Solstice Sunday

[Twins' Mom]

Glad that Elizabeth is joining in the Dance of Joy!

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

We have 8 hours and 42 minutes of daylight today. No sun at all so very thankful we got the sunset photo yesterday!

The day has gone like clockwork. Out of the garage at 9:13 (3 minutes late) and arrived at church at 9:44 (4 minutes late but it was the other church, 5 minutes farther down the road.) No pre-service singing today because it was lessons & carols and more than enough singing.

Delivered all but 2 of the Christmas cards by the end of service. We were gowned and processed, something we never do, so that was fun for a change. Anthem went well despite dh and I only practicing it on our own in the car (I had a youtube recording of it on my phone which I played through the car speakers.) Service was very good. The youth were leading it and it was extraordinarily well organized so went very, very, smoothly. The sanctuary wasn't full but wasn't its normal almost empty either which was also nice.

We had coffee hour after (that church seldom does coffee hour) and then beat it over to our church to set up for the 24th. There were 4 adults and 3 kids and that went very smoothly as well. The minister peeked in later and said it looked perfect.

Then we delivered the last of the cards in the village, and drove by the old house. They've trimmed one tree dramatically - possibly an improvement, and taken out a maple, which is probably a bad move. I know they were thinking it didn't belong with the two fir trees but they are not long for this world (possibly 5 more years) and when they are removed because they are too huge or dead, the maple would have grown up enough to fill in the spot. Now it will just be barren. Oh well, their house, their rules. We took out 4 trees in the first year after we bought it and another 7 came down in the years after (lightening and ice storms mainly), although we also planted 4 trees.

From there it was to lunch, then my service. We were late starting and had to change all the hymns because the Christmas book I used was not in the cupboard where it belonged. They found them but I had already changed the music again so we gave up and used the regular book and will use that book on Christmas Day.

We left there at 3 on the nose. Next errand was Costco to return the humidifier and pick up bacon. Huge lineups to get in, to get out, and for returns. But fully staffed and running really efficiently. We were in and out in less than 15 minutes (although we were efficient as well, with dh dropping me at the door and parking several lots over, then he went for the bacon but had to wait for me because his card wasn't in his wallet. Every cash was open so we just walked up, paid, and left. In the 10 minutes we were there, the lineup to leave dissipated so it was quick for us.

We are home almost an hour earlier than I expected. I might get a nap too!

We are off again after 5 for a quick dinner at McD and then downtown. At least one other person will be doing the fitbit club 'view the lights' walk with me.

[lucylee]

I wish I could join the dance for joy, but I just don't have the energy.
We had a wonderful time in Nashville, but my coughing and stomach upset still bothers me, and on the way home I added a sore throat and general body aches to the mix and I'm just tired and grumpy today.
No fever, still, so I continue to procrastinate re calling the doctor.

Dgs here now.

[helia]

I'll join the dance of joy! I am sitting in my living room in front of a fire with my 3 kids and dh with 2 dogs lounging at my feet. Yes, Maia is actually lounging for the time being. LOL!

Dd16 just got back from seeing The Hobbit 3, so there's a lot of analysis and hashing things out going on here. Dd16 isn't sure how she feels about the movie. She and her friends were flummoxed by a lot of plot holes/non sequiturs. Dialog was, um, not the strongest point of the film. Minor proud mom moment: Dd16 was rather irritated by the female elf character needing to be rescued. --Ah, that's my girl, looking to the strong female characters. Spoiler alert: Um, my proud moment was slightly deflated by that fact that she then said the storyline would have been better if the female elf character had been killed. I kind of agree with her on that one, though. Dd16 is known for killing off a lot of characters in her stories.

S, R, and baby J will be here in about 25 minutes. We're going to delay our Cmas with them until after the holidays.

