Pinterest + Thanksgiving =Success

     Using Pinterest for cooking has been a staple in our home.  Propping my iPad on the counter for easy access and going to town on new recipes is exciting for me.   Whether I'm looking for a quick and easy meal or I want to copycat an intricate dish from my favorite restaurant, it can almost always be found within this red app. 

     My question to myself this holiday was,  " Can I make an entire Thanksgiving meal and it also be amazingly delicious from Pinterest?"

     The answer is a resounding, "Yes!"

     So what did I end up cooking?  Well let me just tell you then. 

 

  First up, our main course was a holiday ham from our farm fed pig.  Necessity dictated that I use our roaster due to the oven being full.  I've cooked several hams, but I always come back to the Brown Sugar Ham.  Ours was 18 pounds and I roasted it for 4 hours at 325 degrees and it was fabulous!

    Second up, Green Bean Casserole.  This is the first time I have used frozen green beans instead of canned and it was still a fan favorite, but some didn't enjoy the crispness of the frozen beans versus canned.  I rarely purchase canned anything anymore because they just are not as healthy an option. 

   Third, 7 Layer Salad.  An item my husband loves to add to any menu. 

   
  Fourth, Warm Bacon Cheese Dip.  I could not find a bread bowl at either store I entered so I made my own, but I preferred the garlic, Parmesan pita chips with this dip instead.

  


   Fifth, Twice Baked Potato Casserole.  This is awesome because it's just the inside of a twice baked potato.  How could you possibly go wrong with that?

   

 
Sixth, Candied Sweet Potato Casserole.  To. Die. For.   This is like dessert.  I ate it two mornings in a row for breakfast!

    


 Seventh on the list, Ramen Noodle Salad.  This is one of my personal favorites.   For whatever reason, I did not buy the bag of coleslaw mix, so I had to make mine from scratch, which I like even better.  You can tell it was made with love because the cabbage slices were uneven. 

   

 Eighth, Sweet Hawaiian Bread.  This is so moist, delicious and easy to make in the bread machine.  Love my bread machine!

    

 Ninth for dessert was No Bake Eclair Cake!   I didn't have room in my oven for one more food item and I was tuckered out at this point from baking.  This ended up being a big ticket item though, so simple and yummy. 

      The only dish I did not steal from Pinterest was Rice Pilaf, another easy dish that I'll have to share later.  You can see it was a busy day of cooking, six hours worth and totally worth every minute of it. 

     My only foul up was that I pulled four hot dishes out of the oven just in time to call everyone to eat and I completely forgot to take a photo of our Thanksgiving homemade feast!

   

 So dinner from Pinterest was a total success!

Carey Portell-Stronger than Yesterday-FB

Carey Portell-cpsty Twitter

Touched by Angels

    

    
      Each week as I ready for blog writing, I let my topic come to me as I go through my every day activities.  Not knowing until I was in church this morning, sitting, listening to the homily, I had  to look down for my eyes were whelming with grateful tears as I remember my first church visit four months after our collision.  Yes, this is what I should share today as the holiday season is among us, as we sit, look back at all we are grateful for and bask in all that we are given.  At the suggestion of a wonderful high school classmate of mine, I want to bring up how each one of us can be someone's angel, right here on this earth we live on. 

    Easter was late that year, April 24th.  Our priest suggested that I wait to come to church until my pain lessened and I became more mobile.   Unable to drive or attend many of my families activities,  unable to stand being cooped up any longer, I asked my husband to take me to mass.  Rolling me into church, I could feel warm eyes on me, although welcome, I felt small in that wheelchair, stripped of my independence.    Dragging my bottom from the chair to the hard, wood bench, I cringed.  I had forgotten to bring a seat cushion.  Weighing around 110 lbs, there was not much padding for my sore tailbone that I had been sitting on, without relent, for many months.  One of our daughters finally gave me their coat to ease my discomfort and stop the grinding sound that came from my constant fidgeting.  

