Sunday, February 15th, 2009
Ok, I don’t know how or why it happened, but the family seems to be suffering from a new addiction. Yes folks, we have been sucked into Facebook.
Now, The Boy has had Facebook for a very long time now. It’s really just me and The Hubby that have recently gotten exposed and infected.
Within the past month, I have gained 17 friends. These are ACTUAL people that I know. It started with one of my cousins, then an aunt, then some old friends and has snowballed from there. The Hubby has a bigger addiction than me – he has uploaded the mobile feature and now can post from his Blackberry!
I’ve posted a few photo albums up there, old family pictures and stuff from trips; I posted a video of The Boy getting his brown belt. It’s like “blogging lite” – you get to tell people in your world about your day and there is feedback on it (sometimes instantly and sometimes not). It doesn’t require lengthy posts – it is actually a better format for quick, off the cuff comments.
The only drawback is the Friends feature. Generally, you need to be a friend to see someone’s profile, pictures and postings. There are plenty of people out there I’d like to catch up with, but not enough to say they are a FRIEND. Say, for instance, there are some people you went to grammar school with, but have lost touch with. You’d like to pop in, say hi, see some of their life, share a bit of yours… but do you really want to know everytime they change their status? Or post a new picture? I guess there used to be an Acquaintance feature, but according to The Boy, that feature is gone with the new updates they put in place a short while ago.
So I guess I will have to continue to struggle with who is my friend and who is not. Man, I thought that crap was over and done with!!
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Friday, February 13th, 2009
Wishing you all a Happy Valentine’s Day!
I’ve been busy with work and family for the past week or so… hopefully I will post more next week….
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Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009
We had our Lay Leader at church give the sermon this past Sunday as our pastor was away.
There are times I don’t remember much of a sermon, just a feeling about it; there are times I can recite parts of it; and there are times when just one sentence or phrase catches in my mind and stays there.
Comparisons Invite Complaints.
In this time of where the world seems to be going downward, and the news keeps telling you how bad things are – if you look at someone and it seems like they still have it all (and you don’t) – comparisons invite complaints.
If you do your job, get paid your hourly rate, and then hear about the people on Wall Street who got part of the $18 Billion in bonus… comparisons invite complaints.
If you hear about people walking away from their homes, being covered by bankruptcy and walking away scot-free from all their bad decision-making debt, but you are eating mac & cheese for a week so you can pay your bills… comparisons invite complaints.
If you are lucky enough to get a bonus or a tax refund or a stimulus check, but find out the guy next door got more…comparisons invite complaints.
But the moral of the parable Jesus was preaching to the disciples needs to be remembered: if you made your commitment and it is honored (an hourly pay rate, the responsibility of paying your bills) – then you have nothing to complain about. You got what you expected and were “promised”. Comparing it to what others get serves no good purpose.
But it’s dang hard not to compare and complain.
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Friday, January 30th, 2009
I know many of us face the new year, telling ourselves this will be the year I slim down and tone up.
I have the perfect item for you… it’s from Japan so it must work!
Click HERE to see this awesome product and then come back… I’ll wait….
Waiting… waiting…
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I love it… everyone needs this face slimmer… just imagine how thin and beautiful we’d all be!
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Sunday, January 25th, 2009
that’s for The Hubby … he knows the whys and wherefores of that.
Love you Hubby!
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Friday, January 23rd, 2009
I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned I grew up on a family farm. My parents were pretty much done with farming by the time I showed up, but the barns were still around. That, and one of the most important buildings for an old farmhouse (any house, I would guess)… the outhouse.
We were lucky enough to have a THREE SEATER. Yup, that’s right folks – the family that pees together stays together! And it wasn’t just for show – it was a practical outbuilding to have since we very often RAN OUT OF WATER in the summer. (Bet you didn’t know that could happen, huh?) The old family farmstead had a hand dug well, not very deep (if I’d been in charge of digging it, it would have been a lot shallower – I hate using shovels!). And, just about every summer, for a week or two at least, water was a precious commodity that sometimes we had and sometimes we didn’t.
