An Easy Cheesecake Recipe

Hi there everyone, hope you are having a great Saturday. Mine was quiet (except for one phone call), my only plans were to make this pie (below), make some pizza dough (and a pizza for dinner tonight) and do the dishes, that never seem to get done. I thought I would get downstairs to do some cards, but did not make it.

Another challenge for today was to call Directv and find out where I am to take their remotes, DVR and cords. If I keep them and don't send them in 22 days I will get charged. Please, am I not paying enough!?! Well, the guy I talked to, tried to give me a better deal then Spectrum. I said they already hooked me up, I am not going to change over, then have Directv re-hook me up again....come on now. Well, he would not let it go and said how about this deal.....NOOOOOO I said, stop pushing me!!! Gerrrrrrr I was getting mad. He finally stopped. I said all I want to do is return your product and not get charged for it. I can no longer pay $225 a month. Spectrum is $75 cheaper!!! Why do they push so hard???

Well anyways, here is the easy lemon cheesecake recipe. I think you could use instant Chocolate pudding mix, or Strawberry mix, or whatever you may want to use. Chocolate sounds good!!!

Instant Pudding No Bake Cheesecake

Soften 8 oz. cream cheese in microwave 30-45 seconds. Blend in 1/2 cup milk with cheese until smooth.

Add pudding mix and 1 1/2 cup milk to cream cheese mixture. Beat for 1 minute until smooth. Pour into a graham cracker crust and put in refrigerator till firm, 2-3 hours. So simple, oh but don't forget the whip cream....soooo good!!! I am afraid this pie will not last the weekend.

I made some more cut-out cookies the other day....using cream cheese and butter, almond extract and flour. They were so soft and the frosting pretty and sweet. Taking a picture now for my next blog post. Needless to say, there are not many left. 

Guess that is why I have so many dishes in the sink that never seem to get done, cooking too much. Well, I think I will cut this post short. Getting tired and want to watch some cooking shows then go to bed. You all have a great rest of the weekend and keep looking up, better days are coming, Cheers ~ Louise

A Few Things On Next Week's Agenda

Hi there everyone. Hope you are having a good evening and your week-end will be a fun one. Can you believe March is just around the corner....whew time does fly by. I think I'm going through "Winter Fatigue" (that would be "just getting tired of the winter blahs") although JP said it was just "Cabin Fever" either way, I am looking forward to Spring and walking outside and getting some fresh air. Lately it has been way too cold and snowy for me or Kylie. I have noticed it is getting lighter and lighter at 5:00....yay...pretty soon we can start walking again.

I was looking at Pinterest and saw some things I would like to try...that's always a fun thing for me to do. Don't these sandwiches look really good below....yum. I think the recipe said a slice of toast, with mayo, tomatoes and avocado with melted cheese....mmm. Sounds good to me.

Here are two drinks that I might try....they sound so refreshing don't they? If they worked and did the things said....it could be worth it. I do have some frozen lemon and mint ice cubes in the freezer. Need to get some ginger....maybe I could use a tsp of ginger might work. Looks like the drink below could be made tomorrow for breakfast. I have all the ingredients. Maybe I could turn it into a smoothie???

These two beautiful cards....I just love. I am going to a Stampin' Up Camp on Sunday. So I know for sure, one of my purchases will be this lovely butterfly. So pretty. Oh, there are a few stamps I will be buying also. Maybe the set on these two cards.

I saw this cake today....mmmm....it sounded delish. The cake is baked in a cast iron pan...now that is interesting to me. I printed the recipe out...so if it works I will surely put it on my blog. I think it is diabetes worthy...I will just cut down on the sugar, like from a cup to 1/2 cup. If I can handle it and not get tempted....and maybe two bites at a time, leaving the rest for JP.

Doesn't this little dish look yummy.....grilled tomatoes on a bed of spinach, a poached egg and grilled portobella mushroom....nice breakfast, lunch or dinner right????

So there you have it....some cards, drinks, desserts and food I plan on making this next week. As for soups.....I have a recipe for Chinese Meatball soup and Basil Tomato Soup and Turkey Meatballs.....sound good??? A few other recipes I need to try...Slow Cooker Teriyaki Chicken and Eggs baked in Portobello Mushrooms. I may also try a recipe that I have not made in a very long time, Tuna Fish Casserole. JP will be eating well this next week, don't 'cha think???

Time to close and go do some wash and ride the bike. I hope you liked my plans for this next week.....maybe this will help me get past the "Winter Fatigue" phase.

