If you were wondering what was in the Two Blind Brothers Box...

 Those who kind of follow along in the blogs saw...

this photo of a slightly worse for wear box that came for Christmas.  I had various theories of how to present it and to whom, and finally decided to take it as is, unwrapped.  

I said it could go last, after all the packages had been unwrapped.  I told the group the story of ordering it sight unseen, and trusting the company to send something wonderful, based on nothing more than that trust.

Then I shared my musings about whether to offer this box up in exchange for any of the gifts I had given them.  Nobody wanted to trade their sox, or chocolate, or gourmet boxes for this, so by default it went to the hosting couple.  Here they are modeling the contents.

The mythical son, in his usual comic style, under wraps, and in the cap.

He has taken photos this way since childhood, so why would I expect him to be different as an adult?

The hostest with the mostest, models with her mom helping out on the comforter.

With your curiosity satisfied, I'm wishing everyone the Merriest of Christmasses, with joy in my heart, and contentment in my soul.  However you celebrate (or don't) today, may you be kind and gentle to yourself, so that you might pass along that attitude of kindness and bless the world in so doing.

We are all worthy of being wrapped up in a warm comforter of love!

Life is good.  Spark on!

🎄🕯✨

Christmas Eve Day

 

Golden brown and ready to go

I had not made these in YEARS.  Seriously, it's been a long time since we had a big enough family gather to justify the work that goes into making them.  As I started getting ready for the effort, I looked high and low and could not find the printed out recipe!

Oh, well, I kind of punt on this one anyway, most years.  But it looks (and tastes) like I got it right.

These are the famous (or infamous) olive filled baked cheese balls.

  

Amounts for those who were asking yesterday, from how I threw it together today:

1 lb. mild cheddar cheese, diced.

3 Tbsp butter (I used lightly salted today, being out of unsalted)

1 cup flour

1/4 to 1/2 tsp ground cayenne pepper

Sift the flour and cayenne together onto the softened cheese and butter.  I cheated this year at this point:  I used the food processor to mix the cheese (diced up), butter (softened), flour and cayenne (sifted together into the mix).

Then you work it into a dough, make balls of the dough, thumb press an olive into each ball, round it out, and bake at 450℉ for 10 minutes until golden brown.

And there you have it... a huge production... but done!  Yield:  2 dozen.  This recipe can be cut in half, by the way.  In fact, it's really doubled from the original which back in the early 1960's called for a blender, not a food processor, to combine.

Now I have to keep them safe from the cats and myself until time to go to the gather.

Rapid test, "if you can get it"

I had one on hand from the last time I tested.  They are saying omicron will only show up at your highest viral load on this one, so test hours ahead, not the day before.

About 1 p.m. I did my BinaxNOW test.  After the 15 minute wait, it came up negative, so I figure I'm safe for the gather at 4!

See you all on the flip side:  A very Merry (and safe, too) Christmas to all!

Be good to yourselves, this one and only Friday December 24, 2021 we'll ever get.  With hopes and prayers that a year from now we won't be having to be quite so careful!

🎄🕯

The day before Christmas eve... Cookie baking day!

Also work out with the trainer day.  

My session with him was earlier than usual by a couple of hours, so there was lots of time to prepare for tomorrow.  The plan was to bake today and tell myself these are for the gather, to keep my mitts off them.

What are they?  My brother's favorite cookie:  classic oatmeal scotchies.  Interestingly, they are also my son's favorite.

Before I started in on the baking, I took Dexter for his fill up.  Dexter is my Honda Fit that is doing double duty as the sleigh this season. I'd been procrastinating.  I think this is only the fourth fill-up or maybe the fifth, this year.  It took 8 gallons and cost over $22 USD!  Ouch!  That's with a 42 cent a gallon discount, too.  As I drove by the grocery store I marveled at how full the parking lot was.

At the end of the day, Frosty the demented cookie jar has leftover cookies in his tummy.  You know the ones:  not quite company ready?  A little too burnt, or not taken out a little too soon?  They still taste fine but the best cookies go to the gather, of course!

