look who came to visit!

spooky~fun!

jerry's daughter and her family carved this cool dude free~hand, using no pattern. they had a blast, and so did we just looking at him! very cool, very creative, very fun.

a quick recap...

so mom came to visit this past monday and help me get some more preparations for the wedding completed. she's finished six corsages, seven boutonnieres, nine centerpieces, one small broom, two large cinnamon brooms, my bouquet, and forty bows. we plan to also do four more centerpieces, three more large brooms, and four more small ones tomorrow. then my brother and father are coming over from arkansas on sunday and will be on hand to help out too.

this past monday, i also went to the first discussion of Between the Pages book club. we had read "guernsey literary and potato peel pie society" for this month. next month, we'll read "the secret lives of bees", which i found last month on bookmooch.com. yea! yea for me! then in december, we will read john grisham's "skipping christmas". i think we've decided on something for january, but i cannot remember off hand which title it is.






tuesday evening, mom and i began to assemble the centerpieces, and jerry spent some time with his grandkids. he read some stories to them, including "it happened on mulberry street"; we could tell by the gleeful recitation of the key line! they had great fun.








wednesday morning, jerry's mom came back home from the hospital. she was really wanting to be back in familiar surroundings and the doc felt that it would be better for her to not be in the hospital any longer. she is doing so much better now, and altho she still requires lots of rest and should not be taxed by things beyond her control, she continues to improve every day. i'm glad of that, esp since she gave us all a scare!

also wednesday morning, one of jerry's best friends from childhood came to visit for a couple days. he is officiating at our wedding, and it was great fun to take him around and show him the lake and the farm and the town and all. he grew up here, but hasn't had any reason to spend much time in the area for awhile. so he was amazed at all the changes! that evening, we fired up the brazier and spent a few hours sitting around it, chatting and laughing and catching up. it was a great night, relaxing.

thursday, he took my mom and i out for lunch at a local mexican restaurant that has a buffet. i tried my first churros and they are just as good as i've heard they would be. he plans to come up again in the next week, for the wedding.

today, mom and i went to tupelo. on our list of things to do was stopping at hobby lobby for more of the fixings for the centerpieces and such. then we went for a wonderful lunch at red lobster {mom surprised me with a birthday lunch, since she won't be here on my birthday next month}. then i had my hair cut. it's now a bit of a chin~length bob, very cute and yet long enough to allow me to be appropriate for the wedding.

so, things are rolling right along, very nicely! this coming tuesday, jerry's other best friend from childhood {who is his best man} will be coming in from wisconsin with his wife. wednesday afternoon, jerry's daughter flies in from portland. i think his son and his wife are coming up from the coast either monday or tuesday. and the preacher will be coming in thursday or friday.

all set for saturday's wedding!!

cool cloudy day, nappage!

my jerry's mama is doing lots better, and then not so good, and then some better and then not too good. she moved from icu to a private room yesterday and seemed so much better when i'd stopped to see her in the afternoon than in the morning, that i felt much better about her prognosis. she needs lots of rest, at this point. so when we were visiting yesterday afternoon, i kept my voice low and any news positive and we just chit~chatted for awhile. it was nice!

my own sleep patterns were messed up, so today i spent much of the day, snuggled with a good book, reading and napping. the lil doggies were huddled up against my upper thighs, butt, and lower back. pearl was under the covers and shaking and shivering as she does when she is deeply terrified of storms. harley was above the covers with his nose so far up his butt, he resembled a warped view of the snake eating his own tail, ya know, only his butt was eating his head {snicker~~poor dude, i pick on him soOOoo much; gotta love the lil horn~dog}.

i didn't venture out of my jammies, let alone get in the car and drive in to visit jerry's mama, today. he did, and had said that she is hurting some, and needs more sleep. so maybe tomorrow, after our running around and moving things {he's borrowing his boss's truck}, but before we head out for dinner; we'll stop and see her for a bit. i don't want to visit too much, cuz she needs her rest, but i know that she likes company too. so it'll be a fine balance.

k, off to get all cozy in my chair with crochet and the tv remote...winks

warm wishes for happy healing

my jerry's mom moved to an assisted living home last year. she likes it and i'm glad to know that. since she is just down the road, jerry can stop to see her a couple times a week on his way home from work. sometimes i pop in, sometimes not. usually i do, but when my folks and i were busy cleaning/painting/flooring, i didn't~i'd just send messages with jerry.

sometimes i take her to doctor's appointments and such. she's not been feeling wonderfully well for quite some time. there isn't any one thing majorly wrong with her health, it's a bunch of things that affect her in various ways. so some days she's feeling fine and can enjoy movies, telephoning her friends, visiting with other residents while they do crafts, and even getting her hair/nails done on site {there is a beautician's shop in the home, that's way cool}.

other times, she's not feeling so great. then she usually stays in her room, only venturing down the hall for meals. when she's not feeling good, it's hard for her to get comfortable and so once she is situated just right, she's reluctant to leave her comfy reclining chair.

