- Good food, good company, good advice from Grandma

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We had a bag of lucious shrimp in the freezer. I bought it because I wanted to have some black bean and shrimp nachos, but FabGrandpa thought otherwise. He asked if I could make a stir fry with some vegetables instead. A little quick thinking resulted in this:

I decided to fry some of them, too. Fried shrimp is one of those things I used to love to order when we went out to eat, and now is off limits. The whole world uses wheat flour to bread all things fried in restaurants. So, last night I made myself a little treat.

To make the stir fry, I used what I had on hand: a red bell pepper, an onion, some garlic, 1 cup of frozen green beans, and two carrots. I steamed the carrots and green beans in the microwave for a few minutes first, then just sauteed everything in some olive oil until it was done. The only seasoning I used was salt and pepper. Served over rice, it was quite delicious!

For the fried shrimp, I dredged them in corn flour (NOT the same as corn MEAL) and deep fried in some olive oil. A little salt, and yummmmm!

p.s. corn flour is smoother than corn meal. I never knew corn flour existed before I started eating gluten free. I don’t like it in breads, but it is a good alternative for breading things.

Moving Is Such Hard Work!

Karen · 12 Comments

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When my children were growing up, we moved 17 times in 5 years. I was a divorced mother of three trying to make ends meet. A lot of the time, that meant moving to a cheaper place, or moving in with friends for a while. We learned to pack up quickly and how to load the car (No, I didn’t have a truck) so that we could make the least number of trips possible to get the job done. Sometimes I did all myself, and sometimes I had help. It was always easier with help.

Moving my blog from Blogspot to a hosted website has been a HUGE job. And don’t think I have done it all myself. I don’t know enough to do it all by myself. To start off, Gayla from MomGadget has given me great encouragement. We “met” through the internet a couple of years ago. She was one of six women who were blogging on a group site called “Seven Babes A Blogging”, which is now defunct. They had one guest blogger each month, hence the Seven in the name. I was the guest blogger over there for the month of December, 2007. Just the fact that they let me blog with them was a huge encouragement to me, as I felt like I was playing with the big girls by doing that.

Then in November of 2009, I ran into her again, (online, of course) when she was looking for writers at MomGadget. I signed up and, and that sort of opened the door for me to ask her some questions, and before you know it, we were getting FabGrandma.com built. Gayla gave me advice on how to go about purchasing a domain name and how to get it hosted (I had no idea where to start). She installed my blog and Studio Press Lifestyle Theme you see here (the theme is the how the blog looks to you, purty, huh?). And she did it all in about two days. I was soooo impressed with her service. Thank you so much, Gayla.

After Gayla got through with the initial software installation and configuration for me, FabGrandma.com was all ready for me to move in. So, I got here, and I couldn’t believe how much room I have over here! At the old site, I only had one “room”, much like living in my travel trailer. There was only so much I could do over there. Not that I need a mansion, you know, I just wanted more room to move around, more places to store my ideas. And boy do I have that here! Just look at all those pages and linky things! But, it still had some “decorating” and remodeling to do. And I had no clue what to do or where to start!

It’s not that I didn’t know what I wanted. Oh, no! I have been thinking about and planning my new website for a couple of years. I knew EXACTLY what I wanted it to look like and what I wanted it to do. I just didn’t know how to do it. So, the next step was to just start. I worked on it for almost a week, many hours a day (good thing I am unemployed right now.) And I got it looking more and more like I wanted it to. All that work involved teaching myself some basic html, from HTML Basic. It’s like trying to learn German a phrase at a time.

At the end of the week, I was at a place where I had gone as far as I could go, but it still didn’t look like I wanted it to look. As I was sitting here wondering what the heck I was going to do about it, I remember a young man I had “met” online a couple of years ago. Brandon lives with his lovely wife in North Carolina. He has been reading my blog for a while, and has corresponded with me on several occasions because he is interested in the fulltime RV’er lifestyle. I emailed him and offered to pay him to do some work for me on here, with a list of what I needed done, and asked him how much he would charge me to do the work. I knew from reading his blog that he was looking for a way to earn some extra money, and I wanted to help.

Imagine my surprise when he emailed me back, and said that someone had done him a kind deed recently, and he would do this thing for me as a “pay it forward” kind of thing. What a nice guy! And thank you, Brandon, because the work you did was exactly what I needed done. You should go into the web design business.

So, here it is, brand spanking new! I think the majority of the work is done. I am just giddy with excitement. Take the grand tour and let me know what you think!

Hurray! I Got Some Sewing Done Today

Karen · 15 Comments

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I have so many projects to get done that sometimes I don’t know where to begin. I made a rule for myself a couple of years ago that I have to finish one thing before I can start another, because I had gotten into the habit of not finishing things. I would make the quilt top, but not follow through with putting the layers together and quilting the project. Since I made that rule for myself, I have finished lots of things.