I got a visit from my younger sis with her dog Benji along for the ride.  She left me a "fish tank" gift (yes, she declared it such, and I have yet to unwrap it at the writing of this blog entry).  I took full advantage of the opportunity to send her home with "red neck Tupperware", i.e. repurposed plastic containers, in this case filled with some of those cookies. 

Yesterday she'd dropped off another gift, that goes with the memory of the day before Thanksgiving.  The tiktok posting of the outing linked here.  The Ace was enthused enough to buy t-shirts - one for her, one for me, opposite colors.  We "mature" ladies don't need a whole lot to amuse us, do we?

A word about TikTok:  it is a medium, it does not create the content.  When I do go over to TikTok (and I don't a whole lot because I get bored with it fairly quickly)... I am generally shown clips of dogs, cats, birds, a hospice nurse whose content I like, a couple of folks that Ace recommended to me, and a hysterical teacher or two.  Somehow I have never seen the videos that make the news as challenges to violence or vandalism.  There is AI buried in this app that shows you things you have reacted positively to, not things you have scrolled on by.

After dabbling making the tiktok in the link above, I made another one on Thanksgiving morning, the making of the pumpkin pie.  Then I have pretty much given it up.  I have decided that video is not a medium for me.  Some folks are really good at this stuff, but for me, it's a lot of work, and not much reward.  It's just not a high or a thrill, other than to determine that if I wanted to do so, I could.  But as they say, never say never.  And I do enjoy the comic folks, including the Bone or No Bones pug, Noodle, and the aspirational Mrs. Space Cadet, who trained for and then ran the NYC Marathon this year, raising money for the Michael J. Fox Foundation.

Tomorrow's plan:  

Make baked cheese balls.  A family classic.  I already diced the cheese, which is only step 1, and am leaving it on the counter overnight to soften.  The plan is to make these close to the last minute, and carry them to the gather trying to preserve their heat?  Or... plan B:  make them early, and request to have them zapped in the microwave at the host home.  I've done both in years past.

Dexter has already been loaded with the wrapped gifts, just to make sure I don't leave any behind!  I even popped the cookie containers in his back seat.  

Christmas eve supper with son, his girlfriend, and her parents.  The same group as got together at Thanksgiving.  Then Christmas day will be at homne, quiet, recovery day... at least that's the plan!

The Pep Talk:

Even holidays are worth being smart about our choices.  Health is the best gift we can give ourselves, and that means following safe practices about how many people and which ones we surround ourselves with, in this time of surging Covid 19 cases, the second Christmas in a row.  At least this year we're not holding on for our fingernails waiting for vaccines to become available.  Many of us already have taken them, in my case three shots over time.  With the added transmissibility of the Omicron variant, better masks are a good idea.  

And with a small gather of fully vaccinated and boosted folks, I feel I'm doing what I can, and doggone it, I'm ready for Christmas!

Whatever your plans and choices, savor and enjoy however you celebrate.  It is the season of peace, good will toward all.  Let's keep that purpose in our hearts and do our best to show it in our actions, this special time of year!

Life is good.  Spark on!  Merry Christmas!  Happy Festivus!  Happy Kwanzaa!  And best wishes to last into the upcoming New Year.

Earl Grey and sympathy?

A quiet Sunday here.  

Chilly, but seasonal temperatures.  I went for an afternoon walk, and came in to tea.  

On-line church, spotting my sis in her Christmas sweater, in her usual pew.  She's in town between the trip to help and the Christmas visit to her daughter, so I did not have cat duty yesterday or today.

The Christmas carols that constituted a lot of the music made me tear up a bit.  The sermon was a good one, giving the nod to Mary's prayer and vision, and the need for all of us to examine ourselves for the pride that would assume we are always correct in our opinions.  