Apparently, when my parents first moved into the family farmhouse, they had a bit of money and they could either fix the well (my dad, having grown up in the house, was well aware of the issue) or buy a car. My mom had two boys at this point and had to figure out what was important. She could either have water and be stuck at home all day, every day with two little boys OR she could get the car, drive to her mother’s house in town (or even go across the street to her mother in law’s) and fill up water jugs and also be able to go places with those little boys. She got the car.
That was actually not the story I wanted to tell you, but you had to know it to appreciate the story I wanted to tell you:
One of our foster kids, L., had serious trust issues. They manifested themselves in all sorts of ways, some amusing, most not so much. She stole. She stole any kind of thing. She especially liked to steal food. We actually had to get a lock for the stand up freezer to stop her from stealing stuff out of there. She came up to me once and offered me a frozen hot dog, like it was some kind of awesome treat.
Years later, my dad was repairing the outhouse. With kids out of the house, they didn’t seem to run out of water so frequently (amazing!) and in fact, had actually gotten a new well dug. So the outhouse really hadn’t been used as an outhouse for quite some time and had become a bit rundown. I am not sure of how or what exactly he was doing, but he came up to the house, his hands full. Layered in the dried up muck he was cleaning out were dishes, silverware and various other kitchen implements. The only thing we could think of was L – she must have stolen food and instead of eating it in the house where it where she could be discovered, she used the outhouse as a secret place and a convenient trash heap.
And the reason I thought of this … the Webbies. The Nineth Annual Weblog Award nominees are up and there is one under the Best Kept Secret Weblog called Chicken in the Road. In her full archive of the blog, she has a section for Outhouses. I particularly liked It’s Hard to Find a Good Outhouse, and Other Things I Never Thought I’d Say. (although, I was moved enough by this one to share it with my parents.)
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Thursday, January 22nd, 2009
Today is my parents wedding anniversary. I have to confess – I wasn’t even thinking about that when I called mom this morning. I was actually looking for some information on a church member. As we were ending the conversation, I asked her if there was anything else going on.
“well, it’s our anniversary and your father has a meeting tonight. So we are going out at noontime to a tool show,” was her reply.
I was very amused at this – it’s very typical of my parents. I told her – “well that’s what you get when you marry a boy you meet at 4H! If you wanted a guy to jet set you around the world, it’s probably not going to be the boy you met on the farm!”
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Saturday, January 10th, 2009
I had to take the garbage out on Wednesday afternoon. Every garbage can we have was full… very full. We hadn’t gotten the garbage out for a few weeks, what with holidays and parties and being sick. So I was very motivated to get the garbage cans out so I could empty out the fridge from the party leftovers.
Since we have a very long driveway, I have started to put the cans in the back of my Outback and drive up to the top of the driveway. I got the first of three garbage cans and started to roll it from the basement door to the car parked in the driveway. There was some snow on the ground, so it was a bit difficult to get it to roll smoothly. As I am walking toward the car, I see a brown blur out of the corner of my eye. It slows down enough and I recognize it as a mouse. “How cute” I think to myself – amazed he’s doing so well in the winter months. I get up to the car and notice there is a HOLE in the bottom of the garbage can.
And then I notice something else… a small claw inching its way out of the garbage can. So apparently there was at least one other mouse living in my garbage can. I figured he needed some time to get out of there safely, so I left the garbage can there and went to get the other two at the basement door. I took those two up to the top of the driveway and came back to get the third. I looked at the hole, and I could still see the claw there. I decided to lift it up and get it into the car – maybe the mouse would find his bravery when the garbage can was at the top of the driveway. As I lift, I make sure that the hole is up – he was hanging on that way and garbage wouldn’t shift back on him. I started to lift up and WHOO!! another brown streak is going through my field of vision. Actually – it went toward my parents field – off to relative safety.
