"String too short to use"

10) I have made my budget already this month. This is a good thing as we are headed out of town on Wednesday, going to spend Thanksgiving at my sister’s. We will have Christmas money if I can work like crazy these first three days of this week!

9) XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXSSSSSSSSS SXC /, UEDZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZS Hhhdn vef Hz bbbbbbbbbbbbbbb Nggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg ggggggggggggggggggggggggggggsmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmsnnnnnnnnnnns MMMMMMMX

8) Because he sees me working on the computer, Liam is determined to “help.” As you can see by #9, he is not much help. He certainly makes working from home much more of a challenge than it was in LBL. What to do?

7) Does anybody want/need a cat? She is a very sweet cat. Completely and unfailingly house/litter trained. She is affectionate but vocal. We cannot keep her anymore. She comes in in the wee hours of the morning and wakes up Liam. She very deliberately goes into his room and yowls until he wakes up. Our only option has been to lock the pet door with her on the outside, but then our dog and other cat can’t get in and out as they need to. I hate to give her away, but we are out of options.

6) The month is over. I just realized anything I intend to do this month, I’d best get cracking. When we get back from my sister’s place, it will effectively be December. Mmmmm. I’ve not really thought much about Christmas yet.

5) If you could “unknow” one thing you know, what would it be?

4) We made a discovery at our house this week: when small children go from being fed to feeding themselves, life gets messier, or at least, the kid and kitchen get messier. They also eat much less when they feed themselves than when you feed them. Weird. I would eat less if someone was feeding me because I wouldn’t want them to see how much I truly can put away. It would be embarrassing. Feeding myself . . . well, there’s just no one around to get hurt.

3) Traveling out of town with a toddler. OMG! Everything must go sans the kitchen sink. It is a good thing we have a vehicle big enough to fit it in. No, not the Mustang. It will take us forever just to gather it all up, let alone load it. Yike!

2) Making cranberry sauce today. The flavors like to have time to meld and it is oh, so tasty. Cranberries with orange and just the lightest touch of nutmeg and vanilla. Yummy! Cranberry sauce is my special contribution to the Thanksgiving meal in my family. Oh, and I always get asked to make the stuffing. Looking forward to a quiet, relaxing holiday this week.

1) Sometimes a chocolate doughnut is the only thing that helps.

It's in the bag

This is the bag. The perfect bag.

Big enough to contain all my junk, which really isn't much, but then I can throw in wipes, a diaper and a bottle if needs be. A change of clothing for me won't fit, but a clean shirt for Liam will.

It has a nice flat bottom with some stiffening so it will sit upright and not just fall into a puddle when set down. No flaps! Best of all it is a beautiful shade of plum which the picture doesn't exactly do justice.

Trust me. This is important. Women know these things. This is the perfect bag.

Advent is coming

These are the paraments I created for one of our local churches for the Advent season. The fabric and everything came together so well. It was indeed a God thing.

Halloween brings a lion to our house

OK, here are the first of several promised pics.

These are Halloween, obviously. This is our little lion boy.


He truly hated this costume when we first put it on him. It took Chris and I both to get him in it, but he got used to it after a bit and quit trying to get it off.

Nobody does it better

I am not now, nor will I ever be, the housekeeper my mother is.

That said, I have discovered a secret to motivation in house cleaning: keep a toddler around.

Liam is a pro at finding the dirtiest, nastiest corner of the house to play in. You know, the dirt I never even knew existed.

Our house is consistently cleaner these days than it has ever been. That should make both my mother and my mother-in-law happy.

I’m not talking about simple clutter here, I am talking about real dirt. There was a program on TLC for awhile called “Clean Sweep.” Scary! I cannot understand how people can actually live in clutter to the ceiling. I am not a pack rat. If it doesn’t serve a function in my life . . . it goes. Sentimental value be damned. I don’t have room for junque.

