MEANINGFUL MONDAY

[Dove]

Good morning

Paperwork & planning are at the top of my list today. I'd like to include writing Christmas cards in that mix, as well as clearing out emails. I have a long list of stores to go to on my errand run later this week, but only need one small item from each. I want to plan the best route so I don't have to backtrack, plus write what I need at each store & gather coupons so I don't forget anything. Have to remember to include a post office stop to buy Christmas stamps & a fill up at the gas station.

I have spent time at Indi's recipe site this last week, copying many of the recipes that interest me. I made that a priority since I don't know how long her site will remain up. It makes me happy to have the recipes as a small tie to her memory, but also sad that I can't talk to her about them.

Hi Dee. Congrats to both of your dgs on their hockey & lacrosse goals. Score!

Hi Blessed, I love making our house a home, too.

Hi Helia, sorry about the flat tire.

Hi Harriet, I agree -- there is nothing more fun than seeing an unexpected card or letter in the mailbox from someone we know, & the anticipation of reading it on the walk back into the house .

Hi Scattered, glad you have some time off work after your busy weekend. Good luck on your final.

Hi Kathryn, good luck with reorganizing your cabinet to accommodate the fryer. Hope it stops leaking.

Hi Mystery, enjoy your walk.

Waving ~~~ to everyone; hope you all have a wonderful day!

[scattered]

Kathryn - can you place an old cookie sheet under the fryer so that if it does leak it won't drip on anything or mess up the shelve?

Mystery - I am very sore to boot so there is no denying I am running around like a herd of chickens sans heads. That does not mean you aren't running around like a chicken sans head also, you are just lucky enough not to have a herd of them.

Dove - could you post her recipes here also?

The house smells awesome as I have some broth cooking down to try to make concentrate. I got several things done on that last pass although they are not things that show.

ToDo
coffee
unload/reload Agnes
counters
Sweep Kitchen
Wet Mop Kitchen
Clean hot spot in LR
Sweep LR
Wet Mop LR
Feed Bert & Ernie w() d() f() p/a()
Fix patches on Dress Blues
Spot treat and Dry Clean Uniform
Pack Uniform into hanging bag for year
Bake cookies for DS13's school

TaDa's
d2s
Send off emails
Clutter Cruise (15 minutes through the house picking up stuff that is out of place)
Unpack bags from weekend
scheduled final for tomorrow evening

Need to sort the laundry and start B&E will spot treat and dry-clean uniforms while Bert chews on the 1st lol.

BBS

[MysteryWoman]

Back from the walk; it's unseasonably warm here today (at least, I hope it's unseasonably warm -- after last winter, I'm starting to wonder), so I went out without a jacket. To pass the time as I was walking, I counted Christmas decorations -- 26 of 56 houses have something up. In a few cases, I had to look carefully -- was that a Christmas wreath, or just a wreath? Were those lights strung around the windows? (Hard to tell in the daylight.) Our house is still one of the ambiguous ones, as I haven't gotten the wreath hung yet.

Dove, I couldn't do Christmas shopping (or really, any shopping at this time of year) without a plan. (Some people are browsers; I'm more of a surgical-strike kind of gal.) It always seems to take longer than I think, though.

I am very sore to boot so there is no denying I am running around like a herd of chickens sans heads. That does not mean you aren't running around like a chicken sans head also, you are just lucky enough not to have a herd of them.

LOL!

Debating which to do next -- make lunch or declutter a bit. It's still a bit early, so I think I'll do the decluttering first.

[blessedw2]

waving back at all of you !!!! ~~~~

a little worried as dh is forgetting major things but seems fine other wise. he had given me the credit card yesterday and couldn't remember doing that... but thats a so me rather than a so him. I think he is a little worried as he gave out our credit card information the other night.
I am going to have to offer much patience for him as he doesn't seem to realize he was cranky and putting the guilt on dd younger either even though I could tell. he felt bad this morning after I spoke about dd youngers feelings and felt he was fine. I notice that he doesn't seem to notice his little quirks and is frustrated that someone would complain when he thinks all is well. I have to be understanding and keep an eye out. he seems so normal but little things come out.

dd younger is sick with the stomach flu (bad case) and she is not used to getting sick like that.

needing to focus. step by step: work on lights

[BookSaver]

Good morning, villagers ~
Kathryn ~ You say "nothing meaninful yet" but in reality, you're caring for your ill DS and DFS. That certainly means a lot.

Trying to keep pace here. After tomorrow night's sewing class, the rest of the month looks easy. I'm the one who came up with the idea and volunteered to teach the class, so I can't blame anyone for the stress but myself! However, the sewing group friends are very meaningful to my life, so this is a way I can give back to them.

Notes to keep myself on track this month

Carry-over from last week:
* Press fabric strips and assemble kits for tomorrow's class
* Decide on gift for DMIL; Email L&J for ideas?
* Assemble & install shelves for shoes in my closet
* Finish clearing out the shed (last week I switched over to finish clearing out the upstairs storage room instead)
* Keep working on 2 research projects -- 1 a music question for DMom that is part of her Christmas gift, the other a nutrition question for me -- ongoing

Adding for this week:
* Finish meeting prep for tomorrow: agenda, test glitter spray, make fudge?
* Call S about gift card and tables -- done
* Call C about gift card
* Update address book to mail a few holiday cards
* Sewing group financial reports -- done
* Library group financial reports
* Clear counter space & set up holiday decorations
* Hair cut?
* Dejunk coat closet

[scattered]

Crud, I have 2 loads of Dry-clean and only 1 D ryel sheet left, going to go to my favorite homemade cleaning products website and look up her recipe for solution. I have found some orphaned plain white socks that I will cut to lay flat and use to make my new sheets, I have also saved the last 2 sheets so I can use those. Her recipe makes more than enough for at least 3 sheets which I will soak and put into ziplock bags for next time.