The next day I got the empty garbage cans to put back at the basement door. I looked at the one with the hole – and there were the remains of the mice’s winter home. There were shredded bits of everything — a spectacular nest of warmth and food to nibble on for a few weeks. Ah, the luxuries of country living!
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Wednesday, December 31st, 2008
It’s New Year’s Eve day and it is snowing. Again. It snowed right before Christmas; then it melted; and now it is snowing again.
I got a small bug after our Holiday Halftime party. I spent most of yesterday “resting” in bed and cancelled my physical therapy appointment this morning. I rescheduled it for Friday afternoon – and I should be feeling 100% by then. I don’t feel too bad right now, but I really haven’t done much of any substance (which The Hubby will attest to!).
I took the photos off my camera from the past week – there were over 100 of them! I think I am going to try to take more photos this year. I have been trying to get a picture into this post, but the little widget doesn’t seem to want to work today. I noticed last week that it has been a very, very, very long time since I put up any pictures on the blog. Write it off to laziness, I guess… except today, when you can write it off to technical issues.
Hope you have a great and safe New Year’s Eve!
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Monday, December 29th, 2008
Christmas is no longer one day a year… it is a whole season. And the heart of the season is a two week span… from a few days before the 25th to a few days after the start of the new year.
We have (like many lucky folks) been busy with family, friends and church. We have our family traditions that, although they don’t seem to change year from year, become more and more meaningful each year.
The Boy was part of the youth group’s Christmas play. This is third installment in the series; and each year we have the church potluck dinner first and then the play (nothing like dinner and entertainment, right?). They added a Sunday community performance – it’s a bit less attended, but still very nice.
There was supposed to be a Christmas party for my work, but Mother Nature and her pal Snow Storm got in the way. So even though there was no actual party, it was nice to know the bosses put the effort into the planning of it.
With my knee issues, decorating didn’t get done timely or in full swing. No lights on the outside of the house (the up side of that is – we don’t have to take them down, either!). The tree went up the week before Christmas – very late for us. I had The Boy do most of the actual hanging of ornaments. Traditionally, The Hubby is in charge of setting up the tree in the stand and putting the lights on; The Boy and I are in charge of ornaments. Since we got an artificial tree a few years ago, The Hubby’s portion has gone down in time, effort and swearing. And it’s even a pre-lit tree, so no untangling of strings of lights either. It’s pretty much get it out of the box, make sure we have the right parts in the right places, and plug it in.
I did the rest of the house decorating – but again, very light and modest in comparison to previous years. And my friend Sally give me her annual post-Christmas purchase for Christmas (she gets great deals after Christmas and gives me my ornaments in time to decorate for the next Christmas) – some nice sparkly (I guess that’s a word!) beaded ornaments.
The Hubby and I went to church the Sunday before Christmas. The Boy was doing the reading that day, and the Sunday School kids led the worship with a drama. We generally don’t go to Christmas Eve services. The early services tend to be packed with families (not that I don’t like families, but it is a small church and I like my space) and lately there hasn’t been a midnight service at our church. I did think about going to my aunt’s church – but their later service was only at 10 and I decided against it. We opened family gifts – the ones from me to The Hubby, from The Hubby to me, and our presents to The Boy. Santa came overnight and filled stockings and left more presents under the tree. We opened those around 9 or so – it is so nice to have a teenager who sleeps in and not a toddler waking you up at 4 am!!
I invited my parents over for dinner and made a chicken. I have to say, that was one of the best chickens I have ever had. I got a large bird – about 7 pounds – and roasted it in the pan I ususally use for Thanksgiving turkey. I really didn’t do much to prep the bird – just washed it out, put some salt and pepper on it and threw some salt/pepper in the cavity – then into the oven for 2 hours. I used the brand new Cuisinart hand blender my parents gave us for Christmas and whipped up some awesome mashed potatoes. Add in the green bean casserole, and it was a pretty good meal. I pulled out the banana bread, ice cream and homemade chocolates for dessert.
