Help: My Straw Floats and Bobs in my Soda Can

Guest Writer: Ruth Morse

Late, late, late!! I'm late getting this to Valerie.

Truth be told, she had to remind me that it was the 30th of the month. It can't be, can it?

My excuse is that our church had VBS this week. Lest any of you jump to the conclusion that I was in a sea of kids for 3 hours every morning this week, barely making it home to stumble to bed for a nap, only to wake up to get supper and then get ready for "real" bedtime.......

Stonehenge and Salisbury: London Day Trip

Travel Tips and Info. at the bottom.

In our recent "Flashpack Across Europe" trip, we wanted to take a day trip out of London to visit Stonehenge and Salisbury.  I knew Stonehenge would be pretty much what you see in a book -- and it was -- but still.  It's Stonehenge.  You kind of have to go see it.  What I didn't expect was the color of the English countryside in May.

Fields and fields of these yellow flowers!  And guess what?  These beautiful things are members of the cabbage family.  These beauties are part of an ugly family and even have an ugly name -- rapeseed.   It's primarily used for cooking oils (canola) and its secondary use is industrial.  I saw them in France also a few days later.

Another thing I didn't expect was....

Wordsmith + Drama = Writer

I just spent a couple days at the shore with my seven year old granddaughter and her baby, Olivia, who is astonishingly quiet.

So my granddaughter was out deep riding the waves with her aunts and uncles while I sat next to her mother in the surf.  Soon my granddaughter approached us, coughing and sputtering.  She sat beside us and put her head in her hands with great show.

"What's wrong?" asked her mother.

"I sunk."

"You SUNK?  What do you mean??"

"I sunk to the bottom of the sea."

I think my granddaughter is going to make a fine writer.  A very fine writer.

Beth Moore's Siesta Summer Bible Study 2012

I woke up very excited today.  Today's the launch of Beth Moore's Siesta Summer Bible Study!  She's leading us in the study of Nehemiah with a guide book written by Kelly Minter.  Watch the video, then go to Beth's Blog and sign in for the study if you'd like to join us.  You can gather together your own small group to follow along with or do the study solo, either way!

Peach Cobbler

It is now peach season in my area of the country. For today's Tasty Tuesday, I want to take you back to my favorite peach cobbler recipe, a Paula Deen recipe.  This cobbler is crazy good and is one of the most popular posts on my blog.

Click here for the Paula Deen Peach Cobbler recipe.  I wrote it back before Tasty Tuesday came around and before I could simply print a recipe without telling you the whole story, so the post is rather long.  Scroll to the bottom if you just want the recipe.

Enjoy!

Perfect Evening in London

Taking the tube to the Waterloo stop, my daughter and I began enjoying our first night in London. Buses to the London Eye include the 211, 77 and 381 and you can also get there via water taxi to the Millennium Pier stop.  It was appropriately drizzly out, not too bad.  We walked around the London Eye area snapping pictures of the Thames and Big Ben.  St. Paul's and Tate Modern are also in this area, but we didn't visit either.

We had reserved fast track skip-the-line tickets for the London Eye and got on quickly.  It was pretty awesome......

London, England Travel Information

We took a night flight to England in the middle of May.  Navigated through customs and baggage reclaim in a semi-sleepy state.  We purchased an oyster card for our public transportation in London and then used it to get on the tube, lugging our large suitcases behind.  Again, I promised to bring a backpack on my next European trip and travel light.  But I won't.

(Travel Advice:  use a backpack suitcase, get the oyster card if you're using public transportation, take a raincoat and umbrella, convert your currency before you go - at TravelEx you can get prepaid international debit cards with the chip in them - a lot of Europe won't accept credit/debit cards without the chip.  You can convert money at any AAA office as well as get an international driver's permit there as well - required if you drive in Europe)

We took the Picadilly line to......

Coupon App: Retail Me Not Free App

Save when you want, where you want!

Get thousands of online and in-store coupons directly from your phone with the FREE RetailMeNot iPhone app. 

The RetailMeNot Coupons app helps you find....

A Rocket on the Fourth of July

He always found it hard to take her

She wouldn't listen to advice

And though he never tried to make her

She often thought it would be nice

Oh, and now she's headin' out to California

It's been a long time comin' but she's feeling like a woman tonight

And she left a little letter said she's gonna make a stop in Nevada

Goodbye, goodbye.

