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Archive for November, 2019

Hats Delivered!

November 21st, 2019 at 08:10 pm

We did our final hat delivery yesterday to one of the schools. It has been a challenge getting them delivered between DH's eye surgeries and doctor's appointments, school issues, and the weather. But, they are where they need to be and I'm so glad.

The local paper came out and took photos and did a story. Here is the link if you are so inclined to read it:

https://herald-review.com/news/local/education/stitches-of-love-delivers-warmth-to-decatur-students/article_93e8f8aa-1bfc-5e9b-adf1-6da82bbf03c4.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook_Herald_&_Review&fbclid=IwAR0IdPJJOlOtt5xCD6AQy1UHKbzBofnlgJALuD_yuapVTXpwNkNqul-p384


This school which is slated to close at the end of this year, was the building where I started teaching in 1986. It was called Garfield then, but that school moved to another building and took the name and it is now Durfee. Funny thing, I taught at Garfield and transferred to Durfee and I was teaching at Durfee when it changed buildings to what was Garfield. I took the opportunity to walk through the school one more time. The district has a dwindling population so they are closing buildings.

Believe it or not, we have already started making hats for next year!

Crafting, Hats, and So On

November 17th, 2019 at 07:58 pm

Looking back on the past few days, it seems like it has been a whirlwind of lots of little things.

We made some more hat deliveries. One is to a school that apparently is often forgotten, but has some high poverty kids. The secretaries and principal couldn't thank us enough. We also gave some hats and scarves to a ladies' homeless shelter and the people working there were thrilled. We have one more school to deliver to and that will be the 2018 hat season finished. We met Thursday and have started counting and we already have 91 hats completed and over 11 scarves. We have a local group that sends Christmas gifts to soldiers, many local, and we are going to make hats in the colors they suggested for them. I find if we add different groups, it keeps things interesting.

DH had his second cataract surgery on Tuesday. We never dreamed we would get such bad winter weather this early in November, but we did...very cold, snow that hit warm ground that then froze. Driving him to the surgery was not fun...I was the proverbial old lady driver poking along. I didn't have a death grip on the steering wheel, but I was not going to be hurried or rushed. We got there, he had his surgery, and we arrived home, safe and sound after lots of praying and white knuckles. Usually the surgery center is like a revolving door, but I guess they had lots cancel Tuesday morning. DH was the last one of the three that still had an appointment. But, it is over other than doing the eye drops and so far things seem to be going well.

While DH was resting when we got home, I tried to find some quiet activities. My mom used to take two dish cloths and sew them to make what looks like a jacket. It isn't really and you use three stitches to hold them together and include a poem about don't get excited, don't get misled, these are not for you, but your dishes instead. I made ten of them and am donating them for our Christmas bazaar. I also started crocheting these little red bags with white trim that I'll put some Hershey kisses in for Santa's treat bag. They might sell too for the bazaar. We normally have quite a few crafters as vendors, but I guess this year with all the shows and bazaars, we didn't have as many. We have a cookie walk that is the big draw since we sell cookies by the pound and people tend to load up for the holidays. I see lots of baking in my future.

Other than groceries, we haven't spent much. I've been buying stuff when it goes on sale either for the pantry or freezer or for the upcoming baking. Most of my Christmas is done as far as shopping and making. I have one more item to finish, but have to wait for a bright day since it is counted cross stitch. I've noticed as I get older, my eyes need the natural light for cross stitch.

GWTW Dinner and other tidbits

November 10th, 2019 at 09:18 pm

Last night we had our "Gone with the Wind" dinner. We had planned for it to be earlier, but life gets in the way. We had a delightful time and the food was great. Our final menu was:

fried chicken
mashed potatoes with pan gravy
green beans
fried cabbage
cornbread
blackberry cobbler
sweet potato pie

I looked up some trivia and we had a lot of laughs over some of these isolated facts such as there were 1400 actresses who auditioned for the role of Scarlett O'Hara.

