Scattered Thoughts . . .

L ukey and Kenzie are staying with us for a few days again.  Tomorrow we plan to go on a cruise on Lake Champlain and tonight we're hoping to get a fire going in the backyard if the weather cooperates.  We're having Pork Street Tacos for dinner tonight...  one of our favorite dishes.   The pork loin is slow roasted on the grill with a dry rub.  After it reaches temperature, I add a glaze to the meat.  While that sets for a bit, I grill some pineapple brushed with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon.  After grilling, I chop that up.  I will saute some onions until the onions are slightly caramelized.  We also have a mix of spring greens to add to the street tacos.  Each taco is wrapped up in a warm tortilla with a delicious sauce that is both slightly spicy and citrusy with a sour cream base, the caramelized onions, the chopped grilled pineapple, the spring greens, and sliced slow cooked glazed pork.  My mouth is watering now! Afte...

W hen Sheila went to pick up Lukey and Kenzie at the rink last night, there was talk of Lukey needing a haircut.  He has been growing his hair long for a few years now and it definitely needed to be cleaned up a bit.  Honestly, I had intended to give him a quick trim to clean up his hair last night anyway before our trip this morning.  It turns out that both his mom and his dad were talking about a fade for Lukey so that is what I did last night. We cut off a lot of hair!  I had only planned to clean up his hair a bit with a quick trim but a fade would require a big change by cutting off a lot of hair.  Needless to say, this took a little bit of time and Lukey was beginning to get a little impatient so I didn't get as picky as I normally would.  Regardless, his hair looks pretty good now...  clean...  neat...  and, best of all, Lukey likes it.   Before we started on his hair, he chose a photo of a boy with a fade.  I definitely...

Wow...  it was impossible to get comfortable enough to sleep last night.  My spinal injuries were painfully and debilitatingly inflamed after all of yesterday's yardwork.  I'd say the pain was in the 8-10 range on the 10 point pain scale.  At times, the good times, the pain was only an 8.  Other times, like when I try to move, the pain was pegged at around 10 and would buckle me at the knees.   Sleeping was difficult, at best.  For a long while, I simply couldn't sleep.  I eventually found a position or two that allowed a few minutes of sleep before I would need to change positions to the other position.  This wasn't until the wee hours of the morning though.  I actually thought about just getting up out of bed around this time.  It was around 5am and, typically, I would have no problem with that.  This time, however, I was thinking that if I'm finding bed extremely painful, then the couch wouldn't be any better.  Act...

Sheila's hair was getting long, looking a bit shaggy and it was driving her crazy so she felt it was time for me to figure out a way to cut her hair.  Until now, I've only cut men's and boy's hair with clippers and I knew that wouldn't work for a woman so I had to educate myself a little bit.   I've done a lot of military style haircuts for men but I knew that a woman's head would require a completely different approach.  Even though Sheila likes her hair short, I knew I needed to do some research and planning.  Clippers would not work here.  It was time to figure out how to use scissors, thinning shears and a safety razor while using a comb and my hand as a guide.   We attacked Sheila's head yesterday afternoon.  It wasn't until I shot a few "before" photos that I realized that her hair had grown quite long and shaggy.  It was definitely time to do something with Sheila's hair.   Let's start with an "after" photo fr...

Yesterday, we had a little birthday party for Nan in the sweltering heat and humidity.   After Sheila and I spent the morning preparing for this little birthday gathering, I set up air conditioning throughout the house so we could take breaks from the heat inside the more comfortable house.  That worked out well especially when a few passing thundershowers passed through the area during dinner. We started the day with a much-needed haircut for Lukey.  Here is Lukey before the haircut...   Sheila managed to capture a few good photos of the haircut... And, here is Lukey after his haircut...   And, a before and after comparison in one image... While I cut Lukey's hair, Kenzie was keeping cool by playing with the cold water from the hose... Lukey had no desire to shower after his haircut but he was covered in long cut hair so he opted for getting sprayed with the hose... The water from the hose was a bit colder th...

Although it is quite unusual for this winter, we have some fine, light snow falling outside as this latest forecast 'storm' approaches. While I'm sitting in our warm home, I was looking for some photos on one of my hard drives and came across photos of Lukey and Kenzie from exactly a year ago that I had forgotten about and thought I should share a few here... We started this particular day with a haircut for Lukey... While the sun was rather high in the sky (a terrible time for photos), we went for a walk... They are all in-step! And, collecting pine cones that have fallen off our live Christmas tree in front of the house...

Lukey and Kenzie have been getting ready for their first day of school in the past few weeks. Gee ordered backpacks of their choice... Lukey's arrived but, unfortunately, Kenzie's backpack was on backorder. Kenzie reluctantly chose a different backpack this past Saturday and Gee picked up the phone to cancel the first backpack and order the new choice. Gee and Kenzie explained their dilemma and the LL Bean customer service rep decided to see if she could find what Kenzie wanted... she put Gee and Kenzie on hold... She came back on the phone after a few minutes and said that she found the backpack Kenzie originally wanted in a store in Ohio and she is having it shipped to our house immediately. Kenzie happily thanked her and was all smiles! The other day, Lukey asked me to cut his hair for school so, after Kenzie finished making cupcakes with Gee (more on that in another blog entry) , we put aside the trains and converted the kitchen to a little barbershop. We did a nice n...