Life is like champagne......

First Gingerbread House

2009-12-22T05:50:00.002-05:00

My daughter went to her friend's 3rd Birthday party last weekend and the theme was Gingerbread. Her mom did a great job, including having all of the kids decorate their own gingerbread house. I thought my daughter did pretty good on hers, and did not eat one piece of candy! Of course her aunties were picking at it this past weekend which she told them "It's decoration, not to eat!". I probably won't be able to get away with that next year.

Tales of the Town Treasurer

2009-12-18T07:54:00.002-05:00

I thought I might fill you in on my first month as the Town Treasurer.

It took a while but I finally received a computer to start tracking information, communication and search capabilities. I am still catching up in entering all of the account information which I am hoping to finish in the new year. Sure if I was there 5 days a week for the past month I could have gotten it all done but I am limited to Tuesday/Thursday. The pay rate also keeps me from spending too much time there!

What have I found so far? The Finance Manager that I work with is very organized, thorough, helpful and has a lot on her plate! I know she is happy I am there to help out and back her up, not to mention take on a few projects and push some key points that needed to be done. The one big project I have taken on is with the Land Use Office and driveway bonds. We have some dating back to the 1980's! What are driveway bonds you might ask? When you put in a driveway to your house, you have to install an apron(small paved portion) which connects the driveway to the town road. This apron has to be inspected by the the Land Use Office to ensure it is done properly and does not effect the town road. A bond deposit is given to ensure the apron is done and once inspected it is given back to the homeowner. For larger projects such as sub-divisions, the bond is much larger due to building roads and driveways. Well the office is a little backed up from not inspecting the aprons, a change of employees in the office and lack of time. The money is not the towns but the homeowners. I have reached out to the office to try and get the money back to the homeowners and clean up the account. The challenge is also finding the original payees since some have moved, may be a contractor or the business is no longer. This project takes time and within a month, we have already pushed out 20% of the bonds we have held. That to me is a big accomplishment! Some people were very surprised that they had money coming to them, an early Christmas present. Just by doing this project, I have felt I already felt I justified my position.

More Tales of the Town Treasurer coming after the holidays!

KY Derby Barbi....forget it!

2009-12-16T12:10:00.003-05:00

Strolling around in Walmart yesterday to pick up my Christmas cards I happened upon the so called "clearance" section. No roll backs anymore here, so I had to look. My daughter just got her first Barbi for her birthday, I'm o.k. with it since it was Birthday Barbi in a nice fun dress, although the high heels are a little much unless she is going out to do her work at night! Anyway, my daughter of course now likes Barbi and she comes everywhere. I was thinking maybe there was some accessory or clothes in the clearance section....nope. But what I did find was KY Derby Barbi, a special edition Barbi which had a hat and a flower dress, very nice. No price on her so I carried her around until we came to a scanner. In scanning her I was taken back at the "clearance" price of $47.56!!!! So now I had to go over to the Barbi section and see what the non-clearance prices were........$80!!!!! For a Barbi, that is completely ridiculous! Needless to say she can go back to KY and enjoy the Derby without my daughter.

Waiting for her friends

2009-12-14T16:16:00.002-05:00

She could not wait for her friends to come to her birthday party, waiting on the porch to greet the first to arrive! Hard to believe that it has come and gone, although she seems to be still trying to work the birthday train!

Greenworks for the Laundry

2009-12-11T06:03:00.004-05:00

I have found myself using less chemicals around the house since I have had my daughter three years ago not only for health reasons but also for the environment. I wanted to make sure the items she touched in our home were clean but also not toxic. For some of the cleaning products, I have chosen Green Works and was satisfied with the use, smell and results. Green Works has expanded their line to include the laundry room....a chore I am very particular with on what I use to clean clothes.

Laundry seems to be never ending every week. I generally do not like to have any smell to the laundry detergent and hang my clothes out on the line as much as I can instead of using the dryer saving electricity and I just love the smell of laundry on the line. This is pretty difficult in the winter time as the jeans can stand on their own! I was given the opportunity to try Green Works Laundry Detergent and Stain Remover as an alternative to my generic detergent. What I found was with less you get more! I used the recommended amount stated on the bottle and for the tough stains like spaghetti night on my daughter's shirt. Green Works did the job and here is the other important point.....I really like the smell! It is a very light floral/citrus scent, not harsh at all. Pleasant enough to the alternative of hanging it out on the line! I also feel good about the product since it is natural plant based detergent recognized by the EPA as safe for families.

Green Works Detergent and Stain Remover has made my laundry chore a little more pleasant and peace of mind with use of a safer chemical for my family and the environment.
I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Clorox Green Works and received a bottle of Green Works Natural Detergent and Stain Remover to facilitate my review and a $20 thank-you gift certificate."

Now that's love......

