So Now We Start on Christmas?

Well, I've got some news for you because in this family we have eight birthdays to celebrate in December.  It's not too bad for Adam, Beth, Robin, David, and I because our birthdays are earlier in the month.  But the younger children are on the 23rd and 28th.  It is tough to gear up for another big celebration so close to Christmas Eve and Christmas.

Of course, we do have to get ready for Christmas while all this is going on, but no Christmas tree will go up before the middle of the month.  I send my cards out really early, but just because that's a favorite part of my own little celebration.  And I have had years when there was news to get to people before they sent cards to me.  Some years are like that.  New addresses, for instance.

Our celebration is pretty low key, and I try to concentrate on the reason for the season by making it a month from Thanksgiving to New Years of giving in little and big ways.  One year when it "just didn't seem like Christmas", I tried that.  It gets me right into the mood right away. 

I have a first cousin who shares my birthday.  She is exactly a year younger than I, so we've always known when we'd hear from one another----if at no other time of the year.  She was my first "sibling" as we would spend time together at our common grandmother's house, long before my sister was born.  So I had to share with Beth, and she always wanted the 'best' stuff!   She's always had the most excellent taste.  LOL

So my wish for you tonight is that you have joy in your preparations.  Do only the things that are meaningful to you and experience them with all your might. 

Thankful Wednesday

We started this busy day before Thanksgiving Day with my "one month past surgery" check up with my bone doctor.  My x-ray was fine and my function is good.  He urged me get moving and stop babying myself.   What happened to "Don't overdo?"  He just laughed at me.  Humph.

Well, if I'm so able, I'll do some Christmas shopping.  So we stopped at the book store and the card shop, so I can start my Christmas card writing on Black Friday, when others are out boosting the economy.  My cousin, Nikki, spends Friday that way, too.

We had a conversation last night because our next to last uncle left in my Dad's family died this week.  Nikki's dad is the youngest and had just arrived in Arizona for the winter when he got word of his brother's peaceful death, which happened in his sleep, it appeared.  (The best we can hope for.)  The two brothers had spoken on the phone on Sunday, when all seemed well.  My uncle was a happy, good-natured guy and a fine Christian man.  It is always a comfort to feel they are "ready to go".  Even if they aren't fixin to leave.

After the shopping, I got to bake an apple pie and start dough for sweet rolls.  So, I've had a pleasant busy day, and it overcomes the mid-afternoon doldrums.  I've been getting cold and needing a nap in the afternoon.  Today I can have a cup of tea, and write a blog entry.  So my house smells yummy and feels cozy, even though it's getting dark so early.

We must bring the aforementioned pie to dinner tomorrow.  Good Guy is making his wonderful "stuffing" too.  We will have a fun time at my sister's, watching football and visiting with her in-laws.  They are great people and we always enjoy them.

Happy Thanksgiving!

A chat about Hair

 Oddly enough, I have had a number of conversations about hair, or lack thereof in the past week.  I think it's funny because after months of never even thinking about hair, there has been such an avalanche of chatter about it.  Maybe it has something to do with growing protection for cold weather.  Or not.

Whatever, since I have been somewhat confined to quarters, I personally am in need of a haircut.  That's about the extent of professional care that I seek.  I do want a good cut though, and I want a person who doesn't gossip to do the cutting. 

Once when I dropped our dog off at the Doggy Hotel, Carole said to me, "I love your hair".  (That is so memorable, because nobody says that to me.)  I replied, "What color would you say it is?"

Long pause........Pewter, was her reply.  I laughed.  My hair is thick and plentiful and shiny, but not styled. 
I'm pretty old, and my husband has both white hair and a white beard, so I don't want to pretend I'm a trophy wife.  He's only six months older than I am. 

Nobody was happier than I was when hairdressers started paying a little attention to what your own hair wanted to do when they'd give you a haircut.  Whooppee!   I could wear my hair straight as long as it was cut and clean, it would look okay! 

So, I don't need hairspray, I can wear stocking caps all winter, and I just have to stay on good terms with Saint Sharon, my haircut maven.  Easy.

All of that to say, if you have questions about or problems with your hair--------I know nothing!  I truly can not help.  Ever.  At all.   Honest.

Thanksgiving Sunday

Today I'm thankful for the friends I've made since I began blogging, including the Sweetie who sent me this beautifully embroidered cushy dishtowel, and recipe cards with the inspirational message:

I am only as strong as the coffee I drink & the hairspray I use.

I do drink high test coffee, for sure.  But if I've bought two cans of hairspray, that's a lot.  So I got a really good chuckle out of the recipe card message. 

Thanks so much, shannon, and thank your MIL for the embroidery job.  It's really nicely done!  Now to get to work copying those recipes!! 

