Butter is a metaphor for me!

Hello again! This week I got the insane idea to make homemade chicken pot pie’s. Let me preface all of this by saying that I do not make pies. Twice I made peach pies with the peaches from the tree in the yard and they were terrible, I used pre-made store-bought crust. I can cook and bake practically anything on the planet but I have never wanted to make a pie. It’s not that I really dislike pie because pie is delicious but pie is not my first choice of dessert and for that reason I don’t feel any desire to bake a pie. That being said, I recently purchased the pampered chef miniature pie pan that makes for tiny pies- because... hello? Cute! I envision tiny kid size pies and far be it from me to impose my desire to NOT make pies on my poor innocent children. For someone who never makes pies I sure have a lot of pie making supplies. That’s what comes from years of being a pampered chef consultant earning new products for free. I have at least two- perhaps three- stoneware pie pans, and things like pastry blenders, piecrust shields, and mats to roll out my piecrust. I always told myself that someday when my kids got bigger I might actually want to master making pies. More for the old-fashioned/homesteading/canning aspect of things (which most of you know I’m crazy for) then for the actual idea of desiring pie. I love Keylime pie, I love cheesecake, I love French silk pie and lemon meringue pie... but folks let me tell you I love me a chicken pot pie! Marie callander is amazing.

My mom would always tell me there’s too much sodium in those frozen potpies, but man it’s the ultimate comfort food to me. So I thought what better way to use up that chicken breast I bought on clearance and scratch together ingredients I have at home then to make chicken pot pies? And really to make a homemade chicken pot pie needs a homemade crust, and in order to make a pie with things I have on hand it needs to be homemade crust. Plus I’ve had a lot of dietary issues in the last year with the removal of my gallbladder and discovering that I have a very hard time digesting grains that are not organic or chemical free, so using my own organic ingredients and chemical free flour makes a lot more sense than buying a piecrust. Plus in my mind there’s a difference between the type of piecrust that you should use for a sweet pie and the type of piecrust that you should use for a chicken pot pie. I want a flaky buttery crust for my chicken pot pie. So of course I have a piecrust recipe that is my moms, I’ve made it once or twice with her when I lived at her house, but I haven’t made my own piecrust ever in the history of me, nor have I made a pie with my own piecrust since living in my own house for the past 17 years. Mom‘s recipe is an oil crust and I wanted a flaky crust so of course I hit all recipes and found a flaky butter crust that is very highly rated. This is where we get down to the recipe that is a metaphor for me. (yes I’m getting to a point, amazing isn’t it?)

The recipe says that I should dice the cold butter. I’m all about butter and fresh eggs, I like to make everything with real butter or use real butter on everything... none of this margarine crap. Being December I have a large stock of butter in the fridge and freezer. Realizing I don’t have butter in the freezer is enough to cause me a panic attack (OK not really but you know what I mean, yes I’m allowed to joke about panic attacks because I literally do have them.)

So I decided to double the recipe because when it comes to a piecrust I don’t want to have “not enough“ and of course I’m making miniature pies and not one pie, so I’m not sure if I might need actually more crust  in the long run. I doubled the recipe which means I needed two sticks of butter - which of course I have -and I had been working this afternoon dicing carrots and celery for the recipe, and I had to go to the locker to get some frozen peas because all I had was canned and I was afraid the consistency would be too mushy. So anyway it’s perfectly quiet in my house because all of the kids are at school, the smallest one is at preschool and I have almost 2 full hours with which to get a jumpstart on these chicken pot pie‘s. Of course they’re going to actually be for tomorrow because the dough has to chill for four full hours. It looks like I really planned ahead but I’m really flying by the seat of my pants here. We have a Christmas program tonight for the preschoolers so dinner can’t be delayed beyond 5 PM at the latest. 

