Category / Next up

by princesshotflash

Hello!

After many years of blogging, I’ve decided to take a WordPress course to draw a bigger audience and focus more on my writing. They suggested taking stock of what I have accomplished and what I liked to do for the next six months. So here’s what I got so far.

Taking Stock

The Chronicles of Princess Hot Flash started as a way to let my family and friends know what was going on with my life through travel, cooking, and baking, turning into restaurant madness, a multitude of crafting projects, and crazy cat lady moments. My trusty companions in my crazy world were my husband Oat and my cat, Click.

Three plus years ago, that all changed plus even more this past year due to COVID. My two companions have gone but hopefully watching over me, making sure I’m okay.

Things I’ll miss: (left to right, top to bottom) my beautiful Click, testing out desserts on my friends, hiking in National Parks, walking on our snowy path, and my funny Oat.

I have a new crew of four: Cora: my mom, the 91-year-old boss of all things and owner of Cora’s garden; Joe, my dad, the 93-year-old singer plus visual artist; Ollie, my stray that I found behind our restaurant; Orange, my round orange tabby. And my location has changed from New Jersey to Hawaii and back to my childhood home.

My new crew: (left to right, top to bottom) Mom modeling a knitted cowl I made for her, Dad the hipster in his new beanie, Ollie looking handsome, and Orange as tiny shy kitten (not any more, hahah).

The Pandemic took my job, and I became one of the many thousands unemployed. I’m currently a freelance graphic designer working part-time, volunteering at my favorite non-profits, and helping care for my parents. In between all of that, I’m working on too many project looking for something to inspire me to make something beautiful.

My slew of project, looking to inspiration: (left to right, top to bottom) Scheepjes 2020 CAL, (still going); trying out boro quilting on my pillow case; basket made from cord made from a lucet loom; trying my hand at pattern making, mom’s shorts; scrappy animals–pink cat;Hot Wheels the scrap dog; Arne and Carlos Quarantine squares blanket (done); hand quilting my aloha shirt blanket; and watercolor painting with embroidery.

The Next Six Months

Planning for the Next Six Months is the hard part. I’ve been putting this off for three-plus years. I guess this was my reason for signing up for this course. Here’s what I’d like to happen. I want to draw a bigger audience by creating more features like Cora’s Garden, posting about my too many projects and looking for inspiration, launching my Etsy shop and posting about my handmade items, and showcasing the photos I’ve been shooting these many years.

How about this does this sound like a plan?

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by princesshotflash

The first meal

The humidity is lower this week and I decided I can work in the kitchen with out being dreanch in sweat. So I decided to do a crock pot meal for Monday’s dinner. The first meal I making is Crock Pot Chili and I’m using Slow Cooker Taco Spice Chili recipe from sally’sbakingaddition.

[hahaha! When I started this post the humidity and heat had lowered and it was bearable to do some cooking in the kitchen. But today as I patiently wait for our meal to be done, the only place I can find to be cool is in front of the front jalousie window laying on the wooden floors like my cats in an afternoon fog of sleepiness because of the heat and humidity]

I picked this recipe because the different ingredients in–sweet potatoes, corn, bell pepper and black beans. [I slipped in some mushroom to just to use it up before it went bad] I wanted to give my parents a little more diversity in their diet. Change it up. I hope they like it.

Made some slight adjustments in the recipe as I found out that Mom’s crockpot is smaller than I thought it was. I just put 1 can of diced tomatoes and I didn’t add quinoa because there was no more room in the pot. We were having “hapa” rice [half brown and white rice] so that filled in for the quinoa.

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Right before I turned it on low for 7 hours.

Very easy and delicous. I can see with the addition of quinoa at the end it would be extremely hearty. Love all the veggies and black beans in it. I would most definitely make it again.

Next up, mango jam. There are mangos waiting in the fruit bin to use them up.