A New Word

A friend gave me this lovely book a few months ago.

I've referred to it several times to answer specific questions, but have not reviewed the entire book. I decided to start that effort tonight and, lo and behold, I learned a new word.

Preprandial: of, relating to, or suitable for the time just before dinner

< a preprandial drink >

According to Merriam-Webster, this word is in the bottom 30% of look-ups on their site. You think?

I challenge you to use this word in casual conversation sometime in the next 7 days. If you manage to do so, would you come back here, leave a comment and tell us the details?

Christmas

The tree is on the front porch and the house (inside and outside) is a blank slate waiting for the decorations to be applied. 

Thanksgiving Recap

We had a few appetizers.

A turkey was fried.

Potatoes were expertly mashed.

The buffet was laden with food.

The cranberry sauce had ridges.

And a family portrait was taken.

I almost forgot to show the desserts. The pumpkin cheesecake was spectacular.

I hope your Thanksgiving was as good as ours!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving Tablescape

I am joining Susan at Between Naps on the Porch for Tablescape Thursday.

To anchor the tablescape, I used a damask tablecloth and 12 napkins I snagged at an estate sale this past summer. Yes, $10!

The table.

A place setting. 

I love these salts.

A knife rest. Sterling purchased within a few months of our marriage.

Tiny butter pat plates.

Our wedding china on chargers from Dillards. The leaf plates from Pier One.

Wedding crystal.

The turkey and the candlesticks were all purchased at estate sales.

The turkey candle holders and candles were brand new in the box from Williams Sonoma, purchased for pennies at an estate sale. As was the pair of ceramic turkeys.

Our sweet 8 and 5 year old nieces were just here with their parents. They loved the table settings, especially the salt spoons and the butter pat plates. They can't wait to use them tomorrow. It's best they learn young to appreciate nice things, don't you think?

I hope you and yours have a Happy Thanksgiving!

Chargers: A gift from Dillards years ago

China: Royal Doulton, Alice

Crystal: Waterford, Araglin

Sterling: Easterling, American Classic

Leaf Plates: Pier One

Napkin Rings: Hobby Lobby

Tablecloth & Napkins: Estate Sale

Butter Pat Plates: Estate Sale

Knife Rests: Estate Sale

Salts: Estate Sale

Candleholders, candles and decorative turkeys: Estate Sale

The Thing To Do The Day Before Thanksgiving

If you have followed me on Twitter and Facebook for a while, you may remember that on July 1, 2011 (one of the hottest days of the year) I tweeted that I had just accepted delivery of our new snow blower.

The Husband unpacked it and carefully stored it away. He had vowed to be prepared if we have a repeat of the snow of February, 2011. No more spending 16-18 hours over two days shoveling the driveway and the sidewalk!

He fired it up this morning and it works just fine. Bring on the snow, Oklahoma. He's ready for you!

A Birthday & A Wedding

Saturday was The Husband's birthday. We don't celebrate birthdays by throwing parties, we usually celebrate by going out for a nice dinner or taking a nice trip. For this particular birthday, we attended a wedding!

We are now the old folks that attend weddings at the invitation of the bride or groom's parents. In this case, the bride was the daughter of a former co-worker.

The wedding was held at the wonderful, historic The Mayo Hotel. The ceremony was conducted in the lobby of the hotel and the reception was in the Crystal Ballroom on the 16th floor. Everything was lovely.

Here's a picture of me and the birthday boy. Isn't he handsome?

The Sister and The Brother-in-Law.

The Sister and The Brother-in-Law, plus our good friends D & K.

I'm the nice sister.

Because it was The Husband's birthday and because we'd never stayed at The Mayo Hotel, we booked a room. Actually, it was a suite. No, really it was one of their residences that has not been rented. There are 70 residences in the hotel. We decided we could totally live there.

The living room.

The dining area and kitchen, with a view into the bedroom.

A view of the kitchen from the bedroom door.

The bedroom was very spacious. This photo doesn't do it justice.

The bathroom is accessible from the kitchen or the bedroom. There is a pocket door that can be used to separate the shower/sink area from the toilet and a second sink. Hook-ups for a full size stacking washer/dryer are in a closet.

I think it would be cool to live in a historic place like The Mayo Hotel.

Maybe they would rename the restaurant from Trula to Cindy and hang my portrait in a place of honor?

Let the Cooking Commence

Preparations for Thanksgiving dinner began this morning. I pulled out my trusty binder.

I turned to the Cajun Fried Turkey recipe and assembled all the ingredients.