You see, clutter I have never had any tolerance for, but dirt I couldn’t easily see never bothered me. I have always been a lick-and-a-promise kind of housekeeper. I was always thankful to have overnight guests several times a year cause it gave me the needed impetus to really deep clean the place. In my world then, as long as it didn’t show too much, I could easily pretend like the dirt didn’t exist. Now that Liam drags it out of its hiding place for everyone to see, it has become more of a concern.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think my house has ever been really truly disgustingly filthy, but I was much more casual about the state of cleanliness around here than I am now. Maybe that’s why my mom scrubs her place faithfully every week and I swear her floors are clean enough to eat off of. She had four little girls tear-assing around for far too many years to ever come down off that horse. So, maybe there is hope for me yet. Perhaps when Liam becomes old enough to stop playing in the track of the sliding glass door and behind the door in the bathroom and in the farthest back corner behind the recliner in the family room, these better housekeeping habits will be so ingrained I will not revert back to my casual ways of LBL. One can only hope.

"String too short to use"

10) Great Green Greasy Gobs of Goo! I have had the worst cold of my life this past week. Yuk! That’s what happens when you have a little one in the house. Liam brought it home from day care and he and I have been suffering all week.

9) My creative juices are flowing along with my nose this week. The United Methodist Church in a little town south of here asked me to create paraments for the Advent season for their sanctuary. The unbelievably appropriate piece of fabric I found on ebay came in the mail yesterday so this afternoon I cut and assembled the altar cloth. This is my spiritual gift. It is what I do. It is how I become God’s instrument. I will post pictures when all are complete. They are lovely.

8) I got a new bag today. I have eight or more in the closet, but this one is fantastic. It is not huge, but it is substantial. It is made of a very shiny leather with brass accents. It has all the appropriate pockets, zippers, but NO flaps. I have discovered after much trial and error, I hate flaps on purses. The best part about this new bag is . . . it is plum! A very deep, dark plum color that almost looks black. Way cool!

7) Christmas is right around the corner. I am not done shopping, but I have a pretty good idea about who I am getting what. Not shipping much this year. Postage is outrageous, just like everything else, so if you don’t live close enough for me to put a gift in your hand, please enjoy the greeting cards sent your way, and rest assured donations to the local soup kitchen will be helping out the needy in our town. Best I can do.

6) Whew! We had a houseful of visitors November 1-3, and we all survived. Several guests even admitted they had a good time! It was a little crowded, and I would have preferred to have it after the election, but, oh well! We got through the weekend with all limbs intact and no fatalities.

5) We are working hard to get things winterized around here. We have sprinklers to blow out and antifreeze levels to check in the vehicles. I have some iris bulbs a friend gave me to plant and about a million other things needing to be done. I sometimes wonder why I like autumn so much. It is a lot of work. But, I love the smell and colors of fallen leaves. I love the crisp air and how the sky becomes a deeper blue in the fall. I love attending the football and soccer games at the high school where Chris teaches. I love this time of preparation before the holidays . . . the list goes on.

4) If you could go back to high school to relive one event as you wish it had been, what would it be?

3) Why is it when cats prepare to hurl they run to the nearest stretch of carpet or rug to do it. Do cats have a fear of puking on tile? It would make cat sick so much easier to clean up if they could just get past this unreasonable phobia. Hoarking onto tile is a good thing, why are cats not smart enough to know this? Course if I could get them to run for the toilet or ask for a bucket, that would be even better.

2) Little boys are delightful, or at least, mine is. He is starting to let go of things and stand. He even stood up all by himself in the middle of the family room a couple days ago. He has discovered that if he gets in behind the lace drapes in my office he is now tall enough to peek out the window, and of course, he loves to play in the drapes while he’s at it. So far he hasn’t destroyed anything significant, though he made quite the disaster of a piece of lemon cake last night, I have no doubt one of these days something I hold dear will be found in pieces in Liam’s wake.

1) Because Dad served in the Air Force, they presented my mother with an American flag at his memorial service, all folded neatly into a triangle by two dress marines while Taps was playing in the background. Yes. I cried. We all did. My question is this: I would like to get my mother a flag case to put it in, but I am unsure if this would be an appropriate Christmas gift or if I should give it to her now just because she is my mom and she would like to have it even though she doesn’t know it yet?