Food 2009 : A Year End Recap

Just making a simple gallery of all the different food that I made in the year 2009 which was kind of little different from the usual and for which I have pictures taken. A year end recap. Bon Appetit.

Read more...

Christmas Wth A Change

This year there are two things that are different on our Christmas tree. One is the kind of lights that we used and the other is the ornaments.

This year we used the new LED lights which we purchased from Costco. These lights have quite a few advantages over the conventional lights. For one they use much less power, which is great. Secondly they are a parallel circuit and not a series circuit. That makes a big difference, because if one of the lights is broken, the rest still work, which is awesome. Also they are far more vibrant.




For ornaments this year we exclusively used shatterproof ones. I got mine from Target. I got the Blue/Silver combination and I absolutely loved the colors. The reason we wanted shatterproof ones was because we have a 2 year old toddler who is running around. This option made it a very safe choice.


Change is GOOD!!!

Read more...

Too Cool For California

It has been really cold for the past 2 days. In fact I have some pictures to prove it. The temperature has been in the 40's. Here you can see the local temperature on my yahoo weather widget for Thursday, December 10th.



The water in the birdbath turned into ice overnight. So when I rinsed it off, the ice shattered and the pieces fell down. The white pieces next to the birdbath are all pieces of ice.

There was snow on the hill tops surrounding our home. Snow happens very rarely.

Read more...

Home Made Pizza

The other day I bought some pizza dough from Trader Joe's. I wanted to make a pizza.

I used some mozzarella cheese, Roma tomatoes, basil, Italian seasoning and a drizzle of olive oil for topping. Here's the pizza before I baked it.



I just followed the baking directions on the pizza dough package. Here it is after baking.

Looks delicious and tasted even better!! Yum!!!

Read more...

Dancing Birds

This morning I was delighted to see 2 birds kind of dancing on the fence in our backyard. They were just moving towards and away from each other in some kind of symphony. So I decided to capture it on my digital camera and here it is ....

Read more...

What .... Green Thumb?

We have been living in this house for past 11 years. But when you look at our backyard it seems as though we just moved in. It hardly has any plants. All thanks to my "not so green thumb".

We had this orange tree for so many years now. We only got one edible orange out of it. If we look over our fence our neighbors seem to be growing fruit in abundance. We also planted a lime tree at the same time as orange tree and we are finally seeing some limes. This morning my daughter was so excited to pick out a fully ripened lime. I took a picture, since in our house the home grown lime is kind of like a celebrity.

Then there is this bird of paradise plant. Apparently there are different kinds in that too. When we planted it we thought we got the usual "orange and purple" variety, but no..... ours is a super special "white" bird of paradise. It hardly ever blooms. So far it bloomed only once, a couple of years ago.

Then there are these 2 hibiscus plants (yellow and orange flowers) which I purchased from my local nursery and planted them. One with orange flowers died and the yellow flowering one barely grew in so many years and gives very few flowers. The only plants that keep coming back each year without fail are the bulbs which bloom in spring. We had these for past 6 years and each year from March to April we see them flowering.

My mom on the other hand is a super green thumb. She once got a small branch of a white hibiscus plant (without a single root) from her friend and planted it in our backyard and it grew so well and all through the year it blooms and gives beautiful flowers. How do you explain that. She also planted a small sapling of an avocado plant last year and it grew into this giant tree. You should see it to believe it.

The only flowering plants I'm successful at growing are the "wild flowers". Thank God for the wild flowers, we had some color in our garden, even if it was temporary.

Read more...

Hand Sanitizing Wipes!

Today I was packing my daughter's lunch for school and I wanted to keep one of those hand sanitizing wipes, wet ones singles in her lunch bag. With the swine flu scare and everything else going on, I wanted to be extra careful. So I had asked my husband to bring me one of those from upstairs.

He goes "Are you sure they have not expired?”  I'm like, do those things actually expire. I never even thought of that. What does that mean anyways....?  Does that mean, they no longer sanitize and kill the germs after the expiry date?  Or does that mean they are harmful to use them once they have expired. I didn't know what to think of that comment.

Anyways that poked my curiosity and I went and did a query on the web. Just for fun. This is what I came out with. There is no expiration date on wet ones singles and the only expiration date is for the coupons to buy the wet ones.

Read more...

50 State Quarters

Photo: Courtesy usmint.gov

You can read all about the 50 State Quarters® Program and download the individual informational pages of all the 50 State Quarters from their respective links.

I had been collecting the state quarters since they started circulating them. I happened to have a See's candy box made to look like treasure box. It was kind of appropriate to collect them in that box since it was kind of my treasure. So far I'm at 44 coins. I need 6 more coins to finish my collection.

So close, yet so far!!!

Read more...