last winter, she had pnuemonia. it never quite went away. several times this year, she's had to take a course of antibiotics, because the doctors felt that her lungs needed it. sometimes she has a hard time catching her breath, and sometimes will cough lots in an effort to breathe easier. she's been examined and treated several times and things get better but not completely so.

last night, she ran a high fever and went to the hospital. earlier today, she was admitted. her fever had broken, but they felt that the pnuemonia was settled in her left lung and they wanted to see if they can rid her of it. finally. so she's in the ICU now, and feeling sorta rough.

jerry's sister kept him updated thru~out the day and after he was able to leave work and all, he stopped by to see her for a bit. since the ICU has strict visiting times and rules, because the primary point is so that the patient can rest and not be disturbed, he was only able to spend a short amount of time with her. but he said that he felt reassured that she is receiving good care and that she is doing as well as can be expected, with a good prognosis for the next few days.

so we're hoping that before the week is out, she'll be back in her room at the home, and feeling tons better and able to enjoy her activities again. and for when she does get to read this: hugs and kisses, sweet carolyn!!

wedding update, day sixteen

and then my mind flipped and i lost my shit.

actually i haven't. that's just what this lil pic reminds me of. doesn't it say that to you?

a couple weeks ago, after my mom and brother left, jerry and i looked at what we'd done, what we'd to do, and make some decisions about what we would get done before the wedding as far as the house stuff goes. that really eased up some of my own stress cuz i decided not to do everything and to accept that i can do some stuff and certainly not all of it. so that helped with the de~stressing lots and lots.

next week, my folks arrive in the area from arkansas. they will be on hand to do all those last minute things that we want to do. and since they are coming in ten days or so prior to, that means that nothing will be ultra~rushed. at least, that's the theory.

the following week, jerry's best man {bill, and bill's wife deanna} will arrive from wisconsin. they'll stay with us and so this weekend, jerry and i are planning to move over my bed, bookshelves, and vanity {so that we can put the room together for them to use}. a day after that, jerry's daughter is flying in from oregon. she's been a HUGE help to us all year and i can't wait to see her again! she'll also be staying with us. and jerry's youngest son and his wife are coming up from mobile and staying with us. and the minister is staying with us too. that's a pretty full house!

so since jerry and i have basically done all we can do regarding the preparation plans and all for the wedding, we have been lots more calm about things in general. tomorrow i pick up jerry's suit's pants, newly altered and hemmed. my own dress goes in for pressing the week of. next week, we'll order the sugar lay~ons for the cake {his youngest is making our cake, and since we're going with a harvest/autumnal theme, our lay~ons are three different leaves in different colors}. the following week, we'll order the live/real flowers {roses in reds, oranges, and yellow...my jerry'd won a gift certificate from proflowers.com}. then several days before, we'll prepare/grill the chicken and hamburgers. the day before, i'll slice the tomatoes and onions, and prepare the lettuce and such for the hamburgers. hopefully, we can get into the building several days beforehand to decorate and assemble things {like the toast flutes, we plan to use white grape peach juice for the toasts}.

so just in case things get real busy and i don't say it then, let me say it now: i appreciate all you guys helping us out and pulling this all together for us! thanks for sharing in the celebration and being happy for us, that means so much! i've had so much fun planning this, and know that it will be a wonderful day. we're looking forward to seeing everyone and know that we thank you from the depths of our hearts!

don't hold yer breath

i'm a tad impatient right about now. sigh. and the thing is, i know that being impatient is not helping, in fact, a good case can be made that it's hurting. yup, hurting.

i'm relatively new to the whole eBay thing. my jerry does use it, so in the spring of the year, he showed me some stuff and we bought a few things for the wedding using the service. for many months, i just looked, and sometimes marked things to 'watch' so that i could show him those items. but when it came to actually ordering anything, i hesitated, and would say, 'you do it' cuz i knew that somehow i'd activate some chain reaction that would end up destroying our entire budget.

so the first time i ever bid on anything, i held my breath {very very ineffective, i know, but i did it none the less} and made sure that i put the decimal in the right place so that i didn't commit to a bid of one hundred dollars, instead of one, or even ten. so yeah, i was all excited when dude, i actually got the item!! yea!!! yea for me!!

that was two weeks ago and i'm still waiting for it to get here. every day, i start checking the mailbox at twelve~thirty, and nope, and then again around one~thirty. the mail definitely runs by two. so you'd think i'd be all, well, let's just wait til two~thirty to be on the safe side. but nope! instead, i walk to the end of the drive, dash across the road, hold my breath {cuz somehow that might make it actually happen...i think that comes from taking a deep breath, holding it to make the birthday wish, and then whooshing out the candles} and pry the lid on the mailbox down to peak inside and go oh. not today. sigh.

last week, i even went out and checked on sunday, cuz i was thinking, maybe i didn't check on saturday {yeah, sometimes i even believe my sillee self}. but today, i didn't even give it a shot. cuz today {well, yesterday now} was a postal holiday and tuesday's mail might even be backed up. so quite possibly, the package might not even arrive til...two weeks from now. sigh.

