Favorite Things

It is quiet and very warm in our living room tonight.  All the current occupants are quietly pursuing their, well, favorite pastimes sounds so nice, but the only one who's really doing that is Zane, he is playing Pokemon.  I enjoy blogging but it isn't my favorite, nor is the puzzle Jim is working on, his.  

It will be chilly in all the other rooms of the house when we go to bed because the thermostat is close enough to the fireplace that the furnace doesn't run when we have a good fire.  

We got a little snow last week.  Just enough to say we got some.  

I love to take photos of the boys playing together.  The tablet that Barry wanted to use is plugging in and charging at this moment, and for some reason wouldn't start up to let him play. It usually does.  So, he is watching Christian sing his nursery rhymes and children's songs.  I think they are working together on their choices.  That kind of behavior deserves a photo, since it is hardly the norm, in this house or anywhere else.  

Thanks giving has come and gone within that week as well.  We had a lovely dinner with all our kids at home.  Usually my folks are here, but they went down to Texas to eat their turkey with my brother and his family.  That was different.  I missed Mom's help in the kitchen, and the pies she brings.  I didn't have enough pie pans and had to scrounge a disposable, thin aluminum one.  I didn't miss her after the meal, since Lynette who sometimes regrets the fact that she is an adult now, very willingly takes over part of the work.  She knows my kitchen and my ways and is so very helpful.  

Besides the turkey, the star of the show was our little Paislee.  She likes sleeping at home better than anywhere else so she complained a bit.  It means she got a lot of holding from aunts and uncles and Gramma and Papa.  The turkey is another story.  

We have a grill that has a rotisserie feature.  It works very well on chickens, but we are having a little trouble with turkeys.  Last year our turkey cooked faster than we expected, and this year is took longer.  Last year we didn't have a 22-pound turkey which confused the matter of cooking time, but earlier in the morning, it looked like it was cooking too quickly so Jim turned down the grill and then went and played with the grandsons and forgot all about checking it.  As our guests were assembling, ready for turkey, our bird was a long way from done, so Jim turned UP the grill and a half hour after our expected eating time we served up our blackened bird.  We really did plan to have it done an hour ahead and let it sit.j And under the burnt skin was a good turkey.  Our family ate of it avidly and took copious amount home with them.  It was not a failure, it is the stuff stories are made of.  Long after this thanksgiving, those boys will remember Papa's playing and not a burnt turkey.  

The windows in our house don't produce good photographs, but here we all are, gathered together. 

It doesn't really seem like November is really over, if we are going by this warmer weather.  The high temps were in the 50's on Friday and Jim went to the farm to cut some wood.  Lorene and her family met him there.

Jim brought Zane home for the weekend.  Zane and I made a plan to make these little goodies beforehand.  The recipe was in the "Little Green" magazine using green and yellow m&m's to make tractor wheels.  We snitched three little packets of m&m's from the enormous stash of Halloween candy at the Miller's.  I bought mini pretzels, and Hershey's kisses.  

Zane peeled kisses and I put them on the pretzels. Three minutes in the oven and they were ready for the m&m's.  

We DID NOT eat the two missing m&m's. Zane counted 43, then 41, then 47, which we took for our final m&m count, but there were really only 45.

It's harder than you might think to pick up small pieces of candy and smoosh them onto melty chocolate kisses.  Therefore, we have a few smudges and off center ones.  

And last, but not least...

Baby Love.

P.S. We're sending this boy home slightly different than when he came to us.

Keep Up The Pace

It is always nice to have a baby girl picture to post for the week.  I'm really lucky that her mother loves to take pictures of this cute little one.  Paislee is 3 months old, 9.15 pounds and 23 inches.  Not a bad size for a little one that started out at 5# 5 oz.

Of course, lots of things happened this week.  Funny things, and I would think, I should blog about that, but I just blogged yesterday.  I should write some of those things down.  The only funny thing I can think of is my current project of slowing down when I do things so I don't make so many messes, like splash milk out of the glass when I pour it, or drop utensils and more on the floor when I'm in the kitchen.  

When I first started my chart looked like this...

Today it looks like this....

. That's because I haven't written down anything for today. This is yesterday's, or perhaps the day before.  Anyway, I'm making enough progress so I can pour milk without having to find the dishcloth and work in the kitchen without dropping every other thing I put my hands on.  There is still progress to be made, but I really think it's starting to get in my head to just pause a bit before any task.  Sometimes, I'm shouting, "fail" as a spoon jumps out of the drawer.  There's a change going on inside, I can feel it, so the chart stays up, whether I mark it everyday or not.  

My mom hurries around in her work, and it's contagious.