2009-12-10T00:51:00.002-05:00

I have so many cookbooks, I would have thought I could have found a recipe for Bolognese Sauce to make for dinner. After looking in the index of 10 books, I gave up and went to the computer to do a google search. I was happy to find a recipe from The Pioneer Woman Cooks. If you haven't been to this site, you are missing out on some great recipes, tips and photography! The recipe is here, and I admit I was sceptical on adding one ingredient...milk, but as you can see from the picture, it tasted as good as it looked.

Next location

2009-12-09T07:45:00.002-05:00

Can you guess where this is? This penguin had too much "holiday Cheer".

BTW, the previous post was New York City, during the sleet, rain, snow storm this past weekend.

Name this location

2009-12-08T08:06:00.001-05:00

Can you guess where this picture was taken?

The Cake

2009-12-04T00:25:00.001-05:00

My daughter wanted a Derek Jeter party for her 3rd birthday so I had to be creative with the cake. I while back when I was working, I had gotten a stadium cake mold. Several years later socked away, I pulled it out and managed to make a Yankee stadium out of it. I was worried that I would not have enough cake for 18 people, so I baked a chocolate sheet cake to maybe do a Yankee jersey. Well that was not meant to be, my dog the bight before proceeded to eat half the sheet cake off of the table, alone for one minute and she took complete advantage! I had to make another sheet cake and did it later that night. Turns out I did not need it and used part of the sheet cake for the base of the stadium to raise it up. Made swiss buttercream frosting and managed to make it look a little ornate along with green grass on the field. This cake was being frosted an hour prior to the party so it was as good as I could get!

Ronzoni Smart Taste Pasta

2009-12-03T00:38:00.002-05:00

The holidays......starting off with Thanksgiving and ending with the New Year, we are in a constant cooking, baking and eating mode. The feasting begins with the Thanksgiving meal of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole and what ever other traditional side you have. Mine is the green jello mold! Then you bake and bake and bake from pies to cookies to what every you get signed up for on the party train. I find myself getting out of the healthy food pattern during this season and feel a need to rope us bake in. Ronzoni has developed a pasta, Ronzoni Smart Taste Pasta that benefits the whole family with lower calories and fat than traditional white pasta, and no sodium, preservatives or cholesterol.

Pasta is a staple in my house, using fresh and healthy ingredients such as tomatoes, shrimp, pea pods and broccoli. Taste and texture is important and there is nothing worse than having a pasta taste like cardboard or be brittle when it is cooked. I found the Ronzoni Smart Taste Pasta tasted good, no different from the white pasta I have used and the texture was also comparable, it did not break apart or become grain like. But the true test is my daughter, she LOVES pasta.....and she had no problem enjoying this one! I also felt good knowing she was getting calcium and fiber from a meal she enjoyed.

I sauteed some garlic in olive oil, added shrimp, sun dried tomatoes and pea pods with a little white wine. Cooked the Ronzoni Smart Taste Pasta according to the directions, added the pasta to the shrimp mixture and sprinkled some Parmesan cheese over it. Served it with a salad and now I felt I was back to healthy eating again!

I am certainly no Supermom, but Ronzoni has developed a spoof video featuring the Smart Taste Supermom: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fr_pTWuBDds. Check it out for yourself.

I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Ronzoni Pasta and received a sample of Ronzoni Smart Taste Pasta to facilitate my review and a $20 thank-you gift certificate."

Sportsman of the Year...no surprise!

2009-12-02T16:57:00.002-05:00

Check out the video interview on Fox & Friends with Derek Jeter. As my 3 year old daughter says "Derek Jeter is a great guy!". I could not have said it better myself.

http://video.foxnews.com/12140058/sportsman-of-the-year

My gift to her

2009-12-01T00:56:00.002-05:00

A picture blanket representing the Yankee games she has gone to starting from when she was 6 months old to this past season. She loved it! Just in case you wanted to know, Walmart does the photo blanket and my mother-in-law trimmed the sides and back with the NY Yankee fleece material.

Do you know this man?

2009-11-30T16:51:00.003-05:00

My daughter certainly does! So much so that she had to have her 3rd Birthday party theme of Derek Jeter this past weekend. My daughter also shares the same birthday as Mariano Rivera, who turned 40 this past Sunday. So needless to say I was busy for the past week between Thanksgiving and her Birthday. The posts in the next couple of days will be a glimpse of her party......which was memorable in many ways!

What are you thankful for?

2009-11-26T00:02:00.000-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving!

GOTV....again!

2009-11-24T00:31:00.004-05:00

I think the editorial linked here in yesterday's Hartford Courant summed up today's election. I am surprised it was written in our favor, pretty rare this paper. Hats off to the Hartford Courant!

