Monday Morning

[asirimarco]

Good morning to all. Finally getting settled in here in Mazatlan. Bill has his awning//tent up to park the Jeep under. Everything that didn't move now has Christmas lights on it. We sure twinkle at night. Rained here for a few minutes last night. Hopefully that will clear up some of the humidity. Other wise perfect weather around mid 80s. The mechanic is coming today to see why we are having same problem with Jeep that we thought got fixed in Amado, AZ. He runs until he warms up then stops. Yesterday we took a Pulmonia to the grocery store and then an Uber home. New experience.
It feels like coming home when we get here. Almost the whole RV park was here when putting up the canopy for the car. Lots of laughing going on. Wrote about it in the blog.
Today if the car gets fixed we will go downtown to see about getting our Internet up and running and take Bills glasses to the optometrist. One of the little nose pads fell off. It will be interesting to see how much has changed downtown Everything here is so green and flowers on bushes that have looked dead in the past.
Will have lots to blog about.
Take care if you are on the road.
We have Mexican pastries - help yourself.

[BirdbyBird]

So glad that you are safely settled. I enjoyed the pictures and story line about the jeep tent going up. When we get reports from the satellites regarding a strange unidentified glow from Mexico, we will know where to look.

Just got back from Kroger here in Ohio and wanted to let everyone know that someone missed their opportunity to sell an idea and gain more travel and adventure money. There was a whole display of Betty Crocker "Mug Treats".
Each box held 4 packets. They appear to be prepackaged pouches of what we used to call "Cake in a Mug". Yes, I bought a box but will need to report back later on quality control review. Hey, a box of those and a nice mug for Christmas, what more could you want?

That is all I got.

If I can get my hands warmed back up I will continue on with grooming day for Josef. Now the girls get to take the back seat again after their weekend of being the center of attention.

Tina

[BarbaraRose]

Good morning gals!

Tina, I have tried those mug treats and was not impressed. I would rather make "real" cake. Something very artificial tasting about them to me. Let us know what you think tho.

Was fairly busy at work yesterday but not as much as I expected for giving free haircuts to vets and active military. I work again later this afternoon. Tomorrow I have off and am driving up to Long Beach to look at a small trailer.

The Woolsey fire in Malibu has consumed 85,500 acres already and is only 15% contained. But tonight the 101 highway will be reopened. So far only 2 deaths and 3 firefighters injured. No count yet on how many homes lost but well into the hundreds. The Santa Ana winds are supposed to continue thru Tuesday.

Got a surprisingly nice and unexpected email from my sister-in-law yesterday. She is the one who is very difficult to get along with. She surprises me sometimes! She and my brother are expecting another grandson next month.

That is about it for me here. Have a good day!

[MandysMom]

Another smoky day here in northern California. As usual, clearer this morning but that's deceiving because I know from past experience that does not mean the microfine particulate matter, so damaging to lungs, is gone! We will need rain to clear air but as Anne said, thats not happening due to a atmospheric High which has been here for many weeks. One of my favorite local reporters was up in Paradise Saturday reporting and you could see her flinch slightly as you heard in background as distant trees fell from being burned and propane tanks blew up! I write to her time to time and she said to me that evening that she had stepped on a nail that day, which fortunately missed her foot as it entered her shoe! That's just a few of the hazards civilians and fire and police personnel face in re entering a fire zone. Inagine being on the teams going in searching for the missing! They have enlisted anthropology teams from Chico State University and 3 other colleges in helping search, along with bringing in a DNA trailer to help collect DNA from family members to aid in ID of bodies. It's a grim time in our states history. Bodies are coming to labs here in Sacramento.
It's been cold at night, yesterday I awoke to 31 degrees, very cold for here esp this early and only reached low 60's during the day. The sun has been blocked since last Thursday by smoke, allowing cooling temperatures.
Those packaged mug cakes have pretty questionable ingredients if you eat "clean" or try to. My son, who would prefer to exist on high sugar yogurt and granola and frozen pizza, tried several flavors but said they don't taste great and he won't buy again. It's pretty easy to find mug recipes and bag dry ingredients and put a label on with what to add then stir and bake, usually one egg, a little vanilla and melted butter. One minute in microwave. I made a double chocolate Saturday with all Keto ingredients including coconut and almond flour, put in two custard cups and one min in microwave. Even Mr Picky said it was yummy, better than the store bought!
Plan to spend day indoors again as expecting smoke to build here again. I didn't go to church yesterday due to smoke but heard that the multipurpose room (a large gymnasium type room with full size basketball court to give you idea of size) was stacked high with donations, so after sacrament service, when normally everyone has Sunday school, the entire congregation went in and sorted clothing by gender and size and packaged to be delivered to shelters.
Have a good day everyone.
Velda

