A good weekend - December 18, 2023

The Grandson is 16 years old and has a girlfriend, which means we rarely get to see him.  I texted him a couple of weeks ago to ask what he would like to have for Christmas.  He said, "How about a shopping trip?"  This suited me just fine.  

After we came home from our road trip, we made our shopping plans.  He wanted to go to the huntin'/fishin' store in the city.  We picked him up Saturday morning and had a good day shopping.  He spent the night with us, as he used to do almost every weekend.  We had a big breakfast and a lazy Sunday morning.

On our way to the store, Granddaughter #1 texted me to ask if I could fix a hole in her jeans.  I told her to bring them to me Sunday.  Around noon, she showed up with Granddaughter #3 in tow.  When we went into the sewing room, #3 whispered, "I LOVE this room!  It's a magical place!  I'm so glad I have you for a grandmother."  (Gotta love this kid!)  She set to work creating an original skirt design on the dressmaker dummy.  I set to work repairing the "hole," which turned out to be a stress rip next to the left back pocket.  It was a mess to fix, but we got it done with a patch cut rom a pair of my old jeans.

While this was going on, Son #1 (father of The Grandson) came in for a visit.  

It was a good day.

* * * * * * * * 

Last week, The Husband noticed an estate sale sign in the little town up the road.  Years ago, he had worked with the deceased and had not known of her death.  He came home and searched for her obituary and discovered that she had died a year ago.  How had we not heard about it?  Anyway, he looked up the estate sale online, and learned that the items for sale included a vehicle, a 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee with 125,000 miles on it, according to the web page.  It looked very nice in the pictures.  Having known the owner, we expected that the vehicle had been well maintained.  Saturday morning, we dropped by the estate sale on our way to pick up The Grandson for our shopping trip.  He made a reasonably low bid, based on some values he'd seen online.  While we were shopping, the estate sale company notified him that his was the highest bid.  He was like the coyote in the roadrunner cartoon in which the coyote finally catches the roadrunner:  "Ok, I got it.  Now what do I do?"

We took The Grandson to lunch, then dropped by the estate sale to write the check.  While this was happening, The Grandson inspected the car and discovered that it was actually a 2007 model.  

We can't bring the car home until the check clears, which should happen in a day or two.  

Now what to do with it. 

The Grandson asked for my 1998 Jeep Wrangler when he was six years old, and I flippantly said he could, if I still had it by then.  I still had it when he turned 16, and I regretted the bargain I'd made with the 6-year-old.  As the date approached, I began to recommend other options so I won't have to give the Wrangler away.  (We've been keeping our eyes open for an older model truck.)  He doesn't have his driver's license yet, so the Wrangler is still in my driveway.  He expressed a keen interest in the Cherokee, but having ridden shotgun with him in the Wrangler to let him work on his driving skills, there ain't no way we're turning the boy loose in a vehicle with a hemi.  ;)

So I don't know what we're going to do with this car.  I think it was a good investment, and we could make a little $$ if we wanted to sell it.  But there are people in our family who struggle to keep their vehicles running, and it might be good to have a spare vehicle (besides the Wrangler, which routinely sits in the driveway with a dead battery).

* * * * * * * * 

I have a LOAD of stuff to do this week.  Today I had planned to grocery shop, but Nanny needs someone to drive her to a doctor appointment in the big city, so the groceries will have to wait.  Tomorrow is painting class day, and possibly lunch with my former boss.  I have to make sausage balls for the painting class party.  And, lunch or no lunch, after the party I must finish the Christmas shopping.  Tuesday night, Granddaughter #2 will be part of her middle school homecoming court, an event that cannot be missed!  Wednesday is office day.  Sunday night, the kids and extended family will be coming for dinner.  We still have not put up a Christmas tree or wrapped a single present.  The bed in a spare bedroom is loaded with stuff.  With all the little girls in the family, I'm not even sure what's for who anymore.  

It's time for me to shift into overdrive.

 

Road Trip - December 15, 2023

The Husband had a meeting to attend in Asheville, NC this week.  It's an annual event. held at a nice hotel/inn.  I went along for the ride.

Shunning the most direct route on the interstate, we opted for state highways and ended up driving through 5 states to get there.  ;)

The meeting was over at noon Wednesday, at which time we hit the road to home, but not the same way we came.  Granddaughter #1, away at college but coming home for Christmas break, was planning to drive home on Thursday.  We chose a route that went right through her college town so that we could follow her home.  When I talked to her about the plan, she said she would be leaving for home at 5 a.m.  The Husband made a face when I told him the time.  We opted to drive on to another town and wait for her there to keep from having to get up at the crack of dawn.  We met up with her a little after 7.  I opted to ride with her since we rarely get any time together.  The Husband ran interference just ahead of us.  So as not to horn in on her homecoming with her family, we followed her almost all the way to her door and waved as we went by.  

