Great is my disappointment this evening.
CBS has decided that it won’t renew and pay for the sappy sweet Sunday evening movies. I looked forward to the silly things —something new or maybe a good rerun. It was different from the ball games everywhere else.
I’m hoping the HALLMARK movies will run every once in awhile.
Sigh. I guess I’ll have to see what’s good in the video cabinet.
I have only about 4 rows and the border on the current baby blanket left to do.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Oh boy oh boy oh Boy! As an anniversary gift, I got to order
Max Headroom the complete series dvd!
The confirmation email says 7 – 10 days, and I can hardly wait.
It’s nice the stash of yarn behind the couch is full for the winter.
I’m gonna be sitting comfy with the hook and the remote. I don’t know which will be working harder.
Thanks for all your kind words about our big day.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Well, I hadn’t thought much about it, until I got an e-card from a friend and then saw my picture over at Momma’s Corner where Mary put up a real nice post! She’s not my mom in real life, but I’ll claim her as an aunt or other close relative.
Thank You Kindly for remembering!
Yep, today is the date for our 26th wedding anniversary.
Falling in the middle of the week like this, there’s not much in the way of plans for a celebration.
I tend to think of the third Saturday in October as the time of remembering, since that was when we could book the church and minister. Our friend who was the Best Man was on Fall Break from college, so he and his wife drove half the night to be there with us.
The day so far was pretty much like any other. We were both up early because of the aches of age. My Mister went off to the job on his bicycle. I did a bunch of yard work while the weather holds.
If you would like to see pictures from last year, when we did a bit more, you can go to Decrepit Old Fool 25 years, or to mine for Our 25th anniversary. There’s no way I can change that cake picture, nor should I want to. My friend Karen did a masterpiece, and went on to have a baker’s business for a long time after.
Here’s one from our 20th.
Lucas, Joe, Diane, George, Chris mid-October 2000
The back yard, from that viewpoint, looks just the same, except this year, fewer leaves have fallen for now.
Talk about going aways from my expectations.
I’m all set to do the ironing.
Thanks, Again, Mary!
~~love and Huggs, Diane
The last(?) of the apples are peeled, cored, washed and sliced into my stainless steel cauldron. I put the lid on top, turned the burner on medium, washed only 3 steel bowls, and took the bucket full of waste out to dump onto the compost pile.
There’s a light rain and slight wind bringing the leaves off the trees. I haven’t seen an extra pretty Autumn this year.
Maybe the weather or temperature wasn’t making ideal conditions, not like in years past.
The whole time I was working alone in the kitchen, I played my Beth Nielsen Chapman (Wikipedia) cds, three in a row. Looking over at her official site, I can see she has a couple others not already in my possession. There’s incentive for me to get a paycheck job—money without guilt for the extras I’d love to have. Trouble is, when I’m working at a job, I don’t have time and energy to listen to my purchases.
Anyway, one of the reasons I listen to this artist when I’m alone is because my housemates tend to think her style is somewhat of a downer. She sings about strain and loss and how hard it is to get up and keep moving on. And I can’t exactly say why I wanted to hear her today, but three in a row in the stereo.
I’ll talk a bit about my weekend.
Every time I went to Latte Time, all last week long, I would see flyers on the door and the customer side of the cash register, announcing that Glenn Wilson would be playing there on Saturday night. I know Glenn and his wife and kids from church, so I really looked forward to being there! On the flyer was an illustration of Glenn playing his saxophone, a really good drawing. I went over to Jazz Maniac, but cannot get the pertinent illustration to copy correctly. It was drawn by the same artist who does the comic strip SHOE.
I asked the owner’s wife if I could claim one of the prints after the concert was done. She promised, so there was even more incentive for me to be in the audience.
