Marking Time

The weekend passed without any further difficulties. Randy seems to be breathing better. He turned the oxygen off at some point during the night. He also did that Saturday night. I don't know exactly what it means, but it seems to indicate that he feels that he is breathing adequately on his own. He does still use the oxygen during the day for periods of time. He is so weak right now and he has no stamina. Doing nothing for basically 8 months will do that to a person. We hope that he will gradually be able to build some strength and stamina. The trick is going to be to do this cautiously, a little at a time. At this point it is very easy for him to be overtaxed. In the past he has become frustrated because he doesn't feel that his health is improving. I will have to help him to remain positive about his progress when his frustration level rises, otherwise he may try to do too much and end up doing himself harm. I know it's very disheartening when you feel that you are just marking time or treading water instead of advancing. But under the circumstances, slow and steady is the way we need to go.

Adventures in breathing

According to the chest x-rays that were done on Randy he had bronchopneumonia. Despite the pneumonia he signed himself out of the hospital late yesterday afternoon. I don't know at this point how that is going to affect his health. I am doing all that I can for him, but as I've explained to him, if he has pneumonia, he needs to continue with antibiotics. Another problem that he had when he went into the doctor's office on Wednesday was low blood pressure. Come to find out, all of the medicines that he is supposed to be taking for his CHF lower blood pressure. With the exception of a few isolated incidences, he does not suffer from high blood pressure to begin with.

Today we went for his disability evaluation. That took about 1/2 hour. The doctor that examined him for this appointment mentioned that he sounded congested on the left side. I'm sure he was picking up the pneumonia. I have no idea how long we will have to wait to find out more from Social Security. Because Randy was in the hospital on Thursday and Friday, and because it was so crazy at work those two days I never had a chance to contact the Cardiologists office to find out if they had forwarded his files to Social Security. I wish we had some portable oxygen that we could have taken with us for the appointment today. Randy did ok, he just had to move very slowly and not overexert himself. As soon as we got home he hooked himself back up to the oxygen. He's been on it ever since, only taking it off to eat or walk to the bathroom. He sleeps under oxygen and I hope he has a better night tonight than he did last night.

While he was still in the hospital, one of his nurses asked us if he had ever been checked for sleep apnea. I have long suspected that he has it, in part because of the way he snores. She stated that he should be checked for sleep apnea because she suspected that he has it. When he was asleep and she came in to the room to check his vitals she observed that he had episodes of not breathing, each episode lasted approximately 30 seconds she said. Of course the only way to verify this is with a sleep study, and at this point a study is just not feasible.

Blue Christmas

Christmas Day at our house was a day fraught with concern. Randy spent most of the day in bed on oxygen. He was very weak and listless. He was able to watch the kids open their presents, but returned to bed soon after this was accomplished. I checked on him about every fifteen minutes. Sometimes he would be sleeping other times just resting. Even with the oxygen he was having a hard time breathing when in an upright position, so reclining in bed was when he was most comfortable.

We had a wonderful meal for Christmas dinner, but despite the selection he was unable to eat more than a few bites. This really concerned me. His appetite has gradually decreased over the last couple of years, but this was ridiculous. I have seen toddlers eat more than what he ate over the course of the day. He kept apologizing for not being able to eat, especially since I had included several of his favorites in our menu.

Because of some of his symptoms we thought he might have bronchitis or perhaps pneumonia. He would break out in a sweat for no apparent reason and he has a cough which sounds like he should be coughing stuff up, but nothing would come up. Because of these things we made the decision to try get him in to see the doctor. Since we have no insurance we were hoping that whatever the problem was could be treated by antibiotics or the like. However, when I took him to the doctor yesterday afternoon, the doctor admitted him to the hospital. We are unsure how long he will be in the hospital. As of last night we still don't know the results of tests that they have run on him. I won't be able to go to the hospital to visit him until I get off work, but I will call him this morning to see what the doctor has had to say.

I have asked friends and family for prayer. At this point in time that's about all I can do. We need his health to improve and we also need to find some way to pay for his medical expenses. When he has in the hospital for a week in 2006 we had insurance so we were only responsible for about $300 of the total bill, and I believe the total bill was close to $20,000.

Coconut cake, blueberry pie and cookies

Yesterday I baked a coconut cake and one batch of chocolate chip cookies. Now I am in the middle of making a blueberry pie. When the pie comes out of the oven I will make another batch or two of cookies. This does not sound like a household that is trying to watch it's consumption of carbohydrates!

These things are so hard to resist, which is why I don't usually have them in the house. Last night while making the cookies I believe I must have eaten about a dozen of them. Warm and still gooey from the oven, yum yum. I generally only bake at Christmas and Thanksgiving, and this is why. I enjoy baking and I love eating what I bake, but since I need to lose a few pounds I try to keep temptation at bay by not having the food in the house.

We are otherwise all set for Christmas at my house. I do still have a couple of gifts that I need to wrap because they were last minute purchases, bought on Friday (12/21/07). The kids were with me when I purchased the majority of their Christmas gifts, so they won't be surprised when they open those, but they do not know about these last couple of things and I want to keep it that way until they open them on Christmas morning. I have also purchased some candy and fruit as "stocking stuffers". I'm not sure when I'll get a chance to put these things in stockings, maybe I'll do it first thing in the morning before the kids get up. Even when they were very young I do not remember them waking us up at some ungodly hour to open gifts.

When I was growing up, we had a rule in our house that you couldn't wake Mom and Dad until after 6:30am. We had some neighbors who's children would awaken at something like 5:00am wanting to open presents. I'm trying to remember if at any time my kids awoke before me on Christmas morning. If they did, it wasn't because it was really early, but rather because Mommy had worked on Christmas Eve and therefore had gotten to bed late.

It's been nice to have this time with all of us together for so many days this year. The only thing that would make it better would be if Randy's health was better. He has had some relief because we were able to make arrangements to get him an oxygen machine. That has helped, but he is still having trouble with his ankles swelling, which is a bad sign. We can't seem to keep the swelling down despite the medicine that he is taking which is supposed to keep fluid buildup to a minimum. I'm very worried about what this means about his heart function. He goes for an evaluation physical for Social Security this Saturday. I do not know how they could possibly evaluate him and come to any conclusion other than that he is disabled. I just hope that he will be approved and that the approval will come soon. He needs some type of insurance coverage so that we can afford to for him to go back to the cardiologist. His last visit cost over $1500, but because we had insurance it only cost us $20. We couldn't have afforded it otherwise.

More baking to do

So now comes the time to start the preparations for Christmas Dinner. Took the turkey out of the freezer today to begin the thawing process. I learned many years ago that it takes days for these things to thaw completely. One year I did not start the thawing process early enough and Thanksgiving morning I was greeted with a still partially frozen turkey. I had to put the turkey in a dishpan and run water over it for a couple of hours. Our dinner schedule was completely thrown off that year. Needless to say I learned my lesson. I now move my turkey from the freezer to the fridge 3-5 days prior to the big event. On the morning of the holiday I have a completely thawed and totally cooperative bird to work with. In addition to the turkey I will be cooking a beef roast. I've had my yearly quota of turkey and couldn't possibly eat any more. I wanted beef, but Randy loves turkey and since I have one in the freezer, and I have access to two ovens, I might as well cook them both.

We have several items that we plan to bake over the next few days. The cookies were such a big hit, both with my family and with my co-workers, that we have decided to bake several more batches. I have received quite a few compliments from co-workers raving about the cookies that I gave as Christmas presents. I'm just glad to have given something that is appreciated. Personally I would rather receive a gift that I will use. I'm just too practical for anything else.

I plan to make a blueberry pie and a coconut cake for our dessert on Christmas Day. I still have a few quarts of blueberries in my freezer. At one time I did have about 5 gallons of blueberries, because I have a couple of cousins who have blueberry bushes and they offered me the berries. I have had the luxury of plenty of blueberries for such things as jams and jellies, pies and blueberry sauce for ice cream. Home made pies are usually so much better than anything you buy. The only thing is, I don't make pie crust, so I have to buy that. Other than the pie crust, everything else is from scratch. I even make my own whipped cream to top off the pies. I have never made a coconut cake, but I'm going to try one this year. If my cake tastes anywhere near as good as the cake I sampled last Sunday it will be great. We'll probably start baking some time tomorrow, especially if we intend to make cookies to eat before Christmas.

Randy is not doing much better. He is still having a really hard time breathing and his ankles remain swollen. He spent a good deal of the day in bed today. That is how he has spent the last couple of days. Jeremy changed the brake pads on the truck by himself and then Randy helped when it came time to bleed them. Since Jeremy had to be to work for 2:00pm both yesterday and today Randy drove him and I've been going to pick him up. Jeremy will have to work tomorrow but then will have the next two days off. Maybe he will have a chance to make some progress on the CRX since it's obvious that Randy will not be able to work on it. If we can just get the CRX back up and running then we won't have to worry about taking Jeremy to work and then going and getting him at night. It will be less stress all the way around.

I will have 4 days off in a row. With the exception of vacation time I never get so much time off, especially not all together. I have a 4 day weekend because I do not work on Sunday, we are closed Monday and Tuesday for the holiday and then we are closed Wednesday, which is our normal day to be closed. Then I will work 2 days and be off next Saturday to take Randy to his physical. My check for that week is really going to be pitiful.