I am glad to be home.  

My "must-do" list for next week is very long.  I have not wrapped a single present, and still have some shopping to do.  My "want-to" do list is even longer.

Pray for me.  ;)

Sometimes I wonder - December 8, 2023

In my attempts to learn to paint, I watch a lot of videos.  (Sometimes, I even try to do the paintings.)  Thanks to youtube's consideration of things that might interest me, stuff pops up that I would not ordinarily see.  

Case on point:  zentangle.  

Which led to zendoodle and all sorts of doodles.  Ad nauseum.

Last week, I saw a doodle in which the artist had woven a name into the design.  Cool.  The Granddaughters would love it on a sweatshirt.  For Christmas.  Using their favorite colors.

I did what I considered to be a suitable original doodle with Granddaughter #3's name woven in.  It looked fabulous colored.  Tuesday, I bought a pink hoodie at the dollar store and imprinted my doodle onto it using sublimation.  Yes, a white hoodie would have been better, as it would not have tinted the original colors, but the dollar store didn't have a plain white hoodie.  And, yes, dollar store shirts typically do not contain enough synthetic fibers to be colorfast.  But I did not care.  I wanted to test the whole process before gearing up for mass production of shirts for ALL the granddaughters (6, to be exact).

#3's shirt turned out halfway okay.  The pink background muted the bright colors of the original, and the name is a tad uphill, but the shirt will do for playing outside.  The kid will have outgrown the shirt by spring, anyway, and she spends half her time cartwheeling, so who is going to notice her name's uphill?  

Believing that my grand project was do-able, Tuesday night, I ordered five more hoodies.

Yesterday, I spent ALL DAY doing the artwork for the remaining names.  I resorted to cheating; instead of doing 5 different designs, I did one with no name at all, scanned it, and figured out how to get the names woven in using the computer.  By nightfall, I had 5 prints, ready to paint in the girls' favorite colors.

I felt so...accomplished.

Today I discovered that I ordered the wrong sizes:  two adult smalls, two adult XLs, and one dark purple kid-sized hoodie (against which no sublimated design will ever show).  

WTF was I thinking?  

<sigh>

Thursday - December 7, 2023

Before I forget, lemme give a shout out to my eldest nephew, born this date longer ago than I care to admit (because if he is old, I am REALLY old).  ;)  

It is colder than a well digger's butt on the back porch today, but the sun is shining and the temperature is supposed to be in the fifties today.  My plan is to do some sketching later today in preparation for a road trip we're doing next week, another work-related trip for The Husband.  I'm going along, since I can work from anywhere.  

I'll be lugging two laptops with me - personal and work.  It never fails that when I go somewhere, an Etsy customer wants something special.  On our recent two-day trip to Nashville, I had two custom requests, and for the first time ever, I did not have my personal machine (the one with the digitizing software) with me.  It's kind of a good thing that I didn't have it, for I probably would have digitized in the hotel room instead of going to the State Museum, which I'd always wanted to see.  I'll have two days in which to occupy myself while The Husband is in meetings.  I'll have to fool with the parking valets if I want to drive anywhere, and driving in strange places kind of makes me nervous, so I might just stay put in the room and do some computer drawing - on my lunch breaks, of course.  ;)

Tuesday - December 5, 2023

Back in the summer, Son #2 gave us his old electric smoker grill.  Until this past Sunday, we'd only used it once to cook a brisket, or maybe it was a pork butt, can't remember.  Anyway, a friend who owns a local BBQ joint kept posting pictures of a smoked meatloaf they sell at the restaurant, and I finally succumbed to the urge to try it, myself.  I mixed up 3 pounds of 80/20 ground beef, a couple of eggs, some spices, and 6 slices of store-bought keto bread, put it in a disposable pan, and smoked it at 275 degrees (might have been a little hot for the amount of time we left it on the grill).  At the same time, we put a whole chicken in the smoker.  It was a small one, and I cut it open with scissors, dusted it with spices, and splayed it in a pan.  

We left them on the smoker for 2.5 hours, then checked the chicken with a thermometer.  When it hit 165 degrees in the chicken breast, we took everything off the grill.  I'd meant to put some topping on the meatloaf (ketchup + jalapeno pepper jelly), so I did that in the oven while I shredded the chicken for chicken salad.

It was all really good.  The meatloaf was a little dry in comparison with my normal meatloaf.  It was over-cooked, PLUS I did not treat the bread the same way I usually treat it.  I usually hold the bread slices under running water to saturate them, then I squeeze out most of the water and squish the bread into the meat.  (Sometimes, there's a recognizable piece of crust in my meatloaf, but I do not care.)  This time, I ran the dry bread slices through the food processor and turned them into crumbs, which I squished into the meat.  No added water. 

