Category: Friday Five

In a week we will celebrate Christmas. It doesn’t seem possible. This year is ending, and the darn Virus is still wreaking havoc with my family and friends. Oh well, here is this week’s list.

1. We’d been wondering if we would have a “White Christmas”. Well, Mother Nature is laughing loudly at us, as we have over 3 feet of snow, (and as I write, it is still snowing!) It is well past “pretty snow”, and now it is tough. I have been out twice to clear out the satellite dish. This means shoveling my pathway, using the roof rake to get some of the snow down (usually on top of me and my face!) and then climbing a ladder with a long-handled broom to sweep off the satellite dish. The second time I did this I thought I was having a heart attack! It’s hard work.
2. Then at noon, I brought out the two dackels. Jack had shoveled a little path, but here is the sad thing. My little blind Anneliese was completely disoriented. She couldn’t smell anything familiar, everything is white and bright, and she was totally lost. She kept walking in a circle.
3. I brought her in and into my bathroom where I could blow her fur dry, but she was so upset, she went into the corner of the room and wouldn’t come back. I stood up, and went and got her, dried her a bit more, and then brought her into the family room and put her in her bed. I wish I could say that this helped calm her, but she is still very upset.
4. I did not see that coming, however, and I am angry with myself for not having thought out a plan on dealing with snow and a blind doggy. I will be leashing her and taking her out from now on, so she knows she is not alone.
5. This weekend is wrapping weekend. I think I will open up my kitchen table to its full size, lay-out the gifts and paper, and have at it.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Dear Covid – 19,

Have I mentioned recently how much I hate you? I am looking at this holiday season and I am thinking that the chances are I will not be able to see my grandbabies for the holiday.

1. I’ve never been one to over-react to this Pandemic, But we are averaging over 500 new cases every day and my little town has nearly 50 active cases. My daughters’ town has over 130.
2. I know, it is not safe for me to be out in this world right now. And my heart is breaking because I will not see my grandchildren this Christmas Day.
3. My plan currently is to wrap their gifts, drive them down, and drop them off. Then I will drive home, in tears I am sure, and spend Christmas watching the TV.
4. Yes, Covid, I hate you. You have taken all that I hold dear and kept me from them. This year it seems, my holiday will be very sadly spent without my daughter and my grands.
5. So, this is my Friday Five. I am feeling sad, angry, and a bit forlorn. This will be one year I hope I can forget very soon!

Here we are, people. The first Friday of the last month of 2020. The weather is cold here, and the forecasters are all excited because the first winter storm “might” come this weekend! Ah, well. Here we go. My Friday Five for December 4th.

1. 1. I’d been working on a very important letter to my Insurance Company and I was all set to print it out on Wednesday when my connection to our Network Printer went Kaflooey!
   2. I attempted a simple fix or two, but then my laptop just crashed. I wasn’t too upset because I know how to reset the machine, which I started Wednesday night.
   3. By Thursday morning I still was frustrated by the darn thing, and by about 11:00 I decided to reload the machine, and if I cannot figure out how to get this blasted machine onto the wireless printing, I’ll eventually call someone for help. But for now, just being able to use my laptop again is a good thing.
   4. My Ancestry.com Results are in. Call me surprised.
      Ethnicity Estimate:
      England & Northwestern Europe 49%
      Scotland 35%
      Germanic Europe 10%
      Norway 4%
      Wales 2%

Now I expected the English and German, but what threw me was how much of a Scottish Heritage I had. Jack insists that it is years of living with him. Ha! Norway and Wales also surprised me. It also told me that my sister was 100% my sister. My daughter was 100% my daughter and my Grandaughter was 100% my granddaughter. Now I am no expert on DNA, but this was fun!

5. Is anyone else doing their Christmas shopping online? It seems every day I get another delivery or four and right now I am nearly done with my shopping! Yay! I may just decide to decorate this house!

So that is what I’ve been doing and thinking about this week. Crazy, and wild, with Covid-19 spreading like wild-fire in my State, but somehow I am staying oddly calm.

Stay happy and stay safe, my friends!

Well, welcome to Friday, November 27th. The month is nearly over and we are officially on the Christmas countdown! That’s hard to believe. Soon it will be a full year of Covid-ness, many have died, and our numbers are climbing. But whatever the case may be, here is this week’s Friday Five.

