Good Morning, Flowers!
The sun is shining brightly but it is only 1 degree outside with a wind chill of -16. I sure hope "spring" is on time this year! There is more snow in the forecast for tomorrow but they aren't saying how much.

Maggie -- I'm pretty sure we've had over 30" total if we include little snow that fell right before Christmas. When this all started, we had NO snow except for small blotches on the north side of buildings where the sun didn't hit. Enough is enough, all right, all ready! At least we can shovel the snow and don't have to worry about flooding; I think I would get really tired of rain.

I need to get busy and clean in the laundry room while the washer and dryer are doing their job. It seems like the dust/fur fuzz balls are accumulating faster than I can vacuum them up.

Hope you all have a relaxing weekend!

Jean -- from Iowa!

Jean: How far into your summer is school going to extend for all those snow days?! I can understand the cabin fever. Dummy me, got bored yesterday and baked a Hershey cake, ganache and all and now I have to get rid of it so I don't EAT the whole thing. Jack HATES chocolate cake except for German Chocolate.

Maggie: Sounds like the weather your way is spectacular. I was watching the gold tournament at Pebble Beach and boy was it beautiful there.

I think I am finally over the arthritis bout. I am going to the gym today. Starting kind of back at the beginning so I don't injure myself, but that is ok.

We went to see "Miracle" on Friday night and what a wonderful movie. I had seen Kurt Russell on "The View" on Thur I think it was and he was saying that this movie would have you cheering even though you know in advance what the outcome will be and sure enough, you are on the edge of your seat cheering those guys on. I am not a big "sports" movie person, but this was a great movie. We also have Netflix and I got 3 movies in on Saturday and sat and watched them all day. "It Runs in the Family" with all the Douglas family in it was a pretty good movie. I also watched the Jacke Chan movie, "The Medallion," and the latest released Lara Croft movie, which both were ok. I don't know if any of you have BBC America and have seen "Keeping Up Appearances" but they just released the series to dvd so I have them all lined up to be shipped to me somewhere down the line. Netflix, if you are a movie watcher, is pretty cool. It costs $20 a month and you can have 3 movies out at one time. They ship them to you, you can keep them as long as you like and when you send one back(in their postage pd envelope), they send you the next selection you have on your list or "queque." It has already paid for itself this month as I have seen 6 new releases so far this month and will probably get my next three this next Saturday. I like the fact you can keep them as long as you like so if we are going on a trip, we can take our portable dvd player and watch movies and not worry about extra charges. We rented Blockbuster movies and were gone like 4 days and had to pay like $30 extra for them because they got turned in late.

Enough yakking, I have morning chores.

Faye

Good Afternoon!
It almost feels like we are having a heat wave at 28 degrees. The streets weren't plowed from last nights snowfall so they are a mess. The sun didn't shine today and that would have helped things melt a little faster.

I am so excited! I have been feeding a lame cat for over a year and we hadn't seen him for a couple weeks. I was afraid he got caught, wherever he goes, in one of the snow storms and couldn't make it back here. He showed up yesterday and spent the night under our deck with the old grandma cat . . . I suppose we will have some orange and white kittens come spring.

I'm glad today is over. Everyone acted like it was the very first day of the school year and they didn't have a clue let alone any assignments done. They were warned last week that the assignment schedule would go on, test, speeches, etc. This is Winterfest Week which doesn't help any and then next week is messed up with ITED testing. They should have done both in one week and really screwed up the schedule.

"Gma" -- What is ganache? The cake sounds wonderful! Right now we will have our last day of school on June 1st. I can't help but believe we will have another snow day or two before it's over. Although, with Iowa weather it's hard to say. The last three winters have been quite mild with very little snow. This should help the farmers unless it is too much when it all finally melts. I've heard that the movie "Miracle" is good. We don't very often rent movies because we both fall asleep watching them!

I need to figure out what I need from the grocery store. DH is at practice so won't be home for another hour or so. Hope you all have a terrific Tuesday!

Jean -- from Iowa!

Jean: A ganache is like a frosting except it is thin and very very shiny when you put it on. Most ganaches are chocolate and are not really sweet so they really match a sweet cake well. I have to say the cake was fabulous, but I had to get rid of it or eat it and so I got rid of it.

Well, we took another step towards our trip and extended it by two days. We are now going to fly instead of drive and leave Friday evening and stay the whole following week, the wedding is Saturday and then fly home Easter Sunday. We called our hotel and they extended our reservations the extra two days. Jack and I are just itching to go.

