Woman's History Month and a little knee rehabilitation

Things are moving right along with the exhibit setup for the upcoming Woman's History Month. Last evening several of the women were in working on exhibits, helping with signage, and taking publicity photos. It is getting very exciting! We are now moving into the final two weeks before we have our grand opening. Wow!

Two classrooms have materialized, a early 20th century and a modern one. The educators involved in the exhibits have put in many hours, especially on the modern classroom, ensuring that it represents every aspect of what a classroom of today has in it. We even have a set of lockers!

Britt and I have been working hard and furious trying to get the signage ready within this next week for the exhibits. One of the hardest things to work with are the photos we have access to. Many of them come from books, including school yearbooks. The quality is not always good and they are hard to improve. We try to make up for it by improving the signage. Every once in a while, some additional glitches appear, today we found out that the individual we thought was the first principal or superintend was not correct. Ouch! We have no idea where to go from here with that one. Hopefully someone will do some research and the info will turn up, with a photo too.

I have been trying to increase my range of motion on the tkr and yesterday I dropped my stationary bike seat down about 1/4 inch. This may not seem like much but believe me the first time one tries to pedal, you know you have changed something. The interesting thing about pedaling on a stationary bike and rocking in a wooden rocking chair is that they really help not only with the flexibility but also with the pain. I do ice after exercising most days. It helps with inflammation and also pain. I also do a lot of massaging of my knee (and hip) as this seems to improve circulation and helps ease pain. I am past seven months on the total knee replacement and close to a year on the hip replacement. The hip seems to just improve constantly without any real work other than exercising, including walking and biking. My goal is to purchase a 5-speed bike this summer and work toward riding the full six miles from here to Ross and back or to highway 3 and back. That should give me a good workout. The key to recovery really seems to be exercise.

Biking brought back so many memories of when our older two children were young. We lived in Hoyt Lakes Minnesota when they were young. Michelle graduated from Aurora-Hoyt Lakes High School; Brian wanted to graduate from Roseau, which turned out to be the same year James started school. This led to our moving permanently to the Haugen family farm in Roseau. Hoyt Lakes really catered to young families back then. It has wonderful bike paths, at that time a life guard at Colby beach, two nice playgrounds; one of which we lived right across the street. Brian fell from the top of the slide while climbing up the slide, not the steps, one day and broke his arm. By the time it was ready to come off, he had gone through 3 casts. Why you may ask, because he hung from the monkey bars by the cast and went swimming with it on (covered but...) several times.

Back to the biking. One of our favorite activities was to bike out to Fisherman's Point, which was about 2-2.5 miles from out house. We usually stopped at the gas station and bought some pop and took some bread to feed the ducks that weren't suppose to be fed. :) We also enjoyed riding to the St. Louis River which was about three miles way. We skipped rocks there. Now we would probably go farther because a paved road goes to the North Shore very close to the river. I was in much better shape then, you can imagine. Good memories!

Walking in the winter

Seeing as how it "looked" like it was much warmer according to http://www.wunderground.com/ I decided to head out for a walk. 7 mile an hour wind at 29 above couldn't be too bad right? Wrong! In our sheltered yard the wind was just a light breeze, by the time I got halfway down the driveway there were thoughts of going in for more clothes. Commitment is tough in the winter but one must endure so endurance it was, a mile and half of endurance in northwest winds. I walked south so first the right side was freezing and coming back the left side froze. Hot chocolate, marshmallows and a cookie in the recliner was a delight!

Last night I finished reading the first of Stephenie Meyers' Twilight Series. Leah finished and had raved about it, plus several of my younger friends had also given it high marks, so I though, why not. It was fun to read, definitely young adult fiction but that didn't keep me from enjoying it. I had read Meyer's science fiction book The Host last fall and thought it was quite thought provoking. I see it is number 4 on the New York Times Best Seller list.

I have also downloaded the audio book Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. Blink is about our immediate reaction to anything and how we are affected by the reaction, i.e. cognitive reaction. I heard him talk on the CBC Radio podcast The Next Chapter and was very impressed by him. (Another plus for my iPod, I would never think of listening to this program due to the time it is on the radio.)

Now it is time to move on to a new book. Hum, do I have time right now with all that is going on at the museum? I do have two on the shelf right now that may be interesting. Full Speed by Janet Evanovich and Charlotte Hughes, plus A Christmas to Remember by Thomas Kinkade and Katherine Spencer.I know that Christmas has come and gone, but I live in Minnesota where right now Christmas doesn't like it was so long ago.

Well it is time to go ride the bike and then ice the knee, it has been quite sore today for some reason.

Windy!

Yesterday, hubby and I went to a funeral for a classmate and former neighbor of his. She discovered a return of cancer a short while ago and went very quickly. She had been to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester about six months ago and had been given a clean bill of health. It is serves as a reminder that we never know our future.

The funeral was well attended and the people had spilled over into the dining area with some even standing. The family is quite large and needed all the pews in this small church. Sometime about three-quarter of the way through the funeral service, the wind came up with rain and snow. It was so strong it rattled the windows and howled outside. When we moved out of the dining area so the family could come in, Ardmore and I headed outside. He had a meeting in another hour and although I had planned to stay a while, the conditions made me change my mind and I headed home against the ferocious winds. I was very glad to walk into my warm toasty home and make a taco pizza.

This morning dawned cloudy but warm and no wind. Would have been perfect for a walk but we had to be at church for an early morning meeting. When we returned home it was in the 20s and I decided to go for a walk. We ate and I went down and started puttering; it was almost 5 when I put on the winter gear to go for the walk, iPod in my pocket. About two minutes after I headed out a strong nw wind came up again, 22 miles an hour! I thought it was going to blow me over. I walked about a 1/3 of mile and nearly froze so turned around and walked in the yard where there was hardly any wind, just a lot of tree noise as the wind charged through them. Decided I was ride the stationary bike for a while and then iced the throbbing knee. TKR recovery is much harder than a person realizes, but the results are so much better than the earlier pain.

This week we had one of our favorite meat dishes, which so easy to fix. Years ago I received a Campbell' s Soup cookbook. It has several mum good, mum good recipes. This was one of them:

1 1/2 pounds round steak or tender chucks cut into 4 pieces
1 can French onion soup
1/2 can water
1 can cream of mushroom soup, I prefer the beefy mushroom but regular works well too.

Spray a 2 quart casserole dish and put the meat in, salt and pepper it on both sides and pour the French onion soup and water over the meat, add the mushroom soup and stir a little to combine.

Bake in a 350 oven for about 1 1/2 to 2 hours until tender. Serve over potatoes or rice.
An alternative to this recipe is to use ground beef, fried with 1 stalk celery and 1/4 onion, diced, add the soups plus 1 full can of water, then add 1 can uncooked rice. This can be cooked on top of the stove in an electric skillet and is ready in about 3/4 hour.

I was listening to the Splendid Table today and hear that the bundt cake is making a come back. As a Minnesotan, where the bundt cake originated, my ears perked. A new book has just come out Bundt Cake Bliss by Susanna Short. Most reviews were excellent, sounds like a good book to have on hand. I can even taste a chocolate cherry bundt cake with a drizzle of fudge frosting on the top. Yum!