Gen Gathering - New Genealogy Resource

A new resource I was just directed to that some may be interested in http://www.gengathering.com/index.php Looking for some info on a family member who moved far from home? Or maybe who is just far from where you make your home now? The above site has a bunch of researchers who are willing to help out if and when they can. You will need to create a user name and password and then you can check and see if there are any volunteers for the area where your people made their home.

So I am completely and utterly EXHAUSTED!!! Why you may ask?? Cause I damn near had a heart attack this morning! Well two!! Around 3:45 this morning my 17-year-old was yelling MOM in my face and shaking me (she must have tried whispering for awhile which didn't work LOL). She says I think there are racoons outside my window again trying to get in. She mentioned this a few weeks back but I thought she was either dreaming or a tad insane (that would be from her dad's side of the family). So I drag my "you just scared the crap out of me - someone get the defibrillator" butt into her room and slowly peel back the curtain, looking side to side. Nothing!!! (Damn my husband and his insane hillbilly inbred kin - no offense to any inbred hillbillies I may have as friends ). Nicely told her there was nothing there while resisting the urge to smack her in the head with her pillow. "Mom, I know something is there!!! Rae (her cat) was hissing and growling and I could hear something picking at my screen!!! I know it's those racoons again," She says to me! "Dev, there's nothing there, look", as I peel back the curtain. HOLY FFFFFFFFFF WORD I SCREAM...and I did not say fudge! Two faces come running towards me like I am the tastiest piece of leftover chicken carcass they have ever seen! Will racoons eat carcass covered in poo cause I am pretty sure I damn near crapped my pants! Apparently they felt guilty about scaring my child and me and felt they needed to apologize by putting on a show for us. By indulging in some HRA - hot raccoon action - RIGHT THERE!!! OUTSIDE HER WINDOW!! She starts yelling OMG STOP!!! I DON'T WANT TO SEE RACCOON PORN!! As if it isn't bad enough I am almost having a heart attack, on the verge of pooing cause they scared me so bad....now she wants me to pee myself too laughing at her Raccoon porn comment? I need a nap!

Loaded Potato and Chicken Casserole

2 pounds boneless chicken breasts, cubed (1") 8-10 medium potatoes, cut in 1/2" cubes 1/3 cup olive oil 1&1/2 tsp salt 1 Tbsp. black pepper 1 Tbsp. paprika 2 Tbsp. garlic powder 6 Tbsp. hot sauce Topping: 2 cups fiesta blend cheese 1 cup crumbled bacon 1 cup diced green onion Preheat oven to 500 degrees. Spray a 9X13" baking dish with cooking spray. In a large bowl mix together the olive oil, salt, pepper, paprika, garlic powder and hot sauce. Add the cubed potatoes and stir to coat. Carefully scoop the potatoes into the prepared baking dish, leaving behind as much of the olive oil/hot sauce mixture as possible. Bake the potatoes for 45-50 minutes, stirring every 10-15 minutes, until cooked through and crispy and browned on the outside. While the potatoes are cooking, add the cubed chicken to the bowl with the left over olive oil/hot sauce mixture and stir to coat. Once the potatoes are fully cooked, remove from the oven and lower the oven temperature to 400 degrees. Top the cooked potatoes with the raw marinated chicken. In a bowl ix together the cheese, bacon and green onion and top the raw chicken with the cheese mixture. Return the casserole to the oven and bake for 15 minutes or until chicken is cooked through and the topping is bubbly delicious. Thanks to my FB buddy Vicki for giving me this recipe.

Where to begin?

Alot has happened around here within the last month. Some good, some not so good. The good stuff is as good a place to start as any I guess?

One of the ladies my husband has done work for over the last few years has been leasing the larger part of her home off and on for the last couple of years. She recently signed on with a new family for a minimum one year lease for her house but one of the conditions was they did NOT want any of the furniture that was in the home so she ended up GIVING us a shitload of new furniture. Like we are talking MAYBE a year old, definitely not two. She has basically refurnished my entire livingroom and kitchen! She gave us a gorgeous silver/gray couch, loveseat and chair with glass coffee table and end table and rug to replace the massive sectional we likely should have replaced a year ago, a huge cream recliner to replace the ghastly recliner that went with my sectional but that was so worn out you thought it was something you found in a pile of crap in some woman on Hoarder's house (it was so worn it was just sad, but oh so comfortable and I pretty much lived in the darn thing during the pregnancy with my son). She also sent us home with a chocolate brown couch, kind of like a futon, that has an adjustable back and sides to it which was supposed to go in my basement for the kids, but forget them, I kept it to replace the other lighter blue couch in my livingroom. Stuff was just to nice to shove it in the dungeon (the kids basement cave)!
We had just come home with the gray set and hubby was to pick up the brown couch the next day, but when he came home she had also sent in the cream recliner THEN proceeded to send him home with a huge kitchen table and chairs (which we desperately needed), a bunch of dishes, glassware and T-Fal pots and pans! All stuff I said she should sell on kijiji, but she said she didn't have time to do so either take it or she was ordering a dumpster and having it hauled away!! What a freaking amazing woman!! I always tease my hubby and call her "Mommy" cause when she knows he isn't feeling well she calls to check on him, if she hasn't seen him she calls just to see how we all are doing, things you think a mom does (but which his doesn't). She is just the nicest, sweetest person ever (and I don't like people, so don't say that about to damn many people LOL) and that was BEFORE she gave us anything. So as you can well imagine, December started out awesome!! Well that lasted about a week.



Couple weeks before Christmas my father-in-law was rushed by ambulance to hospital unresponsive. Assume he had been napping and when mother-in-law tried to wake him, she couldn't. If I remember correctly, she called up her sister-in-law who was a nurse who also couldn't wake him so they called an ambulance. Paramedics couldn't get him to come to either so he was brought into hospital where he finally came to and has been there ever since. (Almost three years ago he suffered some health issues, and after a diagnosis of blood clots in the neck, then changed to "oh he had a stroke", the doctor finally settled on a diagnosis of Primary Progressive Aphasia. Personally, all along, I've thought there was more at work due to the memory issues and some of the things I've witnessed when they have been at our home that reminded me so much of my Grampy who had Alzheimer's.) As of yesterday he has been moved from the main hospital to the Geriatric wing at St. Joe's. Whether this is a shortterm arrangement, only until he is assessed to see if he can (and SHOULD) return home, or whether this is where he is going to remain for the rest of his days in unknown. My husband, when talking to his mother, gets one story and I get something else entirely so where the truth lies is as good a guess as any. You can only get so much information when you are not the next-of-kin or do not hold power of attorney. So now, I guess it is just a waiting game, wait to see how he makes out in another new environment, wait to see what happens with the assessment and wait to see if hubby's mother goes completely round the bend, cause hubby thinks she is losing it. (And I have to agree with him after her telling me how she was playing the roll of her, my father-in-law, and Santa when she was opening gifts at her house on Christmas Day).

The Mutant Tree in progress

My part of the lights and garland is done. Just waiting for the kids to get home from school so they can do their part with the ornaments!

Merry Freakin' Christmas

So this year we opted for a real tree for Christmas. We stopped down at the lot around the corner from our house last night after doing some more last minute shopping and bought this baby. I am pretty sure it took some steroids sometime between when we picked it up and this morning when we woke up cause it sure as hell didn't look THIS big at the lot!!

Marjorie Evelyn (Fitzpatrick) Waddington - 1916-2011

In memory of my grand-aunt Marjorie, sister of my beloved Grampy, who passed away October 31, 2001 in Ontario. Reunited with her beloved husband Tom, brothers, Ralph and Lloyd, and parents Percy and Helen.