Well Hey there, Bloggy Long Time No See

So…Hi, y’all.  🙂  It’s been a while.

So many things have happened since the last time we met.

Mostly bad. But not all. Hey, you. 😉

Let’s see…first, turns out that after a couple of years of believing I was celiac…and making all the required changes…I am indeed NOT celiac. I won’t waste time ranting or whining about the misdiagnosis but my PSA for today is…if you ever think you or esp your child might be celiac…get the biopsy.  We relied on blood testing for my diagnosis (because of my blood thinner issue) but if I had to do it over again I’d definitely risk the bleeding for a biopsy.  It’s crazy expensive…not to mention time consuming…to switch to a gluten-free life style.  Better to be absolutely sure than to waste all that time / money / energy if you don’t need to do it.

After I found out about the misdiagnosis I eased back into regular eating. It went surprisingly well.  My 3+ year iron struggle improved a lot.  I guess because I was eating real bread / cereal / ect…stuff that is fortified with extra vitamins and minerals.

Then in July something horrible started happening.

****Gross Pic Warning****

arm sore1

First ‘blood spot’ showed up last month.

arm sore5

Then a few more.

arm7

Then worse.

chest

And then today this grapefruit size ‘thing’ on my side.

I’m seeing a hematologist, a new rheumatologist and my normal dr.  My regular Dr initially thought it was petechiae.  Sent me to the hematologist who said it wasn’t petechiae but bruising.  I haven’t bumped myself in any of these areas prior to these things showing up.  I just don’t get it.  I feel like I’m bleeding to death or something.  It’s so scary.  I can’t get into the rheumatologist until next Monday so I’m left here worried for days still.  My iron has plummeted again but my blood thinner is barely in the required range (between 2 – 3) so it’s not high at all.  If it was at least that might explain the weird bruising.

Have y’all seen anything like this before?  What did it turn out to be?

Anyway…there’s a lot to catch up on but I’ll end here for now.  I’m going to try to get back to blogging if for nothing else than to get stuff out of my head.  Haven’t been doing much cooking…but I’m also wanting to try to get back into that for the same reason.  The kitchen has always been my creative escape.  I think I need that right now.

See ya soon.  🙂

Birthday Wish and Recent Eats

First…Happy Birthday, Mama B.  🙂  I say this all the time but it never hurts to say it again…in the grand parental lottery we got the Mega times a kazillion.  🙂  Love you muchos, Mama B.

Some recent eats…

2015-02-28 17.09.56 2015-03-02 13.42.04 2015-03-03 13.45.23 2015-03-03 13.48.51 2015-03-03 16.05.35

Mini pizza.  Icebox dough used for pizza and free shaped loaf / garlic bread.  Served with…

2015-03-03 14.22.59 2015-03-03 15.04.59 2015-03-03 15.09.01 2015-03-03 15.45.03 2015-03-03 15.54.04

Pasta bake.  I made a basic white sauce.  Added tomato sauce and parm.  Boiled / drained some pasta.  Stirred in sauce and mozz.  Baked til bubbly.  It was super delish and so easy to make.  If you don’t mind store bought stuff you could just use a jar of white sauce  instead of making it from scratch.

2015-03-08 19.49.40

Jalapeno cornbread.

2015-03-09 13.59.47

Cold rainy day Frito Pie.  🙂

2015-02-28 19.54.38 2015-03-10 21.39.03

Mama B wanted a batch of Neiman’s Chocolate Chip Cookies for her birthday.  She still eats very little sugar but does have the occasional treat.  🙂

As you can see I’m cooking more now.  I’ll write more about this soon but for now let’s just say…I’m so much happier.  🙂

Radom what else?

Sewing is still on the backburner.  I do plan to get back to it but not sure when.