the past couple days, i've bid on a few things. i am proud of myself for exercising restraint and not losing my head to the thinking that "oh, well, what's another fifty cents?" and getting swept up in a bid~battle. there'd been an eight pound cone of cotton yarn/thread and a two pound cone and a one pound cone that someone outbid me on. since i didn't already have a specific use in mind, i'm not vested in gaining possession at this point.

i've never been the sort of person that gets into a skirmish over the last something or other at walmart or what not. it always amazes me when i see harried women doing that during the holidays. i cannot think of anything that is so vitally crucial to my health and well~being that is worth me snatching it up and gloating over.

but, dude, send me the stuff that you've already received payment for! do it, do it now! stomp.stomp.

where did the weekend go? oh, yeah...!

dude! i suggested to jerry that maybe he might want to invite his eldest daughter and her family over for MSU's homecoming game, since it was televised and both his son~in~law and his grandson like football too. then i slept thru the first half of the game. sigh. i don't usually like to sleep when company's here.

but i made it out of the bedroom at half~time and sat at the smaller kitchen table and watched his granddaughter draw and listened to her explain to me what sounds animals make, and how they look, and what they do. {i now know where chicken comes from: turkeys!!} then she decided to gather together some stuff and make a band; very creative, a bucket was a drum, and so was a swiffer {she'd hold one end of the head down with her foot and lift it up with the handle and the other end of the head would thump~thump on the floor} and a fork on a wire rack completed things. she gave my shaddow some treats {and let her lick the barbeque sauce of her hands, it tickles}.

then after the game, and his daughter's family left, we drove over to winona {about an hour} and met up with his best childhood friend, who is now a truck~driver and had a delivery in the area. since he now lives in wisconsin, i've not met him before, so it was really cool. we had a good visit and i'm glad that we will be seeing him again in a few weeks. even tho he says he brings rain with him.

at least i'll know who to blame if we have to move the ceremony indoors!

house update

my jerry hung two door and the moulding around them today, we decided to leave the third off til after i move over my things, that way we won't be needing that extra inch or two. he also repaired the leg/foot of a large rectangle table that had been his late wife' parents', which they'd brought back from germany when her father had been stationed there back in the early sixties. i'm not sure how long it had been sitting in pieces, but it's been repaired and placed and it's looking good!

i sorted thru most of the linen and made up the beds in two of the guest rooms, so they are ready for the wedding guests {one will be for jerry's daughter, and one is for the minister}. i want to wait til closer to the time to do up the room for his son and his son's wife {that is one of the two rooms we haven't been able to get to just yet~~and at this point, i think we plan to wait til after the wedding, no point stressing about it right this minute, now is there?}. i also was able to store some of the extra linens for each of those two rooms' beds in the armours in each of those two rooms {one is a double/full size {jerry's grandparents left that to him} and one is queen sized}.

then i stored the rest of the comforters and quilts. jerry's late wife made some lovely quilts, so i've made up the beds with them, but i can't use all the quilts at once. so some of them are in sealed plastic bins so that they are nicely preserved and safe for future usage. when i went thru the linens in the spring of this year, i'd gotten rid of some sheets that we couldn't use, and some comforters and blankets that we couldn't use. but i made sure to save the quilts because either jerry's late wife, her mother, or other women in the family {jerry's grandmothers on both sides} made them and they are to be treasured for a long time to come. there are a few that need an inch or two of stitching for repair purposes, and that sounds like a winter project; along with unpacking and placing all the keep~sakes we've been storing in one room since spring.

once that room is empty, it can be cleaned/painted and then we will use it for the toys and books and things that would be good for the grandchildren to have. in the past, they had the wide long hall in the addition to play in, it was just loaded with toys. we went thru all the toys in the spring of the year, and got rid of some with broken parts, missing parts, etc. then we set some aside that i'd bleached for very young ones. we put the other toys up in the other guest room that we've not yet cleaned/painted. basically, cuz we had no room to go with any of them.

so next spring, that toy room will be ready and those toys will go in there. my jerry and i talked about buying some children's books for various age groups, because his oldest grandson is ten years now, and they go all the way down in age to his youngest grandon at age ten months. we both love to read and we want to encourage the kids to do so too!

so that's pretty much where things are!

whoa, dude...

i just stumbledupon this, which actually was on a site and then quoted from another:

I grew up in a college town, and one Halloween our doorbell rang and we opened the door expecting to see trickortreater—but what was in front of our open door—was another door! Like, a full-on wooden door, that had a sign that said “Please knock.” So we did, and the door swung open to reveal a bunch of college dudes dressed as really old grandmothers, curlers in their hair, etc, who proceeded to coo over our “costumes” and tell us we were “such cute trick or treaters!” One even pinched my cheek. Then THEY gave US candy, closed their door, picked it up and walked to the next house.

— np312 on MetaFilter

how utterly cool would that be, eh?