Saturday morning I volunteered to work at the church building during the Red Cross Blood Drive. I also put my name on the list as the last appointment so that I could donate. It turns out that I was not able to, my iron is only at 37. While that is an increase from August when the hematocrit was 34, the requirement must be 38 to donate. I cannot believe my disappointment. The nurse mentioned that tea has tannic acid, which is known to inhibit iron uptake. If that’s the case, I’ll never donate again, cuz I ain’t giving up my morning cup of Red Rose Tea! Before the prescription for Synthroid, I was donating blood every other month, so I don’t think the problem is my tea habit.
There was another woman also with a lowered iron count, and she said she didn’t feel so bad since she wasn’t the only one turned away. Small consolation for me.
We did surpass the goal and finished with 31 units. The Red Cross workers were very happy—they expected only 20!
Mahalia and I took a nap on the couch in the afternoon. I’m not sure how I expect myself to go out and work again full time, when 4 and 1/2 hours on a Saturday morning had my legs aching and my head pounding. I am so much out of condition, age and medications ain’t helping get better either. I’m still walking 20 minutes a day, but finding it harder to pull together a good reason. There are only so many trips to the post office.
Down at Latte Time, I walked in and found a table with the overhead light still on. I wanted to be doing my crochet work, but true to tradition for jazz in a coffee shoppe, the owner set illumination low enough for nightstalking vampires.
There was a nice little crowd, mixed ages. One neighbor from down the street asked how I happened to be there, so I pointed to the flyer and said that drawing was great advertising. My status also raised a bit when first the shop owner’s wife sat with me awhile, then the entertainer’s wife dropped into the empty chair at my table.
Glenn, of course, played just beautiful. He had a friend along with an electric cello, which I had never known existed until that minute. The tunes were sweet, just right for a coffee shop on a Saturday evening. I wish my dad was around, he loved saxophone notes.
While the guys were putting away their equipment, I hurried out to take down the paper announcement, removed the tape, and was about to put it into my bag. Glenn asked if I wanted his autograph.
Well, sure, but write around the nice drawing and the shop logo. He put the date, just to be sure of authentication, I guess.
As if I would let go of something so good.
It’s in a page protector in a scrapbook!
Now, while I’ve been writing for you, the applesauce has been bubbling along quite nicely. It is just about thick enough to add the sugar and put into containers.
What are you listening to, and why?
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Here’s the most recent crochet project.
The yarn was given to me by a friend of the friend who had the 50th wedding anniversary awhile back. I carried a huge bag away from the party to the car.
Folks with generous hearts, who have recently cleaned out hobby closets, often find themselves standing in front of me. 🙂
When I sorted, I found quite a bit of the Red Heart Jeweltones, which is a 4-ply of 65% acrylic / 35% nylon.
This pattern is the American Granny Square with a size K crochet hook. The squares are crocheted together with single crochet stitch. The border is a row of single crochet sapphire, then a row of single crochet brights, and lastly a row of double crochet sapphire.
Its destination is undecided so far. The place I originally intended has chosen to not have a craft fair this Fall.
But don’t worry, plenty of other groups want my yarn outcomes.
I’m going to let this one rest awhile. I haven’t had good feelings with it. The nylon part of the yarn made my fingers itch, so I found myself almost dreading to take it up and work another square. Weaving in the ends seemed tedious.
Often in the past, when I have dark thoughts during the work, the project goes on to some weird end, such as not getting bought even at half price. Or saddest of all, being wrapped around a baby who was stillborn and buried.
I didn’t make a pastels blanket for 16 months after hearing that.
Here I am, glum and morose, when that bright picture is up there howling for admiration. I’ll tell ya, folks who have seen it in real life think it’s the nicest blanket. The colors match well, and the nylon makes it soft and warm.
Moving right along….I’ve got some bookmarks to do, and another afghan already started. Time to go back to what I prefer to work with, bedspread cotton thread.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Update: Tuesday, 17 October 2006 This afghan was sent to the Indian Run Christian Church in Canton, Ohio. There’s a Craft Fair happening to benefit the Building Fund. The minister of the congregation is an old friend from DOF’s alma mater, and served as the Best Man for our wedding.