The meaning of work

Jeremy has now joined the ranks of the gainfully employed. He started working yesterday. Since he is on his Christmas Break from college he can work as many hours as they need for him to work. He worked 9 hours yesterday, but only 6 hours today. He will get in about 20 hours this week and then he will have Christmas Eve and Christmas Day off. I think he is going to find out what it means to really work at a job. Although this isn't his first foray into the world of employment, it will be the first job that he got on his own. He won't be raking in the bucks with this job, but any additional income that can be generated will be helpful. If nothing more than helping to offset some of the expenses related to getting him back and forth to school/work. Those expenses would be less of course if we could get the CRX up and running again.

I'm very worried about Randy. He has had several very rough days and nights. I haven't had a good night sleep in several days because he is so restless at night. His ankles are swelling again and he is having difficulty breathing. I can only do so much for him and I'm afraid it's not enough. His health just has to improve, I don't want to lose him now. I want him to be around for another 20 years at least. Of course I want him to be in good health for that time also.

He got notice in the mail that he has an appointment on the 29th of the month for a physical for his Social Security disability claim. I pray he is approved and that approval will mean some type of medical coverage. It would be great if we could get him back on oxygen. He was sleeping under oxygen, but we had to return that machine because we can't afford the $230 a month lease without any insurance.

Jacqueline has one more day of exams and then she is on Christmas break. I know she's looking forward to being able to sleep a little late. I will rely on her a great deal while I'm at work during her break, especially since Jeremy will also be working during this time. She can do simple things for me, and perhaps that will help to keep me from being so overtaxed. She's a big help to me that way.

One extreme to the other

What a difference a week makes. This time last week I was baking Christmas cookies wearing capris with the window open. Today, our high was 44 and we are experiencing overnight lows in the mid 2o's. We've had a nasty wind all day today as well, making the day feel much colder than what the thermometer stated. At least this winter we have a reliable source of heat and the house is almost completely insulated.

Since we moved here we've experienced a variety of circumstances related to our living conditions. The house we were supposed to live in when we moved was uninhabitable so we had to scramble for housing. Luckily we were able to find something we could afford to purchase with the profit from the sale of our house in Connecticut. What we found was 15 acres with a single wide trailer on it. The trailer was ancient, circa 1969, but it had "city water", a septic tank, power, and was hooked to the natural gas line. Although the trailer only had 2 bedrooms and was in reality too small for us, we moved in and dreamed of bigger things.

We had to duct tape holes in windows and hang blankets over the front and back doors because of the air gaps. The furnace quit the second winter we lived in the trailer. Thankfully there was a gas wall heater and we supplemented that with the gas burners on the stove. We were never really warm during the winters in the trailer, but it was tolerable. Summers were another matter entirely. We discovered our first summer that the previous owner of the trailer had used a product, JB Weld we think, to permanently close the louvered windows. This made the daytime temperatures in the trailer at least a balmy 105. Temperature inside the trailer were 10-15 degrees warmer than the outside temperature. You could literally stand at the front door and feel the heat pouring out of the trailer. There was no central air, only a place for a window unit in the kitchen. On our meager income there was no way we could afford to run an air conditioner, so we spent as much time as possible outside in the shade. We ate lots of sandwiches, salads and did lots of grilling on our gas grill. Anything to stay out of the sweatbox that was the trailer.

In September of 2003 we thought our circumstances had stabilized enough for us to be able to afford an upgrade in our living arrangements. We owned our land free and clear, but did not have any cash reserves, nor did we have a large income. Under these circumstances we did have very many options. We looked at double wide mobile homes, but decided against that option. There is a company that operates in this region of the country that builds houses on your land and your land is your downpayment. This is the option we chose. In order for us to get the most house (square foot) for our money, we chose to have the house built only as far as the "shell" stage. This means that the house is complete on the outside, but the interior is completely unfinished. Bare studs, no walls, open rafters and just a layer of plywood for your floors.

And so our work began. Randy did all of the wiring, with Jeremy's help. Anything that Jacqueline and I could do we also did. The employment situation in this area is abysmal and layoffs abound. We had many months that Randy was laid off. This made things hard as far as just making our monthly bills, never mind purchasing supplies for the house. In April of 2005, we made the decision to move out of the trailer into the house. We couldn't face the thought of another summer in the heat, in the trailer. We had no walls still, and our first night in the house was like sleeping in Grand Central Station. I began bringing cardboard boxes home the next day to staple up as walls to help muffle the sounds. That first summer in the house was cooler than it had been in the trailer, but since there was still no insulation in the house, it was warmer than it should have been. Some friends who knew our situation purchased some sheet rock and some insulation and came one weekend and put the insulation and sheet rock up in Jacqueline's room. Being a girl, they felt she should at least have some privacy. There was enough sheet rock and insulation left to cover 1/2 of our living room ceiling.

All went well until about October of 2005. Temperatures started getting cooler. We still had no walls, no insulation in the majority of the house as well as no heat source. We wore layers of clothing, including hats and mittens in the house. We slept with hats on at night. Thank God for electric blankets. I have a customer that comes into work each day who knew that we had no heat source. He had a used wood burning stove that he no longer needed and he offered it to me. We gratefully accepted. One of the fathers of a band mate of Jacqueline's used to work in construction and he came out on Thanksgiving Day to help Randy install the stove pipe and the wood stove. He then brought us 5 pickup loads of scrap wood from the local furniture factory. Now we had a heat source and fuel for that source.

Gradually we have been able to add insulation and sheet rock in some areas of the house. While we have more rooms that do not have sheet rock than those that do, we add sheet rock as money allows us to purchase it. In addition to putting up sheet rock in rooms, our next focus has to be on the plumbing for the house. Currently there is no water to the house, and it is not yet hooked up to the septic system. The trailer is still sitting in it's original location, which happens to be about 12 feet in front of where we had the house built. Good thing it's not further away, since we have to go into the trailer for all of our water needs. We have to go into the trailer to bathe, wash dishes, wash clothes and of course to answer natures call. I for one will be glad when I no longer have to go outside and into another building to use the bathroom when I wake up in the middle of the night. This is lots of fun when it's 15 degrees outside or it's raining. Washing dishes will also be a lot less of a chore when I can wash them in the kitchen sink of the house instead of having to box them up and take them into the trailer to be washed.

After more than two years of living in a construction zone, I'll be so happy when we finish. I can only hope that day will be soon.

Connecting with old friends

What a sad commentary on our current world. We live in a day and age of almost instant communications. The telegraph of our predecessors gave way to the quicker and more personnel telephone. The telephone was then supplemented by mobile phones. We developed the ability to communicate via computer and called it email. This type of communication reached it's destination much quicker than a stamped piece of mail going thru the United State Postal Service, hence a piece of mail traveling the later route has been nicknamed "snail mail". After the introduction of email capabilities we developed an even quicker type of computer communication called instant messaging. Even with all of this technology, it is usually only at this time of year, when we start sending and receiving Christmas cards, that we exchange details of what is going on in our lives with friends and family. I guess it takes a sentimental occasion for many of us to slow down long enough to try and let everyone in on "the latest".

We have received several such Christmas cards this year. Usually these cards contain information related to health issues. Perhaps none of the health issues were serious, but then again they might have been. Often the friend or relative lives far away, but not always. I received a card a couple of days ago from a cousin who lives only about a 1/2 a mile away from me. In her card she asked for prayer because she has started radiation treatments. She had some lumps removed from her breast several months ago and has already had a course of chemotherapy. I felt horrible because I haven't been in closer contact with her. She has a wonderful support system thanks to her immediate family, but still, I felt that I should have been more up to date on her situation. There has been so much going on in my life, with my family, that I completely forgot that she was going to be taking radiation after she finished up with chemo. Maybe that's what the problem is. We are all living in the fast lane, whether we realize it or not. Perhaps we all need to get off of the express and take the scenic route, slow things down a bit. Reminds me of a bumper sticker I once saw. It said that an optimist is someone who can enjoy the scenery on a detour.

I can't imagine what my life would be like now if I hadn't moved to a slower paced life 7 years ago. Even though I have many things going on right now, life is much different for me than it was when I lived in Connecticut. Our circumstances here are so different than they were before the move. The stress level of day to day living is almost non-existent compared to what we were experiencing. Here our nearest neighbor is about 1/4 mile away. We lost our faithful sheltie, Kiesha in December of 2005, but this May we added another sheltie to the family. Where we had one cat in Connecticut, here we have about 10. The cat population changes, depending on a variety of factors including predation by coyotes. Currently I have 11 chickens. The jury is out on how many of the chickens will stay, because 8 of these were just hatched this July so we have not yet been able to determine with 100% accuracy which are hens and which are roosters. The excess roosters will go elsewhere and I will keep the hens. If I should end up with more roosters than hens, I may order some day old chicks for spring delivery. My windows no longer vibrate from loud music of passing cars. Any gunshots I hear are coming from hunters in the distance and are not aimed toward us or our dwelling. Randy no longer lives on antacids either. From the time I first met him he hardly had a day pass that he didn't have to have at least a couple of antacids. After the move here I bought one of those big bottles, like we always had to have on hand before. Usually those bottles would only last a couple of weeks. I finally threw the bottle away a year or so ago. It was still about 1/2 full.