1. I worked pretty hard cooking and baking and planning. As I lay out all the dishes of delectable foods onto our table, I hoped and prayed that everything would be good. I cannot tell you how disappointing it is to work that hard and then have nothing turn out correctly.
2. I needn’t have worried. Each and every item was amazing, most especially the Chestnut Stuffing. But I had another real winner this time, I made Cranberry/Orange sauce and it came out even better than I thought it would. Even my pies were spectacular! Okay, enough bragging!
3. For my Birthday I’d purchased an expensive Champagne. I thought it was really delicious. But today, for Thanksgiving, I bought a bottle that cost 1/3 of what the other cost. And this Champagne I liked twice as much. What can I say? I am a cheap drinker of Bubbly! Scotch is entirely another matter!
4. We let a few hours go by until we had dessert. Both of us had to admit that the Mince Pie came out the best. The Apple Pie was fine, but the Mince was somehow special.
5. The Turkey has been boned, and I have a crockpot full of bones and vegetables, slowly simmering to make a wonderful, rich, broth. Then I will make turkey soup and a turkey pie. Meanwhile, Jack and I are trying to digest all of the above so we can make our Turkey Sandwiches! The best way to end Thanksgiving Day!

So I wish you all a very Happy Weekend!

PS: No pictures were taken of all the food, as it would make me look bad to all my dieting buddies!

Here we are 35 days until Christmas. It sure is feeling like it as our temperatures plunge. But, all in all, the past week although crazy busy has been good and I am so grateful. So without further ado here is this week’s Friday Five!

1. As you know we have been battling doggy illnesses. I think it’s almost to be expected at their age. Arnie and Anneliese (whom I call the twins), will be 14 years old on December 10th. They’re no spring chickens, that’s for sure. Right now Arnie’s back is amazingly better, and Anneliese is comfortable.
2. I needed to give Lili a mini bath. There were parts of her that were just plain gross. Since it was 15 degrees when we got up today, I took a bucket of warm water to our basement garage, bathed her, and then rinsed her off with another bucket of warm water. The best idea Jack had when we built the house was to slope the basement floor to a floor drain. It worked like a charm.
3. I was so happy to see that many of my family and friends have donated to my Birthday Fundraiser for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, where no child is ever turned away, no family is ever billed and St. Jude takes care of the child and the family during treatment. St. Jude, It’s the very best charity I know of where the money actually goes to care for sick children. I am very close to breaking my record for fundraising!
4. On my birthday I was blessed to hear from so many of my much-loved family and dear friends. So many birthday wishes sent so lovingly.  I felt a great deal of love around me.
5. Lastly,  I want to add this. It’s a saying that I repeat whenever I am having a down day. It’s from one of my favorite movies, “It’s A Wonderful Life”.

I remind myself of these words regularly.

Have a safe, wonderful, weekend. It’s my hope that one day the Covid will be gone and life will get back to normal.

Here we are, mid-November, the leaves have now dropped, providing work for Jack each day.

We had warmer than normal temperatures early this week, but here we are on Friday, with more normal, cooler temperatures. So as the week closes, here are my Friday Fives.

1. I have spent this week trying to get my mind in order. I have finally gone through my pots and pans, weeding out the old and replacing with my new Pampered Chef pots.Have I mentioned how much I love these cooking pots? For someone who enjoys cooking like me, these pots are really beautiful!
2. I think after the next few days I will be going back into lockdown. I have two places to go on Friday and Saturday after that, it’s back to restricting my time out. Our numbers have sky-rocked here in New Hampshire, and for the sake of my health and those I love, I know I must do this again. Today we had 323 new cases of Covid in New Hampshire.
3. I listened to the Governor and our State Epidemiologist and they were calm but warned about the climbing numbers.
4. My gathering with my ladies was really good this week. We spoke about the pressures of the holidays with our dieting, and how to enjoy our holidays and then get right back on the wagon. For me, it’s always a bit tricky as I have my birthday, Thanksgiving, and then Christmas. All major food fests! But I know I can do it!
5. Here is my new New Year’s Resolution. I’ve decided to start weeding through my house getting rid of things I do not use and never will. My old pots, which are still very usable, are going to our Recycling Center. I also plan to bring all sorts of old things there. I can hardly wait to keep going. A load a week until it is done!

So that’s this week’s list. I wish you all a wonderful weekend filled with joy, good health, and much happiness!

It’s been a crazy busy week and as I sit here on Thursday night, I see a weekend filled with even more fun and exciting things. Here we go.