     With that taken care of my ankles started talking to me, before long they were barking and by communion, howling.  Since they are elevated most of the day to relieve the pressure of my injuries, an hour of hanging down has caused deep aches and a pounding each time my heart beat.  We all know that Easter mass is a tad longer than a normal Sunday devotion.  Admitting silently that this was not one of my best ideas, communion commenced, meaning we were close to ending.

     I sat on the right side of church, in the front row, at the end of the pew, farthest from the aisle.  I had not heard or absorbed a single word of mass since entering the church.  Concentrating solely on increasing my comfort and berating myself for being impatient with my progress, I had lost the purpose of even attending with my family. 

      Keeping my head down as parishioners received the Eucharist, I felt the first soft touch on my right shoulder.  Gently smiling, I

covered this man's hand and nodded thank you.  Lacing my fingers together, I laid my clasped hands in my lap as another hand gingerly touched my shoulder as they passed by me, another patting, another squeezing, another caressing, another and another and another. 

      Each one of these wonderful angels spoke volumes to me as they moved past.  No words, just touch.  Soft, compassionate, reassuring shoulder embraces.  This was not sorrow or pity from what had happened to me.  This was normal people being sent as angels to comfort.  One hot tear fell from the corner of my right eye and then one more.  As more parishioners moved past me, more tears fell.  I could not lift my eyes for fear of completely collapsing emotionally.  So many hands that I could not count touched my heart.  

     With nothing to wipe my eyes, I sat there, slightly bent, watching the tears fall from the contours of my face to the fabric of my pants as the line moved forward.  My face was hot from the cascade of emotion sliding down my cheeks.  Silent sobs racked my chest in even increments as I earnestly kept them from escaping.   Unable to hide what was transpiring within me, my soaked eyelashes laid on my cheeks for the remainder of the hour.  

     Incapable of succeeding exclusively on my own, I accepted the help of others for the first time that I can cite.  Beholden with gratitude at what God asked these individuals to do that day and their willingness to accept has been the foundation of my successful rehabilitation.  Never knowing when we will be called upon, we should live gratefully and selflessly all year long instead of growing a soft heart only near the holidays or when tragedy beats on our door.  It did not matter that I heard no words recited from scripture this day, He said everything I needed to hear transmitted through your touch.  

   

  It is said that if angels exist, they have wings and halos above their head.  That they only show themselves when we reach so deep within ourselves that we touch a place we never knew we even had.  

But I see angels every day and they look just like you.

We Don't Call it Torture Anymore-it's Called Physical Therapy

     As physical therapy sessions approach again, flashbacks of my first session flood to my mind.  April was the month I began my first voluntary torture showdown.   Me versus induced pain.  It was a crap shoot which one was to win on those first visits.  Never having experienced physical therapy before, I had no expectations.  My bag of bones was petrified into the shape of a chair position.  Barely moving for over three months, muscle atrophy and inflexibility scolded my frail, skinny frame.  I had in this position since my car crash.   

     Pure terror consumed my mind over a stranger touching my ankles.  Unable to bear the thought of multiple strangers working on me, I asked to be scheduled with one therapist only.  Trust was essential in my participation.  As I sat in that cheap, blue contraption known as a wheelchair, my therapist asked what I wanted to achieve from therapy.  My desperate answer, " I want you to challenge and push me.  I want to live as closely to my previous activity as possible.  I want to walk," I declared.  Examining my x-rays and listening to me reveal my last three months made us both sigh.  "What is he going to do with me?" I speculated.  "What am I going to do with her?" he reciprocated in his own mind.  (he later divulged this to me)

     Transferring to a cot that butted up against a concrete wall, I was advised to lie on my back.  "Flat?" I asked incredulously.  My waist and pelvis were rebelling against the action.  Each part of my anatomy liked the position it was in, they didn't moved independently anymore.  Leaving my knees bent and lowering myself down to my left side, I met the white cot with my shoulder and rolled to my back.  I'm sweating.  My 'inducer of pain'  pushed my knees to the mattress and my lower back revolted by awkwardly arching upward. 

