have onions, garlic, and tomatoes over here. i can't wait!!!!

working hard to drill water holes for our pots.

now it will take some time for them to grow, but i promise to post updates, as i know you are DYING to see how it turns out. if you're lucky, i'll mail you a yummy southern tomato.

one fish, two fish...

i haven't posted in a while...I'm sorry! life has been just rolling right along, but it hasn't been anything exciting-that-will-blow-you-out-of-the-water-so-i-should-blog-about-it good. we've been cooking a lot...yummy meals from the pioneer woman, who may be my new idol. we've been growing a garden...it's an experiment, and we'll see what happens. we've been fishing...i'm learning to enjoy it because it's a chance for me to get a tan.
so the fishing...it's been almost surreal that i'm learning to fish. i hate touching creepy crawly animals. scales are disgusting. thus, i shouldn't really call what i do fishing. i sit there, with my legs stretched over the boat, while my jack-of-all-trades husband puts a worm, a gummy plastic thing, or a minnow on the hook, then he hands the rod to me, and i throw it out into the great green (the water is literally green) wander, and i wait. if something does actually bite, i jerk it back, reel it in, and swing that loser fish (because let's be honest...i only catch loser fish) over to that jack-of-all-trades husband of mine. he takes the fish off, i watch him throw it back, and it begins again.

now if he catches a fish, i have an extra job...i have to open the cooler (because he always catches a keeper), and he throws the fish in, and i slam the cooler top shut. then i go back to tanning, because it's what i do better than fishing.

he caught a fish

it's so big that he needs a net

massive, huh?

in the cooler

there's andrew and his dad...they went with us. they caught a lot more than we did. maybe because they weren't worried about getting a tan.

i was determined to catch a fish. i threw that cast out as hard as i could, and my shoe fell off into the water. story of my life.

andrew and his dad are way off in that boat in the middle of the picture.

it almost looks pretty, huh?

i told you the water is green.




and that was fishing this weekend. we hurried to get the boat back on the trailer, raced back to memphis, showered, and barely made it to YL club on time. what a thrilling weekend!