Heal quickly!

Freaky Friday---a late report

We were never in any danger, as far as I can determine.  But yesterday had some unusual happenings.  I am not a great believer in astrology, but it helped me understand why there are people who DO.

First off, my e-mail contained a couple of personal messages from people who don't keep in touch by e-mail.   My niece is involved in a dog rescue operation and asked if we'd consider doing a home visit to a nearby town.  (Hmmmm, it's something Good Guy would have to take care of, or at the very least drive so I could do it.)  It seems these home visits should be done by dog lovers.  We are only dog-likers.

OK, maybe that isn't Freaky.  Just unusual.  We consented to do it. 

Next up, I discovered that a light bulb had dislodged itself somehow from the front porch light fixture.  It lay unbroken on the porch, with the threaded portion still intact in the fixture.  How did that happen?

Then, in my e-mail was a plea from a friend, claiming he'd been mugged on vacation in London and could we help them?  I e-mailed him from the address I had in my address book, and got a reply that they were waiting to hear from me.  (The message wasn't polished enough to have been written by him, so I figured something was amiss.  But we'd be pretty far down on the list of people he'd ask help from....)

When Good Guy got up he called the friend to discover him safely at home, and not adrift in the UK.  I wanted to e-mail the scammer and tell him/her that I'd just wired a couple grand to bail them out.  It would be in the usual place.  That should unnerve them a little.

After that I quit counting the odd occurrances.  I think maybe it's like the old saying.  things happen in threes. 

UP weather----cold and windy, no snow.  The colors of the day----grey and brown.  Dull stuff!

Have a great weekend. 

Friday Fragments

fAhh, wonderful Friday once again, when we can all get together with our leftovers
and make our own version of "Stone Soup".   Thanks to Mrs. 4444 at Half Past Kissin' Time for getting us all to contribute and share.
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The physical therapist who visits me three times a week, (post knee replacement surgery) told me the other day that they have no TV reception.  They use their set for DVD's and movies.  His four children are all great readers and value their library trips above all things when they get to town. I was amazed, but pleased for him.

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It looks like we will spend our Thanksgiving with my sister and her husband and his family.  That will be great fun, because they all love to laugh, and they are wonderful cooks.  I have to call this evening to find out what we can contribute to the meal.  My specialty would be a pie, but I think pie may already be taken. 

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My Christmas cactus has decided to be a Thanksgiving cactus this year.  About half of it is budding like crazy.

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I have four pairs of socks ready for Christmas presents, and one pair on the needles.  I was "gifted" with a load of wool yarn which will make wonderful warm wooly mittens, so I'm anxious to make some of those too.  They go really quickly.

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Even though some stuff is done, I'm feeling some significant pressure, because no other gift choosing or ordering has been done.  I usually shop well ahead, but I'm kind of out of sync this year.  Maybe I'll resort to gift cards, or Heifer International. 
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Happy Friday!  And Have a nice weekend, in case I don't get back here this weekend.

The Rearranger

This little creature is the smallest cat in our house, but causes the most mischief.  She has discovered that by pressing the buttons on the printer, she can cause paper to burp through the printing process.

She also loves to sit on the monitor of the old- fashioned computer while I play solitaire or scrabble, swiping at the "cards" as they are dealt.  Walking across the keyboard, listening for the beeps is fun, too. 

If she gets tense, she rips paper into confetti.  So stash important papers where she can't get at them.

Her latest stunt was ripping the back cover off Good Guy's new National Geographic.  That elicited a stern look, right before he busted out laughing at her. 

She sits and watches me do things, and if I catch her at it, she looks away and yawns, as if to say, "I don't care."  But she is the most curious of any cat I've ever owned, and I'm pretty sure, if she had opposible thumbs she'd work for her allowance.  Her brother just lazes about all day being a Lover, but Bella isn't that affectionate.  She's got a plan, and there's work to be done.  Who turned off the printer?

In the Fog

Weather update for the hunters.  Nasty and unsafe to be out there shooting or being shot at.  I can barely see across the street, so I hope the guys "out at camp" are having a lie-in and a rousing great breakfast until the fog clears away.

In other news, I found a beautiful sweater online this morning.  It looks beautiful on the designer, anyway, and is offered in both cardigan and pullover patterns at the Twist Collective.  But Anne Hansen showed it on her blog this morning, too.  If you are a knitter, check this out at Knitspot.  I love the colors, too.

Mrs. 4444's talks this morning about misunderstanding song lyrics, which made me laugh.  When the kids at my house were growing up, we were all doing that, but the most famous one was Eric Clapton's "Lay Down, Sally"  which had morphed into "Lay Down, Salad." 

