Having your say

If you have looked over my blog in its entirety, you have seen logos for websites of various types. I have encouraged you to investigate the areas where you can stretch your money a bit by using coupons when you shop. The coupon links are listed in the side bar.

I have also encouraged you to investigate the area of sharing your OPINION on various topics through confidential and dependable survey sites. Sometimes they want your opinion on how you shop and what you like to buy. They sometimes want your opinion on a new product that a company is about to launch. (This can lead to the occasional product-test which is nice and fun.) Those of you who have families at home will find that you are given the opportunity to share your opinion on more topics and more frequently than I am given.

Why not take advantage of it? You can do "your opinion sharing" while you are relaxing with that cup of coffee or tea, coke, or whatever you like. But do take advantage of the opportunity. Simply click on the links I have provided and have fun. You can have a "voice" in what is in the market place or simply what is going on on the economic and political scene. And while you are doing it, you can pick up a few dollars here and there. And who knows? You might get that product to test and keep.


Survey sites: SurveySavvy, MySurvey, OpinionOutpost, Buzzback,
Product testing: InHomeProductTesting, VocalPoint

Heirloom Heritage Blooms

Pictured is a lovely azalea that is the result of a "sprout" that came up from the roots of a large azalea bush in my parent's yard in Wilmington, NC. The home is no longer in the family and my parents are both deceased. However, a little history on the azalea. My parents were determined to have a beautiful azalea garden. (The Azalea Festival in Wilmington, NC is famous and long-standing as a celebration of the beautiful area azaleas and gardens.) Mom and Dad collected cuttings from specialty plants that area gardeners shared with them. They had a wide assortment and a show-case garden.

When we closed the home and sold it, I was determined to have a bit of their garden for my home. So I found two tiny sprouts and brought them to my own home. What you see is one of them in bloom. Isn't it lovely.

Heirloom - treasure

The lovely jonquils (or whatever you want to name them) that are pictured at the top of Chat With Vera are a family treasure. These were taken from my husband's home-place nearly 50 years ago. His dear mother wanted to share them with us and dug a cluster up for us to plant at our home. I moved them to our present home five years ago. They are lovely and bring back so many memories of a lovely lady.

How about sharing with me (comment, please below) your memories of home and flowers? I'd love to hear from you and will post your comments unless you designate otherwise.

Come sit a spell with me

Chat With Vera is really just a "bloggy" means of sitting down with this Southern Lady and chatting about whatever strikes our/my fancy. I'm a lady. I'm Southern. I love family and friends. I love America. I love bargains. I love coupons. I love learning about new things, ideas, products, and ways to do things. I'm a seasoned senior southern sweetie that invites you to grab a cup of tea or a cup of java and sit a spell.

How about becoming a "follower" (see the side bar) or grab a "feed." I'd love to have your comments back to me about any of the things you see on here. Just click "comment" and leave your comment for me. I'll get an alert to check the comment. As long as you don't leave a comment that I feel is inappropriate, I'll leave it for any and all to see. You don't have to agree with me, either. Though I do, like most ladies, like a little praise.

Be my frequent "flyer" follower and join me. See ya soon!

The Time. . . .

The flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land (Song of Solomon 2:12 King James Bible)

Here in North Carolina we are seeing the bulbs pop up and bloom, birds cavorting, trees beginning to swell with buds that will soon burst forth with beautiful spring green leaves. It's getting warm. Today it was 70 degrees here. A trifling breeze was reminding us that winter is not yet gone, but enough sun shine to tell us that spring is just around the corner. In fact, there are only about three more days before it is officially here.

What can I say that poets and gloriously gifted authors have not already said and said it much more eloquently than I can even begin to express? But let's do say that spring is a glorious time of the year. It is a time of new beginnings. A time to burst forth with joy and newness. A time of color and warmth. A time to smile. A time for your heart to dance and your soul to rejoice.

Solomon says simply that "the flowers appear" and the "singing of birds is come." Simply said. But profound in impact and implication. How many flowers appear and in how many colors and how many shapes and sizes? How many different types and sounds of song come forth from the birds? We can not humanly imagine how diverse these two are - flowers and birds. The variety simply goes on and on and on.

But what we can as humans do is to rejoice at the sight of a beautiful flower as it unfurls its petals or feel in our heart the joy that resounds with the lilt of bird song wafting on the air.

The futility of frugal orange marmalade

Recently I was wondering about the possibility of using the peels of nice oranges to make orange marmalade. You know how it goes... "waste not, want not." Well I love orange marmalade and sometime in the far, distant past I heard that you could save the peels (after you've used the inside fruit of the orange for other purposes) and make orange marmalde with basically peels, sugar, and water. So I Googled orange marmalade in search of the magic recipe. Well, I really couldn't find one, so I thought perhaps I could simply put it together on my own.

O.k. guys - here is the low-down on how NOT to make orange marmalade.

I used the peels of 4 large navel oranges, plus 1 whole orange

I put them all in my small food processor and chopped it all up.

I then added 2 cups orange juice (out of a carton) and 4 cups water.

I cooked this for about 1 hour. Cooled. Refrigerated overnight.

Next afternoon: I measured the mess and put an equal amount of sugar in the pot with it. Cooked it for about 1 hour. Cooled. Refrigerated overnight. (First I tasted it before refrigerating it and thought, "My this has a 'bite' to it!")

Today, I took it out of the fridge and tasted it. I intended to perhaps add a cup of water and another cup of sugar and cook until it thickened. However, after this taste "treat" I decided that my tongue and my stomach would not be able to tolerate the "bitters" this much. So now I have a syrupy mess to dispose of.

Now I want all of you good jamming cooks to get your chuckles out of this for I have learned my lesson - there just isn't anyway to use those orange peels and make decent orange marmalade. Folks, I'll stick to the good store-bought stuff any day over the mess I conjured up.

Snow, ice, snow = not good

Well folks, we just got to go back to school today after a winter storm that deposited a nice amount of snow on those of us here in North Carolina. And now, they are telling us that North Carolina is about to get socked again - this time with snow, then ice, then snow, and maybe some rain somewhere in there. At first they said the stuff was coming with no appreciable accumulation. We can deal with that. Of course, some of the first snow is still hanging around waiting for some new snow friends to play with.

Then earlier today they (the forecasters of things dealing with the weather in general) said, "Oh yes, yes sirree! There IS going to be some accumulation of the stuff. We're speaking 2 to 4 inches of snow, then 1/4 to 1/2 inch ice, and then a wee bit more snow on top of that. Well, that is enough to scare those of us here in North Carolina who are already trying to recover from a case of cabin fever or "snow-drip-mess-up-the-house-itis."

Now it may be that our part of North Carolina has just been "granted" a slight reprieve. They (again the aforesaid prognosticators of things dealing with the weather) are now prognosticating that our particular little wedge of North Carolina is lying betwixt and between the area of "you gonna get a lot" and "you just might get spared a bit on this one." So we're waiting tenuously for the outcome and trusting that we'll get spared this time.