Hello Stangers!

Please forgive my lack of posts this month. I know you're all dying to read an educational entertaining post transported from my genius brain to digital format.

It's been a busy month. My dad had his second hernia repair surgery last week. I drove my mom and dad to the hospital and then stayed there with my mom for the 6 hours it took before they would release him. They had a problem with the fluid extraction tube not retaining pressure to suck out blood and such (oh, were you eating?) and had to try several methods to get it to work. This seemingly simple hiccup took 2 HOURS to figure out. If I was squeamish to blood, I would have been puking my guts out. but I'm not, so it was cool to watch. maybe I should be a nurse or something. Eventually, they left it as is and said go home. The next day my mom figured out their was a hole in the tube. Genius. Anyway, The doc gave my dad a girdle of sorts to hold his stomach in, and the recovery is going a lot faster this time and less pain. He still is down for 2 weeks though.

Three things I learned during the hospital stay and post op recovery:

1. Hospital beds are made for midgets. Ok, people shorter than 5'9" anyway. (that's considered midget in my family) My poor dad's feet were hanging off the hospital bed by about 6 inches.

2. Intermountain Medical Center is a nice hospital. In the past two months I've been there 3 (4?) times. My mom was at the ER there when she was sick, My sister went there after her miscarriage a couple weeks ago, My dad goes there for his retina specialist (he has sarcoidosis too, poor dadums), and then this surgery. Up to date facilities, good staff and nice place.

3. When nurses say their are cookies for patient families who are waiting, they lie. Graham crackers are NOT cookies.

Oh did I mention this post is ginormous? I'm making up for lost time. Plus I slept until 4pm today with a migraine, can't fall asleep, and what better thing to do than blog at this time of night?

I decided Saturday that I was in a cooking mood. You know, the, "I-need-to-cook-as-many-of-my-recipes-as-posssible-in-one-day" kind of mood? That one.

My outward sign to the family to stay out of my way (that makes my mom groan in anticipation of the dirty dishes to come) is my recipe board, aka the stove hood. I magnet as many recipes as I can and see how many I can get finished before dark. Are those not the coolest magnets ever?

We got them at the Tacoma museum of glass on our vacation

Oooh, but wait first- I've got MILES PICTURES! Have to have a daily Miles break. He's now 10 months old, crawling at lightning speed, saying dada and mum and doing this cheesy smile when you do it to him first.
This cheesy smile

Ah nephews. Gotta love em.

On to the food portion of the blog. Today we will be making Macaroni Salad. I love the store bought kind of macaroni salad, but could never quite perfect the recipe. That is until I stumbled upon recipes.com and combined about 4 different macaroni salad recipes that had 5 star ratings. The outcome? The BEST recipe ever.

You can use chives or red onions, or even white onions with this recipe. I've used all three and they all work. My family isn't a fan of onions though, so green being the most mild of three, I use it.

You can use all three kind of peppers, or none at all. Again I combined four recipes, so use what veggies you want.


After you cook the noodles, I always soak them in ice water to cool them down quick. This also reduces chilling time in the fridge.


All of our flavoring ingredients on display. you can also use real celery instead of celery flakes.

The surprise ingredient? SUGAR!!

Carrots are normally an ingredient, but after dumping these in the strainer and seeing the thick layer of smelly slime, they were a no-go.

I used radish instead. No slime? check. No smell? good to go.

Mix up the rainbow of goodness.

And get the finishing masterpiece!!


I just realized I didn't type the actual recipe. I could make it fun and you have to figure it out by the pictures alone, but I'm not mean -usually.

4 c. uncooked elbow macaroni (yes, cook it eventually)
1 1/2 c. mayo (definitely not a low fat recipe)
1/3 c. white vinegar
1/2 tsp. pepper
1 tsp. salt
1/4 c. carrots (or radish if your carrots are slimy)
1/4 c. EACH of red, yellow and green pepper
2 chives chopped
2/3 c. white sugar
2 T. Deli mustard
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. celery flakes
(I used about 1/2 tsp. of dried red onions for a bit more flavor. It was good)


Chop up veggies, cook noodles, add spices, mix, chill for at least 2hrs. Then devour!



Speaking of veggies, I planted my seeds this week! April 10th is right a round the corner (the last frost danger for you non-gardeners) and I've got things going. This year I'm only planting flowers and tomatoes. My mom and Rachel are doing other vegetables, so we'll still get a good variety.

With the warmer temps, also comes the good ol' compost again. Yay for moldy blueberries!

Hmm, 5am. I think I'll hit the sack now.

AGH! p.s- Do some of you remember when my timing belt broke on my Passat in 2006 and I was out of a car for 2 months? Well, they had a settlement filed against them (volkswagon) and after 6 long months, I'm included in the reimbursment group o' peeps. $2,000 bucks baby! I was so mad when I had to pay that amount back then, but I'm getting it all now. Karma I guess. Yipee!!!!!!!!! If you're interested in details of it all (audi was included I believe) go to http://www.timingbeltsettlement.com/

Now I'm really going to bed.