Category: Making a better Me

Happy Valentine’s Day

I hope you are having a wonderful Valentine’s Day. My husband sent me roses at work. I love roses and I especially like all of these different colors. I think I will try to dry them after they fade a bit.

My mama died on Valentine’s Day many years ago and my husband always tries to make it bearable by sending flowers or strawberries or something. I told him he didn’t have to worry about doing it but he always does something to try and brighten my day.

I didn’t do a lot of Valentine decorating this year. I made the small hearts last week and strung them into a garland. I think I will add to them for Valentine’s next year.

It’s been another scary week around here. My brother in law, who I think of as a brother, I mean after all he has been in my family since I was eight years old, had a stroke in his left eye. What seemed like some blurred vision turned into a three day stay in the hospital while numerous tests were done to rule out a stroke in his other eye or somewhere else. As of now he has completely lost the vision in his left eye. His lively hood is using his hands and eyes for close repair work. It is a terrible thing for him. We know it could have been so much worse such as a full stroke that could have affected his entire body. I feel lucky that we still have him here with us. This just proves how fast your life can change. Don’t take it for granted. He is adjusting very well and I am so proud of him for this.

The winter days have really brought out my lazy mode. It seems like I want to hurry home and get warm and cozy. During these cold winter evenings I’ve knitted and crocheted and read. To be honest with you I just haven’t been in the mood to do much. I am hoping with some warm weather I will feel a burst of energy. Yep that’s the plan.

I finally finished the slouchy hat I was knitting and I love it so much I immediately started another one.

I have also been cleaning out closets and getting things ready to take to Goodwill or a similar place near us. I cleaned out some drawers last week and Kitty Kitty was obsessed. While I was downstairs getting my small vacuum she jumped in the drawer and tried to make a bed. Her and Gus were fascinated with everything I was dragging out. I was a little fascinated myself. I couldn’t believe all of the “things” I have that I don’t even need or use.

Please pardon the mess, oh and what a mess there was. I had everything out of the drawers and I guess it was just too tempting for Kitty Kitty.

Work has been fairly slow and I am thankful for that. The temps have been all over the place which is really not uncommon for East Tennessee. We have had a lot of rain this week and colder temperatures return to us next week. Maybe even a snow flurry or two.

I hope you have a wonderful weekend and you are able to spend some time with your Valentine ❤️❤️❤️

Always remember

Love your day your way!!!!!

Goodbye January

I am very happy to say goodbye to January. January was a scary month around here. It seems as though you worry about little day to day things, and they seem really big at the time. But when you are faced with your health or the health of a loved one, you realize that those other things don’t mean anything. That is how January was for us.

I mentioned in a previous post that my husband and I had been to Vanderbilt Hospital in Nashville at the beginning of the month. This was for his four month check up for the kidney. The kidney is now almost fourteen years old. Well that is if you don’t add the years it was just mine. I think I have mentioned that we named the kidney Baby Kay. The actual transplant date was February 24th, 2011. If you haven’t read our kidney story you can read it here and here. Some of the pictures may be missing, thank you WordPress, but the story is there.

A picture of us leaving the hospital at Vanderbillt just after the transplant. 2011.

Anyway, I got a little side tracked. The blood work for the kidney was slightly elevated in areas that were not good. Not a lot but enough that Vanderbilt wanted the tests repeated the next week. My husband did this through our local hospital so we wouldn’t have to drive back to Nashville. Those tests did not show a lot of change. Another set of tests were ordered. These would actually check to see if the kidney was starting to reject. It’s hard for me to write that because it was so scary to think that could be happening. We prayed, and our faith is strong. So we knew we would be led in the right direction no matter what happened.

The last set of tests were done last Tuesday. Vanderbilt notified us a few hours later that the blood work looked good, the levels were back to normal and no worries of rejection. I was at work when I got the news. I screamed. Amy my co-worker jumped and said what has happened? I told her the news and then all of my other co-workers and of course notified all of the family. What a relief. What happened? we don’t know for sure. It could have been a slight infection or just something off. All I know is that it was a really scary time. But then we know that life can be that way a lot of the time.

