Wednesday, April 15, 2020

Oh My Darlin' Quaran-tine

I wish that my darlin' Quaran-tine was lost and gone forever. Seriously. Here is how I have spent a lot of my time:


That's me in the middle, helping out a couple of doctors and a couple of nurses get ready to enter a COVID room. The public has been very generous with food, masks, gowns, and other things that the hospital staff may not have time or energy to go out and buy. We also got a big sign placed out front :


At home, we may have gone a little overboard with our quarantine food supply, but Doc is LDS, and disaster prep is their thing.


Fruit, veggies and peanut butter and jam:


Boxed milk and chili, stew, tuna, turkey, chicken, spam, and chicken and dumplings:


Water, Gatorade, tonic water, and iced tea:


Beans, beans, the magical fruit - the more you eat, the more you toot. And a lot of canned fruit, especially pineapple:


Pandi and I have a different survival plan :


This is our nirvana.

I have actually been using these cans to make quite a few dishes, so we ARE eating and drinking what we bought. No hoarding going on. I just found it frightening to go into a Vons or a WalMart, so we bought a lot when we did go, masks, gloves, hand sanitizer and all.

First up, Hungarian goulash.


Brown the onion, then add some sweet red bell pepper:


A nice Johnsonville smoked sausage gets added next :


Then our friend the bean. I used pintos in chili sauce.



Some garlic, some stewed tomatoes, and a few spices next.


The final touch - cooked rice. When we used to make this at Camp Oliver (1st - 6th grade) we used broken spaghetti sometimes. Stir it all up and heat through. It's good.



Next a variation on pot of gold - hamburger, tater tots and cheese.


Hamburger, onion, garlic and a can of cream of mushroom soup.





Layer that in a baking dish and top with a layer of veggies. I used frozen mixed. Be sure to salt and pepper, or it will be too bland.

Some Mexican cheese mix on top.


Then the tots. The middle is just a tiny bit of hash browns that we had lurking in the freezer, so I used them.



Bake, bake bake, then enjoy. It was actually pretty good.


Today, I made the standard Catholic family Friday night dinner - tuna casserole. Typical, with egg noodles, onion, pepper, cheese and bread crumbs. Also Cream of Chicken soup, a little mayo and mustard and a few frozen mixed veggies. I will serve it with pineapple on the side.



So now, let's move from casseroles to outfits. I have been getting dressed up to go to work, because that and running and walking the dogs are practically the only joys I have left for a few more weeks.
Way back on April 1st:


This is a tiered silk skirt from the Gap. On top, a lace trimmed velour tank and a brown Cardigan from INC. My embroidered suede booties are from Halogen.


This necklace was a purchase at the Taste of Charlotte a few years ago.


Skip forward to April 7th - I wore a grey turtleneck, a gray and burgundy plaid jumper, and black suede booties.


On top, a burgundy lab coat style jacket.


I tried to take a close up of the plaid pattern, but it doesn't show up very well. It was cold and rainy all week long.


The next day, I wore some teal and black brocade slacks. The cardigan is black, has a zip front, and has beading along the zipper and epaulets.




Another sad close up attempt to show the pattern on the slacks.


On April 8th, I wore a maroon and black color blocked sweater dress from Ann Taylor.



It poured this day. I wore a black blazer from Escada and a Louis Vuitton cashmere scarf on top.


Let's start with the close up on April 9th. This is a cropped sweater and patterned chiffon blouse from Walter, along with sharkskin slacks from Sun Moon Stars.






By Friday, April 10th, I was exhausted. So I busted out one of my old lady pant suits from Antthony. I bought 5 or 6 different ones when my mom was dying and I was spending the night at her place, then going to work after. Now I take them when traveling and wear them when I don't feel like ironing.



By Monday, April 13th, I was a little rejuvenated. But it was still raining. I wore some black jacquard slacks from Express and an Indian style embroidered top from Daisy Fuentes.


I wore my heavy duty rain coat on top of this outfit.


Here's a look at the neckline. It has a black satin shell underneath.


Yesterday, my outfit was a bit problematic. Someone gave me these Classiques Entier slacks and I wondered why I never wore them. Now I know. They are a size zero. I am not. But I managed to stuff ten pounds of sausage into a five pound bag. I didn't have time to figure anything else out.
They did stretch out quite a bit after a few  hours.


One bagel short of an explosion. The nice suede jacket is She by Sheri Bodell and the embroidered top underneath were great.

To cover the stretched side seams, a nice waterfall cardi from Style and Co.


I wore my fleur de lis necklace also.


I also got my sample boxes.  First up, Ipsy:


From right to left :
1) Balance Me Wonder Eye Cream
2) Neogen Dermalogy Real Vita C Serum
3) Kismet Pure Vitamin C Primer
4) Shaina B Miami Blush Brush
5) On top, Araceli Beauty Ojos Perfectos Gel Pencil Eyeliner in Negro.


Now for Birchbox. A very pretty box this month:


 From top to bottom :
1) Bumble and Bumble Hairdresser's Invisible Oil Protective Primer
2) IBY Beauty City Limits Eye Shadow in Fire and Ice
3) Tokyomilk Light Awaken Within Eau de Parfum - orange blossom, neroli and jasmine
4) Manna Kadar Cosmetics Lip Tint in Aura
5) Onekind Pore-fectionist Refining Facial Mask
6) on the side, Benefit Cosmetics They're Real Mascara - I like this one.


I will leave you with a couple of pictures of Vinni Barbarino Holtzman. I am trying to get a cute pic of Vinni to get a Crown and Paw made for him, like I did for Pandi.


I want to put Vinni in a jester costume. He really is sweet and adorable.


And that's all!!! Hopefully, when I do this again in a couple of weeks, the COVID pandemic will be over in SoCal. California did a GREAT job at flattening the curve. We worked extremely hard to get the hospital ready for surge. When that is over, we then have the difficult taks of resuming normal operations in a thoughful and well planned manner. Wish us luck !!!