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Posts tagged ‘Life’

Comfort Food…Sweet Sauerkraut and Pork Ribs


With the onset of Fall here in Northern Minnesota, I decided to share one of my family’s favorite recipes.  It’s perfect for these cool days!

You can certainly replace the pork ribs with pork chops, but I won’t substitute The Zup’s Food Market sauerkraut with any other!

This serves approx. 8-10 people.  This is a large recipe which you can cut in half…however, you’ll love the leftovers too!

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Sweet Sauerkraut and Pork Ribs

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3# of Pork Ribs               1 Qt of Zup’s Homemade Sauerkraut

1/2 to 3/4 bag of Brown Sugar                Caraway Seeds

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Brown the pork ribs in your fry pan with a splash of olive oil.

Layer them in your baking pan (I use a 12×15 pan).

Sweet sauerkraut ribs 2

Cover with strained sauerkraut.

Cover sauerkraut with brown sugar (yes, a lot!)

sweet sauerkraut ribs 3

Sprinkle Caraway Seeds over.  I put them on fairly thick.

Cover and bake in 350 degree oven for 1 to 1 1/2 hr.

Sweet sauerkraut ribs

Serve with homemade mashed potatoes and enjoy!

Patty O

Just Hanging Off the Grape Arbor


Yeah…don’t mind me…

It was just another day in my so-called sane life.  Actually it was last week. Read more

‘My Mommm Said Sooooo’


So today was another daycare babies day…and of course we had more than a few fun moments.  The funniest of which was after we picked up Elena from school.

We were still in the car when she said, “I’m hungry…my tummy is empty!”  I told her we’d get a snack at the grocery store.

That’s when she made her announcement…

“Food goes in your belly and your butt!”

I scowled and said “Nooooooo, just in your belly!”

Elena: “My Mommm said sooooo!”

Let’s just say I dropped it rather quickly.

HOWEVER,

When Jen showed up to pick up the kids, I couldn’t resist telling her what Elena said (now mind you Jen was changing Nicole and I had just left Elena in the bathroom to go potty).  Jen just laughed and said “I did tell her food goes in her belly, but someone else must have said it comes out your butt!”

And from the bathroom we hear Elena yell… “Mommmm – youuuuu said itttttttt!”

Boy they get sassy fast!   It seems just yesterday she was just starting nursery school!

🙂

Patty O

A Bad Day and a Wake Up Call


It was a day.

A day like no other.

Where so many major things that could go wrong, did go wrong.  Or so I thought.

First a neighbor hit my parked car which was parked along the side of our house (not my normal spot) and about 4 inches into the alley.  Accidents happen, I get it, I gave him a hug.

Then the police officer stopped by and gave me a ticket for “parking in the alley”.  Seriously.  And indicated it was my fault that the accident happened.  And he proceeded to hand me a ticket, tell me I could pick up the accident report later today, and apologized, while frustrated tears rolled down my cheeks.  I hate crying when I’m frustrated, but sometimes it just happens anyway.

I then dropped my car off at the dealership for an estimate and borrowed my mother-in-law (and her car) to drive two hours to a dr appt.

On the way to the appt, a young boy crossed the road running after his Momma.  She was about 40 feet ahead of him, plugged into her earphones.  I hit the brakes, which thankfully prevented me from hitting him as he proceeded to run ahead of me (ps, I was driving through a green light).  As I laid on my horn, in an attempt to alert the Mom, she decided to scream at me.  Seriously.

The Dr. appt brought news I didn’t expect, but I guess I’m glad he wants to be so thorough.  An MRI is scheduled for next week to see if there’s a reason for the piriformis syndrome/sciatic pain.  He’s leaning towards surgery, but I don’t want to go that route yet.

An attempt to get the youngest child a cell phone at AT&T was thwarted as my husband is the primary account holder…even though he doesn’t even use a cell phone.  ‘Oh whatever, I’ll do it online’…was my thought.  Her birthday isn’t until Oct 7 anyway.

A few stops and we came home.  Enough is enough, I’m done.

The car had been delivered with a repair estimate of $4,000.

I’m on my second glass of wine.

And then I see a FB post saying prayers are requested for a friend of mine.

And then I get the message that her son was in a terrible ATV accident on Friday night and she didn’t even know about it until Saturday, after he’d had brain surgery.  He’ll be having his jaw wired shut tomorrow for about a month, and his eye socket is fractured.  He is doing well now, thank God.

And that’s when I realized that all the crap and frustrations I went through today are nothing.

My babies are healthy.  I’m home.  I’m safe.  My car is just a thing.  I can pay the stupid ticket.  The little boy is safe.  I pray that his Mom will keep him safe from now on.  And Gab’s cell phone is just a thing.  I have just little things to complain about.

And now I turn my attention to praying for Nate and his Mom and Dad.  Lord, please give them all the chance to complain about the little things that can go wrong in their lives.

Amen.

Patty O

Monday’s Here…Bring on the Coffee!


Gasp…Gasp…crawling out of the weekend into another week…

Lots accomplished this weekend.  Garden harvested and cleaned out, fall decorations up, spray painted new/old goodies and furniture, birthday dinner and cake for Miss Alex, sewed in some clothes (for Gabi), cleaned up the house…etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

And, Alex, Tom and Louis came up Thursday night for a visit!  Mr. Louis had surgery (snip, snip…and hernia) on Friday with our favorite vet, Jen.  He was quite a trooper and back to normal by Saturday afternoon.  More stories to follow, of course as he and Motzy had loads of fun.

And…while they were here, Tom and Alex helped Tim put in our new fire pit and dig out an old sidewalk.  Tim and I jokingly called it the sidewalk to nowhere…it didn’t go all the way to the shop, and it didn’t match up with the garage door.  Gone, gone, gone!

There was a bonfire, toasted marshmallows, a game of Horse in the dark (with a light up basketball).  There were naps (ok, not by me…), visiting with the babies, and more craziness sprinkled throughout the weekend.

Pictures of the harvest, fall decorations, recipes, maybe a little story of the sewing swear session (I hate sewing machines), and more to come.

Sorry for the absence, this blogging thing takes a lot of time and I’ve had ENERGY.  More energy than I’ve had in a year…guessing it’s a thyroid thing…whooo heeeee!

Talk more soon!

Patty O

Thank you to Women Get it Free for sharing the photo!

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