Well, I need to get going. Talk tomorrow

Faye (glad the cat is ok. B goes to the vet and gets declawed and neutered on Thurs so I am already being the Jewish guilty mama! )

Jean: I love it when these kids think they are somehow injuring the teachers and staff when they don't do their work. If this country would only wake up and start taking some kind of notice of their kids instead of letting them raise themselves practically. These kids are violent because they get away with it and we have basically made it impossible for the staff to do their jobs. I commend you for sticking it out all these years. I was too cowardly to continue when I realized I was going to have to do student teaching in this town! As for Butterscotch, I don't know about the overnight stay. The girl that booked it was a noodlehead and vacillated between yes and no for overnight so I guess I will find out tomorrow when I drop him off. I hope he does ok since he is older. I know he is going to be pretty upset with me probably.

Jack got a great checkup today! He is down 27 lbs, his cholesterol is 120 (20 pts lower than what they consider good) his triglycerides are 160 and they like you to be at 150 or below, but she said it is possible it will continue to come down and that genetics play a big part in it so he may not get much better but with the cholesterol being such a great number he is fine. Said his pulse was 68 and his blood pressure is 107/74. She said his heart had a good strong beat and good rhythm. His good cholesterol is a little low she said but his bad cholesterol, which is 60, is phenomenol for someone that had a heart attack in November. We got new 90 presriptions so now it will only cost us $30 per 90 days for total meds instead of $30 a month. Can't beat that! You have to jump through hoops to get them started, but after that I hope it won't be so difficult. They are done through the mail.

I have decided to start going to the gym twice a day until our vacation and working out 1/2 time each time. It will burn more calories and it seems not to be so hard on my body. My bad knee takes a beating when I am doing 45 minutes at a time, but doing 20 with a 5 minute cool down twice a day seems to be ok.

Well, better scoot and get to bed.

Faye

Jean: Basically our animals know that a trip to the vets mean being left there for some reason. I guess "mommy" is more traumatized by it then the pets, but I do hate to board them. Our vet/kennel is wonderful, but they are still in cages. We have decided to board Fortune instead of taking him when we go to Indiana. We are staying with friends that lost their dog recently, but we decided we were going to be out of the house so much that we don't want him having any accidents in the house or them being responsible for him, which I know her and I know she would be instead of leaving him in the bedroom. Besides, they have this HUGE and I mean HUGE dog who would be gently with Fortune because he was with their little shih tze but Fortune would be terrified of Bo and Fortune is such a big wuss anyway!

I was naughty and tricked Jack tonight for supper. I used to always make lasagna with cheddar and Mozzarella because Jack doesn't like cottage or ricotta cheese. I had a lowfat recipe using the cott cheese so I took it and pureed it with about 1/2 c water and then mixed ff cheddar and mozz into it and spread it. I also didn't use bottled sauce but pureed italian tomatoes with spices and garlic and gr sirloin and he raved about it! Gotta keep it a secret because I know if I told him the truth I would get, "Yeah, it did have a funny whang to it." He would then never eat lasagna again thinking I had put cottage cheese in it!

Well, better day goodnight. Have a great day tomorrow ladies!

Faye

Good Evening, Flowers!
I'm preheating my bed and am heading that way shortly. It has turned cold again and the weatherbug says it is 5 degrees right now. We had a two hour late start today because of blowing snow in the country, I guess. Then we had an assembly this afternoon with a hypnotist. He had 15 or so kids down on the floor with him and they will probably be so embarrassed when they watch the video. They were pretty funny. We have a half day tomorrow so it will be a week of zippo learning in the classroom.

"Gma" -- I had to laugh at your lasagna ingredients and fooling Jack. When we were first married, we had a young couple, who were just like us, for neighbors. We used to eat together often and the other guy always raved about my green bean casserole but he absolutely hated mushrooms. So when he asked what all was in the dish, his wife would list everything including "soup" but never saying which kind. To this day he still doesn't know how much cream of mushroom soup he ate over the years!

I just remembered I need to send a birthday card out tomorrow so I'd better go get it ready while I'm thinking about it.

Have a fantastic Friday, Flowers!

Jean -- in Iowa!

Good Afternoon, Flowers!
The sun is shining but it is another cold day in my corner of the world. If the wind wouldn't blow it would sure help! We had a half day at school today; with Winterfest and Valentine's Day it was nuts this week.

Maggie -- Glad to see you checking in. I've given up trying to figure out the weight loss cycle; when I think I've done well I gain, when I think I haven't done well I lose. You will have your small gain gone in no time!

I need to make a grocery run; I thought I had everything to make DH's cake but need cocoa for the frosting. It's definitely not WW friendly but he only has one birthday a year!

Have a good rest of the day!

Jean -- from Iowa!