      "Roll to your stomach," was his next instruction.  My face went blank as if I didn't understand what he was saying.  "On my stomach?", I am appalled.  First off, my legs are in braces, I haven't rolled anywhere in months, my pelvis and lower back pain is atrocious and he wants me to roll over?  Terrible, just terrible is what this movement was.  To make it worse he asked me to then push up on my elbows.  He measured the angle my torso was able to bend.  I had barely moved. 

      "Are we done yet?", I prayed.   Perspiration rolled in droplets down my spine.  Plank like, I rolled to my back again and he announced he was going to stretch my ankles.  Like hell!  Oh no.  NO, NO NO NO and NO.  Don't go there.  Stay away, don't touch them.  Don't even look at them.  No. 

      "Okay," I sulked instead.  Just removing my socks was a time consuming chore as he stared at the damage.  As I sat upright with my legs stretched out to the end of the cot, he spelled out that he needed to extend my ankles downward.  Pushing down on the tops of my feet was the only way to regain movement.  I am panicked.  I don't want to do this, My God, I don't want to do this.  "Let's do this,"  I state with false enthusiasm.   

     My eyes squeezed shut as hot pain seared from my ankles up to my lower legs at the lightest push.  His hands shifted my feet downward even more.  My palm met the concrete wall to my right with a smack, sweaty with fingers splayed apart.  "Dear God!" I screamed inside.  The sound of my bones moving was nauseating as if they were breaking apart all over again.  Reciting internally that I could handle this was the only thing I could do to keep from sobbing. I wanted to sob, it was right there ready to bellow out.
 

 I can describe the feeling only as if my ankles were encased on old, crumbling concrete for a decade.  Now they were being removed from this unforgiving home.  Popping, grinding and my own gasps engulfed me.  Taking myself back to the pain that fateful night as I awoke in the car, I thought that surely today's anguish couldn't be as dreadful.  Could it?

     My nose began to run with tears that I refused to let fall.  A half sob, half laugh escaped me as my fingers clawed at the cold, beige  wall while he held my stretched ankles down for ages.  "That's enough for today," he admonished.  Air rushed out of my lungs as I sighed with relief.  My shoulders slumped and my head leaned against the wall as he strapped my braces back to my legs.  Throwing a narrow side glance his direction as he asked how my first visit went, said as much as if I had uttered the words aloud.  

     Leaving with sheets of exercises to perform at home, I started making my goals list as Mom wheeled me to the truck.  Determination set it's long talons inside of me right then.  Today, I have stopped surviving this trauma and started recovering from it.
Let's do this!

 #PCRMC Success Story!

Carey Portell 2011

My accident occurred on December 29, 2010.  I was hit by a drunk driver that luckily only left me with severe bone injuries.  The most severe were a pelvic ring fracture and severe bilateral ankle fractures.

All bones in my left ankle were broken and dislocated, causing the nerves to tear.  This left no feeling from the ankle down.

I had an open tibia/fibula fracture and all bones were crushed so severely in my right ankle that the physicians could not save all of the splinters.  I still have gaps that are trying to grow back in.

After many surgeries and lots of metal installed, I was put back together and able to start therapy.  With the help of my therapist, I was able to start stretching out my body from being in a wheelchair for so long.  Most exciting was learning to walk again.  Just to stand on my own two feet was exhilarating.

My choice of coming here for therapy is a confident one. The therapists have not just helped me physically, but mentally as well.  Some days are a challenge and you just need to hear someone else tell you that you can do this, then show you that you can.  I am in pain every day, but look forward to therapy days because I know I will be met with a smile from every staff member & I will be challenged to progress in my #recovery.  I leave with a feeling of accomplishment & that I can win this fight.