So February is here and it is almost like spring here. Although, I know colder temps are predicted for next week. I spent most of yesterday crocheting these small hearts. They are so easy. There’s several videos on YouTube with step by step instructions. I made about 35 of these small hearts and I strung them on a garland to hang on my mirror near my front door. I love hearts and I had so much fun making them.

So lots of knitting, crocheting and reading and work and just enjoying our life every day. That’s what has been going on around here. How was your January?

Always remember

Love your day your way!!!!

Tuesday Happenings

Hello and happy Tuesday, and dare I remind you, only one week until Christmas. I’m still trying to wrap my head around that one. Thanksgiving was only about twenty minutes ago.

I have been off from work for seven, yes you heard that right, wonderful and glorious days. Did I have big plans? Nope. Did I have a lot of Christmas projects and decorating? Nope. Just seven awesome days to do pretty much what I wanted when I wanted. I had some vacation days to get rid of before the end of the year. Sadly we can no longer carry them over and your really shouldn’t anyway. Use those days and enjoy yourself.

Last Tuesday night we had our work Christmas party. It was very nice. We had it a restaurant about forty minutes from me. I had to plan everything for the party such as the menu, time, number of people etc. it is always a bit stressful. But I had the vision of those seven days off, bouncing around in my head. We had a lot of fun at the party. It’s always worth it to see all of our members get together and have a good time.

My sister and I spent one day finishing up with Christmas shopping in Knoxville. And would you just look!! the stores are already putting out Valentine’s Day decorations. I love hearts so you know it doesn’t really bother me but it was a little strange to see all the hearts amongst all the Christmas decorations.

It was actually a pretty quiet week. We had to attend the funeral of a cousin. And of course groceries were bought and last minute Christmas items ordered and picked up. I have been doing more cooking and baking, which I love to do when I have lots of time.

My nephew had been in London for a week and my sister and I had agreed to pick him up at the airport on Sunday night. His flight was supposed to get in at 11:51 PM but it was delayed and didn’t get in until after 1:00 AM. I didn’t make it back to my house until 3:00 AM. The airport was deserted until that last flight came in and then it sort of exploded with people. A good thing I had the following day off.

Deserted airport. Also freezing cold. The reflection of those blue lights look like blue footprints.

I have also done a lot of knitting and crocheting while I have been off. I’ve been working on some hats to donate to the University of Tennessee hospital, where my sister had her chemo. There is an area for donations. People leave hand knitted and crocheted hats and head bands for people going through chemo. They always go through a lot of them in the winter. Below are a few I have finished. What is your opinion about a Pom Pom on top? Yes or no?

I am also working on a pair of socks for my nephew’s girlfriend. She asked for a pair at Thanksgiving, and in typical me fashion, I have waited until the last week before Christmas to get started on them.

We put our Christmas tree up a few weeks ago. The same one we have had for 34 years. We bought it the first year we were married. It has made it through a couple of moves. We did order a new tree this year. It was lost in transit and finally made its way to us a couple of days ago. Only about a month late. We haven’t decided if we will return it or keep it for next year. We finally got the last of the ornaments put on the tree this morning. So far the kitties have controlled themselves around it.

Just to let you know that is not an actual kitty at the top of the tree. It looks exactly like my Sadie, Ha!!!

I have done quite a bit of cooking and baking while I have been off. I made sourdough bread for my nephew and had it for him when he got off the plane Sunday night. I made chess bars for my husband. And I made a beef stew today in the crock pot. It was yummy. We had it with biscuits.

So it is back to work for me tomorrow. Sadly all good days off must come to an end. But the bright side is Christmas is next week. I have about 20 people coming to my house for dinner on Sunday. Everyone is bringing a dish so it won’t be a ton of cooking just for me. On Christmas Eve my sister has a small get together at her house. Christmas Day will be just me and my husband and the kitties and a very quiet day. How is your Christmas season going? Do you celebrate big or do you keep it relatively quiet?