I mixed everything together and am now allowing the seasoned liquid to sit for 1 hour before beginning the process of straining it through a coffee filter. It will take a couple of days to complete this task. 

I previously posted two short videos that show how the seasoning is applied to the turkey. You can find them here.

I will now work on my grocery list using my tried and true method to ensure I only make one trip to the store! I'm planning to be there bright and early Monday morning. How about you? When will you do your Thanksgiving shopping?

Blogger's New Dynamic Views

I promise I'm not trying to confuse you!

As you can see, I've reverted to the old template for Cindy's Clipboard. While I really liked the look of Blogger's new dynamic views, you cannot modify them. Because I could not install my "gadgets" on the new template, my site counter did not work. Also, you couldn't see my followers and other things.

I plan to give feedback to Blogger and hope that they will be able to resolve some of these issues for their next release of dynamic views. In the meantime, I back to the old fomat.

Talk to you later!

Unintended Consequences

When you work in the on-line world, you worry about changes to websites having "unintended consequences." I've experienced it this week.

I changed my blog template 3 days ago to use Blogger's new Dynamic Views. Since then, I have only had 1 or 2 recorded visitors per day to my blog.

What's up with that?

I need to investigate. Thank goodness I'll have more time soon to do just that!

I'm A Happy Girl

Thursday is the last day of my part-time, temporary, contract job. It was supposed to last two months, however, it turned into a four month assignment. It was a good experience to re-enter the working world, as I was able to exercise skills not used since my exit from "Corporate America" in October of 2009.

The ending of this assignment is fortuitous because of the approaching holidays. I'm excited to start planning Thanksgiving, which will be at our house, and our Christmas festivities. And, with my new free time, I plan to post more frequently on this clipboard. 

I suppose after the New Year I will seek out another job. If you know of any projects in the Tulsa area that might fit my skill set (organization/coordination), drop me a line.

Changes to the Old Blog

As you can see, I've applied a new template to Cindy's Cupboard.

Blogger is now offering 7 new templates and I think this one is the best way to display my content.

What do you think?

Saganaki

I'm still telling stories from our October trip to New Mexico.

One evening, our friends took us to Nick and Jimmy's Restaurant. We sat at the bar (surprise!) and started our evening with this appetizer:

Saganaki - Flaming Kasseri cheese with toasted pita bread

Yes, you read that right. Flaming cheese!

I had never tasted Kasseri cheese. Have you? I had never tasted Saganaki? Have you?

We are going to attempt to make this delicious appetizer at home. With a fire extinguisher near, of course.

I searched for a "how to" guide and found a number of videos on YouTube. Click here.

It's a great tasting appetizer and looks like fun to make. I'll let you know what our results are!

Disaster Preparedness

I've made a decision.

Since Oklahoma has had two earthquakes this weekend, I'm going to do the necessary research and put together a serious emergency kit for my family. I will begin by researching pre-existing checklists developed by government agencies, as well as others, and which cover:

• natural disasters (tornado, earthquake, hurricane, fire, flood, ice/snow, drought, extreme heat etc.) 
• pandemics (swine flu, ebola, etc.)
• hazardous material spills (both at home and in public), nuclear power plant melt downs, power grid black outs, natural gas explosions, etc.
• terrorist attacks (biological, chemical, nuclear, radiological dispersion device, etc.)
• invasion of the US homeland by a hostile foreign nation(s)
• zombie attacks
• mutant animal attacks
• extraterrestrial attacks

Wow. Did I miss anything? Might as well add:

• maurading bands of criminals who will rise when the social order breaks down due to any of the above situations

Anything else?

My first calculation will be how many cases of Scotch and Vodka will be required to survive each situation. 

I'll let you know how our kit comes together.

Seriously, do you have an emergency kit and a plan? Don't you think you should?

Wild Animals

Did you think I forgot this blog? I took a break from here and it continued longer than I thought it would. I have a few stories from our trip to New Mexico that I wanted to share with you, but I just never got around to it. I'll start with writing them and we'll see if that process kick starts my blog mojo!

While we were in Taos, we met a bartender. Imagine that! (sarcasm) 

He works at a nice restaurant and was so entertaining, we went to dinner there twice. During our chats, he told us he lives outside of Taos proper, on a bit of acreage. 

On our first visit, he told us he has a dog. Actually a 1/2 wolf, 1/2 German Shepard. A wolfdog! On our second visit, he told us he has a couple of cats. One of which is a 1/2 cat, 1/2 bobcat. A pixie-bob! 

I've met a wolfdog before, but never a pixie-bob. How about you? Have you ever met a hybrid animal?