Friday was a prep day for our big family Christmas. I was making all homemade gifts for everyone, so I had to get cracking on the chocolate portion of the gifts. I had already made the cookies – but hadn’t had time to get the chocolates done. I was making baskets for K&E and J&S to give them on Movie Night, so I concentrated on getting those done first. It turned out we went to J&S’s early to talk with Steve about the XBox 360 and gaming, so I was really under pressure to get them done quickly. When I was ready, we headed over to J&S’s place for movie night. We were going to watch The Island (which is a great movie and I had actually just talked to someone about it), but once they heard that we had watched it, they wanted to pick another movie. Jo offhandedly said – hey we could go see The Spirit and The Boy was like “Field Trip!” and we ended up going out for movie night. I wasn’t overly impressed with the movie, but it didn’t suck completely.
So, Saturday was the big family party at my aunt’s house in Windsor. I had to get seven more baskets done before noon, so I was up at 8 am starting my chocolates. I managed to get everything done (the baskets, present wrapping for the niece and nephews, and wrapping the family swap present) in time and off we went to party with the family. We had a pretty big crowd (about 40, I think) and had a great time eating and drinking and playing games. The big boys (the over 15 year olds) actually took over the Wii and bowled quite a bit. We did a present exchange – whoever you wanted to give presents to. Aunts and uncles gave to nieces and nephews, brothers and sisters exchanged gifts, etc. Then we had a Yankee Gift Swap. The basic idea is to get a gift (you set a dollar amount – we used $20) and it gets put into the pot. Whoever gives a gift, gets a gift. We had 12 presents, so the twelve of us got to pull a number to determine what order to pick the gifts in. Number one has the best deal of all. That was my Aunt Joanne this year… she got to pick first. Then the second person picks a gift and unwraps it. They can either keep it or swap it for the first gift. This goes on and on – the current gift picker can exchange the gift in hand for any of the previous gifts. But… poor Number One you might be thinking… gets stuck with whatever they first got or got stuck with in an exchange….not so quick there. Number One actually gets to pick AGAIN at the end… so clearly number one is the best number to pick. And Aunt Joanne knows how to pick them – she opened the CVS gift card first and then took it from my brother at the end!
Then we did our new thing – the family story thing. I got nominated to start first, so I shared the story about the Camaro we bought in Rancho Cucamonga. Mom went next and shared a story about her father in law and her husband when he was a boy. Aunt Joanne shared some pictures of her parents with Cabbage Patch Dolls for Christmas presents. Aunt Marilyn told us how she and Uncle Carl met in college. My cousin Elaine shared a story about her and her husband’s trip to Canada. So now Mom & I will get the pictures scanned and type up the stories for a family book of memories. I hope this is something we do every year.
Sunday was our annual Holiday Halftime party. We basically have an open house for friends, co-workers, church friends, etc. Last year we probably had over 80 people, so we were expecting a crowd. The invitation was a bit late coming out this year, so I think that contributed to a smaller crowd this time around. We had so much food!! (And we still do!) Everyone was generous with bringing something and we had the basics of clam chowder, chili, and meatballs. My dad made a venison chili which was a big hit. I actually bought a deli platter that was to serve 20 – 24 people – and it never made it upstairs to the table!! Even though it was a smaller group, we still had a great time.
And for New Year’s Eve, we will be heading to J&S’s place for a night of games and The Twilight Zone. We’re bringing a bunch of food and drinks; they are providing soup and bread and other goodies.
On Saturday The Boy is having about 10 friends over to have a Rock Bank party. So I am sure whatever food I have left by then will be devoured by Saturday night!
I hope your holiday season, whether Christmas, Hanukkah or Kwanzaa is happy, healthy and full of love and joy!
Posted in Family Life, The Boy, The Hubby | Comments Off on Twelve Days of Christmas