Jeepers, while reading this thread, my eyes welled up and I even ended with having tears running down my cheeks. Thank you everyone, for sharing your "Mom-memories." My Mom was, in my most charitable definition, merely a "serviceable" cook. That doesn't sound very kind, but the fact is that raising two kids on her own, making ends meet and trying to save pennies towards buying a house (which she did by the time I was 10 years old, on a bank teller salary) made feeding us as cheaply (and as quickly) as possible while maintaining our nutritional needs her first priority. We always had some kind of meat for protein (except for a few end-of-the-month dinners when we were very young and she, very poor), a vegetable and a starch on our plate, and always something, even if it was as simple as a can of fruit cocktail or a dish of jello for dessert with dinner. Later on, when she was a bit better off, she did try to get a bit "fancier" with her cooking, but she had a dull palate, I think because she wore dentures and the nasty glue that held them in hampered her ability to taste things, and she had a tendency to a far too heavy hand with herbs, salt and pepper. She baked better than she cooked, however (I've since noticed that it is often the case that people are better at baking or at cooking, one or the other.) In spite of all that, I bless her for taking the time to teach me the basics of cooking. So many of my friends found themselves, when first out on their own, struggling to learn how to feed themselves. My first memory of cooking was helping her cut out sugar cookies, and based on my memory of the kitchen, I could not have been more than 4 years old. By the time I was 9 or 10, much of Thanksgiving dinner was left in my hands, as she had to work a half day on the holiday. I'm sure we ate a number of overdone turkeys and underdone potatoes for a few years. After so many years, I had a hard time thinking about what things I still did because she had done them. One thing, is that once I have filled cake pans with batter, I always drop them onto the floor from a short distance a few times, to knock the air bubbles out. I have no idea if there is any real reason to do that or not, as I've never made a cake without doing it. Another quirk, is that I must roll my pie crust up on my rolling pin to carry it to the pie pan. Even now, when I roll it out on a silicone mat that I could perfectly well simply invert over the pan, I use the rolling pin, because that is the way Mom taught me. One thing she used to do that I never thought to ask her the "why" of, was to prick a potato several times with a fork before baking it. I found out why, once, when I forgot to do it and had to clean exploded potato off my oven walls. There are many things regarding kitchen hygiene that I did simply because my mother taught me to do them that, over the years I have learned the "why" of. I rinsed chickens and meat after taking them out of the package without knowing why. I scoured wooden cutting boards (the only kind we had then) with salt and bleach and doused them with boiling water. I scrubbed iron fry pans with plenty of hot water but no soap. I used different towels to dry dishes than I used to dry my hands.

I wrote this to try to get help with my family or what is left of it. This is the first time I ever posted anything on this forum. So instead of getting help I am getting feed back based on the notion I am a teenager or the same person that wrote something on a wedding. The real issue is that a young girl of 17 has manipulated her entire family to the point that she is now posting blogs on how the ruin your parents life and get anything you want while you do it. Again she doesn't want to spend time with her father her real mother or anyone she justs wants to do what she wants to do.. She is entering her senior year and has no job doesn't want to go to college her father lost his job and he is going into over twenty thousand dollars of credit card debt to continue to keep her in clothes and jewelry he can't nor never could afford he never made more than fifty or sixty thousand dollars a year. He has no health benefits he depends on me and now that she is living with her grandmother I don't even know if she is eligible to stay under my health benefits. She is dating a drug dealer and there is nothing I can do or say about it. Her father says he believes her when she says he never carries drugs or deals drugs when he is with her. Tell me does this seem odd to anyone? I now don't want her in my home anymore in fear that she will bring this home. So since I last wrote these new developments have changed things If my husband doesn't disciple her and I cant how can I let her be around my children or in my home. I love my husband but I have an obligation to keep my children safe and under the new circumstances having her in my home isn't an option.. MY children informed me she was bring drugs in the house and when my son found out he told her he was not only going to tell us but call the police. I am sure she brings things into my mother-in-laws house she is 65 and doesn't speak much English. So although I love my husband my life may have to be on hold until she is 18 in June. She wants to go out and be discovered she is considering working at Disney a character for experience for acting. That is today tomorrow who knows. If I sound bitter I am. I gave this child love, a home, clothes and anything she could want.Including consistence and rules. I was her only parent five to six days a week. Now she has total freedom because know one knows what she does she can lie and they believe it. The fact that she is writing this on her new facebook which her father does think she has since the time she put up naked pictures of her self.Tells you she is really something If she put this to good I swear she could rival Donald Trump

The problem is always trying to find the answer to who is right and who is wrong. The "right thing to do", if what you are looking to do is improve your relationships is to stop trying to make everything so black and white. Sometimes you are right, sometimes somebody else is right. That is the nature of relationships. Unfortunately, if you can't get past all of the percieved wrongs somebody else has done to you, you will not move on and your relationship will not change. Thurman is on here seeking advice, but everytime he gets advice that he doesn't want to hear, he ignores it. If he would try to get past whatever beef he has with his SD and if he starts to see her as she truly is, he would be much better off, and so would she. It doesn't matter what she does, in Thurman's eyes, it is never right. If she did something nice for Thurman, he would view it as being underhanded and for some alternative purpose. Colleen...I agree with kkny and finedreams that anybody who wants to send a card and to whomever, it's nobody's business exept for the sender and the reciever. So, if you sent a nice card to you SD's inlaws and she blew up at you over that and only that (and nothing else), then you are right and she is wrong. However, what difference does that really make? Why dwell on that? Why not try to move forward and try to make the relationship better instead of focusing on who is right or wrong?

Lynn, how was Jurassic World? We thought about seeing it but my mother did not want to go and we didn't want to leave her home alone. Mtnrdredux, the peaches sound divine--- that's next on my list to make! Living in the peach state, we have marvelous peaches at our local farmers market and in our CSA shares. Now, about the casserole....it is good in a 1980s church potluck kind of way but not very good for you....the ingredients are chicken, broccoli, lemon juice mayonnaise, cream of chicken soup, curry, and breaded topping. I did my best with fresh broccoli, organic, free range chicken, healthy choice soup and homemade bread croutons, but did not even bother to total the calories in each serving. I did NOT want to know! Of course our darling future SIL loved it, so I can see it may make more regular appearances at the table in the future. Lyban, BBQ sounds great, and how nice your DD is taking over this celebration. I will be happy when and if our DD does the same :-) DLM, don't you wonder what we did before cellphones? I remember calling my parents on one fixed day of the week because I knew they would be home then and I could catch them on the phone. Dee, your typical "Dad" meal was my fall back position if I hadn't had time to make the casserole :-) Gsciencechick, it was miserably hot here as well, we stayed indoors most of the day. And that was one of the reasons I was glad not to be,grilling either.! Annie, sounds like you had a great day regardless, and Joanie, your DH is lucky to get two celebrations!