Mother of all Inventions

I guess I will give one more Middle TN weather report. Woody did a couple of things that he hasn't done in I don't know how long today...he didn't do his normal Saturday errands--the library nor WalMart nor did he go out to get the mail. Today the temperatures rose, but it took a long time for all the ice on the steps to melt away. The following picture was taken at noon or there abouts:

It's sort of hard to tell but you are looking down at four steps. This is after Kathy came over and poured some salt on them and attempted twice to sweep them off. So for quite a while it wasn't safe to venture off our front porch. Here is another reason...the street...definitely better than yesterday but still very slushy and slippery at noon and it was a few hours later till it was totally clear.

And, the reason that the mail never got brought in...by the time the ice on the steps melted it was so soggy and rainy that conditions weren't all that great for him to go out. And, it was probably good that he stayed in today anyway...he is still coughing. Now...I could have gone out and gotten it...but getting the mail is one of Woody's daily activities so I didn't want to deprive him! And, I'm sure that whatever might be out there can wait till tomorrow to be brought in when we get home from church. The next picture was taken a little before dark...note all the puddles in our yard...snow and ice meltage along with quite a bit of rain. It was also getting foggy when I took this picture. But the roads are clear as are our steps! Just wet and soggy out now. And the temperatures rose into the upper 40's today...a heat wave! But I still felt cold all day. I think that it is the dampness.

I got the Sunday School lesson ready last night so I could play today. I headed into the sewing room and got things straightened out from the latest projects that I had worked on. I have the sewing table all cleared and the cutting board on it along with the fabric all nicely spread out on it and the pattern on the fabric...but I never got around to getting it cut out as when I was ready to do that it was time to make a pot of soup. And, that is where tonight's title for the blog comes in...the answer, of course, to that title is "necessity." Today I had planned to make our Spicy Vegetable Beef soup. Well, it calls for diced potatoes and we only had two small ones...not enough. So I wondered if our friendly "neighbor's store" (Nathan and Kathy) would happen to have some extras. Kathy happened to come over to borrow our pizza stones so I asked and they did have some. A little later she came back with three...our neighbor's store even delivers! So I was all set and came back down the middle of the afternoon to make the soup. I got the recipe out, looked at the recipe and couldn't remember putting away either tomato or V-8 juice on Wednesday...Woody's last trip to the store. So I asked him...nope...he hadn't gotten it. So I got to thinking what I could use instead. I gathered quite a few cans of tomatoes and popped them into the food processor...and voila...pretty good tomato juice...at least tomato puree and added some tomato sauce. Worked great and tasted very much the same too. So in the end I managed to get this pot of soup together and we had it for supper tonight. And, now that I could go back to my sewing I am too tired...there is always another day to sew. And, by not sewing today, my sewing room will stay clean for a little longer!