Another difference is that I have a huge garden spot. Last year was the first year since we moved down here that I didn't have a garden. I missed it terribly. There is nothing like being able to go out into the garden and harvest fresh food that you grew. Nothing store bought tastes as good. If you have been a good steward of the earth and have not poisoned the soil with all sorts of chemicals then you are rewarded not only with great tasting food, but also food that nourishes you. If you have been blessed with good weather and have not been afraid to put forth some effort then you should have enough of a harvest to preserve for later use. That is if the deer didn't eat all of your hard work up before you harvested it! Deer can be a real problem here. I know many people who hunt deer. I always wish them lots of luck and express a desire for them to get their limit each deer season. The reason behind this is two-fold. Not only do I want there to be less deer to eat up my garden, but the deer are so plentiful that they are a hazard when driving.

Air Conditioning in December

While much of the country is suffering thru and trying to recover from some horrible winter weather, here in the deep south we have been enjoying milder than normal temperatures. At least we have in my neck of the woods. The average daily temperature has been about 20 or so degrees above normal for this time of year. We've had several days where the temperature approached 80 degrees. It feels very odd to see everything all decked out for the holidays, and to hear Christmas music playing everywhere but to be running the air conditioning. Not that I'm complaining, mind you. I'll take this any day over below freezing temperatures and/or ice. I'm also afraid that we'll pay for this mild weather later on in the winter. We may get some really brutal cold temperatures before this winter is over.

We had our company Christmas party tonight. Things went very well. We had enough food to feed three times the number of people, and I think all of us ate more than we needed. I believe everyone had a good time. Everyone that I gave cookies to was thrilled to receive them. I overheard one of my co-workers say it was the best gift she could have gotten. I'm glad they were met with such approval. I was a little apprehensive about giving cookies, because so many of us are trying to watch what we eat. Cookies are not generally considered "dietetic", at least not any that I make! We didn't exchange gifts amongst ourselves, but I wanted to give these people something. Since I didn't have any extra money for store bought gifts, something home made was about my only option. Each person received 5 different types of cookies. There was chocolate chip, mint chocolate chip, oatmeal scotchies, peanut butter and chocolate cookies with peanut butter chips.

I think one of the reasons that my co-workers were so thrilled with home made cookies is because so few people bake home made cookies. A home baked item speaks volumes to many people, telling them that you care enough about them to take the time to make them something with your own hands. I know today's world is hustle and bustle and many people don't have the time or the inclination to bake cookies. It is something that I enjoy doing, and I hope I have helped my children to have an appreciation for such things. Both of the kids helped me with several batches of the cookies. I creamed the sugar and butter together, but I would usually have them mix in the dry ingredients. They also took turns putting dough on cookie sheets, supervising the cookies while they were in the oven or transferring cooked cookies from cookie sheet to the rack for cooling. Of course the enticement for this effort is that the end results taste good.

Although I gave away a good amount of cookies, there are still plenty left for us to enjoy. I have had a few, and will be glad when they are all gone. I think the next time I bake cookies, I'll only bake peanut butter cookies. Since I'm not a peanut butter fan I won't have a problem resisting them.

Cookies, cookies and more cookies

Once I did an inventory of my cookie making supplies I determined that I had enough supplies to make quite a few cookies. We began our cookie making endeavor after supper last night. I made a batch of chocolate chip, a batch of oatmeal scotchies and finished up with a batch of mint chocolate chip cookies. I didn't get to bed until midnight. By the time the last cookies sheet of cookies had come out of the oven and cooled enough to be stored away for the night, I was too exhausted to clean up the kitchen. I think I was asleep within a few seconds of laying my head on the pillow. An eighteen hour day will do that to me.

Today we are continuing to bake cookies. We are working on a double batch of peanut butter cookies. I love peanuts but I'm not a fan of peanut butter, whether it be in a sandwich or in cookies. Randy and the kids all love peanut butter and that is the reason we are making a double batch. I have decided that I will give home made cookies to my co-workers for Christmas gifts. I will give each co-worker an assortment of cookies totaling 12. In order to have peanut butter cookies to include in this mix I knew I needed to start with a large amount, to allow my family to consume some. It would be too much for them to resist sampling them and by the time 3 people finish "sampling" from a batch of cookies, there aren't usually many left because my family isn't satisfied to just sample one. I will have to make another batch of chocolate chip cookies because we've all had several of those. I am very particular about my cookies. I don't like cookies that are rock hard and since these did not come out that way, I've had several of them.

Although I like the taste of the oatmeal scotchies, the next time I make these I will see if I can play with the recipe just a little. These buggers are hard to work with in my opinion. I think if I mix the oats in with the butter and sugar and let that sit for a while before adding the other dry ingredients it might help the dough to have a better consistency. It also might help to add just a little more flour, so that the dough isn't quite as sticky and moist. It is much gooey-er than any other cookie dough that I have worked with, which is what makes it such a difficult cookie to master, at least for me.

I suppose there is a great deal of irony in our cookie making experience this year. Even though these cookies are not what many people might think of when they think of Christmas cookies, they are in fact Christmas cookies, since many of them will be given as gifts. They just aren't the traditional sugar cookies cut into "Christmas" shapes. We have made our Christmas cookies dressed in shorts and capris with the windows open. To counteract the oddity of making Christmas cookies in 70+ degree weather, we have listened to our extensive collection of Christmas CDs during this process. Nothing like the mellow sounds of Kenny G, the sultry voice of Vince Gill and the thrilling sounds of Manheim Steamroller to get you in the Christmas spirit.

Let it snow..........somewhere else

The Christmas season is in full swing at this point. Any store you enter has Christmas music playing and buildings are festooned with greenery and bright holiday lights. Retail stores are counting down the number of buying days until Christmas and grocery stores have eggnog and candy canes in stock. All of these things make me almost wish for snow, almost but not quite.

Growing up in the northeast, it is still strange for me to experience such mild weather in December. When I was a kid in New England we often saw our first snow in November. The chances that there would be snow on the ground at Christmas was pretty good. At the very least we could count on the temperatures hovering around freezing. Many a Christmas Break from school was filled with snow related activities. Building snow forts, making a snowman, or sledding. A sled was not necessary to go sledding. A "flying saucer" was a fantastic device. When I was very young they were made of metal, but later models were made of a hard plastic. I also remember several of us piling onto a tobaggon. The bottom of the tobaggon had to be waxed for best results. Later on, before I got too old and mature, I remember using a snow tube. I believe this may have belonged to one of my younger siblings. But boy, do I remember how well it flew over the snow. Made me wish that I'd had one when I was little.

Our high temperature today is supposed to be about 72 and tomorrow's high is forecast for 76. It feels pretty strange listening to all that glorious Christmas music wearing shorts. It reminds me of a commercial on tv where Christmas lights are strung on a palm tree. While we don't have any palm trees in this area, I have seen Christmas lights strung on oak and poplar trees. Looks a little strange if you're unaccustomed to anything other than a pine type tree.

Speaking of lights, I'm so tired of cheaply made Christmas lights. I just bought 3 new strings of Christmas lights for my tree and I noticed yesterday that one of them is not working. We've searched the whole string to try to find a blown bulb, and we checked the fuses. Despite these measures we still can't figure out why the string quit. I would much rather pay a little more per string and have them work for a couple of years. As it is this particular string lasted about a week. Not a very good return on my money.

The kids and I plan to bake cookies tonight. We won't be making sugar cookies in Christmas shapes, but we will probably make several different kind, such as chocolate chip, mint chocolate chip, oatmeal scotchies and peanut butter. What we make will be determined in part by what kind of "chips" I have in the freezer. I purchased several different kinds last year and put them into the freezer. We made cookies around Christmas last year and I thought we might bake some again before the end of winter. We didn't however.

We might also make some oatmeal raisin cookies. I've certainly got enough oatmeal here. The kids were eating oatmeal for breakfast pretty regularly, so I always tried to keep a supply on hand. Then one day, they decided they were tired of it so that left us with several good sized containers in the pantry. How many batches of cookies we make is going to depend on several variables. We might make some tonight and then again tomorrow or tomorrow night. Whether or not I bake during the day is questionable. I may not want to have the oven on if it is 76 outside, so I might wait until after supper to bake any additional batches of cookies.

If wishes were horses.....

There is an old adage that goes "if wishes were horses then beggars could ride". I know that wishing doesn't do much for ones situation, but hopefully if those wishes are turned into prayers situations will improve. I could spend hours wishing things were different. Instead I pray that the burdens that I am currently bearing will be eased. I pray for an improvement in Randy's health. This is probably a very selfish prayer on my part. I want his health to improve because I don't want to lose him at this point. His death would really be a blow to our family, financially as well as emotionally. If he should die soon then we will surely lose the house. We may lose it as it is because the bills exceed my income and there seems to be no relief in sight.

I pray for a true cure for diabetes so that my children can live normal lives without the need for daily insulin injections. There are so many complications that come with having diabetes. Life with this disease is a constant juggling act. Some people are better jugglers than others. For some, no matter how good they are at juggling the different facets of the disease, there are still a myriad of problems and health consequences.