The hardest lyrics to understand (for me, at least) was the second line of "Blinded by the Light".  I've even looked it up, and it still doesn't make a lick of sense to me.  All that gives me great appreciation for men like Johnny Mercer, and Oscar Hammerstein, who could write understandable, witty song lyrics.  Ooops, who's old?

Just to save you the time:        Blinded by the light,  Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night.

A shout out to the Universe-----Um, where do all these catalogs come from?  Does every site we ever visit sell our information to marketers???  We won't ever have time to shop, if we have to peruse all these catalogs.  I look at two or three and file the rest for recycling, but Good Guy wants to find just the right gift.  He usually does, too, bless his heart.

I guess this should be Tuesday fragments.  Don't mind me, I'm lost in the fog.

Firearm Deer Season Begins

Deer hunters are said to like a bit of snow for tracking purposes.  This was the scene on our street ten minutes ago.

I haven't heard any gunfire, though we probably have the most deer per square foot here than in the whole state.  ( There are restrictions about hunting in town.  Even when they decided to cut down on the deer herd.)

Nobody at our house is a hunter.  Good Guy is more of a Gatherer, and will shop the whole town for bargains.  I don't like to shop at all.  I venture out for fabric and yarn on occasion but other shopping is a definite chore.  Online shopping is nice for books, though bookstores would be my one exception to the shopping hatred. 

I am not a lover of snow and cold any more.  Any day from November to April that the roads are clear and we do not have to drive in snow is a day to give thanks, in my book.  And this week, while I'm still navigating with a quad cane, is a day to avoid going out in the snow.  Unless I get totally stir crazy with cabin fever.  It's a mite early for that, but you never know....

Friday Fragments

Ahh, the relief of dumping a lot of tiny bits of ephemera at the end of the week.  Especially since the idea of coming up with a Subject for a Post, seems beyond my ken at the moment.

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Someone left Sweetie outdoors last night, or she sneaked out when someone went out on the deck for something.  Plus we were awakened at 4 AM by a phone call, with no one at the other end.  Did someone call on her behalf?  She was quite chilly when she came back indoors.

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My Christmas cactus us trying to bud.  Someone tell me, is this the time to move it to a cooler darker place?

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Is forecasting "what the winter will be like" by El Nino, or La Nina any more accurate than reading the stripes on the fuzzy caterpillers?

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How is it possible to own six different glasses repair kits, yet none of them have the size of tiny screw you need to fix your problem?

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For a good read, I highly recommend  The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.   Funny quirky characters, and some history thrown in for good measure.

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Projects on the needles.  New yarn and tiny needles----pink socks for Granddaughter.  Leftover yarn and bigger needles-------a winter hat with ribbing and a tight fit to prevent drafty breezes around the ears.

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Happy TGIF!

More Fragments can be found at the hosting site.  That'd be the brilliant but funny Mrs. 4444, of   Half-Past Kissin' Time. 

Thankful Thursdays

Veteran's Day, here in the States,  Remembrance Day in Canada, and Armistice Day in parts of Europe.

My earliest memories are of my mother writing letters to my dad, and her brothers during WW2, and to listening to news of battles and such by Kaltenborn, and other radio newscasters.

Multiplying our little story by the thousands and thousands of people who have been serving in the armed services since then in war and in peace, and there are a great many people to thank.

These people have all had their lives disrupted, some in earth shattering ways.  We appreciate the sacrifices you have made and we pray if you are in harm's way, that you will return home intact. 
My picture was taken at the USS Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor.  This is a solemn and sobering visit to make while you enjoy the paradise that Hawaii represents.

I feel blessed that none of my children have had to serve in this way.  And I thank, with all my heart, those who have been willing to go.  May you always know the gratitude of your country.

Amazon I Love You

Wisconsin has a goodly number of famous and accomplished quilters.  I haven't been quilting as much in recent years, so there are wonderful new ones I don't even know about.

But during the years when I was quilting a lot, there was a wonderful, funny lady on the Wisconsin quilting scene.  She wrote books, she went on with classes of quilters, and she had the reputation as "a character".  She lived in Madison.

Recently, for some reason, I've been thinking of her more often, regretting that I never got to meet her while she was among us.  (She died way too young.)  Maybe some of her books were in our library.  No luck, so I wandered around in my Amazon account to see if I could find any of Doreen Speckmann's  books..

Last month I found a book of patterns she used on her cruise classes.  They were very vibrant in color and the text was laugh out loud funny.  Today I got another book called Pattern Play, 159 pages of wonderfulness, and I bought it for 88 cents!  Isn't that amazing? 