I DO still buy fabric, and cut things out before I finish the project at hand, but this just gives me something to pick up and sew. Today, I finished sewing the star pieces together for the Star of Bethlehem quilt I am making for Seth and Sarah.

If that looks familiar, it may be because I am making one very similar to it for Becca and Ken. There is only one fabric that is different in the two quilts. These are king size, and I am sending them out to a long arm quilter to be quilted. My sewing machine won’t handle that big of a job. Here is a photo of Becca’s quilt ready to go:

Yes, I was working on it in the maintenance shop. I had to clean of the work bench and tape some plastic on it to have a space big enough to work on. Sometimes I go to a quilt shop and use the tables in their back room. I have never been turned down for doing that, as long as they don’t have lessons going on at the time.

I had bought some yellow and purple fabric for the new baby’s quilt when a month or so ago:

But then this cute cute girlie girl fabric came in the mail last week:

So now our new little missy will be getting this purty fabric called “OH, Cherry, Oh” for her first quilt from her FabGrandma. I haven’t decided on a pattern yet, but I think I am going to let the fabric tell me what to do. I got what is called a “turnover”, which is a pack of 40 pre-cut triangles, and three 1 yard pieces. I love those pre-cuts–they make it so easy to get started doing something.

Fog On Payne Lake

Karen · 10 Comments

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I was awake most of the night last night, listening to the thunder roll through the forest. The rain poured down and the lightening flickered on and off. I have to admit I am a scaredy cat when it comes to weather. Being in Alabama doesn’t help that fear much. And then I heard a tree fall out there in the woods! Yikes!

But, after the storm left the area, today was quite beautiful for mid January. And then, at sunset, I looked out the window:

I love fog, when I don’t have to drive in it. It has such a surreal look to it. I remember the first time can remember seeing fog, I was just a little girl, maybe four years old. I was afraid of it, as it seemed to slink into our back yard from the river.

I walked down to the edge of the lake. These photos aren’t really blurry, it’s just the fog.

You can almost hear the Headless Horseman riding through the woods!

Oral Cancer Revisited

Karen · 1 Comment

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You know, when we have our children, we as parents always have dreams for them, that they would accomplish great things, that they would be successful, and that they would follow in our footsteps. Today, I would give anything if my youngest daughter, Emily, was not following in mine. You see, her husband, my Fab Son-in-law, was diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma of the larynx last week.

Right now, they are trying to be very optimistic, hoping for the best, while preparing for the worst. The only thing is, we don’t know exactly what the worst can be. I do know that FabGrandpa and I will be able to guide them to some extent, to show them the road, to help them along the way. As I told her, “unfortunately” they have someone who has gone before them, to give them advice and to listen to their fears. While FabGrandpa and I had each other, and an online support group, Emily and her husband will have us, and I hope we will be able to help them in whatever way we can.

Fab S-I-L is a surgery scheduler at a hospital in Atlanta. Right before Christmas, he lost his voice, so he went to the doctor to have it checked out. That doctor said he had a polyp in his throat, and scheduled surgery to remove it. When he got in there, he discovered that the mass was not what he thought it was, and just did a biopsy instead. He was referred to a specialist at Emory University Hospital, who did a thorough exam, including a CAT scan. He is going to do another biopsy next week. We are hoping for good news.

So, I am here to nudge you all, again, to get an exam for oral cancer at the very next opportunity–it is painless, doesn’t take much time, and can save your life. Please, just do it!

My Vacation Kicked My Hiney

Karen · Leave a Comment

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FabGrandpa and I went on a little trip to Atlanta last week. Our daughter, Becky, gave us tickets to a concert, and two nights in a swanky hotel downtown. We had lots of fun, but I’m tellin ya, that trip kicked my butt!

We stayed in our hometown of Douglasville for one night before heading to the Big A. While we were in town, we we stayed at Hotel Palomar. It was fun to be pampered for a couple of days.

I got to go to my favorite place in Atlanta, the Dekalb Farmer’s Market, and to Whole Foods, where I found the most divine chocolate bar ever, Mo’s Bacon Bar.

Yes, you are seeing correctly–it IS chocolate covered bacon–food for the gods!

The concert was fun, the whole reason for the trip, Dweezil Zappa Plays Zappa. Frank Zappa’s son playing his father’s music. It was a great concert.

But now that I am home, I am having trouble gettting back into the swing of things. I don’t know if it is the blood pressure meds the doctor put me on, or the hectic pace of the trip, but I slept for 14 hours the last night of the trip, and have done nothing but veg out since we got home.

I am hoping this lethargy will leave me alone soon, because I have so much to do!

Survivor!

Karen · 8 Comments

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On January 10, 2001, my sweet husband, FabGrandpa, was diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue. It was the worst day of our lives. We were stunned! We cried, we spent hours just looking at each other, holding on to each other, crying, trying to talk about the unspeakable. That is a day neither one of will ever forget. It was just the beginning. Today, I am so proud to say, “My husband is a 9 year survivor of cancer!” Let us all rejoice!