So here’s the metaphor for my life, I start out with these excellent intentions, I am going to dice the stick of butter and I get this whole stick of butter diced and I realize this seriously must’ve taken me 10 minutes. And I add this one stick of diced butter to my dry ingredients and I look at my watch and I think to myself, “that it’s 10 minutes of my life I will never get back.” Did it really take 10 minutes?? I don’t know but at first I wanted to say took 20, and I knew that was definitely not right, so I’m estimating, maybe it took four minutes but it seemed. like. it took. forever. So I look at that second stick of butter and I think well shit, do I really have to dice that second stick of butter that fine? My mind plays over how ridiculous this is, I decide I’m making an executive decision- I’m gonna get the shit done...  I look at the pastry blender and I think “I’m going to use that pastry blender to cut it all up into that dry mixture anyway so why the hell do I have to go through this excruciating dicing up a stick of butter. Nobody’s got time for that, I don’t have time for that, I love me some chicken pot pie but seriously I can do this better and I can do this faster.” So I literally slice the second stick of butter and throw it in the bowl and I look at that and I think to myself “man did I read that recipe and just take it too literally, or did the idiot who wrote this recipe really think it needed to be diced?” I grab my pastry blender, combine the ingredients in no time and I am moving ahead. Now granted the dough’s in the fridge chilling, at this point I have not actually rolled it out and I don’t know if it’s gonna work out. But what I do know in my head, is that I’m the kind of person who starts out wanting to do things “right“ and then after I think about it a little bit I realize that I have better things to do that I will find a way to do it my way which is generally quicker and more efficient and I get it done. 

This is a life skill. It’s an analytical skill. It’s a decision making skill and if you ask me it’s a leadership skill. I’m not tooting my own horn here, but it’s a skill that I’ve always had and I don’t know if I get it from my mom or my dad or from both of them but they have the ability to look at something and say “why are we doing it this way, when if we just did it this other way, it would take a lot less time and we would get the same and result or maybe even a better end result.” And there are a lot of people in life that don’t have that skill. There were people in life who are rule followers just because it’s the right thing to do. I don’t believe in following rules as much as I do believe in following the moral code, and being kind to other people, but always looking at something with a fresh pair of eyes and seeing if there’s a different way to do things.

I am two sticks of butter (there are definitely worse things to be) I started out trying to follow the rules and do as I was told and dicing things up into this perfect little cube, and then I thought “hell no. Life is short and I don’t have time for this.” The more I have lived life and the more kids I’ve had and the older I get I can look back and think of times that I wish I would have just done what I wanted and not what someone else expected. I live by a pretty strict moral code and I don’t ever let someone down on purpose. I juggle many Plates and I wear many hats and I try to do my very best. Society spends a lot of time telling us how we should do things. Society tells us how we should dress and how our house should look and they tell us what color her hair can be and whether not we can have tattoos or piercings. They tell us it’s not modest if you breast-feed in public and you’re crazy if you do cloth diapers. People think essential oils are voodoo and that having an interest in skills like canning and soap making are things for people who “have too much time on their hands.” I’ve been told I can’t work here unless I take my nose ring out. I’ve been told my skirt is too short when the same man hired me wearing that skirt... and the only reason the skirt looks too short is because the smock they gave me was two sizes too big and went clear past my knees, and made it look like I didn’t have any pants on! Some of those times I stood up for myself and some of those times I just followed the rules. As the working mom of a new baby, I was told by others what time I needed to be at dinner. I would get off work and rush to the daycare to pick up my daughter, rush home try to figure out how I was going to wash cloth diapers and wash and sanitize all of the breast pump parts and pack them up for the next day and still nurse the baby and be at dinner on time. I was a new mom and I let other people dictate how I was going to raise my child. I would literally have complete breakdowns and panic attacks over whether or not I could get to someone else’s dinner on time. I started seeing a counselor and the counselor told me that it was my life and I could do whatever I wanted. That was one of the most powerful revelations anyone has ever given me. When it came time to have our second child it was the thing that spurred me to become a stay at home mom. I knew that’s what I wanted, but every single EVERYTHING was telling me that I needed to go to work every day, even if I desperately missed my daughter, and that I needed to run around and try to be all of these places on someone else’s schedule. Everything everywhere was telling me that I should spend my entire paycheck on daycare and health insurance because that’s what everyone else does. When I realized that after having two kids it was actually going to cost me money to work, I knew that wasn’t the life I wanted. I could do without cable TV and new clothes and a whole lot of things just to be home with my kids and teach them, things like life skills. This is not a debate about whether it’s better to stay home or work. Everyone has different deep-seated personal thoughts and feelings about that decision and everyone is an individual person that has different needs. Growing up for me meant realizing that I could choose my own path. And even if that path was not perfect, and even if other people disagree with it, and even if it means making other people upset now and then because they don’t control me or my family, it’s important that I live and raise my kids the way that I want to. Nothing is more important than teaching my kids to be themselves and do what they want to do. Nothing is more important to me then embracing the silly, the goofy, the creative, the things that make you an individual. Nothing is more important than empowering my children to be themselves and to have self-confidence and did not take flak from other people. I believe it’s possible to care about others without caring about what others think. I believe it’s possible to follow a moral code and help others when ever possible without compromising your own sense of self. I believe I can be comfortable in my own skin, with my own body and my own size without needing to be diced into a tiny cube like everyone else. 

