52 Week Blog Challenge-Week 26

The Best Parts of the Season….

If you don’t know by now, I live in Florida and have been here for 8 years. As long as I have been here, we don’t have the change of seasons but change of temperature. We go from hot in the Winter, hotter in the Spring, hot death in the Summer and little bit hot in the Fall.

So basically all I am saying is, we have nothing to look forward to as far as temperature is concerned but we do get hurricanes. I am originally from Cleveland, Ohio born and raised and I can tell you what the best parts of those seasons are. Although it is cold 9 months out the year, I wouldn’t trade wearing tank tops and shorts for anything.

4 Seasons……..

Winter:

Snow covers grass, you don’t have to worry about cutting the yard
Christmas- My favorite season
Snowball fights
Fully clothed, covered bodies. Don’t worry about my weight

Spring:

Fresh flowers
Not to cold or too hot
Getting together for Easter holiday dinner
Rainy days with a lot of movie night

Summer:

Going to the beach
Family Vacations
Walk out to the car without a coat and warming the car up

Fall:

Kids start school
Colorful leaves
Candy on Halloween

These are the best parts of the season for me. Thank you for reading and don’t forget to like, comment, subscribe!

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52 Week Blog Challenge-Week 25

My Favorite Recipe…..

No doubt about it, I LOVE Food!! I watch the FoodNetwork on cable and I love the shows Diners, Drive-thru and Dive-Ins and Carnival Eats. When I am watching these shows, I always make sure I have eaten already otherwise you can get in some trouble.

When I was a kid, my dad taught me how to cook and one of my favorite things he cooked was CHILLI…..Yummy. While he was cutting all the vegetables and preparing the ground beef over the skillet, it would get “hot” in the kitchen

My Dad’s Recipe (from what I can remember)

2 lbs of ground beef cooked
2-3 cans of whole or diced tomatoes
2 cans of tomato paste
2-3 cans of kidney beans
Green pepper chopped
Onions chopped
1 packet of chilli seasoning
Simmered for about an hour in regular pot

and serve with saltine crackers

My dad used to use those heavy duty pots, the one that you pass down from generation to generation. (It was black, though)

Flash forward…..

My recipe is similar with a few alterations because of my dietary restrictions

3 lbs Ground Turkey cooked
2 cans of kidney beans
Chopped onions
2 cans of chopped tomatoes
Chopped green, red and yellow or orange peppers
1 packet of chili seasoning
Simmered in a crock pot for a couple hours

serve with saltine/ Ritz crackers or like the other 4 members of my family, they put chili hot sauce on it. I don’t do hot sauce at all. Here’s my crock pot.

So, that’s my favorite recipe, Enjoy!

Happy Dads Day to all Dads even mothers who are both parents. Me and my dad are so far away during this time but thanks to technology we are closer than ever!! Love you, dad.

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52 Week Blog Challenge-Week 24

Why does it seem like we are always going in circles like the Earth’s orbit?

Of course, this post was supposed to be about one thing and now with everything that has happened since the last week of May, it has to be included in this post. We all have heard by now about the unfortunate death of an African American named George Floyd who was murdered by police officers during a routine call May 31. As we take a moment of silence to pray over the family he has left behind we have to be advised that it can be any one of us at any time. The fact that he was a black man has stirred things up like back in the Watts Days after the brutal beating of Rodney King in the 90’s. I remember watching this as a teenager and just can’t understand for the life of me, how or why people get so angry and want to attack someone almost to death. With the right to bear arms and be able to defend yourself, it seems it stops with citizens, and allows for authority to do whatever they want and get away with it, Period. R.I.H

I am just so tired of all of it, it makes me so sick that as a black person I can’t even rely on the police to protect me, not to say there isn’t a small % of good cops but I am losing faith in their training and morality. All these riots that are happening, with all the protesting with Black Lives Matter shouldn’t be happening right now.