I also pray for guidance during this difficult time. We are currently trying to live on basically a third of what we made in 2006. This has made things very, very tough. I've thought of trying to find a second job, but just don't know if I would have the physical stamina to do so. There are only so many corners that can be cut to save money or to stretch that money. I've cut to the bone and stretched to the limit, as far as I can tell. Perhaps through prayer I can discover other avenues.

It's been a very emotional day for me. I've had to discuss our situation with several people while attempting to find an alternative insurer for our house. Because our house isn't finished we can't actually get a home owner's policy. The policy we currently have has tripled in cost, and no one else will insure us because the house is still "under construction". We just can't seem to win. What a change from a year ago. This time last year we were doing so well. Of course Randy was feeling okay and he was working full time. Fast forward to this year and it's a completely different story. There are others who are in worse situations I know, so I don't spend time feeling sorry for myself. However, the pressure gets to even me occasionally. I think I need a good cry and some chocolate. Then I'll feel better.

So the countdown begins

Finally got around to putting the rest of the decorations on our tree yesterday. We didn't have a chance to decorate Saturday because none of us had the ambition. I only got 4 hours of sleep Friday night. Actually I didn't sleep at all Friday night, it was Saturday morning before I even managed to get in bed. The band didn't return to the school until 1:30am Saturday morning. It was right at 2:00am when I got back home from picking them up and I went straight to bed. Saturday morning it was up at 6:00am as usual and off to work. I did take a nap for about an hour once I got home from work. However, I don't think my body really recovered until Sunday afternoon. I took a short nap Sunday afternoon and it was only after that nap that I really felt myself again. The kids slept some on the bus ride home Friday night, plus they slept late Saturday morning, so they didn't suffer too much of a sleep deficit.

Since none of us had much get up and go Saturday night, we spent our time watching our Netflix DVD. I am using this Netflix subscription to introduce my kids to some classic tv shows. If we had satellite or cable tv we would get channels like TV Land that air classic tv shows, but that's not the case. Our first foray into classic tv was "Wonder Woman". This came about because one of the tv shows that we do watch had a main character dressed up as Wonder Woman for a Halloween Party. Some of the dialog from the tv show was lost on the kids because they had never seen the Wonder Woman tv show. Randy and I were explaining how Linda Carter was such a perfect Wonder Woman that the comic book could have been drawn based on her rather than her being chosen based on the comic book. This tv series was corny even when it originally aired, because it never tried to deny it's comic book origins. However, it is good clean fun and we all enjoyed it. This particular disc had the pilot episode plus one series episode. Randy had never seen the pilot, and being able to see where Wonder Woman came from cleared some things up for him.

I'm thinking of adding episode of "Welcome Back Kotter" to our list. Not because I enjoyed it so much when it first aired, but because I would love to see how the kids react to a very young John Travolta. They've seen him in several movies, "Grease", "Broken Arrow" and "Ladder 49" are several that come to mind. It should be interesting to see their reactions.

Another classic tv shows that is on our list is an episode of "Mission Impossible". I don't remember much about this tv show, because I don't believe that I actually saw very many of the episodes. I do know that the tv show was quite a bit different from the movies. I've only seen the first two movies with Tom Cruise. While they were pretty good, they were too much of a one person show rather than a team effort. If I remember correctly the series was about a team of specialists. To succeed in their missions everyone had a part to play and everyone counted on their team mate to do their part. I guess I'll have to wait for that particular DVD to see if my memory is correct.

I began addressing my Christmas cards last night. I got about half way done. I'll work on it some more tonight, addressing a few a night. They probably won't go out in the mail until Saturday. There is still plenty of time for them to be delivered before the holiday, so I'm not going to get stressed out about it. I still have some Christmas shopping to do, and don't know when I'll have a chance to do that. I may have to wait until I get my Christmas Bonus to pick up the last couple of things. I'm hopeful that we will get our bonuses at our company Christmas Party, like we did last year. The party is on the 12th and if we don't get them at the party we will most likely receive them on the 21st. That is how it has worked in years past.

Thank goodness I have a Christmas Club account that I put money in each year. I've only been doing this for a couple of years now, putting a little aside each week, but it makes a big difference when it comes time for me to buy Christmas gifts. This year I had to use about half of my Christmas Club to pay bills, but at least I was able to pay those bills. The family knows it may be a lean Christmas and they have accepted that fact. They are grateful to receive anything at all, considering the circumstances. Now that our tree is in place I will have to wrap the gifts that I've bought and put them under the tree. Despite the prospects of not receiving much in the way of gifts, I know we are all counting down the days until Christmas.

and the Popcorn is strung...

Just spent all my spare time in the last two days stringing popcorn. The tree looks interesting. I can't say that I'll do this again, but I'm glad that I did it at least once. I'm also glad that I do not have to rely on popcorn as my sole decoration. What a pain it was to get it on the string. Can't count how many times I stuck that big needle in my fingers. And the mess I made. Popcorn all over the floor.

Now the tree is ready for the rest of our decorations. I guess when I take the tree down, I will probably give the popcorn to my chickens. I don't think it will hurt them. I wonder if that's what people did with it years ago when it played a more prominent role in decorating the Christmas tree. I know I've heard talk of putting it outside for the birds to eat. Same principle.

Got our first Christmas card in the mail yesterday. I hadn't even given any thought to Christmas cards until that one came in the mail. I guess now is the time to get them out and start addressing them. I'll probably address a few a night until I have them all done. I think last year I sent out about 35 cards, and I expect to send out about the same amount this year.

Our football team played in the semi-final playoffs tonight. I was unable to go, since the game was so far away and the band had to leave the school so early. The kids were thrilled by the trip, because they got to ride a charter bus rather than a school bus. They are not expected to get back to the school until quite late. Jacqueline called me when the game was over. Our team lost. I know everyone is disappointed by the loss, however, this is the farthest the team has gone in a very long time. Who knows, next year they may go even further.

In praise of Gorilla Glue

Hallelujah! The Gorilla Glue worked! The bottom ring that holds the branches is now firmly glued into place, doing it's job as in years past. We checked it last night and placed the branches in their slots, leaving them in overnight with nothing else on the tree. Since the ring stayed in place with the weight of the branches in it I went ahead and put the lights on the tree today. Of course before I could put up lights, I had to go and buy some. I discovered that I only had 2 strands of lights and one of those didn't work at all, no matter what I did to it. I vaguely remember throwing out lights last year and if I remember correctly, these were lights that were on the tree and had died after the tree was completely decorated. Since removing those lights would have required a removal of all of the other decorations, we just left them on and threw them out when we took the tree down.

Our tree now has 4 strands of lights on it. There are two multi-colored strands and two strands of clear lights. These are in alternating order. So far the only decoration on the tree other than the lights is strands of red wooden beads. These look very much like strands of cranberries. We have decided that this year we will string popcorn to add to the tree. I don't really care for "garland" and prefer decorations that look like they could have come from 100 years ago. Not that I have any that are that old, but I do have a collection of Santa decorations that look hand carved. I also have a thing for bells, and have a variety of bell ornaments, many of which I made myself. I think the white popcorn will really compliment the red beads.

Up until recently I would not have used strands of popcorn as a decoration. However, about a year ago I was given a hot air popper. I love air popped popcorn, it's so much healthier than microwave popcorn. Since I use real butter on popcorn that I'm going to eat, there is none of that fake fat that is in microwave popcorn. I know there are people that speak of the evils of real butter, but I'll take the real thing all the time. I can taste the difference between butter and margarine and margarine is a pale imitation as far as I'm concerned. Also I have a real problem with lots of "man made" foods, because I don't think the body knows on a molecular level what to do with fake foods. I was not surprised to hear news reports discussing "Popcorn Lung", which is a condition found in workers at factories that manufacture microwave popcorn. It seems the airborne mist resulting from the "butter flavoring" causes the small airways in the lung to become scarred, so the victim struggles to breath. It's irreversible and often fatal. They say when you open a bag of microwave popcorn you release these airborne particles. Doesn't sound like a good situation to me. Okay, soapbox time is over, let's just say I'll take my popcorn air popped, thank you very much.

After we pop, string and hang the strands of popcorn then we'll proceed with the rest of the decorating. Of course I don't know how long this process is going to take, since we may have to pop quite a bit of popcorn to do the job. I'm sure once the house is filled with the smell of popcorn there are going to be family members who will need a bowl, complete with salt and butter. I also don't know how long it's going to take to string the popcorn. I've never done it before, but hopefully I will get some help with stringing it! We don't rush getting the decorations on. We take our time and make it an enjoyable process. We do the same thing in reverse when the time comes to take the decorations down and put the tree away for another year.

Last year I purchased several storage containers for our Christmas decorations. It's nice to finally have a container to hold the tree that was actually intended for that purpose. Same thing goes for our ornaments and my door wreath. The door wreath is a new addition and I bought it at the same time that I bought something to store it in. My only complaint about my wreath is that there isn't quite enough space between our two front doors. As a result of this, you actually have to make sure that the storm door is closed completely. I didn't do that one morning last Christmas season as I left for work. We came home to find the storm door completely open and the hydraulic door closer broken beyond redemption. It seems the wind caught the door and whipped it open, breaking the closer and damaging the top of the storm door in the process. Since that time we have had to make a conscious effort to close the storm door. There are some family members who don't seem to have the "conscious" part down yet, even after a year. Maybe they are just in too big of a hurry coming and going, I don't know.

