SPARKS, Blog for Peace and Reminder

 

It’s Monday and time for a SPARK!   It’s a special Monday too because it’s also BLOG FOR PEACE with Mimi Lenox and we have participated for several years in this global effort to “Give Peace A Chance”.

First though – what exactly IS this Monday SPARK thing we do?   Well, most of you know that Annie of McGuffy’s Reader – who started SPARKS – was hacked and has been on an extended break from blogging although her idea to spread some inspiration on Monday of every week goes on.   Many of us who participated in her SPARKS Blog Hop and found value in sharing a thought on Monday continue doing that to hopefully give each other a “Monday boost” – perhaps something to think about to inspire us in the week ahead OR help us deal with something that’s on our mind.    Why not join us by sharing something that SPARKS you?   It might just start a spark in us too.

I love Fall but it’s the actual CHANGES Fall brings that make me love it so much………………The trees that surround our house and the countryside where we live remind me every year that if THEY can let things go, so can we.    And really – why not?    Carrying things – especially anything negative – just plain WEIGHS YOU DOWN!

Also today it’s the annual Blog For Peace Day – want to know about this wonderful effort Mimi Lenox heads up every year?    CLICK HERE

This year’s Theme is Blog for Climate Change………………one of those subjects people like to ignore but is becoming more and more “undeniable” as years go by!    Anyway, if you want more information on how to join up for this year’s effort – up to and including getting a free template to design YOUR way to express your thoughts just click the link above.    Here’s our Peace Globe which I am sending to Mimi.

“Seeing Mother Earth makes our hearts happy…..Seeing her in danger because of climate change makes our hearts sad….Let’s DO something to STAY HAPPY.”     Teddy and I agree…….

 

Speaking of Teddy, he wants all of you to remember that tomorrow is TEASER TUESDAY – at a surprise time – we will have a photo for you to figure out as usual on a Tuesday.   Oh boy!!

Love, Pam and Teddy too

 

Bakin’ With Bacon AND Blogging for Peace

 

Happy Saturday Fellow Baconians!  

‘Tis I, your King, baking for my kingdom today!

Welcome to the castle – I am going to prepare a little ADULT TREAT today – one that your parents may enjoy during the upcoming holiday season with their friends.   This is not a pet friendly dessert though – not is it a KID-friendly dessert.   It contains ALCOHOL and a WHOLE lot of bacon.   Ask your Mom to let you have some of the bacon before it gets mixed into the recipe because it tastes yummy all on its’ own!   

Ready?????????????

 

BACON WALNUT RUM BALLS (remember this is NOT for us kids – it’s for our Moms and Dads!!)

Ingredients:

5 oz can evaporated milk
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup spiced rum
1 package vanilla wafers, crushed very fine
2 cups finely chopped walnuts
1 cup confectioners’ sugar for rolling
1 lb hickory bacon, cooked, chopped

Instructions:

Line a baking pan with foil and lay your bacon strips on it. Place it in the oven then turn the oven to 400. Cook for 17-20 minutes. Drain grease from bacon, chop, and set aside.   Of course if you want to you can just FRY the bacon in a pan but this is a LOT of bacon so it’s just easier to do it in the oven!

In a food processor, chop up the vanilla wafers until they are in tiny pieces.

Melt chocolate chips and evaporated milk in a bowl over a boiling pit of water, stirring frequently until smooth. Remove from heat.

Stir in the crushed vanilla wafers, bacon, and rum until well blended.

Roll the dough into small balls and roll the balls in chopped walnuts, then repeat in confectioners’ sugar.

Store covered in the refrigerator. Eat responsibly!

This probably sounds like a SUPER DUPER EASY PEASY recipe and it is but just remember to be super careful when melting the chips over boiling water – FRANKLY, I think you can easily melt the chips in the microwave which I do for other recipes then add the evaporated milk.

My Mom said she bets this would still be good without the rum but not nearly as fun (speaking as an adult of course).

 

SO that’s my recipe of the day from the kitchen of the Castle Baconia.    My Mom says these are delicious and I guess I’ll take her word for it.   I will make them for her but SHE and DAD will eat them – not this King!!

This is EVER so true!!!!!

We are also celebrating the BLOG BLAST FOR PEACE today………………..we in the Castle Baconia are all for PEACE.    It seems a rather elusive thing outside the walls of our happy Kingdom but we would hope and pray that everyone in the world would realize that to HAVE PEACE, we must BE PEACE.     It’s up to US to achieve it, and I know my Mom says almost every day that if she had JUST ONE WISH, it would be that this world we live in would be one of PEACE and HARMONY.     That we could accept one another, care for one another and be KIND to one another.    Won’t you join in the effort to spread this wish above all other wishes?    Make your own peace globe and show the world that you are praying and hoping for PEACE…………just like we are.   If you click on my globe, it will take you to the site.

Love and Hope, Teddy and Mom

 

 

Filling In, Blogging for Peace and Thanking!

It’s a “Triple Duty” Day!

First I’m going to do my Friendly Friday Fill-ins which is co-hosted by 15andmeowing AND McGuffy’s Reader…………………..each Friday we have four sentences that we just “fill-in” with our own responses.  Then we all share and it’s tons of fun to see how everyone answers.    If you wanna pawticipate – just go to one of the blogs that’s hosting and use the LINKY TOOL and join in!

Here are the four sentences for today and this week I’m filling them in ALL BY MYSELF!  My answers are in RED.

1. Peace in the world is my family’s #1 wish.
2. I need to  take my thyroid medicine without giving Mom the bitey or spitting it out – I should be better about that, but I keep procrastinating.
3. A friend is  the BEST gift you can get.

4. I  will  try to  stop begging for butter but sometimes I can’t help myself!

There you have it!   My fill-ins for today (say- why did the typeface change?!)

