Cemetery Work

Bill is on the Board of the cemetery so he gets to do some unusual jobs related to that.

On this day this summer, he took the skid loader and backhoe out and removed a row of really big round bushes.  They had gotten so big that they were actually covering some headstones and made the driveway too narrow for the hearse and other cars to get through. I got to learn to drive the skid loader and help a little too.  It was fun.  I should've taken a picture of the big pile after they were all pulled out!

The groundskeeper has spread grass seed and you can hardly tell where these bushes were already.

 

He really made quick work of it.

this isn't me doing this!

More Spencer Fair

The first fun thing you see at the fair when you arrive is people on horseback directing you into your parking spot.

I did spend too much time in the building where the adult entries are - watching cherry pie judging.  It was very disappointing though.  I thought I would get some pie making tips by listening to their comments, but they didn't comment at all about why they gave good ribbons or not - not even at the end.  It was fun to meet the judge, Louise Piper, though since she is a former Rolfe resident, and I've talked to her on the phone before.  Her daughter helped her and she is the owner of Our Daily Bread Bakery in Algona and Bill went to school with her.  Louise's son traps on our property in the winter.

While I was waiting to see the winning pie, I wandered around and looked at the MANY jars of canned food, afghans and other creative things entered.  Of everything I saw that day, I was most impressed with this sewing machine cake!!

amazing detail

such pretty decorations above too

Spencer Fair

Every year, it's a tradition to go to the Clay County Fair in Spencer.  It's in September so something to look forward to at the end of summer.  People around here like it better than the Iowa State Fair.

We went this year and my favorite thing this time had to be the Braunschweig Pottery booth from Alta, Iowa near Storm Lake.  Connie had so many things made by pressing leaves into the clay.  I LOVE oak and gingko leaves and she uses lots of both.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of anything with the oak leaves.

gingko leaves on a lamp base

wall hanging

I bought this and love it.  I added the dried "grass/wheat", etc.  I had Bill save a couple of pheasant feathers for it.  It looks good on our great room wall next to the front window.  

If you love chocolate like we do . . . .

Unfortunately, Bill and I are chocoholics.  It's bad.  And our main thing we're addicted to is 
M & M's - plain ones.  I used to have vanilla ice cream with chocolate syrup all the time and that would "do it" (my mom & dad owned a Dairy Queen for 17 years so maybe that had something to do with it!).  But now I crave brownies fairly often.  Homemade hot fudge syrup is to die for too.  I've posted the recipe for that from the old Amana cookbook already.  If you want to try it, look at my post categories on the right side and click on Recipes and then scroll down until you find it.  That is so good (and easy - make in the microwave) and better than any you can buy in a jar.

During harvest, Bill will have some kind of chocolate candy bar most days - usually a Snickers.  (since I admitted what I like, I had to mention what he likes too)  You've already heard that he LOVES apple pie, but if we don't have that, an Oreo after a meal will do.

I've made a couple of different recipes for "lava cake" but the latest one was this one.  It came from a newspaper and this one is called Grandma Lutz's Chocolate Sunday Cake.  But I'm just going to call it Lava Cake.  It ends up having gooey chocolate on the bottom and then chocolate cake on top.  You scoop it out of the baking dish with a spoon and serve warm with ice cream.  Yum!  Enjoy!  (***warning - it's very rich)

LAVA CAKE

Cake:
3/4 c. sugar
1 c. flour
3 T. cocoa
2 t. baking powder
1/4 t. salt
1/2 c. milk
1/3 c. melted butter
1 1/2 t. vanilla
Sift together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt.  Mix milk, melted butter and vanilla.  Combine wet and dry ingredients in an 8-inch pan.

Topping:
1/2 c. brown sugar
4 T. cocoa
3/4 c. white sugar
   Combine brown sugar, cocoa and white sugar.  Sprinkle mix over cake batter.  DO NOT MIX IN.  Pour 1 1/4 c. hot water over entire dish.  DO NOT STIR.  Bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes.  Serve warm with ice cream.
 

NW Iowa Women's Conf.

Here in NW Iowa, we're so very lucky to have an event like the NW Iowa Women's Conference to go to every year - right at Faith Lutheran Church, the church I go to. It was on Sat., Nov. 9th this year and was a nice day for women as usual - about 375 women, the most we've ever had attend.  

Carol Kent was the speaker. She speaks on how to live a new kind of normal when something bad happens to you.  Her story is that her son who went to the Naval Academy met and married a woman who had two small children.  He ended up murdering her ex husband.  Now Carol and her husband visit their only son in jail in Florida every weekend and that's where they spend their holidays. He is there for life with no chance of parole.

The women in charge of this conference do a great job from promoting it to the decorations to the lunch, the schedule, the music and even lots of door prizes.  My friend, Terri, and I helped Carol's husband sell her books during breaks.

Lunch was chicken salad with lots in it like grapes, apple and nuts, a pineapple cranberry salad, choice of potato or vegetable beef soup, roll and pumpkin pie - all made in our church kitchen.  We sat with some ladies that came by bus from Spencer and they were quite impressed that the food was not catered.

a table decoration

  

this was our lunch minus the soup

goodies to have when arriving

Insulation

This past week, the project around here was blowing insulation above the attic in the shed.  Bill bought the insulation from Community Lumber in West Bend.  They let you use the machines to do it with.  We used two of them.  Bill went up above with the two hoses and sprayed it all around while Tim and I fed the machines down below.

Bill said the bags of compacted insulation were 30 lbs.  You had to cut them in half with a knife and break the two chunks apart.  Half a bag is what fit in the machine at a time.  It wasn't hard and went fairly fast.  It only took about a day total to do.  I think the attic now has a R49 rating if that tells you anything.  The shed is now pretty well insulated. 

only 1 of the piles of empty bags

it looked like pink cotton candy once it was broken up

not fun wearing masks but very necessary