Saturday Smiles

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

I do find it easier to smile these days. They commented on that at the general store when I was there on Thursday.

It has been a tough week in the Village but we all have something to smile about. What brings a smile to your face today?

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

The fact that I have no headache this morning is notable to me. Not sure it is a full a smile, but certainly not a frown!

Ds will be coming to visit later today and dh and I are going to try going out to a party at our church musicians house. For their 10th anniversary, she and her dh decided to hold a HUGE party. I expect over 100 will be there. We'll go for a few hours and leave. Once again, a large number of people mean I don't have to feel bad about not being able to be 'fully' there. I know there will be smiles and laughter there - theirs is the kind of house that is always full of love, laughter and liveliness.

[Harmony]

Hello everybody! I enjoyed reading yesterday's posts, sure nice to see MamaP stopping by.

Today is hurricane prep for us. We just don't know what we will get. We are on the gulf coast, a half-hour trip away from the beach. 30 Minutes makes a huge difference in wind speed. We have 2 houses to worry about and that is disconcerting.

I am still not feeling well. This is dragging on. I would not be doing this work today if I didn't feel I had to. Neighbors down the street have their hurricane panels up. They put them up if there is a slight breeze. We laugh, but they will probably be safe some day while we are not. DH waits till the last minute and he is in denial.

Yesterday we drove an hour up north and picked up our entertainment unit. That was a challenge for us. Up there the guy from the store helped load. Down here we had problems getting it unloaded. DH and I can't get stuff like that done easily any more. I had feelings about Nancy's chicken coop roof when I read her posts, thinking about us unloading that heavy thing. It is 6' tall. It is sitting in our garage right now ready for stain/sealing. I wish we had our garage all organized nicely like Lilac's. No, my DH is not the organized type. He likes the open metal shelves with everything visible. He's very much a visible organizer. No need to remember where one stored anything when he can just look around.

I also am in awe of OKay's living room. I'll be doing mini job similar today. I bought a few bins, containers to clean out the old entertainment unit.

Hurricane prep:
Clean out refrigerator. Make extra ice. I'm worried about losing electricity.
Cook some food ahead, must bring in green peppers from garden, bake a turkey breast I've purchased.
LOL going, will get everything all caught up, might not have water after storm goes through. Fill all my plastic water containers.
Gas up car.
Pay all bills sitting around, get them in post office; put books read into book deposit...better at the library than sitting around here.

Better get going with all this.

[Twins' Mom]

Looks like we may have some remnants of the storm by late this week. We could use the rain. Dh and I are supposed to leave on Friday to be at Hilton Head on Saturday; I still need to find a dog sitter.

Quiet day here, ddogs let me sleep until almost 8 a.m. I'm going to change clothes and take them out for a walk.

Off the top of my head:
-pedicure?
-drop off Goodwill stuff
-drop off shred
-go to mountain house to pick up cleaning supplies and do a few things there
-What else?

[helia]

Good morning! Saturday smiles - yes, great theme!

I started a 2nd post yesterday, but got busy and so never put it up.

Thank you to those of you who were kindly suggesting that some low-key non-productive time might be an OK thing for me. I remember Twins mentioning how she does that when her family is away -- and one or two others of you were encouraging as well.

Actually, yesterday ended up being pretty busy after all. After my jog, I started clearing out my inbox -- Indiana has inspired me. It is ridiculous; thousands of emails. --There, I confessed it! Some I was saving b/c they had photos I wanted to save, so I put the photos in the correct photo folder. Others, had info. I wanted to save - some receipts, family stories, etc. I made several more inbox subfolders to store that info; probably, some of it is outdated and I can delete once I check with dh. Do I need email property tax receipts from 2008? Other emails I just hadn't gotten around to deleting. It felt good to get that started, and I hope to make more progress today. I went to the funeral at 1:30 and then Target afterward and got home around 4:30 pm. Then, dfriend called me. 5 seconds after I got off the phone with her, dh called me. We chatted for a while; I cut up fruit and then immediately after getting off the phone with dh, I went to a small get-together at a friend's house until about 9:30. So, that made for a full day after all!

The funeral was hard; she was the same age as dd16. The funeral service was also very helpful; I felt like I had grieved my piece and come to some closure by the end. Of course, I did not know the girl well. which made it easier for me. She was not a close friend of dd16's, but the family is a part of our congregation. A psychologist had been invited to talk to us about mental illness and suicide, and I found that very helpful. I heard later, there is some concern in the church leadership about how this will affect the youth of the church; maybe there could be copycats or kids already struggling with depression could be inspired by this girl, etc. Maybe the psychologist's talk was mainly aimed at them. There sure were a lot of teens at the service.

-Ah, smiles today! I have NOTHING on my calendar except for lunch with my dear friend B. I think I should get ds to the campus bookstore today or tomorrow to buy his books before all the students arrive and the lines are enormous. He can take advantage of being a "townie."

BBL! Have a wonderful day, all!