As I sit here typing this, our Sheltie, Delta is going crazy in the yard. She doesn't want to be inside right now. The woods are full of deer and she is very territorial, barking and barking to warn all of those deer to stay off of her turf. We have brought her in several times since it got dark, but she's not in the house 2 minutes before she's whining and begging to go back outside. This is the worst I've seen her. She is usually pretty vocal after dark, barking at the woods, but it's bad tonight. It's possible that the deer are closer than usual tonight. Right around dusk we heard a gunshot, quite close. Just one shot, so I figure it was a lone hunter and he got his quarry. It is possible however that the incident scattered the deer in the woods and has caused them to venture closer to us than is usual. They are always pretty close by anyway, I know this because I've seen them in my garden and at the edge of the yard many times.

Uh oh Christmas Tree

We finally managed to find the time to get out the Christmas Tree last night. We had to move one of our DVD racks into another room in order to set up the tree. Everything went well.........until we came to the bottom row of branches. We started placing that row of branches only to discover a problem. The plastic ring that holds that row of branches has a crack in it, so it will not stay in place once branches are loaded into it. We have attempted to glue it with Gorilla Glue, but if that doesn't hold it, I guess we'll just set the tree up without those bottom branches. It will probably look a little odd, but if it's not too odd looking then we will be okay with it. I personally am not overly fond of perfectly shaped Christmas trees, because you sure don't find "perfect" ones in nature.

I've been trying to remember exactly how old this tree is. I believe this would be it's 15th year of service. Not only has it done it's job during those years, but it has also been thru 3 moves. In that time it has not always been treated gently I'm sure. I know there are many who are resistant to artificial Christmas trees, but to me the pros outweigh the cons. I like the cost effective aspect, and the convenience. Probably the two biggest pros to me would be that an artificial tree doesn't need watering nor does it drop needles like crazy. I always hated the dropped needles. I swear I would still be finding and vacuuming up needles in July. Then there is the disposal of the tree after Christmas. When I was a kid we would buy a bagged tree rather than a cut one. This would allow us to plant the tree in our yard after we were done with it. I remember my dad digging the hole for the tree in the fall before the ground froze.

The only real con I can see regarding an artificial tree would be the lack of a smell. I love the way the house is filled with that "pine" smell during the Christmas season. So to give my house that smell, I buy pine scented candles to burn. I also buy air freshener that smells like pine or other similar products that impart the pine scent. I have a bottle of a product called "Just Cut" that I believe I picked up in the Christmas aisle. It seems I'm not the only one who's fond of this smell.

We will begin decorating our tree sometime this evening, if all goes to plan. That is assuming that our lights all light up. Lights held us up last year. We got the tree all set up and starting decorating only to discover that about half of our light didn't work. This was not a case of a burned out bulb here and there. I believe we use 6 strands of lights on the tree. Since half of them wouldn't work I had to purchase new strands before we could decorate. Of course once I accomplished that we were able to go ahead with our decorating.

Last day of vacation

Today was the last day of my vacation and I have to go back to work tomorrow. Oh well, all good things must end. All in all it was a good vacation. I didn't accomplish as much as I would have liked to, so I'll just have to work at the rest a little at a time.

We watched our latest Netflix movie tonight. It was called Apocalypto. It got some mixed reviews when it was in theaters and was condemned for it's graphic violence. However, I have studied Indian culture and didn't find what was depicted in the movie to be unduly graphic. This movie is set at a time when life and death were much different than they are now. I do not like horror movies because often times there is blood and gore just for the sake of the shock value and corresponding ticket sales, this was not in the same category. Although this movie did contain some graphic scenes, I felt that it tried very hard to depict historical events as they actually occurred, without the sugar coating that many try to apply.

We love our subscription to Netflix. My sisters and brother-in-law gave us the subscription. I've got several things on my list that I want the kids to be able to see. I've added some tv shows that I enjoyed when growing up, some of them just to show the kids what I'm talking about. An example of that is Wonder Woman. Randy and I were trying to explain how the comic book character could have been drawn about Linda Carter instead of vice versa. Another tv show that I want them to see for reference is the original Charlie's Angels. The kids have seen both of the movies (starring Drew Barrymore, Luci Lu and Cameron Diaz), but Randy and I have both tried to make them understand how over the top the movies are compared to the tv show. I thought one episode of both of these shows would be enough to get my point across. Then we can move on to something different. So far we've had good luck picking movies. There has only been 1 or maybe 2 that we didn't thoroughly enjoy.

We've had more rain today. It is raining right now and is expected to rain during most of the night. There is a chance of some severe weather. I hope that doesn't develop. One good thing about this system moving thru is that my headache finally disappeared sometime early this evening. What a relief, after having a headache for 3 days. I don't know how much rain this system will give us, but I hope that we will at least get a couple of inches out of it. We need the rain very bad. If only we could get rain on a regular basis we might be able to recover from the deficit that we have right now.

Of course the weather has prevented any work on the CRX. There is a chance of rain tomorrow, so the earliest that Randy could start back to work on the car will probably be Tuesday. I hope he is able to get it fixed soon. It makes things harder on all of us for Jeremy to be without a vehicle. It also makes it harder for Jeremy to hunt for a job. Thus far he hasn't had luck in his search. He's put in applications at several places, but so far nothing. Maybe he'll get a call soon.

Frozen toes and football

Boy was it cold last night. Even though we all had cold weather gear, such as coats, hats, mittens and even blankets it was still very cold at the football game. The complaint voiced by most was that their feet were freezing or that they couldn't feel their toes. The low was reported at 28. I don't care who you are, that's cold. Especially if you are sitting on aluminum bleachers. Of course it helps if your team wins, like ours did last night. The final score was 52-22 so we will be going to the next round of playoffs. If we should win this next playoff game, then we will play for the state title. It's a very exciting time for our students. I just wish it wasn't quite so cold for these games.

I thought I'd never thaw out last night. The heat on the bus didn't seem to include the floor area, so after suffering with cold feet at the game, there was little relief on the bus ride home. Of course once I got into the car I cranked the heat up, but that only went a little way toward thawing me out. Once I got home I crawled into bed with my two pair of socks still on. I even turned the heated mattress pad on for a couple of hours. Some time around 2:30 I think I finally got warm enough. Jacqueline stated that she intended to turn on her electric blanket when she went to bed. The only one of us that didn't complain too much of being cold was Jeremy. He tends to be warm when the rest of us aren't.

Now that Thanksgiving is behind us it's time to put up our Christmas Tree. I have to re-arrange the living room a little in order for our tree to fit and the kids and I worked on that some today. We will probably finish the re-arranging and put the tree up tomorrow. We will then take our time decorating it, probably over the course of a week. There are already many houses in our area that have their Christmas decorations up. We don't do anything in the yard, as I do not care for most yard decorations. I would love to have some lights on the outside of the house, but that will have to wait for another year, since the lights I had purchased for that purpose were stolen from our storage.

It's raining here now, and has been sprinkling on and off most of the day. I'll be glad when this front moves out of here, because I've had a headache for two days now. Some people have old bone injuries that will ache when rain is coming, but I will often get a sinus headache when a low pressure system is approaching. Not as accurate as today's modern weatherman, because I don't get a headache each and every time it's going to rain, just most of the time. Unfortunately, when I have a headache that is related to the barometric pressure medicine only takes the edge off of the headache, it doesn't offer real relief. Relief won't come completely until the front passes and the barometric pressure rises again.

I got up early for this?

Despite not getting very much sleep last night, the kids and I got up at 4:30am this morning and took ourselves off to the local Wal-mart for some good deals. Last year was the first year that I had participated in any of the "After Thanksgiving Sales". It was a nice calm and orderly experience, so unlike what I've seen on tv. That is probably because the local Wal-mart was not a Super Center and therefore did not draw a huge crowd. This year things were slightly different. The Wal-mart became a Super Center in October and the parking lot was packed by the time we arrived at 5:15. The store aisle were clogged with eager shoppers, many of whom were looking for the exact item that had interested me. A 2 gig flash drive for $12.88. Since flash drives of this size memory usually sell for about $34, this was a substantial savings. Everyone else thought so too, because they were all asking the associates the whereabouts of the flash drives. It seems that this particular Wal-Mart didn't have any flash drives, they only had the other item for $12.88, which was a memory card for a camera. We did get some good deals, just not everything that we went for. I expect that this will be the last time that I participate in one of these types of sales. I do not enjoy shopping enough to battle those types of crowds.

We are not looking forward to being out in the elements tonight. Our forecast high today is only about 56, but it would surprise me if it makes it there. It is quite windy, so even if the temperature reaches 56, it probably will not feel like it. The low tonight is supposed to be below freezing, somewhere around 29. If this wind keeps up it will feel so much colder. At least we can come home to a warm house. Randy will not be attending the game, so he will keep a fire going throughout the day, and if he goes to bed before we arrive home he can turn on the heater. I just feel so sorry for the kids tonight, the football players and the kids in the band. I guess I should just be thankful that we don't live in Illinois or some other place where football is popular and temperatures are considerably lower.