I’m in the middle of planning a big fun trip.  Is it crazy I keep picking places that are also song titles?  🙂

Screenshot (90)

Three weeks til the #droughtlander is over, y’all.  🙂  I’m such an Outlander fangirl.  So ashamed.  No not really.  😉

Racist white scum in Oklahoma?  Oh surely you jest, CNN. >;)

This is the very best thing about social media and everyone in the world armed with a cell phone.  Horrible people like this getting exposed.

That’s all for today.  Hope y’all are having a great week.  See you soon.    🙂

 

 

Hodgepodge Catch-up

 

Hey, y’all.  🙂

First before I start with the hodgepodge…for any family members reading this…Mama B’s Dr visit last week was great.  She doesn’t have a tumor or anything else scary.  🙂

And me?  Well…I’m still alive.

Feeling better but still not 100%.

This week I did start cooking a little bit for the first time all month.

2015-02-23 13.45.20

That looks awful but it turned out quite delicious. 🙂  A pot of pressure cooked short ribs.

2015-02-25 19.30.33

Crushed pretzels / brownie batter / salted caramel.

2015-02-25 19.33.06

Layered.

2015-02-25 19.34.05

Swirled.

2015-02-25 19.54.03

Baked 350*.

2015-02-25 20.12.38

One tiny molten section in the middle.  My fav.  🙂

This is a great idea for some salty / sweet / crunchy in one pan but for some reason about 25% of my pretzels were soggy while the rest of them were perfectly crisp.  Have no idea why or how to fix it.  It was all eaten though.  🙂

2015-02-26 15.01.57

Knowing me y’all probably think the brownies were my favorite food from this week but you’d be wrong. 🙂  This was my fav.  Again the pic looks off (and I seriously need to get back into the habit of taking pics because I forgot to get ‘after’ pics)  but I made up a batch of icebox dough and used part of it to make a hamburger / cheese stuffed roll.  It was the best.  🙂  And now I’ll use the rest of the dough for pizza.

2015-02-27 11.31.09

Went out for Lent fish Friday.  I had the grilled fish tacos.  That’s a corn tortilla.  Plus guac / salsa / sour cream.

Did  y’all see this on Kelly & Michael this week?  You put in your birth date and it tells you the number one song the week you were born and the week you were conceived.

Mine were Rod Stewart’s Maggie May (the week I was born…which I already knew) and Dawn’s Knock Three Times.

Sister B, I did yours and yours where Top of the World (the Carpenters) and Roberta Flack’s Killing Me Softly.

I think we can all agree I got the better songs.  😉

I did my whole family and Papa B’s birth song was Smoke Smoke Smoke that Cigarette.  And for real I can imagine ’em all lighting up right there in hospital.  Ick.

Oh and let’s see what else…

The most shocking thing this week?

2015-02-27 13.20.43

The movie theater in my little town is showing 50 Shades.

What?

This is a town where far too many people here are your typical Sunday mornin’ Christians.  Ya know…church on Sunday mornin’…horrible people Mon – Sat.  Racist / sexist / judgmental / homophobic / basically all your ists and ics.  A good portion probably think the segregated 50’s was Shangri-La.

They didn’t even show The Help in this town.

Yeah, seriously.  Too much like looking in a mirror.

But 50 Shades?  Well let’s all head on out for a girls night.  And then hop on a church pew in the morning and pass judgment on everybody else.

Me and Mama B wanna go covertly take pics of all the hypocrites.  😉

Too much?   😉

Don’t worry ists and ics.  I’m not gonna turn this space into a small town The Dirty.    But oh how some of you temp me.

Anyway that’s all for today.

Have a good weekend.  See y’all soon.  🙂

I’ll leave y’all with my birth week song.  Which I actually love love loved long before I ever knew it was my birth week song.  Check yours out and see if you felt the same way about yours. 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

Just Checking In

1976866cc10cdc43a82c352b502e66d2

This has been my week.  Lots of binge watching.

Shortly after I clicked ‘post’ on last week’s post I got deathly ill.  I caught whatever stomach bug was (is?) going around my town.  Note to those who might be reading this in my town…do whatever you have to do to keep from getting it.  I won’t go into details but it was awful.

