bountifulplate

Okay, I admit it, when I heard the Powerball jackpot was over $550,000,000 yesterday, I kind of got caught up in Powerball "Mania." I made the hubby go buy one ticket for me. I could hardly wait until 10:59 p.m. to find out if I had won.  I had one number right, but I think all that will get you is a pat on the back :) I can't even wrap my mind around what it would be like to win that jackpot. After I heard that two tickets with the winning numbers were sold in Arizona and Missouri, it got me thinking this morning, would winning buckets of cash make you happy? I'm happy that my basic needs are met everyday - a roof over my head, food on the table and clothes to wear. I am blessed with a loving family and many friends.  For many of the people that just lived through the devastation of Hurricane Sandy, it may be several months or even years before the most basic of needs will be met sufficiently. If I had won the jackpot, I would have donated about 95 percent of i...

Last Saturday night, Lauren and I went to see the Nutcracker.  We started going back in 2009 and have been going every year since.   It is put on by the local ballet company in the area and they do a magnificent job.  We see at least one or more girls (or guys) that we either know or know of in the production.  Since this was our fourth year of going together, just the two of us, I guess you could say it has become an after Thanksgiving "tradition." With high school graduation about a year and half away and then college after that, Lauren was telling me we might not be able to go together every year.  Hopefully, that is not the case :(  For some families, making a certain kind of cookie during the holidays, putting up the Christmas decorations the day after Thanksgiving or going to Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve are "traditions."  Back before I met my husband, I would always spend Thanksgiving with my own family in Maryland and Virginia.  Onc...

I found out about an opportunity recently that I knew I wanted to be a part of.  The College of Human Medicine at the university located nearby were looking for parents to share their experiences with second-year medical students about having a child with Autism.  I think the main purpose was to give them some insight about how to treat their future patients. Yesterday morning, two other moms and I sat at a table in a lecture hall with about 100 or so medical students in front of us. One of the moms had been on the parent "panel" before twice, the other mom was like me, she had never done it before. It was a teeny bit intimidating and I was little nervous when I first started talking, but I soon got over the jitters :) After we got done sharing our experiences, the medical students could ask us questions. They read about Autism and other related disorders in books, but to hear from parents on the "front lines" is something all together different for them.  Looking o...

This is what our kitchen floors currently look like. We had a dishwasher that we didn't notice was leaking a little water until a few months ago.  We put it off because we had a bunch of other things going on.  When we eventually got around to taking care of the problem, it turned out we had mold under our carpet :(  One thing I found out about mold is that it's not dangerous unless you start disturbing it, which kind of happened when the old dishwasher was pulled out to make room for the new one!!  It cost more to "fog" our house to get rid of the mold than it did for the company to rip out our old cabinet and carpet!! We have been washing dishes by hand until we get the new dishwasher installed.  My hubby grew up in a household where his parents didn't have a dishwasher.  I grew up in a household that did.   I remember complaining one time to my grandmother (the one who lived to be 101) about having to wash dishes by hand sometimes.  Her...

It was around this time last year that I had my unexpected hospital stay overnight.  I can't believe that it has been that long already!!!  I have spent that time reflecting and truly appreciating all that I have to be thankful for.  I am thankful to the nurse at the Red Cross who caught my irregular heartbeat in October of last year, when I was getting ready to donate blood.  Her finding that problem, necessitated an echocardiogram, which in turn, led me to get a heart catheterization, which showed I have the heart condition, non-ischemic cardiomyopathy!! Yikes, I really don't like to think what would have happened to me, had that not been caught.  Especially, since the cardiologist told me the worse case scenario for my condition is a heart transplant :(  I'm so very thankful that my four medicines I take are keeping my heart going strong! My husband told me recently that the whole experience of having me in the hospital was very "scary" to him. ...

When I go to the grocery store, I kind of get in the "zone."  I'm looking at my list, balancing coupons, looking for those good deals, etc.  Last week, when I was doing my shopping, I heard a voice say, "so, how is your week going?"  I looked over and it was the guy who stocks the shelves for Frito-Lay.  I have been going to the Kroger on Tuesday mornings around the same time for as long as I can remember.  I have bumped into my "buddy" on more than one occasion in the snack aisle.  I think I started chatting with him one time when his huge cart was in my way.  He's really nice and I asked him his opinion once about the flavor of the Lay's Dill Pickle chips, thinking he would have an inside track  :)  I told him that my week was going well and that I was going grocery shopping on a Wednesday just to shake things up.  He said, "it's not like we're in our routines or anything is it?"  We had a good chuckle, I grabbed two bags of...

Uncle Eddie was my mother-in-law's youngest brother.  She was one of 13 children, but she and her brother were very close, given that they were the two youngest of all the siblings. Uncle Eddie fought in World War II and was killed in action at age 19. My mother-in-law would talk about her brother and how difficult it was when he died.  I can't even imagine what that must have been like for her, losing a sibling at such a young age.  I used to tell her a lot how I admired her for being such a strong woman. When we cleaned out my in-law's house in Cleveland, we found the items below. Other relatives of my husband (including his own dad) were also in World War II.  When I found the Purple Heart that was Uncle Eddie's, I have to say it made me stop in my tracks. When I asked the hubby if I could write about his uncle on my blog, his words were, "I'm sorry I never got to meet him."  My husband's middle name is Edward (in honor/memory of his ...

I'm all for trying to make your kid independent, but I witnessed something this weekend at my local Target that set my mom "radar" off big time!! We were putting away our cart after checking out and were heading for the main set of doors to leave.  The kids and I watched as a mom and dad headed to the customer service area leaving their son (who looked to be not quite two years old) by himself near the shopping carts.  He started pushing the carts around, banging into people and all the other carts. Not once in about one full minute did the parents look back to see what he was doing. There was an older woman standing around, like us, looking at him and I think she was thinking the same thing, why don't the parents come get him and let him wait with them in the customer service area??  I was telling Lauren we needed to do something.  It was VERY busy right there near the carts, people coming in and out of the doors very quickly.  It would have been easy for so...

The special needs bowling group that our family belongs to started up again in mid-October. The group meets once a month from October until April and is sponsored by one of the local area churches. One of the moms that I met last year came up to me and we started chatting and catching up from the last time we saw each other.  She has a son with Down Syndrome and he is getting ready to graduate from high school :)  I love this mom, she always has a smile on her face and has the best positive attitude about her son. She also has two older children that are typically developing.  She was asking me about Lauren and how high school was going.  She was telling me about her older kids and I was telling her about my stepson and his job.  Her son has been busy getting his senior pictures done and with everything else the last year of high school entails. My friend and I were chatting so much, the hubby had to keep gently "reminding" me when it was my turn.  Eve...