At the end of August I finally dyed my hair fantasy colors. When I was in high school, I used to spend lots of time coloring my hair (and my mom’s bathroom counter) with Kool-Aid. I’ve always loved bright colored hair but when I was younger I couldn’t hold down a job with colored hair. I mentioned before, I got my nose pierced when I was 17 and I often had to remove my nose ring for my job. My gift to myself for Mother’s Day after Marek was born was piercing my nose again. Something I always wanted but after a few years I had to take it out so that I could work. Something that the 17-year-old me got back again when she was 30. I’ve always wanted to have rainbow hair. I spent years talking myself out of it, Thinking about where I work or what group I volunteer with or what people I know who wouldn’t think it was proper. More and more people that I knew were starting to dye their hair colors and my daughter wanted to dye hers, and I thought, it’s my turn. I’m finally going to do whatever I want and I’m not going to worry. If an organization doesn’t want me as a volunteer because of the color of my hair, then I guess I wasn’t that important to them anyway. Actually what I found is a string of compliments from total strangers. Little girls who want to talk to me about how I chose the colors and what color they want their hair to be. A bonding experience for my daughter and myself as we spend a Saturday dying our hair and turning our own bathroom counters into splotchy purple and aquamarine artwork. Hopefully I’m teaching her at a young age that she can be who she wants to be. I don’t care if she has a mohawk or piercing or mermaid hair as long as she’s nice to other people and works hard for what she wants in life. 

Those two sticks of butter really got me thinking today. Life’s short. You do you.

Sewing and Baking and Napping... oh my!

Those of you who are on facebook probably know what I have been up to, but since this blog has been around longer than facebook, I will just do my usual thing and sorry if you feel you're getting spammed, you know that you don't HAVE to read. LOL. For those of you who are my facebook friends, you may not be aware that when you see this as a "note" on facebook, it's simply being imported from my blog, Adventures in Everyday Life, and posted on facebook as a "note" because that's how facebook imports blogs. My blog address is www.adventuresineverydaylife.com and you can certainly feel free to visit there and see everything. I have been blogging since December 3rd, 2004- so over 5 years and about 1500 posts. I did very well writing on a daily basis, up until about the point I had kids. Then all hell broke loose.

So, what have we been up to lately? I could write all night. Let's see if I can hit a few high points and make some progress. Forgive me if I repeat myself.

I recently decided to grow my own sprouts. A recent article in Mary Jane's Farm magazine reminded me of the days when we used to grow sprouts at home, in mason jars with rubber bands and cheese cloth as strainers. I have always loved sprouts, especially on sandwiches and salads, and then there was the whole "sprout scare" that wasn't nearly as much of a "scare" as it was made out to be. I still bought sprouts, but they are so expensive, and really you can most trust freshness and quality when you grow them at home. I had kinda forgotten about it, and then this article talked about how Mary Jane recycles plastic vegetable cartons (think berries and strawberries from the store) to make portable and giftable sprouting trays. I just happened to have a stack of them around, and so I was intrigued. She recommended sproutpeople.com for organic and wonderful quality seeds and supplies, and I thought I would start some online research. When I stopped by sproutpeople.com, I was absolutely blown away by their selection, and their up front honesty and information about various mixes and supplies. I ordered a kid's sprouting kit, which was inexpensive and came with a really cute magnifying glass and a nice starter assortments of seeds, as well as a cool sprouter with two clear stackable trays, so you could really SEE the sprouts' progress. I decided that after my first batch, I would try to involve Ardyn and eventually Marek in the process. Ardyn is really starting to be a salad fan, and I know from experience that she is more likely to eat something that she has helped grow and/or prepare. After helping me chop veggies, she really did start eating them more frequently.

