Today's weather, etc.

Today was amazing, weather wise. It was 10°C (50°F) and sunny, clear blue skies!! It was a pure delight at this time of year to be out and about without a jacket and be totally comfortable. I wish every day could be like today!! Of course, there is a draw back to this in that we had a small amount of snow the other day and today it did a lot of melting, now will freeze and be very icy. Not only could this be dangerous out on the highways, but I live on a hill so have a very steep driveway that can be very dangerous when glare ice as you can't stop and end up on the highway, risking hitting or being hit by oncoming traffic. So if it's going to be sunny and warm I want it to melt all the snow off the driveway and let it dry enough to avoid the buildup of ice. I wish everyone a safe and joyous winter!!

I attended my weekly TOPS meeting and found I gained 1 1/2 pounds over Christmas. While this is not good, it also isn't terrible. Apparently, the average weight gain over Christmas is 5 pounds, so I didn't do all that bad. The worst anyone in our group did was a 3 pound gain. Time to get busy and get rid of that along with lots more. After TOPS, I got gas in my truck, then went to lunch with the ladies, as usual, and had a Veggie Burger with side salad, took the top half of the bun off before I ate and left that on my plate, also using a lesser amount of the Italian salad dressing 'on the side'. I went and got some pellets for my stove (I heat my home with these pellets), then to the Bargain Bin to meet friend Pat and picked up a few items, including some nice sheets for my bed. After that Pat & I went to Dairy Queen where I broke my diet both as a vegan and a weight watcher... I had a Mini Blizzard... so could have been much worse. It was yummy!! When time to head home, I went to the used book store to look for some books I've been wanting. I got one of the ones on my list... and 4 that weren't on the list. This evening I browsed some in the book Cook With Tofu, it looks like some good information and recipes for a new vegan to learn from and enjoy.

Count Down to Spring

Well, Christmas is over and New Years is very nearly here. So far I have no plans for New Years Eve and will likely stay home to cuddle with my cat and watch TV, likely playing games on the computer as I do so. Or perhaps I will go to friend Phil's to watch a movie, though that would probably still see me home well before midnight, so time to cuddle with the cat while on the computer and watching TV, or even go to bed and read a book. A week after New Years is my Birthday. Yup, I get them all over with at once, more or less, with Christmas, New Years and my Birthday all being within a 2 week period. After that, nothing until Valentines day for which I would look at personalized valentines gifts for him... if I had a 'him' in my life, which I don't unless you count some of my animals. I am happy as a single woman, for the most part. There are times I would like that to change, then I give my head a shake. I enjoy my freedom and can't imagine being happy without it. After Valentines there's April Fools Day (nephew Jeremy's Birthday), then Easter... yes this is the count down to something. The May Long Weekend when we celebrate Queen Victoria's Birthday, is the latest I plan to have my trike back on the road. It of course will depend on the type of weather we are having at the time, and if the paint job is done as it will be done outside so must be warmer weather so not a winter project, but early May is when I plan to insure and start riding my trike again. Yes, I am counting down to what I so much look forward to.

Death of a Fire Chief

Today is a sad day for the small city of Enderby, BC Canada. In the early hours of today, there was a burning building and the local volunteer fire department went to fight it. As they worked, there was suddenly a big explosion that woke many sleeping people in Enderby, causing them to wonder what in the world just happened! Dennis Botkin, a man I knew many years ago, was watching the fire when this explosion happened and yelled for someone to call for an ambulance as someone had to have been hurt in that. Little did he know that his grandson, a 29 year old man recently married and the current volunteer fire chief, had just been killed in the explosion, and another fire fighter injured.

I grew up in Enderby and moved away in the late 1970s, though still have family there and only live about a 25 minute drive away. I feel great gratitude for all fire fighters as they put their lives on the line to serve and protect their towns/cities and the people that live there. I am saddened for the Botkin family and for the little city of Enderby with all it's residents. The loss of this life was a big loss all around.

Making Cookies... Again!!

I posted about making cookies the other day. Since then, I looked up Vegan Oatmeal Cookie recipes on the internet and found one that sounds really great so today I got what I need to make a batch or two of them, also for Christmas gifts. I'll bake them tomorrow or the next day. If you are interested, here is the recipe for you to check out! This fall I started eating about 95% Vegan. I have become very interested in eating healthily... and that sounds like something for another post.

Albert Einstein, physicist, 1921 Nobel Prize recipient:
"Nothing will benefit human health and increase chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet."

Food Bank Today..... Vegan Potluck This Evening

All my days lately seem to be very busy and tiring as well as wonderful. Today I had a medical appointment then went to the Food Bank to do another 2 1/2 volunteer hours. This month so far I have put in 11 1/2 hours there. With 818 Christmas Hampers going out this year, we have a lot of extra work to do putting those hampers together. Today my job was working on part of those Christmas Hampers. Ginger was putting 2 bags together so Iris and I could 'double bag' the veggies, so we would take a double bag and fill it with a 3# bag of onions + a 3# bag of carrots + a 5# bag of russet potatoes, tie the bags and stack them. In the 2 1/2 hours I was there, we did about 150 bags of which I know I did more than 50% as I was working at it by myself before Iris came in to help. It's a good thing I had a chiropractor appointment after that today as my back was not being kind to me at that point. As always, though, I enjoyed being at the Food Bank, doing what I can to help out.