Okay, a 20 minute walk straight pace, then around again to take pictures. I’m waiting for the camera to warm up before I mess with the chip, etc.
‘Tis a lovely, sunny Autumn day, the description can be found in a thousand poems and essays if you look it up on the ‘Net. According to the Temperature Lady on the telephone, the current temperature is 44oF.
While I was walking, shoulders hunched a bit in my hoodie, my knit hat down touching the rim of my glasses, hands with gloves cupped around my camera, a neighbor walking to the car in his driveway mentioned that I looked cold.
Well yeah, I ain’t used to this weather yet.
A week ago it was an unusually high of 90.
What kind of month is this, anyway?
I always say I love this time of year, at least until the cold air comes round again. I guess what I love is my memories of the Fall. Grandma would make ‘end of garden’ soup and process it in the canning jars. Dad would take as many kids as he could muster out to the U-pick orchard and we would get bushels of apples and pears, also for the jars.
The nicest memory is walking down the hill near the strip pits to where the tallest trees dropped the best black walnuts. Those were the days before Dad bought a house out in the country where are 7 walnut trees on the property.
No matter the gloves we used for protection, the stain on our hands went to school and got made fun of. 
Secretly, I was proud of the darkness of my hands, a document of the work and togetherness of our family. Those walnuts were washed, allowed to dry, cracked and carefully checked for bits of shells, then the meats given as gifts far and wide.
Upon learning when my Dad had died, one of Mom’s friends said her first thought was “No more walnuts next Christmas”.
I’ll admit that was one of my first thoughts as well. My last quart jar got hoarded and measured out in small spoonfuls to make it last. It seemed like once that nuts jar was empty, I had to admit that Dad really was gone.
These days, around the holidays, I can buy a bag of black walnuts in any grocery store. The dollar price doesn’t justify the effort I know goes into getting nuts ready for sale.
I came home from my walk to seeing that I had left the tea warmer on, and the final piece of Apple Walnut Cake. My Mister took the next to last piece with him to work. You can go over to last year’s Recipe for Apple Nut Cake. Maybe I’ll eat just half so I don’t look selfish.
Who came up with that idea—don’t take the last piece?
Naw, this is my house, I’ll have it all. That means I have to wash the pan.
There’s about a dozen apples left.
I’ll look through my cookbooks.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Had a reason to walk downtown to the post office.
Not really thinking anything, an old poem kept running in my head.
In Autumn
They’re coming down in showers,
The leaves all gold and red;
They’re covering the little flowers,
And tucking them in bed.
They’ve spread a fairy carpet
All up and down the street;
And when we skip along to school
They rustle ‘neath our feet.
~~Fannie Montgomery
It seems to me that no matter what goes on for Sunday mornings, the afternoon is a good time for a nap. This morning was a bit more stressful than usual, so sleeping it off for an hour or so was very much appreciated.
Someone asked me about our oldest son. Apparently, the gossip and grapevine don’t work so well for bad news as it does for sad news. He didn’t know that we haven’t heard from the kid since May 2002, the day he left after skipping the ceremony for his college graduation. I tried to speak easy, but the questions kept coming. It seemed like the guy wanted to hear my bad news to forget his own.
The dish racks seemed heavier to lift, even though coffee hour wasn’t as busy as usual. Or maybe my muscles are protesting all the standing I’ve done this week while dealing with apples.
Clean up looked daunting, but I managed to be done in the church kitchen five minutes sooner than last Sunday. A matter of perspective, I guess.
Earlier this week, Husband had used my car to go over to visit Lucas, the middle son. When I got to the car after church, I shuffled around some stuff inside, and found a bicycle lock.
I knew immediately who it belonged to.
When I got home, I called the student house and left a message with a roomie for the kid to call Mom. Then I called his job, but he wasn’t on the schedule today, so I told the girl to give him a message to call Mom. Then I came over and sent off an e-mail and explained.
Meanwhile, Husband was over my shoulder saying the boy will think that somebody was in a bicycle wreck or somebody died or some other tragic event. He couldn’t understand why I was all worked up, that it has been days and the kid probably already took care of his missing lock.
