Sweeping ... I Just LOVE Sweeping

 Freezing cold 32 degree nights have been followed up with mid 60 days.  If you stand (or sit) in the sun long enough, it does warm you up a tad.  Needless to say, I'm not spending any time outside.  Cafe-au-Jo is now consumed on the couch cuddled up with a blanket and Cooper.  

Since it is WAY too early to be up and about, we play scrabble games on our phone with friends far away, after writing the blog that is.  It's amazing how fast the time flies by before I finally relent and put on something to look presentable ... you know, in case Amazon shows up.  Yup they even deliver on Sundays around here.

Remember those pumpkin pies I was going to bake?  It turned in to no-bake pumpkin cheesecake.  A super easy recipe of sadly only one cup of pumpkin out of that 3-1/2 cup can, a little brown sugar, some spices and whipped cream.  What could be better?  

Well ... being able to lick the bowl and the beaters, that's what!!  Oh my goodness this is soft, pillowy and DELICIOUS!!  Into the fridge it went to set up.  Oh ... and there are 20 glorious toffee crunch Oreo cookies for the crust.  Guess I'll have to make TWO to use up the pumpkin.

Ummmm well pictures are worth a thousand words.  It was great until I took it out of the fridge to unmold and eat a slice.  In spite of following the directions to a T, the crust obviously didn't set up very well.  If you think THIS looks bad, you should see the floor!!!!  

My idea of setting it on a large plate to cut up, didn't work out so well.  I finally got it cut into pieces and stored in containers both in the fridge and the freezer, without much crust attached.  It took me 30 minutes to get the floor clean, sweeping and sweeping.  So much for the Oreo crust idea.

HOWEVER ... that pie is amazingly good and not too sweet like most of them!  And I didn't even have to smother it in whipped cream ... because I forgot.  NEXT time for sure!!!

I spent most of the day sewing that bear paw quilt ... all those tiny pieces.  It's pretty tedious, so I wandered outside to see what the painters had done.  Here's a piece of the molding that was replaced.  Nice that they found the exact same stuff.  This happened on three windows.

Since I was already practiced at sweeping, I swept up the entire garage area that was covered with dead paint chips and dirt.  Next time I'll use my old vacuum cleaner.

Talk about doing the job right ... they found some cracks in the facing, but the lumber was still good.  They filled those spots with epoxy, doing the same around the vents to keep water from rotting the wood.  The last painters did nothing like this ... they just climbed up the ladder and painted without even cleaning anything off.

They were even able to clean up the cupola, which I was sure was on it's last leg, and primed it for painting.  Happily, there are no big dry rot sections anywhere.  The job these guys are doing will pretty much insure it won't happen in the future.  YAY!!

I literally spent the rest of the day sewing on that quilt.  But TODAY ... I'm cooking that big turkey from Bingo.  My Thanksgiving is starting a little early, mostly because I'm out of food for the kid.  That 15 pound turkey will make a lot of freezer food for both of us.  PLUS ... I'll get some of my favorite mashed potatoes and gravy!!!

Here's a morning laugh for you .... I laughed out loud!!  If you don't have young grandchildren, you may not be familiar with Elf On The Shelf.  Poor kitty .... the elf flies down from the North Pole and sits on your shelf, to keep an eye on the kids and report back to Santa.  NO touching is allowed.  Every night they fly BACK to Santa to make their report.  Upon their return, they land in a different spot, which the little ones have to find every morning.  

One of my friends had a traumatic morning when she found the dog used Elf as a chew toy.  She ran all over town trying to find another to replace it.  Her son was devastated that the Elf didn't show up for breakfast.  At least this wouldn't be QUITE as bad ... you could always say he landed in the reindeer barn.

And just like that, another day has passed by at the speed of light.  Oh ... and just for good measure, I have a sore throat this morning.  Hopefully it's nothing.  Hopefully!!!