A pre-Thanksgiving test drive

2009-11-23T07:52:00.004-05:00

I love Thanksgiving! It is all about tradition, family and great food. When Kikkoman offered me to try out a a new recipe for making a Turkey, something a little out of my norm and tradition, I decided to be a little bold and try it out. They gave me the Kikkoman Soy Sauce, ability to purchase the turkey, a new apron and recipes.

I am all too familiar with Kikkoman Soy Sauce. Living in Hawaii for 5 years, it is a staple and used with many foods...even eggs! I never thought of marinating a turkey in it. I went out and bought a fresh turkey......not the one you see from my back yard but darn close! The first thing I had to do was make the Brine for marinating over night. The recipe for the brine is as follows.

2 Gallons cold water

10 ounces Kikkoman Natural Brewed Soy Sauce

1/2 cup kosher salt

1/2 cup sugar

2 TBSB dried sage

2 TBSB dried celery

2 TBSB dried thyme

Mix all of the ingredients, place the turkey in a large pot with the brine and refrigerate overnight for at least 8 hours. After soaking up all of the brine, take it out, rinse well and it is ready to cook. So far, so good. The turkey had a golden color to it, very exciting!

Cooked the turkey according to basic turkey cooking times of poundage, stuffed or not stuffed and equaling the time in the oven. My turkey was 17 pound turkey unstuffed(I like to make the stuffing separate) and needed about 3 hours 30 minutes. I forgot to tell you that Kikkoman also sent me a Kikkoman duck to keep my daughter amused while I prepped the turkey, she grabbed it(her favorite word right now is grab) and ran off into the living room!

The end result was this beautiful golden turkey,moist, savory with a slight favor of soy and hint of sweet! What a great new tradition and so easy! I happened to have some family over on Sunday for dinner, the consensus was everyone really enjoyed it! We had the butternut squash, the stuffing and green beans, a mix of the old and new.

With a 17 pound turkey, you are bound to have left overs. Thankfully Kikkoman sent me some cool new recipes to try out such as Quick Chinese Turkey Salad, Turkey Tetrazinni and a Spanish Turkey Ole(excited about this one!). I plan on working these recipes after the usual turkey sandwiches. You can check out the recipes, tips and a coupon here! Give it try...I think you will be just as happy with the finished product!

An afternoon in the compost pile

2009-11-21T00:48:00.003-05:00

Yesterday afternoon was beautiful weather! I could not resist working outside so my daughter and I decided to spend some time in the compost pile.
I know what you might be thinking......not that fun, smelly, not your first choice to spend a sunny afternoon in. This was the only project that I had besides leaves and I can't seem to start the leaf blower. I know my husband was probably going to be covering up the compost pile with more leaves over the weekend so I needed to get as much black gold out of there!
The beginning of the week I cleaned all of the asparagus beds and phase two is covering them with some compost. My daughter and I shoveled 6 wheel barrels worth of compost, spread them on all of the asparagus beds and also on some of the baby trees planted near by. Domino, the hunter kitty of the house seemed to like the activity and ended up laying on top of the compost pile watching us. Not my choice of a comfortable spot but the sun was there and it was a good view of the activity. I would have taken a picture bu my hands were pretty dirty from the dirt....

Cupcakes for a birthday

2009-11-20T07:34:00.003-05:00

This is part one of three birthday parties for my daughter who turns 3 on November 29th. This party was for her nursery school which we made pumpkin muffins with cream cheese frosting. The pumpkin was from our garden which we pureed over the weekend and my daughter helped me make these every step of the way! Her favorite part had to be putting the orange and purple sprinkles on top. She chose Dora liners over the Elmo and thankfully you could see the pictures on the liner. I have found many times that once you bake the cupcakes, the picture is not clear.

First Day back to work

2009-11-19T00:59:00.000-05:00

Yesterday was my first day of Public Service as an elected official. I have been out of the working world for over three years and was excited to get back in. Let me tell you a little bit about my job.
This past election I was elected to the position Town Treasurer. I sign checks, reconcile the accounts, involved with investments and the Town Finance Manager. I basically am a backup checker to the books. There are no set hours, what ever the time is needed is what you make of it. I have a desk, no computer(yup, this is described in the next paragraph), a phone and walking into procedures that have occurred for a long period of time.
What did I find on the first day? I have no computer, everything has been written out on ledgers by hand. I plan on asking for a computer today and will take a lot of time to update much of the info in it. The Town Hall is so warm, it is stifling! Each department has their thermostat set separately and ranges around 74 degrees! I am use to having my home set at 63 and when the wood stove is going it gets up to 67 at the most. I am sure many of these employees do not have this temperature set at their homes. There are other issues which need to be addressed, probably not going to be the most popular person there and I know change is not easy but this is important to be able to run the town more efficiently and outgoing to the public. I will keep you posted on life is public office.