And I didn’t need to be driving over there straightaway, that we will get in contact and then ship it if necessary.
A whole new lock or the price of overnight delivery would not be as expensive as using a tank of gas for the road trip over and back, even in my fuel efficient car.
This is a major reason we are married, so he can keep me from going all crazy, and worrying myself for small stuff.
Then he drove us to Latte Time for sandwiches. While there, we got an earful from the owner about how his workers often get into a panic during a Rush, and how that doesn’t help anybody to get the job done any better.
The two guys compared notes about women going into a tizzy.
Maybe it’s the weather or the moon time as a likely excuse.
Whatever. I feel better after taking a nap.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Another two bags of apples made into sauce.
Gotta do some figuring here: umm a quart has 4 cups and there are 4 quarts in a gallon so that makes 16 cups total in a gallon and then 6 into jars, so 16 + 6 = 22 cups with most of it going to the freezer.
One time when my sister-in-law was visiting, she mentioned my stainless steel bowls all nestled together on a shelf under the toaster. I own 8 of various sizes, and today, 5 of them were put to use, along with a plastic bucket for the cores and peelings.
I take the clean apple slices and cook them down about halfway, then add some cane sugar and use my potato masher utensil to break and mix.
We like to have small bits of apple left in the finale.
It doesn’t take much longer for cooking with the lid off and evaporation and thickening.
This picture (taken by Husband) shows the dishes and pans which don’t fit into the dishwasher.
Note the upper left corner, where he inserted a picture-in-picture of my reflection in the pot.
I call that particular kettle my witch’s cauldron. It has a bit more roundness to its sides and holds 8 quarts. I filled it level full with the raw apple slices, and it cooked down to the number above.
While I’m stirring, I often chant like the witches from Shakespeare’s MacBeth
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and cauldron bubble
The cats look at me funny, but when I offered them a dish of applesauce, they both turned up their noses and walked away.
Having just bought the stove in December, this is the first harvest season I’ve used it, and I’ll tell you what, those burners put out some Heat! It makes the seven years of having the other one seem wasted somehow.
I stir more often though, to prevent sticking.
Another reason that big steel kettle is so useful.
This evening, I expect to be sitting awhile at the Open Mic Night at Latte Time.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
It has been brought to my attention that I haven’t written a new post for a week.
Well, I guess I should say that real life got in the way.
Plus, Husband is on vacation.
We had to have 3 old and storm-damaged honey locust trees cut down and hauled away.
As soon as the noisy men and machines were gone, Mahalia had to check out her turf.
All we have left is a new yard ornament
broken down stump cutting machine outside my window.
If it weren’t so sad, I could have been fully amused by a man cussing a blue streak into a cell phone and grinding the starter motor of that expensive, often used, very important, needed for the next job, heap of metal.
Sitting in OUR side yard for days.
The company lost time and work.
The applesauce made last week got duplicated twice more.
I drove out into the country and delivered a half gallon to a friend who has 3 little kids.
There were Soybean fields to the right of me
Cornfields to the left of me
and a red bush waiting in the church parking lot.
For a time stretching across two days, a bunch of us workers in the church kitchen processed apples for pie filling. The final number of containers was more than 70, stored in a freezer until needed for baked goods for the Relief Sale. Some folks might not think it could be fun to do so much work, but many hands and good chatter make the hours seem to fly by. I don’t have pictures, my hands were usually too sticky to handle my camera.
Which brings me to today, when I baked Apple Crisp at home.
Now I’m gonna go crochet on the aphgan I’m making for a craft sale, although I’m not sure of the date it is due. I turned the calendar page and it is still blank. I’d better get all the appointments and meeting times written in.
Meanwhile, if I don’t post again soon enough to suit you, please go read
Owlhaven’s assignment about Encouragement and of course the comments
and Carrie’s response
or Anyone, Anything, Anywhere on my Favorite Blogs List
~~love and Huggs, Diane