{oh, and it turns out there are hundreds of thousands versions of this same story floating around in the tubes of the internets; but it all comes down to this dudette...np312, check it!}

sometimes ya feel like a nut...

last night, i draped the hooded cape on my jerry once again, or actually five times. cuz i wasn't sure how best to proceed. jerry is such a great sport, letting me turn him around, poking and pulling as i tried first one idea, then another. it takes a confident, comfortable man who is secure in his own masculinity to be ok with modeling a child's {a lil girl's} garment.

we had a fine discussion, tossing ideas about, in order for me to try to figure out where this child's knee~length would be, if she and my jerry's heads were on the same level. cuz we both had been a bit goofy, we were giggling over the pseudo~serious theorizing that if one's proportions where this and taken into account that, and if this condition were met, then what is the length of that. we were really poking fun at ourselves while trying to also come up with some sort of reasonable guesstimate. cuz dude, it'd be way too easy to ask the mother of said lil girl to just measure from head to knee and let us know. way way too easy and that'd make way too much sense; ya like get all logical on my ass, why doncha?

so we determined that if the lil girl's head was level with my jerry's, then she could quite easily knee him in the groin. after we snickered with each other over the whole infantile process of us arriving at that conclusion, i piped up, "nut~length is it," and then added, "i'm so gonna blog about this" with all the solemnity i could muster at the moment.

on a totally unrelated matter...i had a freshly made fig~preserve muffin {made with home~made fig preserves} today and omg, if i could have rolled around in its sinful moistness, i would have. it was divine. simple fine. i love, Love, LOVE the "lil building cafe" here in starkville, miss'ippi. if you have a chance to stop by, please do so, sigh. you'll love it, too!

lil red

my jerry's middle daughter moved to portland, oregon about a month ago. prior to that, she and her husband had stayed with us for a week, so we did get a chance to visit some. one of the things we did was make hats.

i'd been crocheting a few hats for them, prior to their visit. some were very funky, some had earflaps, some had bills, some were extremely warm, and some were more conventional. while they were here, they'd asked if i would teach them how to make one in particular called a Jeep Cap {it goes by various names, but it generally is close fitting with a short visor/bill}. neither knew how to crochet, but both are creative and since the cap was comprised of rather basic stitches mixed with mathematical principles applied, well, i was fairly certain this was doable.

and it probably would have been, had we not decided two days before their departure to attempt this. his daughter actually caught on very quickly but her husband encountered a few difficulties right off, which is understandable...what with all the stuff there is that is unfamiliar to a newbie {things like yarn tension, how to hold it, how to hold the hook, how to make the beginning half hitch, the steps to a chain, a slip stitch, and then single crochet, working in the round, increasing, and so on}. so i did some thinking and decided to show them how to use the knifty knitter's round looms.

they're simple to learn the basics on, easy to use. and after you become comfortable with them, you can create all sorts of interesting wraps, stitches, textures, techniques, and from all that, the possibilities are endless. or seemingly so. you can find a set of four round looms at walmart for about twelve bucks, and need no prior knowledge of any special skills. they're portable, and make the ideal craft to do while your traveling for a couple thousand miles.

so, they each made their own funky hats. he chose a style with a brim, more snug than hers. she chose to go with a roll up brim, and made hers longer so it was a bit more floppy. the cool thing is that it is entirely up to you, be as creative as you want, and wear your own thing.

after they got somewhat settled in oregon, i sent a box with three hats in there. each was unique in style, tho all were of the same yarn. one was a simple roll up rim, with some added length but not too much. another was actually three layers of brims, harder to explain, sorta like the taller hats that you might picture as russian. and the other was an oversized news boy cap, that sorta looks like an old fashioned hunting cap. they were meant more for warmth than the other ones i'd made. i'd sent them for the entire household, to pick and choose.

then my jerry's daughter let me know that they were much appreciated by the household, including the roomies. she'd asked if i might be able to make a lil red riding hood type cape for their lil girl, who just turned five. sure i can! i haven't before and there are not easily obtained patterns that fit the bill, but! i decided to give it a whirl and i've made some real progress on it.

now i need to make a few adjustments, so that might mean ripping out a row or two, as i think i can make it a bit better. it's a trick to try making things for kids, esp if you don't have them right with you to try it on as you go. kids have different proportions than adults do, and each child seems to grow at different rates, at different times. this lil girl is big for her age, but i don't want to make it too large, cuz i don't want it to swamp her in folds.

so i'll take pix, when it is finished and maybe i can get my best lil friend to model it. she's five too, tho she isn't quite as tall as the lil girl this is meant for, she is large for her age too. and if not, i'll just drape it on jerry and take a pic {wink}!

tho he'd be better suited to the big bad wolf role. snicker.

don't forget the floors

time is taffy, especially of late. in some ways, i feel that things have moved very very slowly, just dragging on and on. and yet, in other ways, i feel that so much has zipped right along, at a fast pace. and the truth is, time moves at the same rate. or so i assume, not being a student of such units and matters, i can never be absolutely certain of these matters.