[Acadianmom]

Carol, I enjoyed your story about the jeep tent. At the rally I just attended someone had an easy-up cover over a Casita. I don't know what the story was on that. Maybe she has a leak. The city we were in had a contest to see which of our rigs was the best decorated. They didn't say what the prize was before hand or I think more would have decorated. The prize was $50. I only had a lit up pink flamingo that has been sitting in my living room since Christmas last year. It's amazing the amount of stuff the women in the little vintage trailers bring to decorate with.

I have seen the mug cake packages for sale but haven't tried it. I still have some of the mix in a jar on my cabinet but it's chocolate. There was chocolate cake for one of the ladies' birthday one night and I had the smallest piece. Ever so often I think I can get away with a piece of chocolate but woke up during the night with a migraine. I'll never learn. When we were in town I found a place that sold fried pies in about 10 flavors. My grandmother made apricot fried pies that I loved so I had to buy some. I was watching them make them and it didn't look that hard. A new project.

I went and picked up Sweetie Pie. She has her stitches out and is walking on her broken leg but with a limp. I'm so glad she will have the use of her foot. They were all loving on her and said how sweet she is. She is living up to her name.

Martha

[JudyJB]

Morning, all! My son from Napa and his family had a rough weekend because the girl from there who died in the Thousand Oaks shooting was their long-time babysitter and her mother worked with both of them in the school districts. So, they went out and stood along the route they were using to bring her body back for a funeral and burial. Very sad. Thousands lined the route, and there was a police escort and line of family cars. Check out the photo of the line of people here: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/thousand-o ... peaks-out/

Sunny here today, so warm during the day. It went down to 29 last night and I had both small electric heaters running all night, but my down comforter kept me warm. I love down because it is so warm and lightweight. Not supposed to be so chilly tonight, I think.

Hope California gets some rain soon. And, Sue, I remember all the problems those little finicky birds caused when they lit fires to get the right-sized trees to grow. (Lit small fires, but got out of control and burned thousands of acres.) Dumb birds insist on jack pine trees between 5' and 10' tall. When the trees get too tall, the birds won't nest! Not only do they require the right sized trees, they nest on the ground underneath the trees on sandy soil only! https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bir ... ds-warbler

[monik7]

Just got back from Kroger here in Ohio and wanted to let everyone know that someone missed their opportunity to sell an idea and gain more travel and adventure money. There was a whole display of Betty Crocker "Mug Treats".
Each box held 4 packets. They appear to be prepackaged pouches of what we used to call "Cake in a Mug". Yes, I bought a box but will need to report back later on quality control review. Hey, a box of those and a nice mug for Christmas, what more could you want?Tina

Walmart in my area has some boxed mixes to make in a mug. There are 4 packs per box and you supply your own mug. I decided to try the Cinnamon Coffee Cake. Didn’t like it and now I’m stuck with 3 packs left. I think they’ll go out with the garbage pickup Wednesday.
Sandi

[BirdbyBird]

I mainly noticed them because of the Cake in the cups many of us would make with the Angel Food Mix and the cake mix and water. No eggs needed. They were nice for portion control and didn't have too many strange ingredients other than what ever was in the cake mixes.

[JudyJB]

One thing I have tried lately and really liked was the "Just My Size" cheesecakes. They make some small cake mixes, but i have not tried them.

One thing is that you need to add an 8 oz package of cream cheese to the mix, which most of us don't keep in stock. It comes with its own baking pan. The thing I really like about these is that they make only four small portions and that the crust stays crunchy, not soggy. I eat one piece and then freeze the other three pieces for later, and they really do taste good.

[avalen]

I buy the Duncan Hines mug cakes, love them!! Brownie and Carmel brownie,,,yum yum

[Shirlv]

I hope you all are satisfied. Because of all the talk about cake, I am baking a cake tomorrow. Ava, you were the last straw, my favorite cake in the whole world is devils food with carmel icing. Going to bed and have sweet dreams.

[Acadianmom]

Judy will have me looking for the "Just My Size" cheesecakes. I had a cheesecake recipe that I can't find so have to read every cheesecake recipe that comes up on Facebook.

Martha