Election in Question...on TV

2009-11-18T17:10:00.004-05:00

Here is the link from the local news station which has been running the story for the past 24 hours with the video link after it.

http://www.wfsb.com/news/21651022/detail.html

http://www.wfsb.com/video/21653159/

Election in question

2009-11-18T07:23:00.004-05:00

The state of Connecticut changed over last year from the old ballot machines to the new scanner machines to bring the state up in technology, accuracy and accountability. I among many other liked the old ballot machines due to the fact you could not get any more accurate than pushing a lever down to cast your vote. Now we have fill in the circle which brings in a lot of question on voter intention if they did not fill out the ballot correct. The scanner scans the ballot to what it thinks is correct, meaning some votes can be missed if the oval is not filled in such as using an "x" in the oval. It does not matter how many times you tell the voter to ensure accuracy, it is up to the voter to fill it in correctly. So what happens when there is a close results for a particular seat? There has to be a recount with both parties represented from the election, the Moderator and agreement on each ballot of what the voter intention was. This is a state law and should be known by the Moderator, Town Clerk(who files the results) and the Registrar of voters for either party. Now that I have given you a mini lesson in voting a recount, let me fill you in on what has happened in the town I live in.
All of the above happened in the last election, a seat on the Board of Education was claimed to be a recount with the Democratic candidate winning by one vote on Election Day. The recount was done officially according to state law and the count was changed where the Republican won by one vote. Two days later after the recount, the Town Clerk(D) and the Moderator(D) decided to take the keys from the Democratic Registrar and open the sealed ballots, recount and change the official recount to a tie vote due to they felt there was an error. Sealed the ballots back up, changed the number and faxed it in to the Secretary of State. A new election has been declared for the seat next Tuesday. There was no representation of the Republican party and did what they said "was nothing wrong". Do you see what was wrong here? This is how easy it is to play with the hand chosen ballots! An abuse of power, pompous attitude that they were within their right to do so and did nothing wrong and a waste of taxpayers money for another election to be held. This story went to the local news today, see the link here but the newspaper story is incorrect also! The Republicans are filing a report with the Secretary of State today for an investigation. Not the "chad" incident but darn close!

Quick.....knit a scarf!

2009-11-17T00:43:00.000-05:00

I needed a birthday present on the fly......got this neat pattern from one of my knit group buddies and managed to finish it in three evenings! A Celtic neck scarf that buttons, very cute! I am knitting another and modifying it slightly to add a little more clean lines to the end that does not have buttons on it. My mother-in-law tried it on and it looked even better on!

Pine cone popsicles

2009-11-15T00:03:00.000-05:00

I had two little girls wanting to do an art project on a yucky day. What I came up with was an hours worth of fun, pine cones filled with peanut butter and rolled in seeds.

I had the girls gather the pine cones they wanted to use. I put cracked corn, oatmeal and bird seed on three paper plates for rolling. I had a large jar of Jif extra chunky peanut butter(one I do not eat since it is not all natural) and put in all in a bowl for them to scoop up and fill all between the cones. They thought this was such fun getting messy and playing with peanut butter. Then they rolled and patted each one with all of the different seeds. The end result is a snack for the birds(or squirrels) which we put in the freezer when ready to use. The mess was minimal, even in the kitchen. This is an ideal project for outside. Tie some ribbon or yarn and hang it from a tree or give them as a gift.

Graham Cracker Conspiracy

2009-11-12T07:09:00.003-05:00

Whether the box says Nabisco, Keebler or a generic label, I think there is a secret agreement with all on how graham crackers are packaged.
I know I must not be the only one who has thought about this. Graham crackers are packaged in three clear or wax paper like packaging that is not resealable. When I make a pie that calls for a graham cracker crust, I will generally use a whole pack of crackers. To take one as a snack is another story. You need to put them in a zip lock to ensure freshness. Then there is that one person in the house that will open up the graham crackers to have one and put them back in the box, not using a zip lock bag. It just takes one day for the graham crackers to get soft. I am not fond of the taste of soft graham crackers. It is a waste and I end up throwing them out. How hard is it for the manufacturers to package these in something you can keep fresh? Fig newton manufacturers got the idea, it use to be the same for this product. Or do the manufacturers for graham crackers have an agreement with the zip lock bag manufacturers? Just one of those little pet peeves I have.......like shaving cream cans that leave rust marks on your tub or sink! That subject I will save for another day!

Kiva Controversy

2009-11-10T07:49:00.002-05:00

I know I am not the only one who felt that I was lending out $25 to an individual who is starting up a small business in an area of the world needed a little extra help to improve their families life via Kiva.org. My sister-in-law emailed me this article here from the NY Times and it seems that this is not the case. I do feel disappointed, taken advantage of and thinking this was such a great idea being directly involved with a person seems to be a pipe dream. Does it make Kiva.org deceiving to the public? You be the judge.