I have gotten DS20 up to help with a few items.

DfS19 has finally decided to show his face to me rather than sneak in while I'm not home to do his laundry. He is also now talking to DS20. He stated last night that we need to talk, but I was not up for it last night... knowing him that will happen in the next week or so, I will post more in J&C.

Anybody have any ideas of how concentrated I should make the broth? I am thinking I need to boil half the water off.

Mystery - I'm glad you enjoy my humor... not everybody gets it. It is also warm here today which is not good for me since I am finding my self more and more susceptible to warm (gotta love the start of Peri-menopause).

Blessed - (((younger DD))) please make sure she stays hydrated.

Books - what is your nutrition question? I love to talk about nutrition it is so important to health.

ToDo
coffee
unload/reload Agnes
counters
Sweep Kitchen
Wet Mop Kitchen
Clean hot spot in LR
Sweep LR
Wet Mop LR
Feed Bert & Ernie w(/) d() f() p/a()
Fix patches on Dress Blues
Make dry-clean solution
2nd load of Dry-clean
Pack Uniform into hanging bag for year
Bake cookies for DS13's school

TaDa's
d2s
Send off emails
Clutter Cruise (15 minutes through the house picking up stuff that is out of place)
Unpack bags from weekend
scheduled final for tomorrow evening
Spot treat and Dry Clean Uniform
sort laundry

Going to make solution and then get busy in the kitchen.

BBS

[Ivy]

Meaningful Monday started out with a lot of coughing. Don't know if it's natural a.m. congestion or a cold coming on.

I said my prayers, wrote in my journal, and gave DH a kiss as he headed out to Costco.
I'm playing Christmas music. It'll help put me in the "mood" to finish a stuffed cat toy for dgrson-19 mos. Body's done. Need to do face, limbs, etc..
A big storm's moving in again.
I watched 2 You Tube videos of Debbie Macomber's. One about angels and what Christmas means to her.
The other was on Thanksgiving, how she writes 5 things of gratitude down, daily, and how she has so much to be thankful for. It was so beautiful, I got tears.
DH mailed a thank you holiday card and letter to Ms. Macomber for the free thank you gift to me of the Cedar Cove Cookbook. It means a lot that my recipe was picked, but it's not posted that I won on-line.
It's listed under desserts though, pumpkin ginger dessert, I believe, if my memory's not failing me yet this morning.

Making my grson's cat is meaningful.

Have a great day everyone.

TTFN.

[ellyphant]

Good afternoon!

It's so warm here today (60's). Drained the outside hoses and put those in garage along with rolling trash bin. Discovered a dead rat in garage...will leave that for DH to deal with. At least our poison is working. No small children or pets to worry about here.

Tomorrow will be warm too. Maybe I'll do some outdoor painting that I had given up on due to cold weather.

What a difference a year makes...so thankful to be settled in here, with new church, new friends, and only one house to keep up with! DD is settled into her job in another state and working on her master's degree. DS and DDIL have jobs in yet another state and are enjoying their first year of marriage. It's a meaningful Monday, indeed!

[BookSaver]

Scattered ~ A meandering route some time ago led me from 1920s-30s-40s clothing fashions to the work the British Ministry of Food did with food rationing after WWI and through WWII to make sure everyone in their country would get enough food. People in England ended up being more healthy after WWII than they were before, due to the government efforts for education/ food distribution/ trying to make sure everyone had a fair chance at getting the good stuff.

I watched online an episode of a food show from a few years ago where the 2 hosts ate exclusively menues and cooking methods from WWII rations for 1 week. After just 1 week, their doctor said they showed improvement in overall health.

I bought a book called "Eating for Victory" which is reprints of some of the pamphlets from the time, and found it really interesting. Unfortunately, the book doesn't have an index or page numbers. That's the first part of my project, to create my own index and make the book more user friendly.

I also found a free version of a 1940s American cookbook.

So I'm researching the basic ideas of what made WWII food rationing successful in terms of increased healthfulness, in spite of the hardships of the time.

I've been reading the H&F threads here which have a lot of good info. Over the past 20 years I've collected cooking references for whole grain, low fat, etc. The book that just arrived in the mail is for more vegetarian meal options.

The combination of resources should help me update some of the old 1940s recipes to include the good research that has been done since then.

It's just a general, overall, let's-cut-out-some-of-the-bad-stuff project. Some of the recipes in the old pamphlets look awful and not worth trying, but most look good.

[Nancy]

Meaningful Monday started out with an announcement the Duke and Dutches & Windsor are expecting! Making today meaningful for me I wrote in my journal last night, freeing up a bit of time this morning, kissed h. before he left for work, worked on a project doing my prayer time, made a call to get meds. Rx refill for 24 hr. insulin so I'll live another month!

Called dson and that was great caught up on the family news from this weekend. H. & I did a drive to see the lights last night for our date night that is fun and some thing we do each year we did it earlier this year than some years glad we enjoyed the warmer temps. doing that.

Did some dumpster diving list night after dark for pumpkins & squash where dson works we had permission from the boss there. This added a bit of spice and excitement to our lives as we were "busted" glad we had permission! LOL!

Yesterday I did not even turn on the p/c was not feeling up to much.
Watched my team win a football game! Yea!
H. cleaned the gutters in the afternoon and I raked up that last of the leaves into piles for mulch. We did a store run and I found a cherry cheese cake so are good for pies for h. potlucks etc.