New Car

My new car. A Hyundai Accent.


The Ford that I was driving had begun to have some potentially very serious problems, and I was uncomfortable with it considering the amount of driving that I do, and I will be doing even more if I get into my program. So we went car shoping and found this beauty. A new 2009 Hyundai Accent, that was on sale because they wanted the '09's out of the way for the '11. It's only the 2ed new car that my parents have ever bought. We went with a new one because of the bumper to bumper warranties and road side assistance, so that I (and mom and dad) would not have to worry about me having to deal with a broken down car by my self.
Mom and Dad financed this car for me. Which means that they bought it, and when I get a decent paying job I will begin to take over the car payments. When I have payed the whole thing off, the title will be transferred to me.

President's List for Spring

Hey all. I made the President's list again, spring quarter with 13 credits. So I'm still holding down a 4.0 GPA. Yeah! I had to work for it though. http://www.westgatech.edu/Misc/PDList.pdf. I'm on page 8, column 3.

Belly Dancing

When Mom started her diet she needed to start to do some regular exercise too. One of the moms of a school mate of Jon told us about a belly dancing class that was held not to far from the high school. So Mom and Naomi and I started taking classes together. Naomi eventually found that she had other things that she wanted to do more and stopped going, but Mom and I have been having fun.

On Sunday a group of us performed in a small dance show with several other dancers of all ages and styles. Mom declined to perform, but I did. Fortunately the whole family was able to come and watch, including Gram and Grandad.


How low can you go? This is not easy to hold for pictures.



This is called the Teapot. I used a white veil for the dance, but the only one I had at home to pose with was pink.



I bought the coin belt a the renaissance fair.

President's List

I made the Presidents List for winter quarter, that is a 4.0 GPA. Granted that was not full time, 8 credits, but it's still cool.

http://www.westgatech.edu/Misc/PDList.pdf

2010 Garden

So here is my new garden. It's a bucket garden, because everything has to be moved the end of June, to the house I will be staying at. Don't ask me how I'm going to do it 'cause I don't know yet.

Me in my garden. Can you see me? There is mint, lemon balm (which I just found an ant's nest in, have to do somthing about that), eggplant, sweet peppers, watermelon, tomatoes, 2 different kinds of squash, cucumbers, rosemary, dahlias, freesia, a pink lily and gladiolus. I'm not so sure how the larger flowers will do in the pots but we will see.

Charlie in the garden. We were trying to get a picture of him looking at the camera, but for some reason he aparently thought I was about to beat him.
Eggplant.



Some starts that are growing under the porch (I know it's a fragment, my English instructor would be appalled, and look, there's a contraction too. Hahahahhahahahahah. Ok sorry, I'm better now). There are marigolds, some other pink flower thing, acorn squash, basil and lots of radishes. I also have more marigolds, sweet williams, green onions, morning glories, forget-me-nots, more basil, straw flowers, tea roses (from last year) and all the left over white lilies from the church's Easter decorations on top of the porch.

I'm out of the large buckets that I had, so I have been using cans or peanut butter jars and such to make planters. The next time I go to Kroger I will have to see if they have anymore empty icing buckets (the big white ones). I got all the black ones you see from the floral department.

Under the porch is where my garden's fairy godtoad lives. His name is Philip B. Hoppytoad. (B. is for Brown 'cause he is a brown hoppytoad.)

Favorite Crock Pot Recipes

A friend of mine just got a new crock pot. My family loves the crock pot because its so easy to use and you get great food. So I figured I would post some of my favorite crock pot recipes.

Sweet and Spicy Corned Beef.

3 lb corned beef
1 cup orange marmalade
1/4 cup backed brown sugar
1 tablespoon butter
1/4 cup mustard (I like brown)

In a bowl mix marmalade, mustard and sugar. Rinse off the corned beef and put it in the crock pot with just enough water to cover the bottom of the pot. Coat the meat with the marmalade mix, cover and cook on medium for about 5-7 hours or so, or until done. Basting occasionally. Slice and serve.

This is my favorite corned beef recipe. I like it in a sandwich, on toasted lite rye, with pepper jack or muster cheese, and a little mayo. So good. Pair it with some cole slaw and you have corned beef and cabbage without boiling anything.



Crock Pot Lasagna

Make up your lasagna sauce and cheese mix however you normally do.
Some things my family likes in it are

Spinach
Tofu (if you freeze/then thaw tofu it will crumble just like ground beef)
Cottage cheese

Be sure to spray the crock pot with Pam or whatever oil spray you use, and your first layer needs to be your sauce mix. This keeps it from burning on the bottom. Don't cook your noodles first, just lay them in dry. A little extra sauce is good as this is the moisture that the noodles cook in.
Cook it on medium 'til the noodles are done. Don't over cook it or the noodles will get gummy.


