Quick little post

I love the candy cane colors of this graphic.

There's not much of anything on TV tonight so we went to a Red Box movie machine at Cub Foods. The movies cost $1 a day and are charged on a credit card. There are three or four Red Boxes in the neighborhood--two at Cub, one outside on the corner at Walgreen's and another a few blocks down at MacDonalds. The movie can be returned at any Red Box so it's really handy.

The Blockbuster in the neighborhood charges over $3 to rent a movie, so I only go there when I'm looking to buy a used movie. However, when buying used movies, we've found that pawn shops are the cheapest place to get them. Pawn shops also offer boxed sets of old TV shows and movies at bargain prices. I recently got a boxed set of Cagney and Lacy shows for a song!

I got a box of four Benji movies but it didn't have the one I really wanted--Benji the Hunted. That's the one where the little dog is lost on an island and takes care of a litter of cougar kittens. I'm still looking for that one. I don't know if my three great-granddaughters will love it as much as I did, but that's OK.

I virtually never buy anything new. I buy my clothes (except undies) at second hand thrift stores like Unique and Savers. I frequent the Dollar Tree store for household items and buy groceries at Mike's Discount Foods, the Tastee Bread Thrift Store and Walmart or Cub.

I don't mean to bore you with my thrifty habits, but maybe my suggestions will help you save a buck now and then.

Of dogs and Christmas cookies

It turns out that the dog in the Snuggie is named Carmella and she has her very own blog! Daughter Number Three kindly forwarded the link to me and it's really worth checking out. It's at http://alittlebrownblog.blogspot.com/.

I have totally avoided doing any Christmas baking this year. Although I miss the fun of decorating cookies and the way the oven warms up the house, my doctor has cracked down on me about my blood sugar.

Now, I am a sweets freak--it I see 'um, I eat 'um; cookies, candies, fruitcakes, bars, Christmas breads, chocolates, pies...I have to stop, I'm making myself drool!

I've been eating lots of veggies and cutting back on carbs. Astoundingly, I have lost ten pounds! Of course, I still have the hurdle of Christmas to get past. Our family of 22 will be getting together for a celebration at my youngest daughter's on Saturday. We decided to do a "baked potato bar" to accommodate everyone's food preferences. The toppings will include bacon bits, cheese sauce, broccoli, vegetarian chili made with Boca Crumbles, sour cream etc. The sides will include meat balls, smokies, salads, veggie tray, fruit plate and of course, desserts.

I'm not so much concerned about what I might eat that day, it's about the next day. Past experience has taught me whenever I splurge on a large meal it triggers my appetite to turn into a monster. And since the previous day's excess usually produces scrumptuous leftovers, there I am with a raging appetite and half a pumpkin pie..the last pumpkin pie I'll make until next Thanksgiving. What's a gal to do?!

OK, OK, I'm getting myself wound up over something that hasn't happened yet. Courage, Sparrow!

The Hot Item this Christmas

I admit I stole this off another blog. I have a weakness for dogs in people poses. And who wouldn't want a Snuggie for Christmas, whether man or beast?

It seems like every store is selling them this season. You find them in big box stores, clothing stores, grocery stores, online and on TV. In fact, I bought one at a Snyder's Drug Store recently in the UM Gopher's colors and logo. (But don't tell anyone because it's a Chrismas present!)

I still have to chuckle at the name because my kids used to inflict a kind of underwear torture on each other that they called a snuggie.

Help! I goofed up again!

I made a few simple changes to my sidebar and the entire contents sank to the bottom of my blog. I have fiddled around trying everything (except the correct thing) to get it back the way it should be. Anybody know what I need to do? Please?

Favorite Christmas albums

I'm an old fogie when it comes to Christmas music (but not so bad that I listen to Bing Crosby records). Still, I'm old enough that I remember when I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus first played on the radio and when Gene Autry first sang Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

I remember saying my "piece" in front of the church on Christmas Eve and feeling so special because my mom had fixed my hair in Shirley Temple ringlets. And to top it off, every kid was handed a brown paper bag of goodies as we left the church afterward. Inside the bag was a bunch of peanuts-in-the-shell, an apple, some old-fashioned Christmas hard candies and best of all--chocolate covered vanilla creme drops! (Some stores still carry them this time of the year.)

I love a lot of the Christmas candies that are sold only at this time of year. I'm nuts for chocolate covered sponge candy, peanut brittle and nut brittle, those tiny little pillow mints, almond bark and divinity! Actually, divinity with nuts is the ultimate candy as far as I'm concerned. I think it reminds me of licking the beaters when my mom made 7-minute icing for birthday cakes when I was a kid.

So many happy memories are tied to foods, it's no wonder we overeat at Christmas!

Cat Lover's Christmas

This kitty has such an intelligent expression on its face, it makes me wonder if the artist used a child's face as a model.

Most of the wonderful graphics that I use are from Olde Dame Penniwig's blog. She provides oodles of nostalgic seasonal images for free. She's a dear and generous old soul and worth checking out.

Coffee House

I don't often frequent coffee houses, mainly because I'm too cheap to pay $2 to $3 for a cup of coffee. I don't care for sweetened hot drinks (like hot chocolate or apple cider etc.) and that goes double for coffee. I tell myself I'm a purist because I don't like anything degrading the coffee flavor.

In spite of this, I was at a coffee house last night drinking a $2 cup of de-caff. My friend S was reading from her recently published book, Ssylka about a Russian woman who follows her exiled husband when he's sent to Siberia. Eight people turned out for the event even though it was bitchin' cold (as we say in Minnesota). It was cozy and warm inside, however, and it was nice to be together with a group like that.

M and S met afterward and found they had many things in common. Except for one big thing--M still has PTSD from living through the WWII bombing of London. (When the local weather warning sirens are tested on the first Wednesday of every month, M has a moment of panic.) S says she remembers the hardships after the war more vividly than the actual war. Both women have written memoirs about those years and are looking forward to getting together to talk about it.

I was living in California during the war years when my dad worked at the Lockheed Aircraft plant. Even so, I have an affinity for those who endured the terror of nightly bombings--of being a little girl in a world where strange men in airplanes are trying to kill you. How do you fathom such insanity!?