Tuesday I was back at the Miller's getting two boys off to school, one with a lunch, picking up one boy before noon then playing with the playdough, trying to give the boys just enough candy from their Halloween treat bags to keep them quiet and not enough to make them sick. 

It was an absolutely gorgeous day for November 15th, A day left over from September and we spent some time outside.  These boys love to play outside.  They like to play with balls on the trampoline.  Usually they just bounce around with them, but often they like to throw them all out and have Gramma throw them back in.  Christian is pushing them through the gap between the net and the springs to the ground.

(I'm not exactly sure where that gap is.)

I seriously love to get in air photos. 

Barry is our big equipment lover.  He has loads of different kinds of equipment and he knows how to use them.  I don't think he was supposed to be digging in this circle of dirt that used to be the pool site and is now where the family gathers around the fire pit, only it's not a pit, since it stands on legs, but I don't know what to call it and I don't have time to look it up because I need to start supper.  

I just love to watch him at work.  

Since their mom is an officer of the OTA group, sometimes she stays late, and sometimes, (like this time), a group project needs to be planned.  So, we had to jump into action about 3:15 and go pick up Zane from school.  He wasn't expecting us so he was pleasantly surprised.  I'm plumb proud of that kid.  I needed a charger since I'm not used to charging this new phone of mine as often as it needs it. Zane was telling me, "you have to look at the shape to make sure you get the right one."  He plugged it in by the sink and then since it was a short cord, he didn't like the way it was just hanging there, so he pushed the 'catch-all' basket under there to give it some lift.  He is observant.  I like that.  I'm proud of the way he works at school.  His grades were A+'s.  His favorite subject is PE, then math.  

After I got home and was telling Jim about our charging contrivance, he says, "Isn't there a charger in the car?" Well, duh, I guess there was, but I don't lock my car in their driveway since it is easier when shooing kids out the door and into the car to have it already unlocked.

That was my excuse anyway.  

Better Early Than Late

My dear people.

I would like to be all impressive and say it is 5:00 am, all my morning work is done

and I am blogging.  

But, I'm not.  

Not blogging, Not 5:00 am.

It could have been, since I was up at 4:15 am to see hubby off to hunt deer. 

However, the truth of the matter is, it is now 7:15 am, no housework has been done and I am sitting here in my jammies having wasted all this time playing computer games. 

(I will have a nap this afternoon, guaranteed.)

I have been thinking about blogging for several days, but I had reasons that it didn't get done. 

I started a new knitting project this week.  I shouldn't have, but yarn lying around calls to me, and if I don't have any lying around, it starts calling from the store, "buy some more, buy some more".  

Lorene was sick this week, so she stayed home from school and watched her own boys who also didn't have school because of some electrical problem at the school.  I took her some chicken noodle soup, homemade.  

Thursday I went to my surgical oncologist in Omaha and had a brief visit there, no concerns at all.  That always feels good, We left at 7 for our 10:45 appointment, and had time to pick up supplies for the business. From there we stopped at a nursery to price trees, and on to a see a guy who sells wood-burning furnaces.  That was a trip out of the way so we were home again 12 hours later, and I didn't blog.  

Last night I started cooking about 4 pm, after making cards all afternoon so I couldn't blog then either. I made a new pumpkin recipe that is a streusel pumpkin pie in a puff pastry crust in a baking dish, called slab pie or something like that.  Jim prefers regular pie.  I'm glad I only made half a batch.  I also made egg and sausage enchiladas for an easy breakfast and I made another egg casserole ready for later.  

***** BREAKING NEWS*******

Jim shot a doe.

*************

I hope I have room in the freezer.

Oh, I voted on Tuesday, too, and I didn't want to have anything to do with the computer on that day.  

Not much going on in the picture department, so I snitched this off facebook.

As soon as I typed that, I remembered that Christian was here over Sunday and I took some photos, or rather some photos were taken since I didn't take all of them.  Perhaps they should have gone in the last post, but they didn't, so we will pause and edit some photos. 

Christian loves to play with my little people things. 

Until next time...

Laughing All the Way

Christian stayed over Sunday with us and he is pretty easy to entertain.  It was his first time in his memory to stay overnight so he was a bit unsure, especially at bedtime when he remembered mom hadn't said, "good night"when she stopped in after work.  He's a brave little boy and likes Gramma nearly as well as mom so he was okay with me staying with him while he went to sleep.  He seems to be a night owl so it took FOREVER for him to stop arranging the 50 or so stuffed animals on the bed, and finally lay still.  (This was 'change back to standard time' day so I hoped he would fall asleep 'early'.) HA.  Anyway, finally I looked over and his eyes were closed so I was hopeful.  However, he spent a good five minutes 'mining for gold' in his nose, eyes shut, before he was out.  Then I went to bed and didn't wake up for good until 6:00 which is 7:00 DST and a miracle since I've been waking up before 5 and not going back to sleep. 