so i've been chipping away at the task at hand, which is to set things to rights and find homes for everything that has been stored in various rooms for the past six months or so. my jerry and i were up late last night, moving furniture around. then this afternoon, i continued to move what could be moved and try this here, well maybe it'd be better there, nooooooooooo, back to here. aha! how about over there?

it may take a bit on the front end, but then, once a home is found for pieces and parts, then that's where they stay. i don't feel a great urge to rearrange on a whim, or with the changing seasons, or what not. sometimes, i'll move things temporarily, rearranging them to accommodate a larger crowd {which since jerry has five adult children with spouses and four with children, a larger crowd happens more often than not~~so i'm taking that into account and attempting to find places for things so that we don't need to majorly rearrange every other month or at least several times per year}. just put things where they will best be used, found, fit, etc.

so for the time being, my jerry and i decided to leave the computer desk in the current location which is the breakfast nook, rather than relocating it to the study. so because it is here, what had been going to go here must go elsewhere. and so on and so on and so forth.

things won't be exactly as we'd have them by the time of the wedding, but much further than they had been. and every step forward makes everything *click* into place. which makes us more comfortable and is soothing to the soul. hope your autumn is off to a good start as well!

my jerry & me

i thought it would be very appropriate to post this pic, which is probably the one we'll run in the paper to announce our wedding, in four weeks. my brother took this pic and a buncha others, when he and mom were here last week to paint and lay floor in three rooms. tomorrow, jerry and i begin to move things into those rooms and i'm very excited, but also sorta nervous. i don't want to do anything that will mess up the tile or the walls. i know i'll feel lots better after some of the stuff that's been sitting in the dining area for the last six months in moved and we can start to unpack one room that has been filled with keepsakes since spring.

the dress is one that i'd gotten at this past may's moondance. it's quite lovely and comfortable. in the past few weeks, i've actually gained quite a bit of weight, and that has been extremely upsetting for me, as i know weigh the most since my jerry has known me.

all the foundation garments in the world won't help if they don't fit, now will they? arghen farghen, blast my weak will and inability to control my insatiable appetite {and no, i'm not pregnant}. i'm sure it'll be fine, The Dress will fit and all that. but at the moment, i'm none too pleased with myself.

sigh.

date day

because my jerry and i have been extremely busy of late, because money has been a bit tight, because we won't have lots of opportunity in the next month, because we haven't be alone, and because we're worth doing this; earlier in the week, we decided that today would be date day. we both slept in some, i more than he {naturally}. we got up and around and decided to go to town, stop at the bank, drop off some items at the palmer home thrift store, and go to a favorite place of ours for a leisurely lunch before heading to the movies.

Scheherazade's is a small middle eastern eatery near the college and a special place we like to go for a cup of tasty coffee, or hot sweet mint tea, or a shawarma pita, or kabobs, or a small feta pizza, or or or... a new family has taken over ownership {the old owners were getting burnt out, that happens in small business, where the owner is the manager and the chef and the bottlewasher and and and...}. provided the women are left to run, serve, and such, the place will do just fine. they were very nice, considerate, approachable, and we had the best time chatted with the new owner and her daughters as well as her visiting father. i wish them all the good fortune in the world, and i'm sure they will do just fine; provided the man of the family steers clear and allows his wife to actually do what she is doing without his heavy~handed interference.

the mood darkened as soon as he came in to the building and began throwing his weight around, brow~beating the working women, and adding to their workload. the mood lightened up immediately after he left. we all breathed a collective sigh of relief when his absence was palpably felt. whew.

my jerry and i engaged in a wonderfully informative conversation with the ladies there, the new owner and her daughters. she has seven children, the eldest will turn 18 in a few weeks and the youngest is just now three. today was the third day of them taking over the restaurant and her parents have come down from the nashville area to watch over the smallest children so that she and her older children can smooth the transition from old owner to new. her father came in, after her asinine husband took his presence elsewhere and blessed us all with his absence, and took a few pictures of his lovely granddaughters who doted on him the entire time he was there. jerry and i spoke with him for quite some time, eventually inviting him to sit with us so that we could continue a wonderfully delightful conversation.

by the time we left, all the negativity that amassed with the presence of her husband had dissipated and all of us were laughing, smiling, and feeling lots more light~hearted. we've every intention of returning, they're very pleasant and the atmosphere they created was just what my jerry and i needed and wanted for today. we highly recommend them for a unique experience!

after stopping by walgreens, we motored on down to the movies. my jerry expressed an interest in zombieland, and i was not averse, so we settled back to enjoy woody harrelson, with a cameo by bill murray. it was corny, but you'd expect that, right? and there were a few very funny moments, quips, and situations.

after that, we headed to walmart to get some needed groceries, and a few other items. among those items was a much~considered brazier. our fire~pit is very similar to this one pictured, without the additional six inch rim. the rest of it is identical to what you see here. the cost for the one online that i just viewed was four hundred and sixty dollars. *gasp* we bought ours right here in starkville, miss'ippi for about a tenth of that! ours cost forty~eight dollars.