Have a good night and keep looking up. Cheers ~ Louise

And the Winners of This Lovely Card are.....

Hi there everyone...hope you are having a good day. So we got home from church today, and the first thing I did was pick the 4 names out of the bowl. And....these are the winners of this lovely Victorian Valentine card.

1 - Patricia - www.patricia-heythereitsme.blogspot.com
2 - Tina - www.kittykatkards.blogspot.com
3 - Brenda - www.inkspiredtostamp.blogspot.com
4 - Biz - www.mybizzykitchen.com

Hope you will visit their blogs also.....I visit them daily, always looking forward to what they have posted and getting some new idea, whether it be card making, food making, exercise or just a little encouragement in daily life.

Tina recently posted a great recipe for Chocolate Peanut Butter Mug Cake....oh my was that DE-LISH-OUS!!!!! Oh and she makes some really neat cards and sells on Etsy too.
Biz posts wonderful ideas about food, dieting and exercise...she is a daily visit....and I must have something to eat before I read her blog because I drool over the food she makes!! She has entered a couple of Recipe Contests and is a contender to win 10k for a pizza she made. Can hardly wait to see if she wins!!
Brenda always has great ideas about making cards. She lives life day by day tackling the problems she deals with living with a husband who has Alzheimer's.
Patricia took a wonderful cruise to Alaska....it was so refreshing, felt like I had gone there too even if it was via blogland. She posts lots of food too, along with everyday life.

So there you have it, the winners. I will get the cards addressed tonight and sent in the mail tomorrow. Hopefully you will see your card by Valentines Day and the Pony Express moves swiftly through the bad weather that is coming soon.

Have a great night and keep looking up. Cheers ~ Louise

Birthday Update......and Car Problems

Hi there everyone and everybody.......hope you had a wonderful weekend and are looking forward to Thanksgiving!!!! I am still dancing around my birthday as you can see. A few more pictures of my flowers and birthday cake, which was a cheese cake from Festival. Oh yum, half chocolate chip and half plain. I so thoroughly enjoyed this cake and will do it again without any celebration.

I love this picture of my bouquet of flowers....you just may see this picture again and again....I think it is sooooo pretty.

In this picture is the chocolate chip....I made some cranberry sauce and spooned it over the cheese cake....was so very delicious and healthy.....don't you think????

This was my slice......had to hold the plate up so the flowers could be my background. Sort of an odd picture, but you get the idea.

Well as you see by the title of this blog, this is an update of my birthday celebration. We had a wonderful time at BJ Clancys. where I had a free steak dinner....no I did not take any pictures. I guess you can take just so many pictures of a piece of steak and fries and salad and some chocolate ice cream with a candle on top.

After dinner, we came home, and I took Kylie for a walk around the block....or I mean she walked me. After the walk, I went downstairs and worked on some Christmas cards for Hospice, have about 30 Christmas, now I need to put some Birthday, Thinking of you and Thank you cards together.

Next thing on my agenda is to make some Christmas cards to send to some friends and family. Hope I can come up with some new ideas.

Speaking of family....our niece had her baby on my birthday....now I share a birthday with a little girl named Madelyn Renee....that should be an easy birthday to remember when sending a card.

Bad news, we went to church this morning which is 32 miles round trip. The car was making a funny sound when we drove off. We got to church, went through the motions of church, sing, prayer, tithes, greet, music, preach. After church this man started talking to us and we ended up staying till 2pm (church had finished at 11am) This guy was the leader of a gang of 300 guys in NYC.....my goodness, did he have some stories to tell......I suddenly felt like I had been to church...gosh he was full of the fire of the Holy Spirit. I probably could have listened to him for another hour. But, all things have to come to an end. His wife was calling him to come home. So we locked up the church and got into the car.

We were going to have something to eat at the restaurant but, it had closed. We stopped at the gas station and JP noticed that the steering was a little hard (that's strange). We left the gas station and the battery light went on...then suddenly another light went on and then a beeping sound....suddenly I saw that the radiator gauge was on hot....."JAY the radiator gauge!!!" We stopped on the side of the road, he got out and lifted the hood and he saw that the serpentine belt had broke.....oh geez...that connects everything to "everything"!!!!

So now what????? So JP called the service station we have gone to for over 25 years....no answer, but then the called transferred to the owner and he answered, we told Dave the problem and he sent a tow truck to pick up the car and us. We sat in the car for a half hour, it got a little chilly, but JP had a few snacks in his lunch box....I could feel my blood sugars either rising or lowering....but the snacks helped.