1. My sister has given me Ancestry.com’s package for my birthday. I believe this is her last attempt to disinherit me, but we will know in a few weeks. I mailed my spit in today and they will email me the results soon enough.
2. Meanwhile, I have started doing the genealogy on their website. My sister has done a lot and I have linked to her site, but I have also been working with my husband’s family, and while researching I discovered a child that no one ever talked about in Jack’s mother’s family. I imagine this child probably died young.
3. Anneliese seems to have perked up since starting the Gabapentin. I am hopeful that it is helping her.
4. A week ago I ordered 25 spanking new Spice Bottles.I cleaned the entire stove, the shelf in the back, and I took the fan screen down and cleaned that too. Then I filled each container and used the labels provided. Now my stove looks so good!
5. And lastly, my incision is healing very well. I think once the inner stitches dissolve, the area will be less puffy and will lie flat.

So, that’s all for this week. I hope you all have a good weekend!

This week is finally over. I’m glad. It was a somewhat tense week, but it is done and I made it through. So here’s what’s happening.

1. We all know Monday was my surgery. It went so well! I am so fortunate to have found Dr. S. and that he got me in so quickly. Looking back on my surgery, I have to say that I am pleased the doctor did such a great job and that he was really interested in my tumors!
2. I’ve managed to keep myself fairly quiet all week, which has helped with the healing process. Luckily, I never did get a black eye, just a headache between my eyes, like I’d been kicked by a horse. All manageable with Tylenol and Motrin.
3. I used to be scared of so many things. I was not brave at all. But here I am nearly 62, and I am one very brave woman! I feel very strong!!!
4. My dogs have been a great source of comfort to me. They are on my lap. or snuggled next to me, or on my feet (Lili loves to sleep on my feet or near them when she can). How lucky I am!
5. My stitches come out on Tuesday and I am excited about that too! I was looking at my face this morning and I realized that with my tumors gone, and the eyebrow fixed my face is once again balanced!

So that’s it for this week. We are now Past-Peak with our Autumn Leaf colors and now rain and cold seem to have set in. It’s my hope that wherever you are, you can find warmth, happiness, and good health!

Thursday found me attempting to get a handle on all the house-keeping stuff before my surgery on Monday. I was crazy busy, and here I will list it all, so you can see that perhaps I should have slowed down. Thursday’s activities are why I plan to do very little this weekend.

1. I got up on Thursday early. I immediately stripped my bed and started the laundry. I did six loads of laundry, hung out some of it, and folded and actually put away all of it, and remade the beds! Yes, this found me running up and downstairs and back and forth in our home all day long.
2. I decided to make Eggplant Parmesan, and in the middle of removing the cooked eggplant, Jack put a can of soup on the counter. I was reaching for a pot for his soup when I brushed my index finger on the cookie sheet that had just come out of the 450 degrees Fahrenheit oven and burnt it!I mean, really burnt it! I iced it down and after a bit put some burn creme on it. Ugh!
3. We took the last Air-Conditioner out of the Office window. This was going so well until the rain-water began running all over my shoes, down my legs, and soaked me. Worst of all, in the end, Jack lost his grip on the air conditioner and I was left to finish placing it. Oh, my aching back!
4. I poached boneless, skinless chicken thighs for the dachshunds. Since they both are getting older, I like to spoil them a little. They love it and occasionally Lili gets a bit too!
5. Tonight I am doing an easy dinner. Leftovers for Jack and of course, the Eggplant Parmesan for me. I already know that bedtime will be early tonight.

What a beautiful week it has been. Despite a little rain, the leaves are still bright and the skies returned to blue. Yes, a lovely Autumn we are having. So, here we go, this week’s Friday Five.

1. I’ll start with the weather as that has been rather crazy. We’ve had several touches of frost, a lot of rain, and then beautiful warmth with blue skies. Not bad for the middle of October!
2. Because I get bored easily, I decided to crochet another afghan. I let Savannah pick out the yarn and in the end, she will probably get it. I am working on it when I sit to watch the TV and the yarn is soft, chunky, and will make a wonderful, cuddly, blanket.
3. I had a strange week on the diet front. I was doing everything right and managed to gain a small amount.I was upset at first, and I weighed myself several times to be sure it was correct, and it was. Ugh! At first, I was upset, and then I decided to look back in my food journals and then see what I was eating. I have made a few adjustments and I hope to see some movement on Tuesday!
4. I received my small 5-inch cast iron pans. Many people use them to make big chocolate chip cookies, but I have made baked apples in them and they have been great!
5. Thursday I loaded up the car with all the garbage and took a trip to the Recycling Center. Arnie rode along with me and we had a great time! Now that is done, I was able to clean the garbage cans and my garage is also smelling sweet. Well, like bleach, but that’s a vast improvement!

So, my gentle readers, I hope that you can enjoy the weekend. Stay safe, and enjoy the little things in your life. Hopefully, this darn Virus will be over soon!