[Elizabeth]

Hello again! Here is my progress:

get two cats vaccinated - DONE!
treat myself to lunch out - DONE!
jewelry store - DONE! (And this is the last of the Christmas shopping!
library book return
grocery store
dollar store for Christmas cards
Bible study
feed my car (added)
webwork

Got a phone call from a friend that complicates my life. She is a recent widow and is getting groups of friends to join her on social occasions to keep herself around people and not moping. A very good idea in my opinion. She and I and a male friend of hers and her late husband's ate together for Thanksgiving lunch and had a really good time. One thing I liked was that none of us were 'in the market' for a relationship. I was envisioning us all as a fun group of friends. He is not so 'off the market' as he described himself and is attracted to me. I really was looking for buddies. <SIGH>

[FelineFriend]

Didn't turn on the computer until 5:25 p.m. The weather report was changed, so had a dry day with no wind. Have been writing letters, sorting scraps, and doing LOL one load after the other. Need to write DH's list for Costco, won't put a lot of food on the list, b/c will be doing the colonoscopy prep in 1 or 2 weeks from now.

This is just a quick C. I. as I have more scraps to sort/launder/iron/measure/cut and a letter to write and I might write my good quilting friend again, too, to keep her abreast of how nicely everything's going.

Have a good week, Everybody! Not much time to CUOP this week.

[Nancy]

My neck was out today not a fun time. But I did get a nice but windy walk in. Made cookies for h's lunches. Took an asprin and napped. Then watched a chior from Norway. Did some knitting.
That was rela ing and helped. Refilled the hens water buckets. Game time now. I have a plan for dinner.

Dgson had fun yesterdau with us. Dsgson has moved back in with sil & dd they are happy.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Had a wonderful walk around downtown Ottawa. And met two people who dh and I hit it off with immediately. These are two individuals from the fitbit club. None of us had met the others (except dh and I, obviously) and yet we had lots in common. They are both world travelers and have visited many places we've visited. And one of them lives so close, we literally walk past her house each time we walk to the store!

The lights were lovely.

So we had a really fun evening. I'm on a real high. Plus I'm at 15K steps for the day now and ready to go out again tonight! When I got home I spent a bit of time on the treadmill while I loaded the pictures onto facebook. Not to go far, just to keep moving a bit so I didn't stiffen up too much.


Here's a link to pictures from tonight and the summer/fall/winter sunset compilation shot dh put together yesterday.

http://shesorganized.org/phpbb/viewtopi ... 28#p117228

[CathyS]

Hi everyone!

Confession time... I had a clean laundry mountain in my bedroom. It was on top of the cedar chest that is between the bedroom door and the closet door. There is a landscape type of painting that fits nicely between the 2 doors. The mountain was hiding the bottom of the frame. I have decided that I will take that entire mountain to the marvelous laundrymat that has double size washers and dryers and just do it all over again. 30 minutes for the washers and 60 minutes in the dryers and it all gets nicely folded for the very short drive home.

Wayne and I went to Niagara Falls for breakfast at a buffet place that we see every time we go there to a really good grocery store. It's got a lot of produce and meat, but almost nothing else. The pork chops are almost 2 inches thick and they are awesome. The produce is mostly in the large wooden crates that the store uses on it's own farms. Nice little place and completely hidden in an out of the way corner of the city. So we got a massive ham and Wayne cooked that for dinner tonight.

I plugged in the 2 new light fixtures and moved a large floor lamp out of the bedroom and into the spare room. All the fixtures here only fit one bulb. Awful lighting in every room.

Suitcases came out today and they are getting filled up. Interesting travelling with only 2 carry on sized bags. Wayne is taking 1 swimsuit, 1 pair of shorts, a couple of t shirts, 2 dress shirts (solid colours) and some socks and underwear and that's it. He will wear jeans on the plane both ways.

Trying to stay up for another hour.

[Norma]

Lucylee! Here I am tapping my foot! Who was it that always said that? Harriet?

Do you think that you could have acid reflux? This is what it sounds like to me - coughing, stomach upset but no fever. Please go find out. That is nothing to mess around with!