She tried for years to be a good wife

It never quite got off the ground.....

The Cheap Senior Citizen: Dryer Lint

Guest Writer:  Ruth Morse, "The Cheap Sr. Citizen"

I just read an article called "The Beginner's Guide to Being Cheap" in an old Reader's Digest.

First, let me point out that I did not buy this magazine! I picked it up free at a book and magazine exchange in our community. I'm not sure the publishers wanted me to carry being cheap to that exent, but cheap is cheap.

Back to what the article said. It had several interesting ways to save money, but the one that jumped out at me was this:

 "Unplug your dryer. That lint you see is from your clothes slowly being disintegrated by all the tumbling. Stick with our gentle friend the clothesline. If you do use a dryer, zip up metal zippers before they mug other garments."

 WOW! Really?

I have always wondered where the lint came from.......

Slow Cooker Recipes for Summer

I met some frugal chicks from the Inexpensively Blog at the Blissdom Blogger's Conference in Nashville.  I thought I should pass along a recent blog post 30 Slow Cooker Recipes for Summer.  (Did you know you can make desserts in a slow cooker?!) 

Go check out some recipes to make your Summer a breeze.  I think you'll fall in love with the saving money site, too.  Now that's what I call a Tasty Tuesday.

My Sister: CSI Secret Weapon

We got a call from my sister this past Friday, she had been detained by the cops for a couple hours after her leisurely lunch.   She had been sitting on a terrace eating lunch when a bad guy ran past her, jumped the fence and ran into the woods.

My Sister wasn't fully aware he was a real, live bad guy until the cops came running up soon after.  Being the only person on the terrace, she was the chief eye witness.  She described the guy to the cops quite accurately with the description:  "white guy, curly hair."

She's good, isn't she?

In the big city news report......

Couch Surfing and So Much More

Hi!  It's Valerie here, coming to you live,

well almost live,

(live a couple weeks ago)

at my very own Patisserie

(I have no idea what a Patisserie is)

from London...

I'm a natural born traveler.

So of course in my 25 years of parenting, it was of great importance to me to teach my children how to travel.  Safe-like and all that.  To love your hometown whole-heartedly but know, really know what's out there in the rest of the world.  Because there's no place like home.  You need a home to come back to, don't go burning any bridges or anything, but if you don't get away from home, you are stagnant.

So it's been of great importance to teach my young how to fly......

Bicycle Protest in Rome

We stumbled upon this bicycle protest in Rome on our very first evening in the city.   We had no idea what was going on as more and more bikes arrived, creating a traffic jam and more than a little road rage.  It turns out that this was part of the Critical Mass Bike Protest that is gathering popularity in large cities across Europe.

Ironically, the cyclists are asking for more safety on the roads in a very unsafe manner.  They are asking for an end to bicycle discrimination in what has been described as "a civil war on the roads." Bici is the Italian word for bike, thus the play on words with the Julias Caesar quote (Veni, Vidi, Bici) for a protest held within two miles of where Caeser himself was burned involuntarily cremated.

I agree with the cyclists that this particular stretch of mass highway -- Via dei Fori Imperiali -- that goes right through Ancient Rome -- was rather brutishly placed here by Musolini and is rather offensive obnoxious unnecessary.

Marj and I ran across this patch of concrete a few times, nearly getting killed right there in Ancient Rome smack next to where gladiators fought with similar intensity and less fortunate outcomes.


Other posts on Italy:
First night in Rome, Bicycle Protest at the Colliseum
Pisa
Florence and the Drive from Venice
Pizza Joint in Rome
Milan
Ancient Rome
Tuscany
Art in Rome, a Dali Exhibit

AMF Free Bowling for Kids Summer 2012

AMF is offering some free bowling for the young ones again this Summer!  Click here or on the image to go to their site and register for coupons.  Once there, you can also enter your zip code to find the AMF bowling center nearest you.

Chateau d'Amboise, Loire Valley, France

Walking along the Naples terrace, castle wall and river to my right.  This is the Louis XII wing of the castle and the medieval Minimes Tower to the right.

I'm a country girl by heart so after a week of city-life in London and Paris, I took a train south and spent two days along the River Loire in the quaint town of Amboise.

