Holy snow.

Winter '06

Hai folks (I dislike the word folks...) welcome ta Iowah! We gotz some snoah for ya!

Ok, harhar...but being I shoveled around a bunch of snow that was probably about 8 inches or so...I think I deserve the right to be mocking. I *am* a farm girl after all, but boy oh boy do I wish I had my dad-Steve's plow blade truck or my dad-Dave's tractor with a blade. Because, seriously, the City of Decorah is great at making me work. Blows inevitably blow you IN. So you are wise to not try and shovel out the drive until later because it is futile. Then when you plow yourself out, you have to go and dig out the entry to the ally because the City of Decorah plowed you in THERE too. (and it's really not my property to shovel!!!)
Frankly, I shouldn't have to shovel anything because the landlord has a snowblower. Last year, tho, he would come very late in the afternoon/evening and that would be pointless. Especially if I had to be somewhere 6+hours ago. I can only be thankful that today was my day off simply so I could do a lot of shoveling. My arms/hands/wrists/back are not happy; cold, wet, and achy.

Yesterday was basically me spending hours making a potato soup and some butter cookies. My soup turned out great....except when I was shredding my 'tatos I ended up cutting a bit of skin off my knuckle. Yay grater! The soup consisted of chicken broth, garlic, shallot, pepper (red/green), zucchini, and mushroom. Late in the simmer process I mixed in some cheese....served myself a hot bowl with some shredded Mozz and pecans on top. YUM. I also made Parmesan and garlic crescent rolls.

The butter cookies came out delicious...tho my hand mixer cried tears of pain. I probably almost over-heated the damn thing. The dough gets very sticky and thick...you do not add liquid except a Tsp of vanilla...it's cream cheese, a stick of butter, tsp. of vanilla, one egg, and cake mix (dry)...so you have a lump of thick dough. Once you get it mixed you stick it in the fridge for a couple hours so it thickens up enough to make balls. Today's dough might have to be like 3 hours of fridge time since I warmed the cream cheese and butter...it kind of helped. I also did more stirring on my own...hard to mix them tho after all the shoveling.

Cordelia Joy got her first taste (literally) of snow. I brought in a mini-ball of snow for her to taste.
Now that I am somewhat rested, I think a shower is in order. I am probably going to stop by a friend's house for a party they are throwing. I figure I could stay for a couple hours...I work Sunday so I'm not wanting to spend all night. 'Specially after all that shoveling. No worries, pictures to come later!