---

I’m joining THOUSANDS of bloggers who Blog For Peace every November 4th.  

CLICK HERE to visit the website……….post your peace globe…………….GIVE PEACE A CHANCE………………

---

AND, last but not least, I want to sincerely thank my very good and dear friend from “Down Under” Sharon Pridmore of Gentle Stitches.   She sent me and Mom a most cool thing from the incredibly magical place in Australia called Uluru Rock.   Ever heard of it?   An amazing red monolith rising out of the ground in the middle of nowhere…….with quite a story.    You can read about it HERE and she sent me a souvenir of her visit there……Check it out!

This is FLAT ME with the globe by my feets!

This is a CLOSE up of the globe – isn’t it cool???????

Miss Sharon is the lovely lady who designed the fabulous “Sammy Tote” which she made with her very own talented hands (and yarn!) and the pattern for this way cool bag will be available in December on a knitting site – I’ll share the link when I get it.    Meanwhile, here’s the photos I posted of it when we received our “prototype” tote from Miss Sharon a while ago!

HOW COOL IS THIS!!! It’s ME – It’s ME !!

Sorry to inundate you with STUFF today but I had a lot of things I needed to say – and thanks to give – and PEACE to share…………so I hope you have a PEACE-FULL day and weekend………..tomorrow is BACON DAY at my house!

 

Peace Baby

 

 

Dona Nobis Pacem….and Teaser!

Hello!   Did you miss my Teaser last week?  Hmmmm?   Well you know I hated to disappoint you but I had other things to do last Tuesday so there!    I’m making up for it now though with a goodie of a Teaser this week.   I’m also doing my “Blog for Peace” today but I’ll do that AFTER the Teaser.   So are you ready????

As always, you can’t just say “Maine” or “France” or “Planet Earth” you need to tell me WHERE these two photos were taken OK?   Got it?  Good………..(yes it’s the same place for both photos!)

See?  Pretty place isn’t it……………..now tell me WHERE it is!

If you’re the first lucky responder with the RIGHT answer, you get this:

For the FIRST to guess right!

If you’re RIGHT but not first you get this:

Right but not FIRST!

If you’re WRONG totally you can still claim a reward……….we can’t be perfect after all right????   It will be MR. GREENIE FOR YOU!!

SO – get your guesses in ASAP…………time’s a wasting……….you only have TODAY to guess because tomorrow we’ll do the TELL ALL and we’ll be TELLING ALL (of course!).

HAPPY GUESSING!!!!!

---

Now, here’s the PEACEFUL part of today’s blog.   Today is the Blog Blast for Peace………bloggers everywhere – all over the globe – will be posting a “Peace Badge” and talking about peace in some way.   I pawticipated in this last year and it was wonderful to read everybody’s thoughts AND see their creative badges.   There’s a website and groups all over the place where this effort is coordinated – I visited https://www.facebook.com/BlogBlastForPeace in order to get information this year.   Here’s my creation:

My Mom has talked to me about peace which is something near and dear to her heart for many reasons going way back to the 60s and 70s.  My Mom was living here in Washington, DC at the time and the peace movement was everywhere…………..she and her friends weren’t radicals by any stretch but they would be on the scene of some of the marches and events and she wore the peace symbol on her clothes and the flowers in her hair and the whole nine yards.  But over and above all of THAT…………she WANTED peace.   As an Air Force kid – brought up in the military – she knew her Dad was very proud to serve his country and if he had to fight for it he would – and did – but what he REALLY wanted was peace.   Mom grew up knowing the value of peace – knowing the joy of peace thanks to her family – knowing even before John Lennon sang it that “all we are saying, is give peace a chance”………….if we don’t have peace, we have conflict and war and we’ve all seen how scary and sad that is.   So much of the world is in turmoil.   We feel blessed to be HERE where even though things aren’t perfect by a long shot, they are GOOD……they are for the most part PEACEFUL…..and they are better than many places are in SO many ways.

Even though I’m a cat……….I have a voice………..and there’s one thing I love in my own household and that’s PEACE.   Peace means nice long naps……peace means no noisy neighbors…….peace means LOVE.   That’s something I have in abundance.

I WISH YOU PEACE….  

Love, Sammy

 

 

Another Monday!

It’s another Monday – another start to another week on the march towards the major holidays of Thanksgiving and Christmas………..then before you know it – NEW YEARS…………….and as you all know, on New Years Day I will celebrate my 15th birthday.   Wow.

FIFTEEN years (almost) since this picture was taken! WOWZERS!

So, first things first – you probably know this already but the Blog for Peace is Tuesday……………You can get info and logos and all you will need at the Blog Blast for Peace page on Facebook HERE.    Choose a logo and make your own badge…………join the crowd who will be showing their peace badges on Tuesday!!!   I have mine DONE!

This was my badge for peace from LAST year!

Also on Tuesday is the TUESDAY TEASER!    Yes indeed it returns at long last……….I just know you’ve missed it – but then again the party for Kyla was so important and so much fun maybe you didn’t notice there was no Teaser last week?   Well there is one this week and guess what……………..I have a GUEST TEASER!  That’s right……….so don’t miss out…………be here Tuesday to agonize over a photo taken on SOMEONE’s camera in SOME part of the world.

TEASER TUESDAY!

We have bone-chilling cold here………..thankfully no snow but boy oh boy is it cold.  I’ve stayed inside for the most part but WAS very brave and went outside with Mom yesterday morning in the wind and cold.   It was not pleasant but I did enjoy the fresh air – Mom probably didn’t – she was dressed in parka, hat, gloves and boots!   I of course wear my own parka, hat, gloves and boots thanks to my ginger furs!

Nope – I don’t need one of these…..I’m BRAVE!

HAVE A HAPPY MONDAY!!

Sammy