hah~UUUUUge difference in dollars.

same difference in enjoyment!

after my jerry and i unloaded the car, and put away all the groceries, we assembled the fire~pit and set it up in the front yard. then we set a nice fire in there while the sun set and spent the evening on the wooden swing under the oak tree and chatted while watching the flames leaping and dancing and the dogs basically doing their own leap~dance. it was a great way to finish the wonderful day!

it's here, october

here it is, the last month i use my maiden name. my jerry and i are to be wed the last day of this month. we've chosen harvest and autumnal themes for our wedding for several reasons, not the least of which is because neither of us are spring chickens and jerry has vowed to share the "autumn of his life, bright and vibrant" with me. both of us are fond of this time of year, the heat of the summer is past, the cool pleasant days are comfortable with cooler nights. there is just such a sense of relaxation and a calmness, a contentness that seems to be implicit in the progression of fall.

earlier this evening, i was reviewing The Spreadsheet. we know who is coming, and who is not {there are many folks who send their warm wishes but are unable to attend~including most of my friends from out of state}. we know who is bringing what {most folks actually like the idea of bringing food to share in lieu of traditional gifts, and since i've been rambling on about the wedding to complete strangers as i get things ready for the wedding, i've been getting lots of feedback~~some folks are at first surprised by the idea, but then really like it}. and we know who is staying where.

the vast majority of the folks live locally, so accomadations aren't even an issue. in the continuing spirit to keep the cost down for our guests {cuz really, what dish could you possibly bring that would cost more than what you'd spend on a wedding gift?}, we wanted to prepare as many guest rooms as possible so that we would be able to have folks stay with us, if they wanted to. our preacher and two of jerry's kids and his best man will be staying here with us, and we do have three of the rooms finished due to mom and mic's visit. the one guest room that is yet untouched will still be used, there is a bed in there, it's just a bit cluttered. but his son doesn't mind and has assured us that it will be fine, so that's alright then.

my folks will be staying at the lake, site of the wedding/party, in their RV. that's probably where i will dress and prepare for the ceremony. now, all the details are being planned and reviewed and taken care of.

one of my oldest friends {we've known each other since we were ten} is traveling down from ohio with her husband and most likely staying in a nearby hotel. in an odd twist of fate, their bestman is now wedding this month in florida, so they've two weddings to attend in the South this month {i too was in their wedding, some fifteen years ago}. we won't have scads of time to visit, as they will be arriving late friday night and then leaving early sunday morning. but it will be great to see them and i appreciate them coming this distance to be with me on a very special day, to help celebrate with us.

it's all coming together quite nicely!

"mrs lincoln" has arrived!

there are three bookclubs that i've recently joined, one i helped form, which is superkewl to be on the ground level of that one and with it since the beginning, right? yeup! one group is reading the 2009 title "mrs. lincoln: a life" by catherine clinton. it took me a little while to get it, cuz it's new and only avail in hardback. our local public library doesn't have it on the shelf yet {they have it, they are still doing the cataloging of it to put it out there for the public} and there are already holds on it!

so i half.com'd it. and it arrived yesterday. in preparation for it's coming in {and because it can be anywhere for same~day shipping to three weeks later they might put it in the mail}, i read up on the author and also some of the folks that wrote reviews for it {which interestingly are all associated with the author, one was even her major prof when she was earning her PhD}. and i read up some on mary lincoln {who never really used the often bandied about "mary todd lincoln"}; so that i could get a better picture of what is already out there and just what does this particular title add to the general knowledge of its subject area.

so the book came in the mail yesterday and i'm ready to get started! wahoo! after i check the mail and reinforce the last floor that was laid this past week. wahoo!

cuz imma goober

last night, i wrote a very long eMail that covered lots of updates {subject line read: all the tids and bits you can sprinkle on yer salat} and then, i got to reading wiki's entries on Richard Dawkins. i had heard of him, but wasn't really able to pin down what it was i'd heard about him. and the reason i'd even wanted to know was cuz i recently joined three bookclubs. one is newly formed and meets on campus and our book of the month is "guernsey literary and potato peel pie society" by mary ann sheffer. one is an interactive online group that is basically eMailed reviews to/for the local paper and our book for this month is "mrs. lincoln: a life". and the other is BookTalk, which has been around for a few years and bills itself as {*ahem*} "a free online reading group and book discussion forum for discussing quality fiction and nonfiction books".

the BookTalk nonfiction title for the last two months was richard dawkin's the selfish gene, which is the prequel to the book for the next two months, which is richard dawkin's the extended phenotype. so my jerry brought home MSU's copy of the selfish gene yesterday and i didn't even get into the foreward before i was taking notes of things i needed to look up. then i read the preface and was all like, "dudes, the theories!" and i was sorta feeling like i was back in grad school again.