When we took the pans off the grill, I noticed that the meatloaf pan did not contain the amount of juice/grease I was expecting.  My wet bread meatloaves usually leak out a ton of juice/grease.  I always pour it off before adding the topping and baking it a little more.  What came out of the smoked meatloaf looked like 100% fat, no water.  

And the meatloaf was dry.  Was it because we cooked it too long or too hot, or because there was less water in the meat?  

Going to painting class today for the first time in I-don't-know-when.  

Cold Frame - December 4, 2023

A couple of Saturdays ago, there was a gardening program on PBS that showed how to build a cold frame.  It made me want one.  The TV guy built his frame from scrap materials around his place, but we don't have those kinds of scraps, so I bought a kit.  We assembled it yesterday.  Amazingly, all the parts were there, and the thing went together without a hitch.

We took it outside and looked for the best place to put it.  Our yard doesn't get much sun.  It appears that the "best place" may be the middle of the back yard.  At least, that's where it is right now.  It came with 4" nails to peg it down, but a good wind will send it flying.

The south side of our shed would be a better place if it gets enough sun during the winter.  The cold frame would be better protected from wind, and we could attach it to the shed foundation.  But I have never paid much attention to how much sun the spot gets during the winter, when the leaves are off the trees.  Right now, at 7 a.m., the sun is blasting that side of the shed.  I just asked my phone to remind me to check the situation at noon.  

I bought this thing intending to plant salad greens in it.  I envisioned filling it halfway with a big bag of store-bought dirt, sprinkling seeds over the dirt, watering it, closing the lid, and enjoying fresh, nutritious, leafy green salads this winter.  

Then I watched some videos.  Now I'm envisioning using the cold frame as an incubator for vegetable seeds.  I started my 2023 tomato plants in a tiny tabletop greenhouse (sort of) in the sewing room.  They did well, at first, but soon turned sickly-looking.  There just wasn't enough light and enough space to start them indoors.  Maybe I should try starting next year's tomato plants in the cold frame.  

As I have been writing this, I've had another vision.  Jose comes out from under the shed at night, raises the lid on the cold frame, digs around in it, and goes away, leaving the lid open.

Maybe I should install a padlock.

* * * * * * * * 

Over the weekend, I finished my friend's chair back.  It is packaged and ready to go, along with a hand-painted Christmas card.  I'll mail it tomorrow.  The post office is right next door to my painting class.

* * * * * * * * 

The Husband's office Christmas party was Saturday night.  Thirty-five years ago, when he first went to work there, the office Christmas party was a PARTY, with food and music and dancing and booze and such.  In 2020, because of covid, there was no party.  Since then, we've mostly just gathered for dinner.  This suits me just fine.  But this dinner was not all that great.  We had not-so-great food.  There was enough booze, though, to keep the younger folks happy.  

   

Friday, December 1, 2023

This is the first morning I've had all to myself in a week.

Starting on Thanksgiving, The Husband has been off work.  We were in Nashville on Monday and Tuesday, and he took off the rest of this week because he needed to use up some vacation time.  While I was at work Wednesday, he winterized the porch, which I thought was a terrific use of his time.  ;)  Today, he's gone to the big city to help deliver some collapsible wagons to the Ronald McDonald house.  

I had my yearly physical yesterday.  (Got passing grades on everything.)  My appointment wasn't until 2:15, and I wasn't supposed to eat anything so they could test my blood for cholesterol and such.  (My passing grade may get lowered when those test results come back!)  As soon as the visit was over, I headed to the grocery store and, being hungry, bought everything I saw, including fried chicken strips from the deli.  I hardly ever eat anything deep fried.  My tummy filed complaints during the night.  

So I was up early this morning.  Cooked breakfast.  Swept and mopped the floors while The Husband emptied his truck bed.  Now it's time to play.

The first thing I need to do is finish my friend's canvas chair back.  It goes on a director's chair.  She sent it to me more than a year ago.  She raises puppies and wanted her kennel's logo embroidered on the back.  I happily agreed to do it, thinking it would be a piece of cake since I'd already digitized the logo.  When the chair back arrived, I discovered that I'd have to take it apart to embroider it.  Then I could not find the embroidery design on any computer in the house and realized I'd have to start the logo from scratch.  I laid the project aside, and it eventually got buried in the rubble in the sewing room.  Back in March, when I was purging craft room to turn it into an office, I ran across it and put it away somewhere safe.  When my friend mentioned the chair back last week, I committed to finishing it this week.  

It took me an hour to locate the "somewhere safe" place.  Thankfully, most of the pieces were there.  I did find the logo design on an old computer, but it was not suitable for the chair back, so I had to re-do it.  I sewed the design yesterday evening.  I am not 100% satisfied with the way it turned out, but it'll have to do.  Now I have to figure out how to put the blasted thing back together.  One piece - a stiffener that goes between the layers - is missing.  I probably threw it away during the purge, thinking it was a scrap from another project.  Hopefully, a strip cut off of a yoga mat will make a good substitute.