Halloween, 2009

Every year we make sure we get at least a couple of pumpkins and I carve them. This year we got just one big one. As usual I procrastinate and I started carving this around 6:00 p.m. on Halloween. I wanted to be done before it got dark and children started coming for trick or treating. Luckily I finished in 15 minutes. Not bad eh? Not bad at all..... I used one of those pumpkin carving tools - serrated knife. It is so handy. The pumpkin looked pretty good. I ended up using one of those battery operated tea lights inside the pumpkin. That worked out great and is such a safe alternative to real tea light candles.

Also this year I ended up making a Halloween costume for my 2 year old son. I started out with a 20"x24" blue cardstock.

I cut two rectangles out as you can see. Next I printed out the word "CRAYON" in green and cut it out and glued it on one of the rectangles which becomes the front of the costume. Next I used a hole punch to punch out holes for the shoulder straps. I used green strings from an old gift bag for shoulder straps.

Then I cut out a semicircle and made the hat for crayon top by stapling the ends together. Again hole punched the sides of the hat for the ties. Yes I used the brown strings from another shopping bag.

It worked out perfectly. It hardly took any time and was so easy to make. My son looked so adorable in his costume and everybody seemed to love it. This costume can easily be changed to either different color or different words like "PENCIL" etc. It's very versatile and easy.

Read more...

Sandwich For Lunch

Today I did not have anything made for lunch. I was lazy to cook something from scratch. So I wanted to make something simple. I ended up making a sandwich for myself.

I used 3 slices of wheat bread. Between 2 slices I used pesto sauce and thinly sliced English cucumber. Between the other 2 slices I used Cream cheese with sun dried tomatoes and thinly sliced fresh tomatoes.

Looks colorful doesn't it?!! Was yummy tasting too. Felt good about eating something healthy.

Read more...

What Not to Use in Microwave!

The following are some of the materials which should not be used in microwaves.

1. Metal.

It is a well known fact that we should not use any kind of metal in microwave. Everybody who uses a microwave is aware that any type of metal would initially start sparks followed by fire. We all know how bad it is to have any kind of fire especially when we live in wooden homes.

However there is yet another material which should never be used in microwave. I found out about it a couple of years ago. But what I realized was there are still lots of people who are not aware of that fact. So I wanted to use my blog to shed some light on that subject. This brings us to the second material which we should never use in the microwave.

2. Plastic.

We should avoid using any kind of plastic in microwave. The ill effects of using plastic in microwave are not obvious to the naked eye. However its effects are more devastating than using metal in long term. The reason being, when you heat food in a plastic container, apparently some toxins are released from the plastic container which can seep into the food. Some of these toxins are supposed to be cancer causing. So the best thing to do is use glass containers instead.

3. Styrofoam.

The reason you do not want to use Styrofoam is because at high temperatures it tends to melt. If you happen to touch it at that high temperature, you could burn your fingers. In fact I know somebody who had an accident and got a pretty bad burn.

Read more...

Uniforms for Public Schools

It is the back to school time again. In fact today happens to be the first day of school for my daughter. So the whole hustle and bustle in the morning trying to get to school on time started again. As it is, it's very hectic in the mornings doing even the simple things like brushing teeth, eating breakfast, combing hair and few other simple chores to get ready for school. Add to this chaos the dreaded "no uniform" anything goes dress picking in the morning. It throws the whole equilibrium out of whack. All the other chores take predictable time, but not the dress picking.

So it brings me to this question, as to why do public schools do not enforce uniforms for children? Why is that only private schools have that privilege? It beats me. There are so many advantages to having a school uniform.

These are 5 reasons why we should have school uniforms for public schools.

1. Focus will be on education and not clothes.
   
   
   Whenever I see those advertisements for "back to school" on television, newspapers or anywhere else for that matter, all they talk about is the clothes, the shoes, how cool they are supposed to look and all that non-sense. Never once is the focus on the real thing, "the education". So if we bring back uniforms for all schools, regardless if they are public or private, we will indirectly help children focus on education and not so much on looks.
   
   
   
2. Everybody will be "uniform".
   
   
   So there will be no distinction between the poor and the rich kids. Since everybody wears the same clothes, they all look the same. At least children won't be checking out each others clothes and shoes, which is a big positive.
   
   
   
3. It saves money.
   
   
   We don't have to buy so many clothes for school. We can buy a few pairs of uniform and we are good to go. That definitely saves a lot of money (who doesn't want to save money in this economy?!!!).
   
   
   
4. It saves time.
   
   
   You don't waste all that time in picking clothes to wear to school. If it is an uniform it becomes that much easier. It is a no brainer.
   
   
   
5. We can identify the child's school.
   
   
   So if somebody is either cutting classes or doing some unruly stuff (like graffiti which seems to be common problem here), the least we could do is complain to their school Principal, since we know which school they belong to.
   
   
   

These are just my reasons for having a school uniforms for public schools in America. I wish our current president, Mr. Obama does something about this.

Read more...

REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE

There is a lot of talk these days about Reduce, Reuse and Recycle, the 3 R's campaign. Finally I see the government got involved in the 3 R's campaign in a major way. These days we are quite frequently bombarded with the water bottle advertisements, where they talk about the bottles ending up in landfill. So true.