Cranberry Roast

1 Beef Roast
1 pk. dried onion soup mix
1 can cranberry sauce

Rinse and trim the roast, put it in the pot with just enough water to cover the bottom. Mix up the cranberry sauce with the onion soup mix and coat the roast with it. Cover and cook 6-7 hours or until done. Slice and serve.

Pumpkin Pie Pudding
My mom makes this instead of pumpkin pie for thanks giving. She doubles it.
2 cups/15 oz can pumpkin (we use fresh that we have cooked and frozen from carved pumpkins)
12 oz can evaporated milk
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup buttermilk baking mix
2 eggs, beaten
2 Tbsp butter, or oil
1 Tbsp pumpkin pie spice
2 tsp vanilla
whipped cream

Sift together dry ingredients and add to wet, mix all together and pour into crock pot. Cook on low 6-7 hours, or until stiff like a custard.

Crock Pot Pork Roast

Mock Disaster At WGTC

Wow, so it's March already. Winter quarter will be done on the 16th. My last class is on Tuesday. Then yeah for spring break.

For fall quarter I'm signed up to take SCT 100 (intro to micro-computers) and BIO 2113(anatomy and physiology). BIO is a tricky class, so I hear from my other class mates. It has already given me trouble and I'm not even taking it yet. I was getting mixed answers as to if it had a pre-req of English (which I have not taken yet) or not. My class mates said yes, but the course catalog said no and my adviser said no, and I have the e-mail, so if someone gives me grief about it I'll...make a fuss.

On February the 25th WGTC staged a mock disaster in the welding room for the EMT class to practice with. Several classes got together to pull it off. The EMTs and First Responders class did what they do. My AHS, as a health care class, was asked to help play patients and ER workers. Several other classes and individuals also helped, including kids from the high-school (a couple of whom I knew as class mates of my siblings) who take classes at the college. The Cosmetology class did most of the make up for the patients.

I played one of the patients. My description was "head wound, ashy, diaphoretic(sweaty due to shock) and confused" They really did a great job with the make-up, it all looked very life like. There was a guy next to me who was being made-up to have a spurting leg wound. They put bits of tin foil in with the make-up to look like shrapnel. We changed into clothes that we could rip or burn as if in a real explosion, or in my case pour fake blood all over. (just so that we are clear, this is all acting, no one got hurt).

I got there early, which was a good thing to because it was crazy, checked in with my teacher and went to Cosmetology to get made-up. They used a latex base and make-up to make me look like I had a head wound and powder to make me very pale, then poured about half a bottle of that fake Halloween blood down my face, onto my shirt and into my hair. (a CD is supposedly in the making with pictures. I will try to get one so that I can show you)

Then I headed off to the Welding room where the explosion was to be staged. They had turned over some of the big steel tables in there, and filled to place with smoke from a smoke machine. (the smoke was made from sugar, and was harmless to breath) It was so thick in there sometimes that I couldn't see 6 feet in front of me. We got some coaching on our part to play and staked out a spot to wait for things to get started.

The worst part was that the shirt that I grabbed from the pile was sleeveless and I was laying on a concrete floor. It was quite cold. It was hard to keep a straight face sometimes, especially when one of the patient who had minor cuts and bruises, was really into it. She was screaming about how she needed to go to the hospital but wouldn't move until she got a wheelchair, and about how she needed oxygen, and dang it, her purse was still in the welding room, really freaking out, it was great. Because we knew it was fake it was quite funny. I'm sure EMTs have to deal with that kind of stuff, and thats why we where doing this whole thing.

When everyone was ready the EMTs came in and began to triage everyone. We all played our parts well for the most part. We began to cry out as if in pain or confusion. I was put on a backboard and carried out of the room and lined up in the hallway where a couple of the EMTs came along to "treat" us. Then I was placed on a stretcher to be moved to the ambulance, and taken to the "hospital"(my health classroom). After a bit of confusion because the stretchers they had were old ones used for training and did not lock into the ambulance, a bit of brute force with about 4 or 5 people to lift the whole thing into the ambulance, and a very bumpy ride, I made it to the "hospital". I was then shifted to a bed, treated and sent home.

I then found my clothes, got the worst of the blood off my face and dashed off to my other class that I was already very late for, where I unintentionally succeeded in worrying the girl who sits across from me. I still looked pretty bad. She thought I had been in a car accident until she remembered the mock disaster going on, and asked if that was where I had been.

It was all great fun. Pictures to come later I hope.