Life in the Middle Age Lane

Another year and another trip to Key West.  The things I love about KW are the following...... 1)  Beautiful bungalows throughout the island 2)  Amazing museums (I toured Truman's Little White House & Hemingway's Home) 3)  Crazy, insane, uninhabited, kind people. All these things make up Fantasy Fest in a nutshell.  Well, perhaps not the museum portion but those can be substituted with Fogarty's Monkey Bar on Duval Street and their delicious Mudslides plus The White Tarpons signature cocktail Key Lime Martini, located on Front St near the pier. Here is a rated R version of the parade of people you will see during Fantasy Fest. Have you heard of the six toed cats in Key West?  Here is a picture of one from the Ernest Hemingway home. I thought they were pretty cool....cats.  Another thing you will find interesting is that throughout the island you will come across chickens, chicks and roosters.  I did may daily mornin...

This year I had my Spooky Gals Night on a Friday night so that I could have two days to recuperate from the cooking, cleaning, decorating, socializing, drinking that this evening brings forth.  A lot of fun with some great ladies! I kept the menu simple but delicious.  We had deviled eggs, meatballs, a vegetable tray and Buffalo Chicken Sliders.  Dessert consisted of a Cranberry-Apple Pumpkin Bundt Cake that was to die for. You can find the recipe for this here.  It took me about two hours to make this because there were several steps for the topping, the glaze, the filling and the cake.  But I have to tell you it is the best fall cake around and it looks very festive for the holidays. My appetizers were kept simple but delicious.  I did not use olives for the meatballs since I am not a big fan of the taste unless they are in a Bloody Mary. This appetizer is so easy that it consist of only 3 ingredients.  Recipe can be found here . ...

I just had to post on my new find for hair care.  What did you think this post was about? I recently purchased this BeLissPro Titanium Curl Genius. Click here for more info.  I went to the Sally store and purchased mine for $99. I see that Amazon has a similar professional curler for $399 not sure why the huge price difference but believe me when I say I did not pay that amount for my magic wand. My hair is very thin and when I curl it it last maybe a couple of hours when I take the time to do it.  Well, with this curling iron, it last all night and still wake up with curls!  It also has three settings for the type of curl, loose, medium and tight. I just love mine and wanted to share with all my friends this new find! Have a great first week of October!

I have always felt that God has been looking out for me.  Even when I would royally screw up it was a lesson I had to learn and had purpose.  I always felt looked after.  I can't explain it, describe it or prove it.  It's just there. An "ah ha" moment happen to me this past week.  Not so much strange as, for lack of better words,  an inner growth spark. I know, now you are thinking that I am making stuff up.  No seriously, I think I grew a little inside. I behaved in the most unfavorable way towards an old ex-friend.  Long story short, some women just should not be friends.  This is the case with this woman.  She on the other hand, felt that we were very close friends.   After back and forth of some very ugly emails to each other, (not my proudest moment), we finally spoke on the phone.  I apologized for my shortcomings and for the 10 year old adolescent behavior and she did not.  That was okay with me.  I wa...

 We were privileged to be invited to a choir performance at Grace Lutheran Church on Waugh this past Sunday.  The concert was to celebrate the Music minister's one year anniversary, who also happens to be my son's boyfriend. The music was beautiful and uplifting.  Aside from leading the choir, J also plays the organ and piano at the church.  He has such a passion for music and you can just see the love the choir has for him.   Two songs they sang were from Sister Act and were such fun upbeat music to hear in the church setting. A few beautiful solos from the choir members and even J joining in at the end with his beautiful deep baritone voice got the congregation clapping to the beat. I have visited and belong to several different churches in my lifetime.  However, they always left me feeling judged, disappointed, and unfulfilled.  This church was the epitome of what Christianity should be. A congregation from all walks of li...

We love Sushi.  We don't love the price tag of sushi.  I recently used my computer talents to search YouTube and various other internet sites on how to make sushi.  John brought home some great Grade A Salmon from Alaska.    Well, you can eat Smoked Salmon only for so long and thought I would surprise my honey with Salmon Sushi Rolls. I found the following website to help me through the process. Sushi Rice:     Food Network   click on it to get directed to link Salmon Roll:   YouTube  click on it to get directed to link I love the guys little hand gesture for sushi rice recipes. Anyway, I had cucumbers and avocado on hand, picked up the seaweed paper and made the rice. In 10 minutes John and I assembled our rolls and enjoyed our dinner together.  We loved it so much that we did it again the next night except I picked up some prawns and I found a recipe online again for Tempura Shrimp. Tempura Shrimp:   http://...

For the past 20 years or so, I have stored bins full of my children's toys and some clothing.  I know that some of my hoarding tendencies stem from the fact that I do not have anything from my childhood.  I didn't want my kids not to have childhood memorabilia once they established their own family.  And another part of me wanted to tell my gorgeous grandchildren (and they will be gorgeous) that the toy they are playing with once belong to their mom or dad.  My husband thinks I'm crazy but he doesn't discourage me and takes the bins to our airplane hanger for storage when needed.  I'm a very lucky wife.  John's philosophy about spending and my over zealous social calendar is "Don't sweat the little stuff" and it's all little stuff. ( Great book by the way.)  It makes living with him very pleasant.  No worries about spending or hiding shopping bags or needing a separate checking account, as some wives I know do.   He always told me that...