Nuts, Nuts and more Nuts

Florida Pecans

The Rocket

Pecan Brittle, YUMMMM

Tangerines are almost ready

Tawnya's baby quilt top ready to be quilted

I finished it last night

Pecans: Last night hubby came home with bags of Pecans. There is a lady where he works who has Pecan trees, Down here Pecan trees are everywhere. Any way, each year I have him place his order with this lady and I end up with bags of these wonderful nuts. I love using Pecans in my holiday baking and making Pecan Brittle, but I hate the shelling of them. I know there are places where we could buy them shelled, but they would cost so much more. The first year I had the handy dandy nut cracker, you know the kind that looks like pliers. That didn't last long for me, after sore hands and many crushed nuts, we headed to the local hardware store. The hardware store is the old fashion kind that sells so much more than lumber and hardware. My favorite section in this store is the kitchen section, so many gadgets and I just knew that I would find what I was looking for. After all this is the store that had all my canning things. Well, I found just what I needed, a Rocket nut cracker, it is the pictured above. Saves so much time and it is easy to use. Hubby gets busy cracking the nuts and I take them out of the shells and bag em up. When we get tired of shelling the nuts, I just bag up what is left and send them to Mel and Jen for their holiday treats.

Tangerines: The tangerines are just about ready, I took one off the tree yesterday just to try it out and it was so sweet and juicy. The first time I have ever had fresh tangerines picked off MY trees. Of my three citrus trees I have two that are loaded with fruit, well as loaded as a small tree can be. Theses trees are two and three years old so I think they are doing really well, now if the apple, peach and loquat trees would start producing fruit.

Puppies: All the puppies are doing really well, Mariah's two have the run of the house, only because they are escape artists and the play area just won't contain them plus they are puppy pad trained. Sissy's crew stay in the play area and they too are doing really well. All the pups are trained to puppy pads and love going out for potty breaks. This can be tricky, I take the two older ones out first and one goes one way and the other goes another direction. Then I take out the other 4 and thankfully they stay pretty close together. I think we have homes for four of them. This week they will be heading to the vet for their well puppy check and their first shots, what fun.

Quilts: Last night I finished the baby quilt for my friends new baby girl, it is done with attic windows blocks, appliqued butterflies and then I quilted butterflies all over it. The picture is before it was quilted. I have two more tops to put together for the Century Care Center and than I will be quilting all of them, need to get these done real soon so we can make a December delivery. I also have two queen size quilts to finish before the holidays, so much to do and so little time.

Ceramics: Mel stopped in Sunday and she cleaned the Christmas greenware I had poured for her. I have been cleaning Christmas Trees and Santa's, trying to get them done for the holidays. The trees are going up north as gifts so they are first on the gotta do list. I just hope there is time to get it all done. Jen will be the delivery girl when she goes to grandma's for Thanksgiving.

Remodel: My one request on the house was that I wanted the woodwork in the hallway done for the holidays, so Sean made the trim and baseboard, I stained and varnished it and he installed it Sunday. Now I can hang the wall paper and get that area done, then on to the dining room. I will be painting in the dinning room and hope to have that room done by the holidays as well. I just want to get all the remodel projects done, many have been in the works for years and I am so tired of looking at unfinished rooms. One way or another all the projects will be done next year, that will be my New Year's Resolution.

Thanks for reading my ramblings.