Cyber Shopping and The Weekly Smile

Happy Sunday friends. I was having coffee this morning and enjoying a quiet Sunday morning. If you were here we would chat about all the things that happened this week, Thanksgiving and all the prep work that went into it how it was different from last year and any shopping you may have done afterwards. Just the day to day flow of life. I like that idea. I wish we could do that right now. A fellow blogger often starts his posts like this and I just find it so welcoming.

The weather here has been cold in the mornings so you have to turn on the heat. And then by afternoon the temps are quite warm and you have to turn on the air. However we may have a winter mix by Tuesday morning and I say BRING IT ON!!! I am so ready for some cold weather. Don’t ask me if I feel the same way in a month it will probably be different.

My weekend so far has been great!! My sister and I didn’t get to do our Black Friday shopping as we had done for so many years. I chose to work because we have been so short staffed. So I worked on Friday but on Saturday my sister and I decided to have a Cyber Saturday shopping day. I went to her house and took my lap top and we trolled the internet for any Black Friday left over sales we could find. I found a few things but after a couple of hours we decided to head out and visit a couple of shops and grab something to eat. We didn’t go far just to Athens which is about fifteen minutes from us. We stopped at Hobby Lobby because I wanted to buy some yarn for some earrings I want to make. I can’t wait to show you those as soon as I get them finished. Then we went to Belk. I am not often a fan of Belk but I found some cute booties and a work satchel I had been looking for. Both of these were $19.99 still on the Black Friday sales. Came home and snuggled my Scruffy and everything is right with the world.

I can’t wait to wear these. I am the queen of wearing black so I think these will go with everything.

I’ve been looking for a satchel to carry to work. I needed something large enough to carry my MacBook, lunch, and my big camera that I have started using much more lately. Even if I don’t have it inside work with me I will have it the car if I need it.

This week has been so nice. I got to spend time cooking some of my favorite dishes and sharing them with my family. I spent Saturday with my sister Sandy and we always have the most fun even if we are doing nothing at all. Wonderful times I have had this week and that definitely made me smile.
What made you smile this week? I know there was something.

Have a wonderful week!!!!

I am joining the Weekly Smile at Tren’t World check it out if you get a chance and see what others had to smile about this week.

http://www.trentsworldblog.wordpress.com

Always remember

Love your day your way!!!

Happy Thanksgiving 2020

I was leaving the post office at sunset on Thanksgiving Eve when I spotted the church steeple through the trees.
I found these little fabric pumpkins a few years ago at an antique store.
It is so amazing that a couple of weeks can bring about such a change in the colors of leaves and trees. I love them all they each have a beauty.
These two love going on our walks and they are the best of friends.
Foggy sunrise.
This is our life size Santa that we have had for over 25 years. Every year he stands in our upstairs hallway in front of the window. I think we bought him at Target. We drag him out of the basement every year. There was a time I wanted to get rid of him because he took up so much room but man I am glad now that I didn’t. Kitty Kitty loves him too.
Live size Santa in the window this is the first thing you see coming down our driveway.

Thanksgiving morning and it was 3:00 A.M. I couldn’t sleep. I guess I was thinking about all the things to do before 2:00 PM when I would have my Thanksgiving lunch. It was different this year only four of us. My sister and her husband came to eat with us. Well five if you counted Scruffy who wouldn’t leave my side the entire time I was cooking dinner. I wasn’t sure if there would be four people or eight for dinner. It was a maybe for a few people. At the last minute my nephew was sick and his brother had been around their mom, who had just been tested for COVID and we didn’t feel comfortable with him being around Mark. However, they did call with their to-go orders. HA!!! Mark’s brother and his wife were a maybe and they didn’t get to come at the last minute.

I had to work every day leading up to Thanksgiving Day. That did not leave me with a lot of time to clean my house and shop for food. I did do some cleaning last weekend but you know how that goes after almost a week. It felt like I hadn’t done anything. Plus I put my Christmas tree up last weekend and did some decorating so that took up most of the weekend. I decided to concentrate on my downstairs because I knew no one would be going upstairs for anything.