One of the things that was brought up was how fun it was to host these dinners and how having everyone bring something meant the host didn't have to spend all day cooking a full meal, but just the main entree. It certainly is more reasonable than going out to eat, that's for sure.


We did our first hat drop off to one of our schools. I invited the local weather man from the TV station and he came with us and talked to some of the kids about the importance of wearing hats and gloves in bad weather. I took some photos of him with the classes and he showed them on his weather segment that night. I was pretty elated after we left and one of the teachers sent me a photo of the kids with the hats. We have two more schools to take hats to. One is tomorrow and the other is in a week. We also want to give hats and scarves to a woman's shelter as well as veterans.

With the colder weather, we tend to have more soup. We usually eat out on Friday nights as our date night. Guess we didn't date the past two -- I pulled soup out of the freezer two weeks ago and made soup this week. There's enough soup from Friday's batch to have at least one more meal. With DH's eye surgery and the fact it gets darker so quickly, he was happy to stay home. I don't mind either. There are only a few places we will even frequent because some of the restaurants in our town have had bad reviews from the local health department. And it isn't just once...some make the same mistakes over and over and they are major. I had food poisoning from a restaurant a number of years ago and I never want to repeat that experience.






Monday Musings

November 4th, 2019 at 10:48 pm

This works out to be a very busy week. Today was running a couple of errands and DH having his pre op appointment for his second cataract surgery. For the first eye, we had to pay $1500 for a special lens. Today the eye doctor said he didn't think this eye would need it. We had the money saved, but I can't say I'm super disappointed. I had taken the money out of savings and transferred to checking so we would have it. I'm glad some of it will be returned to savings.

A friend of mine is a local reporter and she was complaining that she has a very long day tomorrow and won't be able to get anything for supper. After I retired, I had given her one of those ceramic mugs with a plastic lid to microwave soup. She said that between her running for different meetings she wouldn't be able to even do that. So, I suggested heating some soup up and putting in a Thermos. The issue is they only have one Thermos and her husband uses it. I had a couple, one is a wide mouth one, so we took them to her so she can heat up her soup tomorrow before she leaves for work and have it tomorrow afternoon before she sets off to her many meetings. I gave her a regular mouth one too so if she wants to take coffee or tea at some point, she can. I have been blessed that I had these things and I'm more than happy to help her out. The nice thing is she was grateful. Plus, it gives me an excuse to get a couple of things out my cabinets because I know they will be put to good use.

This afternoon I baked two sheet cakes. One is a belated birthday cake for DH. Someone had made him fancy decorated cookies, so I told him I would make him a cake later. The other is for church for a funeral dinner. I cleaned house today and other than cleaning the bathrooms, and doing a couple more loads of laundry. that is done for the week. DH worked in the yard and put away the hoses so they didn't freeze. It's supposed to get really cold by the end of the week.

Tomorrow we drop off the cake for the dinner and fill all the candles around the altar. I also plan on making my grocery lists. I will be baking soon for our bazaar and I'm trying to stock up on stuff a little bit at a time so it isn't one big bite at the grocery store. A friend is going to have knee surgery and she asked if we could bring her some yarn from the supply at church to make hats, so we will do that Wednesday when we grocery shop. I also offered to pick up stuff at the store for her as well.

On Thursday we will make our first delivery of hats to one of the schools. It is supposed to get really cold at the end of this week with a chance of snow on Thursday so it might be a very timely delivery.

Right now Friday is pretty open. I'm sure something will come up. Saturday is our long anticipated "Gone with the Wind" Supper. We were going to have it earlier, but then one of the couples had some things come up. The nice thing with this group is we like fixing food and eating together and it is far cheaper than going out.

So, it is a busy week, but a good busy. I'm glad to have the bulk of the cleaning done. No one says I have to have it done by a certain time, but I do fret over it. I try to keep things pretty tidy and dust even if it doesn't look really dusty so things don't get real bad. I vacuum the floors at least once a week and then use one of those squirt mops on the hardwood and vinyl. It's scary how much dirt two people with no pets drag in.