My Biggest Dream In Life……

Everyone who follows me knows that my children are half black and 1/4 white and 1/4 Puerto Rican and I am worried about their safety. We teach our children to be respectful to authority at all times even when approached by police but what happens if a cop is having a bad day and my child becomes a target. I want to get back to seeing pictures and videos of police rescues and doing good in the community. It is a fact that now that everything is where it is at, not alot of kids want to be policeman in this day and age. It really shines a bad light on the motto “Protect and Serve” Although what has happened is devastating, I don’t agree to compiling violence with violence. We all have a responsibility to make sure that we don’t set bad examples for those we have that look up to us. I want to see that everyone band together in peaceful unity and not destroy everything that we have built as a society. We have to think back to how Martin Luther King would have handled this, besides he has a street named after him wrapped around the Earth.

Racism, Equality, Political Change, Separate but Equal, Peacefulness and Unity. All these things are what should be happening right now. Just a reminder of what we are and should be wanting to see come to light.

Talking about something keeps it a dream. We must act everyday on change to make a dream a reality. For every person you come in contact with be cordial and put all prejudice aside.

….There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, “When will you be satisfied?”
We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of
police brutality. Martin Luther King Jr. (excerpt from I Have a Dream Speech)

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Writing is My Passion

So excited right now!! I love when you work on something for many hours, days, months and maybe and people recognize the talent that you have. Although, I wasn’t successful out on the career front as my age crept up on me, I didnt give up on what I love. I love to write and have a great passion for it. In the last 2 years, I have been writing alot about my experiences with my family or friends in my blog. I came across another writer awhile ago and she has her own blog: Her name is Laura Smith and she does giveaways, guest post, features, essays and book reviews. I like how she recognizes the talents of others and allows for writers to showcase it on her blog. Follow and Subscribe Here to check out her blog.

A couple months ago she posted on Twitter she had been looking for Guest Posts to promote and I responded with interest.

She picked me to be one of her guest post and I appeared June 12th on her blog. Check it out Here

If you are on pinterest click to view and save Here .

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Have a great weekend☺

52 Week Blog Challenge-Week 23

What I Spend My Money On?

In this day and age, the many ways people spend money varies from what their needs are from day to day, month to month and year to year. Most of us have kids, medical bills and debt floating around. The times now are getting shorter and shorter and what we really need to ask ourselves is what do we want to leave behind, or more importantly, what can we just live without.

I have always been a sentimental person and love to by things that have meaning and can be of use. These are some of the things I spend my money on:

–Old School Entertainment

As you all know I love music and movies so one thing I spend my money on are DVD movies. I love being able to pop a DVD in and enjoy a movie. We used to have VCR’s, which were great until they messed up tapes really bad. My husband still has a box of VCR tapes hoping VCRs will come back in style..lol. DVD movies can get scratched but they are easy to come by with cheap prices on Ebay and Amazon.

–Household Items

They just don’t make things as durable as they used too. I literally buy Tupperware and kitchenware every 6 months. Yesterday I got these cool non-stick copper pans that I have always wanted. I am one of the dishwashers in the house and I hate scraping food off skillets. As Seen On TV had these wonderful skillets…had an omelet just this morning. I also buy curtains and bedroom accessories as needed.

–Keepsakes of the Family

I love taking pictures and capturing great moments in time. I made these frames with my two boys graduations. My oldest son graduated in 2017 and now my youngest son graduates this week 2020. 2 down 1 more to go….my daughter will get a similar frame next year when she graduates.

–One Outfit a Year for my Birthday

Almost every woman loves birthdays and celebrating them BIG! I, myself, love to celebrate it every year and how I do it by either traveling or having dinner with my husband, family and friends. I took a trip one year with my daughter to New York. I usually buy myself an outfit-like a dress, get all prettied up and take a photo.

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So that’s all I spend my money on that is sentimental to me.