Mom was going to pick him up after she got off work so he was still going strong in the late afternoon and about 5 pm, when it starts to get dusky with this new ...er... back to old time, he wanted to go outside.  So, we did.  I bundled up, pulled on socks and sweat pants, zipped my hoodie up to my chin and tied the hood.  So, we went out, and it was NICE.  So, I took off the hood and we wandered around, and then Christian ran around and then wanted to play.  I discovered there is NO BALL in this house.  I guess I will have to buy one.  We tried to play catch with a tiny foam traffic cone, but that didn't work.  So, I dug out a skipping thingy.  You put the circle around your ankle and twirl it around, and with one leg keep it going round and round and skipping over it with the other.  We used to do that with jump ropes.  We would tie the thing together around our ankle and go to it. I suppose they have a name, I could look it up.

But, I digress. 

The special deal about this thingy is the ribbon on the bottom can be pulled out a couple of yards and then with the push of a button, 'slurp', it goes back in.  The boys love it.  So,  C and I spent a HALF HOUR pulling it out and slurping it in.  I would hold the end and he would run until it quit and I would let go and 'slurp', it went back in, and he would laugh and laugh.  I'm figuring four times a minute, maybe?  It was the most inane thing to be doing, pulling and slurping over and over again.  It wasn't all that funny, but I got to laughing just over his enjoyment over the whole process.  He'd be sober as a judge until, "slurp" and then laugh hysterically and then I'd laugh. It makes me grin just to remember it.  

Ummm, they are basically called 'ankle skip ropes'

I looked it up.  

PS. I tried it around my ankle, and lets just say, I hope none of the neighbors were watching. 

Is It Just Me?

I woke up at 4:30 this morning, unsettled from a dream. Ugh.  I don't like that.  I have too vivid of an imagination and it spills over into my dreams.  I have to be careful what I watch and read.  I want to keep my mind clean for one thing, and I don't want that stuff to spill over into dreams.  

At 5:00, I thought I would get a jump on the day and blog, but I didn't.  I spent another hour mindlessly playing games on the computer.  Sigh.  

I thought of several things during the week that I would like to blog about, but all I can remember is yesterday.  I did get some productive things done.  I squished squash through the food mill to put in the freezer; I went grocery shopping; I had supper ready when Jim came home.  I washed Jim's work clothes and when I went to bed they weren't in the dryer.  

They weren't in the washer either, hee hee, they were all put away except three shirts hanging in the basement that weren't dry.

It was what happened between those good things that troubled me.  It seems like I can't do anything without spilling, dropping, and bumping stuff.  I spilled milk in the fridge, I bumped my forehead on a cupboard door (just healed from the last time) and dropped the box of small containers out of the cupboard and they bounced and rolled to every corner of the kitchen.  I dropped my change at the grocery store.  I picked up the wrong milk and the person sent to replace it took so long they got another checker to take care of the line behind me.  When I poured my milk it splashed out of the glass.  I keep telling myself to slow down and think before doing anything.  I really should try that.  

I'll write it down.  Snail city, here I come!

You know, I didn't spill squash all over the kitchen, it didn't tip over in the freezer and make a mess.  I did have to wash my hands several times.

I didn't take many photos this week, but the ones I did have a story.

This plate is one of mom's "best set" when we were kids.  We didn't use them very much because she didn't like them.  It may have had something to do with who gave them too her or it may not, there is another set that is truly ugly with chickens on them and maybe I'm thinking of those.  

I like them now, my daughter has them, she likes them.  

I like them because they are a part of my childhood.  

I changed my purse the other day.  I really need a bigger one since I have a larger phone.  

Well, that's not the only reason.  I've been wanting a larger one to easily carry a small water bottle.  I loved this purse, especially the built-in wallet.  The main problem besides the size, was the built in wallet, and the fact that my phone could lose itself in there and people would vainly wait for me to answer while I scrabbled into the corners of my purse.  The best course would be to turn the whole thing upside down, but that isn't the best choice in the grocery store, for example.  

I'm not saying that might have been done sometimes at home.  

I like my new one because it's larger but not too much and had a pocket to put my purse in and two outside pockets to keep things separated. 

I like medium boiled eggs. Yum.

Awwww.

Lorene just stopped in with Christian, so when it was time to go, a little mittened hand was waving out the window.