We dropped our bags at the hotel and walked the narrow alleys over to the chateau/castle.  This was my daughter's first time to visit a castle and first time to roam ancient alleys so I was enjoying her excitement.

The castle dates to Medieval times but has been entirely restored, part in the Gothic style and part in the later French Renaissance style, both around the 14th - 18th centuries. 

The castle stands along the main street - the hub of activity - in Amboise, lined with cafes, bakeries and the fabulous Bigot Chocolatier.  The cross street has sandwich and pizza joints as well.....

Winner, Big Bottom Blessing

I used the online random number generator to choose a winner for the book My Big Bottom Blessing and it chose........ drumroll please.....

Fern!   (Rene')

Congrats, I'll get that in the mail asap. 

Thankful for a Big Rear, Teasi Cannon

(Editor's note:  Click here for my review of
Teasi's book My Big Bottom Blessing.)

Guest Writer: Teasi Cannon

One day not long ago I was sweeping my kitchen floor in the near trance-like state of La La Land, when I was jolted to my senses by the precious voice of my 4-year-old nephew saying, “Aunt Teasi, you have a vahwee (very) big butt.”

I set my broom aside, smoothed my shirt, and calmly turned to face him. Bright-eyed and curly-haired, he stood – completely oblivious to the fact that he had said the words no woman ever wants to hear. And then I let him have it. I bent down, coming only inches away from his little round face, and said, “Why…thank you!” Then I smiled big, stood to grab my broom, and returned unscathed to the task at hand.

A few years ago those innocently spoken words would have completely obliterated me, and rather than a thank you, might have actually incited an immature come-back such as: “Oh, yeah? Well, you’re short and you talk funny.”

But now, to the glory of God, moments like that are reminders to me that the miraculous has happened: I no longer hate my body (especially my back side); in fact, it has become one of the biggest blessings in my life.

Like most women.....

Gimmelwald, Switzerland Travel Info.

Gimmelwald is a little town snuggled in the Swiss Alps at the foot of the Eiger, Monch and Jungfrau.  It's a backpacker's paradise with hostels and hostel-like hotels where guests share a bathroom and eat meals family-style with fellow travelers.

The tourist season is June - September and in my opinion, May is the perfect time to go.  It's still quiet in May and you should see some snow.

Gimmelwald can be a tourist's day-trip excursion from Interlaken or it can be a three-day excursion for hikers and other adventure sport enthusiasts.  Available activities include.....

Happy Transit of Venus Day!

You could see something today that most people don't get to see in their entire lifetime.  Something Edmond Halley (of Halley's Comet fame) predicted and knew he himself would not live to see.

An alert reader notified me yesterday that today, June 5, is when Venus passes directly between me and the sun.  Standing in North America, I should be able to see Venus as a small dot gliding slowly across the face of the sun around 6 pm - sunset.......

Comaraderie

Camaraderie

ca-ma-ra-de-rie

: a spirit of friendly good-fellowship existing among comrades

My Big Bottom Blessing, Book Review and Give Away

Want to win a free copy of this book?  Details on the book give away can be found at the end of this blog post.

"Looking back on my earliest years, I don't remember there being even one season in which I was happy with my body." ~ Teasi Cannon

Can you relate?

I was surprised to find My Big Bottom Blessing by Teasi Cannon a spiritual workshop rather than simply a humorous look at body image.

Sure, Teasi's humorous, but each chapter is full of scripture and each chapter builds upon the previous to strip your soul bare for some serious self examination.  The Q&A at each chapter's end will help you recognize the issues in your life that are preventing you from living fully in the life Christ designed for you.

Teasi will guide you to replace the lie in your head with the truth of God's Word. 

In the first few pages......

Coupon Storage

Guest Writer:  Ruth Morse

I am not an extreme couponer. In fact, I would rather the stores just marked stuff down in the first place. I mean, think think of all the steps involved:

• Cut out the coupon before I throw the paper away
• Store it somewhere
• Remember where I put it
• Use it before it expires
• Remember to take it to the store
• Pick the right brand off the shelf and try not to gyp the store by buying a different brand …………………….don’t ask……………. the dollar bill I once mailed to Price Chopper is another whole story.........................
• Don’t drop the coupon anywhere in the store and then have to trudge back down all the aisles looking for it ………………..don’t ask…………….
• Turn the coupon in to the cashier
• AND make sure the cashier remembers to give me credit

That’s too much work......