I think the virus should be teaching us this lesson... that if we're correct 33% of the time, we're batting well, to use a baseball analogy.  So let's give each other a break, when we don't agree on every opinion.

Monday slipped away

The big thing I did on Monday was to start tracking nutrition again.  I've been very lax for several months now.  Right now, though, we are in the midst of holidays, where rich foods are "tradition".  We're in the shorter hours of daylight, when hibernation sounds oh, so lovely.

Did my tracking indicate a home run, in terms of choices and volumes?  Cough-cough... far from it.  BUT... giving credit for getting honest and writing it down.

But we keep moving forward

Even during Christmas week, I have my two trainer sessions on the schedule.  Tuesday morning I woke up to temperatures in the teens.  Brrrr!  But then I open the drapes and see the rising sun, on the shortest day of the year, lighting up the treetops across the street through my windows.  

It's my son's GF's birthday.  Instead of gifts, she asked for book suggestions, which I thought was a sweet idea.

Now, let's get out and make the most of this "shortest daylight of the year" day.  Be as healthy as you can manage, and don't beat up on yourself if you're not perfect at it!  After all, it is the only Tuesday, December 21, 2021 we'll ever get.  And we are worth taking care of.  Even the elves have to take care of themselves so they can do their work!

Life is good!  Spark on!  💖🍬🎄🎅🤶🔥🔥🎆✨❇

It's wrapping day, here.

 

Pebble jar December 18, non-leap year

You better watch out...

The pebble jar calendar, in its Christmas decor, looks about the same every year when it's time to wrap the presents.  See the dwindling number of days left in the year (little jar, center front)?  See the growing heap of days spent (big jar, center of wreath)?  Yes, I do better with non-living decor!  😏

I always intend to wrap early, provided I'm doing any presents in a given year, that is.  This year, I am determined that they will be wrapped TODAY, not waiting for Christmas eve day.

Christmas eve day is reserved, this year, for baking a couple of treats to go to the gathering.  Wrapping and baking don't mix very well, at least in my own mind.

Tools

Results, so far

It takes me a long time, and it is not one of my strong skill sets.  But getting there!  The stocking is from son's deployment to Afghanistan.  The name at the top is "The Wizard".  It needs to move from my house to his... this is a good time.

I think I shall leave the Two Blind Brothers box "naked", as well as a "fish tank" gift for the young people.

"What is a Fish Tank gift?" you might ask.

Family lore has it that one year on my son's birthday, he asked for a small fish bowl.  His father got him a 29 gallon aquarium!  And this forced me into the setting up of said aquarium, using up a good deal of the birthday time.  Son really didn't want this aquarium, it was something his Dad wanted.  So whenever we go shopping for gifts, if we choose the gift WE want, instead of something that really suits the recipient, in our family we call it a "fish tank" and laugh at the inside joke.

My friend Gerri and I borrowed kayaks from my son and his GF to provide swim leg support for a triathlon in September, and we noticed a couple of things that would be useful if we ever needed to borrow them again:  pool noodles (to help as flotation for a swimmer in trouble) and safety whistles (to call a power boat to the rescue for a swimmer is even worse trouble).  So we went in together to purchase these little trinkets.  But they definitely qualify under the family definition as "fish tank" gifts because Gerri and I are the triathlon support kayakers, not my son and his girlfriend.

Oh, I have real gifts for them, too, but it's tradition to bring humor in the bag, and the beat up box from the two blind brothers and the fish tank gift should supply that!

Does your family have any quirky traditions when it comes to gift exchanges?

Here's hoping you've had a good day, this one and only Saturday, December 18, 2021 we'll ever get!  But whatever kind of day it's been, it's at its closing now, and it had been "enough".  Be kind to yourself and nurture your evening with bedtime routines and restful sleep.  You are loved.  You are valued.  You are worth taking care of... in the only time we have... the present!