I did a little cleaning on Monday night. I stopped and bought groceries on the way home on Tuesday night. As soon as I got home on Wednesday and I had a chance to grab some dinner and change clothes I gave Scruffy a much needed bath. After that I made cornbread for the dressing I would make on Thursday. I also made the two pies. Let me tell you making two pies at once is a little tricky. One pie I had to bake, the pecan, and the other I didn’t. I constantly found myself almost putting the ingredients in the wrong pie. Ha! Luckily they both turned out fine.

So there I was at 3:00 AM on Thanksgiving morning even though I hadn’t gotten to bed until 11:30 PM the night before. I finally got up around 5:00 and started the day which always involves coffee and sitting for a few minutes with whichever fur baby hops on my lap first. Kitty Kitty won out this time and she curled up on my lap and took a nap.

It was just the four of us for dinner and we had a wonderful time. Mark wanted to know why I was cooking sooooo much food. My thinking was, it’s still Thanksgiving and that means food. Mark did not want turkey this year, he is not a big fan of turkey, so we did a spiral ham. I still did dressing, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, baked beans, rolls, cucumbers, cranberry sauce and two pies, chocolate and pecan.

After dinner my sister and I took a walk and enjoyed the warm temperature, which was about 65 degrees F, and the sunshine.

So yes Thanksgiving 2020 was different as so many things this year have been. But you know what? I know I am even more thankful than ever. My faith and the love I have for my friends and family are something that can never change. I am here and living in a time that will never be forgotten and I am just happy to say I am a part of this big wonderful life. So how was your Thanksgiving???

Always remember,

Love your day your way!!!

Has COVID Made Us Mean(er)?

Spoiler alert, This post will end on a positive in spite of the title.

Please understand when I write this I don’t mean the actual virus I mean the repercussions from the virus and being quarantined, losing work, death, fear and on and on. It will eventually wear on anyone’s nerves. I am from the south where southern hospitality is a real thing. I guess maybe I am more sensitive to people acting more stressed, scared, mean or unfriendly or just not being themselves.

I go into a store and am working my way to the check out counter. A man is standing sort of not in line but just beside the line of people. I am not sure if he is observing the six feet social distancing or just waiting for someone. I ask him ” are you in line?”. He turns around and practically screams “YES I AM!! I HAVE BEEN STANDING HERE FOR ABOUT TWENTY FIVE MINUTES SO GOOD LUCK WITH THAT” Wow I didn’t know what to say I just stood there and waited for my turn remembering the day you could strike up a friendly conversation with other people waiting in line. Now you have to be six feet apart and if you’re wearing a mask no one can understand what you are saying anyway. I would like to say this was a one time incident but it hasn’t been. Remember this is the south and everyone talks to everyone. I am the queen of striking up conversations with people. My husband will say “who was that you were talking to?” I say I have no idea I just met them. That is the way it is where I am from. I will not stop being that way.

I guess I have noticed this shift mostly at work. I work in tourism, so yes things are different and people cannot just come and go at any time and expect no wait times or even the possibility of not visiting. To help with social distancing we do have long wait times. This makes some of our customers angry. Really angry. I have been verbally abused and threatened, on the phone, to the point I actually had to call the 911 help center and have them send extra patrol to our area. I know it was probably just someone blowing off steam but it was still very scary. You can’t be too careful. I think when people have this unreasonable reaction it is just because they are so fed up with the “new normal” way of doing things that they just take it out on the nearest person they can find. Not a good thing to do.

Some people berate you and make fun of you if you wear a mask or they glare at you if you don’t. I have been hit with both of these on several occasions.

You may be one of those people that have not let COVID interrupt your life, or so you think, you go on vacations, you go shopping and out to eat but it is still different. YOU KNOW IT IS!!! No matter what you do things are different and you feel it and you see it and there is not a dang thing you can do about it, it is affecting you in one way or another.