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52 Week Blog Challenge- Week 22

Working On My Fitness

Everyday, as I get older I have come to realize that I am not 20 years old anymore. I get up every morning blessed to be alive. I developed osteoarthritis before 40 years of age and I have to do daily therapy at home to keep my joints moving. I sometimes use a yoga ball to stretch my muscles and it makes my back and joints feel good.

For many years, me and my husband have had this tradition in walking 3 miles a day to help with our mental health. We listen to music while doing it. I love listening to music while doing anything, it always makes me feel better.

This was me in 2013 hitting the books. The days when I had my wired headphones, great music and adrenaline got things done for me after working so many hours a week.

These days, I am digging deep into who I really am these days. I am thinking twice about the relationships I have and focusing on positive energy and I feel a whole lot better about life. I listen to 30 minutes a day to Christian teachings and while it took me along time to find the person who would connect with me spiritually; I found Joyce Meyer. For those who are not familiar with her, she is a Christian who speaks on teachings from the bible and relating it to real-life everyday living. I like her life stories and her way of simplifying the meanings of each translation. You can find her on the WORD network on cable. Also she has a podcast, radio broadcast and is on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. Check her out at Joyce Meyer Website

As for my hobbies, right now, since there is a pandemic going on being sociable these days is hard so I keep my blog writing going and I keep positive busy by getting the family together once a week to have a Family Day. We have a nice at the table brunch together, then play board games, eat dinner together and have movie night.

Another way I work on my fitness is paying attention to how my body feels. I am having digestive issues now and with a diagnosis of pre-diabetes, I am having to cut back on sugars, dairy products, get more sleep every night along with taking probiotics and I am feeling better everyday. Overall, I stay positive, keep my energy up and survive.

Wishing everyone a safe and healthy days ahead!!

That’s all I have for you, tune in next week. Don’t forget to like, comment, subscribe!

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52 Week Blog Challenge- Week 21

If I could eat one last meal

This one is not about being in prison and being set to be executed or today being my last day alive, I decided to put a twist on this post to make it less emotional. If we thought about all the things that we take for granted in this world from the air we breathe, appreciating the beautiful flowers to the foods we eat everyday.

If we had a moment in history where our main source for food, which is farming, disappeared and is no more, what would we do? Think about it, most of our nutrients, reasons for some health issues and problem with obesity, lies in the foods we kill everyday.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that animals shouldn’t be eaten but if you thought long and hard about the pros versus the cons. I just recently started to cut back because of digestive issues on beef and replaced with turkey. I replaced pork with fish, occasionally I will have a bologna sandwich or a piece of bacon but it is bad for my blood pressure.

If today was the last day for these animals: Cows, chickens, pigs and turkeys, there would be no more beef, pork, turkey or dairy products.

Pig leaning over the railing of his cot

Trying to entice females and ward of other males, this Tom turkey is fully puffed out and his head engorged. Copy space to the left of bird in blurred forest.

A flock of chickens in search of food late in the day

For me, I love all these animals and wish we didn’t have to kill them. But if I were to eat one last meal it would be ribs, fried chicken, beef hamburgers, steak cut french fries, my homemade potato salad, greens, biscuits and for dessert is a scoop of every ice cream ever made.

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Raw Green Organic Collard Greens Ready to Cook

If there was no more animals, we would have to grow our own versions of food. Right now, with the pandemic going on, essential workers taking risk at factories and precautions not to infect the product has failed leaving alot of companies to shortage of meat. Some companies have already started and I think at some point we can make things healthier, homemade, grown in our own gardens to help us live better and fulfilled lives.

Well, I have given you something to think about!

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52 Week Blog Challenge- Week 20

My Favorite Movies

In my previous posts, I have talked about my three favorite movies of all time, which are:

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These are such classic movies with a little gangsta and a little drama. I think I have seen these almost 100 times.

For this posts, I want to show you the movies I thought were my favorite for this year 2020.

The first movie in the comedy department that made me laugh so hard that I cried was:

Stuber-I loved this movie so much!!