I'm all for using the tap water with some kind of filtration. In fact who isn't. I guess we all agree that we need to keep the planet in a better condition for our children, grandchildren and the generations there after and so on.

So to do our part, first we had a water filter installed in our kitchen a few years ago. Next I went and bought reusable water bottles. I got mine at container store. I liked that they came in a set of 5 and are perfect for my daughter's school, one for each school day. The designs are cool too. These days these water bottles are everywhere, which is nice to see.

While EPA is doing all it can to stop the water bottles from ending up in the landfill, there is a new problem cropping up. I think it is the same water bottles with some simple additives and new labeling.

For example Propel Fitness Water. This is what it is ... according to Wikipedia. So it is water with some added vitamins. I also noticed that they have "Propel Fitness Water mix powder packets" in different flavors. I think I like this instead. So you can use your reusable water bottle and your filtered tap water with their added mix. Another example of this is Glaceau Vitamin Water. As the name suggests, it is water with some vitamins and some flavor enhancers. I did not see any flavored mix with this brand. Too bad.

So what is the verdict? Don't you feel all the money the government is spending to educate people about the 3 R's is a utter waste if people are fooled into buying products like Propel and Glaceau water. Don't those bottles end up in a landfill as well? I think so!!!

Read more...

How to Water a Plant While on Vacation!

I don't know about you, but I always seem to forget to take care of the indoor plants when I go on vacations. When we go on short (less than a week) vacations all seems well. It is those long vacations which are the killer (I mean of plants ....).

When we visit India it is usually for a month or so. There are lots of other things to take care of before such trips. Such as mail, newspaper, making sure to empty the refrigerator and the list goes on. For some reason plants seem to be forgotten, until when you return to find it all wilted and dried and in some cases dead.

So the other day when I came across this video, I wanted to share it with others . I have not tried it yet, but it sure seems it should work. It is a clever idea and done with things that you already own at home. So take a look ....

If you feel that this solution is not for you, I recently saw an advertisement for some "Aqua Globes" watering system on television. I do not own these, but from the advertisement it seems like it should work.

Next time I go on a long vacation, I shall definitely try one of the above solutions.

Read more...

I Cannot Beleive I Met .....

This summer I visited my sister's family in PA. My sister had planned a visit to the Arsha Vidya Gurukulam ( also known locally as Saylorsburg temple ). She had donated $500 to the temple for the "Gift for the Day" program. That donation covers a day of meals, utilities and operations at the temple. She made a donation in memory of my dad.

We went the previous night and they provided us with accommodations at the temple. The next morning was the actual Abhishekam performed to Lord Dakshinamurthi. So my sister's family and my family along with our mom we all got ready and we went to the temple and who do we see there .....

It was Pandit Jasraj Ji performing on stage inside the temple. Apparently Pandit Jasraj Institute for music, artistry and appreciation has it's annual Shibir at the Arsha Vidya Gurkulam every summer. We could not believe our luck. We were so thrilled to see him perform so up close. It is not a publicized event. We felt very lucky to have seen him. My mom was very touched. We all remembered our dad fondly. My dad was a great lover of music. He enjoyed music immensely and we would always catch him singing. So we all felt the connection of the great musician being present for our important day.

After the performance we all headed to the dining hall for our dinner. Pandit Jasraj Ji was there too. So I asked my daughter to say namaste to panditji, which she did. He was very kind and made some conversation with her. He is such a humble man for somebody who is so accomplished. Later my mom, my sister and I went and spoke to him a bit too. We were all so elated to have such an opportunity.

So you never know who you might see, when you least expect it !!

Read more...

Formations on a Tea Cup!

Other day I just made some tea and set it aside. When I came back to get it I saw all these formations on the top in the tea cup. This is the first time I had time even to notice such a thing. Anyways I thought it was worth taking a picture and here they are ...

This first one looked like a heart.

This next one looked somewhat like a Whale.


This one looked like a face of the bird with a beak and an eye in the middle.



just another picture of the bird face ....



This one looked like a diwali diya.


Am I hallucinating or is it for real ?!!! You be the judge !!!

Read more...

Where is Matt? (2008)

What an interesting idea! It apparently took him 14 months to make this video.

Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) @ Yahoo! Video

Read more...

Take a Seat : An Ingenious Idea!!

Take a Seat is a concept where a chair follows a person around a library. The way it works is that you swipe your library card on the square on the front of the chair. Once that has been done, the chair will go where ever you go; the magic courtesy of an RFID chip. Dutch designer Jelte van Geest created them for the Openbare Bibliotheek Endhoven Library Design project.

Read more...

Le Idiot : Watch and Enjoy

Here's a clip of a guy on the French version of the game show "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire."

Read more...

Halloween : 2008

Read more...

Diwali, The Festival Of lights : 2008

Read more...