After the Chiropractor all I wanted to do was come home and lay down, I felt so tired. However, my day was not yet over. I went to the Bulk Barn to pick up "a few things" and ended up picking up a LOT more than planned. YIKES!!! It came to $63!!!! Dang, groceries sure have gotten expensive lately!! I came home, used the washroom, packed up some Bean Soup I had made and off I went to my monthly Vegan Potluck and Video evening. GREAT food, WONDERFUL people, INFORMATIVE video on heart/artery health. I am so glad I went... and so GRATEFUL for being involved in this.

Food Bank

I put in many volunteer hours each month at the local Food Bank, run by the Salvation Army. I really enjoy going there to help out with all the work needing to be done and I so enjoy the people I get to work with there. December is always a very busy month around the Food Banks with all the Christmas Food Drives happening as well as donations coming in from schools, stores and so many other people walking in to bring donations. My TOPS club also donates a bunch of food at this time of year. Donations are needed at the Food Banks all year long and December is when most of the donations are made. When donations come in it means a lot of work sorting through all that mix of various kinds of food items, filling the shelves and boxing the rest to be stored for refiling the shelves as needed through the coming year. All the standing and bending is a real killer for my low back, but I persevere and get lots done. I am grateful for the opportunity to help where help is so needed.

Making Cookies

I packed up the ingredients for 2 kinds of cookies I wanted to make for Christmas gifts for a few of my 'guy friends'. I could of course make them at home, but wanted to go visit my Mom so decided to do both at the same time. I should have just come home after TOPS and gone to bed, or visited Mom for a while and come home early to bed. I went on to 'overload' in tired and in pain. However, I managed to get it done in the end, and still drive the 25 minutes home.

First I made Shortbread Cookies using a recipe given to me by my friend Cat Gee. They didn't turn out as great as Cat said they would be, so obviously not as great as hers turn out. Firs, they took a lot of mixing to get them 'smooth and creamy', then I could only put 1 pan of 12 cookies into the oven at a time. The recipe said bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes until golden on bottom of cookies. Well, Mom swears her oven is right so I don't know why, but it was taking around 25-30 minutes to get them to golden on the bottoms. When baking the 2nd dozen I was checking to see if they were done and WHOOF, the pan fell and there were broken cookies all over the inside of the oven!!! I was not happy!!! I cleaned up the mess and got the 3rd dozen in to bake. Mom was gone to get us some dinner from Subway when this happened and came home to see me cleaning up the last of the mess. She said stuff like this has happened to her too, so that helped a lot. It helped me to see I'm not such an idiot as I was feeling like until then.

Shortbread finally done, I started the Peanut Butter Balls. These ones don't get baked and though a bit fiddly, they are easy to make and are very healthy. Ingredients include flax meal, oat bran, carob chips and powder, honey &/or maple syrup... stuff like that. When all is mixed together, you roll it into little bitty balls that you roll in chopped nuts, or chia seeds, or coconut, or quinoa, or sesame seeds, or whatever else you can think of like that. They are so YUMMY and well worth the work to make them. I think I'll make another batch to give to my brother and his wife.

Another Full Thursday

Today I didn't make it to my every Thursday TOPS meeting. I had answered a post on Freecycle for 150 feet of baseboard being given away and the fellow needed me to go pick it up in Coldstream between 10am and noon on Thursday which is when my TOPS group meets in Armstrong. Once it was on my truck I had to bring it home and unload it. Some of the pieces are so long that I had to open the sliding back window of my truck and put the boards through, resting one end on the dash and the other end still sticking out so far I had to hang a red flag on my 'over length' load. The boards are anywhere from 2 feet long to 15 feet long. Once it was all unloaded I packed up a bunch of baking ingredients for making cookies and headed out for the rest of my day.

I drove to Armstrong for the usual Christmas gift exchange and mini party with 3 of my friends from the TOPS group... Pat, DJ and Pauline. I got there around 2pm and left at 4:30pm off and running to Mom's in Enderby... some days I put a lot of kilometers onto my truck. At Mom's I visited with her as well as made 2 kinds of cookies for giving as gifts to some of my friends this Christmas. Exhausted and in a lot of pain from my back, I left there around 11pm and made the 25 minute drive home again. I thought about stopping to gas up the truck at 2 1/2 cents per liter (1o cents per gallon) cheaper then here, but felt I just couldn't face it, needed to come home and end my day.

Ahhhh.... 'Tis The Season...

'Tis the season for social gatherings when there are oh so many pot luck dinners to attend which means oh so many dishes to cook and take along to share with friends, and oh so many photographs to take of people and food at the parties. Christmas is a hard time of year for many people for many reasons, including so much over eating makes us gain the pounds when what we want to do is drop weight and inches for a slim, trim body and improved health. All the excess photographs I take can be put on my portable hard drives, yet the excess food I eat goes straight to fat that gets stored on my body. I need to make sure I get more exercise as well as do my best to refrain from the over eating thing!! Wish my luck!!

Food Bank

Oh my aching back..... That is what I've been saying all day today and part of yesterday. You see, I did my volunteer hours at the Food Bank yesterday and I over did it a bunch. I was helping put together food hampers for people in need as well as sorting and putting away some of the food that has come in recently. At this time of year, there is a lot of food donated and it all has to be sorted through and put away on the shelves as well as boxed and stored to feed people throughout the coming year when there are not so many donations. I knew I was on my feet too long, bending down too much, and still I kept doing it as there was just so much to be done. We sure could use more help at this time of year. I really love being involved in this. I don't love the pain, and yet it's almost worth it in this case.