“She began glancing around the deli. Nora knew exactly what she was thinking. Who can I tell first? The Kranks are skipping Christmas! No party! No tree! Nothing but money in their pockets so they can blow it on a cruise.”
Nora and Luther Krank’s only daughter Blair has joined the Peace Corps and left for a year to Peru. Christmas without her just won’t be the same. Luther gets a brilliant idea to skip the circus of Christmas altogether, save money, and take a ten day cruise on Christmas Day instead. It’s a full boycott, no decorating, no cards, no parties.
As the big day nears, I was in the spirit to read a Christmas book. 🎄 One of my favorite Christmas movies is Christmas with the Kranks so this year I wanted to read Skipping Christmas by John Grisham. I have had it on the To Be Read shelf for years and I can’t believe that it has taken me this long to read it. Well this is the year! As this year will be so different than any other due to Covid, it felt very fitting. I’m sure that there are so many people out there just wanting to skip the holiday altogether. I don’t blame you. Unfortunately, we can’t escape on a cruise (yikes, no way) or to an island paradise somewhere and forget. Hopefully you are still able to enjoy the season with family and love ones safely. ☃️ If you haven’t seen the movie or read the book, I suggest you do! It is sooo cute and funny, I just love them both!
I am finally starting to feel like I am getting the hang of this now. The stress of not being able to eat “food” and the uneasiness about how to cook my favorite foods are gone. I have found some great products that have been awesome substitutes. I don’t know what I would do without the versatility of the coconut.
“Detective Mackenzie White braced herself for the worst as she walked through the cornfield that afternoon.” “It took no more than five seconds of seeing the blonde woman tied to the wooden pole before Mackenzie knew there was something much deeper going on here. Something unlike anything she had ever encountered. This was not what happened in the cornfields of Nebraska.”
As we head into the cold, winter months, cravings for our favorite comfort foods settle in. Hearty, creamy soups and casseroles are what I love to make and eat on nights like these. So what do I do now? Well… Challenge excepted! I have reinvented a few of my favorite dishes as well as tried some new ones.
Wow three weeks already! Time is sure going by fast. I think I am getting the hang of this now. No epic fails this week so that is a great thing. I tried a lot of new stuff this week so I hope you enjoy and find ideas to try!
Healthy Homemade Vanilla Coffee Creamer by Organize Yourself Skinny. I absolutely love my coffee creamers and probably miss them more than anything else, but alas it has Soy. 😪 I have tried a couple homemade creamers and they aren’t quite sweet enough but this one is really good. On days when I need a little extra, I just add a bit of sugar. I left out the cinnamon but if you don’t need to I’m sure it would be good.
This week I have had a lot of food trial and error, some successes and some epic fails. Its been 10 days now and I am learning more and more everyday. Food labels have become an obsession.
This week is the beginning of my new food life. I recently had some testing done for food sensitivities and was beyond shocked to find out that my body’s immune system reacts to a very long list of foods.
The full list includes: Eggs – whites and yolks Almonds Yeast – Brewer’s, Baker’s and Nutritional Cow’s milk Mozzarella Rye Wheat Yogurt Barley Bell Pepper Bran Cashews Chicken Cinnamon Crab Garlic Ginger Gluten Kelp Mustard Seed Pineapple Soybeans White mushrooms
I have begun to elimate these foods from my diet and picked up some staple substitutes from the grocery store. It was a bit overwhelming and I felt completely out of my comfort zone but you have to start somewhere. Trial and error begins.
I am determined to take control of my health and hopefully one day will feel like a normal person. I know that this will be a long and sometimes hard road to make the changes that I need to eliminate all these foods but I am ready to start that journey now. I have been researching like mad, checking the labels on everything, and searching the coffers of Pinterest for recipes and substitutions.
I have a love of delicious food and I don’t plan on denying myself that enjoyment. Its not going to be easy, I won’t kid myself. I may have to get creative with my favs and I will try anything until I find substitutions that work.
If I find any recipes that turn out great or store bought products I really enjoy, I will share with everyone.
P is for …. P.S. I Love You and palm trees. 🌴 I actually watched the movie before I read this book. I tend to do that more often, I love movies as much as I do books. What I have noticed is if I read the book first, 95% of the time I will be disappointed in the movie and won’t be able to enjoy it. However, I found that if I watch the movie first, and like it, then I read the book and I like it even more, but it doesn’t ruin the movie for me. Well, anyway, I LOVE this movie. I seriously cried the entire film. The book is very different, which I don’t mind actually, it means I can enjoy them independently of each other. I enjoyed the book too. I would recommend that if you have watched the movie, read the book, not because you like the movie but because it’s a good book. If you read the book, whether you liked it or not, watch the movie because it’s wonderful. 🌴 I am missing beaches, palm trees, and Plumeria blossoms something fierce. I was suppose to be going to the Caribbean on vacation this year however the Rona had other plans. As I have previously mention, my vacation has been rescheduled multiple times. Originally, I planned a trip to our favorite vacation spot for my husband’s 40th birthday, which was April. It was then canceled and changed to September, then to November. Well last weekend I learned that once again, November is not happening. So instead of continuing to play this game I have decided that Caribbean will have to just wait until next year. Maybe I can get a trip to Hawaii set up for December? I will take what ever test you need just let me have some sun, I’m begging you! 😭
P has some other great reads to offer here. One I am really looking forward to reading is Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper Case Closed by Patricia Cornwell.
Blurb: In Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper, Case Closed, Cornwell combines the rigorous discipline of twenty-first century police investigation with forensic techniques undreamed of during the late Victorian era to solve one of the most infamous and difficult serial murder cases in history. Drawing on unparalleled access to original Ripper evidence, documents, and records, as well as archival, academic, and law-enforcement resources, FBI profilers, and top forensic scientists, Cornwell reveals that Jack the Ripper was none other than a respected painter of his day, an artist now collected by some of the world’s finest museums: Walter Richard Sickert.
Others – A Private Investigator Thriller Mystery. This book had so many twists and turns. I picked it up in my favorite used book store, I saw it and thought the cover was intreging and I just love PI thrillers. But it turned out to be so much more and I was very entertained.
Blurb: Nicholas Dismas is a Private Investigator, but like no other that has gone before him. He carries a secret about himself to which not even he has the answer . . .
He is hired to find a missing baby. One that was taken away at birth . . . Or was it?
His investigation takes him to a mysteriously located place called Perfect Rest. It is supposed to be a nursing home for the elderly . . . But is it?
Here Dismas will discover the dark secret of the Others. And in an astonishing and spectacular finale he will resolve the enigma of his own existence . . .