I also bought a Mother's Mix of seeds that includes delicious favorites that are high in folic acid and other nutrients, and also has fenugreek to support a healthy milk supply. (yay! how cool is THAT?!) And for good measure (and since they were inexpensive and I was already paying for shipping) I bought the assortment of stainless steel mesh lids for mason jars, so I could sprout the old fashioned way if I wanted to. They say that mason jars require more work to rinse, and I don't think the air circulation is as great in the jars, but at the same time, they are easier to shake and dance with for draining and straining than my trays. I don't like how once the sprouts start to "sprout" they start to clump and it's hard to get them separated in the trays. The directions for the sample bean mix told me to put the entire bag of beans into one of the clear trays. that seemed a little excessive to me, and I thought I would probably do better making half of them at a time (they would last me a long time) and I wasn't sure HOW they were possibly going to sprout being so cramped. So I divided the bag in half and put half in each tray. That worked better, but as they sprouted they still took up the whole tray. I think if it were up to me, for better air circulation and drainage, I would put even fewer in the tray at a time. But I was very pleased with the information that was sent with the kit, the directions, educational information on seeds and sprouting, and some really cool recipes and ways to prepare and enjoy each type of mix that I bought. I am so excited to try them. Here are some pics of the kit and my order, and then a pic of the first crop of sprouts from the Beanies Awesome Mix, which I tried first, mostly because they intrigued me (I have a new thing about beans, just ask me sometime!) and the recipe for eating it fried on top of rice or noodles, or making Beanies Awesome Sprouted Bean Burgers has me all excited!

Last week I went on a baking spree. The house was clean on Monday, and I mean SPOTLESS and by the end of the week it was trashed. LOL. I made bread (honey wheat bread is our staple around here, I make our bread from scratch. It's delicious) and then I made cinnamon rolls from scratch for the first time ever. Unfortunately, they didn't go over well. This was mostly because I think the recipe that I got from allrecipe.com wasn't all that. There HAS to be a better recipe. They weren't bad, but they weren't awesome, and I strive for AWESOME. So, if any of you have a great homemade cinnamon roll recipe to share, I am ALL ears and would be eternally grateful! They did LOOK good though!

















































I long for the day when I can cook, bake, and do canning and prep work in a real kitchen. It doesn't have to be huge, but seriously, I am really really struggling here. The counter space I have is pretty much ZERO and there is no table or place to cool pies, cakes, cookies, or breads, not to mention to actually roll out cookies or anything like that. I have to go out to the dining room to do that, which means that the table has to be clear, remain clear, and that I have to keep the kids off it, as well as then having the issue of where to FEED them when I am working on the table. We don't have enough cupboard space, let alone SPACE period, and my oven was $25 at an auction 10 years ago... and I bought it from a little old lady going to a nursing home... who KNOWS how long she had it. I have recently noticed that burners aren't as hot as they used to be, and the oven itself isn't wonderful. I can only imagine what I could do with a new oven and some counterspace. Here is an example of what my kitchen looks like after I bake bread and cinnamon rolls. It was spotless, and then, in less than 2 hours, it looks like this....

That little "L" of counter space is all I have, and half of that is the sink and the dish drainer.Add two kids clinging to your legs, laying on the floor, and or "helping" and it gets pretty hairy at times. I am very glad that when we got married I used money I received from my bridal showers to buy my hutch and pantry for the kitchen. Without them, I would be a crazy woman.

After I got the baking out of my system, I moved on to laundry and sewing. Actually I was doing laundry the week before too. It never ends. But this week I can't even begin to tell you how many loads of laundry I have done. TODAY alone I have folded 2 loads of diapers and a load of whites from earlier in the week, AND washed six loads, two of which have already been folded. the dryer isn't having an easy time keeping up with the washer (you know how THAT goes) so I have a two loads waiting for the dryer and one drying right now. Oh wait, I actually did seven loads, because I washed more FABRIC (yeah!) I started the sewing bug by cleaning the porch. It badly needed it. I reorganized the kids' play area and once that was done, I set in to find my sewing table again. Here are a few pics of the kids' area of the porch, all cleaned up. We had gotten a new play mat that has roads and such all over it, and so I put that down and they loved driving the people all over it in their cars, and putting the animals in the zoo, etc. I put the tree play tent away for a while.