I leave you with a pic of my big Christmas present that keeps giving all year long. My big boy Gus.

Gus

Always remember

Love your day your way!!!!

Thanksgiving Week and A Scam

Hello friends, I can’t believe that Thanksgiving is just a few days away. We are going to have a very quiet day around here. I think it will be just me and hubs and maybe my nephew and his girlfriend. We are having ham instead of turkey. I will do the traditional sides and a couple of desserts. It seems a little strange because for so many years we had such huge gatherings. Sometimes twenty and thirty people and often several places to visit. I say if you still have that many people to celebrate with enjoy it while you can.

I had a great weekend. We planted fifty tulip bulbs. I am hoping it is not too late in the season. Hubby and I had a great system. He used his drill with an attachment and dug the holes and I placed the bulbs in the ground. I can’t wait until spring to see if they come up. I will be so excited and grateful if only a few survive. I am hoping some critter does not dig them up. That has happened before, and the critter mentioned is one of the cats.

I got scammed:
I can’t believe as old as I am I fell for such a scam on the internet. For weeks I had been seeing those adorable gnome advent calendars. Some were on Facebook and some were on TikTok and a couple of other social media platforms. I thought they were adorable. They were $39.95 and each day starting in December you would open one of the little gnome windows and get a different gnome. They were a great size and the ad showed some people putting them on their Christmas tree as ornaments and some made a little garland from them. I couldn’t wait to get them. Now to be honest, there are some real gnome advent calendars out there, but you have to watch carefully to see what you are getting, I didn’t, and that was my fault. So lesson learned.

Look how big they were supposed to be. And cute!!!

The day the package finally arrived. I went to the Post Office to pick it up. I was expecting this huge box that I would probably have to wrestle to the car. I opened my PO Box and, instead of a card telling me to come to the counter to pick up my box, there was a locker key. The locker keys are for the larger boxes in the Post Office. But there was no way my big box of gnomes could ever fit in one of those. Right??

And to beat it all it was one of the smaller locker boxes. I opened it and there was a small box maybe an 8 x 10 size. Oh well I guessed, this was something else that my husband ordered. But no, it had my name on the box. I took it to the car and I could actually carry it in the palm of one hand. Once in the car I opened it and there was the gnome advent calendar box I had seen online. Only this one was incredibly small and well no, just no. It couldn’t be. I opened one of the tiny advent windows and a small hard trinket fell out. What???? I opened up several more and each had an ugly little hard plastic trinket not much bigger than a charm for a charm bracelet.

I sat there staring at the box with the cold hard realization hitting me. I had been scammed!!! I had been scammed out of $39.95 plus shipping. Close to $50.00 in total. As I looked at this little pile of kids toys I couldn’t believe that someone could sell this. But wait!! There were three bigger gnomes in the box. Sort of ugly they were. But they were there. As I looked at this I started to laugh. I couldn’t stop. If anyone had seen me in my car that day they would have wondered why I was laughing so hard. They would probably shake their heads and say “yep she’s finally lost it”

I was so disappointed and mad that I had allowed myself to be scammed. I went back to the ad and started reading the reviews, something I should have done before ordering, they were terrible. A hard and expensive lesson learned. I was too embarrassed to take a picture of it. I gave it to one of my co workers and she was going to give it to her little sister. She said she would enjoy playing with the little trinkets. So if she liked them it is not all wasted.

I sent an email to the company asking for a refund. Of course I have heard nothing back and certainly have received no refund. It’s funny but this is reminding me of the time when I was about eight years old and wanted to send away for 100 little dolls. They were only $1.99. You can read that post here

I guess if it sounds too good to be true it probably is.

I hope you and your family have a wonderful Thanksgiving. Enjoy friends and family and be sure to love on each other as much as possible. Now I am off to knit on my sock for a little while.

Always remember

Love your day your way!!!!