Mashed Potatoes and Yeast Rolls

What a meal we had today. While most of our vegetables were in fact green, the meal did include some foods that Jacqueline and I have been avoiding. In addition to our turkey I a made a large pan of dressing. We only had a small pan of potatoes, since us girls were not supposed to eat them. I had a very small helping, while Jacqueline passed them up completely since she didn't feel she would be able to eat "just a bite". Our menu also included asparagus, green beans, very small English peas, turnips and turnip greens. Everything was wonderful. None of us ate until we were uncomfortable. I have been trying to set a good example for the kids when it comes to holiday meals such as this one. I never eat until I am uncomfortable, as many people do. We ate our meal around 2:00pm and then instead of having supper tonight we just had dessert. I made homemade whipped cream to go on top of our pie or cheesecake.

We had quite a cool day today, which is unusual in this part of the country. Usually at Thanksgiving we have doors and or windows open. Not today. We had a fire going all day. It was cool and breezy. I got a phone call from a very good friend who lives in the Northeast and their temperature was warmer than ours. We watched the Macy's parade on tv and it was stated several times that the temperature was unusually mild in New York for Thanksgiving Day.

Tomorrow morning we plan to get up at 4:30 to go shopping. We did this last year and got some good deals. Of course after we came home last year the kids went back to bed and I had to go on to work. I don't have work tomorrow, but will have to be up at the high school for 1:30 so that we can load our buses and travel to our football game. I will probably shop for a couple of hours and then come home and take a nap. Otherwise it will be a very long day.

I can't believe my vacation is almost over. It has been a great week. I've been so relaxed. In addition to the baking that I managed to complete in a stress free fashion, I've also been able to make a dent in some other tasks that I had set for myself. Now if I can just get others similarly motivated then perhaps progress can be made in other areas. It's hard when no one else in the house is a self-starter. Perhaps the correct motivation just hasn't been discovered.

A full day

Well, it's kind of been a full day around my house. We got up fairly early this morning to go and visit one of my Dad's first cousins. She lives about 20 minutes away and we don't get a chance to see her very often. I had visited with her about a month ago and she wanted me to bring the kids with me then next time I came. It had been over a year since she had seen them. With both of us in the midst of preparations for Thanksgiving we could only stay about an hour. She is expecting about 25 people in for the holiday meal, so she had a lot of cooking to do. I wanted to get home so I could cook my pumpkin roll. It was a nice visit and before leaving she gave me some photos that she had made copies of. The pictures were from my Grandparents 50th Wedding Anniversary party. There are several good shots of my Grandparents as well as of my parents. I will see about having a couple of them enlarged for framing.

Before coming home we ran to the grocery store so I could pick up more cream cheese. I had decided the previous night that I would make a double batch when making the pumpkin roll. We all love it so much and a can of pumpkin will make several batches. It was raining and since it was the day before Thanksgiving the parking lot was pretty full. As a result I had to park in East Oshkosh. Since I didn't have an umbrella with me, I got soaking wet. I had on my crocs with a pair of socks and although these are probably the most comfortable shoes I own, they are not at all water tight. By the time we arrived home I was freezing. I couldn't get warm and stayed cold for several hours. It wasn't until I had the oven going and was working on the batter for my pumpkin roll that I finally got warm again.

Jacqueline and I ran into her ex-boyfriend Tuesday night. I invited him over for dinner, if he feels up to it. He said he would try to come by, but that he was expected at his Dad's house at 5:00pm to eat. He then has to work that evening. He's a good kid who's had a rough time the last 6-8 months. I sure hope things are looking up for him. He had a real struggle trying to keep up with rent and utilities when he couldn't find full time work. There were many weeks where he didn't have $20 for groceries.

We really needed the rain we got today. It wasn't much, but every little bit helps. The only complaint that I have about the rain is that when it moves out early tomorrow, we will see a decrease in temperatures. Today's high was 68 and I think our low Tuesday night was in the low 50's. Tomorrow's high is only supposed to be in the low 50's and Friday is forecast to be about the same. The overnight lows are also going to be much cooler. Friday night it's supposed to be right around freezing. Oh joy! Sitting through another football game in freezing temps. Why can't we have the temperatures in the 50's on football nights?

Sticky shelves and science projects

It all started as I was trying to re-arrange the shelves in my refrigerator to make room for the thawing turkey and to assure that I would also have room for the desserts that I will be baking this week. I began to move things around and open up containers to see what was inside. My first clue that there was a problem came when I had a hard time actually moving items on a shelf. When I finally did manage to pull the item from the shelf it brought a string of goo with it. Someone had spilled something sticky in the fridge and hadn't cleaned it up. Definitely time to clean out the fridge. I removed items shelf by shelf and opened containers. I love my Tupperware containers, they are great for storing leftovers. However, when these same containers are forgotten or shoved to the back of the shelf, they make great vessels for holding science experiments. You know, the kind where you see how much mold you can grow, or the experiment in fermentation where the gases from the fermenting material causes the container to swell and expand, sometimes causing the lid to come completely off. I located several experiments of the mold growing variety, unintentionally created I can assure you.

By the time I had finished cleaning and re-arranging my refrigerator I had located several "missing" Tupperware containers and the science experiments that they held. I also managed to free up quite a bit of space so that I was able to place my turkey on a shelf to thaw. I washed every shelf, even removing the two crisping pans and wiping down the bottom of the fridge. I can't remember the last time I did this, so it has been a while. I now have room for my desserts as well. I will bake my pumpkin cheesecake today and tomorrow's baking project will be pumpkin roll. I try to time my baking so that I will have the room available in the fridge, but it doesn't help matters that I also have to thaw the turkey in the fridge at the same time.

Jacqueline had a function that she had to attend last night. She is in the chorus at school and they had to sing at a "community" Thanksgiving celebration last night. It was held in the cafeteria at the school. Since we were unsure how long it would take, I stayed, rather than dropping her off and having to go back to get her. I did not go into the cafeteria, but rather stayed in the band room. I had taken my cross stitch with me to pass the time. I am almost done with it. I am doing the outlining and I am so pleased with it's appearance. One of the girls, Consuela, came over to look at my cross stitch and to ask questions. She commented that I was so talented. She is also aware that I made and donated scarves for the band to raffle off as a fundraiser. It's a sad state of things when today's kids are so easily amazed by such simple skills.

I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised by Consuela's amazement. After all, some of the younger people that I work with were amazed to find out that I make pickles and sauerkraut. So many skills are being lost because this younger generation has been taught to just get it from the store. There are certainly times when getting it from the store is easier, but there is a lot to be said for the feeling associated with using something that you have created yourself. Speaking of creating........I have to go make cheesecake.

Time to relax....?

Today is the start of my vacation. I get two weeks a year and I've already had one week, back in September. Many people take a vacation and travel, but I will be staying close to home and will in fact spend much of my "vacation" time working around the house. I will do the usual daily household chores plus the extra baking for our Thanksgiving dinner. I like having the extra time to bake without feeling pressured to finish by a certain time. The timing of baking after I get in from work can be a challenge, so I prefer to bake on Wednesday or Sunday during the week. Since I have several items that I need to bake in preparation for Thursday, it will make things less stressful if I can spread it out over a couple of days.

I will also use this time to get caught up on things that I never seem to finish during the course of a regular week. There is clean laundry to fold and more to wash. Laundry and dishes are two tasks that never seem to end. I'm not complaining, that's just the way it feels. At least I don't have to iron a mound of clothes each time I wash. I remember my Dad's mother talking about when she was a girl and how they had to iron just about everything. Even sheets and pillowcases.

Yesterday was my birthday. I had a nice relaxing day. We didn't do anything special. The kids and I went to church. Randy stayed home as he didn't feel well. After church we finished watching "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers". We had started to watch the dvd on Thursday night but didn't finish it. Yesterday was the first opportunity we'd had to finish it. The kids had never seen it and to my surprise both enjoyed it. They thought it was "cute". I didn't even really cook yesterday, since I had put our supper in the crockpot to cook earlier in the day. I love my crockpots. Yes, plural, I have 2 of them, different sizes. I use one or the other at least once a week.

And on to round three

Well our football team is still on a roll. Not only did we make it to round two of the play-offs, but we won! I know the kids are all excited by our teams continued success. The seniors must be especially happy. It has to be a great feeling when your football team (or soccer, basketball, baseball etc. team) is doing so well. Also, nothing brings the fans out of the woodwork like a winning team. The final score last night was 33 to 25. We scored first and never lost the lead. Even as exciting as a win for our team was, I can't help but feel bad for the losing team and their fans. They traveled several hours to get here, and in fact arrived in charter buses. Prior to last night's match-up we both had the same record of 9 wins and 1 loss. Now we will advance to round three of the playoffs. Our next game will be the day after Thanksgiving and will be several hours away for us. I am on vacation all next week, so having to attend the playoffs won't affect my work schedule. For that I'm relieved.

