The Joys of Freecycling

On Sunday I posted on Craig's List two items for free: a DVD player that, though only a year old, skips sometimes, and a vacuum cleaner that doesn't much like to do rugs, but works okay on hardwood. I listed their faults as above.

Almost immediately, "Bob" writes that he'd love the DVD player. Please call or email him with the address. I email him back right away telling him it's on the porch. It stays on the porch all day. At night it starts to rain. Still on the porch (now in a bag). I call Bob. Oh yeah, he didn't bother to go back online after telling me to email him....He starts asking me about the size of the player and if it has a DVD burner on it. Turns out he's not too interested if it doesn't have a DVD burner.

Fine. On to the next person. "Wind" has emailed me about both the vacuum and the DVD, but, by the next morning, still hasn't responded whether he'll take them or not. I email the next person who responded. Later, Windy writes back and says that he's at work until 11, and could I please save them until the next morning. Morning, of course, comes and goes and he's still not here.

Then he writes an email saying "if i will not find them there by that time i will get hurt in my mind so please save them up to that time". I tell him that, while I will not save it especially for him, only he and one other person knows the address where the DVD player is. He lives in the same city as me, and if was so important to him, perhaps he could find some time between Sunday and Tuesday to pop over and pick the thing up. No response.

Late Tuesday morning, the DVD player is gone. I email Wind and tell him. He shows up at 5:30 Tuesday afternoon and asks where the DVD player is. He gets very mopey when I tell him it's gone and that I emailed him this morning to tell him.

Then he looks at the vacuum and asks if I have a bag for it! I've had it. I shut the door as I tell him I don't. And, after the door is closed, I say "and I don't gift wrap either."

Sometimes, I have such nice experiences giving stuff away. It's kind of weird and obnoxious that only once has anyone bothered to email and say "thank you" after picking something up, but, other than that, it's nice to give things away to people I know want them. But this one was really a doozy!

I Can't Believe It's Not Oatmeal....

Tastes great. Even *looks* like oatmeal!

http://www.scdrecipe.com/recipes/print/493/

1/4 cup SCD yogurt
1/4 cup unsweetened appleasauce
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tbl honey
1/4 tsp baking soda
butter for frying

1. Heat up about 1/2 tablespoon of butter in a small frying pan.

2. Combine all ingredients and add to pan, mixing them up as you would scrambled eggs.

3. Transfer to a bowl and add cinnamon to taste.

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Yesterday's food:

lunch: "crunchy eggs": eggs fried in olive oil. Yum! Chana had (oy!) four (I can't stress about it....)
--frozen grapes

dinner: lentil soup w. onions, carrots and celery
--sauteed mushrooms of three kinds
--green salad

Monday's dinner

Sam's away on business this week, so we got to eat nice and early (no traffic for BH coming home from school!).

Onion soup: mess o' onions, some cabernet sauvignon, butter, water, s&p
--"yummy, yummy peas": frozen peas microwaved and doused w. olive oil, chopped dried onion bits, s&p
--green salad w. dressing
--fresh strawberries

Lunch: cheese plate w. cheddar cheese, black olives and sliced fennel.
--apple muffins made w. coconut flour (I didn't love them. Think I'll stick to the usual banana muffin recipe)

Breakfast: the traditional strawberry-banana smoothie and an apple w. peanut butter for Chana, bowl of cold cereal for the rest of us.

Shabbat Meals

Fun dinner! It was Leah's 15th B-day, and our friend Michel came to spend Shabbat with us. Richard stayed in Malden for Shabbat and joined us for dinner as well.

Menu:
Matza (no more challah b/c of the SC diet. Not that Chana is allowed to eat matza, but it's less psychologically painful that challah).

onion mushroom soup

fried baby artichokes (cut in half and sauteed in a cast-iron pan in olive oil w. salt and pepper)
gefilte fish (not scd) on salad greens

refried red beans w. salsa (not scd), yogurt (homemade scd), tomatoes, and hot sauce
long red sweet peppers stuffed w. farmer cheese, cheddar and monterey jack cheeses
baked butternut squash w. olive oil, salt and pepper

coconut flour carrot cake w. frosting
baked apples (no raisins in honor of Richard and Leah who don't like them)

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Lunch: lentil soup w. carrots, onions, celery in the crock pot
--salad
--cheeses
--for Chana: peanut butter mixed w. honey

Breakfast: for Chana: apple w. peanut butter

Kiddush at shul: fruit and some Diet Coke

Cousin Eli's Video

We were in NY this weekend, and here's what the crazy cousins (Eli, Batsheva and Chana) did with Batsheva's new iMac and its video-taking feature:

Diet Log

We're going away for Shabbat to NY. We'll stay with my wonderful cousin and her family in Lawrence. We LOVE staying with them. On Sunday, if the predicted storm isn't too bad, we'll head to NJ for Sam's company's office party.

Anyway, as Jen and I were discussing menus for this weekend, she said, "well, just tell me what you would make". And I hit a total blank wall! So it seemed to me that it would be good to keep track for a while of what we eat around here.

Breakfast today: banana smoothie
---apple with peanut butter

Lunch (on the road between piano lessons and an appointment): smoked cheddar cheese
--sliced apples

Dinner: Cheese enchilada stuffed with white beans, lettuce and tomato
----broccoli

I forget the snacks, but that's at least a start....

mikvah

Just got back from a meeting at our shul about the proposed mikvah. The architect showed the drawings and the samples of the paints, granite, etc. Wow. It's going to be soooo nice.

And the dish mikvah will make a welcome change from going to Revere Beach! (Did I ever blog about the...odd....experience of toiveling our new ice cream maker bowl at Revere Beach? It was weird to be doing something so foreign to the previous times I'd spent on that beach as a child/teen, yet at the same time, surrounded by a number of covered Muslim women, I felt like I wasn't unusual in the least!)

Latkes

I've come to the conclusion that a person can take just about any grated vegetable, fry it in oil, salt it, and have happy tummies on the other side of the fry pan....

The other day I made latkes out six small grated zucchinis, two large grated onions and two eggs. When friends stopped by unexpectedly, I grated half a butternut squash (!) in the remaining mix and added a few tbls. of coconut flour.

Last night, I grated the only veggies I had around that weren't cucumbers or tomatoes, and we had onion and carrot latkes. I forgot to add the eggs, but did add some coconut flour. They were very delicate, but sweet and yummy.

Happy Chanukah!

new website!

Wow, it's been a long time since I posted....Batsheva's bat mitzvah kept me awfully busy, let's just say.

Our new soap website is finally up! www.4SistersSoaps.com! Whee! Not all of the links are live yet, but we're almost all of the way there!