After I got the porch cleaned, and my sewing table found, Marek found a new love for Ardyn's trampoline. It is like his new "throne." Tuesday afternoon he took his nap on the trampoline, and he also spent every waking moment he could either sitting on it, laying on it, or investigating it.

Wednesday he took TWO naps on it (yes seriously, both naps on the trampoline) and he LOVED sitting on it. He took his sippy cup, his blankie, and his pacifier up on it, and just hung out there. He only moved to eat and get his diaper changed. Really. Today he again hung out on the trampoline, and took his telephone up there with him. He has recently started saying "hi" and also putting phones up to his ears. He says Mamma much more frequently and *usually* on demand, and yesterday he took his first unassisted steps, hands free, towards Daddy. Exciting!

In fact, yesterday BOTH kids slept on the porch for their later naps, while I sewed. It was sweet and peaceful.

Tuesday I made lots of baby legs, which are great because BOTH kids still fit the homemade ones. In fact today Ardyn had a mismatched pair on her arms. LOL. She's just a little fashionista.

Then I moved on to Pajama Dresses. Ardyn is ADDICTED to pajama dresses. She had one last summer and she asked to wear it EVERY Night. It was a horrible dramatic situation whenever it was dirty. I found a winter one with fleece and long sleeves at a resale shop, and bought that for the winter. She had only one all winter, and would sometimes get so upset when it was dirty that she would remind me during the day to wash it so she could wear it that night. Sometimes she refused to take it off all day, hoping to keep it in sight so she could sleep in it again. I bought a pattern that was pretty inexpensive through an online mamma co-op and had plans to make some myself. I finally got around to it! I had already traced the pattern onto tracing paper and cut the pattern out, and the fabric was prepped... I made her a Scooby Doo pair and then a Dora pair, and she is so thrilled with them she wore both of them all day the past two days and at night too. I made them shorter and sleeveless, like tank top dresses, so that they would last all summer. She was so happy that I went out and got more fleece at 50% off at Joann's last night so I can now make her 4 more pair. I shouldn't have to buy her any summer jammies, and making my own is SO much less expensive. It costs me less to make my own than it does to buy them at the resale shop! If I get the fabric at 50% off, it's like $3 a yard, and it doesn't even take a full yard to make a pair. Of course most people would say that the fabric isn't flame resistant and therefore isn't approved for children's sleepwear, but I HATE that flame resistant fabric. I hate how fast it wears and gets pilly and then it sticks to itself in the dryer, and honestly, I am not keen on the idea of putting chemical laden flame retardant fabrics on my little ones. Lots of people don't even have their kids WEAR pajamas to bed... and used pajamas have likely been washed enough to loose their retardant status. At least homemade and used ones make me feel more comfortable. Here's a little reading if you want to be a little freaked out.

The pattern calls for lace at the neck and arms, so I robbed a bit of green lace from an old chemise-style pajama that I had in my "recycle" bin. It was nice and soft from years of use and washing and I thought it might be tolerable around the neckline. It also makes me happy to reuse pretty things :)

Just to help me keep my sanity, I altered the pattern to use a polyacetal snap instead of a buttoned up back, and added a size tag so that in the future (more daughters?) I am not racking my brain to determine what size this or that actually is :)

And then since the kids were sleeping peacefully on the porch while I sewed, I went ahead and made myself a skirt from a Lila Tueller pattern I had bought (I even had the fabric and charm packs all ready to dive into) and it turned out ADORABLE although it was alot of piecing and a LOT of gathering. Thank god for my Serger!

Okay, I will end this post here! Stay tuned to the next post, which if I remember, whill include info on the great toy organization of 2010, and also some pics of what I am up to sewing next! OOOH and the dresser project! I have pics of that too! Just wait till you see what we're up to!

XOXO, Thanks for reading!
Meagan

My next car will be a cupcake!

So tonight we have a freeze warning. That basically means if you have any plants that you don't want dead by morning, get them inside this evening. Ugh. I have ONE planter that I want to steal the ivy out of. Besides that I think I am good.
Of course the skies are all cloudy and dark looking, and the leaves are swirling from the trees and gathering in piles alongside the curbs. It's windy and it just looks gloomy, like one of those days when you need to drink cappuccino or cocoa and read a book on the couch.