so i started wiki'ing richard dawkins and the clicking on other links in the article so that i could read up on those things about dawkins, his theories, the people, organizations, etc. so i only got halfway thru the main richard dawkins entry before i realized that somehow i ended up way off course and was reading up on minerva, the goddess similar to athena. i'm not exactly sure how i got there, and how she relates to richard dawkins, but i am sure it was thru the clickable links that trailed away from him to her.

then i realized along and about then that it was about 3:30am and so i toddled off to bed, slightly chilled {it was our first night below fifty degrees} and then woke up an hour and a half later, sweated thru. so got up and took a shower and got all nice and squeaky clean. spent a few minutes with my jerry before he zoomed off to work, and woke my mom up so she can begin her trip back to arkansas.

cuz i'm a goober, i will end up paying for last night's late excursion into the depths of dawkins. i figure along about ten this morning, i'll hit a major slump and start to wind down like one of those figures on that one depression commercial. but! before then, i'm hoping to get to the library and back again. then slump away. cuz it'd be better to slump here at home than in the car at traffic light number six.

i'm just saying.

*ahem* since i have the podium...

this week is Banned Book Week, which is not celebrating "oh yea! let's ban a book!" but which is drawing attention to the fact that there are ijits attempting to ban books, based on their opinions of what is right or wrong or offensive or whatnot. i find the concept of banning books to be similar to the concept of attempting to legislate morality. if god wanted folks to have freedom of will, so that man would choose to do the right thing instead of being made to do the right thing; then surely that's good enough for man to observe in his own societal dealings.

the vast majority of americans do not read, however, it seems that the folks who do jump on the banned~book wagon are the very ones who hardly, if ever crack the spine of a book in the first place. if a book offends you, don't read it. and since most folks who get offended by what they think is in the book don't read, that doesn't seem to be too hard for them to handle.

in my own experience, i've found that reading a book, even if its author spouts opinions i don't agree with, is a fruitful exercise. it makes you think! even if what it makes you think is, "this author doesn't know what s/he is speaking about, cuz..." at least the reading the book made you think. so read. read anything and everything, cuz reading makes you think.

otherwise, you'ren't doing it right. and it's all just words. but even that would be time well~spent versus some of the other fruitless activities you could be doing, like not thinking and just doing something cuz someone told you to. read, think, choose.

free will.

mah boooooooooooooook

i'm really excited about this book, for several reasons. i learned how to crochet when i was about seven, or maybe six {i say that cuz i remember stuff by where i lived, but that memory of my first lesson was actually not where i lived, but where my mom's best friend lived...and she lived there my entire childhood, tho i do remember approximately i was seven or younger, cuz my grandmother died when i was only seven by a month, and i remember that i proudly showed grandma that i could do what she does toOOooo}. over the years, i would crochet on and off, but it wasn't something that i spent scads of time doing.

then about two years ago, my mom was telling me about a group that she belonged to {a homemaker's group, i think} making hats for heads, caps for kids, knitting for noggins...they'd pledged to make hats for kids at the children's hospital in lil rock, arkansas {mom lives in arkansas}. so i was gonna make some hats and give them to her to give to the group to give to the hospital. i never did learn to knit, altho that had been the point of that long~ago lesson {they were gonna show me how to crochet, but i didn't know how to hold the yarn and kept using my fingers to throw the yarn over the crochet hook instead of picking it up with the hook...so mom's friend thought it looked like i was trying to knit...so she was all for showing me how to knit, but i think the fact that there are two knitting needles versus one crochet hook meant twice as much likelihood that my fingers would get tangled up}. so to do the hats, i'd need to crochet.

so i looked up all kinds of patterns online, for free crochet patterns for hats, beginner's level. so then i came up against another challenge right away...reading friggen patterns. sigh. cuz everyone out there thinks they have a great pattern, but if the reader doesn't know the language and terms and how you are communicating, then that great pattern is indecipherable and not so great after all. for instance, when someone uses the word "turn", they may assume that you, the reader, know that they mean "flip the work over to the other side and continue working". yet "turn" could mean "turn the work around and around, as tho you are working in a circle".

so reading patterns was a challenge cuz not everyone uses the same terms to mean the same concepts. i started to find that there were certain groups and organizations which offered patterns or linked to patterns that used the same language to mean the same things. and i learned what to look for to tell whether "treble stitch" meant the americanized treble or the united kingdom's "treble" {which in america would be considered the double crochet stitch}.

and i started to trust that i could not only learn the anatomy of a stitch, enough to be able to read the pattern, and intuitively get the concept the writer was conveying, and then execute it accordingly. and i started to learn how mathematic principles can be applied to various projects to create my own squares, rounds, hectagons, etc. i am learning that where you place the stitch doesn't always seem obvious and can yield very different drape and stetch to the same yarn and the same stitch.

for about a year, i spent every four or six weeks experimenting with various concepts. taking a pattern, breaking it down into elements, building them out exponentially, using various size hooks, then changing out yarns, then maybe inserting the hook into this place in the previous row's stitches instead of that place. and some things got ripped out right away, some things got abandoned, some of the turned out perfectly and were given as gifts.