🧧🎁🎄🎅🤶🤶🍬🍬💖

Friday comes every week

Morning sun above stretching cat

The Prisoner proof of life after the storm shot.  He far prefers the outdoors to indoors.  He has many hiding places in my wild yard and about the neighborhood.  And he's the one that more often will stay out in a storm, and hole up somewhere other than in my house.  I have ceased worrying about him.  He has made a choice.

The mythical son came over for the "assessment" and by the time he left, we had a temporary fix of the fence in place.

Looks pretty good, and I'm hoping it will last to Spring, then if the next big storm flattens it, it will be time to replace the fence entirely.  I'm looking across the street at a lovely wrought iron fence.  Son warns it would likely be very expensive.  But an old gal can dream, can't she?

Son observed the softening / rotting of some of the timbers.  The fence is at least 15 years old, and the gent who put it up said it would be good for 10, so I think it's done as well as could be expected.

But he allowed that at least it looks enough like a fence that Carl will likely respect it.  

Speaking of Carl, he was along, sitting quietly and obediently in the car, so my son invited me to come along to the dog park for a couple of turns around. It was a dog park I had not visited before, and it was chosen for its lack of mud.  It's cool but not the brutal cold it sometimes gets this time of year, so it was a pleasant outing.

Your giggle for the day:  I am not a safe custodian for botanical life

I was regifted a cheerful looking little poinsetta on December 9th.  I set it beside Frosty and treated as I treat all such things... as what I figured was an artificial decoration!

This morning, I happened to look at it again.  Poor thing should have made an escape while it could have.  

I posted the contrasting photos up on Facebook with a similar warning:  my level of plant care is "lethal".  Heck, I have even killed the plants everyone says are "easy"... I have killed ivies, I have killed succulants... I am just not an herbalist!

In any case, it's finished.

And the daily pep talk

This is my chance to remind us all not to treat our bodies the way I treated that poor little plant.  Plants might be replaced and we can try again with the next one to take better care, but this is not true of our one and only human body, issued at birth!

So, let's do our best to nourish, exercise, hydrate and rest that precious resource, using this other precious resource:  the one and only Friday, December 17, 2021 we will ever get!  Each of us is worth taking care of, as our world needs us... it needs us to be kind and to encourage one another, and if we're running on empty we have nothing to give.  So start out being kind to yourself so that you have the oomph to also be kind to those you encounter!

Life is good.  Spark on!  🎄💖✨🔥

Survived the winds, but there is this fence section...

I am hoping that weather cooperates in getting this repaired before the snow flies.  

I sent the photo to my son, he'll come assess tomorrow, to see what supplemental materials might be needed.  Then we shall attempt a fix next Monday or Tuesday.  All of this "weather permitting" on whatever day is being discussed, of course.  The goal:  make it Carl-proof, so I can still have visits from my beloved canine!

It's getting to be that time of year when the "after work" walks with Alicia end after the streetlights have come on.  She needed 2.6 miles to get her 300 for the year, so we walked the route we call "Grape Ape with a Cape" which we knew would give her the miles.

Aaaaand done!  She's got her medal.  She waited to open the package until after we did our walk and I'll let her post the photo of herself wearing it.  I will settle for the moon over street lights here!  Photos never quiet do it justice, but... calm and not as warm as before the storm.

It was a lot to do and also pop up to Ontario to go to Lynda's (LeanJean6) virtual birthday bash, but y'all know her parties are NOT to be missed!  It was a blast, as it always is.

My son tells me their Christmas decorations that were staked down survived the wind storm.  Those that were not staked down they took inside the garage for the duration.  I'm so grateful for what did NOT happen here, while praying for those who got worse weather.  I did not lose power, but my cousin down on the farm did, and as of this afternoon they still didn't have it restored for them.

Here's hoping y'all are safe and warm and dry, and doing your best to support your health and well-being, physical, emotional and spiritual.  Let's take care of these precious bodies... we each get issued one, and only one, so we'd best take care of it, this one and only Thursday, December 16, 2021 we'll ever get.

Life is Good.  Spark on!  🎂🔥💖✨