It was a challenge to get up this morning, a Bigger challenge to get dressed. It was one of those days where, if I didn't have to follow a dress code, I'd be wearing a hooded sweatshirt and track pants with my hair in a ponytail and no jewelry with the exception of the valentine's day diamonds in my ears every single day, and the wedding ring on my finger. It's a day to wear my sweater mules and curl my feet up underneath me.

But NOOOO - Work beckons. This is allot like my Friday again this week, since I have to attend some training/education in Peoria Thursday and Friday. The only bad thing about it is that I will have to get up at 6am to be in Peoria by the time my classes start, but I will be home by 5pm, so it's a small sacrifice I suppose. My biggest morning issue (besides getting up and trying to get all the bumps out of my hair without washing it AGAIN this morning {I washed it before bed}) Was SOCKS. I have an ENTIRE Drawer full of black socks. ENTIRE Drawer people. And not a small drawer, and the drawer is full mind you, but NONE of the socks match. Except 1 pair of snowflake socks. Black with silver snowflakes. Yeah. That's my life. I desperately need more black socks. No- not MORE Black socks, just more MATCHING black socks. Black socks disappear around our house like nothing else (except maybe Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.)

I love cakes. I love decorating cakes, I love cupcakes, and I really have a HUGE appreciation for the talented cake decorators out there. Recently I have come across LOTS of cool cakes on Flickr. If It's awesome, I add it to my Flickr faves (See my favorites here!) So now I have been thinking about cupcakes. I have been thinking about buying one of those cupcake trees. But the ones at wal-mart are too small. I thought I could make some cool cupcakes for my girl's night out party in November. (sex toys and cupcakes, what could be better?) Maybe my next car will be a cupcake? Wouldn't ya'll just shit if I built one?
And one thing that I can't wait for about having kids? PARTIES! Yay! Birthday cakes and pinatas and party hats. If it were up to me, I would have a party for my birthday every single year. And hopefully I can have little girls who can have tea parties and picnics. I would also like to try making these bullseye cupcakes.

So I guess I had better get to work listening to Italian Language CD's and decorating cupcakes!

Fall Food

Listening: REO Speedwagon The HITS (another thing learned from my dad)
Wearing: Black Ballet Style Shirt, Khaki Pants, Puppy Dog Socks, and Mary janes. Straight Hair. Link: Fall Photos from around home

Last night was a very "fall-like" night. we peeled/cored/and sliced 30 cups of apples. I made two batches of apple crisp and some wheat beer bread with Budweiser. Yum!

I have a "fall" swap, I have everything ready to send. The only thing I didn't put in the picture is my handmade item. I need to package that up and get it mailed off to Germany.

I am happy today is Thursday.... but I don't have a HNT Photo. I suck. Oh well. I guess with all the Apple slicing, bread baking, and apple crisp making, I have an excuse, right?

One of the other things that makes me all excited for fall? My Tastefully Simple Order Arrived on the back porch yesterday, and now I have a sample of "Oh My Chai" tea and "Hazelnut Hot Chocolate." I am totally ready to curl up with a hot mug and a good book. I am just to the end of Rebecca Wells Ya-Yas in Bloom. So far it's been a really good book. But really, it isn't a page turner. It's lots of little stories, so when I finish a chapter, I don't feel the urge to continue like you would with a regular book, because you already know the end to that little story. It's good, but it has taken me much longer to read it than it usually would.... because I am not dying to get to the end. I had a hell of a time getting to sleep last night, I was still awake at 3am, even though I lay down at 1:30. It was annoying and it was really pissing me off. Then of course this morning I did NOT want to get up, since I was all sleepy and snuggled in.

Well, I can't think of a whole lot else to say today. Just your regular day. no profound realizations, no big purchases, no driving success stories. Just another day. I guess I could have some "Oh My Chai" or perhaps just a DQ Pumpkin Pie Blizzard since they just got them in. Mmmm. I hope that we can have some nights filled with relaxing and playing games with friends. I love fall.

Pie Eyed

Watching: Johnny Knoxville on Late Night with Conan O'Brien
Wearing: Pajama pants and a matching shirt, pink thong slippers
Baking: A pumpkin pie and an apple pie

It's hard cooking late at night. Because my mom is sleeping. And when I have a question like how in the hell can I make a pie with heavy cream when I can't find it at any grocery store in the midwest (okay, at Wal-Mart in Princeton) and I just want to make the damn pie. So I looked on the internet for a substitution. I found a few. The most mentioned was the butter and milk combination. But I don't think it was as effective, especially since I only keep skim milk. I think that I should have tried the evaporated milk substitute instead.