I go to work and I go to a few outings, I even went on a short trip with my sisters, and to the grocery store but nothing like I have done in the past. There is a big part of me that doesn’t mind because I am a bit of a home-body anyway. I wear a mask when I go out. I sanitize constantly. But there is also a big part of me that wants things to be just the way they were before COVID. I am not sure that will ever happen. No matter what I think this will leave a lasting memory or scar for most people. WahWahWah!!! I know I know. I am blessed that I haven’t had COVID or lost a loved one to it. We are in stressful times people. Be nice, be patient, be kind. When I say this I am yelling this to myself the loudest. I know it starts with me.

Now on the other hand I have also noticed some people being kinder and gentler and giving. Some people go out of their way to do for others during these trying times. Which way do you want to be remembered? we are making history here let’s make it the best we can moving forward. Too many bad, senseless and unthinkable things have happened this year. I hope we can end it on a better loving note. Are you with me?

My peaceful happy place

Always remember,

Love your day your way!!!

And It All Came to a Grinding Halt!!!!

Sunday morning I was at home by myself with just the babies for company. I was enjoying some banana bread I had just baked. Oh and I have to tell you, I added chocolate chips to one of the loaves and it was amazing. It was about 8:00 AM and the wind was howling terribly. The trees were bending almost double and leaves were swirling outside the windows like we were in a hurricane. You can probably tell I’ve never actually been in a hurricane. I just knew my power was about to go out. That is one of the things about rural living that you have to get used to. So yes at approximately 8:05 AM Sunday morning my power clicked off. Just thinking about it jinxed me I guess. I sat there for a few minutes. My heat went off, my lights went out. My internet stopped working. I thought, well it may come back on in a few minutes. It didn’t. I went into the office and plugged in the rotary phone. Yes I still have one of those for just such occasions. I called the Utility company to report the outage. The automated voice at the other end told me that an outage had already been reported in our area. O.K. way to go distant neighbors!!!. I settled back in my recliner with Kitty Kitty on my lap and Scruffy snuggled against my leg and picked up a book I had been reading. I just can’t explain how cozy it was.

10:00 AM and still no power. I continued reading and napping and loving the weight of the warm babies on me. I dozed and dreamed and contemplated life. I may have gotten up for a small snack.

You may be wondering why I couldn’t do anything while my power was off. O.K. My power is tied to my pump for the water so I couldn’t use too much water because the pump couldn’t pump water without electricity. Just enough for drinking if I wanted to. So I really couldn’t do a lot of cleaning, right? No vacuuming or laundry could be done. So I was sort of trapped. Who am I kidding I sort of loved it!!! HEE HEE!!!! I felt very Little House on the Prairieish. But you know Laura Ingalls and that bunch never had power and it certainly didn’t stop them. Oh well that was a long time ago.

12:00 PM Still no power. I decided to drive to the top of our driveway and see if I could see anything that would have caused the power outage. I would have walked but honestly I have a fear of death by a falling tree. I’m sure there’s a name for this phobia. I don’t like to walk in the woods when the wind is blowing at hurricane strength. I drove to the top of the driveway and could immediately see power lines all over the road. I stopped!!! I didn’t even try to walk up on the road to see if a tree or pole was down or what caused all the lines to be down. I wasn’t sure if those were live wires or not. That was not for me to decide. Realizing that I couldn’t even drive out of the driveway with all of these wires down did make me feel a little trapped but I had no where I had to be.

I went home and called the power company and pressed the number 2 to say that Yes I did have additional information to report about the outage . I felt so proud. Within an hour I heard utility trucks at the top of my driveway and lots of noise from chainsaws.

Within another two hours the power was restored. By this time it was after 2:00 PM and the power had been out for over six hours. A nuisance? maybe. A wonderful opportunity to snuggle babies and catch up on reading with the interruption of my cell phone or anything else? DEFINITELY!!!!

Not a bad way to spend a Sunday. How was your weekend? How is your week going?

Turns out a lot of people were without power that day not just us rural country people. I wonder if they felt Little House on the Prairieish?

Always remember,

Love your day your way!!!