[Emptynester]

I am smiling today as DH is on the roof of our MH fixing the vent cover that broke a couple weeks ago. With the vent cover in place we can keep the vent open even if it is raining - so that is a good thing. I have been handing tools, etc. up to him via a rope and grocery bag.

The main reason I'm smiling is that he is sweeping hundreds of acorns off the roof. We are parked under an oak tree that has thousands of them. They fall at all hours of the day and night - sometimes lightly and sometimes as if a cannon has gone off over our heads. We will have to sweep them off the slide covers before we leave but at least some will be gone.

It is supposed to be very hot today so I'm planning to spend my afternoon in the AC at the volunteer sewing room. I was able to get the drapes all hemmed and pressed yesterday and some of the daybed skirt pinned on the cover. I discovered that I needed more fullness in the skirt so cut another length of material for the skirt. I also was able to cut an old foam mattress in half length ways to put together for a bolster. I'm not sure I have enough material to cover all of the bolster so I think I will put a coordinating fabric on the back.

Since the bolster is the same length as the daybed, it makes a great place to work while pinning the skirt on the daybed cover. I'm using the huge table in the old dining room in the Castle as a work space. (Pictures on my blog tomorrow)

Now I'm going to sit back and relax in the cool air coming in the window. I know it will be very hot by noon and like a sauna here in the MH by afternoon. But by then I will be in the AC.

Oh! I must go check out the cording that has been steeping in coffee all night. I'd best get it hung out to dry as I will need it both for the daybed and for the bolster.

[OKay]

Good Morning!

OH HOW I want people to feel/say this about our home. I hope you enjoy your time in their home Kathryn!

theirs is the kind of house that is always full of love, laughter and liveliness.

I have tired of the living room cleanse project. I'm soooo close to finishing though! I'm going to force myself to continue working on it to completion. Lessons to self....always finish these projects by Friday. What would have taken me 30 minutes without LO "help" will most likely take couple hours today.

Smile = LO just told me "I washed my jeep to make it all clean and shiny"
Clean and shiny seems to be contagious!

[DeeClutter]

My smile came as soon as I 'unpacked' a bag of goodies we bought at Vidler's yesterday. Had completely forgotten we bought a pair of "kids" work gloves for dgs7. He constantly asks dh if he can 'help' do something around the campground and just loves working with Grandpa! These are like the adult size work gloves -so cute! I know he's going to love them, but he's also going to want to put them right to 'work'.

I fell asleep after only reading maybe a page of my book last night, awoke at 11:23 and that was it until after 3. Never heard dh get up & leave and could barely open my eyes when I got up. Surprise! It was 8:10 Late for me. But even then I came out and semi-dozed in the recliner for over 1/2 hour. I've finally managed, s2s, meds, breakfast, made the bed and picked up here a little. I have water heating so I can do the dishes.

There's a camp wide pot luck tonight at 6. I was not going to go but dh wants to so I'd better think of something to take. My weight was up a pound or so today and it's been going down steadily so didn't like that.

I'm amazed at how consistently warm /hot it's been here all summer. It was near 90 again yesterday. Unheard of at this time of year.

Guess we've decided on 5p.m. Sunday, September 9th for our family get-together at DS-A's. At least if it's warm all the dgks can swim. Think DS likes entertaining, but we told ddil that she was not to worry one iota about food -that we'd bring it all. Just have each family bring their own drinks. DBaby is easy to please -"just breast milk for me please." DDIL is supposed to go back to work Sept 5th and I can see her dreading it already. She really worries about leaving dgs in child care. Can't say I would have like it either. But right now it's fiscally impossible for her to stay home. She's sort of hoping that a lot of her work will be able to be done from home.

Have to go check my e-mail account. Been pretty lax about checking that very often and I need to be much more vigilant about it. I'm off to that and dishes await!

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Haven't done a thing today except wander around the village and the internet a bit.

Sad to see that the voice of Sesame Street's Count has passed away. The Count was dd's imaginary friend for a while when she was little. Wouldn't expect anything less of my Pure Math Degree holding child!

I'm going to try and get something done now. Given my allergies are an issue, dusting the bedroom level (a nice easy chore) will be the first thing I tackle.

[Bernice1027]

Good Morning
Hope everyone is enjoying the start of the weekend. We have been up and moving, Dh took 8 to her soccer practice after getting the oil changed in my car, the twins are cleaning up the massive mess they created in the toy area yesterday, and I after getting my morning stuff completed have been in the kitchen hoping to get this monthly cooking done as early as possible today, I have nixed making any cookie dough, I have 2 crockpots going one with pork for pulled pork and one with a beef roast, also have chicken on the stovetop cooking for potpies and enchiladas. Will be starting my muffins soon, along with my breakfast sandwiches.
Via another board I read that the Holiday Grand Plan is starting, I did that once or twice before but never finished it, hoping to complete it this year but need to get the plan printed out. We have been invited to a friend's house for swimming tomorrow not sure if we will go since 7.1 is getting over strep, plus there is a chance of rain..which we terribly need. So that is what is going on in my little world.
Hope to be back later if not see you all tomorrow:)