Next movie, is in the horror department. This movie scared me so bad, I wasn’t expecting it. I usually don’t see remakes of movies but my kids talked me into it so I saw part 1 which was okay but when I saw part 2…I almost peed my pants…

It: Part 2 –So scary on the big screen!! They did a great job with reinventing the clown, although, when I first saw the clown it looked kind of corny but when they added the special effects it was awesome!

Last movie of the year so far is one of drama, not the ones where you cry and get all emotional throughout the whole movie. This movie had a mystery to it:

Knives Out- This movie was amazing because I love mysteries. Kept you on the edge of your seat.

That’s all for now, tune in next week and don’t forget to like, comment and subscribe!!

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52 Week Blog Challenge- Week 19

My OCD Habits

Right off the top of my head, I can think of alot of things I do out of habit but I will pick the top three for me which affect my everyday life.

#1 Licking my Lips

I have a tick in which I continuously lick my lips. I don’t know why but it brings me comfort when I am nervous or sometimes when I am thinking about something.

#2 Everything Has its Place

Just like the picture above, I like things to be put where they belong and not thrown anywhere. It makes me feel unsorted when things are not clean. Now, that I have stopped working, I am working on this by taking a couple days off housework every Friday and Saturday and making sure I practice letting things go. it is very hard to watch dishes pile up in the sink and towels run out.

#3 Grocery Store order on conveyor by department

This picture shown above is chaos to me. I like my dairy products, produce, meats, frozen, paper goods and canned foods together on belt so that when they are bagged they are easier to put them away once I get home.

That’s it for now, tune in next week. Don’t forget to like, comment and subscribe!!

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52 Week Blog Challenge- Week 18

My Embarrassing Stories…….

It took me along time to remember back when I had an embarrassing moment but I was able to pull it out. When you are embarrassed, you tend to block it out and with old age it gets harder to remember.

My readers know that I am from Cleveland Ohio and we are famous for some of our amusement parks like Cedar Point, Geauga Lake and Great Wolf Lodge. Well, for those that lived in what I think was North Olmsted, there was a water park called Dover Lake.

Here’s my story…

In 1994, I was working for a company called Marc’s Deeper Discount in Cleveland heights Ohio, and I was there 2 and a half years. The Ceo of Marc’s who is Marc Glassman, also owned Dover Lake. The company had their annual employee appreciation day at Dover Lake and I went that year. So, I bought a two piece swimsuit and flip flops and was excited for the day. They were famous for the water slides and at the time I wasn’t into those things but I wanted experience it so I waited my turn on this slide….

So, the attendant says when you lay down make sure you cross your arms and keep them crossed all the way until you get to the bottom. It seemed simple enough until it is your turn and that rush of adrenaline comes over you….I forgot the instructions……got scared

and….of course, landed at the bottom and I had a wardrobe malfunction along with water in the eyes and couldn’t see. Everyone was screaming, Frieda!! Your boobs are out, your boobs are out!!! Omg, I just died. I was a big C at the age of 17 and it was bigger than the rest of my body. I wear one pieces from now on. (not me pictured above)

Dover Lake closed in 2006, this is what it looks like now:

2nd embarrassing story:

I worked for a company called Pepsi for 6 years and in 2014, they had what was called Pepsi Sales Training Day and we all got together for a meeting. Our supervisors decided to get the employees involved in scenarios in selling and because I was on the front line, I had to be one up on stage. I am so afraid to speak in front of people already and of course my boss/mentor told me to go up and sell something to a pretend customer….

The customer was on the left waiting for me to speak and I just couldn’t get the words right at all. It was so embarrassing being put on the spot like that and especially when I know how to talk to the customers out on the field one on one. Some years later, I said that I needed to get over this fear so when I created my casual Dinner and Movie Group here in Lakeland, I was able to overcome my fear that first meeting when I had over 20 people that listened to me as the organizer. I was nervous but here we are 7 months later and the group is doing well.

That’s all for now, thank you for reading. Don’t forget to like, comment and subscribe!! Tune for next week.

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