So the pumpkin filling wasn't thick enough, and I worried. I mixed up enough to make two pumpkin pies. But after seeing how runny the filling was, I panicked a bit and decided to make an apple pie as pie number 2, just in case the pumpkin one wouldn't set... I would hate to bake 2 pies and have them both be a bomb. But now the pumpkin is set about 3 inches around the edge, so I hope the rest will set in a few minutes. I will practically be awake all night baking at this point, LOL.

Pies are NOT my forte. My mom makes good pies, but even she has issues now and then. I have watched her angrily toss out enough botched pie crusts in my time to know that pies are touchy. Practice would probably make perfect, but I have resorted to buying refrigerated or boxed crusts so that I can eliminate the crust factor and concentrate on the filling. I need to take a pie baking class!

I can bake all kinds of breads, from scratch, and be incredibly successful. Other people get frustrated and are amazed with my patience and success of baking bread and rising dough. I can bake cookies, tea rings, roast turkeys, make salads, can veggies, make soup and chili from scratch, and make homemade tortellini. But I really don't like making pies.

Oh the center of the pumpkin pie is setting! I am using two of my Pampered Chef Stoneware Pie pans. My mom hates those. She always says that her crust burns before the center gets done because the stoneware takes longer to heat up. I use the pie crust shield from Pampered Chef and as long as I put it on within the first 8-10 minutes, I don't have a problem. Of course my mom doesn't have a whole lot of patience when it comes to letting the stone heat up and turning the heat down a bit so that the crust doesn't get done so fast.

You know, it's a small world. Case in Point? The commercial I just saw on TV. Let me start at the beginning. When I went to college, I took classes with a guy named Ty Kipp from a couple of towns over. Besides having a porn star name, Ty is super nice, and a good looking, really built guy. The broad shouldered type, like my husband, and I LOVE the broad shouldered type.

We always got along and I had alot of fun with him and other friends at school. Once I left college, I rarely if ever saw him. I probably didn't see him in 7 years. Then my sister started dating a guy who was in my class in college! Strange! and we had been good friends too, and rode to class and field trips together quite often as the only two people from our area. Well, they didn't date long, but right around that time I went to the bar in Mineral with her and ran into Ty and another classmate. Talk about wild. They had never put two and two together that she was my sister.

So Ty and Liz (sis) play on the same sand volleyball team, and I see him about once a month or so. As I was sitting here watching Conan, A commercial came on the TV for Weber Meats in Geneseo. I was busy typing and I happened to look up, JUST as I saw Ty on the screen! What?! Thank god for TIVO because I rewound and sure enough. He had his head down but I was sure it was him. I called Liz (because she is always awake) and clarified that he does work at Weber in Geneseo. Cool! Not everyday you see someone you know on TV. At least not here. Around here even the weather man is a celebrity. So I told her "you HAVE to tell Ty I saw him on TV!" And I explained to her that when we were in school, we went to Weber Meats for a lab, for our meat evaluation class. I can't remember if Ty was in that class with me or not... because that was 8 years ago!

Now the Pumpkin Pie is out and the Apple Pie is in the Oven. I can't wait for it to cool so I can put the cool whip on top. Mmmm.

UPDATE: I took the apple pie out of the oven at 1:45am. Then I fell fast asleep and had a dream that I was back in college and that I was skinny! (I was fairly skinny then) and I had long hair (in the dream) and I was at like an arcade playing Atari with Ty and when it was time to part ways, he kissed me! What the? Now this morning I was a little upset that I didn't kiss him in college- although a dream kiss is probably better I suppose. At least this one probably was. Plus I dated my husband all through college, I was only there like two months before we "officially" got it together. So I didn't get to kiss any college guys. Oh well. So this morning I was like "hmmm, I should convince my sister to ask Ty out. He's a great guy, just what she needs. They could get married. He would be an awesome uncle to my kids. "Uncle Ty." It has a nice ring to it. And someday, Ty is going to google his own name (or maybe someone will do it for him) and he will find this and be like What? The Fuck?