The tow truck showed up, the mechanic put the car on the truck and we jumped in the front seat of the tow truck (well, I did not exactly jump into the front seat...68 years does not jump very high or fast). The mechanic drove us to our house, cause the service station is about 5 blocks away.

What a crazy day....way too much stress of this old lady. Another adventure with JP.....no....not liking these adventures much anymore. So now we wait to see what tomorrow brings, hopefully the car will be fixed in time for JP to go to work....if not, that will be our next problem. The service station has some cars that people can use if their car is un-drive-able....well, that would be us, hopefully they have an extra car if our car is not finished.

Well, I can see this is way to long of a blog and you have probably stopped reading, cause it is so boring. I shall close here and follow-up tomorrow....I am hating the idea of seeing the bill for this job. Since I was only $125.00 away from paying off our previous bill, now they will add on to this bill the new total....uge, can we never get ahead???????  Just wondering.

Have a good day and keep looking up.....I know I do.
Cheers ~ Louise

Chocolate Please..........

Hi there everyone. Hope your Sunday evening is special and relaxing. My husband is on a "pity party" right now, and seems to like blaming me for his problems. Although he says it is not, I still feel guilty. So my evening is not so special and relaxing. I think I will go hide in the basement and make some cards till the storm passes by.

Lately the "lemons" have been falling in abundance!! "Sweetest Day" came and went yesterday and my "supposedly sweetheart" did not acknowledge me or the day, he's not very romantic. Oh Well. Finally I reminded him and he said, "what do you want??" I said, no card, no flower, how 'bout a nice "Prime Rib from Festival Foods???" He said, "okay"...huh!...maybe I should ask for some chocolate too?????

We went out to eat today....that was nice. I had a "freightliner omelet" 3 eggs, cheese, fried potatoes and bacon and rye toast. Gosh was that delish. I took half of it home for breakfast tomorrow, or lunch. I did not do my smoothie this morning so I must more then make up for it tomorrow. I have lost a couple of pounds...but not enough to say "I am losing weight" because of my smoothies every morning.

Oh well....I guess a smoothie a day will hopefully keep the Doctor away. I do feel better, so that is a plus. My blood sugars today was 110 this morning....good numbers for me.

The roofers may show up this week and work on our roof.....I hope....the weather is suppose to be nice this week. I will keep you posted. We still have lots of leaves to rake in the back yard. But we have 2 more leaf pick-ups, so we are ahead of the game at this point. I have a leaf blower, so that makes the chore a little easier.

Let's see, what more lemons can I give you today that deserve some chocolate?????  My husband says there is dirt in our drinking water....and does not want to drink it. He wants a Brita water pitcher....okay I said, I will buy a new one for myself, in purple and you can have this one. Oh goodie, I have been wanting a new colored Brita pitcher....Chocolate!!!!!

I am not so sure where this blog is going, or where it went, maybe it is a bit of complaint here and there....but what are blogs for but to get things off our chest. I do feel better though, so thanks for listening.

You all have a good evening and enjoy your week.......don't blink your eyes too long cause these two weeks will fly by pretty fast!!!
Keep looking up and enjoy some chocolate this week!!
Cheers ~ Louise

♥Coooookies♥and a Recipe♥

Hi everyone, how you all doing?? Keeping your Christmas activities "stress-free"?? So much to do in so little time it seems. Well I have a lot of loose ends to tie up. Finally got all the decorations up. Need to finish up a few more cards which usually contain a letter. I used to do those Christmas letters to everyone, but who wants to read a run-down of everything a person does in the year. My year was not that much different then the previous year...so I guess not alot of news.

Been doing a bit of baking, need to send a package to Pops in Las Vegas. So far I have Buttered Popcorn cookies and Peanut Butter cookies with almond kisses in the center. As you can see in this picture below.

Today I will be making some Georgia Tea Cakes and hopefully packing the package tonight in order to mail it tomorrow. Oh and I am adding a cute little stuffed puppy dog. I Hate to see the lines at the post office tomorrw, but it needs to get done.

The recipe for the Georgia Tea Cakes is really easy....that is why I chose them. Here's the recipe:
1 cup sugar (I might add less)
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup milk
2 - 2 1/2 cups self-rising flour
Colored Sugars

Intructions:
Mix together sugar, butter, vanilla, egg and milk. Stir in enough flour to make a stiff dough. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto greased baking sheets; sprinkle with colored sugar. Bake @ 375 degrees for 9-10 minutes. Center should be soft when cooled.