As cranky as I've been about technology, it does amaze me that I can sit on my couch and search for books I'd love to own and find them as bargains, and that I can download old Chet Baker tracks somehow through the same ether that steals my posts.  I hope that someone who is trying to listen Peggy Lee or Michael Buble is getting jammed up with my blog's postings.  That'd be pretty frustrating.

These are the pink socks I alluded to yesterday.  I think my battery was dying.  One is done and the other is started----about three inches worth.

All clothing for my granddaughter is in shades of pink, or "magenta", her favorite color.  She loves words.

Back tomorrow, God willing.

Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen---LOL

 Wait a minute, I can hear you saying.  Wasn't she just counting her blessings a few days ago?

I am, I am, over all the most important things in my life.  But this method of blogging is wearing me down.  I have had nothing but trouble since I came home and tried to reach into Blogland.  I can't post pictures without taking a college course, apparently.

I can't tell you how many new posts I've written that have been snatched away into the ether.  So I'm beginning to think that there is nothing important enough to share that is worth the aggravation of dealing with my computer/google/ picasa/toshiba complex of problems.

On the other hand, here I am, trying yet again.  If I could post pictures, I'd show you a nifty little table topper I found to finish-------after I made all my deadlines in September and October.  I had to dig deep to find old UFO's to complete.

And my granddaughter's pink socks are my companions as I move from room to room trying to avoid boredom.  One is completed and I started the ribbing on sock two today.

I enjoyed the blessing of a sleep through the night last night.  Hospital life doesn't encourage sound sleep, but it was a pure pleasure to do so last night.  So my days are full of lovely little pleasures.  The big grey cat snuggling beside me, the mug of steaming sweet tea, the sun pouring through the west windows in the afternoon, the lovely striping yarn I'm using, and shelves full of music.  Enough to enoy for however long it takes me to get back to Tap-Dancing for Grannies.

Maybe I'll call Rent a Kid, and get one over here to solve my computer confusion.  I'm sure my problems are caused by my ignorance, rather than my technology. 

So, I'll bask in the things that give me pleasure and avoid things that make me annoyed.  Tonight, anyway.
Cheers!

Missed the Boat

It already too late for me to jump aboard the "post every day this month" bandwagon, but it have lots of time to read while I hang around and "mend".  And I have lots of prompts about things to write while I am enjoying the writing of others.

Our neighborhood enjoys a unique designation in the annuls of Ford Motor Company history. Our neighborhood was occupied by Ford factory workers for many years when the company was building their wood-sided station wagons here.   I think they suspended making woodies when they retooled this factory to make gliders for the war effort during WW2.

The Ford plant and Kingsford Charcoal Company dumped their industrial waste between our area and the Menominee River and one day about a block or two away from our house, an explosion happened in their basement when they turned on a light . 

This was the first indication that the years of dumping waste had resulted in a gigantic lake of methane below our town.  The story is long and pretty interesting even, but I'm not sure of all the facts, so I'll skip to the way Ford stepped up to take care of the problem.  Every house in town has been inspected and has a methane detector in the basement.  Every house and garage has piping and a whirling device to assist in dispersion, should any methane surface.  We have flagpoles galore, not only because we're so incredibly patriotic, but because they serve as venting devices.

These detectors are inspected and replaced yearly, if necessary.  They don't just drop by now and then, we have monitors in place, on the job, every day. 

I'm pretty proud of Ford, as a matter of fact.  It is great to see a corporate entity do the right thing. 

Would you like to buy a sweet little house here in Methane Meadows?

Thankful on Thursdays

I found a nice blog yesterday where the hostess was listing 10 ways to simplify your life and she has many smart and funny followers.  Today she had another fine idea and is hosting Thankful Thursdays.  I probably won't link this up, but it's a pretty good discipline anyway.

Now that I'm recovering nicely at home, the surgery well behind me, I have so much to be thankful for, I can barely begin.  I don't have any images to express how thankful I am for faith and answered prayer and the unspeakable mercies of God.

But since he ministers to us through our loved ones, Good Guy has to have honorable mention for picking up the slack and being the nurse on duty when necessary here.

I'm also thankful that excellent medical care is available locally and that I was well cared for throughout the course of care without having to travel away from home.

So that paragraph is including my surgeon, GP, hospital staff, and home health physical therapy.

I'm thankful for my own basic healthy self, so eager and able to recuperate quickly.  I got my staples removed this morning at the doctor's office and instead of being admonished to get moving, I was told to not overdo.  I like that better.  I can blog and surf without guilt.

If you'd like to check out Carole's blog, she's at http://caroleknits.net/. 

So that is the bare bones beginning of my thankful list.  This is the month to ponder these things, after the opportunity to express ourselves at the polls is over.  ( My witty cousin, Nikki, has what she calls Post Partisan Depression.)  Isn't that funny?