It was pretty cold here last night for the game. The temperature was down in the 30's with a slight breeze. I wore my big winter coat and two pairs of socks, so I stayed pretty warm, especially compared to some. I could not believe the attire of some of the fans in attendance last night. Most of them were female and warmth was not a consideration when they dressed for the evening. It is possible that there was a time in my life that being "fashionable" was more important to me than being warm/comfortable, but if there is I can't remember it. I even saw one young lady with a pair of open-toed heels on. I realize that adding a coat can make one's silhouette appear boxy or chunky so if they'd rather appear slim and svelte than be warm, then I guess it's their problem, not mine. I hope the temperature for next weeks game is milder, but since we are approaching December I don't figure it's going to be much warmer.

I am on vacation next week and plan to do much of my baking for Thanksgiving early in the week. I still have to sit down and make up a menu and grocery list for Thursday. I already have a turkey in the freezer and some of my other menu items have been purchased as well. One thing I will have to pick up is potatoes. The guys say it wouldn't be Thanksgiving without mashed potatoes, so I guess I'll make some for them. I don't plan on eating any potatoes but will have some dressing. I will also splurge and eat a yeast roll or two with my meal. I have a feeling that even if I am cautious Thursday will not be a low-carb day. I will have to be diligent or Friday and Saturday will follow the same pattern.

I won't be spending all of my vacation baking, because we have planned a couple of outings during the week. The college is shut down for their "Fall Break" and so Jeremy will be home, and Jacqueline only has to go to school Monday and Tuesday at which time they will dismiss for their Thanksgiving Holiday. We will probably go to Tuscaloosa Tuesday evening and on Wednesday I have promised to take them to see one of my father's first cousins. This particular cousin is in her 70's and hasn't seen the kids in over a year. On Friday, depending on what kind of sales the stores are having, we may be getting up early to go Christmas shopping. If we go shopping at least I won't have to go on to work like I did last year. Then of course Friday night will be the game.

Cooler weather

Today was my day off. I got a lot done around the house, which always gives me a good feeling. We had a beautiful day, with warm temperatures and a little breeze. As it got later in the afternoon it began to cloud up. It really got cloudy around 2:30pm and when I went to get Jeremy it rained on me in several different places on the trip. It continued to rain on and off for a couple of hours and now that the rain has moved out the temperature is dropping. Our high today was 77 degrees and the low for tonight is forecast to be about 46 degrees. I saw a weather forecast on tv at supper time and they predicted about 1/2" of rain would fall. We'll take all that we can get right now.

Since the grocery flyers came out today, I spent time looking over the ads to try to see what is on sale that I will need for our Thanksgiving meal next week. Randy expressed interest in pumpkin pie and I will probably purchase one this year instead of making one. I am thinking of making pumpkin roll again this year. It was a big hit last year. We had it for breakfast. (yikes! kids will need to take extra insulin). I am also considering making a pumpkin cheesecake. I've made this several times before for Thanksgiving and it is well received. I'm not really fond of pumpkin, and hardly ever eat pumpkin pie, but I love the pumpkin roll and pumpkin cheesecake. Especially when I top it with real, homemade whipped cream.

The house smells so good right now. I've got spaghetti sauce started in the crockpot. Right now it's just the meat, onions and spices cooking, but it sure fills the house with a great aroma. Before I leave for work tomorrow I will re-start the crockpot and add my sauce, then leave it on the really low setting all day. I haven't had spaghetti in quite a while and am really in the mood for it. I have really cut back on my pasta consumption, since I am trying to eat a very low carb diet.

I've been trying to re-stock my pantry with staples. We went grocery shopping late last night and I managed to get a bunch of things that I was very low on or completely out of. Since it is so inconvenient for me to run to the store once I am already home, I try to have lots of options to choose from because plans can change rapidly depending on circumstances. There have been days that I had a particular meal planned and all set to make when I arrived home from work, only to arrive home very very late or so exhausted that I wasn't up to cooking. On days like that it's good to know that my pantry, fridge and freezer are stocked with items that I can pull together quickly for a meal. Grilled cheese sandwiches and homemade vegetable soup (which I can in 1/2 gallon jars) has come to the rescue on several occasions.

Randy had a better day today than he did yesterday. He didn't feel well at all yesterday and spent the majority of the day in bed. Some days he just has no energy. Of course those are usually days that follow a day that he has missed his medicine. He has a hard time remembering to take the evening dose. He has so far resisted my suggestions as to a system, or routine which would help him to remember. Sometimes it takes him a long time to see that doing things my way can be a lot easier than doing them his way. Not all of the time of course, but many times.

The leaves are really starting to fall here. We've had some very pretty colors lately, with the trees slowly dropping their leaves. However, we've had rain and some wind the last two days and that really speeds up the shedding process. We don't usually have too many leaves in the yard, but I think I might have the kids rake the ones we do have this year and put them in my garden. I am trying something a little different this year and am working dialy to improve my garden spot so that maybe I can get a decent crop out of my garden. It was very hard for me to not have a garden this year. I so much miss being able to fry up some fresh squash or to pick ripe tomatoes out of my own garden and to have fresh beans and other fresh produce. It's just not the same to buy it at the store. Even buying it from the produce stand isn't the same. It just doesn't taste as good. Maybe I'll be able to get things all set and be able to produce a bumper crop next year. That would be wonderful.

Low Carb and Ladybugs

Jacqueline and I have been trying to follow a low carbohydrate eating plan. We had originally started with the South Beach Diet in April. We tried to follow this diet, but I soon found that there were only certain recipes that I could make, due to the overall cost of seafood and fish, both of which are used quite frequently. The overall concept of the diet however has stuck with us. We basically try to stay away from anything with white flour in it. This is an easy one, since I have been eating whole wheat bread since I was a child. As a result I have never purchased white loaf bread, only whole wheat. She and I have also given up eating potatoes, which has been more of a challenge. I was raised eating lots of potatoes, especially since this was one of the staple crops we grew to feed our family of 7 when I was growing up. Giving up white rice was another simple step, since I have been buying brown rice instead of white rice for years now. Sugar is another ingredient to be avoided. This is a little more of a challenge than you might think. Many foods contain hidden sugars, which increase the carbohydrate value of a food.

It hasn't been possible for us to make any drastic changes in our diet and eating habits. We haven't allowed ourselves to be hyper-focused on carb content, and as a result we have made slow, steady changes which we hope will allow us to continue to improve our health and lose weight at a steady pace. The weight loss may not be sudden, but if it steadily declines then we will have accomplished our goals. Jacqueline has seen improvements in her blood sugar levels from eating this way. She still experiences swings in her blood sugars that are most likely attributed to hormonal changes of a 16 year old girl, but eating fewer carbohydrates helps to keep those swings to a minimum. She weighed herself yesterday morning, and she has lost 4 pounds. May not seem like a lot to some, but for anyone who has dieted before, any loss is something to celebrate. I haven't gotten on the scale in a while, so I don't know about my own weight, but I have seen some difference in my clothes, which is more important to me.

I was very impressed with a book by Gary Taubes called "Good Calories, Bad Calories". In his book Mr. Taubes explores various studies of diet, obesity and cholesterol. I found the work to be very eye opening and have concluded for myself that much of the commonly believed "truths" about food, diet and obesity are based on what I can only call bad science. I was shocked to learn about the difference in treating diabetes today and before the development of injectable insulin. Before the development of injectable insulin, diabetics were put on a very, very low carbohydrate diet. They remained on this diet until their urine was free of sugar, which meant that their blood sugars were stable. They were to add carbohydrates back into their diets in very small quantities, until sugar was once again present in their urine. Once sugar began to show up in their urine, they had to decrease their carbohydrate consumption to the level it was at before the reappearance of the sugar in the urine. I was never told this information upon Jeremy's diagnosis. The standard diet for diabetics (from the American Diabetes Association) includes high amounts of carbohydrates (53%!). In fact in their Exchange List for Meal Planning, one of their "principles for good nutrition" states "Eat more carbohydrates (starches and breads) especially those high in fiber." The paragraph goes on to extol the virtues of eating more carbohydrates and fiber. Actually, I don't know why this discovery came as a surprise to me. I have long believed that modern medical practices are not all they are cracked up to be. Anyone who knows me well knows I do not have a whole lot of faith in doctors, and none in pharmaceutical companies and their supposed research.

So given the information that I have uncovered, plus being able to see for myself the benefits of eating a low carbohydrate diet, I am attempting to encourage the rest of our family into eating this way. I don't believe Randy will ever be able to truly eat low carb, because he is too addicted to sugar. He will have a really hard time later in life should he develop type II diabetes. Jeremy is also not as cooperative as I would like. He loves bread too much and he is also very fond of sweet things. Since he is not over his ideal weight he seems to have less incentive than Jacqueline to be strict with what he eats. The fact that his eating of certain foods is counter productive doesn't seem to phase him. He is like his father in that respect. I don't know if it's a gender specific trait or if it's age related, but neither one of them can look ahead at the repercussions that will occur tomorrow from their actions today.

Of course they are not alone in being short-sighted. Someone in this area, years ago, thought it would be a good idea to introduce lady bugs in great quantities to aid farmers. Now, several times a year we have lady bug hatches. We are in the midst of one right now. Our house is a pale yellow. Because of the light colored paint, we can see the lady bugs very well. They are all over the outside of the house. But that's not the only place that they are. They find their way into the house through the smallest of openings. They tend to congregate by windows, I suppose in an attempt to get back outside. However they are quite obnoxious. I have several fly strips hanging up through-out the house. I didn't take them down as cool weather approached, since we do still have some very mild days and consequently, some flies. The strips are now covered in lady bugs. I know that lady bugs are supposed to be a gardeners friend, but there is such a thing as too much of a good thing.

