It’s so hard living away from family, friends and home. When I’m back at my house in MO, I don’t dwell on how much I miss my family and this area probably mostly because I’m so busy with day to day activities and I’ve always been one to believe that I need to bloom where I’m planted but when I’m here . . when I’m with family and friends, enjoying the food that, for the most part, only Louisiana has to offer, when I see how green it is here when it’s still so dull and brown in Missouri, when I see the azaleas blooming, the ginger lilies poking their cheery green shoots up out of the ground, knowing that very soon their fragrance will fill the back yards of gardeners who choose to grow them, it takes all my effort to fight back tears and cry out that I want to live here! I don’t want to leave! My roots are here! But . . come Friday morning, Chad and I will pack up the car and begin our trek back to Missouri but I’ll have plans to return to Louisiana in August, if not sooner.
This morning Chad and I went to our favorite beautician and both got hair cuts, much needed haircuts! Chad desperately needed a hair cut and he only wants Jennifer to cut his hair. I had not had a hair cut since my January 2 incident. We both left Jennifer’s shop looking much better.
Dad picked Chad up and they went to load up some concrete steps from a mobile home Dad had owned that had been destroyed by Hurricane Rita. He’s taking the steps to his camp but they’re not doing that this week. I went by the grocery store and bought the supplies to make meatballs and spaghetti sauce at my niece’s house. Her 4 year old was a tremendous help! 🙂 You should’ve seen the different size meatballs we ended up having! I love that child!
If you’ve read my blog much at all, you know I don’t like chocolate . . except for Goldbrick! Don’t ask me why I love that so much but I do. As far back as I can remember, Goldbrick eggs were in my Easter basket. . . until we moved to Kentucky and I couldn’t find them anywhere! That was really hard for me to accept. I had expected that when we moved to Kentucky, I wouldn’t be able to get crawfish but I never dreamed I’d be giving up Goldbrick eggs too. Then we moved to Missouri. Surely they would have Goldbrick eggs. No! I haven’t been able to find them there either. Thank goodness for Spring Break because it almost always falls either at Easter or a bit before and I’m able to be in Louisiana where Goldbrick eggs are plentiful. Until . . this year! The first day I was here, I went to Wal-Mart expecting to snag a few of my favorite chocolate eggs . . the eggs that cause my family to say “you just say you don’t like chocolate but you really do love it!”. Guess what . . no Goldbrick eggs to be found. I was about to panic . . maybe Elmer’s is no longer making Goldbrick eggs. Mom suggested I try Walgreen’s and sure enough . . there were Goldbrick eggs.
Yep, there’s 24 eggs in there. I will not probably will not eat them all before I get home!
Chad and I went out and ate crawfish again tonight. Mom and dad went out and ate steak. Dad thinks this is the year he will eat zero crawfish. Maybe I was adopted or something! How can my own Dad not be dying for crawfish? To those who asked about them – they could taste like a small lobster but since they’re so small and since the water is so highly seasoned, they absorb a lot of seasoning and are real spicy – much more spicy than any lobster I’ve ever had but I confess to having had far too few lobsters in my time. Crawfish are much easier and quicker to peel than crabs. You kinda twist the head off (I won’t discuss what you do with the head but most of us don’t just throw it away!), you kinda peel the first joint of shell away, then you pinch the tail right where the end of the meat is and . . the edible part of the tail just pops out. Most of us can peel them very quickly. My hands can keep up with my mouth and that’s a very big job. 🙂
Here’s a good little demo on how to peel a crawfish . . if you’re really wanting to know.
And, should anyone think all I’m doing while here in Louisiana is eating and visiting, you would be very wrong!
I’ve been working on my pink and gray Topsy Turvy Nine Patch. I have a class with this pattern and my regular sample will be on its way to Paducah at that time so I need to get this one finished. I had the pieced portions of the borders done before I left MO so I just have to get them on here. Yesterday I sewed all the blocks together into rows, sewed the rows together and got the first border added.
Tomorrow my sister and my nephew are coming from Lafayette. I’m smoking a ham on Mom & Dad’s smoker; Mom is doing the rest of the cooking. For Chad’s political science class he needed to interview an elected official; someone who is currently serving or has served in the past, so he’s interviewing the former Mayor of the small town where I grew up (who also happened to be my history teacher in high school!). On second thought, maybe I don’t want to live back here where everyone remembers me when I was skinny, shy and young!