Oral cancer is something I had never heard of until that day. But look at this:

“More than 34,000 Americans will be diagnosed with oral or pharyngeal cancer this year. It will cause over 8,000 deaths, killing roughly 1 person per hour, 24 hours per day. Of those 34,000 newly diagnosed individuals, only half will be alive in 5 years. This is a number which has not significantly improved in decades. The death rate for oral cancer is higher than that of cancers which we hear about routinely such as cervical cancer, Hodgkin’s lymphoma, laryngeal cancer, cancer of the testes, endocrine system cancers such as thyroid, or skin cancer (malignant melanoma). If you expand the definition of oral cancers to include cancer of the larynx, for which the risk factors are the same, the numbers of diagnosed cases grow to 41,000 individuals, and 12,500 deaths per year in the US alone. Worldwide the problem is much greater, with over 400,000 new cases being found each year.

The death rate associated with this cancer is particularly high not because it is hard to discover or diagnose, but due to the cancer being routinely discovered late in its development. Often it is only discovered when the cancer has metastasized to another location, most likely the lymph nodes of the neck. Prognosis at this stage of discovery is significantly worse than when it is caught in a localized intra oral area. Besides the metastasis, at these later stages, the primary tumor has had time to invade deep into local structures. Oral cancer is particularly dangerous because in its early stages it may not be noticed by the patient, as it can frequently prosper without producing pain or symptoms they might readily recognize, and because it has a high risk of producing second, primary tumors. This means that patients who survive a first encounter with the disease, have up to a 20 times higher risk of developing a second cancer. This heightened risk factor can last for 5 to 10 years after the first occurrence. There are several types of oral cancers, but around 90% are squamous cell carcinomas.” (from the website of the Oral Cancer Foundation)

FabGrandpa’s cancer was found early, because it was on his tongue and visible. He had gone to the dentist for a checkup. His dentist told him he needed to go to an oral surgeon without delay. The next day, he was in the oral surgeon’s office having a biopsy done. A week later we got the devasting news. He was lucky that they found it so early, one factor that I am sure has contributed to his 9 year survival.

The exam for oral cancer is simple and painless. It can be done by a dentist, oral surgeon, ear-nose-throat doctor, or a general practitioner. All you have to do is ask your doctor to do it next time you go.

“Besides a visual examination of all the tissues in your mouth, your doctor will feel the floor of your mouth and portions of the back of your throat with his fingers, in the search for abnormalities. A thorough oral screening also includes indirect examination of the nasopharynx and larynx, and involves manually feeling the neck for swollen lymph nodes, and other abnormalities such as hardened masses. Your doctor will also check the mouth for white patches, red patches, ulcerations, lumps, loose teeth, and review your dental x-rays for abnormalities. Be sure to tell the doctor if you have been a tobacco user in any form. Tobacco use is implicated in more than 75% of all oral cancers. After the physical examination of your mouth, if your doctor finds any areas that are suspicious, he may recommend a biopsy. This is simply taking a small portion of the suspicious tissue for examination under a microscope.

You should always contact your doctor or dentist immediately if you notice the following symptoms in yourself or a loved one:

A sore or lesion in the mouth that does not heal within two weeks.
A lump or thickening in the cheek.
A white or red patch on the gums, tongue, tonsil, or lining of the mouth.
A sore throat or a feeling that something is caught in the throat.
Difficulty chewing or swallowing.
Difficulty moving the jaw or tongue.
Numbness of the tongue or other area of the mouth.
Swelling of the jaw that causes dentures to fit poorly or become uncomfortable.”

Want to help us celebrate FabGrandpa’s 9 years of survival? Make a $9 donation to the Oral Cancer Foundation today! But even if you don’t make a donation, make yourself a reminder to get an oral cancer screening the next time you see your doctor or dentist. It could save your life.

It’s A Girl!

Karen · 7 Comments

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Remember back in the dark ages when we old grandma’s were having our babies,and we had to actually wait until we woke up after the delivery to find out if we had a boy or a girl? Sigh…

We found out yesterday that our newest FabGrandchild is going to be a girl. We are all so excited and can hardly wait until May for her to get here. The proud parents, my son and his wife, are still debating names for her. I’m just calling her Baby Girl until she’s named.

I was so happy to know there is going to be another FabGranddaughter, that I drove 35 miles to Tuscaloosa yesterday to go shopping. OK, we also had to go get FabGrandpa some new pants, but seriously, I couldn’t wait another minute to look at girlie girl baby clothes.

Isn’t that just the most adorable outfit?

And ooooooooo

ahhhhhhhhh! cutie cute cute! You know Fabgrandma is going to be sewing for this girlie soon!