which brings me to another point: most of the things i make are intended for a specific person, and i think good thoughts about that person as i am working on the item, intertwining all my warm wishes into the yarn, which becomes an afghan, a baby blanket, a hat, a scarf, leg/arm/wrist warmers, shawls, etc. the majority of the other things i make go to charities, whether they are the kids, or their parents, comforters for puppies and elderly injuried doggies at the shelter, or whatnot.

very seldom do i keep something, or make it for myself. last year, i was gonna do just that. i had been experimenting with yarn and stitches and hooks and had taught myself how to make the pieces to replicate the patterns that are traditionally thought of as quilt designs. like the double~wedding ring pattern. i bought the yarn, each color meant something special to me. and then my world exploded destructively.

and all that yarn, those plans, changed. and i've not yet made myself another other than a few hats or scarves/wraps. and it's time to think about making something this winter, for both jerry and myself, as a couple. so i might go on and make the double~wedding ring quilt~ghan after all!

{as a quick note, two years ago, one weekend, i taught myself to knit {continental, cuz it makes much more sense, being that i've been crocheting and so already hold my yarn with proper tension with my left hand}. i can see some benefits, sure. but i prefer crochet, and so that's what i usually do. i'm not a purist, so i can appreciate knitted garments and items and not get all snooty about them. and i've used knitting looms and taught others to use them too; altho there have been some folks that have said things like, oh that's not real knitting...hm, and using a stove isn't real cooking, cuz you should have used some flint, started a fire, and cooked over that...are you kidding me? seriously? what, are the knitting police gonna descend on me and confiscate my yarn and hooks? dudes, get a grip}

so yeah, the book. i'm excited for a few reasons, one of which is that the book is bound by spiral, so it opens and lies flat so that you can use it easily to refer to without trying to juggle it and a weight to hold the pages open and all that other stuff. i'm excited to be learning how to read graphs instead of written instructions. i'm excited cuz it not only uses and teaches basic stitches, but it builds on those to create more complex stitches. the book has explanations that allow you to learn the elements behind the project, so that you can take that and make it your own, cuz patterns are great, but sometimes you want to take this element, and that feature, and oh! hey this technique and oh! and that there stitch and wow, check this out!! something that is beautiful, or funky, or elegant, and uniquely yours.

there are other reasons i like the book, and am excited about delving into it! but right now, i've been listening to the comedian and the dogs and jerry and mic and now my meds are kicking in. i'll keep ya posted on my adventures into the Bible...later, dudes!

i decided to take a break from scrubbing bathrooms, and update my journal. this week, i've actually done very little. mostly, mom has been painting, and she finished three rooms in the addition. my brother, mic, has been laying out the subfloors and several other projects like repairing the internal lever so the shower in the guest bath actually works. now, i'm putting some of the finishing touches in some areas, like replacing the vent covers, switch plate covers, and outlet covers and hanging shower curtains and liners.

now i need to get the step~stool so i can reach the upper third of the walls and all in the bathroom in the addition. scrub the shower in there and then do the floor and i'm pretty much done in that bath, altho i do need to hang the liner in there, and find the rod for it {since we took out the sliding glass doors in the spring, they were broken and hanging off a derailed track that was beyond repair}.

in the other guest bath, i've not yet begun to clean the toilet, sink, or floor yet. eeek. sigh. i won't have to worry about any hair being painted onto the walls, in that bath. in the guest bath in the addition, mom has not painted it {there was no time at the moment, maybe next year} and whoever did it before painted lots of strands of hair right onto the wall. i tried to scrub at them, and a few have come off, but most are there til i can take a sander to the walls...which won't be anytime soon.

so mom has started to lay the tile, since she is done painting for this visit. it looks very nice, and the tile choice {marbled white with dark green} goes great with the peppermint tea paint {a light green with a blue tinge}. between the earlier in the week fiasco with lowe's {which i didn't write about here, so don't go trying to find it, ya didn't miss it, i just didn't have the energy to focus on something so stupidly frustrating~~it all is resolved to the best possible outcome, but the very fact that it occurred threw us off schedule, which meant monday was a wash} and my brother getting sick and being down and out for a day {yesterday, today he's kinda gingerly proceeding}; we've really been crunched for time and outta whack.

so all that means that we weren't able to get down what we'd've liked to. we still have put a huge dent into the task~list. but there were a few rooms that we didn't get to, cuz we don't have the space to go with the stuff in them and we don't have the time to properly clean them and paint them. so they will have to wait til some other time, along with most of the ceilings, and the master suite.

in other news, i received "the crochet stitch bible: the essential illustrated reference: over 200 traditional and contemporary stitches with easy~to~follow charts" by betty barnden in today's mail. the book retails at thirty bucks and my jerry bought it for me for thirteen! he's soooOOooo sweet ta me!! more on that later, time to return to the task at hand, the walls await, the floors call, the bathrooms are incomplete...later, dudes.