Being warm, football playoffs

Oh the joys of being warm! It is so nice to be able to have a warm house again. We finally managed to get the wall heater installed on Wednesday. It's so nice to wake up in the morning to a warm house, no need to fear that the fire has gone out in the night. This is something that everyone takes for granted these days. After all, there are very few people in this country who do not have some type of heating system installed in their homes. The concept of heating with wood is so foreign to many that they cannot even conceive it. Don't get me wrong, I love the smell of a wood fire and I think that a fire speaks to something primal in all of us, however, heating with wood also has many downsides. First and foremost is the work involved with heating with wood, especially if you cut your own firewood. If you don't cut your own wood and have to purchase it, the cost associated with buying firewood is quite high. Then there is the splitting, the stacking and the handling of the wood. Of course let's not forget the mess associated with burning wood. You have extra dust, ashes to dispose of, ever present wood chips, splinters, bark and other wood debris. On top of that, when you heat with wood, it doesn't matter how lousy you feel, you still have to maintain the fire and your supply of wood to feed the fire. Otherwise you will be cold. No going to bed for hours to sleep off whatever ails you, because if you did that you'd wake up to a very cold house. Especially if you were the only one home to tend the fire. We will probably still use our wood burning stove to supplement the gas heater, since we have several cords of wood that we had purchased in the spring. However, gas will now be our primary heat source. Hallelujah!

Our football team played their first playoff game last night. We won 36-6. Since we won the first round we will now go to the second round. Next week's game will be at home also, but I understand if we win that one the third round game will be away. Far away. About 4 hours I think they said. Oh, joy (heavy sarcasm here). I'm thrilled for our boys, and especially for all of our seniors, but I am not thrilled at the prospect of having to travel so far for a football game. It will mean that we will have to leave very early and so I will probably only be able to work a half day that day. That makes things hard for us financially. Since my income is the only one right now, we need every penny that I can bring home and losing 4 hours will hurt. Of course if we have to travel that far there is no telling what time we will get back home. That means that I will probably not get much sleep. Since Saturday is just another day at work for me that means I will be a zombie that day. I am also just ready for the football season to be over with. Even Jacqueline said something to that effect. She is eager for concert season to begin.

Since Jeremy doesn't have class on Fridays he rode with me to work yesterday so he could fill out applications. We are hopeful that he will be able to get a job soon, so that he can pay his own expenses. Putting gas in two vehicles and paying for his food is really hard right now. If he is able to find a job it will help. He also needs some tools for the course he is taking and that is another expense we can't afford right now.

The best laid plans

This weekend we had planned to add on to our existing gas line so that we could install a wall mounted gas heater in our living room. As the adage goes about the best laid plans of mice and men..... so it was with us. Nothing worked out the way we had planned for it to. We had to finish installing sheet rock on the wall that we wanted the heater to go. That of course took time. Since Randy got a late start on this project while I was at work yesterday, it still wasn't completed by the time I arrived home. It got dark before we even completed the sheet rock installation, so we were unable to put the pipe together or go any further on the project. We resumed working on the installation today after lunch. We discovered that we needed some additional pipe. Randy was able to find what we needed locally. He went and picked up the piece we needed and only after he got home did he discover that there is an additional connector that he is in need of. So, we will have to wait for my day off to hopefully complete this installation. The overnight low is predicted to be around 39, but it often gets several degrees cooler here than what is predicted. I figure we can expect lows closer to 34 or 35. We have a fire going, but I want to get this heater installed as soon as possible. The fire went out sometime last night and when Randy awoke around 5 am to use the bathroom he had to re-start it. He said it was pretty cool in the house at that time. It is unusual that someone didn't get up during the night, but some nights no one does. That's one reason that I will be so happy to have a more reliable source of heat. That and the fact that we spent over $600 for wood last year and don't have the resources to do that this year. It shouldn't cost us anywhere near that much to heat with gas this winter.

November begins

This has been an event filled week, not all of them good. Tuesday I realized my drivers license had expired two days before, so Wednesday I had to go and renew it. From there Randy and I dropped Jeremy off at school and the two of us went to Tupelo so I could pick up some of the crafting supplies that I was in need of. The two of us had a good day and got back in time to run by the college and pick up Jeremy.

Thursday night our football team had it's last regular season game. We won 42-28. Next Friday night we will play our first play-off game. We don't think we will be advancing any further in the play-offs, even though our record is 9 & 1. Our only loss was to Winfield, and they are a 3A team, where we are a 1A team. I have no idea why we play them, it makes no sense to me. I enjoy the football season, but will be glad to see it end. I don't enjoy sitting out in the cool weather, nor do I enjoy having to go to work the next day, since unlike many other parents, Saturday is just another work day for me.

This morning on my way to work I had a flat tire. Thank goodness it happened where and when it did. It could have been a real problem if it had gone flat on Wednesday as I was traveling down the highway at 65 miles per hour. I was unable to change the tire because the ground was too soft and the jack kept sinking in without raising the car very much. Thankfully, the boss was able to send someone to come pick me up. I called Randy and he and Jeremy brought a board to set the jack on and took off the flat and put the donut on. They then brought the car up to me at work. I had to get 2 new front tires put on after work. Cost me $137, which I could ill afford. The other tire was actually ok, and I had it rotated to the back. The car needs a front end alignment, or the problem will continue to occur. I'll have to see if I can find a way to budget for that, because these tires only had 20,000 mile on them. The one that went flat was fine to look at, but when we removed it, you could see the steel where the tire was worn on the side closest to the engine. I certainly can't afford to replace tires every 20,000, if I can help it.

As if there weren't enough drains on our limited resources, Jeremy got a ticket a couple of weeks ago, because the insurance had lapsed on the CRX and we weren't been able to renew it immediately. They considered it as driving un-insured and the ticket is going to cost $108.

Meanwhile, Randy is trying to repair the CRX so that Jeremy can have a way back and forth to school. Right now he rides with me on Monday morning and Randy takes him on Tuesday and Thursday. He rides home with me, since he gets out at 3:00 and I work until 4:00. He just walks from the college to my work. Takes him about 10 minutes. Wednesdays are going to be a real inconvenience, because he has class but I don't have to work, so I have to make 2 special trips to Hamilton. With gas being almost $3.00/gallon this is not my idea of a good way to save gas and money.

Jeremy has applied to the Wal-mart supercenter in Hamilton, maybe they'll call him soon. He doesn't have school on Friday, so he could work Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I don't expect him to work full time, but it would be great if he could help out with gas and his lunch expenses.

Latest happenings

Today wasn't all that eventful. We went to church this morning and then after changing out of our church clothes, Randy and I went to Jasper (an hour's drive away) so we could go to Home Depot. We needed to buy black iron pipe so we could run more gas lines in the house. We have one line that goes to my gas stove, but we need to install gas wall heaters before winter really sets in.

It has been cool here at night, getting down into the 40's and we are expecting more of the same this week, gradually getting cooler as November approaches. We used 6 cords of wood to heat with last year, but only have 3 cords this year and with Randy out of work there is no way we can afford to purchase additional wood. The fact that we don't have a chain saw, plus Randy's questionable health means cutting our own wood is out of the question. If we can install at least one wall heater we should be alright for the time being. We will install more heaters as money allows. Thankfully we have all of the heaters that we will need, it's just a matter of purchasing the iron pipe and connectors to add to the existing line.

As Murphy's Law states, anything that can go wrong will and usually at the worst possible time. With that in mind, this Wednesday when Jeremy was on his way to class, the CRX broke down. He was about 5 miles or so from home and managed to get a ride to the Post Office. From there he called home, and since it was my day off, I went to get him. He and Randy towed the CRX home and began working on it. Randy thought it was going to be a fairly simple repair, but so far that hasn't proven true. He worked on it for 2 days and hasn't managed to get it running again. Today at church he talked to someone who is a fair mechanic about the problem and between the two of them they decided on a plan of action. We have the second CRX which he has been cannibalizing for parts. He will now probably need to swap out motors. I hope and pray that the engine swap will solve the problem, because we need a vehicle for Jeremy to drive. Even though his classes are in the same town that I work in, his schedule is so different from my work hours, that it will make it a real challenge if I have to take him back and forth to school. If and when he gets a job things will be even more challenging.

On another note, I'm a little bit frustrated on another front. I have a cross-stitch that I've been working on, on and off for about 3 years now. I'm very close to finishing it, which is great, but I'm having trouble locating embroidery floss locally. Wal-mart has apparently decided not to carry this item any longer. Since we live so far away from any kind of craft supply store, I usually purchased my crafting supplies from Wal-mart because they were local. I will now have to travel to Tupelo or Tuscaloosa to purchase floss. I could do it online, but since I also need additional colors for another project, one that doesn't include floss numbers, only floss colors, I prefer to actually be able to see the skeins of floss in person. I think I'll be going to Tupelo on Wednesday, where I will visit Hobby Lobby and purchase a good bit of floss. I guess I'll need to go over some of my charts to see what colors I might need and get a bunch of different ones all in one trip. It will be more cost efficient to do it this way.