So maybe when I get the cookies baked, I will add the picture to this blog at the end of the day so you can see what they look like. If you would like the recipe for the Buttered Popcorn cookies here is the address: http://www.milkandmode.com/2012/11/buttered-popcorn-cookies.html?spref=bl the Peanut Butter with kiss centers is from Pillsbury Peanut Butter dough.

After reading this blog a couple of times, I failed to let you know what I thought of the Buttered Popcorn cookies....I really liked them, but then who doesn't like popcorn????

1) The dough was really good and you probably could add just about anything your heart desires to it.

2) The recipe calls for 1/3 cup un-poppedcorn which is equivilant to 4-5 cups of popped popcorn.

3) Mix the dough and popcorn all together then roll into golf sized balls. I found pressing the balls down before baking rather then waiting after they baked, they will be more crispy-er...which is the way I like them. Good Cookies for popcorn lovers.

Well, you all have a great day and keep looking up for your redemption draws nigh.
Cheers ~ Louise

Do You Like Chocolate Cake???

Hi everyone. How are you all doing on this bright and sunny day??? Well, it is bright and sunny here. Looking out the window though...looks like I need to wash a few windows...hahahaha.

So here's my question: Do you like Chocolate cake??? If you do, this is the BEST chocolate cake I have EVER had!! I thought I might be able to freeze a little, but I don't think it will make it to the freezer, maybe a couple of pieces might, just not sure at this point!!

If you are looking for a GOOD cake for one of those special occasions...this is your cake to buy. Go to: http://cakebosscakes.com

You'll see a big picture of Buddy holding a pretty blue cake. Go up to the right of the screen and click on PRODUCTS go to the pretty teal cake wrapped up like a present. Click on the cake and up will come 7 different cakes and OH! there is that wonderul "Oh My Ganache" cake I had for my birthday!!!

In this picture the cake has been taken out of the box and is sitting pretty on the table. My taste buds were singing at this point and I could hardly wait for the first bite of this scrumptious cake.

Here I have placed 3 candles on the cake and lite them (67 candles would have taken too long to place, light and then blow out) 3 candles was enough and also all I had on hand...lol!

Here I have cut a piece of cake and lite another candle........mouth drooling......I could hardly wait for that first bite of heavenly, delicious, chocolate. YES, YES, it truly was what I was expecting. If I could give you a piece...I would have.

In this last picture is all that is left...actully JP got another slice. And yes.....I did manage to save a few pieces and freeze them for later on in the week, like maybe for Thanksgiving day. BUT....I may get some Peanut Butter Cup Cakes from Buddy...maybe, maybe :)

Well there you have it....Ode to "oh my ganache" cake.......best birthday cake I ever had and best $19.99 I ever spent and well worth it!!!

You all have a great day and keep looking up for your redemption draws nigh. Cheers ~ Louise

We Got The Car Today.......YAY!!!

And I started the day off with Chocolate so the day went way better then usual.......hahahahaha!!!!!

Every thing worked out pretty well, concidering there were lots of hoops we had to jump through buying this car. (see previous blog) But oh, it looks great sitting in our drive way. (Picture to follow in next blog.) I got to drive it home from Fond Du Lac today, air conditioner works great and the ride was really smooth. I am a happy camper!!! We got the financing and had the title released as the Taurus was paid for via the loan which we still owed $400 on for the roof. When we got down to FDL the dealer said we could not drive the Taurus back home without plates on, (our plan was to drop off the Taurus at the Junk yard but, we did not have the title release either) so she set us up with temp plates on the Dodge. When we get to the junk yard the plates go on the Dodge and the temps get thrown in the garbage. That will probably be tomorrow......(sniff) I shall miss the Taurus, it was a good little car, But it kept us close to home for fear of something breaking on a long trip. Now, we can go for little mini vacation for a day and come back......I think this shall be a good summer with a few trips in the future.

Well, tis time to close this blog for today. Need to go do some dishes and begin to decide what JP should have for dinner @ 1:00 am. Chicken Noodle Soup, so far, is on the menu. Maybe fish and some sort of vegie and his fruit with yogurt. JP would be happy with fish every night, but we need to change it up for varities sake!!!

You all have a great day and keep looking up for your redemption draws nigh.

Cheers ~ Louise