I ended up going to the Dr because I was feeling so bad and couldn’t eat anything.  I ended up with some other complications which again I won’t go into but it is equally as awful.  Spread out over 7 days I ate exactly 3 cups of rice…2 cups of mashed potatoes and countless cups of broth.  Today I was finally able to try to keep some more solid food down.

So needless to say the paleo experiment has been completely off this week.  Will try to get back to it as soon as the stomach is ready.  After a week of pretty much nothing but starch I can tell a huge difference in my joint pain.

All was not lost though.  Me and Roku got real close.  🙂

Hope y’all have had a better week.  🙂

Hey, Y’all

Sorry I didn’t get a post up last week.

Last week was just plain hellacious.   Mama B had a cat scan order for 2 months and getting that scheduled was a mess.  Finally we were able to get it done last Thursday.   She’s got another appointment next week so here’s hoping it goes better.

2015-02-05 13.51.11

I was so frustrated with all the nonsense…at one point I had to go sit out in the lobby…watch the fish and just breathe.

Let’s see…what else did I do last week?

Well …

I made some spicy wings.

2015-02-01 15.17.58 2015-02-01 16.14.34

Made some crispy green beans…

2015-02-01 15.24.23 2015-02-01 15.53.37

These were so easy and so good.  I just seasoned some fresh green beans with salt / pepper and a tsp of spicy Macadamia oil.  Then baked at 400* til they got crispy and a little charred.

I got a delivery…

2015-01-19 14.08.30

Y’all know that I gave up soy a long time ago.  Until last month pretty much the only soy I ate was in the form of mayo and I’d even cut my consumption of that by about 70%.  When I started Whole 30 eating I found Tessemea’s on the Whole 30 site.  Most of their products are paleo / Whole 30 approved.  There is zero soy in the mayo.  AND it’s actually really good.  All of their stuff is ‘clean’.  The only downside I find with any of it is that you’re supposed to icebox the dressings / marinades and since they’re made with olive oil (the good tasting kind not extra virgin) they harden in the cold.  You have to wait for them to soften or sit them in some warm water to speed it up.  They say it doesn’t damage the product at all but still it’s annoying.

2015-02-08 15.18.47

2015-02-08 15.20.08

Right now these are my two favs.  I take about a 1/4 cup of the mayo and about 2 tbsp of the zesty southwest ranch and mix it together really well.  Then put back in the icebox to let the flavors meld.

2015-02-08 15.21.35

Then I use it like a dipping sauce for beef and chicken…kind of like the dipping sauce at a steak house.  Or even as a creamy dressing on a salad.

Oh and one last update…

I’m still attempting the sewing thang.  It’s…interesting.  🙂

You know how we have all kinds of vanity sizing in store clothes?   Well patterns don’t do that.  So if you’re a size 10 in regular clothes you’re like an 18 or 20 in patterns.  I didn’t know that so I have a bunch of wrong size patterns and wrong amounts of material.   But it’s all just practice right now so it’s not that big a deal.

2015-02-07 13.38.55

Right now I’m working on the shorter dress on the left.  I’m stuck now though because I don’t have an iron.  I know.  I’m gonna go get one tomorrow.

It really is a little comical.  First I didn’t have the right color thread.  Then I didn’t have a zipper.  Directions, y’all.  They’re there for a reason.  😉   As I was cutting out the pattern I did stop and wonder how may patterns my Mema cut out / sewed on that same table.  Hopefully she’ll send me some mojo.  🙂

Besides the sizing issue with patterns…the other thing I’ve found frustrating is this pattern is clearly marked “see and sew” and “Yes it’s easy”.  Uhmmm no.  No.  It’s not any of that.  Mama B is an experienced seamstress.   She even thought the directions were way too confusing for a novice.  But anyway…I’m still giving it a go.  Maybe someday soon I’ll have something to show for it.   🙂

Hope y’all are safe / warm and well.  🙂